After sending the information to Malkie about the drugs forums and the possibility of a link to the fairground, Davie is at a loose end. He’s not working for CID officially, so he can only do what Malkie asks him to do. Which was fine for a while – dipping his toes in without the responsibility. But he’s already starting to feel bored again.
He knows what he has to do – the options are simple. He can stay here and be in charge of a station that effectively does nothing and will remain on the brink of closure until someone higher up makes the final decision. Or he can take control of his life and take a position in CID. It’ll involve on-the-job training and he’ll be part of a much bigger group. And at some point he’ll have to go and do the residential part and sit an exam. It’s that part that puts him off, but Malkie is insistent that this won’t be an issue. It’s nice that his friend and colleague has so much faith in him. In fact, he’d probably have more faith in himself if it wasn’t for all this stuff with Marie. It’s clouding his judgement, and he knows he should stay away from her, or tell Malkie his suspicions about the link between Marie and Woodley – but it’s hard for him to move away from the informal community policing style that he’s so used to.
He doesn’t know another way.
He’s managed to turn the previous inhabitant’s office into his own. Gordon ‘the Big Ham’ Hamilton has been gone for nearly a month, and oddly it doesn’t seem to have made much difference to the place. Apparently Gordon is moving to Spain. Getting away from it all. A new start for his retirement. Davie’s not convinced. He thinks there is more to it. Money, for example. Gambling debts due to the wrong people. Other stuff too. There were always rumours about Gordon’s murky past. Him and dodgy councillors. But nothing ever held up.
There are a couple of shelves full of old ring binders that Davie has to get sent off to archiving. It was all before his time, but there are some old cases. He’s sure there’s some interesting reading in there. It’s a shame to archive the files without having a chance to read them, but it’s hardly a priority. He’s in the middle of packing the files into boxes when there’s a knock on the door. Callum sticks his head around the corner.
‘Someone here to see you, Davie. He reckons you’ll want to talk to him.’ There is a smirk on Callum’s face that he is clearly unable to shift.
‘Who is it? Can you not see I’m busy?’
‘Stuart Mason. Says he’s got information for you. Want me to bring him in? He’s at the desk trying to chat up Lorna for a cuppa.’
‘Fine. Get him a cuppa. Bring one for me too, would you? And bring him through. This’ll be interesting, I’m sure. What’s he doing anyway? I was hoping he’d be back inside for a bit after last week’s wee stunt.’ He sighs.
‘I heard a new word down at the school the other day. I reckon it was made for our Stuart. Cockblanket. What d’you think, Davie?’ Callum laughs, quite pleased with his own hilarity, then shuts the door without waiting for a reply.
‘Cockblanket,’ Davie mutters to himself. ‘Aye. Sounds about right.’
He slides the box of files under the desk. There are still a few on the shelf, so he lays one on its side to stop the rest from tipping over. He sits behind the desk, shifts some bits of crap out of the way. He’s putting pens into a pot when the door opens and Stuart Mason slithers in, like the wee snake that he is.
‘Stuart. To what do I owe this pleasure? Let you out, did they?’
‘Just gave me a fine, boss. Big man says there was nae point me going back in. They’re gi’en me a chance, I think. I’ve tae go doon the job centre the morn. They’re gonnae sign me up an’ all that. I’ve hud one oh they things . . . what dae ye call ’em again? When there’s the flash o’ light and it all just comes tae ye in yer heid?’
‘A migraine?’
‘Naw! An episcopacy, something like that . . . ye ken what I mean?’
‘An epiphany, Stuart. Is that what you’ve had? Sounds painful.’
‘Dinnae take the piss, or I’ll no bother telling ye what I came here tae tell ye.’
Davie is stopped from saying more by the arrival of Callum with two mugs of tea. He’s got a packet of digestives tucked under one arm. He lays them on the table and walks back out without a word. Davie can see his shoulders shaking. Bastard’s laughing. He should’ve got him to interview Stuart. The bloody time-waster. It’s all a big joke, but Davie has an issue with Stuart Mason. Apart from not trusting him as far as he could throw him, he thinks there’s more to him than just a daft wee wannabe burglar. No one ever got to the bottom of why he tried to strangle his dog. Obviously drugs were suspected, and the dog was fine, taken away, rehomed with people who didn’t have plans to strangle it . . . but it was a thing that made Davie uneasy. Someone who was capable of something like that could be capable of a lot of things.
At the moment, though, he looks happy enough, dunking his biscuits into his tea and humming away to himself quite the thing, as if the two of them are out for an afternoon jolly, not sitting in an office in a police station. Davie takes a mouthful of tea. A bite of his biscuit. He’s not a dunker. Mushy biscuit floating about, ruining the tea. There is something fundamentally wrong with dunkers. It’s surely no coincidence that Stuart Mason is a dunker and he once tried to strangle a dog . . .
‘Right, Stuart. I’ve not got all day. What is it you wanted to tell me?’
Stuart lays his mug down on the desk. He links his hands together. Cracks his knuckles. Davie doesn’t react. ‘You asked me, after the vet thing. Aboot why I took the bottles of alcohol. The stuff that ye cannae even attempt to drink or you’d go blind on the spot – even I ken that.’
