Chapter 3.16
Roberta snorked, flinching awake as something weird vibrated against her left boob.
Where the buggering hell was . . .?
Harmsworth’s plop-brown Volvo. Passenger seat.
He bloody better not have interfered with her!
Know what men are like.
But both his hands were on the wheel as they tootled their way through sleepy, rain-drenched Newmachar – past the Co-op, heading north.
The Volvo’s windscreen wipers screeeeek-scroonked across the glass, just out of time with the miserable buggers moaning away on the radio.
‘And they drove the darkness to our hearts,
Sang midnight’s song, and screamed inside,
They built a pyre, made fire an art,
And lied and lied and lied and lied . . .’
Harmsworth wriggled in his seat, which can’t have been good for his unmentionables. What with all the sand. He glanced across the car at her. ‘Your phone made a noise.’
She rubbed her eyes, sitting up. ‘What the hell is this Goth shite?’
‘We tried . . . to sing,
We tried . . . to fly,’
‘Dunno. It’s just the radio. You were asleep.’
‘It’s called a “power nap”.’ Plus it’d been a long day, what with all the running about and fresh air and everything.
‘We tried . . . to sing,
We tried . . . to cry,’
‘How is this music?’ Grimacing at the radio as the band chuntered on.
‘We tried . . . to cry,
We tried . . . to cry,’
‘Whatever happened to proper rock stars – with skintight leather trousers, frilly shirts, too much make-up, and manly bouffant hair? Groupies and wrecking hotel rooms. Album covers clarted in big-breasted bikini babes.’ Pulling her phone out. ‘This lot sound like they lactate smudged mascara.’
TUFTY:
Had weird dream.
ALL BIRDS ARE OPERATED BY REMOTE CONTROL!
CHEESE LIES TO US!
SO DOES BADGERS!
Now eating Weetabix.
Will do DDD after Weetabix eated.
The wee loon was off his rocker.
And an inconsiderate funtnugget. Sending buzzy texts when people were asleep. What kind of behaviour was that?
On the plus side, there was no more singing from the radio, just a whole lot of gloomy-flailing-away on acoustic guitar and piano.
Outside the car windows, Newmachar went from an old-fashioned Scottish village to a commuter town – swapping granite for harling and brick, with snaking rows of plastic semis, lock-block driveways, and yet more bloody hatchbacks.
The song ached to a halt, followed by a long exhale, then a full-on teuchter voice. ‘Oh, me, fit a miserable song! If I kent it wiz that bleak I wouldn’t’ve played it. Let’s hiv summit a bittie mair cheery, shall we?’
Roberta stuck two fingers up at the radio. ‘Shut up, you pish-headed cock-lump.’ Then switched it off. Yawned. Stretched. Let out a wet raspberry and sagged, smacking her lips. ‘Thirsty.’
‘Maybe Graeme Anderson will offer us a nice cup of tea and a biscuit?’ More wriggling. ‘And somewhere I can dig half of Aberdeen beach out of my pork scratchings.’
‘Urgh!’ A shudder rampaged down her spine. ‘Don’t you dare ruin pork scratchings for me.’
The Volvo drifted past yet more new-ish-build housing estates, where all the homes were crammed in like battery hens.
Harmsworth pulled his chin up. ‘I’ve been thinking.’
‘Oh, God . . .’
‘No, listen: about what Lewis Kelman said. Who you really shouldn’t have antagonised, by the way, even if he is a tit. But he’s right.’
She snorted. ‘He’s a twat.’
‘OK, a tit and a twat.’ Frown. ‘But what have the ASDG got to gain from stabbing Billie Nesbit? They know everyone’ll point the finger at them, right? And what does it achieve?’
‘That’s the thing about the far right, Owen – they don’t do joined-up thinking.
And I’ll antagonise anyone I want. What’s he going to do, clype on me to the Rubber Heelers?
’ She grinned. ‘Professional Standards can kiss my pert and succulent buttocks. Creepy snudgers can’t touch me, now I’m retired. ’
‘Do you mind? I’m lynchpinning here.’
Roberta rolled her eyes. ‘Pfff . . .’
‘Thank you. If Kelman’s goons didn’t do it, then Occam’s razor implies it must be someone from the other side.’
She stared at him. ‘“Occam’s razor”?’
A smug, know-it-all smile burst across his chubby face. He opened his mouth, but she got there first:
‘I know what it is, so if you try mansplaining it I will punch you right in the pork scratchings.’
His mouth clacked shut again.
They puttered through the last gasps of Newmachar and out the other side, into a landscape of fields and pylons and wind-battered barley. Sheets of rain thundering down from an angry sky.
Clearly suffering from a case of mansplainus-interruptus, Harmsworth drove on in silence for a bit.
Pouting as they passed waterlogged sheep and mini-lochans and great swathes of mud.
