‘I’m not able to put a time limit on the forensic team, I’m afraid,’ the detective replied.

  ‘But surely . . .’ Sanders paused, then added, ‘Listen, officer, without naming names, I have some influence within the club. You understand me?’

  Haddock felt the limit of his patience drawing near. ‘Captain,’ he said, calmly, ‘my team will be here until they tell me they’re done, I’m afraid. This is a murder inquiry and as such it takes priority over the invitation foursomes. You can play the twelfth off a temporary tee if necessary without it ruining your day; you know that as well as I do. As for your influence, if you’re talking about Bob Skinner, I’m due to play in the event as his guest. I’m not looking forward to telling him that he might have to find a new partner, but he’ll understand exactly why. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to check on progress down there.’

  He turned away and jogged down the slope towards the closed off square. Reaching it, he pulled on blue disposable overshoes before ducking under the tape and stepping into the area where half a dozen blue-suited technicians were working, combing through the scene inch by inch. One of them noted his arrival and stood.

  ‘Detective Superintendent Haddock?’ He nodded. ‘Jenny Bramley, I’m the new head of the scientific support unit. Pleased to meet you.’

  ‘Likewise. Is Paul here?’ he asked, nodding towards her colleagues.

  Paul Dorward was the son of Bramley’s predecessor, whose fall from grace had caused a seismic reaction throughout the policing community in Scotland.

  ‘No, he’s not,’ she replied. ‘We’ve agreed that Paul will be confining himself to the lab for a while. He and I both felt that he shouldn’t attend crime scenes in case his presence was noted by the media and became a distraction. The last I heard, the Crown Office was still in a debate with defence counsel about whether his dad is fit to plead or not.’

  ‘That’s right,’ Haddock confirmed. ‘Arthur has terminal pancreatic cancer. The prognosis indicates that he could die halfway through a trial. What does Paul think? Have you talked to him about it?’

  ‘He hasn’t said a word, and I don’t know him well enough to ask.’

  ‘Whatever, the last I heard was that if they don’t set a trial date by the end of this month, there won’t be one.’

  ‘How will the murder victim’s next of kin feel about that?’

  He smiled softly. ‘She’s only a few weeks old, so I doubt that she’ll be troubled by it. So, Ms Bramley . . .’

  ‘Doctor, actually, Superintendent,’ she corrected him, ‘but Jenny will do just fine. Have you dealt with Mr Anxious up there?’

  ‘Captain Anxious, please . . . and people call me Sauce. I’ve given up trying to stop them. I’ve explained to Mr Sanders he’s going to have to live with your team for as long as is necessary. Forgive him, this is a bombshell for him. You’re under no time pressure.’

  ‘That’s good,’ Bramley replied, ‘because this one could take some time. The greens staff here do a very good job. The most obvious firing position for the sniper is prone, behind that fence because the ground is absolutely flat there, but so far we can’t find any trace of anyone being there. The ground is so firm and the grass is so well cut that there’s no obvious sign of anyone having lain there.’

  ‘How do you know the shooter was prone?’ Haddock asked.

  ‘Because I’m a shooter myself,’ the scientist replied. ‘It’s my sport: rifle shooting. I hope to make the next Commonwealth Games team. On the basis of what I was told by your DS Wright when she called us out, that he was killed by a rifle bullet passing through his brain on a downward trajectory . . . that’s not a shot anyone would attempt while standing. It’s not a shot that many people could pull off either.’

  ‘What are you saying?’

  Bramley gazed at him for a few seconds. ‘I came to this job from London,’ she said. ‘I worked on crime scenes there. As you can imagine, I was kept pretty busy. I may be, I probably am, telling you stuff you know already, but in my experience there are four types of homicide. There’s manslaughter, culpable homicide to use the Scottish legal term, unintended killing. There’s spur of the moment murder, for example, a domestic confrontation that goes way too far or two guys having a barney in a pub and someone produces a blade. There are what the media like to call gangland killings, sometimes over drug dealing, sometimes just over turf. Then there are contract murders. They happen when someone buys a professional hit. Even in London they were the rarest type. The effect was the same, someone dead on the floor, but I learned to identify them and separate them from the rest.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘By the complete lack of forensic evidence. A professional assassin will leave nothing behind him. Tell me, Sauce, how many murders have you investigated where that was the case?’

