Snow Storm (10 page)

Jones shook
her head, “Nobody saw or heard anything.”

“
I don’t
actually understand it,” Campbell exclaimed. “It’s not like you can
just rock up to a place like this, armed to the teeth like some
kind of conspiracy nut, pummel the shit out of a house and its
owner and go unnoticed. They must have made some noise, even with
silencers, or at least been quite visible. I mean the guy had
electric gates. You don’t just shin over them with half a ton of
metal over your shoulder and not create a ruckus.”

“
Suggests he
knew whoever it was doesn’t it?” Jones volunteered.

“
Not as well
as he thought.” Campbell replied.

“
Who did you
actually speak to?” Burke asked.

“
Aye well
that’s the thing Sir. We spoke to the au pair on this side.”
Campbell pointed to the left hand side of the house. Owners are a
couple of lawyers but she said she was on all night and she never
heard a peep. She sleeps on the side next to the victims house,
says her employers didn’t mention anything at
breakfast.”

“
What about
the other side?”

“
Stay at home
mum. How do people afford these places? Anyway she never heard a
thing, sleeps on the other side of the building though. Kids aren’t
old enough to be interviewed or at least make sense,” Jones
said.

“
Maternal
instinct’s strong with this one boss,” Campbell added looking at
Jones, who frowned in response.

“
Over the
road?” Burke asked, ignoring the pantomime act.

“
Couple of
pensioners. Both seemed a bit doddery, possibly hard of hearing,
saw nothing, they were busy watching a documentary on the Discovery
Channel most of the night, that one about dolphins, classic, anyway
the old boy fell asleep in his chair and woke up about one a.m.
stumbled upstairs but saw nothing. His wife was out like a light
already, she’d gone after the ten o’clock news. Didn’t feel up to
Newsnight. Rock and Roll eh?” Campbell looked around for approval
at this and finding no real interest moved on. “Next one along was
another au pair. She wasn’t home but her employers were, so I’ll
check back with them later, as well as with the other ones on the
left hand side.”

“
Good stuff,”
Burke replied. “Keep it up. You never know what you’ll turf
up.”

They both looked at him
and nodded as he gestured for them to continue.

He wandered back inside,
past the accumulation of gore and through to the rooms beyond. To
the left there was a fairly formal living area which seemed to
double as an office. A large imposing desk sat at the far end of
the room. It would have completely swamped most rooms but not this
one with its high ceilings and imposing woodwork. The empty base of
a think pad sat in the middle of the desk. He hoped Scene of Crime
had that.

To the side there were
some brown chesterfields congregated round a granite fireplace,
above which, there hung a flat screen looking more than a little
incongruous. The previous day’s papers were scattered on the coffee
table and various empty cups gathered dust as they waited to be
cleared.

Burke didn’t need to look
much further to know Karpov was a single man.

On the other side of the
hallway stood a more formal living room, clearly never used, not a
sign of a screen in there.

To the rear there was a
kitchen which had not as yet been anointed with the status they
generally were these days, especially in this area. It was bereft
of a glass extension. There was no AGA or even fitted units to
speak of, just a tiled floor, some old cupboards and an overhanging
washing pulley that had doubtless seen the smalls of generations.
The empty food cartons told a story. This was a takeaway plating-up
room. Nothing more. Clearly the maid had quite an uphill battle
every morning. He wondered if she could be in the frame. Had he
perhaps made her clean that chandelier too many times?

He tiptoed across the now
sticky red hall and found a dining room to the other side, table
set in anticipation of something, though the cutlery looked to have
gathered some dust.

He carefully climbed the
creaky oak staircase to the first floor and made his way into what
must be the master bedroom. As in the case of the formal sitting
room below, this sat on a rounded turret like section of the
building, which faced south and got the best of the light owing to
the vast semi panoramic window. This room seemed opulent in
contrast to the others. A large amount of gold leaf and an almost
over the top collection of neo-classical sculpture was on display,
quite out of character with the rest of the house. An en-suite led
off the bedroom. There were more flat screens in here. Burke found
a remote by the four poster bed, switched the largest one on and
was immediately accosted by the image of himself staring back from
beside the bed. Interesting.

There seemed to be no way
of playing anything back at hand, so he would leave it with the
forensics guys on the way out.

The rest of the house
again seemed fairly standard: another four bedrooms three of which
had en-suites and all of which looked like they’d been decorated by
someone looking to sell the place. There appeared to be an attic
but no one had the key. He would see about getting hold of that
along with the laptop later.

“
Any sign of
security cameras Doc?” He asked as he creaked
downstairs.

“
Give us
time, Jim,” Brown replied.

He was now leaning over
the recently de-chandeliered remains of what Burke realised was a
red dragon-kimonoed victim, picking up what appeared to be
fragments of shattered skull with a pair of tweezers and placing
them on sample containers of some sort.

“
I haven’t
heard anything about any additional ones besides the ones on the
front gate. That’s not to say they’re recording ones anyway, may
just be a type of intercom with no storage.”

“
Might not
want to have a record of comings and goings.” Burke
agreed.

“
Didn’t
matter in the long run I suppose.”

“
No.”

“
You might
want to look at the hardware upstairs though.”

“
Really, how
so?”

“
Well it
seems our boy had his boudoir wired for playback. Couldn’t find any
kind of storage though.”

“
Kinky.” The
good doctor replied scratching one of his many chins. “Might be
with that laptop we’re missing.”

********************

He called in
at home on the way back to the station, hoping to cadge some kind
of food now Rachel was up and about.

