Scotch Mist (19 page)

They were separated while crossing the hall, and Max knew he had been placed on a different table from her. His dining neighbours would be two Royal Cumberland Rifles officers whom he knew on nodding terms from when he had lived in a room here.

Finding his seat, Max then glanced across at Duncan MacPherson. The Scot did look rather magnificent. Although he was a doctor in the same corps as Clare, he had somehow wangled permission to wear the colourful trews with his RAMC tunic. Well, it would be a plucky man who denied the red-haired giant, he supposed.

His attention was then caught by a curious flickering light brightening the window behind MacPherson. It took no more than a moment or two for Max to identify it, and his pulse quickened. Disregarding protocol, he swiftly crossed the room to confirm what he suspected. The hedge surrounding the car park on three sides was alight and burning so fiercely the flames were liable to engulf those cars standing nearest to it.

They stood in a group surveying the dismal scene as firemen rolled up their hoses that had covered the vehicles on the perimeter of the car park with foam, which a blustery wind was spreading everywhere. The bonus of having fire engines and manpower on the base meant very swift responses to alarm calls. Even so, the hedge was now no more than a three-sided square of bare, burnt twigs. Max's prompt call on his mobile had led to the fire being contained and the threat of exploding cars averted. All personnel in the Mess had been warned to be ready to evacuate the building, if necessary, and worried car owners had watched events from the windows.

‘It looks a sorry sight,' commented the Chief Fire Officer. ‘Second time in a week. In my experience that doesn't equate with the law of averages. I think we have an arsonist on the base, and if it isn't one of the Jocks it's someone who wants them gone.'

Max continued to gaze at the foam starting to plop in sooty globules on the tarmac, his eyes narrowed in speculation. No, it did not align with the law of averages. Evidence showed that Tuesday's calamity had been the result of a deliberate act; he had little doubt that what had occurred here had not been caused accidentally.

‘Don't spread that opinion around, Chip,' he warned. ‘Admittedly, both incidents have happened since the Scots marched in, but we've no evidence to show a connection with them. Feelings are running hot enough already without fanning the flames.'

‘It's my job to douse them,' Chip Reynolds returned sharply. ‘All I'm saying is . . .'

‘I know what you're saying, and I'm telling you not to,' Max snapped. ‘We presently have the Drumdorrans laying blame without knowing the facts. It'll take very little to set them off again, and we're the people who have to deal with it.'

After a drawn out silence, Max softened his tone. ‘I agree that this was a deliberate act, most probably by the same hand as the one that put that IED in the bonfire. How soon can you examine the scene and come up with the cause?'

The reply was brusque. ‘Are you booked in for the night?'

‘OK, I get the message. We'll leave you to it and get details from the owners whose vehicles were alongside the hedge, dodging the ammo sure to be flying our way from the DGC and Major Carnegie.'

Reynolds moved away to where his men were taking a breather with mugs of tea brought out from the kitchen to slake their thirsts and clear smoke from their throats. Max then concentrated on Tom and George Maddox, both of whom he had called out to the scene.

‘He's bloody right. It's too easy to imagine a link with the advent of the Drumdorrans. We have to get to the root cause before anything further develops.'

He shivered in the blasts of cold air sweeping down from the Arctic. Tom was wearing a padded coat over his suit, and George was warmly clad in his greatcoat, but Max was dressed for a social occasion in the smart military uniform he rarely needed to wear.

‘I'm going to be stretched this weekend,' George reminded him. ‘The funeral's going down at midday, which is sure to revive aggro in the bars and discos later.' He nodded at the foam-covered cars. ‘This'll rachet it up a dozen or more notches. Krenkel's been made aware of the situation and he's putting on extra
Polizei
patrols. I'll give him a bell about our increased concern following this.'

