Death in a Cold Spring (Pitkirtly Mysteries Book 9) (14 page)

Keith sighed and glanced at his watch. ‘I don’t really have time just now. Ideally we should be going up to the police station anyway. You’d better come in tomorrow so we can get a proper statement. So don’t think you can make up your own rules.’

‘I won’t,’ she lied.

Chapter 15 Help from On High

It felt as if nothing had happened for days, and now everything was happening at once. Keith found when he got back to the police station that several kinds of reinforcement had arrived in his absence. Most of them were crammed into the tea-room where Sergeant Macdonald was brewing up as well as conducting an impromptu presentation on the perils and joys of police work in Pitkirtly. Mostly perils, by the sound of it.

‘... and if you make the mistake of tangling with her, you’ll live to regret it – if you’re lucky. She’s had training in armed and unarmed combat, she speaks about fifteen languages, she has a hotline to MI6 and the CIA, and she’s always trying to prove she’s better than us.’

Keith only agreed with about half of this analysis, but he didn’t want to steal Sergeant Macdonald’s thunder, so he lurked near the doorway and kept quiet. There wasn’t anywhere else to lurk. Uniformed officers, some of whom he recognised from last night, occupied all the chairs, and a tall burly woman wearing the kind of old-fashioned beige skirt suit that Keith’s granny would have been mortified to be seen in, loomed over everybody, probably waiting her moment to prod them all into action.

Sergeant Macdonald glanced round and saw him just as he had decided not to wait around and be prodded.

‘Ah, Keith, there you are,’ he said with quite uncharacteristic geniality. ‘Cup of tea?’

‘No, thanks.’

‘Keith’s always out and about,’ the Sergeant explained to the tall woman. ‘He likes to keep his ear to the ground. Gather information. See what’s going on for himself.’

‘Great!’ said the woman, to Keith’s alarm. ‘That’s just the kind of police work there isn’t enough of these days. I’m going to need your local knowledge, Sergeant Burnet, to inform my strategy.’ Keith took a couple of steps backwards, and was almost out of the door before she added, ‘Don’t run away now, son. My bark’s worse than my bite, you know. Come right in and close the door.’

‘Is somebody watching the prisoner?’ said Keith.

‘After the last time? We’ve got three of Queensferry’s finest on guard down the corridor there,’ she told him. ‘We need to catch up on things. Have you got an office of your own?’

‘There’s the interview rooms,’ said Keith.

‘Get yourself a cup of something and let’s find somewhere less noisy.’

‘There’s a package for you,’ Sergeant Macdonald told him while he was grabbing a cup of coffee. ‘It came by courier. I think it’s from forensics or something.’

‘Why didn’t you tell me? Where is it?’

‘On the counter through there.’

Keith put down his cup somewhere. He would probably never find the right one again. He glared at the two officers from Queensferry who had their feet on the table, pushed past the three who were blocking his way as they argued amicably about football or something, and went to fetch the package. The tall woman followed him out to the front desk and then down the corridor to one of the interview rooms. It seemed incongruous to be speaking to her under those conditions, but it was better than being overheard by all the extra constables or by Sergeant Macdonald, for that matter.

It wasn’t until they were sitting opposite each other at the table that he realised he didn’t even know who she was.

‘Chief Inspector Ramsay,’ she said, holding her hand out to him. ‘Sarah Ramsay, on a good day.’

‘Yes, sir, ma’am.’

‘So are you going to open it or not?’ she enquired, glancing at the package in his other hand.

‘Um – it’ll just be forensics,’ he said. ‘We’ve been waiting for some results.’

‘Go on then. Let’s find out the worst.’

He opened the package gingerly. He didn’t want to look at the contents in front of her, but he sensed she wouldn’t be satisfied unless he did.

‘It’s the full report on the quilt and a preliminary summary on the bodies in the van,’ he said. ‘I’d already heard something about the blood on the quilt – they phoned me to let me know.’

