‘Whereabouts do we go, Mum?’ Alice asked, worried that they would be late. Peering round in all directions as if still trying to find her bearings, her mother said, ‘Keep going to the top of this road and then, I think… take the first right.’
‘And you’re sure they’ll have a space there? The place seems to be jam-packed.’
‘Yes. Yes. I’ve got a reserved one in the oncology car park, a privilege I could well do without.’
As the car drew up at the barrier, a fat man in a peaked cap, sweating profusely, peered in at the driver’s window, frowning as if to repel any interlopers. Hastily, Alice’s mother passed across her appointment card and the bouncer, pudgy fingers obscuring most of the writing, examined it.
‘Busy today?’ Mrs Rice enquired politely.
‘Aha. The pole’s already been up n’ doon like a hoor’s breeks,’ he muttered, head still bowed, engrossed in his inspection, before continuing, ‘Okay hen. In ye go. Furst oan yer left.’
The radiotherapy staff trooped out, one of them putting a comforting hand on Alice’s shoulder as he passed. Seconds later the red light above the door went on, signalling that the treatment had begun. Inside, Olivia Rice lay semi-naked on a hard metal bed, with little more than a paper towel to preserve her modesty. She stared up at the ceiling, willing herself to relax, conscious that her neck muscles were on the edge of spasm. Everyone had said that she would be fine, the rays would cure her, not kill her. And the small tattoo on her breast, delineating the target area, had been minutely aligned with the machine. ‘One thousand and one… one thousand and two,’ she began counting, but before she reached ‘One thousand and five’, her six seconds of radiation were up and she heard a strange clicking sound followed by a passage of whirring, announcing that her first session was complete. The middle-aged nurse returned and freed her from the bed and the contraption above it, directing her behind a screen where she was reunited with her clothes.
Seated in the corridor, Alice crossed, uncrossed and then re-crossed her legs before, on automatic pilot, beginning to recite a Hail Mary. Self-consciousness returned with the first ‘Holy Mary, Mother of God’ and she laughed at herself, parroting mumbo-jumbo, but found that she was unable to leave the prayer incomplete. Just as she had decided to rise from her seat and investigate the magazine table, her mother reappeared, calm and smiling, chatting animatedly with the radiographer about the virtues of pink fir-apples.
It was just too unlikely, she thought. And, looking at Georgie, affable, amusing Georgie, she could not imagine the James Freeman that his partner had described forming any kind of alliance with him, never mind a one-night stand. He poured more tea into her cup, before resuming his stool amongst the books and beaming, magically, at her again. Although she returned repeatedly to the original meeting in the Boar’s Head, he took no offence, patiently answering all her questions. She knew it was the lynchpin, without it little more would be left than a chance meeting between two gay men, both of whom worked in the same area of Edinburgh. Ivan became a suspect because of Georgie, and Georgie became one because of Ivan.
‘So you’re sure it was him, the Sheriff, because of the likeness to the newspaper photo?’ Alice asked.
‘Yes. I never bothered reading the actual obituary. But I remember his looks all right.’
‘Not because of anything he told you?’
‘No.’
‘Did he say anything much?’
‘Well, we chattered for a bit, as you do, got to know each other… Not so different, really, from the heterosexual world, you appreciate.’
‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to suggest…’
Georgie quickly touched her elbow, grinning again to reassure her. ‘That’s all right, Miss Rice, I didn’t think you did.’
She tried a different tack. ‘James Freeman, you know, was not far off eighty.’
‘No!’ The man seemed thunderstruck.
‘The chap you met, I take it, didn’t seem so old?’
‘Certainly did not. No. Let’s change that. Was not. I’m not some kind of gerontophile, I can assure you. No wonder Ivan seemed a bit taken aback when I told him about the liaison. It’s a miracle he didn’t run away screaming.’
And then the light dawned. The photo, used in the papers, and which she had not seen, must have been an old one. She racked her brain for anything else she could remember about the dead Sheriff.
‘When you talked, did the man have a speech impediment?’
