Absolution (42 page)

‘How can she be? How can this be innocence? Alan? Alan? Look at me. Even now, after all these years, see how you are captivated by her. Let her go, Alan; let all of it go.’ Leask’s voice was kind. He placed his hands on McAlpine’s shoulders, as if comforting him. ‘It’s her fate, as it was the fate of her mother. Look around you, look at all this. She has all this because your brother died.
Your
brother.’

‘No.’ McAlpine lifted his blood-soaked jacket and tried to press the edges of the wound together. Trude whimpered slightly. She was so very, very thin. “We need to get help,’ he insisted.

‘She has your brother’s blood on her hands.’ Leask was almost singing now, the island lilt seductive, as though McAlpine were his whole congregation. ‘They don’t change, do you see that, they don’t change. Her mother looked just the same, too good to speak to me, too beautiful, too important. Laughing at me just because I didn’t know about good coffee, laughing at me because I carried my Bible everywhere. Too important to give a thought to anybody
else. And all those policemen going on about how beautiful she was, and what a victim she was. What victim!’ Leask scratched his eyebrow gently with his forefinger, talking all the time. ‘You see, Alan, it was all over the news that week, how a Dutch yacht was holed by a government boat and a Mr McAlpine lost his life. Well, I had a little Dutch girl upstairs. Then she was attacked and a PC McAlpine came to investigate. Then she died.’ Leask stopped scratching and shivered, as if somebody had walked over his grave. ‘And then PC McAlpine was taken off the case, because his brother was involved as well. That’s when I realized. I have a talent for being invisible, I think. People talk in front of me as if I’m not there. Also I have a talent for never forgetting a face. Well, not any more, not after this.’

McAlpine turned to look at him, remembering the ugly little transient that had passed him on the stairs, clutching his Bible for comfort. How he would have welcomed helping the police, boiling the kettle to make cups of tea for the search team, being the hub of the investigation.

‘They told me it all at the time, Alan; they told me about the boat, about your brother. Everybody talks to a minister, Alan, everybody. Your brother lost his life, so a spoiled little rich girl could continue to be just that. Look around you. Look at all this… she’s a parasite, she is living off your grief.’

McAlpine turned back to look at Trude as she moaned, the slight gurgle of breath escaping through the blood that pulsed slowly from her mouth. Her eyes flickered open, those huge grey eyes came to life, moist and so full of pain McAlpine could hardly bear to look at her. But she was the image of her mother. Every memory he had ever known, every touch, every smile, rushed over him like a kiss.

‘You’ll be fine, baby, you’ll be fine,’ he whispered. He
pulled the ring from his pocket, the ring that he had kept, the ring that Helena had worn for twenty-two years. He picked up her limp hand and fitted the diamond on to a finger slippery with blood. ‘It’s yours. It’s always been yours. You should have it back,’ he said.

‘She lies like Ophelia, don’t you think? In a river of red, with her blonde halo of flowers.’

‘How did you find her? I’ve waited more than twenty years to find her.’ McAlpine pulled the hair from her face; her breathing was laboured now, quickening, then fading.

‘Women, Alan. Your little blonde detective should learn to keep her voice down in the pub.’ Leask scratched the side of his face with the broad blade of his
skean dhu,
leaving a smear of Trude’s blood on his cheek. He wiped it off with the cuff of his Barbour, disgusted. ‘You said she was good at her job. Well, you’d think she would be more observant… of being followed. But she’s another one who finds me invisible,’ he added chillingly. He went on, ‘I saw her in the street once.
Her!’
He flicked the point of the knife at the gasping figure on the floor. ‘It couldn’t be anyone else. That same face, after more than twenty years… I’ve never forgotten.’

Trude breathed out. A slow stream of breath bubbled through the blood at her mouth and a crescent of foam curled at the corner of her mouth. It was a long time before she breathed in again.

McAlpine stood up. ‘She needs help.’

‘No,’ Leask said matter-of-factly, the madness in his voice as well as his eyes. ‘No. God will have his way.’

‘I’m not letting her die.’

‘She’s not worth it. You know that.’

McAlpine turned to look at Leask, pointing to the knife. ‘Hand it over.’

‘No.’ The minister was calmly certain. ‘Alan?’ he said gently. ‘This one is for you.’

‘For me? But I loved her.’

‘She beguiled you. Your brother died for all this. All of this. You never knew her. But
I
knew her. She was a bitch.’

