Resurrection Men (2002) (19 page)

“I don’t know,” Siobhan said. “There’s a rumor Marber might have been cheating clients.”

“Bing!” Claverhouse said, snapping his fingers. “Every frame you put on the wall, Cafferty fits it perfectly.”

“An interesting image, under the circs,” Bain commented.

Siobhan was thoughtful. “Who would Cafferty not want to tangle with?” she asked.

“You mean apart from us?” Ormiston said with the beginnings of a smile. For a while, he’d sported a bushy black mustache, but had shaved it off. Siobhan noticed that the difference made him seem younger.

“Apart from you, Ormie,” she said.

“Why?” Claverhouse asked. “What did he say?” He’d stopped pacing, but couldn’t get comfortable, standing legs apart in the middle of the room, arms folded.

“Some vague mention of people he didn’t want to cross.”

“He was probably bullshitting,” Ormiston said.

Bain scratched his nose. “Anybody out there we don’t know about?”

Claverhouse shook his head. “Cafferty’s got Edinburgh sewn up tight.”

Siobhan was only half listening. She was wondering if Ellen Dempsey maybe had friends
outside
Edinburgh . . . wondering if it would be worthwhile taking a look at the owner of MG Cabs. If Dempsey wasn’t fronting for Cafferty, was it possible she was doing it for someone else, someone trying to break Cafferty’s grip on the city?

A little warning bell went off in her head, because if this was true, then wouldn’t Cafferty have every reason for framing Dempsey?
Ellen’s got friends, Siobhan . . . the sort it’s not worth crossing.
His voice had been seductive, intimate, almost reduced to a murmur. He’d been trying to get her interested. She doubted he would do that without a reason, without some ulterior motive.

Was Cafferty trying to use her?

Only one way to find out: take a closer look at MG Cabs and Ellen Dempsey.

As she zoned back in on the conversation, Ormiston was saying something about how Claverhouse and he should try to get some shut-eye.

“Surveillance op?” Bain guessed.

Ormiston nodded, but when Bain pressed for details he just tapped his nose.

“Top secret,” Claverhouse stated, backing up his colleague. His eyes were on Siobhan as he spoke. It was as if he suspected —
knew
even — that she wasn’t telling him the full story about herself and Cafferty. She thought back to the time she’d spent at Fettes as part of the Crime Squad team. Claverhouse had referred to her as “Junior,” but that seemed like a lifetime ago. She returned his stare confidently. When Claverhouse blinked first, it almost seemed like a victory.

15

A
nd you haven’t seen him since?”

The woman shook her head. She was seated in her fifth-floor flat in the Fort, a high-rise on the edge of Leith. There would have been great coastal views from the windows of the cramped living room, if they hadn’t been so filthy. The room smelled of cat pee and leftovers, not that Rebus could see any physical evidence of cats. The woman’s name was Jenny Bell and she had been Dickie Diamond’s girlfriend at the time he’d disappeared.

When the door had been answered by Bell, Barclay had given Rebus a look which seemed to suggest that he could see why Diamond had done a midnight flit. Bell wore no makeup, and her clothes were shapeless and gray. The seams of her slippers had given way, and so had her teeth — leaving her mouth shrunken and lacking the dentures she probably wore when expecting company. This made her speech difficult to understand, especially for Allan Ward, who sat now on the arm of the sofa, a frown of concentration drawing his eyebrows together.

“Haven’t clapped eyes on him,” Bell stated. “He’d’ve gotten a good kicking if I had.”

“What did everyone think when he offskied?” Rebus asked.

“That he owed money, I suppose.”

“And did he?”

“Me for starters,” she said, jabbing a finger into her prodigious bosom. “Nearly two hundred he had from me.”

“In one go?”

She shook her head. “Bit here, bit there.”

“How long had you been an item?” Barclay asked.

“Four, five months.”

“Was he staying here?”

“Sometimes.”

There was a radio playing somewhere, either in another room or in the flat next door. Two dogs were involved in some noisy challenge outside. Jenny Bell had the electric heater on, and the room was stifling. Rebus didn’t suppose it helped that he and Ward had been drinking, adding alcoholic fumes to the general miasma. Bobby Hogan had given them Bell’s address, but made some excuse and headed back to the station. Rebus didn’t blame him.

“Miss Bell,” he said now, “did you ever go to the caravan with Dickie?”

“A few weekends,” she admitted, almost with a leer. Meaning:
dirty
weekends. Rebus could sense Ward give an involuntary shiver as the image filled his consciousness. Bell’s eyes had narrowed. She was concentrating on Rebus. “I’ve seen you before, haven’t I?”

“Could be,” Rebus admitted. “I do a bit of drinking down this way.”

She shook her head slowly. “This was a long time back. In a bar . . .”

“Like I say —”

“Weren’t you with Dickie?”

Rebus shook his head; Ward and Barclay were studying him. Hogan had hinted that Bell’s memory was “shot to hell.” Hogan had been mistaken . . .

“About the caravan,” Rebus pressed on, “whereabouts was it exactly?”

“Somewhere Port Seton way.”

“You knew Rico Lomax, didn’t you?”

