Davina was making progress, the nurse told them. She was breathing well without oxygen, her jaundice was responding to the fluorescent lights that shone night and day around her cot. While he held her in his arms, Alex could forget the depression Mondo’s funeral had trailed in its wake, and the anxieties Weird’s reaction to the wreath had generated. The only thing that could be better than sitting with his wife and daughter in the neonatal unit would be doing exactly the same thing in their own living room. Or so he’d thought until his conversation at the crematorium.
As if she read his mind, Lynn looked up from feeding. “Just a couple of days now, and we’ll be bringing her home.”
Alex smiled, hiding the uneasiness her words created. “I can’t wait,” he said.
Driving home afterward, he thought about broaching the subject of the wreath and Brian Duff’s revelation. But he didn’t want to unsettle Lynn, so he kept quiet. Lynn went straight to bed, exhausted by the day, while Alex opened a particularly good bottle of Shiraz he’d been saving for a night when they deserved indulgence. He brought the wine through to the bedroom and poured them each a glass. “Are you going to tell me what’s eating away at you?” Lynn asked as he climbed on top of the duvet next to her.
“Oh, I was just thinking about Hélène and Jackie. I can’t help wondering if Jackie had a hand in Mondo’s murder. I’m not saying she killed him. But it sounds like she knows people who might, if the money was right.”
Lynn scowled. “I almost wish it was her. That bitch Hélène deserves to suffer. How could she creep around cheating on Mondo and pretend to be the perfect wife?”
“I think Hélène’s genuinely suffering, Lynn. I believe her when she says she loved him.”
“Don’t you start defending her.”
“I’m not defending her. But whatever the score is between her and Jackie, she cared about him. It’s obvious.”
Lynn pursed her lips. “I’ll have to take your word for it. But that’s not what’s bugging you. Something happened after we left the crematorium and before you arrived at the hotel. Was it Weird? Did he say something to wind you up?”
“I swear to God you’re a witch,” Alex complained. “Look, it was nothing. Just some bee Weird got in his bonnet.”
“Must have been the killer bee from Alpha Centauri to have this much effect when you’ve got so many other important things going on. Why don’t you want to tell me? Is it boys’ own stuff?”
Alex sighed. He didn’t like keeping things from Lynn. He’d never believed that ignorance was bliss, not in a marriage that was supposed to be equal. “In a way. I really don’t want to bother you with it, you’ve got enough on your plate right now.”
“Alex, with what I’ve got on my plate, don’t you think anything would be a welcome diversion?”
“Not this, love.” He sipped his drink, savoring its warm spice. He wished he could channel all his consciousness into appreciating the wine and lose touch with everything that ailed him. “Some things are better left.”
“Why am I having trouble believing you?” Lynn leaned her head against his shoulder. “Come on, spill. You know you’ll feel better.”
“Actually, I’m not at all sure that I would.” He sighed again. “I don’t know, maybe I should tell you. You’re the sensible one, after all.”
“Which is not something any of us could ever have said about Weird,” Lynn said dryly.
And so he told her about the funeral wreaths, making as light of it as he could. To his surprise, Lynn made no attempt to dismiss the story as Weird’s paranoia. “That’s why you’re trying to convince yourself Jackie hired a hitman,” she said. “I don’t like this one little bit. Weird’s right to take this seriously.”
“Look, it could have a simple explanation,” Alex protested. “Maybe somebody that knew them both.”
“The way Mondo cut himself off from his past? The only people who could reasonably have known them both must come from Kirkcaldy or St. Andrews. And everybody there knew about the Rosie Duff case. You couldn’t forget something like that. Not if you knew them well enough to be sending a wreath to funerals where the announcements said ‘family flowers only,’” Lynn pointed out.
“Even so, it doesn’t mean somebody’s out to get us,” Alex said. “OK, someone wanted to get a dig in. That’s no reason to suppose that the same person has committed cold-blooded murder twice.”
Lynn shook her head in disbelief. “Alex, what planet are you on? I can just about credit that somebody who wanted to get a dig in might have seen the reports of Mondo’s death. At least that happened in the same country as Rosie Duff’s murder. But how would they have heard about Ziggy’s death in time to get flowers to his funeral unless they were involved somehow?”
