Thursday Legends Read online

  water now?"

  The detective constable, who, the DCC had been amused to learn, was

  named Martin Andrews, nodded, picked up a bowl from amid the shambles

  on the floor, filled it from the tap in the sink, and placed it on the

  table, beside the body's head. The medical examiner thanked him again,

  and took a box of tissues from his case. He soaked a handful in the

  bowl, and began to wipe the thick mud from the head and face.

  The police officers watched him work in silence for several minutes,

  until finally he nodded and glanced up at them. "Yes," he murmured, "I

  thought so." He beckoned. "See here." The three moved in, their eyes

  following his pointing finger, which drew them to the body's right

  temple, between the right eye and the top of the right ear. The skin

  was broken and discoloured. They focused on it, each trying not to

  look at the rest of the grotesque, puffy, dead face.

  Duck pressed the area firmly, his fingers feeling around. "There's

  been a severe blow to the head; hard enough to cause a fracture, I'd

  say. What I can't say is whether it was sustained before or after the

  man went into the water. There's very little blood, but that doesn't

  mean anything. Only the pathologist will be able to tell you whether

  the injury was sustained pre- or post-mortem. It's over to him now,

  I'm afraid."

  "Take a look at the wrists," Martin murmured. "Could he have been tied

  up?"

  The examiner frowned, but did as he had been asked. "It's possible, I

  suppose," he said.

  "Time of death?" asked Greatorix.

  The ME looked distastefully at the victim, and sniffed. "Several days

  ago. That's another for the pathologist."

  "Okay, doc, fair enough; you can head off now. Give me your statement

  tomorrow."

  "I will' Dr. Duck glanced at his watch. "If I'm lucky, he grumbled,

  "I might even find a partner for later in the day."

  They listened as he squelched his way back up the narrow staircase. The

  deputy chief patted the body on the shoulder with a gloved hand.

  "Inconvenient of you to die," he murmured.

  "Identification," said DCS Greatorix, abruptly. "Andrews, don't remove

  any of his clothing .. . that'll be done at the mortuary.. . but go

  through his pockets."

  The young man, who was in his mid-twenties, grimaced. "Could that not

  wait, boss?" he asked; it was almost a plea.

  "No, it can't. Go on, lad; just think of the day when you'll be able

  to order people like you to do the really dirty work." He turned to

  Martin. "Fancy a breath of air, sir?"

  "Do I ever." They followed in the doctor's footsteps, up the steep

  stair and into Miss Bonney's hall. Martin stripped off the

  all-covering scene-of-crime tunic and threw it on the floor, beside the

  one that the doctor had discarded. "I won't be going down there

  again," he said. He looked down at his white shirt, then at his

  reflection in a mirror that hung on the wall, above the level of the

  flood.

  "Your wife's going to be pleased when she sees that shirt, Andy,"

  Greatorix chuckled.

  "What makes you think she's going to see it? This one's for the bin."

  He frowned, suddenly and savagely. "I hate it when they've been in the

  water, Rod. It doesn't happen very often with homicides .. . that's

  assuming this is ... but I had one in Edinburgh a year or so back. What

  a fucking mess he was in; much worse than that guy."

  "It's never nice," the DCS said. His new deputy chief glanced at him,

  privately feeling self-conscious about being higher in rank than such

  an experienced and clearly capable officer. The head of CID was

  somewhere in his fifties, and could have been up to twenty years older

  than him. Martin knew that he had been a candidate for his job, and

  guessed that it was only his age that had told against him. Graham

  Morton, the Chief Constable, had made a point of telling him how highly

  Greatorix was rated, but he had known that from the grapevine within

  the Superintendents' Association.

  "I've had a few in my time too," he continued. "They're a bugger to

  begin with in terms of what you pull out, and they can get worse. I

  just hope young Martin comes up with a name and address, otherwise we

  could have a problem. That's quite a big river over there, especially

  when it floods, and without an ID we won't have a clue where our guy

  went in. The only thing I can say with any certainty is that he didn't

  drift upstream. Christ, he needn't necessarily have gone in in our

  area at all. I've got a bad feeling about it already, Andy. I know he

  was in a state, but even at that, he looked like a bum. He needed a

  shave, and his hair looked as if he'd cut it himself... and badly at

  that."

  "Let's wait for Andrews, then," said the DCS. He led the way out of

  the front door and down on to the pavement. There was an ambulance

  parked nearby; its rear doors were open and the crew, a man and a

  woman, were sitting inside. Two cars were parked alongside; one

  belonged to the DCS and the other to the detective constable and his

  sergeant, a woman named Joan Dunn, who was sitting with Miss Bonney in

  what she called her sewing room, on the upper floor of her home.

