Lies of the Land Read online

  Finally there were far too many evenings alone in her flat working, or emailing and Skyping Louis Casci in New York. She spent a lot of time on emails. Many of them never sent. Too needy. Or boring, going on about work and the sad loss of decent cafés and pubs. Or mucky. She’d learned not to hit “send”. Wait till morning. How many times in the cold, wine-free, light of day had she thanked the heavens she hadn’t hit that button. If she’d got one of those emails from him she’d have reported him to the police. If only for offences against prose.

  Her phone rang at last (“Happiness”, the Blue Nile. She’d been going though a nostalgia kick for her favourite old Glasgow band).

  “DI Coulter, good of you to call. What’ve you got for me?”

  “I gather you already know most of what I know,” Coulter sounded like he was calling from a busy corridor. “In fact you knew before me. How do you do that?”

  “Networking, Alan.”

  “So you’ll know that Julian Miller was shot dead by a pistol around 6 a.m. this morning.”

  “Six o’clock? Busy firm, JCG Miller.”

  “And on a Saturday too. Apparently they’re in demand these days. Partners working all day Saturday, the rest of them Saturday mornings.”

  “Make hay while the sun shines.”

  “Found by a caretaker, seated at his desk in JCG Miller’s offices. How well did you know him, Maddy?”

  “No better than you. Only came across him once professionally, I think. The Petrus case. Five years ago? He won that round.”

  “You were socialising with his employees last night, I hear.”

  “Yeah, I heard that too. Samantha Anderson, and her husband, Stuart, came round for a nightcap. Sam is JCG’s conveyancing woman.”

  “She seem okay?”

  “Full of the joys.” Of what Maddy could remember, that seemed to be the case.

  “Unless she left after six this morning, it wasn’t her who told you about Miller.”

  “Am I being interrogated here? There was another member of JCG with them. Douglas received a text around 8.30. Well, he told me around 8.30. When I took a coffee in to him. In the spare room. He couldn’t get a taxi and—”

  “No need to justify your lifestyle to me. You know I’m endlessly jealous. Douglas. That’d be…” she heard Coulter flick through a document. Hoped he’d find the name quickly: she had forgotten already. “Mason.”

  “That’s the fellow.”

  “I’m going to see him, and everyone else at the firm now. Want me to give him your regards?”

  “Why not. He didn’t get them last night, if that’s what you’re fishing for. Anything else interesting so far?”

  “Are you officially assigned to this case?”

  “I’ve already emailed Binnie. So unless the bastard tries to bypass me again… How do you know it was a pistol? You found it?”

  “If it turns out to be the weapon used, yes. The killer made very little attempt to hide it. In a rubbish bin in Miller’s offices’ car park, yards away from his car.”

  “Made no attempt, or he didn’t know you’re supposed to. Maybe it was a she. Crime passionnel. Perhaps he or she followed him by car to the office?”

  “Now I’d never have thought of that.”

  “Anything in the car? Damaged at all?”

  “Nope. James Blunt album in the CD player.”

  “Maybe it was suicide.”

  Zack Goldie, the caretaker, was a fully qualified doctor but never did his foundation years. “I like this kind of life better,” he told Coulter. A twenty-six-year-old with the wearied disappointment of an octogenarian.

  “I’d have thought you’d be overqualified for a jannie’s post?”

  Zack laughed, his black thick curly hair quivering. “I checked that with the agency. They guy said, ‘Medical degree, son? We’ve got lads in here with a string of O-levels as long as your arm.’”

  “I suppose finding someone with his head shot open must be less traumatic for a medically trained man like yourself?”

  “Not really,” Zack Goldie’s pupils shrank to pinheads as if he was seeing the blood and brains again. “That’s why I never completed.”

  “What made you go into Mr Miller’s office?”

  “He’s often already in when I start. I like him to see me so he knows I amn’t late. Usually just pass by, say hello, ask if anything’s needing done.”

  “You normally work Saturdays too, Zack?”

  “Always. Relief caretaker does Mondays and Tuesdays.”

