‘Here’s another: Strathclyde Police round up a really nasty tally man, a loan shark of the worst kind. The charges include serious assault, extortion, you name it. But the police witnesses were a bit sloppy, and one or two of the victims were clearly a bit wide themselves. Mike goes on the attack, and his client goes back to Castlemilk a free man, on a Not Proven verdict, to his astonishment and joy.
‘Then there’s the Chinese job. A young Japanese student at Strathclyde University — the daughter of an industrialist, resident in this country — is found raped and strangled. Two Chinese waiters are arrested. One of them has the girl’s knickers in his pocket. Mike and Rachel Jameson defend one each. They put up a lovely impeachment defence. First, they claim that the girl was into group sex, and produce three witnesses to that effect, one Chinese, two white. Then their clients allege that there was a third boy involved. Neither of the other two knows his name. They claim that the girl was a willing participant, that they left her behind with this bloke, and that he must have done it. Forensic evidence — semen samples and so on — confirms that there was a third person involved and the two lads are acquitted, fifteen — nil.
‘I’ve been through the rest of Mortimer’s court work. There is nothing else of any significance. One or two small-timers in jail for shorter terms than they expected, others free and happy, and absolutely no sign of anyone swearing vengeance.’
Skinner and Martin sat deep in thought. Murray looked frustrated.
‘Thank you, Peter,’ said the Dean. ‘Faced with that, we are forced more and more to the conclusion that Mortimer just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Such a damn waste. I almost wish you had found a link.’
But Skinner’s optimism had not dissipated. ‘I agree, David, I can’t see anything there either. Still, there is something. I know it, and I’ll nail it, and I’ll nail him. Can you find me transcripts of those three trials?’
12
As Skinner’s meeting was taking place, his team had their first small stroke of luck. An early-shift railway worker, interviewed by uniformed police at the end of his day’s work, produced the first possible sighting of the quarry.
‘Aye, it would be a bit before six o’clock. Ah wis on ma way to that early mornin’ roll shop in Cockburn Street for ma breakfast. Ah was walkin’ over Waverley Bridge when this fella goes tearin’ off doon Market Street as if he had jist landed a big treble, then heard that the bookie was packin’ his suitcase.’
‘Can you describe him?’
‘Well it wis dark, ken, but he looked like wan o’ they ninja fellas. He wis wearin’ a black suit and some sort of black bunnet. Ah couldnae see his face.’
‘What happened then?’
‘Well, like ah say, he goes tearin’ off doon Market Street. Then a car starts up, and this big white motor goes shootin’ back up the hill.’
‘Did you get the number?’
‘Gie’s a break, lads.’
‘Didn’t it occur to you, after two murders that something might have been up?’
‘Naw, wi’ the shifts ah work, ah see odd buggers a’ the time. And onyway, ah’d had a few bevvies the night before. All ah could think about was two fried egg rolls, a mug o’ tea and a fag.’
Skinner seized the statement when it was put before him in his High Street office. ‘Bring him in. Now!’
An hour later, Arthur Murphy, consenting but complaining, found himself in the High Street facing Edinburgh’s most famous copper.
‘Right, Mr Murphy, I’ve read your statement, and I thank you for it. Maybe you can recall a few more things if you concentrate, and put your healthy eater’s breakfast out of your mind. For example, was the fellow carrying any sort of weapon?’
The man knitted his brows and thought hard for a minute or so. ‘Well he’d this sort of sheath or holster thing at his back, and there could hiv been somethin’ in that.’
‘That’s a good start. Now what about the car? What make was it?’
‘God, a dinna’ ken yin frae anither!’
‘Well was it a Sierra?’
‘Naw, it wisnae yin o’ thon.’
‘Vauxhall?’
‘Naw, no that either. Ah tell, ye,’ said Murphy with a sudden flash of inspiration, ‘it could have been yin o’ thon German motors, an Oddy, is that it? Or maybe it was yin o’ thon Jap jobs.’
Skinner sighed inwardly. That was as much as they were going to get from the man, and even that might have been dredged from his imagination.
‘Right, Mr Murphy, that’s all. Thank you for coming in, you’ve been a great help. We’ll arrange a lift home for you.’
‘Eh, could yis jist take me back tae the pub where ye lifted me from?’
‘Fine.’
Skinner shook his head as their first witness left the room.
‘Doesn’t take us much further, does it, Andy?’
Martin had slipped into the room at the beginning of Skinner’s questioning of the bewildered Murphy.
‘A wee bit, sir. We can tell the troops to look out for a white vehicle, possibly an Audi. And for a man in dark clothing. But of course the driver of the car wasn’t necessarily our man.’
‘He had to be. If that had been anyone else getting into his car, he’d have been face to face with our man, and then he’d have been a goner. Tonight, we double last night’s strength, in the area from the Castle to Holyrood Palace. Everyone warned about the car. And I want a dozen armed men in the area. That includes you and me.’
13
Rachel Jameson arrived home at 6.45 p.m. She still ached from the loss of Mortimer, but she had decided against asking the Dean to grant her leave from practice. Instead, she had chosen work as her solace. In her line of business, that had meant acting for the defence in a nasty rape trial in the High Court in Glasgow.
The first day had been taken up by the empanelling of the jury, and the opening statements of counsel. The second, which had ended that afternoon at 4.25 p.m., had seen the alleged victim spend four and a half hours in the witness box.
Patrick McCann, Rachel’s client, was a dark man in his late twenties. The rape of which he was accused was particularly brutal, with the victim having been mutilated after the attack.
The trial troubled Rachel; she knew with utter certainty that her client was guilty. The girl, who had been attacked in her own home, had known McCann by sight and reputation. The weapon had been found, with blood patches, consistent with the victim’s group, on the handle, and with clear prints of the accused’s thumb and two fingers.
All the forensic evidence backed up the Crown argument. To cap it all, the victim, who had been forced to have every kind of sex with her attacker, had described in detail a brown mole on the right side of the man’s penis.
Rachel’s advice to her client, endorsed by the instructing solicitor, had been quite clear. ‘Plead guilty. If you go to trial you will be convicted and the judge will probably give you a life sentence. Plead, save the woman the ordeal of a trial, and keep detailed evidence from the Bench, and I might, just might; be able to keep it down to about eight years.’
McCann had looked at her with the arrogant eyes of a psychopath. ‘No way, miss. She was wantin’ it all. The stuff with the knife she made up.’
Occasionally, an advocate will come across a client who is pure evil. Rachel recognised this in Patrick McCann. She knew that at fifteen, he had knifed a schoolmate to death in a brawl which had followed McCann’s attack on the boy’s sixteen-year-old sister. She knew also that he was the chief suspect in two recent, and still unsolved, murders of drug users.