we’ve heard it elsewhere too. But when Graham described the scene, I thought I’d better take a look for myself, and that you should see it too. You agree with me, do you, that it’s just like the other one?’
The detective inspector nodded. ‘Absolutely. The way the body’s arranged, the fact that it’s a female, the age group, it all matches. She’s dressed differently, and her hair colour is different, but otherwise it’s identical.’ He glanced around. ‘Has the area been disturbed at all?’
‘I’m assured that it hasn’t; not since she was found, at any rate.’
‘Well, that knocks the supposition of suicide on the head. There’s no sort of paraphernalia around, no pill containers, no syringe, no booze bottles, no blades.’
‘And no blood, just like the South Queensferry murder. It looks as if she died instantly.’
‘You reckon she might have been killed somewhere else and brought here?’ asked Steele.
‘That’s a possibility, I suppose, but look around you, look at the sand: it’s unremarkably flat around the body. If she’d been dragged, it would show. If somebody had carried her here, surely his feet would have dug deep under the weight, and we’d still see the tracks. There’s been no wind to smooth them over; at least, that’s what the local officers told me. It just looks as if she was walking on the beach when someone came up behind her and . . . whap!’
‘Yeah. That’s what we reckon in the other one too, but we’ve never been able to say for sure.’
‘No: because it’s still unsolved.’
The inspector winced. ‘We’ve done everything we can, boss. But every lead we’ve followed has wound up taking us precisely nowhere.’
‘Hey, I’m not knocking your investigation, Stevie,’ McGuire assured him, ‘just stating a fact. You couldn’t have been more thorough; whoever shot Stacey Gavin was either very clever, or very bloody lucky. Normally I would expect the latter, but if this is a repeat performance, Christ, it looks ominous.’
‘Might it be a copycat?’
‘How? You know as well as I do that all our press statements were cleared through Neil McIlhenney, and the crime scene was never described in any of them. No, we begin with the assumption that it’s . . .’
The head of CID stopped in mid-sentence. ‘No, we don’t. If our deputy chief constable was here he’d kick my arse . . . and an arse-kicking by Bob Skinner is something to be avoided. We begin by following proper procedure. Let’s allow the doc in for a more thorough examination, and an estimate of time of death.’ He turned and lifted the flap of the enclosing screen that had been erected all around the body, holding it up for his colleague as they stepped out on to the beach.
Aidan Brown, the pathologist, was waiting a few yards away, clad in the same crime-scene tunic as the detectives. He was a tall man, in his mid-thirties: he had been on the scene for a few years and was known to both of them. ‘Sorry to keep you, Doc,’ said McGuire, as he approached. ‘I wanted to let DI Steele see things exactly as they were found. You can go in now and take a look at the body.’
‘I suppose you want my thoughts on cause of death, as well as time?’ His accent was light, Irish.
The head of CID nodded. ‘I do, but I suggest that you begin by taking a look at the base of her skull.’
The medical examiner frowned. ‘Have you . . .?’
‘We didn’t lay a finger on her. There’s a tenner on it if you fancy a bet on the cause, though.’
Brown chuckled. ‘That’ll be the day. I’m a scientist, man: I don’t indulge in such frivolities.’
‘You mean you’re a tight bastard.’
‘It’s in our Irish blood, Mario,’ the pathologist shot back. ‘You should know that.’
Steele glanced at them: McGuire had switched from tender to hard-boiled mode in a few minutes. Yet he knew that it was forced, the copper’s defence mechanism against the realities of the job. Not for the first time, he found himself wondering about his unborn child, his and Maggie’s: a daughter, as they knew already. How would her personality be moulded . . . blessed or cursed . . . with two police officers for parents?
‘How’s Mags?’
The question, thrown from out of nowhere as he watched Brown move off towards the tented area, took the inspector completely off-guard. ‘She’s fine,’ he replied, a little abruptly. ‘How’s Paula?’ At once he regretted his impetuosity. McGuire’s new partner, Paula Viareggio, had been, briefly, a figure in his past, but that was not something the two men had ever discussed.
But the big man simply shrugged. ‘She’s good. Busy as ever; maybe busier, now that the family business is a public limited company. She’s got more legal stuff to look after, and she spends more time talking to the accountants.’
Silence fell between them for a few seconds, until McGuire broke it awkwardly. ‘I’m sorry, Stevie,’ he said. ‘Don’t think I’m prying, please. But Maggie and I were . . . Shit, you know what I mean. Her being pregnant, it’s so . . .’
‘Unexpected?’
‘Well, yeah. Tell me if I’m wrong, tell me the two of you planned it, but I’d guess it came as a hell of a surprise to you both. If that’s so, it hasn’t exactly happened at the best time for her career.’
Steele looked out to sea. They stood in the middle of a wide bay, bitten out of the coastline by nature and defined by a semicircle of sand dunes, which formed a natural bridge to the bents above. The tide was at its highest and the water was millpond-calm, so flat that the sound of the engines of a distant tanker carried all the way to shore. ‘You’re not wrong, Mario,’ he replied. ‘And I hear what you’re saying about timing. But does she want a career any longer, assuming that everything goes all right with the baby? That’s the question you really should be asking.’
‘You’re kidding me!’ McGuire exclaimed. ‘Maggie’s thinking about packing the job in? She’s one of the most career-minded people I’ve ever met.’
‘She’s mentioned the possibility; that’s all I’ll say for now. That’s strictly between you and me, by the way. Understood?’
‘Of course. So she hasn’t discussed it with anyone else? The DCC, for example, or Brian Mackie, now that she reports to him?’
‘She hasn’t had the opportunity to discuss it with Mr Skinner, even if she was inclined to. Remember: he’s been on sabbatical since the end of January. As for our new assistant chief constable, they may have known each other for a while, but she’s not ready to discuss careers with him.’
‘Why not?’
The inspector frowned. ‘I’m not sure, but I don’t think she trusts him enough.’
‘Brian Mackie? Why wouldn’t she trust him?’
‘Because he’s new in post: people change when they go into the Command Corridor. I reckon she has a concern . . . I’ll put it no stronger . . . that if she went into a meeting with him to discuss career options, she might come out without any. No, let everyone assume what they will, I reckon she’ll say nothing about her future until after the baby’s born and maybe not till she’s getting close to the end of her maternity leave.’
‘When does she go off?’
‘In three days. She finishes on Friday.’
‘How long can she take?’
‘A full year from then, if she wants; and just between you and me again, that’s her present intention.’
‘Jesus! She’ll be bored stiff after a month.’
‘Maybe, but a month after that she won’t, not with the baby on her hands.’
‘I suppose you’ll be going off then too. Bloody paternity leave,’ he grumbled. ‘Losing Neil McIlhenney is something I did not need.’
‘You’re complaining about that?’ Steele laughed. ‘I thought you were going to be his new son’s godfather.’
‘Louis? That I am. I’m his big brother Spencer’s too, but Neil didn’t get swanning off for a fortnight when he was born.’
‘Times change, sir.’
‘I don’t know what you’re grinning about,’ McGuire retorted. ‘With Bandit Mackenzie off on extended sick leave, you’re running your subdivision, and with Neil away . . .’ He broke off, as Dr Brown re-emerged from the green enclosure. ‘Well, Doc?’
‘I’m glad I didn’t take the bet.’ The Irishman grimaced. ‘It looks as if death was caused by a single gunshot fired directly into the brain, upwards through the second spinal vertebra. It wasn’t a contact wound, but the muzzle