“I don’t know. But it’s a small world these days. Maybe whoever sent the wreath had a contact in Seattle. Maybe somebody from St. Andrews moved there and ran across Ziggy through the clinic. It’s not exactly a common name, and it’s not like Ziggy was Mr. Nobody. You know yourself—whenever we ate out with Ziggy and Paul in Seattle, somebody always came over to say hello. People don’t forget the doctor who treated their kid. And if that’s how it happened, what would be more natural than to e-mail somebody back home when Ziggy died? A place like St. Andrews, news like that would spread like wildfire. It’s not so far-fetched, is it?” Alex’s voice grew agitated as he struggled to find something that would mean he didn’t have to believe what Weird had suggested.
“It’s stretching it a bit, but I suppose you could be right. But you can’t just leave it at that. You can’t rely on a faint possibility. You’ve got to do something, Alex.” Lynn put down her glass and hugged him. “You can’t take risks, not with Davina coming home any day now.”
Alex drained his glass, paying no attention to the quality of the wine. “What am I supposed to do? Go into hiding with you and Davina? Where would we go? And what about the business? I can’t just walk away from my livelihood, not with a child to support.”
Lynn stroked his head. “Alex, take it easy. I’m not suggesting we jump off the deep end like Weird. You told me earlier that Lawson was at the funeral today. Why don’t you go and talk to him?”
Alex snorted. “Lawson? The man who tried to con me with lentil soup and sympathy? The man who’s carried the torch so long that he came along to see one of us cremated? You think he’s going to give me a sympathetic hearing?”
“Lawson might have had his suspicions, but at least he stopped you getting a kicking.” Alex slid down the bed, nestling his head against Lynn’s stomach. She winced and pulled away. “Mind my wound,” she said. He shifted back, settling against her arm.
“He’d laugh in my face.”
“Alternatively, he might take you seriously enough to make some inquiries. It’s not in his interest to turn a blind eye to vigilante justice, if that’s what this is. Apart from anything else, it makes the police look even more crap than they already do.”
“You don’t know the half of it,” Alex said.
“What do you mean?”
“Something else happened after the funeral. Rosie Duff’s brother turned up. He made sure Weird and I knew he’d come to gloat.”
Lynn looked shocked. “Oh, Alex. That’s awful. For all of you. That poor man. Not to be able to let it rest after all this time.”
“That’s not all. He told us that Fife Police have lost the evidence in Rosie’s case. The evidence that we were relying on to produce the DNA that would clear us.”
“You’re kidding.”
“I wish I was.”
Lynn shook her head. “All the more reason why you need to talk to Lawson.”
“You think he wants me rubbing his nose in it?”
“I don’t care what Lawson wants. You need to know for sure what’s going on. If there really is someone after you, it might be the realization that they’re not going to get justice after all that has set them off. Call Lawson in the morning. Set up an appointment. It would put my mind at rest.”
Alex rolled off the bed and started to undress. “If that’s what it takes, consider it done. But don’t blame me if he decides the vigilante’s right and decides to arrest me.”
To Alex’s surprise, when he called to arrange a meeting with ACC Lawson, the secretary gave him a slot that afternoon. It left him enough time to go to the office for a couple of hours, which left him feeling more out of control than he had previously. He liked to keep a close eye on the day-to-day business, not because he didn’t have confidence in his staff but because not knowing what was going on made him feel uneasy. But he’d had his eye off the ball too much lately, and he needed to get up to speed. He copied a stack of memos and reports on to a CD, hoping he’d squeeze some time at home later to get on top of things. Grabbing a sandwich to eat in the car, he headed back to Fife.
The empty office he was shown into was about twice the size of his own. The privileges of rank were always more visible in the public sector, he thought, taking in the big desk, the elaborately framed map of the county and James Lawson’s prominently displayed commendations. He sat down in the visitor’s chair, noting with amusement that it was much lower than the one behind the desk opposite.
He wasn’t kept waiting long. The door behind him opened and Alex jumped up. The years hadn’t been kind to Lawson, he thought. His skin was lined and weathered, with two patches of high color on his cheeks, the broken veins the badge of a man who either drank too much or spent too much time exposed to the harsh east winds of Fife. His eyes were still shrewd, however, Alex noted as Lawson took him in from top to toe. “Mr. Gilbey,” he said. “Sorry to keep you.”
