Water of Death (36 page)

Hamilton nodded.

“That is excellent news,” the culture guardian said, a broad smile blooming on his face. “The Edlott tourist promotion will be able to commence as planned.”

Sophia gave him an unfriendly glare. “It is less than twenty-four hours since the poisoners' initial communication was received, guardian. We are not in the clear yet.” She looked down at her notes. “Besides, the city does not revolve around your directorate's promotions.”

Hamilton nodded his head vigorously. The old hypocrite. For all his confidence that the threat was over, he'd have happily gone along with anything that messed up Edlott. Maybe that was Sophia's game too. I remembered my suspicions about her. Was I really serious about her having some involvement in the poisonings and the murders at the mill house?

“Post-mortems have been completed on the three men Citizen Dalrymple found in Colinton,” Sophia said. “I am still waiting for various test results, but there is little doubt that they were killed in the same attack that left the woman with the matching tattoo in a coma. They have similar wounds from heavy, blunt instruments and from sharp, single-edged, non-serrated knife blades.”

I nudged Hamilton. Sophia had just given a perfect description of the standard-issue auxiliary knife. The public order guardian stuck his chin forward resolutely but declined to look in my direction.

“Unfortunately,” Sophia continued, “the female victim has not regained consciousness so interrogation is still impossible.” She looked at me severely. “Citizen Dalrymple has some unsubstantiated ideas about the perpetrators of the attack. I suggest that we postpone discussion of those ideas until he succeeds in finding evidence to support them.”

She probably thought that put me in my place.

“Surely only the four people with the tattoo were involved in the poisonings,” the culture guardian said, standing up to Sophia with unexpected nerve. “Whoever sent that message was just a postman.”

“Or woman,” said the information guardian, promoting her gender and giving the senior guardian the perfect opportunity to nail me.

“Quite so. The Kirkwood woman is still at large,” Sophia said, turning her icy gaze on me. “Citizen Dalrymple, have you made any progress at all in the investigation?”

Mention of Katharine made me wonder how she'd been spending her time this morning. I shook my head to dispel that thought and filled the guardians in about Allie Kennedy's reputation. None of them looked very impressed.

“Are you sure this is relevant to the poisonings, citizen?” the culture guardian asked.

I shrugged. “Have you got any better ideas?” That shut him up. The problem was that I ran out of things to say myself soon afterwards.

“Is that all, Citizen Dalrymple?” Sophia asked with a sceptical look. “Very well. I propose that we maintain the current high level of security on the city's alcohol and water supplies for another day. Public order guardian?”

Hamilton nodded. “My people can sustain that but I wouldn't want them to work continuous shifts for too much longer.”

I had to pinch myself. Lewis Hamilton caring about his staff's welfare? What was going on?

“We'll review the situation at tomorrow's meeting,” Sophia said. She glanced at me. “Thank you, citizen. I'm sure you must have some other leads to follow up.” The implication being that the ones I'd been working on so far were worth as much as a citizen-issue wristwatch.

“Where to now, citizen?” the guard driver asked morosely. He'd written me off when I refused to let him loose on the bagsnatchers. Now I returned the compliment.

“Get out, guardsman,” I said. “I'll drive myself.”

He shot me a disgusted look then slid out of his seat. “Going anywhere near the castle?”

I was heading up the Royal Mile so I could have taken him most of the way, but he'd caught me at a bad moment. “Exercise is an essential part of the auxiliary's daily life,” I said, quoting from Barracks Regulations as I slipped into first and pulled away.

That was my response to Sophia's high-handed treatment of how I was running the case. Pathetic, really.

I turned left and went slowly down George IVth Bridge, peering into the window of Ray's office at the central archive. He was bent over his desk with his head resting on his hand. I decided to catch up with him later. I wanted to know why the bugger had been avoiding me and to see if he could give me any dirt on his barracks colleague Nasmyth 05. But before that I had more pressing things to do.