‘Christ almighty! What else? No, not that I can recall. What did you have in mind?’
‘Ws for Rs. You know, “Wound the wagged wocks, the wagged wascal wan…”’
‘No. Definitely not. I’d have noticed that.’
‘What about a scar-on his body. Cutting right across his chest?’
‘This is beginning to sound as if I picked up an aged monster… er, no disrespect to the Sheriff intended. No, no scar either. I take it all back. The man I slept with was normal, normal body, normal voice and not Methuselah. I did not, repeat did not, sleep with the deceased judge! I take it all back!’
Then he ruffled his hair with the tips of his fingers, laughed and said, ‘What I want to know, detective, and this could be your next assignment, is who the hell did I bestow my favours on? As my old flame used to say-
“You know it’s mad and bad as well,
To copulate when stocious.
You do not know your lover’s name,
And the sex will be atrocious!”’
A single trail remaining, and all that was needed now was a phone check. It was the obvious thing, except that permission from on high would be required, and those breathing the chilly air had seemed singularly unimpressed by her theory. An alternative, albeit imperfect strategy would now have to be deployed. She searched for Vertenergy’s phone number and found it scrawled on a Post-it attached to the front cover of her diary.
‘Detective Sergeant Rice here. I understand that my colleague, DS Watt, spoke to a Mr Vernon from your company yesterday. Could I speak to him, please? There are a number of new matters that have arisen.’
The receptionist, boredom unconcealed, said that she would send someone to find him; he was certainly in the office but had not been answering his phone. In the meantime, Alice would have to be put on hold. A minute or two of complete silence and then she was unceremoniously cut off. Re-dialling, fortunately, produced another receptionist, one abashed to hear of the mishap and prepared to leave her desk to find the Director.
‘Hello, Sergeant Rice. What can we do for you today?’ The man’s voice was cheery, eager to please.
‘It’s in relation to the Scowling Crags wind farm, Mr Vernon. I understand that all of your dealings, originally at least, were with the late James Freeman, but that later his brother Christopher Freeman became involved…’
‘That’s right. Christopher Freeman informed us that permission would be granted to use Blackstone Mains as the access strip for the development.’
‘After you received the Sheriff’s letter withdrawing permission for the inclusion of Blackstone Mains, did someone from your company contact Christopher Freeman to tell him of the withdrawal?’
‘No,’ the man sounded puzzled, ‘I wouldn’t think so. You see, at that stage, we dealt solely with James Freeman. I doubt anyone here was aware, then at least, that the land was jointly owned. Even if they did know it, the assumption would have been that Freeman was consenting on behalf of all the landowners of Blackstone Mains. We’d have no cause to contact Christopher Freeman. I’m not sure anyone then knew that he even existed. Normally, we would have tried to tie up the “legals” before embarking on the quest for planning, but we couldn’t this time, too many applications to risk being barred by “cumulative effect”.’
‘So you’re pretty certain that no-one from your company phoned Christopher Freeman for that purpose?’
‘Well…’ Mr Vernon hesitated before replying. ‘Yes. I’m in charge of the Scowling Crags development. I didn’t talk to him and I can’t think of anyone else who would have done so. I could check it with Roger I suppose…’ he paused again. ‘No. It’s pointless. He was off on holiday then, so there’d be nobody. I bet my life on it that no-one from here contacted Christopher Freeman. We were very relieved when he contacted us.’
Alice replaced the receiver and breathed a long sigh of relief. DC Lowe strode to her desk. ‘The boss wants to see you, Sarge, and it’s urgent,’ he said, frowning and jabbing his finger at her as if to convey added force to the order.
The scent of coffee in the small office reminded Alice that she had missed her breakfast cup. Too much of a rush if the appointment at the Western was to be kept. DCI Bell looked up on her entry, busy brushing a mound of spilled sugar off her desk into a waste paper bin.
‘Ah, Alice,’ she said, and the relative warmth of her tone reassured her subordinate that she was not facing the dressing-down she had begun to anticipate.
