Devil in the Detail (Scott Cullen Mysteries) (25 page)

One thing that puzzled him was the method of killing. Mandy had been suffocated by a pillow. They hadn't found a pillow. Deeley's postmortem had pointed to white pillowcase. Mandy's own bed had a purple pillow so it looked unlikely that she'd been killed in her house. Besides, they had found her teddy bear in the lane outside.

He considered his sudden revelation about Charles Gibson - could he have abused and killed his own daughter? The man looked absolutely destroyed by her death - he was falling apart, he was drinking heavily. His trip to see Mulgrew the night of her disappearance had been legitimate, part of his religious training, nothing more. They certainly had no direct evidence to begin to accuse him. Yet. Cullen hoped that Wallace would come up with something.

Cullen supposed that Bain still being in charge would lead to no end of trouble. He was already hitting the Red Bull hard and, to Cullen, it was only a matter of time before a vendetta emerged against which suspect turned up first. Cullen thought that Bain was living on borrowed time in the Force, even though he was being entrusted with this case. Bain seemed to be oblivious to the shooglie peg that his coat was hanging on - the signs from Turnbull were that Cargill would soon be replacing him.

He looked around the general area – the gaps in Anderson's work were infamous, if only in Cullen's mind. Yet another functionally inept officer still employed in a key role. From Irvine's notes, Cullen discovered that they had only really looked at the spot surrounding Mandy's body. They still didn't have any idea how Mandy had been buried, or how she'd been transported there. There could be traces yet to be discovered in the rest of the area. They might be missing the wood for the trees and there were a lot of them, Cullen reckoned.

His phone rang; Irvine. He let it go to voicemail then screened it.

"Cullen, where the fuck are you?" asked Irvine. "I need you to go to interview another two families with me. Bain will get told if you don't call me back right now."
 

Cullen really couldn't be arsed with Irvine. The fact that he was asking Cullen to carry out the task made him a lot less likely to bother with doing it. They had more than enough officers to ask run of the mill questions – Caldwell or Law could do it, or any number of local plod. In Cullen's view, repeating yesterday's actions wouldn't exactly push them further forward. Irvine was a total joke in the station, he'd just never stepped out of line badly enough to be caught. It pissed Cullen off that Irvine was a Sergeant and that Cullen wasn't likely to ever be, the way things were going. All the time they'd been working together, Cullen had been the lead officer in spite of being Irvine's subordinate. Irvine earned more than him and that bit into Cullen.

He wrapped his overcoat tight around himself and headed along the path, away from the road, away from Mandy's grave, into the freezing winter wind. The first pond was on his left, surrounded by reeds. Trees on the far shore partially hid a cliff. Cullen could make out some fallen boulders on the far side, not all of them covered in moss.
 

The rain of the last two days hadn't been sympathetic to the site. There was mud everywhere and giant brown puddles blocked his way at several points. His boots were absolutely caked by the time the path split after the first pond. It forked left up a hill onto higher ground, beyond the cliffs that surrounded the ponds - Cullen thought that must have been the way that the SOCO van had come. The right hand fork went around the second pond, through a coniferous wood. He went right. He could double back and check the other path later.

As he walked, the rain started again, fortunately lighter than earlier, betraying his enjoyment of the day. The second pond was much bigger, less reedy and looked much deeper to Cullen. He could see a broken jetty on the far shore, a badly damaged small boat near it, long since destroyed by the elements. He reached the end of the pond and drew closer to another fork. The left path was a loop back around the other side of the pond. The right went across some sheep-filled fields set on some small hills. He decided to keep away from there for now.
 

He carried on round, hoping that the loop joined up with the other pond. After a few minutes of walking, he spotted a swing - a Tarzie as they'd called it when he was growing up - just a length of rope tied to a tall old tree, with a small seat improvised from a stick. Next to it was a large shed, nestled in the trees, almost hidden from sight. The shed was roughly five metres by four, a summer house with decking out front and glass doors. A barbecue sat at the front, a rotting shell of brick and charred, fat-encrusted steel. The summer house appeared to be uninhabited, probably the local land owner used it a couple of times a year. He pulled the doors open and entered.

