‘You make it sound so easy.’
Wylie slid the list towards him. ‘Some of them are bound to be still in the building trade.’
Hood read the names. The first seven were typed, the eighth added in pencil. ‘Does that say Hutton?’ he asked.
‘The last one?’ Wylie checked her notebook. ‘Hutton or Hatton, first name’s either Benny or Barry.’
‘So we talk to every building firm in Edinburgh? Try out these names on them?’
‘It’s either that or the phone book.’
The kettle clicked off. Hood went to see if Mrs Coghill wanted a cup. He came back with a copy of Yellow Pages, opened it at the section headed ‘Builders’.
‘Read the names off to me,’ he said. ‘We might strike lucky.’
The third name they tried, Hood said, ‘Bingo,’ his finger stabbing at a display ad. The name on the sheet was John Hicks, and he’d just found J. Hicks. ‘“Extensions, Renovations, Conversions”,’ he recited. ‘Got to be worth a call.’
So Wylie got on her mobile, and they celebrated with coffee.
John Hicks’ business premises were in Bruntsfield, and the man himself was working on a job in Glengyle Terrace, just off The Links. It was a garden flat, and he was busy converting the large back bedroom into two smaller units.
‘Ups the rental income,’ he explained. ‘Some people don’t seem to mind living in a rabbit hutch.’
‘Or haven’t got the money for anything else.’
‘True enough, love.’ Hicks was in his late fifties, small and wiry with a tanned dome of a head and thick black eyebrows. His eyes twinkled with humour. ‘Way things are in Edinburgh,’ he said, ‘there won’t be a decent building left that hasn’t been subdivided.’
‘Good for business,’ Hood said.
‘Oh, I’m not complaining.’ He winked at them. ‘You said on the phone it was to do with Dean Coghill?’
Somewhere in the flat, a door banged.
‘Students,’ Hicks explained. ‘It pisses them off I’m here at eight, and hammering till four or five.’ He picked up his hammer and thumped it a couple of times against a length of two-by-four. Wylie held out the list towards him. He peered at it, took it from her and whistled.
‘Now this takes me back,’ he said.
‘We need to know about the others.’
He looked up. ‘Why?’
‘Did you read about the body found in Queensberry House?’ Hicks nodded. ‘It was put there late ’78, early ’79.’
Hicks nodded again. ‘While we were working there. You think one of us...?’
‘We’re just following a line of inquiry, sir. Do you remember the fireplace being open?’
‘Oh, yes. We were supposed to be putting in a damp-proof course. Pulled the wall open and there it was.’
‘When was it closed up again?’
Hicks shrugged. ‘I don’t remember. Before we finished the job, but I don’t actually recall it happening.’
‘Who closed it up?’
‘No idea.’
‘Can you tell us anything about the other men on this list?’
He looked at it again. ‘Well, Bert and Terry, the three of us worked together on a lot of jobs. Eddie and Tam were part-timers, cash in hand. Let’s see... Harry Connors, he was a bit older, worked with Dean for donkey’s. Died a couple of years later. Dod McCarthy moved to Australia.’
‘Nobody walked off the job?’ Wylie asked.
He shook his head. ‘No, we were all present and accounted for at job’s end, if that’s what you’re getting at.’ Wylie and Hood shared a look: another theory blown out the water.
Hicks was still studying the list.
‘There’s one name you haven’t mentioned yet,’ Hood reminded him.
‘Benny Hatton,’ Wylie added.
‘Barry Hutton,’ Hicks corrected her. ‘Well, Barry was just with us for a couple of jobs. Bit of a favour to his uncle, or something.’
‘But there’s something about him?’
‘No, not really. It’s just, you know...’
‘What, sir?’
‘Well, Barry’s made it big, hasn’t he? Out of all of us, he’s the one who’s got to the top.’
Wylie and Hood looked blank.
‘You don’t know him?’ Hicks seemed surprised. ‘Hutton Developments.’
Wylie’s eyes widened. ‘That’s this Barry Hutton?’ She looked to Hood. ‘He’s a land developer,’ she explained.
‘One of the biggest,’ Hicks added. ‘You can never tell with people, eh? When I knew Barry, well, he was nothing really.’
‘Mr Hicks,’ Hood said, ‘you were saying something about his uncle?’
‘Well, Barry didn’t have much experience in the building game. Seemed to me his uncle must have put a word in with Dean, give the boy a bit of a start.’
‘His uncle being...?’
Hicks looked at them again; he couldn’t believe they didn’t know this either.
‘Bryce Callan,’ he explained, whacking his hammer against the two-by-four again. ‘Barry belongs to Bryce’s sister. Friends in high places, eh? No wonder the kid’s got where he has.’
22
Rebus took the call on his mobile as Siobhan drove them out to Roslin. When he’d finished, he half-turned in his seat.
‘That was Grant Hood. The body in the fireplace; one of the labourers working there at the time was Bryce Callan’s nephew. His name’s—’
‘Barry Hutton,’ she interrupted.
‘You’ve heard of him?’
‘He’s in his thirties, single and a millionaire; of course I’ve heard of him. I was out with a singles group one night.’ She glanced at him. ‘Working, I might add. But a couple of the women were talking about eligible bachelors. There was some magazine piece on him. Good-looking, by all accounts.’ She looked at Rebus again. ‘But he’s legit, isn’t he? I mean, he runs his own business, nothing to do with his uncle.’
‘No.’ But Rebus was thoughtful all the same. What was it Cafferty had said about Bryce Callan? Let his family look after him, something like that.
As they drove into Roslin and approached Rosslyn Chapel, Siobhan asked why they had different spellings.
‘Just another of the chapel’s unfathomable mysteries,’ Rebus told her. ‘Probably with some conspiracy at the bottom of it all.’
‘I wanted you to see it,’ Gerald Sithing said as he met them in the car park. He was wearing a knee-length blue plastic mac over a tweed jacket and baggy brown cords. The mac made swishing sounds as he moved. He shook Rebus’s hand, but kept his distance from Siobhan.
The chapel’s exterior didn’t look promising, covered as it was by a corrugated structure.
‘That’s only until the walls dry out,’ Sithing explained. ‘Then the repairs can be done.’
He led them inside. Prepared as she was, Siobhan Clarke still gave an audible gasp. The interior was as ornate as any cathedral’s, its scale serving to heighten the effect of the stonework. The vaulted ceiling boasted carvings of different kinds of flowers. There were intricate pillars and stained-glass windows. The place was chilled, its doors standing open. Green discoloration on the ceiling showed there was a problem with damp.
Rebus stood in the centre aisle and tapped his foot on the stone floor. ‘This is where the spaceship is, eh? Under here.’
Sithing wagged a finger, too excited by his surroundings to be annoyed. ‘The Ark of the Covenant, the body of Christ... yes, I know all the stories. But there are Templar artefacts everywhere you look. Shields and inscriptions... some of the carvings. The tomb of William St Clair; he died in Spain in the fourteenth century. He was transporting Robert the Bruce’s heart to the Holy Land.’
‘Wouldn’t it have been easier posting it? Might have got there by now.’