They went into the Clerk’s office, alongside that of the Dean, and closed the door behind them.
Cowan dialled an internal number, and issued instructions to his secretary. Soon afterwards she appeared carrying two folders. Each contained a set of the papers in the Chinese trial.
They read through the notes and transcript in silence. Then Skinner went back to the beginning and listed the facts, point by point.
‘The victim. Shirai Yobatu. She’s twenty, and she’s at Strathclyde University. She’s found strangled in Kelvingrove Park. There are signs of sexual activity which could be rape. Forensic establishes that three men had intercourse with the girl immediately before her death.
‘She was seen earlier from across the street in Park Circus, by another girl student. She was in the company of three oriental men. The girl recognises two of them as waiters in the Kwei Linn Chinese Restaurant off Sauchiehall Street. A lot of the students have eaten there and know the two lads. The witness doesn’t know the other one. No one does. He’s never been found and the. other two wouldn’t name him. It didn’t occur to the witness that Shirai might not have been going willingly with them. She didn’t look under duress.
‘Christ, Peter, the Crown Office made a balls of this, and no mistake. If they’d left out the rape and just gone for a murder conviction they’d have got it no bother. As it was Mortimer and Jameson were able to take the rape charge apart, and to lull the jury into acquitting on both counts.’
Skinner went back to the notes. ‘The accused: John Ho, defended by Mortimer; and Shun Lee, defended by Jameson. They deny the rape charge and it falls apart. They say they didn’t know the third man. They claim that he had just started that day as a dishwasher at the Kwei Linn, and they didn’t know his name. The owner says he only gave the guy a few hours’ work, and he didn’t know it either. He says that the boy was a deaf mute.
‘The lads claim that they had a date for a threesome in the park with Shirai, who, they allege, is a student nymphomaniac likely to graduate with honours - there’s absolutely no evidence of that; her flatmate said she was a quiet girl - and the third guy came along as a spectator. They say that Shirai fancied mystery man too, and that they went off in a huff, leaving her to get on with it.
‘That evening they hear on Radio Clyde that a girl has been found strangled in the park. Mystery man doesn’t show up to wash dishes, and John Ho and Shun Lee decide to do a runner. They separate and go home, but each one is lifted by Strathclyde CID in the act of packing his bags.
‘Mike and Rachel plead panic. The guys are good witnesses; the jury believes them and they walk. So once again, we’ve got two very satis fied clients. Agree?’
Cowan nodded emphatically.
‘But not everybody’s going to be happy with that, are they? What more do we know about Shirai?’ Skinner flicked through the papers before him and found a two-page document, the A4 sheets stapled together. ‘This is the Strathclyde Police report on her background. Let’s see what it says.’
Cowan found the same document in his sheaf of papers; each read quickly.
Skinner summarised aloud as he went along. ‘Interesting. Comes from an above-average family background, even by Japanese standards. And interesting too, she’s not an overseas student, as such.’
The shadow of a smile crept across his face.
‘Her father and mother live in Balerno, of all places. He’s forty-four, managing director of a Japanese pharmaceuticals company in Livingston.’
Cowan looked at him. ‘So he could be a man with a grudge? Not a. dissatisfied client, but the father of a victim. Is that what you think?’
Skinner shrugged his shoulders. ‘It’s the only lead I’ve got, so I’ll have to follow it up. Tell you one thing, I’ll be interested to learn what John Ho and Shun Lee are doing right now. And I can’t wait to show a photograph of Yobatu
Cowan held up a hand. ‘Hold on Bob; you can link this man to Mike and Rachel through that trial, fair enough. But how can you connect him with the other three murders?’
‘I’ll worry about that later. This is the only bone I’ve got to gnaw on at the moment, and I’m going to give it a bloody good chew.’
Skinner closed his folder. ‘Come with me when I pay a call on Harcourt, once I lay hands on that photo.’
21
Detective Sergeant Mackie had just returned from hospital, where his injured elbow had been pronounced sound, when Skinner buzzed from his office.
Mackie went through to the inner sanctum. ‘Hello, sir. I didn’t know you were back. Did our man put in an appearance at the funeral?’
‘I won’t know for sure till I’ve seen the photographs. That’s the first thing I want you to chase up for me. These are the others.’ He issued a series of clear concise orders. ‘And I want them now!’
The funeral photographs arrived two hours later.
Skinner sifted carefully through the blown-up prints. Some of the people, he recognised, but most, he did not. However the most telling thing was that no one seemed to be out of place, or standing in isolation, other than, in one photograph, himself.
‘Christ,’ he muttered aloud. ‘No one would ever know I was a copper from that! Not bloody much!’
Skinner scanned the prints again, to confirm his first impression. There were no oddfellows there. And no one in the gathering looked in the slightest oriental.
The photograph of Toshio Yobatu, Managing Director of Fu-Joki Blood Products plc, arrived half an hour later. Mackie brought it, having been handed the print in a brown envelope, in a pub behind the Scotsman office, by a photographer with whom he maintained a mutually beneficial acquaintance. Mackie had agreed that his friend’s lack of curiosity about the reason for the request would earn an extra favour at some time in the future.
Skinner tore open the envelope and withdrew the photograph. He looked at it and caught his breath. Alongside him, Mackie gave a soft whistle.
The picture had been ‘snatched’ as Yobatu left the High Court in Glasgow, following the acquittal of the two Chinese youths. It had been blown up until most of the features were fuzzy, but nothing could dim the ferocity of the eyes which blazed out at the two detectives.
Nothing could have been further from the image of the smiling Japanese businessman. Even in a bad photograph, Yobatu’s ferocious gaze had an almost hypnotic effect. Not a hint of humour or compassion lay there, only a burning anger, accentuated by a tight mouth, which seemed to have been slashed across the man’s face.
‘Jesus, boss,’ Mackie whispered, ‘if this character had sat staring at me for three-and-a-half days in a High Court trial, I think I’d have jumped under a bloody train as well!’
22
Like many advocates, George Harcourt lived in the network of streets which stretches downhill and northward from Heriot Row, in grey and ordered simplicity.
George Harcourt was a slightly rumpled Glaswegian, with a round head, set on a stocky frame. He had a voice which seemed to echo from the depths of a well, and which in court had the effect from the outset of his trials, of convincing juries that they were there on serious business.
Skinner had encountered him twice professionally; on the first occasion Harcourt had been acting for the defence, and on the second he had been prosecuting. He had been impressed by the man, in each role. A judge in the making, he had decided.
Harcourt poured each a Macallan, and offered them seats in red leather Chesterfield chairs.
Skinner took a sip from his glass. ‘George, I’m going to ask you to look at a picture.’ He drew Yobatu’s