“No problem. I know you must be busy. I appreciate you fitting me in so quickly.”
Lawson swept past without offering his hand. “I’m always interested when someone connected with an investigation wants to see me.” He settled into his leather chair, tugging at his uniform jacket to straighten it.
“I saw you at David Kerr’s funeral,” Alex said.
“I had business over in Glasgow. I took the opportunity to pay my last respects.”
“I didn’t think Fife Police had much respect for Mondo,” Alex said.
Lawson made an impatient gesture with one hand. “I presume your visit is connected to our reopening of the Rosemary Duff murder?”
“Indirectly, yes. How is the inquiry going? Have you made any progress?”
Lawson looked irritated by the questions. “I can’t discuss operational matters relating to an ongoing case with someone in your position.”
“What position is that, exactly? You surely don’t still regard me as a suspect?” Alex was more courageous than his twenty-year old self; he wasn’t about to let a remark like that pass without challenge.
Lawson shuffled some papers on his desk. “You were a witness.”
“And witnesses can’t be told what’s happening? You’re quick enough to talk to the press when you make progress. Why do I have less rights than a journalist?”
“I’m not talking to the press about the Rosie Duff case either,” Lawson said stiffly.
“Would that be because you’ve lost the evidence?”
Lawson gave him a long, hard stare. “No comment,” he said.
Alex shook his head. “That’s not good enough. After what we went through twenty-five years ago, I think I deserve better than that. Rosie Duff wasn’t the only victim back then, and you know it. Maybe it’s time I went to the press and told them how I’m still being treated like a criminal by the police after all these years. And while I’m at it, I could tell them how Fife Police have screwed up their review of Rosie Duff’s murder by losing the crucial evidence that would have exonerated me and might just have led to the arrest of the real killer.”
The threat clearly made Lawson uncomfortable. “I don’t respond well to intimidation, Mr. Gilbey.”
“Neither do I. Not anymore. You really want to see yourself all over the pages of the papers as the copper who invaded a grieving family’s last farewell to their murdered son? The same son whose innocence was still in doubt, thanks to the incompetence of you and your team?”
“There’s no need for you to take this attitude,” Lawson said.
“Oh no? I think there’s every need. You’re supposed to be conducting a cold case review here. I’m a key witness. I’m the person who found the body. And yet there’s not been a single officer from Fife Police in touch with me. That doesn’t exactly smack of zeal, does it? And now I discover you can’t even keep a bag of evidence safe. Maybe I should be talking about this with the investigating officer, not some bureaucrat who’s hidebound by the past.”
Lawson’s face tightened. “Mr. Gilbey, it’s true there’s a problem with the evidence in this case. At some point in the past twenty-five years, Rosie Duff’s clothes have gone missing. We’re still trying to track them down, but so far, all we’ve been able to find is the cardigan that was found some distance away from the crime scene. And that had no biological material on it. None of the clothes that might have been susceptible to modern forensics are available to us. So at the moment, we’re stymied. Actually, the officer in charge of the case wanted to have a chat with you, just to go over your original statement. Perhaps we can arrange that soon?”
“Jesus Christ,” Alex said. “Now you finally want to interview me? You really don’t get it, do you? We’re still twisting in the breeze. Do you realize two of the four of us have been murdered in the past month?”
Lawson raised his eyebrows. “Two of you?”
“Ziggy Malkiewicz also died in suspicious circumstances. Just before Christmas.”
Lawson pulled a pad toward him and unscrewed a fountain pen. “This is news to me. Where did this happen?”
“In Seattle, where he’d been living for the past dozen years. An arsonist set a firebomb in his house. Ziggy died in his sleep. You can check it out with the police over there. The only suspect they’ve got is Ziggy’s partner, which I have to tell you is about as dumb as it gets.”
“I’m sorry to hear about Mr. Malkiewicz…”
“Dr. Malkiewicz,” Alex interrupted.
“Dr. Malkiewicz,” Lawson corrected himself. “But I still don’t see why you should think these two deaths are connected to Rosie Duff’s murder.”
