Father Confessor (J McNee series) (13 page)

But he didn’t move.

As though he was a simulacrum of the man I’d known; a fake, a stand-in.

I didn’t know quite what to feel. The old animosity I’d come to rely on when dealing with Lindsay seemed petty.

I found myself thinking about how he’d react if he knew what I was thinking. He’d be telling me what a screw-up I was. How I wasn’t able to leave things alone. How I should just leave this to the bastarding professionals. The poor pricks like him who were paid to deal with all this shite and do it right.

He’d have a point, of course.

I’d done all I could. I needed to take what I had to the proper authorities. To Discipline and Complaints. But I was hesitant to do that, a little voice at the back of my brain asking,

What do I have?

A name.

A rumour.

Sure, I had evidence on the three corrupt constables. But given Lindsay had already got information on them from D&C, my stepping forward would hardly be revelatory. And if anyone asked me about Cal Anderson, I couldn’t really say what had happened to him. If he turned up dead, I’d just be putting myself in the shite. I knew the truth about what had happened to Cal Anderson. Because, for all his talk, Burns was a man of swift, brutal and decisive action.

I wondered how long Anderson would be kept alive.

Whatever happened to Anderson, I was certain Burns wouldn’t be present. Deniability was his watchword. The old bastard had become careful in his old age. Aside from whispering a few words in the right ears, he made sure to keep himself away from the scenes of the crime. That was why no-one had been able to touch him.

It doesn’t matter, you pansy wee prick.

I looked at Lindsay. His eyes were still closed. He hadn’t moved. I’d just imagined what he would say. From this angle he looked small. Weak and insubstantial. His arms were pipe cleaners, his frame thinner than I recalled.

I heard a sound from the door. Turned and saw a woman there. Tall, with long mousy hair that fell in waves down her back. Dressed in blue jeans and a black polo-neck. Her eyes were large, making her look years younger than she was.

She said, “Who are you?”

“You’re Mrs Lindsay?”

She nodded.

“I used to work with your husband.”

She came into the room. “He’ll recover. That’s what they’re saying, anyway. Doctors never give you absolutes. So I’m taking that as a good sign.”

“I’m glad.”

“You’re CID? You look in pretty bad shape for a detective.”

“I’ve had a bad day,” I said. “And I’m not CID. I was. Once.” I wondered, what did Lindsay tell his family about his working life? Did he tell them about the work he did? What he thought of his fellow officers? How much did his wife know about what he’d been working on before he was attacked?

I gave her my name.

Her eyebrows raised and she shook my hand. “Don’t take this wrong, but you’re the last person I would have expected to see.”

“We had our disagreements,” I said.

She smiled. “I often thought he had more respect for you than he admitted. He put so much time and energy into complaining about you.”

“I never knew what I did to annoy him.”

“I’m not sure he did either. He’s funny that way, always has been.”

She took the chair I had been sitting in. Reached out and took her husband’s hand. Her grip was gentle, more a caress than anything else.

“I always understood,” she said, “that he could be one person on the job and another at home. He feels a responsibility, I guess.” She smiled, and I wished I could see the memories replaying in her head. “He was the same when we met…”

“Where did you – ?”

“University,” she said. “My first year. He was shy, you know.”

I nodded.

“I know he’s all bluster at work,” she said. “I’ve heard the way some of you speak about him. But he has to do that, you know, to be heard.” She was trying to smile again, but it wasn’t working. The tears were breaking through. “He’s a sweetheart. You should see him with our son. I couldn’t… I didn’t want to bring Alan here. I don’t know that… he’s just turned seven, you know? He knows that Daddy’s sick. He hopes he gets better. But I don’t want him to…” She took a deep breath. “No-one will tell me why this happened.”

“No-one knows,” I said.

“I want to know.”

“There are people working on it.” Meaning the police, the proper authorities.

She said, “You?”

I said, “Yes,” without even hesitating.

Realised once the word was out there that I couldn’t go back on it.

That I didn’t want to.

We took a coffee in the reception. Standard vending machine fare; sour and unpleasant. Taste didn’t matter, really. Holding the drinks gave us something to do.

