Autographs In The Rain Part 26

As she took them from him and turned to leave them, Bob watched her.

Tall for her age, almost ready to burst into womanhood, she was a younger version of her mother, so much so that he wondered whether, on occasion, it broke Neil's heart just to look at her.

'I'm a lucky man, eh?' said the inspector. 'What a legacy. Now, what dug you two from the bosoms of your respective families? You didn't just come to see mine.'

'No,' the DCC admitted. 'It has to do with Lou. After you dropped her off last night, she had a mishap.' He outlined what had happened in Louise Bankier's suite, and was struck by the mix of horror and anxiety which crossed the face of his exec.

'Who the h.e.l.l would do a thing like that to the woman?' he exclaimed.

'I'm betting that it's the same b.a.s.t.a.r.d who fired that shotgun in London last Friday night. . . not at me, but at Lou. Do either of you disagree with that a.s.sumption?'

'No,' said the Head of CID. 'Someone's stalking her, trying to scare the life out of her. A blank cartridge, then a smoke bomb; nasty stuff.'

'Yes, but who's to say that the next one won't be lethal? We have to a.s.sume that it will be, and we have to give her protection. Who she is, the fact that she's a friend of mine, that doesn't come into it. There's a clear threat to her safety and she has to be protected. At the same time, we have to keep it quiet. This sort of craziness can bring all sorts of bugs out of the woodwork; we don't want any copy-catting.

'However, there's a limit to what we can do. Lou has a movie commitment .. . fortunately it's here in Edinburgh, but she won't cancel it.'

114.

AUTOGRAPHS IN THE RAIN.'No,' Mcllhenney murmured. 'She's not the sort of lady to be frightened into seclusion.'

'Exactly. So we have to help her get on with her life, as safely as we

can.'

'We need a safe house then, Boss,' the inspector suggested.

'She won't have it. But I won't have her in a hotel. Nor will she agree to stay at my place; not with the kids there, she says ... as if I couldn't fortify it, but there it is. So what I plan to do is have her rent a house for her stay here ... a detached house, not a flat or a semi . . . install certain security devices that she doesn't need to know about, like geophones to detect movement in the garden, and an alarm system linked to the nearest nick, or somewhere suitable. Then I'm going to persuade her to bring her secretary up here, for company as much as anything else.

'On top of all that, I want to give her a minder; someone to watch over her, to make sure she gets to work safely, then home at night, to take her shopping if she wants to go, to keep an eye on her if she wants to go out for a meal.'

'Got anyone in mind?' Mcllhenney asked, casually.

'Yes. You; but it's not an order.'

'It doesn't need to be; of course I'll do it.' He frowned. 'There is just one problem, though.'

'I know,' said Skinner, 'and I've antic.i.p.ated it. If there is an emergency, you can't just run off and leave Lauren and Spence. So ...

'That girl you have as a part-time help. D'you think she'd work for you on a live-in basis for the duration of this job? Don't worry about the added cost; I can take care of that.'

Til have to ask her, Boss, but I'm sure she will.' Neil paused. 'But what about Sammy Pye? He's single.'

'Maybe, but he's too young. Whoever does this job has to be someone with whom Lou can feel comfortable, and safe. She knows you, plus she likes you; I could tell that last night over dinner. Besides, Sammy's full of Ruth McConnell at the moment, and Ruthie has her own problems, with her uncle's death and its aftermath.'

He looked from one friend to the other. 'So that's it sorted then. Neil, you'll look after her. Andy, you'll catch the b.a.s.t.a.r.d who's after her.'33.The approach to Howdengate Trout Farm was the opposite of that to Mgllerkirk. It ran along a tight, steep-sided valley, through which a river ran; Pringle was in no mood for a walk, so McGurk drove his Astra along the rough forest track, looking ahead carefully for boulders.

They drove through woods for over a mile until they came suddenly to an end, and the unmade road opened out into a flat field with hills rising on either side. In the middle distance, they saw a number of buildings close to the river, and next to several large rectangular tanks half-buried in the ground.

'Looks bigger than the other one,' the superintendent observed.

'It is, sir, if the size of the loss is anything to go by. When I spoke to the manager he estimated the stock nicked at four tons.'

'What's his name?'

'Arthur Symonds,' McGurk replied. 'He'll be waiting for us, with the owner. His name's Glenn Lander; like Sir Adrian Watson, he owns the estate on which the farm stands. Trout's an extension of his business.'

The sergeant drew to a halt beside half a dozen cars which were parked beside the first building. As the detectives climbed out two men walked towards them. They were both in their twenties. One was very tall, taller even than McGurk by a few inches, but more heavily built, with fair hair; the other was stocky, with a ruddy complexion and very wide shoulders. In build, he reminded Pringle of Andy Martin; as he approached with hand outstretched, he imagined him, too, in the back row of the scrum. Looking at the other man, he guessed that he might pack down immediately in front.

'Mr Pringle? I'm Glenn Lander. And this is my manager, Arthur Symonds.'

'Morning.' The policeman shook the landowner's hand, and nodded sideways. 'This is DS McGurk.'

He was pleasantly surprised by the contrast between Lander and Sir Adrian Watson, but he saw no reason to show it. 'Well, gentlemen,' he barked. 'Have you two been living on another planet? I mean after what

116.AUTOGRAPHS IN THE RAIN.happened last weekend, how the h.e.l.l could you manage to lose another farmful of fresh f.u.c.king fish?'

Arthur Symonds blushed bright red. 'It was my fault, I'm afraid.'

'I'd have done the same thing, Art,' said Lander, at once. 'Don't blame yourself, because I won't.'

'So what did happen? You guys were warned, weren't you, to keep the farm guarded overnight.'

'Aye, we were,' the giant agreed. 'And I was here; only I had a phone call just before midnight. From the police in Hawick, or so they said. They told me that my father had been hit by a car on his way home from the pub and that he was critical. They told me that they were taking him to the Borders General, but that it was touch and go whether or not he made it.

'I never thought, or doubted it for a second. I just jumped in the Land Rover and bombed out of here. When I got to the hospital they didn't know what the f.u.c.k I was talking about. Eventually I worked out what might have happened and called Glenn.'

'You never thought to call home before you went tearing off?'

'My dad lives alone, Mr Pringle. He's in the pub every Friday night, and every Friday night he's the worse for drink... no' just Fridays, either. I just took it at face value.'

'So how long would it have been before you realised you'd been set up?'

Symonds knotted his eyebrows. 'I never thought to check my watch, but given the time it took me to get up to Gala, then the time I spent farting about the place trying to find my old man, it would have been over an hour, anyway.'

The superintendent looked at the young estate owner. 'And you, Mr Lander? How did you react when Mr Symonds called you?'

'Apart from calling him a dim-witted f.u.c.king second-rower, you mean, then having to apologise to my girlfriend for my language? After what happened to Mellerkirk last weekend, I jumped straight out of bed and drove to the farm. I was here inside ten minutes.'

'Didn't you ever stop to wonder what you'd have done if you'd driven right into the middle of them?'

'No, but I'd a shotgun in my jeep.'

Pringle ran a hand over his eyes. 'I never heard that, son,' he murmured.

'So what did you find?' he continued.

'An empty farm, basically. There was nothing here but a lot of tyre tracks,a few fish left swimming in the tanks, and a few dead ones, on the ground and floating on the surface.'

'Did you pa.s.s any large vehicles heading in the opposite direction as you were driving here?'

'I didn't pa.s.s anything, Mr Pringle. I hit a deer on the road but that was all I saw.'

'How many people do you employ here, sir?'