‘If you want to get off soon, I can hold the fort.’
‘What’s wrong with you, Alec? Are you on the verge of turning into a half-decent human being?’
‘Aye, well, don’t let on to that lot, will you?’ McKay gestured out towards the still-busy incident room. ‘Or they’ll all want a slice.’
Ginny Horton looked at her watch. ‘It’s barely afternoon. I can’t slip off yet.’
‘It’s Christmas Eve,’ McKay pointed out. ‘Even in our game, we can exercise the odd bit of flexibility. Anyway, the offer’s there. It may be your only chance to take advantage of my largesse.’
‘That’s true enough,’ Horton said. ‘Okay, I might take you up on it and get away a bit early. Isla’s got the day off and is doing the prep for Christmas lunch so it’s not too stressful tomorrow. Be good to give her a bit of a hand.’
‘Well, there you go, then. Never say that your Uncle Alec doesn’t give you anything. Besides, it doesn’t look as if anything new’s going to break today. I’m just hoping it stays quiet for tomorrow so I can enjoy an uninterrupted day with Chrissie. Not to mention Fiona.’ He shook his head. ‘Suspect it won’t be fun for Fiona. It’s bound to bring back memories of last year.’
Horton nodded. ‘This time last year she was still happily married without a care in the world.’
‘Or at least only the same kind of cares as the rest of us. It’s a shock to see how quickly that can all fall apart. She seems okay so far, but Chrissie’s worried that it might hit her suddenly.’
‘Hope you manage to have a decent Christmas, anyway. And that nothing new blows up here.’
McKay shrugged. ‘Depends what it is. If we get a sudden breakthrough, I’ll be delighted even if it means foregoing the turkey. But I’d be surprised if we get much new over Christmas. Everybody’s plugging away but there are limits to what you can do.’
‘By the way,’ Horton said, ‘there has been one mildly interesting development this morning, but I don’t think it’s likely to be relevant to us.’
‘I could do with something interesting,’ McKay said. ‘Go on.’
‘It’s just that I asked for us to be updated with any new missing persons reports, in case any of them turned out to be our man. There’ve been a couple across the region, but nothing that fits in terms of age or sex. Then we had one this morning that at first I thought might be more promising. Man in Cromarty.’
‘Fits the bill,’ McKay agreed.
‘Except that unfortunately he doesn’t. When I read the report, it turned out that he’d actually gone missing yesterday morning. His son arrived to pick him up because he was due to spend Christmas with the family in Edinburgh, but no sign of the father. Too old, too.’
‘How do they know when he went missing?’
‘The son had spoken to him on the phone the evening before. Just confirming when he was likely to arrive. So he was safe and sound then.’
‘Definitely not our man, then,’ McKay said, glumly. ‘Unless he’d managed to rise from the dead.’
‘Seems not. It’s an odd one, though.’
‘Why odd?’
‘I noticed on the log that the PC who’d dealt with it was Billy McCann. I got to know him a bit because he was helpful when I had all those issues with my stepfather.’
‘I remember. McCann was the poor wee bugger you kept calling out.’
‘He was the officer who happened to be on duty when I called for support,’ Horton corrected. ‘Anyway, he’s a decent cop. I gave him a call just to double-check the report and make sure that this definitely wasn’t our man. Whole story seems a bit odd. Son turns up. No sign of the father. Son assumes the old man must have popped out for some reason, though that’s apparently out of character. Son waits around for an hour or so and gets anxious, so goes to talk to various neighbours. Nobody’s seen the father but one of them saw a car turning up outside the father’s house early that morning.’
‘Maybe the father got a better offer for Christmas?’
‘By all accounts he’s not the most sociable type. Anyway, the son eventually calls the police and Billy gets the short straw. At first, Billy’s not too concerned, and assumes that there’s probably some straightforward explanation for the father’s absence. Then the son shows him the father’s mobile, which has been left in the house, and which shows receipt of an odd text message at around the time the car was seen outside the house.’
‘What sort of odd text?’
‘Something about it being the end. McCann reckoned he found the message slightly threatening, though it’s hard to know how to interpret it. The other odd thing is that the father seems to have left the house without any outdoor clothes, which again the son reckons is untypical, especially in the depths of winter. That was why Billy decided to escalate it, even though the old man had only been missing for a few hours and there are no other immediate grounds for concern.’
‘The father wasn’t suffering from dementia or anything like that?’
‘No. Sound in mind and fairly sound in body, according to the son. Not as mobile as he used to be, but able to get around.’
‘Sounds an interesting one.’ McKay’s tone suggested his own interest was limited. ‘Just a pity he wasn’t considerate enough to go missing a few days ago so we could claim him as our victim.’
‘You’re all heart, Alec. There is one other interesting thing about this one, though.’
‘I hope this is as interesting as the previous stuff,’ McKay said. ‘I could do with a nap.’
‘The missing old man is Hamish Forres.’
McKay sat up. ‘That actually is interesting.’
Hamish Forres had come onto their radar from time to time during investigations into various people trafficking and money laundering activities in the region. Most recently, following the death of Archie Donaldson, one of the major local operators, they’d been working with the Revenue and the National Crime Agency to identify his potential associates. Forres had had a background as a supposedly legitimate businessman, who’d spent his career working in the import/export industry.
In Forres’s case, as in others, they’d concluded there was no mileage in investigating further. Forres himself was now retired and, although there’d been various rumours during his career, the police had never uncovered any substantive evidence of criminal activity in his businesses. If they’d had the resources to launch a full-scale investigation, they might well have found something, but neither the police nor the partner agencies had identified sufficient justification for doing so.