“Oh aye, nice man, Rico.”

“Ever go with Dickie to one of his parties?”

She nodded vigorously. “Wild times,” she grinned. “And no neighbors to kick up a stink.”

“Unlike here, you mean?” Ward guessed. At which point, someone through the wall started shouting at their offspring:

“I’m telling you to clean that up!”

Bell stared at the wall. “Aye, not like here,” she replied. “There’s more space in a bloody caravan for a start.”

“What did you think when you heard Rico had been killed?” Barclay asked.

She shrugged. “What was there to think? Rico was what he was.”

“And what was he?”

“You mean apart from a bloody good shag?” She started cackling, offering a view of pale pink gums.

“Did Dickie know?” Ward asked.

“Dickie was
there,
” she declared.

“He didn’t object?” Ward asked. She just stared at him.

“I think,” Rebus explained for Ward’s benefit, “Miss Bell is saying that Dickie was a participant.”

Bell grinned at the look on Ward’s face as he digested this. Then she started cackling again.

“Is there a shower at St. Leonard’s?” Ward asked on the drive back.

“Reckon you need one?”

“Half an hour’s scrubbing should suffice.” He scratched his leg, which made Rebus start to feel itchy.

“That’s an image that will be with me to the grave,” Barclay stated.

“Allan in the shower . . . ?” Rebus teased.

“You know damned well what I mean,” Barclay complained. Rebus nodded. They were quiet for the rest of the journey. Rebus lingered in the car park, saying he needed a cigarette. After Ward and Barclay had disappeared inside, he reached for his mobile, called Enquiries and got the number for Calder Pharmacy in Sighthill. He knew the pharmacist there, a guy called Charles Shanks, who lived in Dunfermline and taught kickboxing in his spare time. When his call was answered, he asked for Shanks.

“Charles? John Rebus here. Look, do pharmacists have some kind of Hippocratic oath?”

“Why?” The voice sounded amused . . . and a little suspicious.

“I just wanted to know if you were doling out methadone to an addict called Malky Taylor.”

“John, I’m really not sure I can help.”

“All I want to know is whether he’s doing okay, sticking with the program . . . ?”

“He’s doing fine,” Shanks said.

“Thanks, Charles.” Rebus ended the call, slipped the phone back into his pocket and headed indoors. Francis Gray and Stu Sutherland were in the interview room, talking with Barclay and Ward.

“Where’s Jazz?” Rebus asked.

“He said he was going to the library,” Sutherland answered.

“What for?”

Sutherland just shrugged, leaving Gray to explain. “Jazz thinks it would help to know what else was happening in the world around the time Rico got hit and Mr. Diamond did his vanishing act. How did you get on in Leith?”

“Zombie Bar’s gone downwardly upmarket,” Ward commented. “And we talked to Dickie’s old girlfriend.” He made a face to let Gray know what he thought of her.

“Her flat was skanky,” Barclay added. “I’m thinking of investing in some disinfectant.”

“Mind you,” Ward said mischievously, “I think she might have serviced John here sometime in the dim and distant past.”

Gray’s eyebrows rose. “That right, John?”

“She thought she recognized me,” Rebus stressed. “She was mistaken.”

“
She
didn’t think so,” Ward persisted.

“John,” Gray pleaded, “tell me you never shagged Dickie Diamond’s bird?”

“I never shagged Dickie Diamond’s bird,” Rebus repeated. Just then, Jazz McCullough walked in through the door. He looked tired, rubbing his eyes with one hand and carrying a sheaf of papers in the other.

“Glad to hear it,” he said, having just caught the last few words.

“Find anything at the library?” Stu Sutherland asked, as if doubting that Jazz had been within a hundred yards of one.

Jazz dropped the sheets onto the desk. They were photocopies of newspaper stories.

“Look for yourself,” he said. As they passed the sheets among them, he explained his reasoning. “We had the newspaper cuttings at Tulliallan, but they were focusing on Rico’s murder, and that was a Glasgow case.”

Which meant the Glasgow paper — the
Herald
— had covered the story more comprehensively than its east coast rival. But now Jazz had gone to the
Scotsman,
finding a few scant references to the “disappearance of a local man, Richard Diamond.” There was a grainy photograph: it looked like Diamond leaving a courtroom, buttoning his check jacket. His hair was longish, sticking out over the ears. His mouth hung open, teeth angular and prominent, and he had stubby little eyebrows. Skinny and tall with what looked like acne on his neck.

“A bonny-looking bugger, isn’t he?” Barclay commented.

“Does this lot tell us anything new?” Gray asked.

“It tells us O. J. Simpson’s going to catch his wife’s killer,” Tam Barclay said. Rebus looked at the front page. There was a picture of the athlete after his acquittal. The paper was dated Wednesday, October 4, 1995.

“ ‘
HOPES RISE FOR AN END TO DEADLOCK ON ULSTER
,’ ” Ward said, quoting another headline. He looked around the table. “That’s encouraging.”

Jazz picked up one sheet and held it in front of him: “ ‘
POLICE STYMIED IN HUNT FOR MANSE RAPIST
.’ ”

“I remember that,” Tam Barclay said. “They drafted officers in from Falkirk.”

