At half past seven, he’d ordered lasagne and chips from the bar snacks menu. It arrived at ten to eight. He’d finished eating it by five past. He returned to his paper, making sure the lighted windows of Coyne’s flat were in his peripheral vision. If there was any movement, he’d register it, tired though he was.
By half past eight, the place was heaving. Every other seat at Neil’s table was taken, the other occupants crowded round with their pint glasses and cigarette packets. Occasionally, one or other of them would try to draw him into conversation, but he kept himself on the fringes, answering in monosyllables and barricading himself behind his paper.
A few minutes before ten, Coyne’s light snapped out. Suddenly alert, Neil folded his paper and drained his third drink. He pushed his seat back slightly, on the alert for whatever was going to happen next. A light appeared in the glass panel above Coyne’s front door, then the door itself swung open. Neil couldn’t see Coyne very well against the light hitting him from behind, only the silhouette of a slim frame of medium height. Neil readied himself for the off.
Coyne pulled the door to behind him and emerged on to the street. Thank God he wasn’t taking the bike, Neil thought. Coyne glanced both ways past the parked cars that lined the street, then crossed the road.
Oh shit, Neil thought, he’s coming in here. He unfolded the paper and pulled his chair closer to the table. When he looked up again, Coyne was walking towards the bar, greeting a couple of the men standing there with their pints of Guinness.
There was no mistaking those deep-set eyes in the narrow face coupled with the goatee beard and moustache and the slightly prominent teeth. This was the man whose CRO photograph was etched on Neil’s memory. As far as he was concerned, the evidence might be circumstantial, but it had convinced him. If he’d been a gambling man, Neil would have staked a year’s salary that he was looking at Susan Blanchard’s killer.
He fought to hide his excitement and watched as Coyne bought himself a pint of bitter. Neil pushed back his chair, covered himself by saying good night to the others at his table, as if they’d been his drinking companions, and pushed through the crowd to the door.
The cold night air took his breath away after the stuffiness of the pub. But it did nothing to calm the thrill of anticipation that surged through him. It had worked. Good solid policing, helped along with a bit of flair and inspiration, and he was looking at the first serious suspect for Susan Blanchard’s murder since Francis Blake. Only this time, they’d got it right. He had a feeling in his bones.
He hurried along the street to where he’d parked his car earlier. It had a view both of the pub door and, at an angle, of Coyne’s front door. He dived behind the wheel and pulled out his mobile. Time to report. He stabbed the speed dial buttons to connect him to Steve’s mobile. He couldn’t believe his ears when he heard, “The number you are calling has not responded. Please try later.”
“Bugger,” he said, trying Steve’s home number. When he got the answering machine, he swore softly. But he knew better than to hang up without leaving a message. “This is Neil McCartney, guy. I’m outside the suspect’s house. He’s just gone across the road for a drink in his local. I know I’m supposed to go off duty at midnight, but I’m going to stay on here till Joanne relieves me or until I hear from you. I don’t want him to get away from us.”
Finally, Neil left a message on Steve’s pager. Surely he’d get that? The boss was never out of touch, especially since they’d been running this operation on a shoestring. He’d known Neil was watching their new suspect, so he’d be expecting a call. Sooner or later, he’d ring back.
Till then, there was nothing more he could do now except watch and wait.
FOURTY-NINE
Waiting was not something Fiona could bear. Not when she feared for Kit’s life. Galloway had tried to be reassuring, but it hadn’t gone anywhere towards calming the torment. She knew there was no point in trying to follow Galloway’s advice to get some sleep. All that would happen if she went to bed was that she’d toss and turn restlessly, riven with anxiety. She might as well stay up and try to figure out a way to help Kit.
If only she knew where his bothy was. Given that whoever had Kit captive would have to drive up from London, the chances were that they were nowhere near Loch Shin yet. If she could find the exact location, it might be possible to head them off before they ever got there.
Whatever Galloway had said about there being plenty of time, Fiona knew she couldn’t rely on that. In each murder, the killer had deviated from the template provided by the book when it had suited him better. Keeping Kit alive for a week was clearly a huge risk to take, and from what she had seen of this murderer’s work, he was a man who liked to minimize jeopardy. The sooner she could get to Sutherland, the more chance she had of finding Kit alive. Waiting for Galloway to grind into action in the morning was too big a chance to take. She had to do whatever she could as soon as she could. Of course, it was too late now to find anywhere that could sell her an Ordnance Survey map of the Loch Shin area to check out possibilities. Fiona poured another glass of wine and logged on to the Internet. She entered the keywords ‘Loch Shin’ into her search engine and impatiently scanned the results. There were websites where amateur photographers displayed their photographs of the area; websites for those who believed the Loch Ness Monster had relatives in Loch Shin; websites for holiday cottages with views of the loch; websites that offered advice on fishing; and even a website devoted to the hydroelectric power station. But no large-scale map. The on-line version the Ordnance Survey offered was too small to show any useful detail.
She had even taken time out to torment herself with the ghoulish gossip of Murder Behind the Headlines. Fiona knew even as she was logging on to the site that it would give her no peace, but like an itching scab demanding to be picked, she had to see what Georgia’s death had provoked. At last, confirmation from London of what anybody with half a brain already knew. Yes, there’s a serial killer out there preying on the weird and the wired who spend their days writing fiction about surprise, surprise, serial killers. Although it sounds a bit like biting the hand that feeds you, it’s true! Even more amazing was the confession that stopped a police press conference in its tracks. As the police revealed to the world that British crime writer Georgia Lester’s butchered remains had been found in a disused freezer in London’s Smithfield Meat Market, a man claiming to be the killer distributed a FLYER to the waiting hacks that outlined his motives for the series of gruesome killings. The confessor is a wannabe writer called Charles Cavendish Redford, who alleges that the three writers in question plagiarized manuscripts he had sent them in the hope of winning their support in getting his books published. Redford, 47, once worked as a hospital porter, which may be where he picked up his murderous skills. He’s now in custody, under arrest, but so far hasn’t been charged. The discovery of Lester’s remains provided incontrovertible evidence of what some of us had already deduced. To paraphrase Oscar Wilde; One Drew Shand is unfortunate. Two Jane Elias looks remarkably like coincidence. And three Georgia Lester is a series…Lester went missing over a week ago. Sceptics said she’d deliberately staged a disappearance as a publicity stunt, as Queen of Crime Agatha Christie did herself back in the 1920s. And it’s true that Lester had been complaining that her publishers weren’t taking proper care of her. She’d demanded bodyguards for her latest book tour, but had been spurned by publishers with more sense than money a rarity in itself these days. But when we read the accounts of her disappearance the deserted car in the country lane, the apparent lack of any signs of violence, the absence of any witnesses those of us with a sensibility tuned to these things felt the creep of dread, remembering the fate of the victims in And Ever More Shall Be So, tester’s only serial killer novel, which was made into a film. Word is that the London cops got the tip to search Smithfield from a psychological profiler one of those legendary Clarice Starlings (and we all know what happened to Clarice, don’t we???) who figure out what the bad guys are going to do next. Mind you, it doesn’t take a doctorate in psychology to work that one out. All it takes is the ability to read. Still, there must be a few thriller writers sleeping easier in their beds tonight. Because if Redford hadn’t conveniently spilled the beans, you can bet your bottom dollar it would have been a long time and a few more bodies before the police managed to nail him.