‘I’ve been thinking things over…’ she continued, ‘and I’m persuaded by your… reasoning. I just hope to God that your unofficial sample of the man’s DNA proves identical to the official one we’ll get on arrest. That it’s not his wife’s, for example. Otherwise, I’ll be for the high jump. Anyway, after you left I got the ACC’s grudging permission for a check to be run on James Freeman’s telephone calls for two weeks prior to his death. We’ll see if he called his brother. A verbal result should be available either late this morning or early afternoon, the printout will follow later. We’ve got permission to do Vertenergy too.’
‘Excellent, Ma’am. I’ve already spoken to a Director of the company, a Mr Vernon, the chap that Alistair talked to yesterday, and he’s pretty positive that they didn’t tell Christopher Freeman about his brother’s change of mind. But a check would put it beyond doubt.’
The absence of the poodles from the bungalow made it appear, somehow, larger, more commodious, as if the grand proportions of the beasts had distorted the scale of the house. It also seemed unnaturally quiet, dull and lifeless, and Sandra Freeman herself seemed subdued, immobile and absorbed in the business of smoking her cigarette. Without much thought Alice enquired politely as to the dogs’ whereabouts.
‘He’s got the boys, both of them, up at the Mains for a good long walk,’ she replied, distractedly.
Slowly but surely the significance of this ostensibly innocuous piece of information began to sink in. Blackstone Mains was a remote destination, one off the beaten track, and a couple of Shetland ponies would be more welcome, less disruptive, on a bus than those two massive, ill-disciplined poodles. Anyway, few buses, if any, would pass on such obscure back roads, and only the closest friend would allow his vehicle to be soiled by the dogs and their messy ways.
‘I didn’t see the car outside,’ Alice said. Her hostess, briefly, showed some interest and then, expelling smoke forcibly through her mouth, said calmly, ‘No. It’s back in the garage, the one we got it from. In Liberton.’
‘What’s the matter with it?’ Alice shot back, allowing little time for thought or, more importantly, fabrication.
‘Mmm…’ Sandra Freeman paused. ‘The carburettor-dirt, yeah-dirt in the carburettor, I think.’
‘The garage,’ Alice said, while removing her mobile from her pocket, ‘that would be Tooles, wouldn’t it?’
‘Yes! Yes! Tooles.’ Mrs Freeman was becoming vexed. ‘Why on earth do you want to know that?’
‘Because I need to check that the car is there. At the garage, I mean. You see, I think that your husband must have it, up at Blackstone Mains.’
Mrs Freeman rubbed her eyes with her thumb and index finger, and then forcibly stubbed her cigarette out.
‘Oh very well…’ she said, exasperation having replaced her previous irritability. ‘Very well. He does have it. There. He shouldn’t have it, of course. I know that. But… well, he does. Now, are you satisfied? Going to go up there and charge him now? That’ll be the toast of your enquiry I expect, eh? “Murdered Sheriff’s brother caught driving his own car without a licence”.’
‘Or insurance,’ Alice added, then continued ‘-but it’s not the first time, is it? His driving whilst disqualified, I mean?’
‘What exactly are you getting at?’ Sandra Freeman asked, her face creased with concern, brows furrowed, blinking rapidly.
Quickly, Alice thought things through. It would be a gamble, she knew that, but one that would surely pay dividends. If she could project sufficient certainty, then the woman’s own surprise would prevent her from making false denials, protecting her husband and painting herself into a corner.
‘On the night of his brother’s murder your husband had the car. That’s correct, isn’t it?’
The woman’s expression revealed that she had, indeed, been caught off balance, but she said nothing, playing for time, so Alice repeated the question verbatim, emphasising her assertion and then waiting patiently for a reply.
‘All right, all right. I was staying at my mother’s that night, down the road. So he kept the car, to go to the pub he said. The next morning he told me that he was worried that someone had seen him, reported him, a neighbour or some other do-gooder. And they would do that here, you know, in this neighbourhood. I said I’d help him. He needs his licence back. He’s a man, he needs to be independent.’