‘She was an angel,’ McAlpine said. ‘You were wrong. But you have the chance to do the right thing now.’ He held his hand out for the knife. ‘Please, George.’

‘No. Not this knife, this knife is mine.’ Leask looked at Trude, like an artist contemplating his work, wondering whether it is finished. The minister looked pleased and turned away.

McAlpine backhanded the sweat from his upper lip, knowing he had to play for time Trude didn’t have. ‘That knife’s yours? What about the knife you used on the others?’

‘Couldn’t get near it, could I? Not with your lot all over the Phoenix, but I thought it fitting that this one should be used on her.’

McAlpine shook his head; his hand remained steady. ‘Give me the knife, George. This is not absolution, this is not justice; this is revenge; and you – of all people, George – you are above that.’

Leask did not respond, he merely tested the point of the
skean dhu
against the tip of his thumb. Trude coughed slightly, and her lungs wheezed quietly. Then nothing. ‘And that’s how you see it, Alan?’

‘That’s how I see it, George. Now you are going to do the right thing. I’m going to phone for help. We are going to save her life. And then we’ll sit down and have a long chat.’

Leask nodded. ‘If that’s the way it has to be,’ he said.

And smiled slowly.

∗

Sean was running, running at night, running effortlessly, his feet hardly touching the sand, the wind in his hair, fresh sea air in his lungs. Behind him, Gelert lolloped along the waterline, his paws splashing in the shallow waves. Sean put a little speed on – the sand was harder here – his legs pumping, his arms driving, oblivious to all noise but his own breathing, regular and slow, never puffing, never panting. In. Out. In. Out. Steady.

Then he noticed the dog was no longer with him. He jogged to a halt and turned.

Gelert had stopped in his tracks and was looking back along the beach, ears pricked, a faint growl coming from the back of his throat. Sean ran back and slapped the dog on the neck.

‘Come on, come on, another three miles yet.’ But the dog trotted forward, then broke into a run and galloped back towards the cottage.

The phone went, its noise drilling through the first night’s sleep Anderson had had for ages. It was Burns down at the Phoenix. ‘Good news, sir. We’ve found a knife.’

‘Does it fit?’ Anderson asked, immediately awake.

‘In every way. It’s an old black blade, right enough, a proper working knife with a bog-oak handle and a wee bit of sawtoothing up the back of the blade. The tip’s slightly damaged. It’s got the initials ADW on it.’

‘ADW? ADW?’ He tried to pull something from the back of his sleepy head. ‘Alasdair Donald Wheeler,’ Anderson said suddenly. ‘Where did you find it?’

‘In a toolbox, tucked away under the stage, wrapped in the cloth the Brownies use as a prayer mat or something. But it looks clean. The sheath might prove more fruitful.’

‘Has anybody touched it?’

‘No. Wyngate found it. Don’t worry, he was thinking at the time. That’s the good news. The bad news is that we don’t know where Leask is. He went up to his flat, the lights went on, but there’s no answer to the phone or at the door.’

‘And the minder was left in the car?’

‘Leask waved to him on the way up, so he presumed he was going to bed. Didn’t know there was a back door from the close.’

Anderson sighed, feeling his career slip away from under him. ‘Send a couple of uniforms round. Kick the door in if there’s no answer, say we’re doing it in case he goes the same way as his brother. But first get the knife to forensics ASAP. I’m on my way.’ It was out of his hands now. He felt desperately tired. His system, so long wired with caffeine, had taken no time at all to deflate. A headache began to roll over his forehead; he rubbed gritty eyes and sighed. He could not remember the last time he had had a good sleep, a decent meal and a quiet moment to himself with his children.

He could not remember a time before Christopher Robin. And now, just as they thought they could see light at the end of the tunnel, it was probably that of an oncoming train.

Red.

Nothing but red.

It was all he could see, on the floor. The life pouring out of her.

Nothing.

Then breathing.

Rhythmic breathing.

Nothing more than the tranquil ebb and flow of life.

Her eyes were open. There was no response. Nothing. In there, in the bloodied mess of her white dress, Sean could
sense the rise and fall of her breath. He put his finger between his teeth to stop himself crying and stood up, stepping over the man stretched out on the floor. He ignored the standing knife, its tip embedded in the floorboard, and reached for the abandoned mobile sitting in its little pool of blue light.