  Out on the Inch, he saw a television crew. "Who are they?" he asked

  his colleague.

  "Grampian, I think," Greatorix replied. "Yes, I recognise the girl

  who's talking to Harry Sharp; she's a reporter."

  "They can't know what we're up to here then."

  "Not yet; they're probably just filming the clear-up, and Harry won't

  make her any the wiser. But sooner or later she'll work out that the

  ambulance crew aren't here for a tea-break. Do you want to deal with

  her when she does?"

  "No. Like I said, this is your show."

  "Excuse me, sirs." DC Andrews' voice came from behind them, from the

  doorway. The head of CID waved to him to join them.

  "I've been through all his pockets," the young officer reported.

  "There's not a clue to his identity. There was nothing there but three

  pounds seventy-four in his trouser pocket, and this, in the inside

  pocket of his jacket." He handed something to Greatorix.

  The object was encased in plastic. At first, Andy Martin thought it

  was a driving licence, but realised quickly that if it had been it

  would have borne a name. He looked closer, and saw that it was a

  photograph. "Odd," the chief superintendent muttered. He glanced at

  it idly for a few seconds, then handed it to the deputy chief. "Maybe

  it's him, in his younger days."

  Martin looked at the plastic packet. As he did, some control mechanism

  within him made him stifle the gasp that sprang to his lips, and held

  him straight when he felt like wobbling. With its covering, the

  black-and-white photograph had survived the flood, and was clearly

  recognisable. It was that of a young man, dark-haired, tall and

  powerfully built, but no more, he guessed, than twenty-one or

  twenty-two years old. He was looking solemnly at the camera, and he

  wore a dark suit with broad lapels. Martin stared at it in silence,
/>   until he realised that the other two were staring at him.

  The deputy chief constable tucked the likeness into the pocket of his

  shirt. "I've been promising you all day that I won't interfere, Rod,"

  he said, 'and I still mean it. But I think I can help here. With your

  permission, I'd like to hold on to this for a day or so. I don't think

  this is the man inside, but it could help us find out exactly who he

  is."

  "If you can do that, sir..." said the chief superintendent.

  "Thanks," said Martin. He headed off towards his car. "I'll be in

  touch," he called back over his shoulder. "As soon as I can."

  Seven.

  It takes very little to cause traffic congestion in the centre of

  Edinburgh. A major fire alert in the heart of Princes Street is a

  recipe for major-league chaos. Maggie Rose was stuck in it for a

  while, until she called HQ and had a motorcycle officer locate her and

  clear a way for her through the queues.

  She had to concentrate as she followed his lead, but still thoughts of

  Rufus, and of Mario, forced their way into her mind. She knew that she

  had no choice but to give the boy up, and she knew that her husband

  realised that also. However, what he did not know was that even if she

  could have seen a way to keep him, she would probably still have opted

  to hand him over. He was, after all, her father's son; taking him in

  had been Mario's idea, not hers, and while she had gone along with it,

  it had taken a great effort on her part. The truth was she felt

  nothing for the boy.

  As for Mario ... the core of her feelings for him had not changed. She

  believed that she loved him, even if she could no longer force herself

  to do so physically, the act having become completely abhorrent to her.

  She had no illusions about the meaning of his overnight absences. At

  first he had been 'working late', but recently no excuse had been

  offered and no questions asked. Her outburst that morning had been a

  mistake that she regretted already. She could guess where he was

  spending those missing nights, and with whom, but if that was what it

  took to keep them together, she could handle it. She was confident

  that he was not going to leave her to move in with his cousin, and if

  Paula was prepared to feed his appetites on that basis, well, it was

  fair enough by her.

  She pushed her musings away as her escort led her into Princes Street.

  It was closed off, from Waverley Bridge to the West End, and two

  uniformed constables were stationed at the Scott Monument, diverting

  traffic past Jenners and up towards St. Andrews Square. Her

  motorcyclist, a sergeant, spoke to one of them and she was waved

  through without delay. She parked as close to the scene of the

  incident as she could, about one hundred yards away, and walked the

  rest.

  As she approached, she counted four fire appliances parked in the

  roadway, outside the pillared entrance to the Royal Scottish Academy,

  with another three drawn up in the paved area to the right. At least

  two dozen firefighters were milling around, and beyond them a crowd of

  spectators were being marshalled by uniformed police. As Rose looked

  at the scene, she realised to her surprise that no ladders were

  deployed, and no hoses rolled out. She frowned, and looked for signs

  of smoke coming from the grey stone building, but she saw none.