A man lay on a mattress in the middle of the room, feet pointing towards the door, huddled almost in a foetal position. Cullen slowly entered the room.

"Hello?" he asked.
 

No response.

He couldn't hear any breathing or movement. He kneeled down by the head - there was no pulse, the skin was cold. The face was lying flat on the mattress. He retrieved a latex glove from his pocket and put it on. He reached down and turned the head over.

It was Seamus Mulgrew.

After Bain, Lamb and the other officers arrived, Cullen spent twenty minutes in the squad car, out of Bain's way, writing down his movements in copious detail, making sure that every i was dotted and every t crossed. Even the f's and j's. His decision to avoid Bain and recheck Irvine's work had led to his finding the body that morning. He was being hypocritical but Cullen knew he could not admit his motives for taking a wander around the crime scene, so he made up some nonsense about wanting to verify the exit points on the crime scene log. That would have to do.
 

He went back to find them. The puddles seemed worse - deeper, muddier and more of them.
 

Irvine had been appointed Crime Scene Manager by Bain and he had arranged the set up of the two standard cordons. The path had been split at either side by police tape, a good twenty metres apart. The outer cordon. Cullen could see Johnny Watson at the top of the hill, marking out a possible exit point. It would be freezing up there in the arctic gale, so much higher than the ponds. The inner cordon was formed around the shack itself. Cullen thought he could see ADC Law standing guard in the entrance.

Irvine was positioned nearby, garbed in the full Scene of Crime baby suit, managing access at the left hand side. He held a clipboard and was logging everyone in and out of the scene. "DC Murray's got the far end," he said.
 

"Deeley turned up?"

He showed the form to Cullen.

Jimmy Deeley had yet to arrive, having been stuck in the tail end of Edinburgh's morning rush hour.
 

The SOCOs had better luck - they were attending an incident in Dalkeith with two vans so one had been immediately dispatched to the scene. They were now packing the inside of the shack with whatever tools and techniques they used. Cullen and most other officers didn't have much interest in the means so long as they finished the job and didn't take longer than forever. Cullen spotted some poor figure in a coverall who was investigating the gas barbecue. It looked like it hadn't been cleaned in years.
 

"Where's Bain?" asked Cullen.

Irvine pointed at a figure beside Law. Bain was standing glaring into the cabin.
 

"You wanting to suit up?" asked Irvine.

"I'll see if I can get the mountain to come to Mohammed," said Cullen. Although he did not particularly want to put the suit on, he preferred to avoid Law after their earlier incident. He called over to Bain who scowled, nodded at Cullen and wandered over.

"What in the name of fuck happened in there, Sundance?" asked Bain, shaking his head.

"Got an MO yet?" asked Cullen.

"Aye," said Bain, "and I don't fuckin' like it." He took a deep breath. "Looks the same as Mandy."

"Suffocation?"

"Aye," said Bain, with a slow, resigned nod. "I spoke to Deeley on the phone. He asked me to check a few things out while he came over."

Cullen could imagine the hectoring that Bain had put Deeley through while he drove through the late morning gloom. He hoped the instructions that the Coroner had given to keep Bain out of his hair had included some tasks that could later be used to make Bain look stupid.

"It's the same as Mandy," said Bain.

"So we've got the same killer?" asked Cullen.

"Need Deeley to confirm it but it's looking that way," replied Bain. "And there's still no fuckin' sign of Jamie Cook."

Mulgrew still looked alive when Cullen had found him. His skin tone was a few shades lighter than normal but everything else indicated a man asleep. Not like Mandy in her shallow grave, twisted and contorted. Mulgrew looked like he'd died peacefully and mercifully in his bed.

"What in the name of fuck happened?" said Bain, louder. "We've lost a fuckin' suspect here. This fucker was a bloody paedo and our Plan B. I don't like his body just turning up like this. I do not fuckin' like it."

"It's not looking good," agreed Cullen.

"What were you doing out here?" asked Bain.

"I was looking at the board in the Incident Room," said Cullen, "it looked like nobody had been around the pond. I was looking for... I don't know. Evidence. I wanted to make sure the crime scene log stacked up - I've been done over for that before. There were a load of exit points here, at least twenty that I can think of."