The letter had arrived
this morning, amongst the usual flotsam and jetsam issued by the
banks and everyone else that was encouraging him to spend
money.

He left the bank
statements in their envelopes as usual. And rifled through to the
bottom of the pile. This one only caught his attention because of
the fact it had nothing on it and must have been dropped off by
hand, probably some kind of leaflet he thought. But the envelope
seemed wrong, too expensive.

He tore it open and
pulled a letter from inside; cheap printer paper, inkjet printer,
times new roman font.

Dear
Inspector Burke,

Sometimes
it’s best just to bury the dead.

You might
want to think about new arrivals instead of overdue
departures.

Regards

A concerned
observer

What the fuck? Who? How
dare they? How could they?

“
What’s up?
Energy bill gone up again?” Rachel asked.

He hadn’t seen her. He
wondered how much of his reaction she had seen. “Something like
that,” he replied, pocketing the letter and the envelope, knowing
it would be of practically no use. “I’m feeling the heat anyway.”
He smiled, hoping that would suffice.

Rachel smiled
back but with a questioning frown.

Everyone had inkjet
printers these days and the thing about posh envelopes was that
they didn’t require licking.

He locked himself in the
bathroom and threw up as quietly as possible.

Giles Herriot-Watt stood
on the harbour admiring the craft before him, like a man in his
position may have admired the form of a fine thoroughbred steed in
centuries gone by. She was something to behold; the Brentwood
Viking, sleek, long, light and yet most importantly in possession
of brutal power. Her red haunches shone in the winter sun as the
gathered hack photographers and assorted slack jawed yokels took in
her magnificence.

Drink it in his inner
voice declared. It’s more than you’ll ever afford.

They lowered her down the
slipway into the mouth of the cold river to much applause. She was
suddenly alive, snorting fire, as the two man crew waved to their
enthusiastic audience. The publicity was important of course. It
was imperative they were seen to be doing such things, adding a
touch of glamour to the area, giving them something they’d never
see the likes of again.

He cracked a
bottle of Moet & Chandon; hardly Crystal but what did it matter
on such an occasion. Not like anyone
here
would know the difference. He
preferred to keep the Crystal he had expense accounted and use it
to impress the ladies; the ones who knew the difference, the ones
who knew what clothes to wear and were seen at the right functions,
the ones with the right breeding. Again his mind turned to
thoroughbreds. He appreciated the equine form, knew one end of the
animal from the other. He could happily watch a race or three given
the right quantities of the bubbly stuff and possibly some of the
old marching powder. And polo; that was fine and obviously a decent
social lubricant, but the horses didn’t like him. That was for
sure.

He charged
the glasses of the local provost and a reporter from the Galloway
Advertiser he might think about getting the number of later and
smiled as he took it all in, this spectacle he’d created. Brentwood
Viking roared to life on top of a foam pillow and her nose lifted
as she powered along the side of the harbour. The crew waved at
some local kids as they ran along the wooden walkways in pursuit.
They tucked themselves down into their respective cockpits as she
howled higher still and powered out into the bay for the nautical
dressage display.

“
It’s a real
boon for the area,” he heard the provost say and turned to say
something along the lines of the firm being delighted but instead
he couldn’t resist simply saying yes. The provost looked slightly
wrong footed which of course had been his intention and Giles set
about reeling her back in.

At times he
couldn’t resist saying such things just for the hell of it, just to
screw around with people’s minds and challenge his manipulation
skills. “As, of course is the area to us. I mean let’s face it
where better to test in secret than a place such as
this?”

“
True,” the
reporter replied.

“
And as an
added bonus I get to enjoy some of its,” he looked at the reporter,
made a point of doing so, “more natural beauties.”

She giggled slightly,
covering her mouth in a modest gesture he heartily approved of. He
knew what he would be doing for the rest of the week.

“
Of course it
would be good if we didn’t go into too much detail, as we agreed.
We don’t want everyone to know exactly what we are doing now do
we?”

“
No,” she
agreed, as the provost suddenly found she had somewhere else to be
and Giles congratulated himself on being such a skilled manipulator
of the press.

********************

John Campbell
was in his element. The building he had entered felt as if it
should be home. If cop shops looked like they did on CSI, this
would be home.

He announced
his arrival with the receptionist who looked pissed off in that way
people did when they truthfully didn’t give a flying fuck but
wanted the world and his wife to think they did because, what? It
made them a better person somehow? Hell no. Better to be honest
than dish out conciliatory smiles that you could tell weren’t real
anyway. The delicate turning up of the corners of the lips said
concern but the eyes said “anyway moving swiftly on.”

She probably
never even knew the Ruskie boy. He wondered what it took to get a
girl like that. Receptionists; they always seemed so snooty in a
way that had the effect of only making him more interested. Maybe
he should come out of the closet as a fully-fledged masochist, get
someone to strap him into something and kick the living hell out of
him while he begged for mercy, begged for more or whatever would
happen when he embraced the madness. Half the time he was like a
man picking at a scab.

Another girl
came out of one of the offices and greeted him with a smile and a
visitors badge just as he’d settled on one of the cream leather
couches and got his nose stuck in the latest copy of Heat magazine.
He then had to do a bit of a manoeuvre whereby he put the magazine
back down on the glass topped coffee table without her seeing, like
it was a copy of Playboy and she was his mum. Truth be told he’d
rather be caught with a copy of Playboy than Heat but he liked to
keep abreast of the celeb situation. You never knew when that might
come in handy if trying to salvage a conversation.