Skinner's Rules (19 page)

‘Bob and Sarah.’ The toast rippled round the room like a Mexican Wave. Glasses clinked. Bob hugged Sarah to him. Alex grabbed her left hand.

‘I’ve always Known you had class, Pops, and you’ve really shown it this time!’

The party started to break up around 1.00 a.m., and the last of the guests left an hour later.

Bob and Andy were both signed off on leave until the following Monday.

Fat chance! thought Martin as he snapped off the table lamp in the small guest bedroom.

Inevitably, the door opened just after 9.00 a.m. Skinner, wearing track-suit trousers and a tee-shirt, came into the room. He was flushed and perspiring. ‘You don’t mind if I drip on you, Andy?’

Martin made a face. ‘No, not at all. How far have you run?’

‘Along to Dirleton and back past the farm. The usual circuit. Remember, you did it with me once.’

Martin recalled only too well the punishing pace that had been set on the five-mile lap. The experience had confirmed his preference for running alone.

Skinner sat on the floor, and came straight to the point. ‘Did you take care of that job for me?’

‘Yes. No problems other than breaking into New Year’s Day in the Haggerty household. You were right about our Productions Store. You could lose a corpse in there. Mind, I still managed to find Mortimer’s case, by luck rather than judgement. There’s no sign of the other one. Not in Glasgow, not in the Advocates’ Library, and not with her mother. It does exist though. Great big black thing apparently.’

‘Did you check with the Transport Police?’

‘Willie Haggerty did. Nothing there though. Some passer-by probably nicked it at the scene. They’d steal anything in Glasgow.’

Martin lay in bed, propped up on an elbow. Skinner looked at him, with perspiration running in a line down his temple.

‘Casual theft is one explanation, but not the only one. Someone nicked it all right, but was it someone with a motive other than simple theft?

‘ Where’s Mortimer’s case?’

‘Locked up in my security cabinet. But listen, boss, what is all this? The Yobatu enquiry is over and done with, isn’t it?’

‘Maybe; but in the middle of it all, there’s something out of place. It has to do with those two advocates, or at least with their cases. Let’s go and take a look at Mortimer’s.’

Driving into Edinburgh half an hour later, Skinner explained his unease over the combination locks on Mortimer’s case. Unusually, Martin was sceptical. ‘OK, so if you’re right and Yobatu took a look in his briefcase, what will that prove?’

‘Why the bloody hell should Yobatu do that? He’s in the frame because we see him as a madman out for vengeance. Once he’s killed his target, he’s not going to stay around to search his briefcase. But even if he did, why shove it under the body to hide the fact from us. That doesn’t fit Yobatu. Theft was not his motive.’

‘He stole something from Shun Lee, remember.’

‘Then why didn’t he take the same bits from Mortimer? Or maybe even his head? Andy, if he stole from Mortimer and Jameson, why didn’t we find those things in our search? I tell you, it doesn’t fit. If your killer took something from Mortimer’s case, and then stole Rachel’s, having heaved her under the train, then that person wasn’t Yobatu.’

‘So what are we going to look for in Mortimer’s case?’

‘Proof that someone did look inside.’

The police headquarters building was still on a care and maintenance basis, three days into the New Year. The Special Branch office was manned by a single detective constable, who stood up when Skinner and Martin entered, trying unsuccessfully to conceal an Ed McBain novel.

‘Morning, Jimmy,’ said Martin. ‘Pretend we’re not here.’

‘Very good sir.’ He sat down, but did not go back to the 87th Precinct.

Martin’s office was beyond the main room. They went in and closed the door behind them. Martin took a bunch of keys from his pocket and unlocked the cabinet. He took out the case and put it on his desk.

Skinner picked it up. He held it up and looked underneath. He looked closely at the sides. The twin locks were still set at the combination they had discovered. Skinner pulled the catches outwards with his thumbs, and again the clasps sprung open.

Several pockets were set in the lid. He went through them one by one, finding only a red electricity bill, and an American Express Gold Card debit note. He skimmed through the documents in the case. They were depositions relating to a criminal trial in which Mortimer had been instructed for the defence. He switched on Martin’s hooded desk lamp and held the papers in its light, one by one, front and back, keeping them in their original order.