Max sighed, his breath clouding in the cold air. ‘Until Reynolds gives us a run down on what caused this there's nothing for you to do here, George. This is SIB's pigeon, because it's my guess someone is making a statement that's liable to grow progressively more vicious. This could have been a really serious blaze. Fuelled-up vehicles in close proximity are highly inflammable. If Reynolds' team had been attending another emergency, it could have . . .' He broke off with a frown. ‘There's a thought! Chummy could have created a diversion on the far side of the base designed to delay their response to this call from the Mess. That he didn't suggests to me that this wasn't meant to get out of hand and endanger lives.'

Tom rose to that. ‘Fire is unpredictable, especially in a strong wind like there is tonight. He couldn't have been certain there'd not be casualties. The bastard who's doing this is careless of lives. The McTavish woman could have died from that chest wound, and any of those kids could have been fatally hurt.'

‘But we've already established that the IED in itself wouldn't have created such a dangerous explosion. It was the combination of it with the stuff that had been inserted by brainless squaddies.'

‘You think whoever's behind this has brains?' demanded Tom.

‘Inasmuch as I'd wager he was here over an hour or so ago checking that all vehicles were empty before setting the fires. I'm no expert but it's pretty obvious he went the whole way around this area starting fires every few yards, because the hedge burned so evenly. He intended the flames to be noticed by people in the Mess before it spread to the cars.'

George made a point as he prepared to leave. ‘You're saying you believe it wasn't meant to get out of hand and risk lives. So what was the reasoning behind it?'

‘I wish I knew,' Max confessed. ‘He's deeply serious about whatever's causing him to do this; prepared to risk damaging cars to make his point.
Does
it connect with the Drumdorrans? He made his first move on the day they arrived, and there is a large number of them in the Mess right now, but he could be deliberately leading us from the truth.'

George Maddox was a calling-a-spade-a-spade type of man who found Max's theorizing too airy-fairy, particularly on a bitterly cold night, so he laid out his plans for the next day and departed.

‘Christ, I'm freezing,' declared Max. ‘Let's sit in your car while we get things straight before we go in there and take the flak.'

They walked to where Tom had left his 4x4 in the road, and sat in it glad of the comparative warmth and the chance to escape from the smell of smoke and burning.

‘Sorry to ruin your evening, Tom, but I thought you'd want to be here. No plans to do something special, I hope.'

‘Oh, no.'

It was said in such a curious tone, Max took the subject further. ‘Problems? You've been a bit abstracted for a while. Anything I can help with?'

Tom shook his head, gazing into the distance. ‘The weighty business of being a father. You can't give advice on that.'

‘No, I can't,' Max agreed hollowly.

As if he had recalled the tragedy that had robbed Max of parenthood, Tom glanced across at him with a rueful smile. ‘It's the girls. Playing up. Maggie and Gina are at a tricky age; lead each other on. It gets to you when there's a big case on.'

‘Mm, must do. You're lucky to have Nora behind you. If you had a wife like some we come across,
you
might be setting fires to make a statement,' he said in an attempt to lighten the atmosphere.

Tom merely nodded. ‘There's one angle we haven't seriously considered. Is Chummy a Drumdorran Fusilier? It's possible for one of them to have put that IED in the bonfire on the day they came in. Difficult, but possible. Tonight's shindig would have been easy.'

Tom had turned on the heater, so Max was beginning to thaw out and relax. ‘As you say, Tuesday would have been difficult, but possible. I can't immediately see the motive for that. What happened tonight ought to make sense because something particular was underway in the Mess which concerned the Drumdorrans. The only link with them at the bonfire party was the possibility that Eva McTavish was committing suicide during the fireworks display.'

Tom gave an impatient grunt. ‘That case is closed. The team brought in enough witness statements this afternoon to prove the woman was doing just that, while calling her husband's number seventeen times on her mobile.'

Max frowned. ‘There was no mobile with her effects.'

‘The hospital sent it to Captain Goodey, who passed it to us. Olly Simpson checked on the calls made on Tuesday.'

‘
Seventeen
?'

‘None of them were answered.'

‘The bastard! There's more to this case yet, Tom. That man McTavish is hiding something.'