‘It’s just, if we’re looking for the simplest explanation, it’s got to be one of the counter-protesters who stabbed her.
’ Preening away in the driver’s seat, like a self-satisfied twunt.
Gosh, Owen: you’re such a genius. ‘So, who had motive? Jilted boyfriend? Jealous rival? Or maybe it’s a money thing? ’
Hmmm . . .
He might’ve been a satchel-faced idiot, with Y-fronts full of sand, but he had a point.
Roberta reached behind her, into the rear footwell, fumbling for her tote bag.
Pulling out the Operation Troglodyte file.
Then flipped through the witness statements – searching for Paddington ‘Paddy’ MacInver’s.
Because let’s face it, she’d read them all often enough to know what she was looking for.
‘This guy said Billie and Vivian Staybridge had some sort of feud going.’ Paddy’s statement went on the dashboard.
Next: ‘Erm . . . Here: Ethan Rattray gushed about how great Billie was. Which is exactly what you’d do if you wanted to deflect away from the fact that you stabbed her.
’ That went next to Paddington’s. ‘Vivian says Billie was jealous of her being promoted to campaign media liaison.’ Dashboard.
‘And Declan Tinworth says Todd Pherson-Weir’s dick was all out of joint because Billie rejected his advances and wouldn’t shag him.
’ Closing the file. ‘That’s about it for motive. ’
Smugness radiated off her driver. ‘See? Three perfectly viable suspects, right there.’
Nothing worse than a total bumwank who was actually right for a change. But yeah: it was worth exploring.
Harmsworth took a left, onto a single-track road that wound through an avenue of trees. ‘Smart and resourceful, remember?’
He swanked all the way down the avenue, self-satisfied lump of arseholes that he was.
Then turned right, onto a short section of road that led to a pair of stone gateposts – topped by what were probably supposed to be roaring lions, but looked more like Labradors who’d just stepped on a bit of Lego.
Between them stretched a set of black iron gates.
Closed.
Which explained the intercom, fixed to a post, on the driver’s side of the road.
Harmsworth pulled up beside it.
A pair of security cameras were mounted high up in the trees, glaring down at them with glittering eyes.
Which was interesting.
Roberta turned in her seat, peering out at the woods on either side of the road. ‘Back up a bit.’
He looked puzzled, but did what he was told.
Very interesting indeed.
She pointed. ‘This “car bomb” that went off – how come there’s no sign of any damage? No broken trees, no burnt bits, no scorched tarmac, no buckled metalwork?’
‘Maybe Anderson had all the damaged stuff replaced?’
‘He got the trees replaced?’
‘Oh.’
Exactly.
‘Ring the doorbell, there’s a good lynchpin.’
Harmsworth pulled forward again, wound his window down, and poked the intercom till it made a strangled electronic squeak. ‘Anderson’s probably not even here. He’ll be down in Westminster, won’t he? Snuffling in the trough, like all the other—’
A young man’s voice buzzed out of the speaker, riding on a prissy Central Belt accent. ‘Hello?’
One of the security cameras turned – zooming in on the Volvo’s occupants. The other stayed where it was, probably focussed on their number plate.
‘Yes.’ Harmsworth leaned out of his window, one arm up to shield his receding hairline from the rain. ‘We’d like to speak to Mr Anderson, if he’s in?’
Roberta thumped her idiot driver. ‘Course he’s in – checked before we left this morning. “On constituency business” according to his website.’
‘Hello-oh?’
Harmsworth tried again. ‘We’d like to—’
‘You have to hold the button down, if you want to talk!’
‘Oh for . . .’ Doing as he was told. ‘Hello, we’d like to talk to Mr Anderson, please.’
‘He’s busy.’
Roberta gave Harmsworth another thump. ‘Tell your man, “The person Anderson named a law after wants a word.”’
Harmsworth pressed the button. ‘The person he named a—’
‘I heard.’ Which meant the voice had been screwing with them the whole time. ‘Hold on.’
The gates gave an almighty buzzzzzzzzzzz, a clang, then juddered open.
‘Come on up.’
So they did.
Anderson’s conservatory was huge, featuring lots of wicker furniture and bright cushions.
Pot plants. A small dining table. Three walls of floor-to-ceiling glass – two of which looked out over the fields surrounding his house; while the third provided a view of the driveway, parking area, and paved bit around the front door.
Perfect, if you wanted to monitor everyone’s comings and goings.
And given the plethora of security cameras mounted all over the place, Anderson did.
Roberta took a sip of tea – slightly bitter, but that probably had something to do with the ASDG-branded mug it’d been served in, with ‘NO THANK EU!’ on it. The plate of mixed chocolate biscuits helped, though.
She munched, watching one of those robot mowers valiantly battling in the rain, keeping the huge sweep of front lawn in check. Circling the pollarded sycamores, to head out on another sweep.
Couldn’t be good for it, getting soaked like that . . .