“Did you ever meet a colleague of your husband’s; a man named Kevin Wood?”

She laughed. At least I think it was a laugh. A sad little sound, halfway to a cry. “You mean the Deputy Chief Constable for Tayside?”

“Aye, that’ll be the one.”

“You know how much you annoyed George?”

“Probably the understatement of the year.”

She shrugged, as though saying I didn’t know what I was talking about. “Well, you were an annoyance, a pain in the arse… but he hated Kevin Wood. I mean seriously.” She licked at her lips as though they were suddenly drying up. “You know they joined the force in the same year? Only difference was, Kevin liked to play politics. And maybe more.”

“Corrupt?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know. George never came out and said it, but then he didn’t like to make baseless accusations.” She smiled. “Maybe that sounds strange to you.”

I thought of the insults he’d thrown my way down the years. Wondered if I could really deny any of them. He used to make me angry, spitting mad. But the truth will do that to you.

I said, “What about Ernie Bright?”

Her forehead creased. She said, “You know how upset George was when he heard about that man’s death? I don’t know that I’ve seen him take anything so hard.”

When I was on the force, I remembered that at best Lindsay and Ernie Bright had maintained a professional relationship. But the tension between them had always been clear to those who cared to notice.

Ernie had once called it a “clash of personalities”, and I think maybe he meant that sincerely. But you didn’t have to like someone as a person to respect them as an officer. The world is more complex than that.

“I don’t remember anything about the two of them.” She shook her head. “After a while, if I’m honest, I forgot the details of what George used to say. Sometimes you just need someone to rant to. Not to remember everything you say to them.” She looked at me strangely. “Are you married?”

I shook my head. “I was engaged.”

She raised her free hand to her mouth. Gesture of shock. Eyes wide. “Oh God, I’m sorry. He told me and… you know he did everything he could to…?”

I didn’t want to hear this. Didn’t want to be reminded. Mrs Lindsay lowered her hand. “When he told me, I wanted to… I don’t know, I didn’t know you and I felt so sorry for you.”

When Elaine died, the worst part had been the sympathy. Words that became a blur of abstract sentiment. People going through motions because they didn’t know what else to do. That somehow hurt more than the memory, the fact that people were walking on eggshells around me, uncertain what to say, as though the slightest thing might set me off.

They meant well, of course.

Like Mrs Lindsay. She said she felt sorry for me. She didn’t know me. Only knew what her husband had told her. And what did he tell her? Did I even want to know?

I said, “It’s in the past.”

“He never told you what he found out. He said he didn’t know –”

“He found nothing,” I said, maybe a little too quickly.

Mrs Lindsay nodded, and her eyes darted to the coffee in her hand.

I said, “He thought Wood was on the take, then?”

“He said a lot of things,” Mrs Lindsay said. “I don’t recall specifics and I don’t want to start saying things I don’t know are true.”

“I’m sorry,” I said. “Forgive me.”

“You look like you’ve been through tough times, too.”

I stood up. Slow. Trembling a little. If she noticed, Lindsay’s wife didn’t mention it. Instead, she said, “When he wakes up, ask him about your fiancée. About what he found.”

I said nothing.

Walked away.

###

In the car, I let my head batter back against the seat rest. I took deep breaths in and out.

The snow that had begun falling lightly the night before was back and was now falling harder. Heavier. The temperature in the city had dropped. Below freezing. It was colder in the car than outside.

I turned the key. Blasted the heaters. Closed my eyes. I wanted to go to sleep. My breathing was unsteady, rhythms shot to hell. Every rise and fall of my chest was heavy.

I could have slept.

But for the residual adrenaline that kept me awake.

Kept me focussed.

Wondering where the hell I went from here.

It was past ten when I pulled up outside Ernie’s place. I’d slept for a while in the car, coming awake cold and tired. My skin was tender where it had bruised, and my mouth felt dry. But I was alive. And rested.

It was enough.

Ernie’s house was empty. No lights. No movement.

I left the car on the street, made sure no-one was watching when I walked up the drive. I took the keys from my pocket. I’d taken Susan’s spares earlier, knowing I’d be coming here sooner or later.