“That’s why I wanted to see you today. To explain why I believe there’s a connection.”
Lawson leaned back in his chair, steepling his fingers. “You have my full attention, Mr. Gilbey. I’m interested in anything that might shine a light in this particular dark corner.”
Alex explained about the wreaths once more. Sitting here at the heart of police headquarters, it sounded feeble to his ears. He could feel Lawson’s skepticism across the desk as he tried to give weight to so slight an occurrence. “I know it sounds paranoid,” he concluded. “But Tom Mackie is convinced enough that he’s putting his family into hiding and going underground himself. That’s not something you do lightly.”
Lawson gave a sour smile. “Ah yes. Mr. Mackie. Maybe a wee touch of ‘too many drugs in the seventies?’ I believe hallucinogens can lead to long-term paranoia.”
“You don’t think we should take this seriously? Two of our friends die in suspicious circumstances? Two men who lived respectable lives, with no criminal connections? Two men who had apparently no enemies? And at both funerals, a wreath turns up that refers directly to a murder investigation where they were both regarded as suspects?”
“None of you was ever publicly named as suspects. And we did our best to protect you.”
“Aye. But even after that, one of your officers died as a result of the pressure that was put on us.”
Lawson jerked bolt upright. “I’m glad you remember that. Because nobody in this building has forgotten it either.”
“I’m sure you haven’t. Barney Maclennan was the killer’s second victim. And I believe that Ziggy and Mondo were his victims, too. Indirectly, obviously. But I think somebody killed them because they wanted vengeance. And if that’s what happened, then my name’s on that list, too.”
Lawson sighed. “I understand why you’re reacting like this. But I don’t believe that someone has embarked on a deliberate program of revenge against the four of you. I can tell you that the police in Glasgow are pursuing promising lines of inquiry that have nothing to do with Rosie Duff’s murder. Coincidences do happen, and that’s what these two deaths are. Coincidence, nothing more. People don’t do that kind of thing, Mr. Gilbey. They certainly don’t wait twenty-five years to do it.”
“What about Rosie’s brothers? They were pretty keen to take a pop at us back then. You told me you’d warned them off. That you’d persuaded them not to bring anymore trouble to their mother’s door. Is their mother still alive? Are they free from that worry now? Is that why Brian Duff turned up at Mondo’s funeral to taunt us?”
“It’s true that Mr. and Mrs. Duff are both dead now. But I don’t think you’ve anything to fear from the Duffs. I saw Brian myself a few weeks ago. I don’t think vengeance was on his mind. And Colin works out in the Gulf. He was home over Christmas, but he wasn’t in the country when David Kerr died.” Lawson breathed deeply. “He married one of my fellow officers—Janice Hogg. Ironically, she came to Mr. Mackie’s rescue when he was set on by the Duffs. She left the force at the time of the marriage, but I’m pretty sure she wouldn’t encourage her husband in lawbreaking on this scale. I think you can rest easy on that score.”
Alex heard the conviction in Lawson’s voice, but it brought him small relief. “Brian wasn’t exactly amiable yesterday,” he said.
“No, I can see he might not have been. But let’s face it, neither Brian nor Colin was what you would call a sophisticated criminal. If they’d decided to kill you and your friends, they’d probably have walked up to you in a crowded bar and blown your heads off with a shotgun. Elaborate planning was never their style,” Lawson said dryly.
“So that kind of disposes of the suspects.” Alex shifted in his seat, preparing to stand up.
“Not quite,” Lawson said softly.
“What do you mean?” Alex asked, apprehension gripping him again.
Lawson looked guilty, as if he’d said too much. “Ignore me, I was just thinking aloud.”
“Wait a minute. You can’t brush me off like that. What did you mean, ‘not quite?’” Alex leaned forward, looking as if he was about to jump across the desk and grab Lawson’s immaculate lapels.
“I shouldn’t have said that. I’m sorry, I was just thinking like a policeman.”
“Isn’t that what you’re paid to do? Come on, tell me what you meant.”
Lawson’s eyes flickered from side to side, as if he was looking for a way out that didn’t involve passing Alex. He ran a hand over his upper lip then took a deep breath. “Rosie’s son,” he said.