  She strode past the throng and trotted up the entrance steps. There,

  in the open doorway, the first person she saw was Chief Superintendent

  Manny English, the uniformed commander of her division. "Where's the

  fire?" she asked him.

  "Out," he replied, curtly. "The staff here fought it successfully with

  extinguishers."

  "All that lot outside are a bit of overkill, then," said Rose.

  "Perhaps that's true, but it's better to look over-cautious in

  hindsight than to look negligent."

  She made an effort to keep from smiling. Within the force, English had

  a reputation for over-caution that bordered on the legendary. "It's

  your business," she said, "Manny, yours and the firemaster's, but what

  if there's another major incident this afternoon with most of the

  appliances here and doing nothing, and the traffic screwed up good and

  proper?"

  "That's a damn good question, Maggie," said a voice from the side. She

  turned to see Senior Fire Officer Matt Grogan, in his white helmet,

  bearing down on her and the divisional commander. "Do you have the

  gift of second sight?" he continued. "We've just had a call-out from

  the Exchange district, up Lothian Road. There's been a major outbreak

  in one of the new office blocks up there. It's just round the corner

  from the fire station, but of course all our bloody appliances are down

  here, aren't they! I need your people to clear the traffic for us,

  Manny, and I need them now!"

  "Yes, yes, I'll deploy officers at once." English stepped out into

  Princes Street, shouting orders to a nearby inspector. Grogan was

  about to follow him, when Rose caught his sleeve.

  "Hold on a second, Matt," she exclaimed. "What about this incident?"

  "It was deliberate, Maggie; no doubt about it. But my boys have

  searched the whole place, and found no other surprises. Your man

  Steele's through there. He'll bring you up to speed on it. Now I must

  go. From the sound of things we've got a real fire up there, unlike

  this one."

  "Thanks. Good luck." Grogan shouldered his way through the door and

  broke into a run; Rose turned and headed up the stairs that led into

  the main hall of the Academy.

  The big room was split into a number of alcoves, but she had no trouble

  locating the scene of the fire; a crowd of people, one or two in

  uniform, the rest informally dressed, stood directly ahead of her, all

  staring into a booth on the left of the gallery. She could not see

  what they were looking at, since a wall blocked her view, but she could

  read the shock and distress on their faces.

  "Ma'am." She turned, to see Detective Inspector Stevie Steele, as he

  stepped out of an alcove on her right. He was tall and good-looking,

  in his early thirties, single and something of a heart-throb, she had

  heard, although he tended to keep his private life to himself. She

  knew that he was a former boyfriend of Paula Viareggio, and there had

  been one other dark rumour about an attraction, but Rose had always

  thought that he was too smart to risk that.

  "Less of the formality, Stevie," she said. "There are no other ranks

  around, are there?"

  "No. I was in on my own when the shout came in."

  "Has there been an arrest?"

  "No. It looks as if someone planted an incendiary device on a

  timer."

  "We'll need back-up then."

  "I've got technicians on the way; we're going to need them. I'm

  expecting a couple of DCs as well to start taking statements."

  "Why, exactly... just what is this?"

  "Didn't you see the signs outside?"

  "No. I saw Manny English; that was enough."

  Steele laughed. "Yes, I decided to keep well out of his way, otherwise />
  I might have found myself on points duty too. Actually," he said,

  'what we have here is an exhibition of religious art. Do you know

  anything about the subject?"

  "I wouldn't know a Botticelli from a Beryl Cook," she answered,

  truthfully.

  "You'll find him here," the inspector told her, 'but not her. You'll

  also find Titian, and El Greco, and even Dali's Cubist Christ. This is

  the RSA's big summer attraction; it pulls together great works, from

  various schools, and it's scheduled to run all the way into September.

  It's being sponsored by the solicitors, Candela and Finch, to mark

  their bicentenary, and also the refurbishment of the Academy building

  itself; the opening ceremony was just getting under way when the brown

  stuff hit the fan. The people you probably saw outside in the piazza

  are their guests.

  "The problem is that someone's torched one of the prize exhibits.

  That's what they're all staring at over there; I've got the Academy's

  security staff standing guard over it, to make sure no one touches it

  before Arthur Dorward's lot get here."

  "Bloody hell!" Rose exclaimed. "What is it? Not the Botti-what's-it,

  I hope."

  "No. It's a work called The Holy Trinity, by a modern Chilean artist

  called Isobel Vargas. It's what you would call controversial, although

  some people have gone further and called it blasphemous."

  "Why so?"

  "Because the Blessed Trinity are all depicted as female."

  "What, you mean Mother, Daughter and Holy Ghostess?"