As he turned over the last sheet, Skinner’s eyes widened. He motioned to Martin. ‘Look at this.’ The younger man leaned over and looked at the sheet of paper, blank, save for a faint rusty smear which stretched up to the top right-hand corner. ‘Let’s have that checked. Remember, those gloves that we found were caked in blood.’

Skinner picked up the lamp and shone it inside the case. The lining was cream pigskin. A gold leaf rectangle, traced on its base, reflected the light from the lamp. Inch by inch he shone the light on the lining, until at last, his eye caught a faint brown circle in the centre.

‘Check that, too, Andy, but I’ll bet you now that it’s blood and that it matches Mortimer’s group.’

He put down the lamp and took from a pocket of his heavy windcheater jacket, a small chisel with a fine blade. He picked up the case and looked again at the locks. The three numbered wheels in each were set in a rectangular brass face, with the head of a rivet showing in each of the four corners.

Skinner slid the chisel’s edge between one of the rivets and the facing. Holding it steady with his left hand he gave the wooden handle a sharp downward blow with the heel of his right. The brass rivet head flew across the room. He repeated the process with the other seven rivets. Finally he levered off the two square sliding catches which released the locks. As each one came away, so the brass facings fell on to the desk, exposing the inner mechanisms.

He bent the flexible shaft of the table lamp so that it shone straight down on the desk. Carefully he eased the right hand lock from its casing and placed it in the beam. Reaching once more into his pocket, he produced a small square magnifying glass with a swivelling leather cover, and a pair of philatelist’s tweezers. As Skinner peered through the glass into the lock, Martin realised suddenly that they were both holding their breath.

Suddenly Skinner’s face was lit with triumph. ‘Got you, you bastard!’

In the outer office, the slumbering detective constable jumped in alarm.

Skinner handed Martin the glass. He leaned across and peered at the magnified image of the locking mechanism, in the bright light of the lamp. There, at the back of the device, four black strands of fibre were trapped between the numbered combination wheels.

‘Get me an envelope please, Andy.’

Martin pulled open a drawer in his two pedestal desk, and took out a small folder, made of clear plastic, with a self-sealing strip along the top. He pressed its edges to force the envelope open, as Skinner picked up the tweezers and inserted them carefully into the lock. The strands came clear without breaking, and he placed them gently in the clear container.

Quickly, he examined the other lock. A single strand was trapped there. He put it beside the others and sealed the envelope.

‘We’ll get confirmation from the lab. tomorrow, but we know for sure now. The man who killed Mortimer looked in that case. And, certainly, he looked in Rachel Jameson’s as well, only he couldn’t do it at the scene.

‘I ask you again, why would Yobatu do that?’

‘But what about all the evidence pointing to him?’

‘I know. Motive and opportunity. He’s unstable after the death of his daughter. He kills his three targets, each in different circumstances, and along the way commits three smokescreen murders to lead us away from the link, and from him. It’s incredible, but its a perfect fit. And like a Marks & Spencer suit, I bought it. An off-the-peg solution. A crazy avenging angel, dropped right in my lap.

‘I bought it then, but now I’m taking it back to the shop.’

‘Come on, boss! What about the stuff in the garage?’

‘Andy, son, all that was planted. Whoever did all this had Yobatu picked out as Mr Lucky.

‘Listen, when he looked in that drawer, I was watching him. Just for a second his expression changed. I didn’t know what it was at the time but I know now.

‘He was astonished. He was seeing those things for the first time.’

‘But why didn’t he say that? He had the chance, but he didn’t deny any of it. None of our accusations. He virtually admitted killing the Chinese boy. Why would he do that?’

‘That, I’m going to find out. He is deranged, remember. Maybe when we told him about the murders he even imagined that he did them. But the fact is, we’ve been fed this poor guy.’

‘So there’s another crazy, and he’s still out there? Is that what you’re saying?’

Skinner paused and settled back on the edge of the desk. His eyes were level with Martin’s, and he gazed steadily at him.

‘Yes, Andy, this is a very dangerous man, and he’s still out there. But he’s no lunatic; at least not the sort you’re thinking about.