  ‘One,’ Haddock replied. ‘And yes, the perpetrator was definitely a professional.’

  Bramley managed to smile and frown simultaneously. ‘I think I know the one you mean. That one was unique, but it proves my point; a professional leaves nothing behind. I might be proved wrong, but I have a feeling that’s what we’re looking at here. Whoever the dead man on those rocks down there was, someone wanted him dead and may well have paid for it to happen.’

  The detective nodded. ‘Noted, but I still have to consider every possibility until I know it isn’t. But, Jenny,’ he added, ‘haven’t you missed out another type of homicide. Could this be a random act? There have been serial killers in Scotland before. What if this is another?”

  ‘If it is,’ Bramley murmured, ‘then . . . excuse my Swahili . . . you have a real kutania problem!’

  Thirteen

  Spike Thomson smiled as his mobile screen lit up. He slowed the treadmill down to walking pace, paused the playlist on his earbuds, and took the call. ‘Hello, Bob,’ he said, his voice raised against the background noise of the gym. ‘This is a pleasant surprise. It’s well timed too, I’ve just finished my five K and was thinking about doing five more.’

  ‘Bloody hell,’ Skinner exclaimed. ‘Are you running the London Marathon?’ He had known the one-time radio presenter and impresario for many years, but as the former policeman’s life had changed, they had seen less of each other.

  ‘Not this year,’ Thomson chuckled. ‘I’m in rehab, breaking in my knee replacement. It’s hard work, I’ll tell you. Are all your joints still in working order?’

  ‘So far. At least I think they are. I have a couple of training partners these days, and they keep me honest.’

  ‘Who are they?’

  ‘My sons, Nacho and Jazz. Nacho’s twenty-one; Jazz is just breaking into his teens, but he’s the pace setter. He humiliated his brother a few months ago, which was a good thing because it made Nacho realise he needed to work on his fitness. He’s not with us full time, but when he is, we often run as a trio.’

  ‘With you still in the lead?’

  ‘That’s not guaranteed,’ Skinner admitted. ‘Jazz has still got a lot of growing to do, so I rein him in, but when I let him loose we see his back and there’s not much Nacho or I can do about it.’

  ‘Maybe he could pace me,’ Thomson chuckled, his voice reflecting his situation.

  ‘Be careful what you wish for. Anyway, Spike, good as it is to compare athletic notes, that’s not why I’m calling. I know that since you retired from the entertainment business you’ve been spending a lot of time at Witches Hill golf club.’

  ‘Too right. More so since my knee op because they have no issue with me using a buggy.’

  ‘You’re a sociable guy so I imagine you mix with the membership while you’re there.’

  ‘Of course,’ Thomson agreed. ‘That’s why they call it a club.’

  ‘Does the name Gavin Ayre mean anything to you?’ Skinner asked. He waited as his friend considered his question for a few seconds.

  ‘I know a Gavin. Tall, fairish hair, probably in his thirties. I’ve seen him there a few times; even had a drink or two with him, but his surname never stuck. I’m bad for that; especially in a group situation. Could that be him?’

  ‘That matches the description. Do you know much about him?’

  ‘I know he’s not Scottish. He was at my table at the Burns Supper last February, just after he’d joined. He thought that Tam O’Shanter was real, a historical figure. Poor old George Woodburn ripped the piss out of him about it. You knew George, didn’t you? Schadenfreude, they called him, because of his delight at the misfortunes of his golf partners.’

  ‘I remember him,’ Skinner conceded. ‘Why the past tense, though?’

  ‘Did you not hear?’ Thomson exclaimed. ‘He walked in front of a tram, in Prague, a few weeks ago. He was there on a business trip. Gavin got the joke that night though. He was really cut up about George last time I saw him.’

  ‘When was that?’

