Tooth for a Tooth (15 page)

That morning, a sea haar dampened the scene.

He parked his Merc and shivered off a chilling sea breeze.

The call from Kara surprised him.

‘I don’t know who else to talk to,’ she began. ‘I’ve tried talking to Jack about it. But you know what he’s like. Stubborn as they come. Even when he knows he’s wrong.’

‘And is he wrong?’

A pause, then, ‘He’s back on drugs.’

The words were spoken so quietly that he almost never caught them. ‘How long?’

‘A few months. After we started going out.’

Gilchrist felt his breath leave him. He faced the sea. The haar was lifting, giving a bleak glimpse of swelling waves. In the harbour to his side, anchored boats rocked and creaked as if stirring alive.
A few months
. But Gilchrist suspected differently. Jack was a freelance artist, someone who was perceived to thrive on drug-induced creativity and who mixed in a circle of friends and associates with access to drugs, among other things. Had they sold drugs to Jack? Did any of them know his father was a detective? Would that have mattered?

He struggled to mask the desperation in his voice. ‘What’s he taking?’

‘MDMA.’

Ecstasy
. ‘Anything else?’

‘I don’t think so.’

‘Where does he get it?’

‘I shouldn’t have told you.’

‘You did the right thing telling me.’ He tried a different tack and concentrated on keeping his voice gentle. ‘Did you know Jack had taken drugs before?’

‘Just dabbled. Nothing hard.’

‘But not any more?’

‘I think he’s becoming addicted.’

Gilchrist gritted his teeth, stared off to the horizon. This was his son she was talking about, his little boy, the same child who cried when a crab gripped him by the toe on the East Sands and who almost died from a combination of measles and pneumonia that had him and Gail taking turns during the night to dab the sweat from his swollen face and the gunk from his welded eyes. How could that boy now be—

‘Don’t tell him we’ve spoken,’ she said. ‘I don’t want to lose him.’

‘I
will
need to talk to him.’

‘I know you will. But please . . . ?’

Gilchrist promised to be discreet, thanked her and hung up.

Well, there he had it. His fears realized. Jack
back
on drugs. Despite his repeated denials. He thought of calling right away, then decided not to. He needed to reason with Jack, not crash over him like a stampeding bull. Besides, even noon could be an early rise for Jack.

He slipped his mobile into his pocket and set off into the village.

He found her house in Routine Row without difficulty – no nameplate, just a number pinned to the door frame in bold brass plates. A brass door-knocker invited him to disturb the early-morning quietness.

He looked at his watch. Not yet eight.

He stepped into the middle of the narrow street. The curtains were still drawn on the upstairs dormer windows. Blinds shielded the downstairs from passers-by. The houses either side had drawn curtains, too, so he decided to give her another ten minutes.

He found a mobile cafe near the harbour, ordered a coffee and a bacon sandwich.

The coffee warmed his hands, and the sandwich dripped bacon fat as he walked along the pier. Seagulls performed hovering aerobatics in readiness of an easy meal, but Gilchrist was too hungry to consider sharing. Down to the crust, on impulse he tossed the remains into the water, only to see it snatched mid-air by a heron gull that swooped inches from the stone wall and wheeled away, others hard and loud on its tail. With the gulls no longer interested in him, he finished his coffee in solitude.

By the time he returned it was 8.27.

The blinds were still closed, but the house next door had curtains opened that gave a view through cleaned windows to a tidy garden that boasted shorn bushes.

He gripped the knocker, gave two hard raps and back-stepped on to the street.

He waited until his watch read 8.30 before giving another two raps, hard enough for the next-door neighbour to stick her head out.

‘Rabbie’s no here,’ she shouted out to him.

‘I’m looking for Linda Melrose.’

‘That’s right. Rabbie’s no here.’

Gilchrist failed to follow the logic. ‘Does Linda Melrose not live here?’

‘Aye. But Rabbie’s no here.’

