Anderson put the phone down and dropped his head into his hands, a slow breath out, counting to ten then counting backwards again. Costello was on the warpath. That was bad enough, but knowing that Walker was with her, witnessing it all, made it so much worse. But he couldn’t, no matter how much he tried, he couldn’t motivate himself. It wasn’t that he didn’t care Lynda McMutrie had been found dead. Or that Costello was ranting about Gyle’s version of events possibly being true.
He took a lorazepam and closed his eyes, listening to the voices of Wyngate and Mulholland outside; they sounded as though they were down a dark tunnel.
He sat up, finished his glass of water and scrolled through his phone, finding two voicemails, one from David Griffin and one from Brenda. His wife was asking when he was coming home, and did he remember that he was only supposed to work nine to five these days? Claire had lasted a whole day at school and had seemed bright and chatty. They had already had their tea and were now settling down to watch a film, so could he text her when he was ready to come home.
And that was exactly what it said. Anderson read the subtext. He knew the minute he walked in the door, Claire would find an excuse to go upstairs and avoid him. That didn’t seem fair on anybody and maybe it was better that his daughter had some quality time with her mother. He was walking into the main office, looking at the wall chart. He had a pile of reports and notes in Costello’s loopy handwriting that he was supposed to sift through to action or non-action. She was in charge down at the McMutrie scene, so he was kind of redundant here. He looked out to the board, looking at Sue Melrose and her two wee boys. Was the man who killed them familiar with them as a family? Did he know what made Sue tick? Griffin might know, he had been a close friend of Steven as well as the first officer to stumble on the tragedy that had taken place at the Doon. That might have been years ago but it definitely had its roots in the dynamics of Altmore Road, so he phoned Griffin back while walking into his office.
‘Hi, how are you doing?’
‘Hi, it’s that I’ll be staying overnight in town and I’m at a bit of a loose end. I had an idea to go out for a curry and wondered if you wanted to join me, have a few beers and a good bitch about life in the force?’
Anderson heard the words ‘yes, that’ll be great’ come out of his mouth before he had even thought about it. For God’s sake, he had tried everything else, so he might as well try getting pissed and falling over and see if that made him feel any better.
It was a sad truth that Lynda McMutrie’s death created more interest in Altmore Road than her life ever had. Costello sat in Walker’s car, listening to him on the phone but not hearing what he was saying. She was looking out of the window, watching the black van, two police cars, O’Hare’s car. The crime scene manager was there already. There was normally a babble of people – lookers-on, nosey parkers, the bored and disenfranchised – who would be hanging around outside waiting to catch a glimpse of something gossip-worthy. Here there were just the outcasts of Altmore Road, peeping out from under their stones. There was nothing here, just a drunk woman had taken a slip on the stairs, it happened every day. Shame on the neighbours for not noticing she was not around. Shame on her for not gaining entry sooner, Lynda might have been saved.
Everything had such clarity with hindsight.
She spent half an hour watching Jock Aird watching the scene, a hawk of a figure in a dark waxed coat, the dog visible at the window. Cadena Broadfoot, her hair pulled back into a large doughnut on the back of her head, filming unobtrusively on her mobile. Costello only knew it was her because the wind kept blowing down her hood. The big car came past, bouncing up the pavement, being stopped by a uniform, a quick conversation, voices raised through the pitter-patter of the rain. The car drove up the driveway of number 12.
‘Brian Steele?’ Costello said out loud, watching the tall slim man with a number-one haircut step out and be caught in the rain. As he walked towards the gaggle, Michael Broadfoot came out of number 4 to drag Cadena away. The girl tried to shrug off his hold. Then a blonde came out of number 12 and remonstrated with Brian. This would be Laura, who had already been interviewed by Anderson.
With all that going on, the passing of Lynda McMutrie into the black van went quietly unnoticed. Costello saw Jennifer Lawson, red eyed, standing at the door of number 8, a female officer standing with her, keeping each other company, keeping out of the rain. She looked in her wing mirror to the big house behind her. Everything about it was oppressive and dark, except for the single candle burning behind a window on the upper floor.
It took a long time to get everything done; the rain impeded their progress. Costello had made a big decision. It looked like another accidental death, but there had been some criminality going on in the street before and she couldn’t lose their one chance to collect evidence – that was the sort of decision that came back to bite people on the bum. She insisted it was treated as a crime scene. Anderson would go ape-shit over the budget, but he wasn’t here. She made arrangements to pop into the lab the following day; the house was too unpleasant with its flies and the stink of decaying flesh and rat faeces. By half nine at night, she had everything covered. She needed to get back to her own car, then buy some heavy-duty hand wash. The stink of the McMutrie basement had covered her like a blanket and she had been glad to stand in the rain to help wash off the stench that clung to her anorak.
She was trying not to dwell on the scene she had witnessed. It seemed a very sad death, drunk, alone, unsteady on her feet and heading down to the basement for some mundane reason they might never know, and falling, a slow bleed, death. They had found two photographs trapped under the body. They had asked Costello if she had wanted a look, but she declined. She’d see them later.
She had more of an urge to see what the Broadfoot girl had been filming – not that the young needed any excuse these days. She had a brief word with Walker, with O’Hare, then she hitched a ride back to her own Fiat by a police car.
She collapsed behind the wheel. It was the back of ten o’clock, the light was failing badly. She realized how tired she was. Her whole leg was hurting now; maybe she was walking awkwardly because her foot was so sore with the blister from hell. It was black in the middle now, red round the edges. She checked her phone. Wyngate had a lead on Griffin’s ex-wife; instead of walking the fifty feet into the station she phoned him, making brief notes on what he was saying and looking at the clock on the car, watching her life tick by. God, she needed sleep. If she got her act together she could move on this now, and she really needed to buy some hand wash and disinfectant.
She was now on the track of Griffin’s ex-wife. She needed to know what sort of man he was, and bloody Anderson thought the sun shone out his arse. Anderson had not sanctioned the search but Costello was intrigued to find out what the man had been like in his pre- and post-traumatic stress days. How was that memory of the crime scene? She was still sitting in her car when the man himself walked across the road in front of her, a little unsteady on his feet. It was twenty past ten and he had come from the car park at the back of the station. She put her phone in her handbag, stuck her bag under her arm as she locked the car and then made her way to the car park. Anderson was leaning against the door of his own car, flicking through his keys trying to find the right one. He was swaying slightly and stank of pakora and whisky. She put her hand out. He looked up.
‘Hi Costello! How the hell are you? What are you doing here this time of night?’ He was looking at her through half-closed, unfocused eyes. She took the keys off him and phoned a taxi, not trusting herself to speak.