The Courier & Advertiser (Angus and Dundee)
He looked around, his eyes focusing on the inspector. Tears welled up in the wrinkled lids
The room was the private study of a wealthy man, filled with yet more antique furniture and modern art. Mr Buchan Stewart had been catholic in his tastes; there was something for everyone. But none of it would do him any good now. He sat in a Queen Anne chair facing into the room. He had been wearing pyjamas and a long velvet dressing gown, but someone had removed all his clothes and laid them neatly on the desk.
Blood matted and stained the wiry grey hair on his chest, oozing from a wound that had opened up his neck from ear to ear.
His head tilted back, staring blindly at the ornately plastered ceiling, and yet more blood smeared around his mouth, dribbled over his chin.
“Ah, Mclean. It’s about time a detective showed up round here.”
Mclean’s eyes flicked down towards the dead man’s lap and he suddenly noticed the white boilersuited pathologist and his assistant hunkered down on the floor.
Dr Peachey was not his favourite among the city’s forensic experts.
“And a good evening to you too, doctor.”
He stepped forward gingerly, aware of the pool of blood spreading out in a dark stain around Buchan Stewart’s chair. “How’s the patient?”
Blood loss
“I’ve been here an hour and a half waiting for one of your lot to show up so we could get this body out of here. Where the bloody hell have you been?”
“At home, with some friends, sharing a bottle of wine and some pizza. I got the call exactly half an hour ago, doctor.
“I’m sorry if your evening’s been ruined, but you’re not the only one.
“I guess Mr Stewart here’s not exactly thrilled at the way events have turned out either. So why don’t you just tell me what’s going on, eh?”
Dr Peachey looked up at him with narrow eyes, a fierce debate raging across his pale face.
It would have been easier with Angus, Mclean thought. Just my luck to get Dr Bolshy.
“Cause of death is most likely massive blood loss.” Dr Peachey spoke in short, clipped sentences. “Victim’s throat has been cut with a sharp knife.
“The rest of the body shows no signs of immediate injury, except the groin.” He heaved his bulk up from the floor and moved to one side so that Mclean could get a better look. “Private parts have been removed.”
“Are they gone? Did the killer take them?” Mclean felt the pizza weigh heavy in his stomach; the wine go sour.
Dr Peachey reached for an evidence bag that lay beside his open medical case, lifting it up to the light for him to see.
It contained what looked remarkably like the bits you find shrink-wrapped inside a Christmas turkey.
“No, he left them behind. But he shoved them in the victim’s mouth before he went.”
Frail
Timothy Garner was frail and shaky. His skin had that translucent quality you only see in the very old, like rice-paper covering yellow muscle and blue veins.
Constable Kydd sat with him in his tidy apartment; she looked up with hope in her eyes when Mclean entered the room.
He had watched the undertakers remove Buchan Stewart’s body to the mortuary, seen the SOC officers pack up and leave, taking all the wheelie bins outside. Someone was going to have fun.
Sergeant Houseman was organising a half dozen uniforms to interview the tenement owners on the lower floors, which just left the witness who had reported the incident in the first place.
“Mr Garner. I’m Detective Inspector Mclean.” He held out his warrant card, but the old man didn’t look up. He was staring at nothing, his hands slowly smoothing the folds of his dressing gown over his thighs.
“You couldn’t rustle up a cup of tea, could you, constable?”
“Sir.” The constable stood up like someone had jabbed a fork in her and scurried out of the room. Mr Garner’s company must not have been the most pleasant. Mclean took her seat close by the old man.
“Mr Garner, I need to ask you some questions. I can come back later, but it’s best if we do it now. While the memories are still fresh.”
Still the old man didn’t respond, didn’t look up. Just kept smoothing his hands over his thighs, slowly.
Mclean reached out and placed his fingers on the back of one of Garner’s hands, stopping him.
The contact seemed to break whatever trance he had fallen into.
He looked around, his eyes gradually focusing on the inspector. Tears welled up in the puffy, wrinkled lids.
“I called him a cheating bastard. That was the last thing I said to him.” His voice was thin and high, tinged with a soft Morningside accent that clashed with the swear-word.
“You knew Mr Stewart well, Mr Garner?”
“Oh yes. Buchan and I first met in the 1950s, you know. We’ve been in business together ever since.” “And what line of business is that, sir?”
“Antiques, art. Buchan has an eye, inspector. He can spot talent, and he always seems to know where the market’s going.”
“So I’ve seen from his apartment.” Mclean looked around Garne’s living room.
It was well-furnished but not with the same opulence as his business partner.
“And what of you, Mr Garner? What did you bring to the relationship?”
“Brilliant men need their foils, inspector, and Buchan Stewart is a brilliant man.” Garner swallowed, his prominent Adam’s apple bobbing in his thin, sinewy neck. “I should say was a brilliant man.”
“Can you tell me what you argued about?”
Cheating
“Buchan was hiding something from me, inspector. Of that I’m sure. Just these past few days, but I’ve known him long enough.”
“And you thought he was cheating. What, setting up a business with another man?”
“You might call it that, yes, inspector. I very much suspect there was another man involved.”
“The man who killed him, perhaps?”
“I don’t know. Maybe.”
“Did you see this man?”
“No.” Garner shook his head, as if reinforcing the answer in his mind, but there was uncertainty in his voice. Mclean kept silent, letting the doubt do its work.
“I can’t expect you to understand, inspector. You’re young still. Perhaps when you’re as old as me you’ll know what I’m talking about.
“Buchan was more than just my business partner. He and I, we were . . .”
“Lovers? There’s no crime in that, Mr Garner. Not any more.”
“Aye, but there’s shame still, isn’t there? There’s still the way people look at you in the street. I’m a private man, inspector.
“I keep to myself. And I’m too old to be interested in sex these days. I thought Buchan was too.”
“But now you think he was seeing someone else? Another man?”
“I was sure of it. Why else would he be so secretive? Why would he lose his temper and send me away?”
More tomorrow.