The sentry on duty at the checkpoint by Napier Barracks knew me but she went through the motions of checking my ID and authorisation before she raised the barrier. The extra security measures seemed to be working, though the young guardswoman was handling the checkpoint on her own and she was sweat-stained and tired-looking. Most of her fellow auxiliaries would be guarding the alcohol stores, central reservoirs and water-tank depots. The question was, how long could they keep it up? A day or two more of this and the city would be watched over by thousands of exhausted zombies, giving miscreants a hell of a free run. Had Allie Kennedy or whoever else was behind the killings worked that out in advance?

I pulled into Millar Crescent and parked outside the Kennedy flat. Twenty yards further on a Roads Department squad had dug a deep and completely unnecessary hole in the street surface. This was the Public Order Directorate's idea of a subtle surveillance operation. I was bloody sure that Allie Kennedy would spot it as quickly as I had. I moved towards the door but saw Agnes coming from the water tank, weighed down by a couple of jerry cans. I went over and took one of them from her. She didn't resist.

“Citizen Dalrymple,” she said, squinting into the sun. “What a surprise. More questions?”

“Just a couple of things.” I put my shoulder to the street door and let her go past me. She was in her workclothes, the scarf round her neck drenched in sweat. Her hair was speckled and redolent of paint. I followed her up the stuffy stairwell, aware of the swing of her hips as she climbed quickly.

“Come in then,” she said when we reached the third floor, her breath catching in her throat. “I'll just check on my mother.”

She disappeared down the corridor into the far bedroom. I took the chance to have a look in her brother's room. It was exactly as it had been when I was last there, the loops of the fire rope above the window coiled as I remembered them.

“Citizen?” Agnes called. “You'll be more comfortable in here.” She gave me a tight smile as I headed towards the sitting room. It was in its customary gloom, the curtains pulled almost to. At least the windows behind were fully open, although what passes for a breeze in Edinburgh during the Big Heat wasn't doing much to cool things down.

“Did you get off work early?” I asked.

She handed me a glass of water and nodded. “We're nearly finished in the tourist hostel. My mother's in a bit of a state and the supervisor let me come home.”

“Do you need a nursing auxiliary?”

Agnes's eyes sprang open. Normally you have to be close to death before the Medical Directorate approves home care. “No, it's all right. She's quiet now. She just needs me to calm her down sometimes.” She sat down on the sofa her father had made and beckoned to me to join her. “What is it you want to know, citizen?”

“Quint,” I said. “Call me Quint.”

“Okay.” She looked at me steadily. “What do you want to know, Quint?”

“It's about Allie.”

Her eyes stayed on me. “What about him? I haven't seen him.”

I nodded. “That was one question. He hasn't been back?” I wasn't being straight with her. I knew from the surveillance reports that he hadn't been spotted either by the operatives in the hole out front or by the ones who'd moved into a flat in the building at the rear.

She was shaking her head. “Not since he was here with the auxiliary.”

“And you haven't heard from him in any way?”

“No.” Her voice was suddenly shriller. “Why do you want him? He hasn't done anything.”

I turned to her. Her head was still bent and she was knotting her fingers nervously. “Are you sure, Agnes?”

She glanced at me angrily, her eyes damp. “What do you mean?” she asked in a low voice.

“Your brother's got a bit of a reputation, hasn't he?” I said, studying her reactions closely.

She blinked then quickly wiped her hand over her eyes. “Reputation for what?”

“I was hoping you could help me with that.”

Agnes got up quickly and went towards the door, then stopped and turned back to me. A great tremor shook her frame and she let out a sob. I went over and tried to put an arm round her but she shook me off and moved away again, this time to the window. She stood in the shade of the curtains and pulled a handkerchief from the pocket of her work trousers.

“I need your help, Agnes,” I said, keeping my distance. “It's very important that I find your brother. Can you help?”

Her body quivered again. “No  . . . no, I don't want—” She broke off as another sob racked her. “I can't. He'll  . . . he'll hurt me.”

Now I realised why she was so distraught. It wasn't because she was worried about her brother and was trying to protect him. It was because she was terrified of him.