‘What was your view of Forres?’ Horton knew McKay’s views were often out of step with the official positions adopted by his more senior colleagues.
‘If you want my considered and thoughtful opinion, he was up to his oxters in it.’
‘In what exactly?’
‘In his case, fraud and money laundering mainly. In his heyday Forres was a dab hand at extracting money from the public purse and trousering it himself. Any development grant that was going. He knew the right people and he greased the right palms. But there was money coming in from other dubious sources too, winding its way through the labyrinth of Forres’s businesses until it popped out the other end as clean as a whistle.’
‘Very poetic. So why wasn’t he investigated further?’
‘You tell me. Friends in high places? Funny handshakes? Who knows? In fairness, conducting an investigation into someone like Forres is always tricky. You need a lot of resource and expertise to make it stick, and there’s always a risk of embarrassing someone senior even if you succeed. It’s easier to turn a blind eye.’
‘Forgive me, Alec. I said you were in danger of turning into a half-decent human being, but I see you’re the same old cynical curmudgeon you always were.’
‘I wouldn’t want to let any of you down.’
‘From what Billy McCann told me, your assessment of Forres’s character would come as a complete shock to his neighbours and friends. And maybe even to his son.’
‘Oh, aye?’
‘They all reported that he was a perfectly pleasant old man. A quiet sort, who kept himself to himself, but was always amiable towards his neighbours. Friendly chap.’
‘I daresay his neighbours would have said the same about Sawney Bean, if they’d known he was there.’
‘But you think Forres was a crook?’
‘I’m sure of it. We’d have had a hell of a time trying to prove it, though. And by the time we linked him to Archie Donaldson, he was well retired so that was another reason not to pursue it. There are plenty of new villains for us to worry out, without wasting time on the superannuated ones.’
‘I guess. Is Forres wealthy? Billy reckoned the house was impressive, but not exactly billionaires’ row.’
‘Don’t know,’ McKay said. ‘If you’d asked me a few years back when Forres was at the top of his game, I’d have said he was rolling in it. But from what the grapevine tells me, he’s lived a quiet and abstemious life since retiring. I mean, Cromarty for Christ’s sake. It’s nice enough, but not exactly Monte Carlo or Nice. So either he’d spent it, which doesn’t seem likely from his circumstances, or he’s somehow managed to lose it. Which would be careless. Or…’ McKay paused for a theatrical moment, then continued, ‘He’s squirrelled it away. For what reason, who knows? To fund a retirement somewhere warmer than this godforsaken country? To leave to the son who was good enough to take him home for Christmas? Or because it’s just what misers do? They’re good at amassing wealth, but don’t know how to spend it. I’ve always been the opposite.’ He paused, thinking. ‘Interesting that he’s gone missing, though. I assume he’s not gone gaga, or anything like that?’
‘Billy said he’d checked that out with the son, who reckoned he was in full possession of his faculties. The neighbours thought the same.’
‘Intriguing, then. Especially the car and the text.’
‘What are you thinking? That he might have been kidnapped?’
‘You don’t normally phone kidnap victims in advance,’ McKay pointed out. ‘And it seems unlikely up here in the wilderness that is Highland Scotland. More likely, there’s some straightforward explanation that no one’s thought of. Either that, or the old bastard’s fallen down a hole somewhere. I assume your PC friend is aware of his background?’
‘He wasn’t, but he is now. Anyway, whatever the reasons, Forres has been missing overnight now. Which doesn’t bode well for someone of his age, especially at this time of the year. The son’s frantic with worry.’
‘I’m sure he is. I would be in his shoes. Especially with our lot on the case.’ McKay leaned back in his chair, a contented expression on his face. ‘Luckily for us, it’s not one we have to worry about. Not unless he pops up dead from something other than natural causes. Which, in the case of our Mr Forres, is not impossible.’ He paused, thinking. ‘Although if your young PC friend has no objections, I might send Josh Carlisle over there to stick his nose in when they next speak to the son. Coincidences make me uneasy. Forres clearly isn’t our victim, but another disappearance, especially one with Forres’s background, rings alarm bells for me.’
‘I’ll check with Billy McCann, but I’m sure I can talk him into it.’
‘I’m sure you can. I’ve been on the end of your influencing skills often enough.’
‘I’ll see what I can do.’ Horton hesitated. ‘Going back to our victim, are you serious about this fire-sacrifice idea?’
McKay had already shared his thought of the previous day with Horton. He’d expected her to laugh, but to his surprise she actually appeared to take it at least semi-seriously. ‘I don’t know.’ For once, McKay looked almost embarrassed. ‘It was just an idea.’
‘It’s certainly an idea. It gives me the creeps.’
‘Not a nice thought, is it? But I guess we can’t entirely write it off as a possibility.’ He grinned. ‘Especially over on the Black Isle. They have some funny ways.’
‘You’re one of them now, Alec. You’ve gone over to the dark side.’
‘That’s what worries me. Before you know it, you’ll find me at the Clootie Well sacrificing a goat at the full moon to ward off the coronavirus.’
‘Might have worked better than some of the stuff that was done.’ Horton looked around at the papers scattered across her desk. ‘You really reckon you can manage without me?’
McKay looked around as if checking how much resource was available to him. ‘I reckon we can just about cope.’
‘In that case, I’ll take you up on your very generous offer and push off for Christmas.’
‘You do that. I’ll do my best not to disturb you.’
‘Don’t hesitate if anything breaks. Isla knows the score as well as I do.’
McKay smiled at her. ‘How long have you known me, Ginny? Do you think I’d hesitate for a second?’