To look for leads. Or absolution.

Either one would do.

I opened the front door, moved to the alarm box. Part of me panicking suddenly, wondering if Ernie had changed the code. But he hadn’t. It was still the same. Susan’s birthday. Maybe not the most secure of codes, but memorable enough for both of the Brights to remember.

I stood in the main hall. Listened to the house. The silence.

Most places have a heartbeat. A background hum that you never really think about, but that’s always there. This place didn’t. It had died with the man who used to live here.

I stood there for a long time, barely drawing breath. As though doing so would somehow insult Ernie’s memory. When I stepped forward, the creak of old floorboards was like an earthquake.

I closed my eyes for a moment. Half-expected to see Ernie standing down the other end of the hall when I opened them.

I used the light from my mobile screen as a torch, not wanting to touch the light switches.

Who was going to be looking here? Who was going to report a trespasser? Aye, so call it paranoia if you like. Sometimes you just know when something’s wrong. If I was a thriller writer, I’d say it was a gut feeling and act like that was a good thing. But it was merely instinct. And instinct is not always infallible. Just ask any good investigator.

On the upper landing, I moved down into the master bedroom. The bed was made up neatly as though expecting Ernie to return.

Through there again, a small back room: Ernie’s office. Views across a conservatory extension, onto the back garden and down, out onto the river Tay. A faux-pine top desk by the window. The surface neat. Everything filed and squared away. A photograph of Susan as a child. Seven years old, smiling away on a farmyard, while a pig troughed about in the dirt behind her.

I checked the tray system. Nothing in the outbox. He was caught up, it seemed. Everything minimal and squared away.

I moved to the filing cabinet. The drawers were locked. I gave them a few good tugs just to be sure. They rattled loudly. It echoed through the empty house, sounding mournful.

In the books or the movies, I’d have been taught lock picking by a friendly criminal with a heart of gold. A good kid from the wrong side of the tracks. Fact was, I didn’t know anyone like that. I could still go to work on some basic locks, sure. You pick up some skills on the force that you don’t expect. But I wasn’t equipped for something so small and fiddly. I could maybe open a poorly-designed front door if I had to, given time and space. But chances were I’d be caught before I had a chance to prove my skills.

I looked around the room. Saw the box on the window. Round, wooden, decorated with faded paintwork. I pulled off the lid. Inside, paperclips, old stubs, pen lids and…

Keys.

Small keys. Maybe five or six. No marks to show what they were.

The windows were double-glazed. Would take keys around the same size as the filing cabinet, I reckoned. Meaning I had choices. But also the time to make them. I grabbed the keys, tried them one at a time.

Nothing. But they got the windows open. As much use as that was to me.

I felt a swelling in my chest. Old anger and frustration. Threatening to overwhelm me; make me lose control. But I held on. Left the keys on the windowsill.

Looked around.

He wouldn’t keep the keys on him. He’d keep them somewhere safe. Somewhere personal. Somewhere no-one else would look.

Where?

I figured he wouldn’t want Susan or his wife to find it. But he’d need easy access.

I looked around the room. On the wall, framed photographs caught my eyes. Photographs of a younger Ernie. Official-looking. Taken on the steps of FHQ. I realised they were pictures of milestones in his career. His graduation from police college. His reassignment to CID. His promotion to DCI.

That last one caught me. He was with other men that I knew, all of them smiling, or trying their best to. Looking like they’d rather be getting on with the work they knew they had to do.

I reached for that last picture, took it off the wall. Felt behind the frame.

Found the key in a small pocket down in the left-hand corner, a stitched on fold of paper you wouldn’t notice at a casual glance.

I gave it a shot in the filing cabinet. Finally got that top drawer open.

The files inside were arranged and in a way I guess Ernie understood. Shorthand and initials that spoke of a personal system he either didn’t want or need anyone else to understand.

Susan had told me that, growing up, her father’s office had been a no-go area. She understood in no uncertain terms that it was his space. His sanctuary. He needed somewhere he could escape from the world, where he could consider things in seclusion without distractions. Or maybe he just didn’t want his daughter to know the truth about the work he did.