‘Forgive me, but who’s Rabbie?’

‘Her brother.’

Gilchrist waited.

‘Linda cannae get up by herself. Rabbie helps her. Come hail or shine.’

Gilchrist glanced at his watch. ‘When will Rabbie get here?’

‘He’s usually here afore nine. Sometimes after. So there’s nae need to waken up the whole street. Just bide your time and he’ll turn up soon enough.’

She was about to return indoors when Gilchrist said, ‘Do you know where Rabbie lives? Or where I can find him?’

‘You’re right impatient, so you are.’

‘It’s important,’ he said.

She glared at him. ‘He walks his dog along the harbour. A muckle Alsatian.’

‘Thank you.’

‘Wait ’til you see him before you cast any thanks.’ And with that, the door closed.

Back at the cafe, Gilchrist ordered another coffee. ‘I’m looking for Rabbie,’ he said. ‘He usually walks his Alsatian.’

‘Tam.’

‘Tam?’

‘Rabbie’s Alsatian.’

‘Oh, right. Yes. Tam. Have you seen Rabbie walking Tam this morning?’

‘Not yet.’ She glanced at her watch. ‘And I wouldnae expect to see him for another hour or so.’

‘Why’s that?’

‘Heard he got gubbed last night. He can be a right nasty drunk when he’s had a few, let me tell you.’

‘Do you know where he lives?’

‘Somewhere in town.’

‘Can you do any better than that?’

‘Sorry.’

‘Well, in that case, I’ll have another one of your bacon sarnies,’ then added, ‘You wouldn’t have a phone book by any chance, would you?’

‘You’re in luck.’

While he waited for the bacon to fry, he thumbed through the pages, but found nothing under Robert Melrose. Perhaps he had no house phone, only a mobile. He returned the phone book to the counter. ‘Can’t find Rabbie Melrose’s number in here.’

‘That’s because he’s Rabbie McKerihar. Melrose is his sister’s married name.’

Gilchrist found the number within seconds, entered it into his mobile and assigned Rabbie’s home address in Session Lane to memory. But the phone rang out and did not roll over to an answering machine.

The cafe owner’s directions took him across the A917 into Charles Street, and had him at Rabbie’s door within ten minutes, in time to finish his coffee and crush the cardboard cup into a rubbish bin.

The cottage reminded Gilchrist of his own before he purchased it. Paint flaked from the door frame and facia. Wet rot nibbled the window frames. Whitewash peeled from stone walls. The small garden was a patchwork of weeds and dog shit and urine-bleach marks. He set foot on the front step and was met by a barrage of growls and snarls. Something hard snapped at the door by his feet.

He tried the doorbell.

Tam let loose with a burst that stirred the hairs on Gilchrist’s neck.

He rang the bell again, this time held it down. But it did little to drown the barking. Tam sounded demented. The door shivered as something hit it. Then silence, followed by a yelped whimper and a man’s curse.

The door pulled open, and a man stepped into the chilled air, wearing a pair of boxer shorts that had seen better days ten years ago. The air filled with the smell of tobacco and stale beer. Red-rimmed eyes glared at him.

‘This had better be fucking good.’

Gilchrist showed his warrant card. ‘Detective Chief Inspector Andrew Gilchrist.’

‘What’s this about?’

‘Are you Rabbie McKerihar?’

‘What if I am?’

‘Let me ask the questions, Rabbie. All right?’

Tam’s growls turned Rabbie’s haggard face into a mask of anger. He turned and gave a growl of his own. ‘Back. Now.’ A bare foot at Tam rewarded Rabbie with a growl. He tracked Tam down the dark hallway, through an open door that he closed hard enough to loosen hinges.

‘Fucking nuisance,’ he said when he returned to Gilchrist.

‘Good guard dog.’

‘I can look after myself.’

Gilchrist caught the grazed knuckles, the cut lip. ‘Even when you’re drunk?’