There was nothing on the tablet yet, of course, and he had a feeling it might be the key to the whole thing.

‘Good. Tell me about the case.’

With a lot of hesitation, and some prompting from the Chief Inspector, Keith attempted to describe the case as he saw it.

‘I can’t work out if it’s one case or several,’ he confessed at the end of his effort. ‘There’s been random odd stuff happening, and it doesn’t seem to tie in but it might do, if you see what I mean.’

‘What do you think your top priority should be at this point?’

‘The missing girl,’ he said without hesitation. ‘But I can’t see how…’

‘I agree,’ she said. ‘Tell me what you’ve got on that, without letting the other things get in the way.’

‘Some of this has come from a member of the public,’ he said. ‘So it may not be all that reliable. Or useful.’

He felt vaguely disloyal to Amaryllis as he spoke. But he thought the Chief Inspector should be aware of what he was up against. Her eyebrows rose as he spoke.

‘But surely we are always reliant on the public to pass on information to us,’ she said. ‘Why are you reluctant to believe it in this case?’

‘It’s from somebody who interferes in things on a regular basis. She used to work in the security services and I think she sometimes thinks she knows better than any of the rest of us.’

‘Security services. Hmm. Tell me about the missing girl anyway.’

For Chief Inspector Ramsay’s benefit he ran through the wreck of the van and the unidentified body, the discovery of the tablet, the suspicious noises in the old coffee kiosk and the sandwich wrapper. The more he talked about it, the flimsier it all seemed as evidence. Except that the tablet could yet yield up its secrets and give them a few more clues. If it was the right tablet, that was. And if the forensic computer wizards could recover its data.

‘Right,’ said the Chief Inspector. ‘Now what’s your next priority after the girl?’

‘Investigating the deaths of the two men in the van.’

‘And the next one?’

‘Working out what happened in the Folk Museum. And the church hall. And what Young Dave has to do with it all.’

‘There,’ she said, and sat back with a satisfied smile on her face. ‘That was relatively simple, wasn’t it?’

Simple if you hadn’t been tangled up in the middle of it for days like some sort of Sleeping Beauty, Keith thought. Not that he had been sleeping – far from it.

‘So what have you done to find the girl so far, Sergeant Burnet?’ she said.

‘Um – I’m not sure.’

‘That isn’t the kind of answer I want to hear.’

‘I’ve been trying to establish whether she’s actually missing or what.’

‘Marginally better – but not quite good enough, is it?’

Was the woman trying to make him squirm?

‘No, sir, ma’am.’

‘I want you to get some posters organised, and teams of men searching the area,’ she said. ‘Start with known associates and places we know she’s definitely been to. Do we have a photograph of the girl? If not, send somebody to get one from her parents. Put it out on social media. If necessary we’ll make copies and go house to house.’

An unexpected and colossal wave of relief rolled over Keith. Somebody else was taking charge. Somebody who hadn’t wasted much time blaming him or telling him off – so far – but who had almost instantly grasped the essentials and made a plan.

‘There’s a photo. I got one from her parents when I last spoke to them.’

‘We’ll start up an incident room. Do you have a big enough space here?’

‘The main office might do,’ he said happily.

‘I’m going to treat the whole thing as one incident for the moment. It’s beyond the bounds of possibility that all these events aren’t connected.’

Keith opened his mouth to contradict here – this was Pitkirtly, after all, where random events occurred with startling frequency – but decided he had better not rock the boat. Instead of arguing, he said, ‘I’ll get a whiteboard set up.’

‘You should have enough men now, but speak up if you haven’t. I’ll get more sent over from somewhere. Pitlochry. Shetland. Kyle of Lochalsh. There’s never any crime in those places... Sergeant Burnet?’

‘Yes, sir, ma’am.’

‘After you’ve done the posters and got the search teams set up, I don’t want you to leave the station until you’ve written down all you know or think you know about any of this. I’m sure you’ve spent your time interviewing local people and getting the flavour of what’s happened. It’s time to write all that up so that we all get the benefit of it.’