  “Did you know that Mr Miller would be in today?”

  “Nearly all of them have been in Saturdays for the last few weeks. But Miller and Crichton have been here every Saturday since I’ve worked here.”

  “And how long is that?”

  “Eight months.”

  “You were the only person in the building this morning, apart from Mr Miller?”

  “Yes.”

  “Was the main door open?”

  “He always left it open. Mr Crichton or one of the other staff would normally be in just after him.”

  “And you didn’t see anyone else in the building?”

  “No. Everything was normal, until…”

  “What do you think, Zack? Miller was dead before you arrived?”

  “I s’pose.”

  Coulter got up to go. “You ever come across anything like this before?”

  “What? A dead man sitting at his desk at dawn, blood all over the shop? No, sir, I have to say I haven’t.”

  Coulter believed him.

  Back upstairs, Miller’s office cordoned off now, Coulter looked around the rest of the suite. Merchant’s Tower is a pretty good address, with the price tag to go with it. Big airy open space with desks and offices off, all in muted colours, rugs not carpets, the desks a deep rich red – oak maybe?

  Bill Crichton arrived and stood at the main doorway like a man who had lost his keys. He just stared, as if trying to work out which of these many strangers might know where they are. A constable brought him over to Coulter.

  “Is this the time you normally arrive, Mr Crichton?”

  Crichton gaped at him for a moment – slight build, balding, late forties, conservatively dressed, he gave Coulter the idea that he was somehow smaller than he should be. That, despite the success and the wealth, life had compressed him – then absent-mindedly checked his watch. “Yes. But that’s not why I’m here. The police phoned.”

  “I’m sorry, sir.” Coulter moved back into the open plan where DS Dalgarno was finishing a call. Crichton followed him vacantly.

  “How many work here, Mr Crichton?”

  “Eh? Oh. We’re the two partners, Bill and I.”

  “What’s the ‘JG’ in the title? C for Crichton I assume, and J. Miller, the deceased.”

  “No, the ‘J’ is for Jardine. Julian worked for the firm Jardine and Graham. They made him a partner about ten years ago and added his name. Phil and Ronnie retired when I came in five years ago. Jules made me a partner immediately.” Coulter decided that Bill Crichton was genuinely upset. “Don’t know how it’s going to be from now on.”

  “You were telling us about the staff.” DS Dalgarno changed the subject back.

  “Yeah. The two of us. We have a team of four lawyers, two researchers, two trainees. Six admin, support staff, two of them part-time. Do you want to meet them all now?”

  “In a moment. Could we go through to your office, sir?”

  “Of course. This way.”

  “Is Douglas Mason around?”

  “Actually, no. We spoke on the phone. He’s very upset.”

  Crichton’s office, like the man himself, was smaller than Coulter expected. He’d only had a glimpse so far through open doors to the other offices, they all seemed at least as big as this.

  “Did your partner always come into work so early, Mr Crichton? Six a.m.?”

  “Usually we’re both in a good hour or so before the others. But I didn’t think Jules would be in s
o early today.”

  “Why not?”

  “We had a late meal out last night.”

  “Just the two of you?” Dalgarno asked.

  “No. With clients. Fulton Construction. Their MD, Tom Hughes.”

  “Any special reason for this dinner?”

  “Nothing specific.”

  “Which restaurant, sir?”

  “Nick’s. In the West End.”

  “What time did Mr Miller leave?”

  “Late. I didn’t really look at the time.” Bill Crichton looked distracted, taking off his jacket and dropping it on his desk rather than hanging it on the coat stand at his elbow.

  “And you left with him?”

  “Yes.”

  A middle-aged woman opened the door without knocking, agitated. “Mr Crichton? What’s happened?”

  “It’s … Julian, Debbie.”

  “Oh no.”

