shout rose as it travelled, and reached a crescendo as it dropped into the hole for a three, and a round of 64.
Skinner, with Wales and Murano at his heels, stepped across to shake his captain's hand.
'Well played, partner,' he said. 'That was even better than yesterday.'
`You don't know how much better,' said Atkinson. 'When you're playing for this sort of dough, the fairways, and greens, even the hole itself, are helluva narrow. The hole seems barely more than the width of the ball. Look at some of the other scores.'
Skinner peered up at the board behind the stand to the left of the green. Atkinson was four shots clear of Andres Cortes, who was alone in second place, with Ewan Urquhart and Deacon Weekes a further shot back. Oliver M'tebe had recovered to level par, but Tiger Nakamura had crashed to 75.
`The team must be well placed too, Bob. You chipped in with five birdies on top of my eight under, then there was Norton's crazy two at that short hole. I make it we're fourteen under in total. We're on a roll, boys.' Arms around the shoulders of Skinner and Wales, he led them towards the Recorder's tent to register their cards. Too bad I let you down with that six.'
`You didn't, pal,' said Skinner, with undisguised triumph. 'I covered your tail on that one, remember!'
Atkinson laughed aloud. 'I told you you were a bandit off seven. A gross seventy-four for Christ's sake. D'you realise you shot one better than the Tiger? Come on, I'll buy you all a drink to celebrate. Let's hand our cards in, talk to the press, then go change.'
They stopped at the entrance to the tent, totalled and signed their scorecards. Skinner handed his to Atkinson. 'If you'll register that for me, I'll join you guys in the bar. I want to call in on my people, and I'd rather do that before I have a drink.' He glanced towards the clubhouse and saw Sarah, seated beside Arthur Highfield, through the window of the first-floor dining room, which was in use as a competitors' hospitality suite. 'Tell my wife where I am if you get there before me, will you?'
Skirting the clubhouse, and waving to Sarah as he passed, he jogged round to the tented village, and to the mobile police office. He jumped up the three steps and thrust the door open. Inside, Alison Higgins and Andy Martin — looking as uncomfortable as ever in his Superintendent's uniform — were seated at the table which they had used earlier for their press conference. They were watching television, and looked round in surprise as Skinner entered.
`What the hell's this?' he barked, in mock anger. 'There's a murder investigation on here.'
Higgins took him seriously, and looked flustered. She switched off the TV. 'We've gone as far as we can go on the enquiry, sir. We've got Morton more or less under open arrest, we've got all the other players and celebrities under very discreet police guard, and we've interviewed everyone relevant. There have been a couple of developments, though sir.'
OK Ali, calm down and tell me what they are. No, let me guess one of them. There's been another letter to the Scotsman.'
The detective looked up sharply. 'Not quite, sir. This one was shoved through the letterbox of the Herald office in York Place. They called us and faxed a copy down here.' She picked up a sheet of curling A4 paper, sliced from a fax roll, and handed it to him.
Skinner looked at it and frowned. 'I was afraid this would happen. Typed this time,' he muttered. 'Wonder why that should be?'
He read aloud, 'Dear Editor, By water… so goes another.'
`Brief and to the point. Right, I want the original, not a fax. I want publication stopped too.
The Herald might not like it, but enough's enough. I let the first one go because I thought it was a crank, to see if we could smoke him out. But now, with a second murder I'm beginning to get a chilly feeling. Do we know when this was received?'
`Mario's been to the Herald to check that out, sir. It was found in the hallway at York Place around ten, behind the door, but it had been there since the receptionist got in at nine. It was in a dirty envelope, with footprints all over, and the girl thought it was rubbish that the cleaner had missed. A delivery rider picked it up eventually and handed it to her. She tore it open, saw the 'Dear Editor', and stuck it, as usual, in the newsdesk in- tray. They get lots of punter stuff handed in like that. It didn't come to the top till twelve-thirty. The Herald contacted us just before one. The editor called me, personally.'
`When did you hold your press conference?'
`We began at nine-forty-five, and finished about ten past ten.'
And no details of the death were reported before then?'
'No, sir. The first report of a second incident at Witches' Hill was on Radio Forth at nine o'clock, and that said only that the start of play had been delayed by a police operation on the course. No one said anything about a death, before we issued our statement at the press conference.'
`Therefore…' he paused `…whoever dropped that note off at the Herald, knew about the murder, and the detail of it, before it was made public. Apart from us, Jimmy Robertson, the club pro, who's been in shock since he found the body, and the ambulance drivers — who are all tight-lipped — only twelve people at Bracklands knew about this. They have all been under police guard since Masur's death, so none of them could have slipped up to Edinburgh to stick this through the Herald's door.'
`Could one of them have been playing silly buggers, sir, phoning an accomplice in town?'
`Nice thought, but no way. Andy, Neil and I were with the house party until around quarter to nine. The envelope was through the Herald letterbox by nine. I'd say that possibility is ruled out.
`That just leaves the killer in a position to drop that note, or have it dropped. We were entitled to be sceptical about the first letter. The second makes it deadly serious. Do we know how Maggie got on in Germany with the Soutar girl?'
`She called in from Amsterdam Airport, sir. She's coming here to report at eight-thirty tomorrow morning.'
`Good, I want to hear what she's got to say.'
He paused. 'Right, what else do we have? Post-mortem results, forensics on Morton's kit?'
On the P-M results, yes, sir. Sarah was right as usual. Blow to the head, then death by drowning. The lungs were full of water. There's nothing from the lab about Morton yet though. That could take a couple of days. They're having to take mud samples from the garden, from the banks of the loch, and from the fairway to see if they're different. They've found grass traces on the trousers, and they're having to take samples of that as well.'
`Bugger!' snapped Skinner, impatiently.
`Yes, boss, but here's some good news. The manufacturers of those cigarettes called. They're sending up a full report, but what they're saying is that the stub we sent down is special. The company is about to launch a new brand of luxury fag, and last week they handed out some samples… last Saturday morning in fact, at the European Golf Tour event in England. They won't be on sale anywhere for another month, and they've never been distributed anywhere else. So whoever smoked that cigarette in the starter's hut brought it all the way from last week's golf event, and he was there on Saturday.'
Skinner beamed with pleasure. 'Ali; he said, 'you may have made an unusual day even more memorable. Keep the pressure on our colleagues to find Richard Andrews, and let me know when they do. Now I must go. There's someone I have to see.'
He paused at the door, jerking a thumb towards the television set. 'What were you watching, by the way?'
Martin smiled. 'I had the TV people give us a monitor and a live feed in here. This event's going out worldwide. You were very impressive, boss. But what I want to know is, who taught you to putt like that?'
Only the best, my boy. And now I must go and talk to him.'
He jogged back to the clubhouse, and changed, after the briefest of showers, into his formal wear. Sarah and Jazz were the centre of attention when he reached the dining room. The baby was holding a golf glove, twisting it in his strong little hands. Skinner gave Sarah a quick kiss, as Darren Atkinson handed him a pint of McEwan's 80 Shilling ale. 'Cheers, skipper, I need this.' The policeman took a generous mouthful of beer, savouring its smoothness.
'Whose is the glove, Jazz?' he said.
The baby looked up at him, and gurgled.
I thought I'd try to interest him in the game early,' said Atkinson.
`That's nice of you. I'll see that it's preserved. He can hand it on to his firstborn. The way you played today
