A Dark So Deadly. Stuart MacBride

touchy.’

      ‘Yes, hello?’ A little voice replaced the pan pipes. ‘We’ve checked and we’ve never had a human mummy here. We’ve got a mummified dog and a stuffed polar bear in storage, if that helps?’

      ‘No. Thanks. You’ve been a lot of help.’ He hung up and stuck two lines through the museum’s name. Sat back and massaged his temples.

      Franklin sniffed. ‘So?’

      ‘So what?’

      ‘So where is everyone?’

      He pointed at the murder board. ‘Off interviewing Glen Carmichael’s mates.’

      ‘Ooh, there’s stuff on the board.’ She disappeared from view. ‘Wait a minute, how come I’m down to do the post mortem?’

      Callum stood.

      She was in front of the murder board, hands on her hips, frown on her face. ‘What, I’m stuck in the mortuary with a decomposing corpse while you’re all off interviewing people? Thank you very sodding much!’

      He pointed at the list of tasks. ‘If you didn’t want to do it, why put your name down?’

      ‘I didn’t. None of this was on the board last night.’

      Hmm … ‘You didn’t mark up the actions with Watt and Dotty?’

      ‘No. We ate the pizzas, then Mother told me to head off and not come back in till quarter past ten, as I’d been here till late.’

      Lovely. So even though he’d been here three weeks longer than she had, Franklin got to call DI Malcolmson ‘Mother’ while he had to call her ‘Boss’. And she got a lie-in.

      Franklin sniffed again. ‘What’s wrong with your face?’

      ‘Nothing.’ He picked his coat off the back of his chair. ‘Get your stuff, we’re off to the mortuary.’

      The pool car slid along Camburn Road, following the edge of the woods. They made a thick blanket of green: leaves and bushes trembling in the rain. There were people in there, on the paths and tracks that wound their way between the trees – walking dogs, wheeling pushchairs, jogging. A wee girl on a bicycle …

      Callum slammed on the brakes.

      ‘Aaargh!’ Franklin lurched forward against her seatbelt, both hands slapping onto the dashboard – bracing herself. ‘What the bloody hell do you think you’re—’

      ‘Just be a minute.’ He stuck on the hazard lights and scrambled out into the downpour. Flicked his collar up as he jogged between the puddles and in under the canopy of branches. Wiped the rain from his face. ‘Willow.’

      Her dirty-blue anorak was frayed at the cuffs and shoulders, hood thrown back, gold ringlets stuck to her shiny face. Pink cheeks and Rudolf nose. ‘Sup?’

      Raindrops pattered on the leaves above them, like a million tiny drummers. The occasional drip made it through the canopy, splashing into a puddle big enough to drown a toddler.

      He cleared his throat. ‘Is your mum all right?’

      ‘Been waiting on you for ages, Piggy.’

      ‘Did Jerome come back and hit her again?’

      Willow tilted her head on one side. ‘You perving on my mum?’

      ‘No.’

      ‘Why? What’s wrong with my mum?’

      ‘It’s OK, I’ll keep your name out of it. No one will know you told me who hit your mother.’

      ‘Get bent, Piggy. I ain’t no snitch.’ She balanced on the pedals, shoogling the bike from side to side to stay upright. ‘You got them toys for Pinky from the wee creepy guy with the pawnshop. Why?’

      ‘Because.’ Callum shrugged. ‘No one should have to pawn their kids’ toys just to stay afloat. No matter how much of a pain in the arse those kids are.’

      She almost smiled.

      ‘Willow, your dad – the guy who broke your arm when you were four – what was his name?’

      ‘How come you always asking questions, Piggy?’ She pedalled around him in a slow circle. ‘Nosey, nosey, nosey: oink, oink, oink.’

      ‘Just interested.’

      ‘Always sticking your nose into other people’s stuff and that.’

      ‘Hey, it’s OK if you don’t know.’

      ‘Course I know.’ She did another lap. ‘You saying I don’t know?’

      ‘Lots of people have no idea who their dad is. No shame in that.’

      ‘Yeah, well I know: and I ain’t no snitch. But see if he ever comes back? I’ll break his arm.’

      ‘Sure you will.’ Callum turned in place, facing her as she circled.

      ‘Break his little bitch legs too.’

      A seven-year-old girl, with blonde ringlets. And the worst thing was: she probably meant it.

      ‘You don’t have to be like him, Willow. You can be so much better than that. Hell: put your mind to it and you can be anything you want.’

      ‘You’re a nutjob, Piggy.’ She pedalled away a couple of feet, then dug into her pocket and came out with a small blue bag – the kind dog-walkers used to collect moist, soft, stinking presents – and chucked it to him.

      Please don’t let it be warm, please don’t let it be warm …

      It wasn’t. And what was inside wasn’t cold and squidgy either, it was a thin, flat rectangle.

      Callum opened the bag, and there it was: one tatty leather wallet, the lining dangling loose from one side like a Labrador’s tongue. A smile pulled at his face, but when he looked up Willow was already fading into the distance, pedalling for all she was worth.

      He took a deep breath and bellowed it out anyway: ‘THANK YOU!’

      Then the car horn blared from the roadside behind him. Franklin, being her usual patient charming self.

      Right.

      He puffed out a breath and slipped the poo-bag in his pocket.

      Time to visit the dead.

       12

      ‘Thanks. Thanks a lot. And now I’m late.’ Franklin sat in the passenger seat, arms crossed, scowling.

      ‘It’s only just gone half ten.’ Callum swung the pool car around the roundabout and into a shabby industrial estate. Past boarded-up business units with empty car parks and rusty chain-link fencing speckled with ancient carrier bags – their colours bleached and brittle. Through puddles the size of lochans, sending arcs of spray up onto the pavements. Windscreen wipers thumping back-and-forth across the glass. ‘It’s like going to the pictures: first fifteen minutes is all adverts and trailers.’

      ‘I happen to like the trailers.’

      Yeah, she would.

      Left, past a garage selling shiny four-by-four flatbed trucks, and down to the end of the road.

      A thick line of green bushes – at least twelve foot tall – stretched out from either side of a big automatic gate topped with razor wire. An intercom unit sat in front of the gate, mounted on top of a big concrete bollard. Callum pulled up beside it and wound down his window. Pressed the button.

      Its speaker crackled and popped, then hissed something unintelligible at him. So he stuck his thumb on the button again and held it there till the gates squealed and rumbled their