‘Same again on the night of Mr Lyon’s accident, eh?’
‘Yes, he took the car then, as well. But he wasn’t away that long. He said he had to get out, cabin fever or whatever, and we needed ciggies too.’
‘Mrs Freeman, you lied…’ Alice began.
‘I know I lied,’ the woman interjected. ‘Of course I bloody lied. I had to. Wouldn’t you have done it? He’s perfectly safe, you know, been driving for years, and it’s only a matter of days before he’s allowed to drive again. Legally. If either of us had told you the truth… well, what then? You’d probably have him disqualified for life!’
Climbing the flight of stairs, each upward step felt easier than the last, as if her legs were on springs, but on arrival at the office she found it empty of all life except for DC Lowe. He was on the telephone, receiver clamped between shoulder and ear, attempting to write something down whilst simultaneously flicking through a telephone directory. No. Not him, she thought. Too much of a liability. DCI Bell was in her office, puce in the face, struggling to fend the Press off, fiddling crossly with a rubber band.
‘No. I appreciate that. What do you expect me to say? If you are not getting satisfaction from Fettes or from here then, obviously, it’s your prerogative to go elsewhere. Indeed. The Chief Constable may well, as you suggest, view matters differently. Yes. It is entirely up to you. I expect that your Editor does know him well. Goodbye.’
She slammed down the instrument and began massaging her shoulder and neck. ‘A RIGHT FUCKER’ she mouthed silently at Alice, before, breathing out slowly and calming herself, she turned her full attention to her Sergeant.
‘Good news…’ she began, ‘the Sheriff spoke to his brother on the phone the day before he died, and there’s no record of Vertenergy contacting Christopher Freeman following their receipt of his brother’s letter.’
‘Yes, Ma’am. And Mrs Freeman lied…’ Alice replied. ‘Her husband has no alibi for either of the nights. A friend’s giving her a lift to the station and I’m going to ask DC Lowe to look after her when she arrives, get her tea and so on. If we go to the Mains he can keep an eye on her until we get back. The others are all out and about, and DI Manson’s not back yet.’
Heavy rain started to fall, overwhelming the tattered wipers on the Astra, reducing visibility in the city to a few yards. Crossing the Dean Bridge the traffic ground to a halt, filthy water streaming from blocked gulleys on either side of the road, flooding the slight depression opposite Eton Terrace. They stopped again at the lights by the Bristo Baptist Church, rainwater now beginning to drop through the roof onto Elaine Bell’s lap, ingeniously deflected to the side by the use of a laminated map adopted as a shield. Headlight to bumper the line of traffic flowed on, the Astra trapped mid-stream, until at the Barnton roundabout, the shower having finally dissipated itself, black sky gave way to blue and the sun emerged from its hiding place.
No tickets. No money. No purse even, Alice thought, instantly cursing herself, visualising her bag on her desk at the station. And everything, everything she needed was in it, including, critically, her identification. Surreptitiously she glanced at the fuel gauge. Full, thank Christ-that humiliation, at least, avoided-but the towers of the bridge were looming nearer, her crass ineptitude about to be exposed.
‘I don’t suppose you have a pound coin for the bridge, do you, Ma’am?’ she asked lightly, attempting to disguise the acute discomfort that she felt.
‘No, Alice…’ the DCI replied. ‘I assumed that you would have come prepared, so I didn’t bring my purse.’ The car reached the booth and the toll man extended his hand in automatic anticipation of payment.
‘I’m sorry, we’ve no money between us, but we’re Police officers-on Police business,’ Alice said, but hearing her own voice and taking in afresh the shabbiness of the unwashed car, the hollowness of the assertion struck her.
‘Well, well,’ the man sounded doubtful. ‘Must be some mighty big operation on over in Fife, eh? You’re the third car of polis I’ve had this morning. Do us a favour, eh? Prove it! Go on, hen, gie us, gie us a flash o’ yer blue light or something.’