She was lying in a white tomb, staring at the ceiling with unseeing eyes, bathed in an eerie light, so small and thin on the bed she seemed hardly there at all. A halo of blonde hair curled round her perfect face, the beautiful profile spoiled only by the tube that ran from her nose to the drip stand. Across her stomach a set of wires coiled from her heart to the monitor that caged one weak, thin line, peaking every now and again. Her heart was still beating.

Sean was standing, wearing a white paper gown, leaning his forehead against the window, his eyes closed.

‘You left this. You might need it,’ said Anderson, his voice cracking. He handed the young man his jacket.

‘Is there any news?’

‘Nothing yet, but don’t worry, we’ll get him.’ His voice more assured now.

‘You had better get him before I do.’

‘Don’t worry, every hour that passes builds the case against him. His fingerprint was on the picture at the house, a thumbprint on the phone, his knife is covered in blood. We just have to find him now.’ Anderson watched the thin line race across the screen, such a thin line, a fine balance. He swallowed hard. ‘How is she?’

Sean shook his head, not trusting his voice to speak. For a moment they shared a silence, while a nurse fussed around the room for a minute.

‘She’s in the best place.’ Anderson waited until the nurse had walked away. ‘This might not seem the time or the
place, but we are alone and you can deny everything afterwards.’ Sean gave no response. ‘I’ve been wondering about something,’ Anderson said. ‘And I’d like my curiosity satisfied.’

Sean imperceptibly moved away, but Anderson kept talking. ‘Suppose your girlfriend inherited some diamonds. Suppose somebody else thought they had a right to them. I imagine you’d have to keep it a secret, wouldn’t you?’ Anderson stopped, as if thinking the problem through. ‘Bit awkward, as you couldn’t sell them – the money would attract all kinds of attention. So what would you do? What would
you
do, Sean?’

Sean didn’t move. Only the weary sag of his slender body stiffened slightly.

Not looking at the boy, Anderson said, ‘Help me out here.’

There was a long silence before Sean spoke. ‘You know how there’s no such thing as magic? By the time the trick’s seen to be done, it’s already been done? I’m a great believer that if you show something, you’ll get away with not showing much.’

Anderson frowned.

‘She’s a good artist, Truli. She makes a lot of money. We can sell those paintings all over the world to tourists. A painting is really only worth the price of a canvas and the frame, but sometimes they have deeper… value. A small diamond is untraceable. And very small,’ he added unnecessarily.

Anderson felt a slow penny drop, and nodded. ‘A trickle of money.’

‘Self-employed artist, tax paid, earned income. Nothing illegal in that, if anybody asked.’

‘I get your point.’ Anderson leaned his back against the
glass, neither man looking at the other. ‘How the hell did you set that up? Who do you sell to? Who knows? Without exposing it, I mean?’

Sean bit the corner of his lip, stopping the smile before it got any further. ‘You can make useful contacts in jail. Diamonds are, in a strange way, respectable. Gentle crime.’

‘Until folk like Malkie Steele get involved.’

‘Indeed.’ It was hardly more than a whisper.

‘And you were happy to do the time for killing him.’

‘I was. I’ve spent all my bloody life in institutions, and this time I had something to come out to.’

‘But you had to keep Trude safe. She and Nan together.’

‘That’s how that woman – Costello? – found us, wasn’t it?’ Sean smiled, biting his own tongue.

‘Sean, how did you get hold of the diamonds in the first place? The entire might of Interpol only got as far as her mother coming from Amsterdam to here… but then nothing. She died, and the trail ended. How did Trude end up with the stuff?’

Sean sighed. ‘The two years we were together in Ayr were perfect, just me and her. Then a letter arrived, a few days after her eighteenth birthday – just a few lines on a white page. From a lawyer. That lawyer sent us to another, somebody up in Edinburgh. He had a photograph, and it was obvious Trude was exactly who she said she was. She and her mum are like peas in a pod. That done, he just hands over an envelope. Trude opened it, and cried and cried.’ Sean smiled, pinching the tears from his eyes. ‘She ripped it up. Then we were sent to a bank, and they treated us like royalty, ushered us into a small room, and they walked out and left us alone… with a little metal box on the table and a key. They wouldn’t let us open it until they had all gone. It was only a collection of stones, just a handful of little
stones. It was only then Trude told me what was in the letter.’