'What's this three o'clock meeting about, Jack?' the DCC asked. He checked his watch: it was two forty- five.
'I don't know, sir. The chief, ACC Haggerty and DCI McIlhenney are involved in it; people from London, that's all they've said.'
'Ah,' said Skinner. 'Colleagues from another service, I suspect; spooks, to the punters. Where is it?'
'The main conference room.'
'Okay.' He rose from behind the desk. 'Thanks, Jack. Now I must have a word with Sir James.' He followed McGurk from the room and stepped across the corridor. Gerry Crossley, the chief constable's secretary, was at his desk in the anteroom that led to the chief's office. He looked up as Skinner entered, then blinked in surprise.
'Hello, sir,' he exclaimed. 'Good to see you back.'
'Thanks, Gerry, I'm not sorry about it myself.' He nodded towards the door to his right. 'Is he…?'
'Yes. Go on in.'
Skinner opened the door and stepped into the office. He had never coveted it: although it was bigger than his, the view was over the playing-field behind the headquarters building. The silver-haired figure behind the desk was bent over a folder, studying its contents. 'Yes, Gerry,' he murmured.
'Wrong: try again.'
Sir James Proud's eyes widened; a smile followed. 'Bob!' he exclaimed. 'Willie said that we could expect you today, but he wasn't sure when. You must be exhausted, man.'
'I'm fine,' Skinner replied. 'I managed to get my head down for a while.'
'How did things go? Did you and Sarah…?'
'Things are not yet resolved.' He sighed. 'In fact, Jimmy, truth be told, we're in a right pickle, and it's more my fault than hers. I'd like to talk to you about it, when we've more time.'
'Mmm,' the veteran chief constable murmured. 'Forgive me for asking this, but it's been on my mind. Do I sense a dangerous liaison in the air?'
Bob stared at him, pure surprise in his eyes. 'Has someone been talking to you?'
Proud Jimmy shook his head. 'No,' he said, quickly. 'But the new Justice Minister is a very attractive and dynamic woman, and when I saw her in your office a few weeks ago, it occurred to me that it might not have been an official visit.'
'I see. So you haven't had a visit yourself, then?'
'No. Who'd have come to see me?'
'Greg Jay, perhaps.'
'Jay?' Sir James looked baffled. 'What's he got to do with anything? He's not part of the picture any more. Since you've been away, he's taken early retirement and gone.'
Skinner grunted. 'He might have gone, Jimmy, but he hasn't retired. He's the First Minister's new security adviser, so-called.'
'Good God!' The chief slapped his desk lightly; it was as close as he ever came to an angry gesture. 'The duplicitous so-and-so! He never mentioned a word of it to me. He let me believe that he had had enough and wanted to work on his garden and his golf handicap.'
'No, he has other plans for his future. His appointment's a real bugger, too. When he was in the job, Jock Govan was a friend of ours; most certainly Greg will not be, as he's proved already. Murtagh's had him keeping tabs on Aileen and, in the process, on me.'
'And has he found anything…'
'That could damage us? If you mean real harm as opposed to some fleeting and unpleasant publicity, no, and he won't, either, because there's nothing to find. From now on, I'll be watching him even closer than he's watching us. But it's all very murky, Jimmy. Very soon you and I and all the others are going to find that we've got a new boss.'
'Who?'
'The First Minister… directly.'
Sir James gasped. 'But he can't,' he protested.
Skinner frowned at him. 'He doesn't have that word in his vocabulary, Jimmy,' he said. 'And people who don't, they tend to be rather dangerous.'
Eighteen
McIlhenney stared at the phone in his hand as if it was smiling at him. Finally he put it down, retrieved Andy Martin's private office number in Dundee from his index, and called it.
'How goes, big fella?' asked the Tayside deputy chief. 'Why's Special Branch calling me?'
'This isn't Special Branch,' he replied. 'This is DCC Skinner's vicar on Earth. He wants to see you and me together, on the quiet, as soon as you can make it.'
'What do you mean 'on the quiet'?'
'I mean nobody else is to know about it. Somewhere off patch, he told me.'
'What's the mystery?'
'No idea. He's literally just back from Florida; one of the first things he did was to tell me to set up this meeting, but he didn't say why.'
'Just us?'
'Just you, me, and him: nobody else is to know about it. I tell you, Andy, he's got me worried. If he wants the two of us together like this it's not just for a pint: he's got something serious to tell us.'
'What's your guess?'
'I'm trying not to guess,' McIlhenney exclaimed, 'but he's fresh back from the States. Do you know what he's been doing there?'
'Trying to sort things out with Sarah, he told me. And she's been making loud noises about wanting him to quit.'
'Exactly. What if she's persuaded him?'
'Forced him to choose between the force and the kids, you mean? She's hardened a lot over the last couple of years, I'll admit, through her parents dying, then Bob's illness, and her own troubles. I could see her putting it that way. But whether he'd give in… that's another matter.'
'I'm not so sure: his four children are the only thing in this life he values above the job.'
'You know what you're saying there?' asked Martin. 'That he puts the job over Sarah.'
'He's proved that in the past,' McIlhenney reminded him. 'Besides…' he stopped himself short.
'What?'
'Nothing. Nothing at all. When can you manage?'
'Tomorrow, midday: let's meet in the Green Hotel, in Kinross. It's off your patch, if not mine, and about equidistant for all of us.'
'Deal. I can do that and the boss will change his diary if he has to.'
'Fine. I'll make the arrangements from here.' Martin paused. 'By the way, while you're on, have you seen your colleague Mackenzie lately? I've been expecting to hear from him about a wee bit of business we did together on Sunday.'
'You won't,' said McIlhenney. 'That's disappeared.'
'What? They were looking at attempted murder and Christ knows what else. The guy Cable bloody near spiked me.'
'And he's got the nose to prove it. Forget that one, Andy: we'll buy you a new jacket if it'll make you happy.'
'Put the old one back together: that'll make me happy. Anyway, you can tell me all about it tomorrow.'
'Maybe yes, maybe no. See you at the hotel.' He hung up and checked his watch, then pressed a button on his desk that changed the light outside his door from red to green.
Almost at once, Bandit Mackenzie stepped into the room. He glanced at his watch. 'Five minutes to three,' he said. 'Spot on. So, what am I here for? If it's to tell me that Special Branch wants to know every move that the
