McNab hated being in the Tech department. If he were honest it was because he didn’t understand any of it. Forensic was bad enough, but at least the experts weren’t kids. In here was like being back at school with the swots and nerds who knew the answer to everything. It was their version of willie waving, or so McNab liked to think. Even when they tried to explain things in terms they believed an idiot like him would understand, he found himself tuning out mid sentence, in case he was infected by the weird digital insanity of it all.
He’d been in a bad mood when he arrived, having made the call to Orkney. He’d tried to congratulate himself for a wise and sensible move, but hearing DI Flett’s accent had immediately reminded him of Pirie, and he’d made it plain he didn’t want to work with that particular Orcadian. To give him his due, Flett had been unfazed by that and had offered a compromise McNab could just about put up with.
So now, having parked two of his obsessions for the moment, he should have been a happy man. But the ridiculously young face sitting in front of a large computer screen, displaying what looked like a game, was seriously pissing him off. McNab registered that once again he’d been focussing on his negative thoughts rather than what the boy wonder was saying.
‘Run that past me one more time,’ McNab said.
‘From where?’ The youthful voice sounded eager and not the least bit irritated by McNab’s inattention.
‘From the beginning.’
‘Okay. Briefly, the victim was a keen online gamer. He played most of the popular ones and ranked high on all their charts.’
The word ‘boring’ resounded in McNab’s head, but he managed not to voice it and nodded to go on.
‘However, in a hidden and passworded area, I found another game.’
McNab’s immediate thought was that it was pornographic, but that was quickly squashed.
‘It’s a Druid-themed game currently being played, I think, by five people.’ He brought up a stylized map of what looked like the UK. On it were a number of crosses. McNab ran an eye over them.
‘There’re twenty-five crosses,’ the boy wonder was saying. ‘I think they mark Neolithic or Druid sites . . . like this one.’ He pointed to Orkney.
McNab had already spotted that one and the one due south of Glasgow. He muttered ‘Jesus’ under his breath.
‘Who’s playing this game?’
‘Their avatars are all Druid in origin. Myrrdin, Caylum, Erwen, Morvan and Moonroth.’
‘What’s an avatar?’
The boy wonder looked startled and a little fearful at McNab’s tone.
‘Their online persona,’ he said. ‘A name, usually accompanied by a stylized image of the person they’re pretending to be.’
‘What’s this game about?’
‘I haven’t been able to engage with it yet and I can’t find any mention of it on any of the discussion boards.’
‘So why the hell summon me here?’ McNab snapped.
The Tech guy flushed, making him look even younger.
I’m bullying a child, whose name I don’t even know, McNab thought.
‘What’s your name?’
‘Ollie.’
Fuck, what kind of handle was that? Thank God he wasn’t wearing specs. He looked enough like Harry Potter as it was. ‘Okay, Ollie, I need you to locate and identify these gamesters for me as quickly as you can,’ McNab said in a softer tone.
The flush faded to be replaced by a determined look.
‘And get back to me if you find anything, no matter how small. Okay?’
‘Right, sir.’
McNab decided he had to know. ‘What age are you, Ollie?’
‘Twenty-four.’
Had he looked that young at twenty-four? A picture of Iona reared up in his mind. This was the age of the guy she should be screwing, but somehow he didn’t think Ollie would appeal. Not unless he had a couple of death-defying scars as collateral.
‘Anything on the computer apart from games?’
‘Mostly university work. Maths problems, which I don’t understand.’ He gave a wry smile.
‘Emails?’ McNab tried.
‘He had a uni account for his lectures etc., and a personal account. There’s nothing in the personal account that mentions the game.’
‘So a mystery, eh?’
‘That’s half the fun. As well as not knowing who you’re up against.’
McNab thought it sounded like his job, if you omitted the fun part.
On leaving the Tech department, he decided it was time to get away from the police station. There was one job he couldn’t hand over to anyone else, not even his DS.
McNab picked up his car and headed south. The continuing sunshine that bathed his city in a mellow glow seemed to mock him, suggesting that Glasgow had no shadowland, no places where evil flourished and dark deeds were done. McNab knew better. Behind closed doors, bad things were happening, even as he passed them by. Some he might get to hear about. Many, he never would. Even if he kept his ear to the ground and had his team of black ops out there, ever keen to exchange information for a monetary award.
McNab had never understood his hidden troops. Being a spy had never appealed, unless while watching James Bond’s latest outing. The snitches he knew weren’t handsome, and they weren’t babe magnets either. The majority were so close to the ground that those they informed on had probably stepped on them already without even noticing.
Still, he needed them as much as they needed him.
