older one had an Eastern European accent. He definitely wasn’t local.’
Pirie curled his top lip. ‘Every time there’s a new victim we get an anonymous phone call. Usually on the victim’s own mobile. Voice is muffled, Slavic accent. We’re pretty sure it’s a put on: he sounds like Mr Chekov from Star Trek. Dr Goulding thinks our boy’s either mocking his victims, or using them as a cipher.’
Finnie waved a hand at him. ‘Oh, thank you, that’s very helpful. A “cipher”: that’s really going to help us catch the bastard.’ He snatched the printouts from Pirie and stuck them in the middle of the desk. ‘DS McRae, I want you to set up a meeting with Dr Goulding. Go through everything that happened today.’
Logan groaned. ‘But, sir—’
‘As soon as possible, Sergeant.’ He stared off into the distance for a moment. Then smiled. ‘Has anyone spoken to Simon McLeod’s next of kin yet?’
‘Ah…’ Logan could feel the blush rising in his cheeks – he’d been putting that particular task off since getting back from the hospital. ‘Actually I thought that would be better … coming from someone more senior.’
‘Excellent.’ Finnie levered himself to his feet. ‘I think it’s time for us to indulge in some real police work, don’t you gentlemen? Pirie, get a pool car sorted. We’re going to pay our respects.’
The traffic was dreadful, a stop-start procession of people trying to beat the rush hour and failing miserably. ‘Lazy bastards,’ said DS Pirie from the driver’s seat. ‘Look at them all. Why does no one work till five o’clock any more?’
Logan sat in the back, watching the sunshine glinting off a pale white blob in skinny jeans and an ‘UP THE DONS!’ T-shirt. Her arms were already starting to go lobster-red. Aberdonians just weren’t designed for the sun.
Finnie turned round in the passenger seat and handed Logan a clear plastic evidence pouch with a sheet of paper in it. ‘We received this in the morning post.’
You still will not do anything!! You are CORRUPT. You sit there in your tower of SIN and you let THEM run around free from consequence. You complain when the SHEEP do not behave themselves, but you do nothing about the foreign wolves!
The last one screamed like a woman when I cut out his eyes. The next one will too!!!
You will wade in the blood of dogs!!!
‘Fingerprints?’
‘Same as all the others.’ Pirie’s voice was clipped, his face an ugly shade of pink that clashed with his hair. Still sulking – it probably didn’t help that Finnie had made him drive, instead of Logan. ‘No prints on the letter or the envelope, and no fibres either.’
Finnie handed over a second evidence bag. This one had the envelope in it. ‘Posted day before yesterday in Aberdeen.’
Logan read through the letter again. ‘So are the Polish people supposed to be dogs or wolves now?’
DS Pirie glanced over his shoulder. ‘I think the fact this guy has a tendency to mix his metaphors is the least of our problems, don’t you?’
Finnie smirked. ‘So, tell me: does the great Detective Sergeant Logan “Lazarus” McRae have any startling insights to share with the class? Come on, this is why I brought you on board, remember? Chance to redeem yourself?’
‘Well… He’s definitely unhinged. No sane person uses that many exclamation marks.’
‘That’s your startling insight? The man who gouges people’s eyes out and burns the sockets is “unhinged”? Pirie, call the Press and Journal: tell them to hold the front page.’
Bastard.
‘OK… Postage dates. This was posted day before yesterday, right? What about the others? Is there a pattern?’
‘Pirie?’
Finnie’s ginger-haired sidekick shrugged. He was tailgating a Renault Megane with a ‘HONK IF YOU’RE HORNY’ sticker in the back window. ‘The letters arrive pretty much at random. Dr Goulding thinks they’re a coping mechanism, by writing to us he makes us complicit in his acts. That’s why he keeps telling us it’s our fault: if we didn’t want him to keep on blinding people we’d have caught him by now.’
‘I suppose…’ Logan handed the evidence bags back to Finnie. ‘Then why attack Simon McLeod? He’s not Polish.’
The DS leant on the horn: BREEEEEEEEEEEP! ‘Come on: move it!’ The Megane lurched forward and Pirie accelerated up behind it again. ‘Who knows with whack-jobs? The McLeods run a stable of hoors, maybe our boy was after a nice piece of local ass and ended up with a Polish bird instead? Doesn’t like them mucking up our good Aberdonian gene pool with their filthy foreign ways. Or maybe Simon McLeod was just in the wrong place at the wrong time?’
Finnie smiled again. ‘Serves him bloody right too – whole family’s been a pain in my arse for years.’
Twenty minutes later, DS Pirie parked outside a rose-encrusted bungalow in Garthdee. Not really the kind of place you’d expect a criminal mastermind to operate out of, but for forty years that’s exactly what Tony McLeod did. Right up until his third heart attack. CID sent a wreath, then threw a party.
‘Right,’ said Finnie, climbing out into the warm afternoon, ‘Sergeant McRae, do you think you could keep your eyes open and your mouth shut in there? Hmmm? Just for me?’
Logan sighed. ‘Yes, sir.’
They opened the gate and marched up the path, bathed in the scent of roses. A little old woman answered the door on the second ring, smiling up at them. She had a pair of bright-yellow Marigold gloves on and smelt of furniture polish.
‘Can I help you?’
‘Morning, Doris.’ Finnie showed her his warrant card, and the smile disappeared from her face. ‘Agnes about?’
She turned and shouted back into the house, ‘Mrs McLeod, the pigs are here! Again.’
Simon McLeod’s mother appeared: a hard-faced woman with short blonde hair, dressed in black cashmere and white silk. She was clarted in gold jewellery, every finger encrusted with rings of bling: diamonds and sapphires and rubies and sovereigns. A magpie with a credit card.
She took one look at Finnie and said, ‘What the hell do you want?’
‘Mrs McLeod, can we come in please?’
‘You got a warrant?’
Finnie tried on a smile. ‘Wouldn’t be asking if I did.’
‘Then you can bugger off back where you came from.’ She let her eyes drift from the Chief Inspector to Logan and Pirie. ‘Aye, and you can take your pet poofs with you.’
‘It’s about Simon, Mrs McLeod.’
She folded her arms, hoisting her bosoms up a notch. ‘You should be ashamed of yourself – there’s perverts out there walking the street and you’re round here harassing us. My Simon’s a legitimate businessman, and he’s—’
‘He was attacked this morning.’
‘Don’t be stupid, who would be daft enough to—’
‘Simon’s up at A&E. He’s been blinded.’
All the colour drained from her face. ‘But… We…’
‘Someone gouged his eyes out.’
‘Oh God…’ Mrs McLeod stumbled and the old woman rushed to her side, holding her up.
Finnie’s voice softened. ‘Can you think of anyone who’d want to harm your son?’
Doris