  Maddy had intended to spend a bit of time on the Garner case, but found herself looking back through files and emails for Julian Miller and his company. She couldn’t get the picture of Julian Miller, dead in his office chair, out of her head. She could picture the scene well enough. She’d seen too many recently dead people. None quite so dismal and sinister as two boys in Kelvingrove a couple of years back – infancy and innocence so quickly mutilated, annihilated. Miller was a successful man in his prime and his death, in comparison, clean. Those teenagers – “neds” Bruce Adams had called them – had had to cling desperately to the sliver of slippery life they’d been granted. Miller had all the advantages and all the equipment needed to climb confidently to life’s summit.

  There is, Maddy believed, a point in crying over spilt blood. Chaos had exploded in that chic little office in the Merchant City, and order needs to be restored. If it isn’t, the darkness she too often feels inside will spill out into the real world.

  Her search didn’t reveal much and she knew it wouldn’t. Bill Crichton, in reports, transcripts, newspaper articles, the odd direct email, came across as serious, maybe a bit severe. But Maddy had met him in person often enough to think he was just shy, quite a pleasant bloke. Julian Miller was flashier, wittier, Gucci and Ralph Lauren suits, the more ambitious of the duo. They reminded her of something she once read Paul McCartney say about himself and John Lennon. John was hard on the outside, with a soft centre. McCartney confessed to be the other way around.

  There had been lots of communication between Miller and Crichton, and others in their team, and the fiscal’s office. JCG Miller were a decent enough bunch to work with – even if they had won more than their fair share of cases against the Crown.

  It occurred to her that she should get in touch with Sam Anderson. She owed her an apology – inviting a near-stranger and her husband back to her house then, if Doug Mason was right, dancing under the influence of alcohol. Then going to bed without as much as a goodnight. It’d be interesting to see what Sam made of her boss’s murder. It took a while to find a number – no home contact, but a mobile found on the end of Anderson’s work emails. She tried the number twice. No joy. Perhaps Sam didn’t use that number at weekends.

  Halfway through reading a report on a criminal negligence claim that Maddy had played no part in, an email from Louis came through.

  “Just a quickie.” (If only.) “Any possibility of you coming over here for Easter?”

  “Not unless you want my mum, three aunties, two uncles and a skein of cousins too.”

  A moment before the reply, then: “skein?”

  “You Americans can’t speak proper.” Then she wondered if skein was a Scots word. “Anyway, it’s your turn to come over here.”

  Their correspondence, messaging or Skype, was always light-hearted. Banter was a way of neutralising the distance between them. Not just the miles but the feeling she had that they were on different planets. And the universe was accelerating wasn’t it? Planets moving slowly apart, stars dying. On email she could be talking to anyone; on screen it was like Louis was on TV, a fictional character. Sometimes she felt lonelier, when they were united electronically. The sheer distance, the tininess of them both. Insignificant, on either side of the black Atlantic.

  “Well, guy I know is offering me tickets for opera or something in Central Park.”

  “Or something?”

  “Classical. I think. You like classical don’t you?”

  “Do I?”

  “Listen, Maddy, I’m doing this on the run. Got to be out the office pronto. Meeting with Parks and Recreation. Play safe, etc.”

  “Thus the freebie? Corruption! Louisgate. I can see it now.”

  Smiley face.

  “Can you make it over here? I’ll get tickets for the Krankies.”

  “I’m not even going to ask. Okay, I’ll see what I can do. Skype tomorrow?”

  What was wrong with tonight she thought but didn’t type. Hot date? Sex club? Worse, ex-wife?

  There was no way of either of them knowing what the other got up to. She knew only too well that that was true of couples married for twenty years, living in the same house.

  “Sure.”

  “Miss ya.”

  Before she could sign off, her mobile rang. Unknown number, but she knew it’d be Doug Fraser, or Mason or whatever. “Hello?”

  “Doug Mason. Remember me?”

  “I may have had a glass of wine too many but my short-term memory’s not that bust. John.” At the same time she typed: “Me too. A domani, tesoro.”

  What did she have to worry about? One man invites her over to New York while another, younger one, is hot on trail.

  Put another way, Louis calls in dutifully; Mason’s a common or garden pussy hound.