The drive out gave him time and space to mull over what had happened in the last few days. Much of which he didn’t like. His theory of a gang-related killing on Cathkin Braes was developing more holes than a sieve. Yet he couldn’t shake off the feeling that the buried cocaine stash was somehow involved. DI Flett had indicated they’d found traces of cannabis resin on the Orkney victim and confirmed that they had a real problem with all types of drugs getting into Orkney. Flett hadn’t been averse to connecting this to the death of his island victim.
McNab forced himself to consider the alternative: that the deaths were linked by the game that Ollie – he winced again at the name – had discovered on Alan MacKenzie’s computer. Surely it was too much of a coincidence that he’d been playing a game with four others, which involved the Neolithic site he’d died on? And what about the stones and the decreasing numbers? He’d been sharp with Rhona about that, but she’d been right to consider it, just as she’d been right to study the geology of the stones. Something he hadn’t thought of.
McNab allowed himself to consider another uncomfortable question. What the hell did Patrick Menzies have to do with it all, if anything? McNab was a natural and committed sceptic. Death was death. The end of. Kaput. There were no voices from beyond the grave. No messages. Menzies was a trickster, a fraud who tortured bereaved people with nonsense about the afterlife. In that he was no different from other religious nutters.
But the Druid game had to be thought about, whether he liked it or not.
McNab considered what Ollie had said about gamers. How they loved their secrets and their mysteries, and the fun of not knowing who or what they were up against. He had a sudden image of himself as a participant in one of those games. Only he was the one the rest were whispering about behind his back. The one being set up for a fall.
The plane wasn’t as tiny as the Loganair that served the smaller northern and western islands, but it wasn’t big enough for Magnus’s tall body. He was in the single row seats on the left of the aircraft, so at least he could ease his long legs in the aisle now and again. Thankfully, the journey was only fifty minutes so he’d be back in his waterfront apartment within the hour.
He’d used the time in transit to check out details on the spiritualist church and Patrick Menzies. As far as believers were concerned, Menzies had a formidable reputation, despite the little-boy-lost look in the accompanying photograph. Testimonials were numerous and complimentary. He gave the bereaved what they sought, which didn’t mean much in Magnus’s eyes. Grief was a powerful emotion that could lead to experiences little short of psychosis. Meeting with the dead while asleep. Talking to them. Walking with them. Asking forgiveness for wrongs done and words left unsaid was a normal part of grieving, even though it did resemble mental illness at times.
Magnus had a great deal of time for the subconscious. He often relied on his own to work while he slept and present him with the solution to a problem when he awoke. If the brain was left to its own devices, it was capable of extraordinary bursts of insight. However, communing with the dead was not, in Magnus’s opinion, one of them.
He took a taxi from the airport and, changing his mind, asked to be taken to Glasgow University instead of to his flat. Rhona, in a return text, had indicated she was at the lab. It seemed important to speak to her in person as soon as possible.
When the receptionist called up to Rhona’s lab, he was asked to wait and told she would be down directly. Magnus felt a little guilty arriving unannounced and guessed Rhona would immediately think something was wrong.
The concerned look on her face as she emerged from the lift confirmed this.
‘Has something happened?’
Magnus quickly assured her. ‘I’d like a word. Do you have time to talk?’
She hesitated. ‘Okay, but it’ll have to be quick.’
She led him along a corridor to a room with a coffee machine. It was empty apart from a young woman in a lab coat in the far corner, absorbed in a copy of The List. On their arrival, she seemed to realize she’d been there long enough. She abandoned the magazine and exited, paper cup in hand.
Rhona indicated the machine. ‘Coffee?’
Magnus shook his head. ‘I don’t want to keep you.’
‘Okay, let’s sit.’ She chose a place near the window.
Magnus began by telling her he was now officially on the case, courtesy of DI McNab.
That astonished her. ‘McNab okayed it?’
‘Provided I keep out of his way.’
She gave a small laugh. ‘Much like myself.’ She paused. ‘So what next?’
‘I plan to check out Menzies and the spiritualist church.’
‘Good luck with that.’ Rhona glanced at her watch. ‘I should get back before Chrissy blows a fuse.’
‘There’s one more thing. I had a visitor at Houton. A teenage girl.’ Magnus gave a brief summary of his encounter, omitting the sexual aspect.
Rhona was reading his expression. ‘She knew the victim?’
‘She said she was a stupid bitch who meddled in things she shouldn’t have.’
‘And that meddling caused her death?’
‘That’s what she implied.’
‘Did she mention Alan or Cathkin Braes?’
Magnus said no. ‘Although she was definitely strung out on something, so McNab could be right and the Orkney death is drug related.’
‘She’s the first real lead we’ve had,’ Rhona said. ‘Let’s hope they find her.’