'No. He called to say that Sarah's making him stay at home for the rest of the week.'
'Okay.' He hung up and looked at his wife. 'That settles that. We're going to Gullane.'
66
Jack McGurk snapped into wakefulness; he had been on the verge of dozing off as he leaned back in the passenger seat of the anonymous Vauxhall as he watched the building across Rothesay Terrace. He sighed, deeply; 'Ah, bloody hell, Ray,' he said, to the man behind the wheel, 'I hate this sort of duty. Sometimes I wonder if Dan Pringle's still blaming me for that crap my brother-in-law printed in the News'
'Come on, Jack, you've still got your stripes, haven't you?' said DC Wilding. He grinned. 'No-one ever held that against you… at least not for long, anyway.'
'Maybe so, maybe so. Someone's got to do this, I know. It's just
…'
'It's just that you thought that once you became a sergeant you could leave this sort of crap to poor bloody foot soldiers like me.'
McGurk laughed. 'Aye, I suppose so. Whereas all that's happened is that I get to sit on this side of the car, not in the driver's seat.' He glanced at his watch. 'Five to bloody one. Chances are they'll be having a boardroom lunch in there, and you and I'll be stuck here till fuckin' six o'clock or later.'
'Or maybe not,' said Wilding. 'Look.' McGurk followed the direction of his nod, and saw a man trotting briskly down the steps which led from the offices of Paris Simons. He seemed to move awkwardly, an impression created by his twisted, stunted left arm, undisguisable even by his expensively cut suit.
'Our man,' the Sergeant muttered. He made to open the car door, until his colleague laid a hand on his shoulder. 'Wait, Jack, wait.' As they watched, Luke Heard strode along the pavement and turned into an alleyway at the side of the building. 'There's a car park back there.'
'He can drive? With that arm?'
Wilding nodded. 'He's got an S-type Jag. Automatic, with adaptations, I suppose.'
The two detectives sat for a minute, watching, until a silver Jaguar with Heard at the wheel, appeared in the alleyway and turned left into the road, heading eastwards. The Constable slid the Vauxhall into gear and set off after him.
The fund manager took a right turn at the end of Rothesay Terrace, not noticing, apparently, the vehicle following. He headed downhill, and across Belford Bridge, the temporary resting place of Howard Shearer, then up Belford Road, until he turned into Ravelston Dykes.
'Where's he going, d'you think?' Wilding mused.
'Maybe he's off to the casino to lose another couple of grand. We'll see.' They tailed Heard down to Western Corner and then along the Corstorphine Road, out of the city. 'Aye,' McGurk muttered as they swept past Murrayfield Hospital, 'Looks like the tables right enough.'
The right turn took them completely by surprise. 'Fuck me, he's going into the zoo!' snapped Wilding. 'He'll twig if I follow him in there.'
'Pull into the filling station opposite,' the Sergeant ordered. 'We'll leg it.' His colleague did as he was told, swinging off the road and parking on the forecourt, well clear of the pumps, and flashing his warrant card at the attendant, before following McGurk across the road to the grey-walled zoo.
'Police,' the Sergeant barked at the girl on the admissions kiosk. 'Let us in, quick.'
Inside, they looked around, until Wilding spotted the sleek form of the Jaguar, brake-lights shining as it pulled into a car park beside a stone building. 'Look; the bastard's going for his lunch, Jack,' he gasped, breathlessly. 'There's a club out here, and he's probably a member. He must be, to be able to park there.'
'Let's just wait and see.'
The two detectives stood at the top of a rise, a hundred yards distant, watching Heard as he climbed out of his car. Before he closed the door he reached across to the passenger seat, picked up an object, and slipped it into his pocket. Then, instead of heading for the building he turned on his heel and strode out of the park, into the zoo itself.
'Going to throw buns to the elephants, d'you think?' murmured McGurk.
'Not in that direction. He's heading for the penguins; first place my kids make for when I bring them here.'
Edinburgh Zoo's penguins are its star attraction. At weekends or during holiday periods, their enclosure would have been surrounded by spectators, but on a midweek afternoon it was deserted, except for a tall girl in dungarees and green Wellington boots; she was brushing the pathway around the pen. Heard walked straight up to her and stopped. She was as tall as him. As the detectives watched, maintaining a safe distance, she smiled and leaned forward as if to kiss him, but he swayed back.
'Now who the hell's she, I wonder?' the Sergeant whispered, under his breath.
'Bit on the side? Lucky him if she is.'
'He doesn't fancy it today, then; even from this far away, he does not look like a happy man.'
Their target stood stiffly, facing the girl. His voice was raised as he spoke to her, for fragments of incomprehensible sound seemed to drifted across on the light breeze. She was in no way intimidated; instead she stared at him, eyes bright, lips moving in a retort. All at once, Luke Heard seemed to slump down into himself. He reached into his pocket, took out the packet which he had brought from the car, and shoved it roughly down the front of her overalls. Then he turned on his heel and walked away, back down the rise. McGurk and Wilding watched him, all the way back to the car park.
'What the fuck d'you think that was about?' the Constable exclaimed as they watched him slide back into the Jaguar. i don't know, Ray,' McGurk answered. 'But I think we should find out.'
'Will we brace the girl?'
'Not without checking with Dan Pringle; we don't want to blow our surveillance of Heard just yet. She works here. We can find out who she is, and talk to her any time we like.'
'I've just remembered who she is, Jack,' said Wilding, quietly. 'I recognise her from this distance, even if you don't; you and I took a statement from her the Saturday before last. She's the girl who spotted Howard Shearer in the Water of Leith.'
67
Skinner put down the telephone and stared out of the conservatory, across the wide Firth of Forth. There was something unsettling about Lennie Plenderleith; even when he spoke to the man by telephone, as he just had for the first time in his life.
Big Lennie, when he was Tony Manson's first lieutenant, had maimed or murdered God knew how many people; later, after his mentor's death he had taken revenge in savage and terminal fashion. He had even tried to kill Skinner himself.
And yet, in spite of it all, against all logic, he found himself liking the giant in Shotts Prison. 'Why?' he asked himself, yet inwardly he knew the answer. In his own way, Lennie understood the meaning of loyalty and obligation as well as anyone he knew and had practised them, even though it had led to his imprisonment for life.
Those were the virtues which Bob Skinner valued above all others and if, in Plenderleith's case, these were accompanied by awesome, pitiless violence when he perceived it to be necessary… the DCC knew that the same streak ran through him. They came from different backgrounds, they had taken different paths through life, yet as Skinner sat in his comfortable home, he wondered whether, had their circumstances been reversed, it might have been him who had ended up in a cell.
Forcing himself to shove the thought to one side, he picked up the phone again, dialled the Torphichen Place police office and asked for Detective Superintendent Pringle.
'Afternoon, sir,' said the veteran as he came on line. 'Did you get anything?'