  Douglas Mason didn’t have much to tell. Coulter and Dalgarno had hung around the office all morning – they were still there when Doug got in at lunchtime. Taking statements from everyone. Now they’d gone to speak to Marion, Miller’s wife.

  “But she knows already presumably,” Maddy asked. Doug wasn’t sure. It was possible she didn’t. Radio Scotland had only said a body had been found, city centre. They hadn’t specified where or identified the victim.

  The partners had been out last night wining and dining a cash cow businessman. Presumably Marion had noticed Julian hadn’t come home. But that’s all Doug knew. He was more intent on trying to fix up a meeting with Maddy. On various grounds – talk about the murder, thank her for last night, show himself in a better light. Maddy made up a few engagements for herself, but left him – and herself – with a glint of hope.

  She’d hoped Coulter would call, between the office visit and the “death knock” – what cops and hacks call telling kith and kin the bad news. Why should he? This wasn’t her case yet. Might never be. Binnie – her boss, the fiscal – would have his excuse: she was already involved. Too close to the victim. But, with Miller being in the game, that was true of every fiscal and advocate in the land. Even if she did get it, there was nothing she could do for weeks to come, until police reports began to come in and she could start preparing a case. Then again, ever since she – not Glasgow’s Finest – had cracked the case of those two murdered boys, DI Coulter had taken to confiding in her. Even asking her advice, in a roundabout way.

  Back then everyone had told her – especially Maxwell Binnie – that she had overstepped her authority, gotten too involved in the case. Dan made a habit of saying she should make a career change. Join the polis. Maddy worried that all her colleagues now thought she was in the wrong job.

  The murder of Julian Miller wasn’t affecting her the way those two boys had. It was tragic, and violent and, as with all murders, a gap had opened in the universe. One that would never quite close, even if somebody were caught and convicted. But she couldn’t deny it, it intrigued her. Worried her. It was close to home. Too close. She had compiled a good number of cases involving murder – nearly twenty years in the job, it was unavoidable – and prosecuted some of the killers in court. But this was the first time that someone she actually
knew had been killed. In her city. While she was in bed – oh dear God – with one of his employees.

  Killearn is a rich sleeper town a few miles north of Glasgow, wearing the surrounding hills like a fur coat.

  It would have been a pleasant drive there if it weren’t for its purpose. Every now and then, when the guilt gets to him, or the fear of imminent death, or worse, a stroke, this is the route Coulter takes on his road bike. From Milngavie on, the houses become ever bigger and more exclusive. There’s a sharp uphill behind the reservoir that gets the blood pumping. Then out past Strathblane to Dumgoyne Hill.

  “My favourite hill in the whole of Scotland,” he told DS Dalgarno as they passed the whisky distillery at its foot. “Not that high, but the views are incredible.”

  “Yeah, I’ve done it.”

  “Tougher climb than you’d imagine, eh?”

  “Good workout, though. Gary and I try and do it, up and down, in under an hour.”

  Coulter let that slide. Last time he’d climbed it it took him nearly half the day. But it wasn’t just the ascent, the days out, that made him love Dumgoyne. It was the fact you could see it from almost anywhere north of the river in Glasgow. At meetings he’d stare out at it, over the city’s broken skyline. On rainy days commuting, or shopping with Martha, or dealing with Glasgow’s even more broken people, you could look up and there it was, still and quiet and ancient. Dumgoyne was Alan Coulter’s prayer, his dreaming spire.

  They found Miller’s house easily. Imposing, even among these stout buildings, in creamy stone set back from the roads, some of them turreted, with pillars and porches. The Millers’ front garden was like something out of a TV programme: water feature, shrubs and plants of every hue even now in late February. Someone was green-fingered or, more likely, they hired a gardener.

  When she opened the door Marion Miller was impeccably dressed, as if she was going out for the afternoon, low-cut top, a single diamond pendant, expensive-looking pashmina, heels. Alan reached for his ID.

  “Don’t bother. I know who you are. I’ve been expecting you. Come in,” she said, smiling broadly. As they entered, Amy Dalgarno whispered, “She’s coping well.”