so she’s told Mrs Baillie.’
‘I wonder what she’ll really be typing onto the screen?’
Lorimer shrugged. He trusted Pat Crossan to cover her tracks effectively. She’d think of something plausible.
The next hour passed in a haze of boredom as Lorimer switched his attention from monitor to monitor, only calling up the members of his team to check out their positions.
It was a quiet Monday evening in a peaceful Glasgow suburb when all good residents were out walking their dogs or strolling in the park. There was nothing to suggest that the surroundings contained small pockets of watchful police officers waiting for something sinister to happen. And that was the way it should be, Lorimer thought, looking out from the restricted view they had in the back of the van. He could see the pavement that curved up towards the clinic then turned into its drive. Beyond the dense shrubbery there was nothing else in sight. Above them the sky was full of house martins dipping and diving for insects. Lorimer watched their swooping movements as a relief from studying the monitors. Already it was June. Only a few more weeks remained of the school term, then Maggie would be away on her travels.
Lorimer stretched his long legs out in front of him. Earlier they’d been able to slip out for brief comfort breaks to the pub across the road but now he’d told them to stay put. He was aware of Cameron squirming beside him; cramped muscles no doubt. The monitors flickered as a car passed by, sunlight bouncing off its wing mirrors.
Phyllis had been watching the woman all day with a growing curiosity. Pat had revealed her identity on her first visit to the room. It was their secret. Nobody else knew that the agency nurses were plainclothes policewomen. It gave Phyllis a small feeling of triumph to be part of this clandestine operation when so much of her existence depended on other people. She had under stood the need for the policewoman’s presence. Their witness must be protected, Pat Crossan had stressed, especially now that Phyllis had agreed to this.
The paralysed woman told herself that she ought to feel frightened or even excited; after all, she was the bait being dangled to attract the person she thought was the killer. But today she was too exhausted to summon up such emotional energy.
Instead she had merely observed the policewoman’s movements, watching her intently until sleep had overtaken her.
Since Lorimer’s interview the sick woman had slipped into sleep more and more. Observing her, Pat had wondered at the tenacity of the human thread that held onto life. From time to time she bent over the bed, just to listen to the whisper of her breathing. It could scarcely be heard above the rise and fall of the machinery below the bed that hissed and sighed. She’d been sleeping now for almost an hour. The room was warm although Pat had closed the blinds against the direct sunlight. She wanted Phyllis to have a decent sleep. The poor woman seemed so weary.
A buzzer sounded suddenly so Pat reached up to the red button on the patient’s water line to switch off the noise. But Phyllis did not even blink. Below the sheets she was somewhere else, dreaming and drifting as the shadows shifted around the room, oblivious to the fluids being pumped into her body. The policewoman looked at the watch pinned to her uniform. Two more hours and Erica would be here to relieve her. Quietly she left the room, closing the door behind her. She had other things to check; the whereabouts of other members of staff or visitors. And she needed to go to the loo. She wouldn’t be away all that long.
Meantime the camera fixed inside the television set would watch over Phyllis.
As Pat walked briskly along the corridor a figure emerged from the shadows, looking after her.
Then, as silent as a cat, Leigh Quinn slipped into Phyllis’s room and sat beside the sleeping woman. His hands strayed towards the vase of flowers on her bedside locker, touching their petals, rearranging their stems. Then he drew one of them out of the vase and regarded it for a long moment.
Alistair Wilson circled his head slowly, hearing the crunch of fibres around his cervical vertebrae. At least he was out in the open air. Lorimer and the others would be roasting inside that BT van. So far all was quiet. The only communication they’d had was to check out all the visitors to the Grange. There had been no strangers among them, nobody who was out of place. The detective sergeant was sitting with PC Davie Inglis opposite the back entrance to the Grange, the gardening tools at their feet, screened from view by the thick branches of the rhododendrons.
‘Reminds me of playing hide and seek at my auntie’s garden in Saint Andrews when I was wee,’ Davie had whispered after they’d scrambled out of sight.
The door to the basement had been left locked, as it normally would be. It was vital not to arouse any suspicions on the part of anyone who might have access to the basement area, Lorimer had insisted. Whoever had murdered Kirsty MacLeod had been able to make their escape this way. But had they? Alistair wasn’t so sure about that and he knew Lorimer himself had doubts about the access. Had the door been left open to make it look as if an intruder had broken in? And had the real killer remained in the clinic during the hours that had followed? Whatever theories they might have, there was no way they could fail to keep this exit under close surveillance.
‘I need to stretch my legs,’ Cameron said suddenly.
‘Don’t we all,’ grumbled Lorimer.
‘No, sir. I mean I really need to stretch my legs,’ Cameron told him. Lorimer noted the flush around his collar and sighed.
‘OK. But don’t be long,’ he warned. Trips back and forth to the pub were OK for so long. Someone behind the bar might begin to comment if they weren’t discreet enough. If the lad really needed to go to the toilet, he couldn’t very well stop him, could he?
Perhaps Maggie had been a bit overgenerous with her refreshments after all.
Cameron clambered over their legs and slid open the van door. The sun had made the metal hot and he winced as he touched it. It was a relief to be out in the air again. He bent down slowly, massaging his calves, then stood up to walk carefully around the van.
Inside, Lorimer craned his neck to watch Cameron walking towards the pub but he was either out of sight or had sprinted across, more desperate than he’d admitted. He tried to catch Solly’s eye but the psychologist was engrossed in the papers in front of him. Even in the sweltering heat of the van, the psychologist was trying to keep up with his exam marking.
Sister Angelica was happy. It had been a beautiful day, just like the summers when she was a girl. She’d been telling the other patients in the lounge all about the summer holidays of her youth when the family had spent weeks on the farm in Melrose. She’d walked the Eildon Hills until she’d known every crag of them, she said. Then she’d told them about Lewis and how peaceful it could be in Failte.
The weekly prayer meeting was due to begin soon. There was only one person left to arrive then they could start. She’d lit a fat scented candle and placed it on the table by the window. The breeze stirred its flame beside the muslin curtains, sending the fragrance of sandalwood into the room.
Angelica beamed at them all. It was so heartening to do something for these people who had become her friends. Mondays were quite special for her, now. Her vocation was not over, after all. That was something else she had found out during her stay here.
It happened so suddenly that nobody quite knew how to react. First there was a whooshing sound followed by the table being upset as Angelica lumbered to her feet and one of the girls began to scream. The fire caught hold swiftly, spreading to the wallpaper and sending sparks of tinder onto the soft chairs.
‘Out! Everybody! Get out!’ Angelica ordered, shooing them all like sheep from the room just as the smoke alarm began its insistent beeping.
They were coughing in the corridor and gasping for air by the time the nun joined them. One man had picked up the fire extinguisher and was heading back into the room, followed by Peter, one of the male nurses. The front door gave its alarmed ring as they all spilt out into the fresh air. Angelica did a swift headcount. They were all there, she told herself. Everyone, that is, except the one person they’d been waiting for. Where was Leigh?