  ‘It would have been last month, when I played my first full round after my surgery. He was looking for a game so he came out with me. He wouldn’t get in the buggy, though. I did offer, but he said he was there for the exercise more than the golf. He’s keen on the game, even though he’s a novice. He told me he was thinking of having a short-game practice area with a putting green laid out in front of his house. He said he lives in one of the new places just west of Yellowcraig overlooking Fidra Island. I asked him what his wife would say about a golf course in the garden. He said he didn’t have one so he could do what he liked.’

  ‘What about his business? Did he say anything about that?’

  ‘Yes, he did, when I asked him. He said he was in logistics. I’ve got to say, in my recent experience when someone tells you that, it’s a polite way of telling you to mind your own fucking business, so I didn’t press him for any details. Why are you so interested in him, Bob?’ he asked. ‘I thought you’d moved on from the detecting business.’

  Skinner laughed. ‘My new career’s in press-and-broadcast media. It’s much the same thing.’

  ‘I suppose so, when you think about it. So why’s the mighty Saltire newspaper interested in this guy. What’s he done to attract its attention?’

  ‘He’s got himself killed, Spike. A few minutes after I saw him on Gullane beach, he came off his horse and never got up again.’

  ‘Bloody hell!’ Thomson exclaimed. ‘Really?’

  ‘Really. My wife did his autopsy this afternoon. She assures me he was dead before she began.’

  Fourteen

  ‘What you’re telling me, Sauce,’ Noele McClair said, ‘is that I was looking at a murder and I wrote it off as accidental death. That’s really made my day, not.’

  ‘I would have thought exactly the same thing,’ Haddock countered, gazing at her image on his phone screen. ‘So did the best pathologist in the country until she found the bullet lodged inside the skull.’

  ‘Still,’ she persisted. ‘I was a detective inspector at a crime scene and I took things for granted. I made a snap judgement without considering all the possibilities.’

  ‘You were a new mum out for a walk with her baby. Listen Noele, if I’d been there and run through the possibilities, a professional hit by a sniper would not have been one of them. If the Gaffer had been running in the other direction and had found him, he’d have called it in as a fatal accident too.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ she exclaimed. ‘How is Bob involved?’

  ‘He saw him on the beach just before the . . . just before he was shot. He helped Inspector Hill identify him.’

  ‘He did?’

  ‘Yes, his name was Gavin Ayre. He lived in a new property on a gated estate, out beyond Muirfield golf course.’

  ‘How did Bob know him?’

  ‘He didn’t. He’d seen him at Witches Hill, without knowing who he was, so he went there and checked him out. You know what he’s like.’

  ‘Do I ever. What do you do next?’ she asked.

  ‘We go through his house,’ Haddock replied. ‘But I’ll leave that until the forensic team are finished at the crime scene. Monday, I reckon, we’ll be in there.’

  ‘Can I help?’

  He grinned. ‘Noele, you’re on maternity leave. Your baby needs you.’

  ‘And you need me too. You’re stretched by my absence, and don’t try to tell me otherwise. I’m not talking about coming into the office, or interviewing suspects. But there are things I could do online or on the phone. Sauce, this morning I laughed at my mother for suggesting I could work from home. I hate to admit it, but she’s right. I’m here, and I’m available, so use me, please.’

  Fifteen

  ‘Nice putt, Spike,’ Bob Skinner called out to his playing partner as their ball dropped into the hole. ‘I’ll try to leave you the same length on the next hole.’

  ‘A tap-in would be better,’ Spike Thomson replied, casually, as he strolled towards him from the eleventh green after recovering the ball. He glanced beyond his host, towards what would have been the twelfth tee on another day. ‘What’s going on over there behind the yellow tape?’ he asked.

  ‘It’s a crime scene,’ Skinner told him. ‘The blue tunics are what the Yanks like to call CSIs.’

  ‘A crime scene? What happened?’

  ‘I told you. Gavin Ayre, the guy I asked you about.’

  ‘Yes, I read about that in the Saltire yesterday, but given what you told me I thought it was just a riding accident. You and your reporters are slipping up.’

