DC Gallagher marched confidently into the room, but when he saw his boss’s face darken at his lateness, he said immediately, ‘Sorry, I’m late Ma’am. I was on the phone. The crime scene manager wanted to speak to you. I took the message.’
‘And?’ she said, crossly.
‘And they’ve found a book there, in Clerk’s flat. It’s got a bookplate on it which says “Ex Libris Gavin Brodie” or something like that.’
‘Yes!’ Elaine Bell said triumphantly, raising her fist in the air. ‘We’ve got the creepy bastard now.’
Tonight would be spent in her own bed, Elaine Bell thought, seeing and smelling the freshly-ironed sheets as if they were in front of her. And, another big bonus, now she would have time to prepare herself for the confrontation with the Super, assemble all the evidence she needed and consider the best strategy to make him rewrite that travesty of an appraisal. She would have to give him wriggle-room to change or rephrase his expressed views without it resembling a retreat. The slightest hint of such a thing would make him more recalcitrant, more uncompromising and, possibly, if cornered, positively belligerent.
Their meeting would take all her tact, all her diplomacy, virtues she was well aware that the good fairy had left out at her christening. And if these failed, then she would simply appeal over his head to his superiors, or perhaps try the grievance route. Of course, resort to either would result in gossip about her predicament. An appeal of any sort, however legitimate, would leave her damaged or tarnished in some intangible way. She would be marked out as another troublesome woman, hand-bagging her way to the top over the bodies of better candidates, all men. And that would be a victory for the Tyrannosaurus, although a different sort of one. No, somehow he would just have to be persuaded to change his mind.
It took four hours to compile, then distil, the evidence that she needed for her campaign, and it could all be contained in one large brown envelope. Looking at it, it seemed strange that her future could depend on such an unimpressive package. Stage two was to arrange the meeting, ideally for some time after lunch, when his belly would be full and his mood benign. Her phone rang and she picked it up, her thoughts still centred on the confrontation to come.
‘Chief Inspector Bell.’
‘Just thought you’d like to know, Ma’am,’ Alistair Watt said, ‘we’ve had Mr Anderson in and he’s just positively identified the video clip of Clerk as the man in his flat. He thinks he may have recognised him from the day centre in Raeburn Place, he sometimes goes there too. That’s where Robert Clerk goes as well.’
‘Alright,’ she replied, sounding unexcited by the news. ‘There was no doubt about that anyway, was there? Clerk didn’t deny being in the man’s flat, even admitted to picking up the man’s things, including the knife, didn’t he?’
‘Well, yes, but…’
‘Probably picks his victims from the place. It would make perfect sense wouldn’t it? I’d bet money that Gavin Brodie also attended that day centre.’
Seeing Professor McConnachie standing waiting in her doorway, she glanced at her watch and quickly terminated the conversation, waving the pathologist in. He sat down opposite her, his battered old leather briefcase perched on the edge of his fleshless knees.
‘And how are you this cold afternoon?’ he began, fumbling inside it and taking a couple of sheets of paper from its ink-stained interior.
‘I am fine, just fine,’ she replied, feeling well-disposed towards him, content with the way the investigation seemed to be going.
‘Well, we’ve got the toxicology report back, and I thought I’d bring it myself. I was due to see one of your people anyway.’
‘Anything interesting?’ she asked, picking it up and beginning to read the first paragraph.
‘Yes.’
‘Yes?’ she repeated interrogatively, her head on one side, waiting for him to explain.
‘That Brodie man seems to have been very unpopular. He was poisoned as well as having his throat cut.’
‘Bloody Hell!’
‘It was, I agree, a rather unexpected finding…’
‘Are you telling me,’ she interrupted him, ‘that the cut to the throat wasn’t the cause of death? Because if so, we may have wasted the first few, crucial days of this investigation…’
And, glowering at him, she added with real anger in her voice, ‘If only these reports weren’t always so bloody late!’
‘What I’m telling you, actually, Elaine, is that this is a complex, difficult picture,’ Professor McConnachie replied emolliently, trying to calm her down and ensure that she took in his news, digested its import properly.
‘Then he did die in consequence of the cut?’ she chipped in, unwilling to proceed at his sedate pace.
‘Yes, yes. Brodie was undoubtedly alive when his throat was cut and he did die in consequence of it. He exsanguinated, bled to death, if you like. We know that, you saw the evidence of it splattered all over th e place, running down his bedroom wall. But the toxicology here’s… well, anything but straightforward. At the P.M. I had difficulty getting blood, so as you know I submitted liver and heart samples too. They’ve been analysed, and the tissues contain significant concentrations of two drugs – morphine and nortriptyline – at a toxic or near-toxic level. A level, possibly, probably, suggestive of an overdose.’
‘What do you mean “possibly, probably”? We need beyond reasonable doubt, remember,’ she said sharply. ‘And which is it? “Possibly” or “probably”? And neither’s good enough, as you’ll appreciate.’
‘Yes,’ the Professor said, trying to remain unriled despite her combative tone. ‘I do appreciate that, but we can’t give you a more categorical result because of post-mortem redistribution. It’s likely there’s been some degree of post-mortem diffusion from the gastro-intestinal tract into the liver lobes lying closest to the stomach and into the cardiac tissues.’
‘So?’
‘So that makes it difficult to estimate ante-mortem drug concentrations, and the ingested dose, from the post-mortem measurements.’
‘So what is it, exactly, that are you telling me? I told you, I need, as a minimum, to understand.’
The Professor sighed, ‘From the toxicological results it looks possible…’ He corrected himself, ‘Probable, that at some interval, perhaps a couple of hours before his throat was cut, Mr Brodie ingested a toxic or near-toxic dose of morphine, in some form, plus an anti-depressant, one of the tricyclics called nortriptyline – both medications he took for his condition.’
‘So we’ll need to check it all out, won’t we? Find out if he could have taken the stuff himself… or if it had to be fed to him – if it could even be fed to him – and then he’s bloody killed by something else anyway. I wonder where that leaves us?’
‘I really don’t know,’ the Professor said, his head bent as he fished in the interior of his bag once more.
‘Could he have taken it himself, accidentally or otherwise?’
‘As I said, I don’t know. I had a look at his medical records this morning, but you can’t tell from them.’
He rose to go, handing her another sheet of paper. ‘One other thing – and I’m just the messenger, remember – here’s the lab report.’
As soon as she lowered her head to read it, he took his opportunity to escape, casually ambling out of the open doorway, humming under his breath as if without a care in the world, but feeling the need for a good strong cup of coffee.
Although he was seated at his desk in the murder suite, Inspector Eric Manson’s mind was on his wife, rather than his work. Under his left hand lay a sheaf of papers that he was supposed to look at, fresh from the photocopier and still warm to the touch, but they remained unread. Tom Littlewood was scurrying about the room distributing the copies, the DCI’s barked orders ringing in his ears. The milk in Manson’s coffee had begun to form a skin, and he gave his cup an absent-minded stir, then removed the spoon from it but did not pick up his drink. Even his mid-afternoon snack, a white pudding, had been allowed to grow cold within its paper bag.