An incident room – a whiteboard – paperwork. Keith hadn’t been looking forward to the day ahead so much since Charlie Smith was in charge.

Chapter 16 Friends and Strangers

Amaryllis was taking a long time to get back from the supermarket. Christopher had checked the tea-room twice, the library once and he had stuck his head into the Folk Museum to ask if Zak had seen Maggie. When he returned to the office he found Jock McLean reading his emails while the wee white dog played with a digestive biscuit all over the rug.

‘Maggie won’t like that,’ said Christopher without thinking.

‘Oh, you’ve found her, have you?’ said Jock absently. ‘What happens if you press this button here?’

‘What are you doing? Those are confidential.’

‘They’re pointless and boring, if that’s what you mean,’ said Jock.

Christopher removed the mouse from Jock’s hand before he used it to click the whole mailbox into oblivion. He had read somewhere that service providers kept copies of emails for ever, but he wasn’t entirely convinced that this was true, particularly as it was an official West Fife Council email box, and only a few months before they had lost everybody’s emails altogether in what they said was a glitch in the anti-virus software but which he thought was probably just their usual gross incompetence.

Maybe he would have to revise his opinion of them if Amaryllis got into power at the forthcoming bye-election. The idea of Amaryllis getting into power made him shudder instinctively. He hadn’t seen any sign of her canvassing lately, though, so maybe she had given up on the idea. On the other hand, maybe giving her opponents the chance to expose their weaknesses while she kept a low profile was a new tactic on her part. Certainly the more Christopher saw of El Presidente, the more sinister the man appeared.

‘There’s no sign of Maggie in the building,’ he reported, hanging on to the mouse. ‘But maybe Amaryllis will have had some luck at the supermarket.’

Jock stood up, shaking his head. ‘What if she’s gone the way of that artist girl?’

‘Then we’ll find them both together somewhere,’ said Christopher, wondering where he had learned to be so naively optimistic. He switched off the computer and went over to try and pick up the digestive crumbs from the rug. The dog seemed to think it was a new game.

‘I’d better get on, then,’ said Jock, possibly sensing his welcome was about to run out, though if that was the case, it would be the first time ever. ‘He needs his exercise.’

‘Nothing to do with opening time at the Queen of Scots, then?’

Jock and the dog were long gone and Christopher had deleted most of his emails anyway, before Amaryllis arrived back from her planned sprint to the supermarket. She looked – he got up from his chair and put his arms round her. She looked shaken. He couldn’t remember another occasion when he had seen her quite like this.

He didn’t ask her what had happened. She would tell him in her own time.

It wasn’t until she was standing in her usual spot at the window, staring out at the car park, that she said anything.

‘They nearly took me. In broad daylight. They had a van waiting. Outside the café in the High Street. There were brie and blueberry scones today.’

‘Who was that?’

She shook her head. Her hair, which had been lying down in a sort of admission of defeat, flew out in spikes again. He took it as a good sign.

‘I don’t know. Oh. I do know. It was Murray Williamson – the man who masqueraded as a cop last night and helped young Dave and the other one to get away. Young Dave was with him, and at least now they’ve got him locked up again.’

‘I hope they throw away the key,’ said Christopher. He paced up and down behind her. He wanted to ask if she was all right, but he knew that would be a silly question. She was here with him and alive, and without any visible sign that her world had turned on its head, but he guessed that she was deeply wounded by the near-abduction.

She turned towards him. ‘There are so many of them, Christopher. They’re everywhere. Murray Williamson. Dave. The man driving the van today. The other man who was found in the other van with the boy. What sort of network is this? I had no idea it existed!’

‘Maybe they’re from some other town,’ said Christopher. ‘Maybe it just happens that they have things to do in Pitkirtly.’

She turned back towards the window. ‘I just wish I could see the whole picture.’

‘Remember when the Petrellis were involved in the protection racket? Maybe it’s something like that.’