"Aye, well," said Bain, "it's very fuckin' lucky that you're a nosey jobsworth."

"Not for Mulgrew," said Cullen.

Bain grunted. "What is this place anyway?" he asked. "A fuck shack in the middle of nowhere is what it is."

"Shite." Cullen winced. "Mulgrew had mentioned something about a shack..."

"Eh?"

Cullen flicked through his notebook. "Here," he said. "Mulgrew said that Jamie Cook had had sexual fantasies about abusing children and mentioned something about a shack."

"Reckon this is it?" asked Bain.

"That or Mulgrew's fucking us about from beyond the grave," said Cullen.
 

"And he's not even in one." Bain spat on the ground. "Could Jamie Cook have met him here and done him in?"

"I don't know," said Cullen.

"Fuckin' mess this is."

"What do you want me to do?" asked Cullen.

"I want you to come with me," he said. "I'm going to speak to Charles Gibson, see what he has to say about this. It's too fuckin' weird that his daughter and the head of the church turn up dead two days apart. He's fuckin' comin' into the station as well."

"Fine."

Irvine waddled over, mask off, chewing away. "All right, gaffer?" he said. "Just had a call on the old Airwave, eh? That's Jimmy Deeley arrived. He's just on his way over here through this bloody mud."

"Right," said Bain. "Sundance, give me ten minutes, then we're off. Wait by my car."

"Anything you want me to do?" asked Cullen.

"Just keep out of my fuckin' hair," said Bain.

Bain and Irvine went off to meet Deeley half way. It was still dark, though the SOCO lights gave enough illumination to see. There were dark clouds heading over again - it looked like the rain wouldn't be off for long.

Cullen spotted Caldwell and Lamb standing apart from the group. From a distance, it looked like he was showing off to her. He was making big hand gestures, as though he was talking about fishing. Caldwell blushed as she spotted Cullen's approach.
 

"You're under Bain's wing again," she said.

Cullen raised an eyebrow. "Sadly," he said.

"Heard you found the body," said Lamb. "That's some good work, Cullen."

"It was chance," Cullen replied. "I just came upon it."

"Strange place to be wandering about, though," said Lamb.

Cullen shrugged. "It was Irvine that had been leading the search here," he said.

Lamb laughed, almost too loud. "I see your point."

"How's the hunt for Jamie Cook going?" asked Cullen.

Caldwell took her notebook out. "We spoke to Malcolm Thornton again, asked him about this girlfriend of Jamie Cook's in Dunbar. He'd heard of her but never seen her."

"That's not good," said Cullen. "We're going to have to find him. It's not looking good for him."

"We've got guys in Haddington and Tranent out looking for him," said Lamb. "Shouldn't be too long now."

"No, I guess not."
 

"I had Eva Law in floods of tears," said Lamb.

Cullen sighed and checked his watch. "I'd best go wait for Bain."

*

Charles Gibson shook his head again. "I cannot believe it," he said.

They were in one of the few interview rooms in Garleton station, stuck in the small bit of the station still inhabited. The tape machine whirred on a chipped grey table top. Charles Gibson sat across from Cullen and Bain - none of the four chairs in the room matched.
 

Bain had explained to him that he wasn't under arrest or suspicion and that he was giving a statement - the recent Cadder case at the new UK Supreme Court had ensured that all Scottish cases had a lawyer present at suspect interviews, and everybody seemed to know it. One of the local uniforms stood by the door. Cullen thought that Bain would be on shaky ground if Gibson became a proper suspect.

"You can see why it seems so strange to me," said Bain. "Two unexplained deaths so close together is never a good thing."

"I can see that," said Gibson.

"Is there any possibility that Father Mulgrew could have taken his own life?" asked Bain.

Cullen couldn't work out why Bain was asking that question - Mulgrew had probably been suffocated, they hadn't found anything that he could have been suffocated with, therefore he hadn't killed himself.

"There is absolutely no way that Seamus took his own life," said Gibson, shaking his head. "In our Faith, suicide is one of the biggest sins there is. If you had read any of our literature, you would see this."