  His friend smiled and shook his head. ‘No, we’re not. I only know because Sarah was involved.’ He paused. ‘Well, also because Sauce Haddock’s the SIO, and he was supposed to be playing with me today. It’s privileged information, so I couldn’t share it. There’s a press briefing at ten tomorrow when Sauce will announce that it’s a murder investigation.’ His smile returned. ‘However, if you’d read the Sunday paper this morning you’d have seen a story about a forensic team working in Gullane Hill. I could let them know that much.’ Glancing towards the temporary tee he saw that the match before theirs had yet to drive off. ‘Come on,’ he murmured. ‘Let’s find out how they’re getting on.’ He walked towards the taped off area, with Thomson following behind.

  An enormous figure, his crime scene tunic stretched almost to bursting point, greeted their approach. ‘No civilians allowed, gentlemen,’ he boomed, but with a grin on his face. ‘Morning, sir.’

  ‘Detective Inspector Tarvil Singh, as I live and breathe.’ Skinner returned his smile. ‘Congratulations on the promotion, big man,’ he said. ‘Long overdue. It would have happened a fucking sight sooner if the politicians hadn’t wished Scot Squad on us.’

  Spike Thomson chuckled at the reference to the TV satire. His friend’s dislike of the unification of Scotland’s police forces was legendary.

  ‘Have you got much more to do here?’ Skinner asked.

  ‘I think they’re just about done,’ Singh replied. ‘Is that right, Jenny?’ he called out as the team leader came towards them. ‘Jenny,’ he continued, ‘this is . . .’

  ‘I know who he is,’ she said. ‘Paul Dorward marked my card when we were called here. He said it was a racing certainty that Sir Robert Skinner would turn up sooner or later to find out what we were up to.’

  ‘Or simply to meet you, Dr Bramley,’ he countered. ‘I heard about your appointment and I welcome it. New thinking and new ideas benefit any unit. Not to mention a change in leadership style,’ he added. ‘So, what have you got? Anything worthwhile?’

  She held up a sealed evidence envelope. ‘We have this. A casing from a seven-point-six-two sniper cartridge . . .’

  ‘Fired by?’

  ‘There are a number of possibilities. Whatever the shooter was most comfortable with. M24, Arctic Warfare, or possibly something custom made, since we’re almost certainly looking at a pro. That may be the most likely, given the force with which the casing was expelled. It’s taken us two days to find it, buried in the heart of a tuft of grass yards away from the likely firing point. I’m afraid we’ve found nothing else, though. I’m pinning my hopes on there being a recoverable DNA trace on the bullet.’

  ‘The chances of that being slim or none,’ Skinner forecast. ‘A pro will have worn gloves to load the weapon and probably wiped the cartridge as well.’

  ‘Did you ever have to investigate a hit like this, Sir Robert?’ Bramley asked.

  ‘I’ve seen one,’ he replied, ‘but there was no investigation required. The shooter didn’t leave the scene. Well, he did, but in a box. Assuming we’re right and there are no forensic traces on the bullet casing, could there be other markings to link this with other assassinations, here or in other countries?’

  ‘I won’t be able to answer that until we’ve had a look at it in the lab . . . that’s assuming I’m asked the question officially,’ she added.

  ‘You will be.’ He looked across at the tee, where their companions were waiting. ‘We must be off,’ he said. ‘We have a competition to win.’

  As they walked, Spike Thomson broke his uncharacteristic silence. ‘Is that what happened, Bob?’ he murmured. ‘The guy was shot by a sniper, from up here?’

  ‘That’s what the evidence suggested. They’ve just proved it.’

  ‘Jesus, how could anyone do that? Just snuff someone’s life out in a second.’

  ‘It happens all the time in warfare.’

  ‘But this wasn’t in warfare. It was a guy on the beach in the morning and . . .’ He put the tips of two fingers to the side of his head.

  ‘I know.’

  ‘Who could do that? What sort of mentality would they need?’

  ‘I could do it,’ Skinner replied. ‘Any firearms trained police officer could in specific circumstances . . . if there was a threat to life.’

  ‘Have you ever done it?’

  ‘I’m not going to answer that, mate. Firearms officers are trained, physically and psychologically, to use lethal force. If they’re authorised at a scene and in their judgement it’s necessary, they fire.’

  ‘There’s always room for error, though.’