“Has he hurt you before, Agnes?”

She looked at me with her eyes wide open then nodded slowly. “He's  . . . he's always hurt me. Ever since we were kids. He  . . . he likes hurting people.”

I went over to her and led her back to the sofa. She let me take her by the elbow. Her limbs were slack now and she sat listlessly, the handkerchief twisted in her hands. I glanced over at the photos on the dresser. Allie looked more than sullen to me now. He looked positively malevolent.

“I've heard that he's involved in the black market and other illicit activities.”

She kept still, only her fingers moving.

“Agnes?”

“I don't know what he does. He never tells me anything.” She looked at me weakly. “Except to keep my mouth shut.”

“You should have told me about him.”

She shrugged. “Told you what?”

“Who he has dealings with, where he goes, that kind of thing.”

“But I don't know any of that,” she said, her voice rising. “I don't know anything about what he does.” Her head dropped again. “Dad did though. He had a big row with Allie not long before he went missing.” The words came out in a staccato fashion, as if their significance had only just struck her. “Oh my God.” She looked at me desperately. “Oh my God.”

I lifted my hand to calm her but, before I could, the door banged open.

“Allie? Is that you, Allie?” Hilda Kennedy stumbled forward, a heavy nightdress hanging loosely over her thin body.

“It's me, Mother. It's Agnes.” She got off the sofa and caught her mother before she fell. “It's all right. I'm here.” She put her face against the older woman's and lifted her upright. “Allie'll be back later, okay?”

Hilda's eyes were puffy. She looked at me blankly as if she didn't see me, never mind know who I was. Then she seemed to faint, her eyes rolling upwards and her body going limp.

“Here,” I said, “I'll help you.”

“No,” Agnes said sharply. “No, Quint. I can manage.” Her voice lost its edge. “She's used to me.” She half pulled, half carried her mother out of the sitting room.

“You'll have to go,” she said when I followed them out. “She needs me to be with her now.”

I nodded. “You're sure there's nothing you can tell me about Allie's whereabouts?”

She shook her head slowly, her mouth caught up in her mother's long, tangled grey hair.

“All right. You will call me if you see him anywhere?”

“Yes,” she whispered. “Now go. Please.”

I went, trying to reassure myself that Agnes was safe enough with the surveillance squads around the flat. And went down to the Land-Rover to seek out another member of the female sex.

Davie came on my mobile about the drugs traffickers as I was driving up Morningside Road.

“You were right, Quint. These guys are seriously reluctant to talk about Alexander Kennedy. I threatened one of them with the fourth degree and he told me Allie took over his dealing patch. Listen to this. When a heavy went to lay into him, Allie threw acid in the guy's face.”

“Acid? Jesus. Another version of the water of life.”

“What? Oh, I see. The heavy's blind now.”

“When was this?”

“A couple of months back. The traffickers reckon Allie put the guard on to them as well.”

“Very interesting. Okay, see if they've got anything else on Allie. Like premises he uses, bars where he hangs out. I'll meet you at the castle later.”

“What are you doing?”

He was better off not knowing that. “You're breaking up, Davie,” I said. “Out.”

“Over here, Quint.”

I looked to my left and saw Katharine's fair hair appear at the side of a moss-covered gravestone. There was no shade in the Grange Cemetery and I'd been wandering around getting roasted for ten minutes.

“At last,” I said. “Didn't you see me arrive?”

“I had to be sure you weren't a guardsman,” she said, keeping close to the ground.

I got down beside her in the knee-high grass. “Do I look like a guardsman?” I demanded, opening my waterbottle and handing it to her.

She drank thirstily. “No,” she said, wiping her mouth. “You look more like a mobile scarecrow.”

“Thanks a lot. You seem to have done a pretty good job of keeping the carrion birds away yourself.”

“There are only old bodies here, Quint,” she said. “So what's happening?”

I told her there had been no further ultimatum.

“That's good. That means I'm in the clear.”