‘Show him your identification, Sergeant,’ the Detective Chief Inspector said testily. Alice caught her superior’s eye, and shook her head, dumb with embarrassment. Instantly, looking daggers drawn, Elaine Bell extracted her card from her jacket and flashed it at the official. With a mock salute the barrier was raised, just as a lorry behind, lights glaring, began to hoot its horn, impatient for progress.
No-one appeared to be about, but the Freemans’ car was parked at the top of the first track, near the farmhouse. The building itself was clearly unoccupied, with metal shutters protecting its windows and fallen slates perched perilously in the rhones. Instinctively, the two women stuck together as they began searching the sheds that formed the quadrangular steading. The first one, cobwebs frosting the windows, appeared to be some kind of feed store with piles of old hessian sacks stacked against one wall and empty grain bins on either side of the door. Attached to it, fortunately with electric light installed, was a workshop, half the floor removed to form an inspection pit, and the concrete of the remainder blackened, coated in a thin veneer of ancient oil. Old Shell tins lay about the place, and on a rough-hewn work bench rested spanners, wrenches and other tools, beside a yellowing newspaper, as if someone had been interrupted mid-task and never returned. Next, Elaine Bell prised opened a stable door which creaked noisily, and as they peered in a rat scuttled, hunchbacked and lame, across an old table, then jumped, landing heavily in a pile of sawdust. Quickly, the door was slammed shut, ensuring that the creature remained incarcerated, unable to reach them. Over the excited twittering of sparrows perched on the roof, distant shouting could be heard.
‘Pepe… Chico, you bloody dogs. Come here!’
Following the direction from which the voice had come the two policewomen ran towards a patch of scrub woodland, finally stopping for breath on reaching a large haystack built on an old bonfire site. A few bales had fallen from the stack and lay, burst and broken, on the cold ash. Sitting beside them, incongruously, was a rusty can of petrol, and the stench of fumes from it filled the air, obliterating the gentler scent of the hay.
Suddenly, Alice felt two huge paws thudding on her back as an exuberant poodle welcomed her, then slid to the ground to shake itself vigorously, showering her with a fine spray of mud. Chico, not to be outdone, immediately bounced up on her before turning his attention to Detective Chief Inspector Bell, the flustered woman now engaged in a losing battle, ineffectually attempting to fend Pepe off with an extended knee. When this ploy failed, she turned in a circle hoping to baffle the dog and unbalance it, but inadvertently created a game, as with each turn the poodles revolved with her. Eventually, having lost interest in the visitors, the two dogs raced up the stack, chasing each other all over it, causing little falls of hay in their path and emitting high pitched yelps like excited puppies.
‘What the hell are you doing here?’ Christopher Freeman said, striding briskly towards them, stick in hand, staring at Alice and then at the Chief Inspector. He looked dishevelled. His jacket was torn, stems of dry hay protruding from the tweed, and it and his corduroy trousers were heavily stained, as if water or oil had permeated deep into their fabric.
‘Looking for you…’ Elaine Bell replied calmly. ‘I am DCI Bell of Lothian & Borders Police. Major Freeman, we’d like you to come back to Edinburgh with us, to St Leonards Street.’
Christopher Freeman said nothing, but stroked his chin between his thumb and forefinger. Just as the silence was becoming oppressive he said, ‘And for what reason exactly?’
‘To interview you about the murders of James Freeman and Nicholas Lyon.’
‘Oh for God’s sake,’ he exclaimed, evidently astonished. ‘You’ve got absolutely nothing on me. If you had a shred of evidence I’d have been pulled in long ago. I have an alibi. I was with Sandra, both nights, remember? She told you. I told you.’
‘No,’ Detective Chief Inspector Bell said quietly, ‘you were not.’
‘Have you been pestering my wife again?’ the man demanded angrily of Alice.
‘No,’ Elaine Bell snapped back, ‘she hasn’t. She’s been doing her job. Perhaps you should know that your wife is at the station at this very moment and she, too, is likely to be charged, obstructing us… as she has done.’