‘I can’t help feeling it’s to do with El Presidente and the Council election. I don’t know if I did the right thing when I put my name forward.’

Not just deeply wounded but almost mortally wounded. Christopher searched around in the far corners of his mind for something that might help.

‘If it’s something to do with El Presidente, then it’s probably just as well you are standing against him.’ He waited for a moment to see if it had helped or not. ‘Somebody has to,’ he added. ‘It might just as well be to do with the Face of Pitkirtly thing, anyway. Or not connected to either of them. It could all just be coincidence.’

He waited for her to say she didn’t believe in coincidence, but she didn’t. Instead she nodded and said, ‘There’s a police car in the car park... There’s a woman in uniform getting out... She’s looking this way... Holy mackerel! I don’t believe this.’

Amaryllis darted across the office and was out in the corridor before he had told his legs to move. He managed to make his way through the foyer and out through the front door just in time to see her fling herself at the woman police officer, who grabbed her with two very sturdy-looking arms and held on tightly.

‘It’s all right,’ he began to say. ‘She didn’t mean...’

But his tentative words of apology on her behalf were drowned out by what sounded almost like girlish squeals of glee from the two women. He had never heard Amaryllis squeal girlishly before.

‘Sarah! What are you doing here?’

‘Amaryllis! Of all the places...’

Christopher understood that Amaryllis wasn’t in danger of being arrested after all, so his apology was redundant. He stood back and exchanged baffled glances with the policeman who had been driving and who was now waiting to see what happened next.

Eventually Amaryllis freed herself from the death grip the other woman seemed to have on her, and turned to speak to Christopher.

‘Sorry – we were at school together. In the same hockey team. I don’t usually hug people. Neither does she.’

‘I certainly don’t,’ said the other woman, who was bigger and sturdier than Amaryllis, and had more sensible hair. The fact that she was wearing a crumpled beige skirt suit might have had something to do with the sturdiness. She held out a hand to Christopher. ‘Sarah Ramsay.’

He introduced himself, trying not to picture her and Amaryllis dashing around some cold damp field wielding their hockey-sticks.

‘I’ve been assigned to Pitkirtly for the moment. Just until we can do something about the shortfall in staffing,’ she said.

Presumably this was a tactful way of referring to Inspector Armstrong’s sick leave, or whatever it was.

‘Of course,’ she went on before he had a chance to say anything, ‘Sergeant Burnet is best placed to continue with the current caseload, but at least I can make sure he has enough resources.’

‘Amaryllis and I were just talking about it – the caseload, I mean. If you need to use the Cultural Centre for anything, let me know.’

‘That’s very kind of you, but we’re setting up an incident room at the station... Could I have a quick word with you, Mr Wilson – inside, if that’s all right?’

‘Of course, but I’m not sure if I can be of much help.’

‘Do you need me for this?’ said Amaryllis.

‘I’d prefer to speak to you separately, if possible,’ said Sarah Ramsay. ‘Have you got time to wait, or will I catch up with you later?’

‘I’ll wait for you in the staff tea-room,’ said Amaryllis meekly. She followed them into the Cultural Centre and took herself off along the corridor when they went into the office.

‘Well, that was a surprise,’ said Sarah Ramsay – he hadn’t worked out her police rank or whether she was married. ‘I haven’t seen old Amaryllis since we bumped into each other at our terrorism refresher session a few years back. She seems just the same as ever.’

‘Yes,’ said Christopher. ‘Would you like to sit here?’

He took up position behind his desk. He felt more secure there. ‘Would you like a cup of coffee? Tea? Water? A biscuit?’

‘No, thanks. Let’s just get on... As you may have been one of the last people to see the two young artists, I wanted to check on what exactly happened. Keith’s writing up his own notes on the sequence of events and so on, but I’d like to form some sense of how things are before I read them.’

‘The girl’s still missing, isn’t she?’ said Christopher.