‘For a while I was prepared to believe the Yobatu solution, and accept the idea of the three smokescreen killings, meant to steer us away from the real story. Now I’m even more ready to believe that someone else committed not three, but four side-track murders — yes that’s right, Shun Lee as well — to set up Yobatu, and to stop us looking for a link between Mortimer and Jameson and whatever is the real cause of all this blood-letting.

‘Let’s forget Shun Lee. Maybe the Triads did whack him. Let’s forget John Doe the Wino, Mary Rafferty, even for the moment young Mac Vicar. Let’s concentrate on Mortimer and Jameson. They were the targets. They were involved in something we don’t know about, and they were killed for it.’

‘Suppose they weren’t the only advocates involved,’ said Martin quietly.

‘That’s another ugly thought; but yes, let’s just suppose that they weren’t. We’d better check with our friends at the Faculty whether any other advocates have met their Maker lately; and let’s run a quiet check on anyone who might have instructed the late Michael or the late Rachel. At the same time I want a full search of all their effects, personal records, professional and social, and anything else that might give us a start on this.’

Martin nodded. ‘I take it you want Special Branch to handle this, boss.’

‘Too right I do. Think back to our friends Allingham and Wilson, and remember how eager they were to see Yobatu off our national premises. We could be involved in something here that goes far beyond our wee city, something that reaches up to Government itself.’

‘Jesus Christ,’ Martin muttered softly.

‘You start searching through the personal effects. Brian Mackie’s due back on Monday, but bring him in tomorrow. Brief him, then put together a small team of good people who’ll keep their mouths shut. Use Maggie Rose as your sergeant if you like. I’ll square it with her boss.

‘In the meantime, I’ll find out if the Faculty has lost any other advocates lately. Then I’m off to London. I want to see Shi-Bachi, to find out a bit more about what makes a man like Yobatu tick, and why he might have been willing to carry the can for something he didn’t do.’

Cold rain was beginning to fall on the dimly lit Morningside Street as Skinner pulled his Granada to a halt outside Peter Cowan’s solid, grey, terraced home. Internal wooden shutters, an original feature still in use in many of Edinburgh’s elegant Victorian homes were pulled across the ground floor windows.

The Clerk of Faculty answered Skinner’s knock on the door. ‘Hello, Bob. Good to see you. Congratulations are in order, I hear.’

Faster than a speeding bullet, that’s the Edinburgh grapevine, thought Skinner.

‘Thank you, Peter. Yes, I’m a lucky man. Happy New Year, by the way.

‘Same to you; many of them. Come away in. Now what’s the mystery? He led the way into a comfortable family sitting room, with heavy velvet curtains and a chintzy suite, set around a coal-effect gas fire.

‘Deep and dark, my friend, deep and dark,’ Skinner replied. ‘Look don’t over-react to this, but I want you to think carefully. Have there been, since Rachel Jameson’s murder, or before Mortimer’s, any other deaths in the Faculty of people who might have been close to either of those two?’

Cowan’s expressive eyes widened. ‘Rachel’s murder! You know that the Crown Office has it labelled SUICIDE in big black letters. That’s how the evidence will look at the FAI.

‘I thought your Japanese connection had fallen through. Hasn’t it?’

‘It’s a long story, Peter.’ He explained how the Yobatu lead had developed, and how it had ended with the intervention of Allingham and Wilson.

‘Now after being convinced, I’ve got reason to think that Yobatu didn’t do it. If Mike and Rachel were killed by the same man — as I’m bloody sure they were — and it wasn’t Yobatu, then there’s another reason for their deaths, and maybe, other people involved and at risk. That’s my concern.’

‘I see.’ Cowan’s face took on a troubled look. He thought in silence for a few moments. ‘No. There’s been no one, no deaths. Not since Rachel, and not for more than a year before Mike. And I would know. As Clerk, I have to arrange wreaths, letters of condolence, that sort of thing. We’re a relatively small club, and so deaths of practising members are not exactly common. The last one before Mike was two years ago, one of our most senior seniors, and he died of cancer.’

‘That’s something to be going on with. How about associates? Were Mike and Rachel part of any group?’

‘Not that I’ve ever heard of. We have some special interest groups in the Faculty, but neither Mike nor Rachel belonged to any of them.