Ben’s voice became quieter again as he turned to the DS. “Did we? When? I didn’t see it.”
“It came in when you were out, sir,” Hamza said. “Looks like the same accelerant was used on the caravan as on the body. A turpentine, petroleum jelly mix.”
“We used to use that in my army days, when we were out in the wilds,” Ben said. “We’d mix up a jar or two, and take it with us. You could use it on cuts, to keep insects at bay, and it was one of the best firestarters around. Smear it on a bit of kindling, and away you went. Wouldn’t blow out, no matter what the wind was doing.”
“Still no’ exactly common, I’d have thought,” Logan remarked. “Hell of a coincidence if it’s not the same person responsible for both fires.”
“It’s not uncommon among campers and the like,” Ben said. “But aye, that’d be a bit of a stretch, right enough.”
The road on the right cleared enough to let three of the queuing cars turn into the castle car park, freeing the traffic behind them to continue on up the road towards Inverness.
“So, what are we saying, boss?” Tyler asked, though it wasn’t immediately clear which boss he was addressing. “The killer was there? At the caravan? Watching us?”
“Probably, aye,” Logan confirmed. “When you two went blundering off, he must’ve seen his chance. Waited for Dinky to leave, then set the place alight.”
“So, presumably there was something in there that might have identified him,” said Sinead.
“Aye,” Logan said. He shot Tyler an accusing look. “Though fat lot of good that does us now.”
Tyler flashed a nervous smile. “Still, least we got the briefcase.”
“You had a chance to open it yet?” Ben asked.
Logan explained that they hadn’t, and his slight concerns that, even if they were able to work out the combinations for the locks, the case might explode in their faces the moment they opened it.
“Hence the visit to Shona,” he said. “Since she’s the only one I know with easy access to an X-ray machine.”
“Oh, you old charmer, sir,” Sinead said, and there was a general sense from the speakers of the others trying not to laugh.
“Less of the ‘old,’ please, Detective Constable,” Logan warned. “Oh, and there’s one other thing. Bernie borrowed money off Dinky to buy a van.”
“A van?” asked Ben. “What sort of van?”
“We don’t know. Bernie had sent Dinky a link to it on Craigslist, which Dinky has given us. But the listing has expired, or something. It’s no’ there.”
Hamza’s voice became louder again as he came closer to the microphone of the speakerphone. “Fire it over to me, sir, and I can take a look. Might be able to find it on the Wayback Machine.”
“What the hell’s a Wayback Machine?” Ben asked. “When did we get one of them?”
“It’s a website, sir,” Hamza told him. “Like an archive of webpages. If we can’t get it there, I might be able to get it from Craigslist.”
“Good. Aye. That’d be very handy,” Logan said. “Tyler’ll send it over to you.”
“Aye, but not until we get to Inverness,” the DC said. He caught the inquisitive look from Logan. “Can’t text when I’m in a moving car. Makes me sick.”
Logan tutted. “Of course it does.” He sighed.
They were heading through the village of Drumnadrochit now, and another mobile reception blackspot was looming, so Logan moved to wrap up the call.
“Right, everyone keep at it. We’ll be stopping up here overnight, then heading back in the morning,” he said. “What about Dave? Are we bringing him back with us?”
“Dave?” Ben chuckled. “You must be joking,” he said. “The bugger’s so keen he’ll have already passed you on the way down the road!”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Logan’s plan to surprise Shona by turning up out of the blue was dealt a bit of a blow when he realised he had absolutely no idea where she was. If she’d pulled an all-nighter, there was a good chance she was at home sleeping the effects of that off. Then again, she might’ve already done that, and be back at the hospital now to start another late shift.
Or, unhappily, she could be literally anywhere else in the Inverness area, and potentially beyond.
The hospital was closest. After dropping Tyler off at home, he decided to start there, not least because they had flowers for sale at the shop in the foyer, and given his lack of recent phone communication, he felt it best not to turn up empty-handed.
The lights were on when he arrived at her office, but there was no sign of her through the glass. Further lights were visible beneath the double doors of the mortuary, suggesting she was in there somewhere, hard at work.
Either that, or they’d brought former pathologist Albert Rickett back out of his enforced retirement. Even with the current state of NHS Highland staffing levels, he thought that was probably unlikely, given the old bastard’s current whereabouts.
“Hello?” Logan called, easing open the outer door and stepping into the office. Music was playing from the smartspeaker that sat on one of the shelves—an acoustic cover version of what Logan guessed was a recent chart hit. And by ‘recent’ he meant ‘from some point within the last fifteen years.’
There were no sounds of dismemberment echoing out from within the mortuary. No sawing, or drilling, or cracking of bones. No anything, in fact. If it wasn’t for the music, the place would’ve been—fittingly enough—as quiet as the grave.
Still, best not to go through and disturb her. For all he knew, she’d be elbows deep in some poor bugger, and while he was no stranger to corpses and gore, he didn’t tend to seek them out.
He crossed to the counter which doubled as a desk, sat down the rather disappointing bouquet of Dutch Freesias, then jumped back in fright when Shona reared up from the other side, all wild hair and wide eyes, gasping like she’d just surfaced from an undersea dive.
She windmilled frantically, screamed sharply, then fell backwards off her stool and landed on the floor with a thud that rattled the glass beakers and test tubes on the shelves.
“Jesus. You alright?” Logan asked, hurrying around to where Shona lay flat on her back on the carpet tiles. “What happened?”
“I fell off,” Shona wheezed. “Just then.”
“Aye, no. I saw that. Bloody impressive it was, too, with the waving arms and everything.” He extended a hand, gave Shona a moment to grab on, then helped her back to her feet. “Were you sleeping, or something?”
“What? No. No, of course I wasn’t sleeping. I was just resting my eyes.” She yawned and stretched. “And, you know, my brain.”
She caught her reflection in the glass of the door, and pawed at her hair in a hopeless attempt to flatten it down, straighten it out, or otherwise stop it looking like it had recently played home to a family of slovenly birds.
“You alright?” Logan asked.
“Me? Fine!” Shona replied, a little too forcefully. “What? Yeah. Fine. Right as rain. Why?”
“You seem…” Logan gestured at her, not quite finding the right word. “Different.”