‘Yes – we have people out looking for her now. I can’t understand why it wasn’t taken more seriously before.’

‘Keith did all he could,’ said Christopher.

‘I know. It was the people who take the decisions who weren’t really listening... Anyway, setting that aside for the moment, can you tell me exactly what happened when you met the two young artists, and what your impressions of them were.’

‘Um,’ said Christopher. It seemed as if quite a lot had happened since that evening, and he was afraid of getting anything wrong. What if his account didn’t match Amaryllis’s, or what they had told Keith Burnet? Would they have to keep going through it until they got it right? Would they both be arrested? Sarah Ramsay didn’t look like the kind of woman who would let friendship get in the way of doing the right thing.

‘Take your time, Mr Wilson. It might be that one little detail holds the key to everything.’

That was even worse. If he had forgotten the only important thing he knew, then they would fail to crack the case and it would all be his fault.

He managed to pull himself together sufficiently to give an account of what had happened when Maggie Munro – who was still missing too, he suddenly recalled – had brought the two of them in until they had shooed him away. The whole thing hadn’t lasted very long. That was why he was having trouble remembering.

‘And then later on, when you and Amaryllis went back to the Folk Museum after...’ She glanced at a notebook that had appeared in her hand. ‘After a political meeting? Is that right?’

‘Yes. Amaryllis is standing for the local Council.’

‘What?’ Sarah Ramsay burst out laughing. ‘Sorry – I know this is all terribly serious, but really! Poacher turned gamekeeper, or what?’

‘You’re not the first person to say so,’ Christopher told her. He ran through the discovery of the blood-soaked quilt and of the camera.

‘So,’ she summed up when he had finished, ‘the girl was called Sammy and she was pretty feisty. Not the kind to give in under pressure.’

‘I don’t think so,’ said Christopher.

‘And this Face of Pitkirtly thing? Had you heard of it before?’

‘The minister may have mentioned it. But I had forgotten.’

‘So it wasn’t exactly something that was much talked about around the town, then.’

‘No – but I sometimes miss things that are being talked about. I sort of get bogged down in other stuff.’

‘It’s fine,’ she said. ‘It’s not your job to keep up with that.’

‘Well, it is in a way. Only I don’t find it easy.’

‘You should try Facebook or Twitter,’ she said, smiling. ‘Some towns have local groups that are hotbeds of gossip, innuendo and feuds.’

He tried and failed to suppress a shudder.

‘Some museums use social media extensively,’ she added. ‘We do too in the police, where appropriate.’

He resisted the urge to run screaming from the building. Instead he said, ‘I don’t know if this is anything to do with what’s been happening, but we seem to have lost track of one of the staff here.’

‘Oh, really?’

‘Yes – the cleaner just left her mop lying about in the corridor earlier and we haven’t seen her since.’ Even as he spoke, he realised he hadn’t made it seem like a missing person case. It sounded more as if Maggie had downed tools and gone out on strike.

The Chief Inspector frowned. ‘Let us know if she doesn’t come back. It could all be connected, for all we know.’

‘Thanks. I don’t suppose it’s anything really...’

‘Have you spoken to her family? Maybe she felt ill and went home.’

Now he felt as if he had been ridiculous even to mention it. ‘Sorry – I’ll do that now.’

Sarah Ramsay got to her feet. ‘I’d like to speak to Amaryllis now. Will it be all right to use the tea-room, or could we possibly borrow your office for ten minutes or so?’

Sarah Ramsay was a different kind of senior police officer from Inspector Armstrong, or indeed from Charlie Smith. She spoke with authority but without aggression. The iron hand in the velvet glove.

Christopher gave up his office to her and retreated to the Folk Museum.

‘Have you found Maggie Munro yet?’ said Zak. He must have been desperate for something to do, because he was polishing the top of one of the display cases.

‘No, but when I get back into my office I’ll ring her at home in case she wasn’t feeling well and had to leave,’ Christopher mused. ‘Only I think she would have mentioned it to somebody.’