happen at that place.’
Brennan allowed Gallagher a moment, then pressed again. ‘That boy, on the charge sheet…’
‘Colin McCabe… It’s Crawley, he changed his name years back, way before the Education Board started looking into that kind of thing.’
Brennan frowned, ‘No, I didn’t mean him… The victim, John Burnside, tell me about him.’
Gallagher raised the cigarette to his mouth and took a deep draw on it; his hand seemed to flutter before his face as he held the cigarette. He pinched his lips and blew out a thin trail of blue smoke as he spoke with a trembling voice, ‘He was a cunt… What do you want me to say, Rob. He arse-fucked us all… He was a fucking animal. What we did, he had it coming.’
Brennan watched the ash fall from the tip of Gallagher’s cigarette, stepped forward. ‘What we did?’
Gallagher’s head turned sharply; his eyes were wide as he took in the DI. ‘You’re the detective… Why the fuck do you think I’m here?’
Brennan stood before Gallagher, bent his knees to face him. He had taken in Gallagher’s words, absorbed their implication, but their true meaning seemed to have escaped him. The logical answer had been given, but Brennan’s mind seemed to be having difficulty keeping up. ‘ We, Jim?’
Gallagher lowered his head again, the cigarette in his fingers fell to the ground as he clutched at the back of his neck and sobbed. ‘Colin and me, we killed him… Colin took the weight, they had it down as manslaughter but it should have been murder because we killed him, we both did.’
Brennan felt an urge to reach out to Gallagher, to place a hand on his shoulder and offer him some comfort; the man was hurting, but there was no sympathy on offer to him. Brennan rose, turned away towards the cell door. As he gathered his breath, his strength, he tried to process the information he had just received.
Gallagher called out to him, ‘What’ll they do to me, Rob?’
Brennan turned back, his heart was pounding beneath his shirt front. ‘What’ll they not do to you, Jim.’
Chapter 47
DI Rob Brennan made his way towards the main staircase at the front of the station. He paused before placing a foot on the first step and felt himself pulled towards the main desk; as he turned, Brennan locked eyes with Charlie for a moment. The desk sergeant had observed the earlier arrival of DI Jim Gallagher and had been silenced by the shock of his removal to the cells. The unusual display of taciturnity sent a jolt through Brennan: he knew Charlie was a barometer of the station’s mood, and looking into his hollowed, lined face, the reading he took was for stormy weather to come.
It unnerved Brennan to think of the way he would be perceived in the station after Gallagher’s betrayal, but he shoved it to a part of his mind where he seldom retreated to. What people thought of him was of little concern to Brennan at this stage of his life — he had never been one to cultivate colleagues for his own ends, or any other reason — nor was he concerned with winning any popularity contests. The force could think what it liked about him — he’d stared down opprobrium in the past but he knew now the rest of them would have to get used to being on the receiving end. This was what bothered Brennan more: the force was going to share the blame for Gallagher’s wrongdoing; he had no doubts about that at all.
Brennan kept a fixed glare on Charlie for a moment and then the older man tipped back his head in acknowledgement; it was an unspoken concurrence — passed between them like radio waves, and would have been just as impossible to execute without the correct equipment. They had both been around long enough to know that the shame Gallagher had brought on himself, and all of them, was not a perennial experience; it was as if the sheer scale of what he had done was beyond words, beyond reason. Brennan returned Charlie’s nod and took the first step towards the Chief Super’s office.
The DI had vowed to inform Benny of Gallagher’s return to the station right away — he hadn’t done that, but disobeying direct instructions from the Chief Super seemed like a low-grade offence today. He knew his superior would have to reassess his priorities too: it was not the time to go after slightly wayward DIs when his own best boy had stepped beyond the limits of all known boundaries. Benny’s priority would now be damage limitation — his own arse was on the line, thought Brennan, why would he care about settling old scores? The DI replayed recent decisions he’d been challenged on by Benny: there was the overtime ban; the appointment of a profiler from Strathclyde; and there was the press conference which had descended into complete and utter farce. Brennan felt himself gripping the banister tighter as he ascended the stairs; he knew that, even a few hours ago, he would not have been able to go to the Chief Super to seek support for his next move, but the axis of power had shifted now. The DI knew Benny was a greatly diminished force; he would have to put his faith in solving the case — that would be his redeemer — and there was only one man left capable of delivering that for him since Gallagher had dropped out of the picture.
Brennan grabbed the handle to the Chief Super’s door; he felt ready to flay any opposition to his desired course of action, but he knew that the situation would require some degree of subtlety. It never helped to overplay your hand, he thought, and he knew that what he was about to propose was risky; getting Benny’s support would be the easy part.
The boards beneath the carpet tiles creaked as Brennan entered the Chief Super’s office. Benny stood staring out of the window, in much the same position he was when Brennan had last seen him, only now he seemed preoccupied with a ruckus of seagulls as they caterwauled over fresh deposits in the station’s bins. The DI scratched at his cheekbone as he waited for the Chief Super to turn around; the sky had settled into a dark-purple wash.
‘Ah, Rob, you’re here,’ said Benny.
Brennan lowered his hand, nodded, said, ‘I thought you’d like to know that Detective Inspector Gallagher is…’
He cut in, ‘Yes, I know… I still have some ears and eyes in this station, Rob.’
Brennan let the remark slide, but absorbed its implication. He watched the Chief Super take a seat, motion him towards the chair in front of the desk. As he sat down, the DI felt the atmosphere in the room tighten around him; ‘I spoke to him,’ he said.
Deep lines creased Benny’s brow, two dark declivities sat beneath his eyes as he wet his grey lips, ‘Was there any… justification?’
Brennan felt a corkscrew turn in his gut, he gripped the chair’s arm with his closed hand as he spoke. ‘Murder; you could call that justification… of sorts.’
The Chief Super cleared his throat, made a guttural noise as his facial muscles tightened into the shape of incredulity. ‘ What?’
As Brennan outlined Gallagher’s confession, and his claims of abuse, Benny groaned audibly; his eyes receded and his gaze looked distant, out of focus, as he slumped further into his chair. It started to darken in the room and the silence between the two men added to the unwholesome air. Brennan felt his earlier thoughts coalesce with an entirely new emotion: pity; he felt sorry for the Chief Super. As he watched him, almost writhing before him, Brennan knew the man felt unable to withstand the latest barrage to his authority. He wondered if Benny too entertained thoughts, doubts about whether he had chosen the right career path. The notion seemed fantastic, he was always so sure of himself, ‘a puffed-up wee prick’ Wullie had called him once; but now he appeared all too human and the thought gored Brennan. For a second or two he wondered how many times in the past he had made ill-founded decisions about people and then he checked himself, corrected his thinking. He was a DI, he reminded himself, and he had a triple murder case on his hands. The press were talking about an Edinburgh Ripper.
‘Sir, I need to ask your approval for the next stage of the investigation,’ said Brennan.
The words seemed to fall on Benny like blows, ‘What?… I mean, what do you need, er, want to do?’
Brennan leaned forward in his chair, ‘I believe our suspect may make a move to kill again, sir.’
Benny cut in, ‘Yes, yes… Well, that doesn’t change if Angela Mickle was killed by Henderson.’
Brennan watched the day closing through the window, said, ‘Our suspect doesn’t know about the Mickle killing, but the press pack will soon enough, if not already; we need a blanket ban on reporting on the case for the next twenty-four-hours.’
‘Oh, Christ, Rob…’ The Chief Super shook his head. ‘Have you any idea of the complexity, the hoops I have to