The man looked crestfallen. ‘Why, for pity’s sake… why are you dragging her into this?’
‘Because she lied to us. And she, like you, will have to pay the penalty for that.’
‘Well, do your bloody worst then.’ Christopher Freeman had speedily recovered from his surprise and regained his initial confidence. ‘We’ll get a decent lawyer. Maybe plead guilty to some silly trumped-up little charge. You’ve got nothing, after all…’
A crashing sound accompanied Pepe’s sudden descent from the hayrick, bales cascading to the left and right, one tumbling on top of the poodle, temporarily stunning him. A good portion of the structure had fallen with the dog, and beneath the remaining stack, a stretch of glass had begun to reflect the cloudless sky above. It was the windscreen of the white Volkswagon Polo. It took a few seconds for the impact of the revelation to sink in, and the first to react was Christopher Freeman, breaking the silence with a furious oath. Alice braced herself for threats, menace, physical violence even, and was beginning to feel the unpleasant effects of the adrenaline now coursing within her, but when she looked again at the Major she saw that he no longer appeared aggressive or defiant; panic had transformed his features, his face now pale and bloodless. Without another word, he struck a clutch of matches and hurled them towards the car, one dropping lit at his feet.
And then, mysteriously, time stood still, rendering Alice immobile, transforming her from an actor in the drama of her own life into a mere spectator. Before her eyes a man had begun to burn, snakes of flame encircling his legs, weaving sinuously upwards, twisting and turning, the heads of the serpents seeking out his face. And the brightness of the fire, its brilliant intensity, mesmerised her, drawing all her attention to it, making its source seem insignificant, compelling her to watch the strange spectacle that seemed to have been choreographed for her benefit alone.
‘Alice! Alice! For Christ’s sake, help me!’
The sound of DCI Bell’s voice broke the enchantment, revealing with hideous clarity the scene in its true colours. Christopher Freeman was standing engulfed by fire, shaking his head frantically, his hair now alight, limbs writhing ineffectually in an attempt to rid themselves of the clinging flames. From his mouth issued a grotesque noise. A continuous high-pitched squeal, like a terrified, wounded pig, and the cry echoed and echoed in Alice’s brain, before reaching an unbearable crescendo. And then, suddenly, it stopped, but the silence that followed it was eerier yet, as if all life on earth had ended.
In their repeated attempts to smother the flames they used their jackets, shifting them from place to place, frantic that their only weapons should not be consumed by the enemy. Become the enemy. To begin with they did not feel pain as their hands burnt, but when it did break through they continued, determined to subdue the flames, to suffocate them and somehow return the hellish torch back to its human form.
Her lover shampooed her hair and then soaped her body gently, as if she was a child, before pouring scented bath oils into the warm water. And still Alice did not feel clean. The awful smell of roasting flesh had permeated her, clung to her skin, tainted her hair, entered every single one of her pores. Nothing would drive it away, eradicate it from her system or cleanse her. A glass of white wine rested on the bath, the opened bottle beside it, and desperate to take the taste from her mouth she took one little sip after the other, rolling each around on her tongue, concentrating on the flavour. But a single image remained before her eyes, unalterable; a man incandescent, alight, writhing and twitching on the ground as, frantically, they tried to douse the flames, sticks of charred flesh emerging from beneath black smoke. And, in the process, she had inhaled him. Literally. Minute particles of scorched human being had entered her nostrils, probably her mouth too.
Exhaustion having made her careless, she reached for the plug, withdrawing her hand the instant the first moisture soaked through the bandage. The stab of pain in her fingers was excruciating, robbing her of breath and bringing tears to her eyes.
Walking slowly into her bedroom she found that it had been festooned with flowers: freesias, lilies and roses, the air now laden with their innocent perfumes. Clean sheets had been put on the bed and the covers turned back.
‘Live with me?’ Ian Melville said, coming close and lying next to her. She did not hesitate, needed no time to think or fashion an evasive reply. ‘I’d love to,’ she said, and it was no less than the sober truth.