Rabbie’s eyes narrowed. ‘What the fuck’ve I supposed to have done this time? It was a fair fight. He had it coming.’

‘Do you want to tell me about it?’

‘No really.’

‘Good,’ said Gilchrist. ‘I don’t want to hear it.’

Rabbie’s sore eyes widened. ‘What’s this about then?’

‘Your sister.’

‘Linda?’ Rabbie’s face worked through a short display of surprise and confusion, then shifted to anger. ‘If anything’s happened to my Linda, I’ll have the bastards by the—’

‘Nothing’s happened to her.’

Rabbie brushed the back of his hand across his mouth and chin, the stubble as grey as steel filings.

‘I need to talk to her,’ Gilchrist continued. ‘That’s all. Ask her a few questions.’

‘What about?’

‘There you go again, Rabbie, asking questions. Get dressed before I start on about last night’s fight.’

Gilchrist could almost hear the wheels turn.

‘Give me a minute.’

The door slammed in Gilchrist’s face.

CHAPTER 11

Linda’s house was as clean as Rabbie’s was grubby. Paintwork glistened. Windows shone. Flowers that Gilchrist thought must have been imported at this time of year filled her home with the scent of spring. He counted three vases in the hall and six in the front room where he now waited. Overhead, the creak of floorboards gave him some bearing on Rabbie’s progress.

Once the introductions had been made and Gilchrist had given Tam more ear-scratching than any dog deserved, Tam had shown himself to be soft-mouthed and placid. All he had wanted was his morning walk, and he now lay asleep outside on the front step, a warning to anyone who threatened his master’s sister.

Nor was Linda what Gilchrist had imagined. Grey-haired and white-toothed, she greeted him from her wheelchair with a firm handshake that defied her frail appearance.

‘Rabbie’s telling me you’re a nuisance,’ she said to Gilchrist.

‘I thought he was talking about Tam.’

She smiled for an instant. A flash of sunshine. ‘Would you like a cuppa?’

Gilchrist was about to say he was all coffeed out until it struck him that this was her way of keeping Rabbie from listening to whatever he had to ask. ‘Just the one, then. Tea. Milk, no sugar,’ he said.

‘And I’ll have my usual, Rabbie. But I’ve no fresh milk.’

Rabbie slid from the room without complaint.

Gilchrist heard the front door open, Rabbie’s words of encouragement to Tam, then a gentle click as the door shut. ‘He looks after you well,’ he said.

‘As well as can be expected at this stage. But I don’t think he’ll be up for what’s coming,’ she said. ‘I’ll need to get a nurse in. To do the personal things.’

Gilchrist lowered his gaze. He wondered how he would feel if he knew he was going to die. Oh, we are all going to die. There is no getting around that. But to know
how
you are going to die, and that it is only a matter of time, that must be a hard thing to acknowledge.

‘So why are you here?’

Gilchrist looked into eyes that he saw had once sparkled with the promise of life. Now they glistened with the knowledge that the promise was dashed, that life was nothing more than a routine of wakening and sleeping until one day you didn’t waken.

‘I met Gina Belli,’ he said.

At the mention of her name, something seemed to snuff the light in Linda’s eyes. ‘She told me you might come.’

‘Did she tell you why?’

‘Only that you had a vested interest. Whatever she meant by that.’

Annoyance gripped Gilchrist’s lips. Gina had veiled the truth. Linda Melrose did not know Jack had been his brother. He decided to edge into it, unsure of how much to disclose.

‘You were a passenger in a car,’ he said. ‘What do you remember?’

She faced the window again, and Gilchrist felt his own gaze following, as if the accident was about to be replayed in the reflective sheen of the glass.

‘Not much,’ she whispered.

Gilchrist waited.

Seconds turned to minutes. Still, she stared out the window.

Then her shoulders heaved, and her body seemed to rise from her chair before settling once more into immobility. ‘It was raining,’ she whispered.

Gilchrist strained to catch her words.

‘We’d been drinking.’