bank account on Tuesday of last week. Since then, neither his cash card nor his credit card has been used; his account balance is eleven hundred and forty-one pounds.'
'He can't have run far, then. Do you think he could be in the founds of a new building somewhere?'
'I'm beginning to wonder. If he is, I just hope it'l be heavy enough to hold the swine down.'
28
Bob Skinner had been several times to the USA, before and since his marriage to his American wife. He had been to New York City and State, to Florida and to the original California Disneyland with his daughter Alex, to Houston, Texas, on an exchange visit, and to Atlanta, Georgia, as a delegate to a security conference. However he had never been to the north-western states, and nothing had prepared him for their size or for the spectacle they offered.
The flight to Great Falls, Montana, was blessed with cloudless conditions all the way, across the pale blue of the Great Lakes, the green of Michigan, and the changing shades of the landscape below as they flew westward. Even Skinner, who tended to view the wonders of nature with a jaundiced eye, spent the entire journey looking out of the window of the aircraft.
The hundred-mile drive down Interstate Fifteen to Helena was no less dramatic; the first half of their route, through Cascade County, ran close to the great Missouri River… the Scot had had no idea that it originated so far north… past Cascade itself, then into the great open spaces of Lewis and dark. Finally they drove into the Helena Valley, overlooked by its gently sloping mountain, with the small state capital nestled at its heart.
'Well, did you enjoy that?' asked Doherty, who had driven from the airport in a rental car, as they cruised past the State Capitol building, to arrive at the Investigations Bureau headquarters on North Roberts.
'Yes,' Skinner admitted. 'But enough of the tourist bit. Who are we seeing?'
'The Bureau guy's name is Tad Polhaus. The police chief is Chuck Harris, but he's on holiday, so we'll be met by the senior detective, Lieutenant Gordon Sumner.'
The Montana investigators were waiting for them in the Bureau Chief's office on the second floor of the building. Both were in their mid thirties; Polhaus was big and beefy, his broad features proclaiming his German ancestry, while Sumner was lean and wiry, equally tall but looking like a welterweight alongside his colleague.
Ill
As they ran through the formalities of the introduction, and took their seats around a coffee table. Skinner looked for signs of one deferring to the other but found none. State cop and city cop seemed to treat each other as equals; there was no sign of the jurisdictional jealousy that he had found in Buffalo. However they were both visibly impressed by, and slightly in awe of, the Deputy Director of the FBI, and his Scottish companion.
'Welcome to Montana, gentlemen,' said Polhaus. He looked at Doherty. 'I don't suppose I need to tell you, Mr Deputy Director, that your cal took us by surprise. Make no mistake though, we're hell of a glad you're here. We've run into a complete brick wall on this Wilkins homicide investigation. Any input you can give us will be more than welcome.'
Lieutenant Sumner nodded. 'I'l second that, Tad,' he concurred, but tell me, sir, what brought this case to your attention? You gentlemen haven't come to the Queen of the Rockies just to see the sights.'
'I have,' Skinner told him. 'I'm an observer here, just tagging along on Mr Doherty's invitation. A visiting fireman, I understand you'd cal me.'
'Now why don't I believe that?' said the city detective. 'I did some research on you, Deputy Chief Skinner. I had a look at your force's website, and at a couple of files on Internet versions of your Scottish newspapers. I know who you are; I know what you've been into. You haven't come here for the fishing.'
Doherty laughed. 'Goddamn Internet. Pretty soon there wil be no secrets left in this world… but we're not at that stage yet, otherwise, pretty as your city is, we wouldn't be here. Tell me about the late Bartholomew Wilkins.'
'There isn't much to tell,' Polhaus answered, 'as far as his life around here goes. He was sixty-eight years old but he had been among us for only the last three years, since he retired from legal practice in Chicago, Illinois. He and his wife RoseAnne bought a house here at that time.'
'Any family?' asked Skinner.
'They have a son named Arthur, who succeeded his father as senior partner in the Chicago firm, and two daughters, Annette and Merle.'
'Where's the body?'
'It was released to the family last Friday. Mrs Wilkins and her son flew back to Chicago on Saturday with the coffin, for burial in their family plot. She said that the services were scheduled for Wednesday. Is there a problem with that?'
'I shouldn't think so,' said Doherty. 'Were either of you two gentlemen at the crime scene?'
'We both were,' Sumner replied. 'When she found her husband, the lady assumed at first that he had fal en and cut his head; she thought he was unconscious, and she reported the circumstances as such, so a paramedic crew was sent. They realised that it was a fatality, so they called for a patrolman to attend. Fortunately one of our smarter guys responded. He saw that there was no obvious place for the victim to have cut himself and that there was no blood trail… indeed that there was very little blood. So he radioed in for detective backup.
'When I got there I knew at once that this was no superficial head wound, and I knew that I was going to need Tad's resources as well as my own.'
'Going on the report that was filed, and logged on to the national database, you decided that this was a homicide committed in the course of a burglary.'
'That's what it was,' Polhaus exclaimed. 'We're in no doubt about it.
There were articles removed from the house. Mr Wilkins' pocketbook was taken, containing Amex, Master and Visa cards and over four hundred dol ars in cash. The man wore a ten-grand Breitling watch. That was gone; so was a heavy gold bracelet from his other wrist and a top specification laptop computer from his desk.
'If that doesn't constitute a burglary, sir, I don't know what does.'
'Neither do I, Chief,' Skinner assured him. 'No one's disputing that for one minute. How about signs of entry? The report I read didn't mention that.'
'There weren't any. Gordon and I believe that Mrs Wilkins left the back door open when she went out to the mal and that the guy just walked in. She recal ed that she locked it, but she admitted that she couldn't be certain.'
'She's been eliminated as a possibility, I take it?'
'Yes she has, completely. We did consider that possibility, don't worry, but the autopsy ruled that out straight away. The knife wound in the victim's head was five inches deep. It went clear through his brain; if the blade had been any longer it would have come out the other side of the skul. That was a hellish powerful blow, Mr Skinner. She couldn't have done it.'
'Did the pathologist give you a picture of the person who did?'
'Yes. A right-handed man, he said; probably as tall as the victim, and he was six one. Mrs Wilkins is five two; we're looking for a big guy, not a little woman.'
'Granted,' the DCC agreed. 'How about location? Where did the attack happen?'
'In the victim's den; his study, I suppose you'd call it in England.'
Skinner smiled. 'I wouldn't cal it anything in England, Chief; I'm a Scot, remember. I know what a den is; I know also from my father-in law that quite often it's in converted cellar space. Was that the case here?'
'Yes, it was. It's accessed by a door off the hall leading to a flight of stairs.'
'Apart from the items you described, what else was taken from the house?'
Skinner saw the frown gather on Polhaus' broad face. 'Nothing, according to Mrs Wilkins.'
'What else was disturbed?'
'Nothing, but so what? Our theory is that the guy broke in, started his search in the den and was disturbed by the victim. He kil ed him, grabbed what he could, and ran for it. There was a home gym next door and a shower-room beyond that. Maybe Wilkins was taking a leak and came back in.'