‘So what?' cried Tom irritably. ‘Three quarters of the personnel on this base are, no doubt, but until some crime is committed by them it's not our concern.' He pointed at the car park. ‘That mess out there is, and Major Crawford is waiting for us to explain why his flaming dinner has been ruined, giving the Scottish incomers another example of how badly disciplined this base is.'

Annoyed by this outburst, Max said, ‘OK, so let's go in and give them the one bit of good news; that out of the cast of thousands they're the only ones not under suspicion for this.'

Tom spent another night in the Sergeants' Mess, seeing little point in driving home in the early hours when he had to make an early start to return to base. There would be no opportunity to tackle the baby issue, anyway, a fact of which he tried not to be glad. Max had driven to his apartment to change from his uniform to a suit and warm topcoat, vowing to have a large early breakfast to compensate for the dinner he had missed out on.

The atmosphere in the Officers' Mess had been generally hostile. Majors Crawford and Carnegie were very angry, the Scot coldly so and the DGC on the verge of igniting with rage. The catering staff were furious over the long delay in serving food they had prepared with such care.

Beneath all this there had been an element of antagonism from the Drumdorrans that deepened to contempt when speaking to Max or Tom. Their opinion on the security and policing on the base was freely aired, and they were not in the least placated by the promise that everything possible was being done to trace whoever was responsible.

The dinner was finally served an hour and twenty minutes late, and the officers ate in silence food that had been kept hot beyond the limit of freshness, having been assured that transport would be laid on to take them to their quarters at the end of the evening. That Miles Crawford and Dougal Carnegie barely exchanged a word during the meal registered with the diners, and it strengthened the antagonism. The piper, who normally played during the dinner, sensibly left the scene.

Having already used his fresh shirt and underwear kept at Headquarters, Tom had washed both before going to bed where he stayed awake troubled by this case which had wider-reaching involvement than any he had previously dealt with. Early morning saw him ironing his white shirt and pressing the trousers of his dark grey suit ready to set in motion a new programme for his team. He had called them all at six a.m. and told them to report in at eight. The only member excused from so doing was Pete Melly, who was strictly still on leave and was due to meet his estranged wife at the airport mid-morning.

Piercey had tried to get out of it by saying he had a date and there was no way of letting the girl know he was unable to meet her at the fixed rendezvous. As Phil Piercey picked up and dropped girls with swift regularity, Tom merely suggested that she would have a lucky escape and told him to be at Headquarters dead on time.

While eating a substantial breakfast Tom tried to see a way through the veil hiding the truth behind the two attacks, which surely must be attributable to the same person. Or persons, he supposed, which would complicate the case further. With a twinge of irritation he wished Max would divorce the Eva McTavish suicide from what was clearly a separate issue. That was the trouble with Max; he worried at vague oddities trying to inflate their importance to fit the facts they had and only succeeded in clouding them further.

The members of the team drifted in, some looking disgruntled and others only half-awake. Heather Johnson kept smothering yawns, which suggested to Tom that she had been on a late date with the blond German policeman she fancied. He was not happy about that connection. Pillow talk might acquaint the
Polizei
with facts SIB would prefer to keep confidential. Only Connie Bush, in a dark blue suit and white blouse, looked fresh and ready for anything, but she invariably did. Tom had often thought she would make a good career with an advertising agency promoting soap, cosmetics or health foods.

For the benefit of anyone who had not heard about the previous evening's disaster, Tom outlined what was known and what was surmised.

‘Needless to say, relations between the Scots and the rest of us have worsened. The uniformed guys will be on overtime to cover the certain trouble in town tonight, and they'll be watching the Garrison Church during the funeral. The cortege is due to arrive from the hospital mortuary around eleven forty-five. Time it gets to the church the clock should be striking twelve.

Connie looked concerned. ‘Why're they watching the church? A hearse is sacrosanct. Whoever Chummy is, he surely wouldn't violate Eva's coffin.'