‘That’s pure coincidence. She was named after her maternal grandmother.’ He frowned. ‘No, I suppose I’ve always assumed, if for no other reason than the fact that her will’s still gathering dust up there in Church Road, that she’s still alive, sitting in an olive grove or a vineyard in the South of France, cracking the whip over Claude. However, from what you say, if she is still cracking the whip, it’s not over him. Where did he wind up?’
‘Glasgow,’ Proud told him, ‘teaching in Jordanhill School, a year later . . . at least that’s where he surfaced next.’
‘She must have binned him bloody quick, then. Maybe the outside world worked wonders for her.’
‘It worked wonders for him: he remarried in Glasgow in that same year.’
‘He did what? But he couldn’t possibly have been divorced. Not enough time would have elapsed.’
‘He wasn’t, not in Scotland at any rate. I suppose it’s possible they went to Nevada or Mexico, or some other lax jurisdiction, but it doesn’t seem likely, especially when you consider that he married for a third time in 1961, again with no evidence of divorce.’
‘Good God! I’d never have thought he had it in him. So what you’re saying is that he ditched her, is that it?’
As he looked out of the old man’s window, Sir James Proud was visited by a dark thought, one that he had been pushing to the back of his mind, until finally he had to give it voice. ‘I hope that’s what I’m saying, Mr Ward. I really hope it is.’
The old man caught his meaning at once. ‘You don’t imagine . . .’
Proud gave him a strange smile. ‘I have a deputy. His name’s Bob Skinner and he’s from these parts.’
‘I know who you mean: Bill Skinner’s son.’
‘That’s right. Bob and I are very different types in our approaches to police work, but the more I get caught up in this thing, the more I find myself thinking like him.’
Fifty-three
For all its ugliness, Bandit Mackenzie liked the Fettes building. He had spent most of his service out in the sticks of Glasgow and North Lanarkshire; his spell at the centre of affairs in Edinburgh, in his role as head of the Drugs Squad, had been stimulating. The Leith posting reminded him of Cumbernauld, which had been by no means the highlight of his career.
He had to ask the doorkeeper for directions to McIlhenney’s new office. It was three floors up in the main office wing; he climbed the stair with a frown on his face.
The detective superintendent was standing in the doorway, waiting for him. ‘Hello, Bandit,’ he said, as he ushered him into the room. ‘That was a hell of a long half-hour.’
‘Traffic,’ Mackenzie grunted.
‘That’s always the tale in Edinburgh. Take a seat.’ There was no offer of tea or coffee; the chief inspector was surprised, until he remembered that McIlhenney drank neither. ‘So, David,’ he began, ‘what have you got to tell me? How’s the Starr investigation going?’
‘We’ve just seen his ex-wife; she’s a right brassy cow, but she’s well alibied for the time of death. So’s her husband: he’s a long-distance driver. Before that we saw Starr’s current girlfriend, Mina Clarkson. Nothing there: she had the occasional bet in his shop and he gave her one equally occasionally. That’s us done with interviewing family and associates.’
‘Leads?’
‘A few; we’re following them up.’
McIlhenney leaned across his desk. ‘And where exactly are you doing that? Pamplona in Spain? How about that?’
Mackenzie felt his chair shift under him, and realised that instinctively he had pushed it backwards. ‘I had occasion to call the police there for assistance,’ he said.
‘So I gather. And in their turn, the Guardia Civil, which has jurisdiction over all drugs crime in Spain, had occasion to call the Scottish Drug Enforcement Agency and ask them what the hell you and the local plods were doing poking your nose into an operation on which the two of them have been co-operating for months. This led to the director of the SDEA calling the head of CID and asking him much the same thing, and not very politely either. Since he didn’t know what the fuck he was talking about . . . well, you can imagine his reaction. Mind you, you nearly didn’t have to imagine: it took all my powers of persuasion to get him to leave this to me.’
‘Neil . . .’
‘Shut up!’ the superintendent snarled. ‘How do you see me? Good old Neil, amiable guy, soft touch, string him along: is that it? Was that what you thought? Well, I’ve got news for you, pal. That’s the face I show to my wife and kids, to colleagues I trust and to people I like, people who don’t upset me. Those who do get to see the other side, like you are just now. Chief Inspector, you may be pissed off about being moved to Leith, or you may be carrying some residue from the St Andrews operation. I do not know and I do not fucking care. What I do perceive is an arrogant bastard who’s on a one-man mission to prove that he’s better than anyone else in this department, and who’s prepared to jeopardise anything in its pursuit. Well, Bandit, you may be prepared to put your own career in the crapper, but don’t think that you can drag mine along with it. You don’t agree with what I’m saying? You believe your own press cuttings? You want to take me on? Try it. I’ll fucking bury you.’
Mackenzie looked back at him, making an attempt to summon up some belligerence, some sort of a defence against the onslaught, and then he folded. ‘Neil, I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I should have told you about the drugs and the money. I was out of order. It won’t happen again.’
‘True; not on this investigation at any rate, because you’re benched.’
‘You mean I’m suspended?’
‘No, you’re on holiday. You and Cheryl are decorating the bathroom, and you’ve been planning it for some time. I’ll see you a week on Monday; then we’ll talk about second chances.’
Fifty-four
Normally, Bob Skinner preferred his dentist’s chair to the passenger seat of a car. However, on the way to Bakewell he was content to leave the driving to Shannon: he had serious thinking to do.
The inspector thought that he was asleep as she turned off the M1, skirting Chesterfield as she headed for the A619 and the Derbyshire Dales: she was startled when he spoke. ‘I brought my older daughter down here on holiday once,’ he said, ‘when she was about thirteen. Easter was late that year, and we decided to do something different. It was bloody freezing, but the pub food was terrific, and they were relaxed about letting Alex in. It’s nice countryside.’ He smiled at the memory. ‘Maybe I’ll do the same with the second lot in a few years. Jeez,’ he mused, ‘I’ll tell you, Dottie, being a one-parent family isn’t something you reckon to do once in a lifetime, but twice . . .’
The revelation took Shannon by surprise; for a moment she wondered whether she should sympathise, but decided that silence was the better option. As if he sensed her unease, the DCC moved on. ‘Okay, tell me about Esther Archer.’
‘She’s Esther Craig now, aged thirty-six, and married to a baker called Elton Craig . . . but you knew that already from the letter. She has two sons, Aaron, who’s eleven, and Joshua, who’s just turned eight. The family seems to go in for Biblical names. Her parents were Joshua Archer, a soldier, and Joan Hartland, who’s described as a housewife on Esther’s birth certificate. The father was killed in action, serving with Two Para in the Falklands, but the mother is still alive. However, there is no record anywhere of the birth of anyone called Moses Archer.’
‘There wouldn’t be: Adam, and the MoD, would have made sure his tracks were covered for the family’s sake. That’s why I find the houseboat so hard to figure out.’ He glanced at her. ‘What were you able to find out about that?’
‘He’s been registered as owner with the Port of London Authority for the last six years. The previous owner was a Dutch registered company: Archer bought it from them for a hundred and thirty thousand pounds, paid in full by certified cheque drawn on an account in the Premier Taiwan Bank, City of London branch.’
‘Who was the account holder?’
