Close to the Bone

The cell block was quiet, the singing and swearing of last night reduced to a sort of anxious murmur as people got ready for their turn in front of the Sheriff to find out if they’d be released on bail, or banged up in Craiginches.

‘Oh Lord, I got trapped in the lift with him once. Always take the stairs, and never light a match.’ She led the way to cell number eight and rapped on the door. ‘Best to let them know we’re out here, in case he’s pleasuring himself. Happens more often than you’d think.’ She slid open the hatch. ‘He’s had his breakfast, so don’t let the puppy-dog eyes con you into giving him any treats.’

Logan stepped up and peered into the cell. Dr Marks had graduated from the floor to the mattress, curled up in the foetal position, arms wrapped around his head. ‘Go away. .’

‘That was one night, Dr Marks. What do you think a week in prison’s going to be like? ’

‘They wouldn’t even switch off the light.’

‘That’s in case you decide to do yourself harm in the dark. Don’t want to find your cold dead body in the morning, do we? Probably a good idea to keep you on suicide watch up in Craiginches too. Sensitive lad like you- Sod.’ His phone was ringing. ‘Have a think and I’ll be back in a minute.’ He pulled it out. ‘McRae? ’

‘LoganDaveGoulding, how you doing? ’

He moved down to the end of the corridor and pushed through into the stairwell. ‘I’m kind of in the middle of something, Dave.’

‘Excellent, excellent. Look, I’ve got you a profile for Agnes Garfield.’

‘That was quick.’

‘Had a head start. Do you want the highlights? Agnes’s psychological condition means it’s unlikely she’s operating alone, or in a dominant role. She’s a subservient fantasist, looking for someone to make her dreams come true. That coupled with the obsession with books like Witchfire means she’s trying to live a life that never existed in the first place. She’ll probably resort to self-harm when things don’t live up to her expectations.’

‘Subservient? Didn’t you see what she did to Anthony Chung? Far as we can tell, he’s the only dominant-’

‘No. She’d never do anything to hurt or disappoint him. It isn’t-’

‘She staked him out on the linoleum and tortured him to death, Dave. Doesn’t get more final than that.’

Silence came from the other end of the line.

‘Dave? ’

‘Then that idiot Marks is even more useless than I thought. His files clearly show she’s elevated Anthony Chung to the position of personal deity. There’s literally nothing he can do that she isn’t going to forgive or see as a test of her faith. Infidelity, violence, abnormal sexual behaviour. .’

‘Well, he must’ve done something, because he’s lying in the morgue with. .’ Logan frowned at the stained concrete beneath his feet. ‘Wait a minute: Marks’s files? ’

‘Have you read Witchfire? In it there are three primary forms of punishment doled out by the Fingermen: trial by fire, trial by blood, and trial by water. We’ve had the first two. She’s going to have a go at chucking someone in a river next, and if they don’t drown she’ll drag them back on shore and burn them.’

‘How did you get your hands on Dr Marks’s files? ’

‘Agnes started off pretending to be in Rowan’s world. It was a harmless fantasy, daydreaming she was someone special with a destiny and power, but she did it so often that it became habitual. The fantasy became real. She’s not play-acting any more, she genuinely thinks they’re witches and they’re evil and they need to be purged to save their souls.’ A deep breath. ‘And that’s where the problem starts: there’s a dichotomy at the heart of Agnes’s psyche and it’s eating her sense of self. In the book, Rowan’s a witch- finder that doesn’t believe in witches, but has to punish them. But Agnes doesn’t just believe in witches, she thinks she is one. She’s trapped between two diametric delusions.’

‘Dave!’

‘I broke into his office, it’s not important. What matters is that she’s following a pattern: it’s not malevolent, it’s not because she enjoys it, it’s because this is what she believes she has to do.’

‘You broke. .? ’ Logan glanced up and down the corridor. No one there. But he lowered his voice to a whisper anyway. ‘Are you insane? Anything you get from those files is inadmissible. Put them back!’

‘I don’t see how: you’ve got a warrant, haven’t you? And who’s going to know? ’

‘Put — them — back.’

‘She won’t be moving about, she’ll have a single base of operations, somewhere she feels safe. Somewhere she can paint protective circles.’

Like the ones on her bedroom roof and in her cupboard under the stairs.

‘She has a romanticized notion of decay, it appeals to the entropy she feels inside, so she’ll want to stay somewhere that’s been empty for a while. Run-down, abandoned, maybe derelict. Assuming the dominant personality lets her have any say in it.’

And that explained the half-dozen dead roses.

‘Anything else? ’

‘Yes: tread carefully. Agnes Garfield is a deeply damaged individual, and the world is a terrifying place for her right now. She’s the only one standing between us and the powers of evil. In her mind she’s a hero. Don’t break her.’

Not a monster, just doing monstrous things.

‘Thanks, Dave.’ Logan hung up and headed back to the cell block. Stopped outside number eight and peered through the hatch again.

Dr Marks hadn’t moved.

‘Last chance, Doctor. You stood up to us, we got a warrant, you got arrested. You did everything you could, no one can say you didn’t.’

Marks just stared at the far wall.

‘OK, well, you think about it.’ Logan marched over to cell seven and banged on the door, then did the same to number six. The swearing and shouting kicked off again. ‘Enjoy.’

Rennie slouched in and collapsed into Logan’s visitor’s chair. ‘Urrgh. .’

Logan glanced up from his door-to-door forms. ‘Well? ’

Rennie’s suit looked as if he’d slept in it, then taken it off and battered it to death with a cricket bat. ‘I quit. Sod this for a game of soldiers.’

‘What did Ding-Dong say? ’

He wrapped his arms around his head and let it fall backwards, knees clenched together. ‘How come Chalmers got the morning off, eh? She wasn’t even there all night. I was there all night, but do I get the morning off? Of course not, because every bicycle-seat-sniffing tosspot-’

‘My heart bleeds for you.’

‘Not as if we turned up anything, is it? No one’s seen Agnes the Nutbag; someone “thinks” they saw Roy Forman leaving the Green with an unidentified woman, but they reeked of meths and wee, so I wouldn’t trust them to ID their own reflection; and by the time I got back to the front of the queue they were all out of tiramisu.’

‘Focus.’

Rennie blinked at him. ‘Right: Ding-Dong. I sneaked into his briefing and he says he interviewed some Stacey woman last night? Apparently she’s being very cagey about her whereabouts and the death of Anthony Chung. So she’s become a person of interest.’

‘He say what’s happening to her? ’

‘Up in front of the Sheriff at ten for the assault and indecent exposure. You want me to check it out? ’

Logan swivelled back and forth in his chair for a bit. Then shook his head. ‘No: she’s a time-waster, looking for something she can shock Daddy with. Forget about her. And yesterday wasn’t a complete washout, was it? You found your missing tramp.’