“And Livingston,” Stu Sutherland added.

Jazz was holding the sheet for Rebus to see. “You remember it, John?”

Rebus nodded. “I was on the team.” He took the photocopied story from Jazz and started to read.

It was all about how the inquiry was running out of steam, no result in sight. Officers were being sent back to their postings.
A core of six officers will continue to sift information and seek out new leads.
Those six had eventually dwindled to three, Rebus not among them. There wasn’t much in the story about the assault itself, which was as brutal as anything Rebus had seen in his years on the force. A church manse in Murrayfield — leafy Murrayfield, with its large, expensive homes and pristine avenues. It had started as a break-in, most probably. Silver and valuables had been taken in the raid. The minister himself had been out visiting parishioners, leaving his wife at home. Early evening, and no lights on. That was probably why the man — just the one attacker, according to the victim — had chosen the manse. It was next door to the church, hidden behind a tall stone wall and surrounded by trees, almost in a world of its own. No lights on meant no one home.

Being blind, however, the victim had needed no lights. She’d been in the bathroom upstairs. The clatter of breaking glass. She’d been running a bath, thought maybe she’d misheard. Or it was kids outside, a bottle thrown. The manse had a dog, but her husband had taken it with him to give it a walk.

She felt the breeze from the top of the stairs. There was a telephone in the hall next to the front door, and she put one foot on the first step down, heard the floorboard creak. Decided to use the phone in the bedroom instead. She almost had it in her hand when he struck, snatching her by the wrist and twisting her around so that she fell onto the bed. She thought she remembered the sound of him turning on the bedside lamp.

“I’m blind,” she’d pleaded. “Please don’t . . .”

But he had, giving a little laugh afterwards, a laugh that stayed with her during the months of the inquiry. Laughing because she couldn’t identify him. It was only after the rape that he tore her clothes off, punching her hard in the face when she screamed. He left no fingerprints, just a few fibers and a single pubic hair. He’d swept the phone to the floor with his arm and then stamped on it. He’d taken cash, small heirlooms from the jewelry box on her dressing table. None of the missing items ever turned up.

He hadn’t said anything. She could give little sense of his height or weight, no facial description.

From the start, officers had refused to voice their thoughts. They’d given it their best shot. The business community had put up a £5,000 reward for information. The pubic hair had given police a DNA fingerprint, but there hadn’t been a database around back then. They’d have to catch the attacker first,
then
make the match.

“It was a bad one,” Rebus conceded.

“Did they ever catch the bastard?” Francis Gray asked.

Rebus nodded. “Just a year or so back. He did another break-in, assaulted a woman in her flat. This was down in Brighton.”

“DNA match?” Jazz guessed. Rebus nodded again.

“Hope he rots in hell,” Gray muttered.

“He’s already there,” Rebus conceded. “His name was Michael Veitch. Stabbed to death his second week in prison.” He shrugged. “It happens, doesn’t it?”

“It certainly does,” Jazz said. “I sometimes think there’s more justice meted out in jails than in the courts.”

Rebus knew he had just been given an opening.
You’re right . . . remember that gangster who got stabbed in the Bar-L? Bernie Johns, was that his name?
But it felt too obvious. If he said it aloud, it would alert them, put them on their guard. So he held back, wondering if he’d ever take the chance.

“Got what he deserved anyway,” Sutherland stated.

“Not that it did his victim much good,” Rebus added.

“Why’s that, John?” Jazz asked. Rebus looked at him, then held up the sheet of paper.

“If you’d extended your search a few weeks, you’d have found she committed suicide. She’d become a recluse by then. Couldn’t stand the thought of him still being out there . . .”

Weeks, Rebus had worked on the manse inquiry. Chasing leads provided by informants desperate for the cash reward. Chasing bloody shadows . . .

“Bastard,” Gray hissed under his breath.

“Plenty of victims out there,” Ward suggested. “And we’re stuck with a toerag like Rico Lomax . . .”

“Working hard, are we?” It was Tennant, standing in the doorway. “Making lots of lovely progress for your SIO to report to me?”

“We’ve made a start, sir,” Jazz said, his voice full of confidence, but his eyes betraying the truth.

“Plenty of old news stories anyway,” Tennant commented, his eyes on the photocopies.

“I was looking for possible tie-ins, sir,” Jazz explained. “See if anyone else had gone missing, or any unidentified bodies turned up.”

“And?”

“And nothing, sir. Though I think I’ve discovered why DI Rebus didn’t seem overly helpful when Glasgow CID came calling.”

Rebus stared at him. Could he really know? Here Rebus was, supposedly infiltrating the trio, and every move they made seemed calculated to undermine him. First Rico Lomax, now the Murrayfield rape. Because there was a connection between the two . . . and that connection was Rebus himself. No, not just Rebus . . . Rebus and Cafferty . . . and if the truth came out, Rebus’s career would cease to be on the skids.

It would be a car wreck.

“Go on,” Tennant pressed.

“He was involved in another inquiry, sir, one he was loath to take time out from.” Jazz handed the rape story to Tennant.