Davie sits up straighter. Shuffles forward in his seat. ‘Go on.’
‘Well, it was nicked to order, you see. Somebody requested it. Said it was urgent, and that they couldnae get it anywhere else.’
Davie frowns. ‘You can get that stuff in any chemist, Stuart. Nothing special about it. It’s bog-standard medicinal-grade ethanol. You can probably buy it in five-litre containers. In fact, you can get it in DIY shops too.’
‘No’ the medicinal stuff. It’s extra sterilised, ye ken.’
‘And how would you know any of this?’
‘Customer telt me. He said it was important. Said he couldn’t buy it anywhere, and there was no time to get it online.’
‘Why couldn’t he buy it anywhere?’
Stuart rolls his eyes. ‘Because it would look dodge, wouldn’t it? He’d already been buying loads of the stuff. He’d been to all the chemists in the area, gone as far as he could. Even as far as Duns and Hawick, he said.’
‘Hang on . . . so he’d been buying up loads of this stuff? Not just in East Lothian, further afield? What was he doing with it?’
‘He said it wiz a solvent but that it had to be medical grade. He was specific about that. Medical grade. I wouldnae forget that. Why do you think I went to the vet’s? I’d have just tapped the paint shop down the street if I could’ve got him the usual stuff, ken, like they use to clean paint brushes.’
‘So, what was he doing with it?’
Stuart shrugs, looks away. ‘He didnae say.’
Davie is losing patience. He bangs a hand on the desk and Stuart’s tea jumps out of the mug and sloshes down the sides.
‘Hey . . . Hey, boss. Take it easy. I’ll tell ye. Just wondered what was in it for me, like?’
‘What’s in it for you is that I don’t find some way to get your weaselly wee body locked up for a month in Saughton, that’s what’s in it for you. Bloody job centre? That’s a bloody joke, that one. Stop messing about, Stuart. Tell me what he wanted all this medicinal-grade ethanol for, and then tell me who your client is, or I swear I will find a reason to get you cuffed and back in a cell before you can finish your second biscuit.’
‘All right, all right. He wanted it so he could make his party drug – that thing they’re aw taking now. I dunno how he makes it. He’d hardly tell me, would he? I just know he needed that stuff and he needed it quick. Orders to fill, I reckon.’
‘Who’s “he”, Stuart? And, out of interest, why are you telling me all this? What exactly is in it for you?’
Stuart sighs, crosses his arms across his chest. He shakes his head, looks at Davie as if Davie is the mad one. ‘Is it no obvious, Sergeant Gray? The wee nyaff hasn’t paid me, has he? That wee shite from the shows. Gary McKay, his name is. Everyone calls him Gaz.’
Nice, Davie thinks. Although he already suspected that Gaz was behind all this, he didn’t have all the pieces in place.
‘Well, thanks, Stuart. I’m sure you know I can’t do much about you not getting paid, but how about you take the rest of that packet of biscuits with you, eh?’
Stuart picks up the biscuits, turns the packet over in his hand as if he is inspecting the quality of a rare diamond. He tucks the biscuits into his jacket and stands up. ‘Cheers, boss. Mind, though . . . I’ve scratched your back. Maybe next time you could give me a wee tickle, eh?’ He winks.
Davie shudders. ‘See you later, Stuart.’
He waits until the door closes, then picks up the phone. ‘Malkie? It’s me . . .’
23rd July 2015
Marie, Marie, Marie,
Listen – I’ve got a plan. Hear me out. I know you’re reading all these letters thinking, what a fucking loon, but I’m telling you. I’m fine. I’m better than fine. They’ve been having meetings about me. I think they’re going to let me out. Maybe not permanently, but I think they’re going to take me on one of the trips that they take some of them on. A white minibus pulls up outside. I can see it from my window. They take ten of them at a time. When they come back at the end of the day, they’re happy. They’ve had ice cream. Fish and chips. They take them on trips, and then after a while they’re gone. Vanished. Whoosh!
They actually get to leave!
I’ve got a plan though . . . I’m getting out of here, one way or another. The girl who works in the office really fancies me, you know. It was her that gave me your address. She gave me Mummy and Daddy’s, too. Next of kin. One letter each, she told me. I know what you’re thinking – why didn’t she just let me write the letters and she could’ve written the envelopes? I persuaded her. You know how persuasive I can be, don’t you, Marie?
I let her kiss me. I could tell it was giving her a thrill. She’s always got books on her desk in there. True-crime stuff . . . all that. She told me she used to write to a prisoner on death row. She’s sick, this girl. I don’t know how she got the job.
Lucky she did, though.
I think she’s going to help me get out of here. She’s going to get me a phone. You get internet on phones now, you know. Did you know? It’s amazing what’s happened since I’ve been in here. I just need to bide my time. Just a little bit longer. You can wait though, can’t you, Marie?
You’ve already waited twenty-five years.
What’s a few more weeks?
Are you excited? I am.
Love,
Graeme