Logan McRae Crime Series Books 4-6: Flesh House, Blind Eye, Dark Blood. Stuart MacBride

Spain for her holidays, talked about running a bed and breakfast… And no one had seen or heard from her since the night Ian and Sharon McLaughlin died.

      If you wanted to get rid of a lot of suspect meat there were worse places than a school canteen. Who’d ever know?

      ‘… himself with a pineapple. Some people, eh?’

      Logan glanced across at his passenger. ‘Sorry, sir?’

      ‘Never mind, I probably shouldn’t be complaining about my officers anyway.’ Faulds stuck his phone back in its holster as Logan drove them through Turriff. ‘I’d forgotten how much I missed this: out on a case instead of stuck behind a desk, or shaking some slimy politician’s hand. Must’ve driven half my team mad when I got back from Aberdeen last time. Poking my nose in …’

      He watched the market town with its collage of red sandstone and grey granite buildings go by. ‘You know,’ he said, touching the glass, ‘I grew up in a little place like this …’

      Logan turned the pool car into the road with Alaba Farm Fresh Meats at the end of it.

      Faulds peered through the windscreen at the large plastic sign with its grinning butcher pig. ‘This it?’

      The massed armies of the national press had gone, but a couple of die-hard journalists were parked by the high, chain-link gates, scrambling out of their cars as Logan pulled up at the barrier.

      ‘Do you have any suspects?’ ‘Will Alaba Meats be torn down?’ ‘Do you think the Polish community is responsible for the killings?’ ‘How would you react to claims that this is just an attempt to pin the blame on ethnic migrants?’‘How many bodies have you identified from the remains?’

      Logan kept his mouth shut and let Faulds do the talking as they waited for the security guard to open the gate, then drove round to the little office block bolted onto the side of the abattoir. ‘Hmm …’ said Faulds, stepping out into the sunny afternoon, ‘the smell’s … interesting. Sort of a greasy bleach …’

      The receptionist made them sign in and offered them coffee. Mr Jenkins would be down in a minute.

      Mr Jenkins turned out to be a grey-haired man in his fifties, with a paunch that made him look six months pregnant. He showed them upstairs to an office on the second floor, overlooking the car park, and sank behind a desk overflowing with paperwork. ‘Forty years I’ve been in this game. Forty years! And now the only buggers who’ll take my calls are the sodding supermarkets.’ He waved Logan and Faulds towards a pair of leather visitor chairs that squeaked and farted as they settled into them. ‘Don’t get me wrong, I’m grateful they’ve not dumped us like everyone else, but they were screwing us on price before all this started. You imagine what they’re doing now? Barely worth opening again.’

      He leant forward and poked the desk. ‘There’s been an abattoir on this spot since the year dot. And I’m not talking about the fifties or sixties, I mean since the sixteen hundreds. When I was a kid there was a slaughterhouse in every wee town in Scotland. We used to cut the carcasses in half, chuck them on a flat-bed truck, cover them with tarpaulin and stick them on the next train to London. Didn’t even have refrigerated carriages back then. And did everyone die of food-poisoning? Did they buggery. Now it’s all factory freezing and EU regulations and health inspectors.’

      ‘If it’s any consolation,’ said Faulds,’ ‘policing used to be the same.’

      Logan couldn’t add to that. It’d been wall-to-wall forms and procedural guidelines ever since he’d joined. ‘At least they’re letting you open again.’

      Jenkins scowled. ‘Tomorrow. You would not believe the hoops we’ve had to jump through. Sixty new security cameras, twice as many guards, and I’ve got to have some moron from the Environmental Health on staff full time. And guess who pays for it all: me, that’s who.’ He picked up a thick wad of paper from his desk and wiggled it at them. ‘Every single joint has to be tied back to a specific animal, not just a batch like every other place. Every knife has to be sterilized before you can use it on a new quarter. We used to do fifty, sixty carcasses a day. Be lucky to get through thirty now. You got any idea what that’s going to do to our cashflow? Bastards made us throw away every side of beef in the place, and all the stuff in the aging shed. Bloody criminal.’

      ‘Well,’ said Faulds, ‘to be fair, they did find a whole heap of human remains in there.’

      ‘There was nothing wrong with the rest of the meat!’And so it went. On and on and on … Until the receptionist buzzed up to say that someone from the Environmental Health had turned up for a spot inspection.

      ‘It’s OK,’ said Faulds, before Jenkins could go off on another rant. ‘We’ll see ourselves out.’

      But first the Chief Constable wanted to see where the Flesher disposed of the bodies.

      Logan led him round to the ageing shed. The place was spotless – the shelves and plastic bins emptied and cleaned, the concrete floor scrubbed to within an inch of its life. Everything reeked of bleach.

      ‘So …’ Faulds did a quick three-sixty, his breath fogging in the refrigerated air, ‘how did our boy get the meat in here?’

      ‘Far as we can tell, it was all dumped in small batches, probably when he was getting rid of the bones. When we searched the place we found bits of at least seven individuals, all vacuum packed and slipped in with the other meat. Still waiting on DNA-test results for most of them, but we’ve IDed joints from Tom and Hazel Stephen, and Duncan Inglis.’ He pointed back at the small side door. ‘CCTV coverage of this part of the plant’s a joke. It’s all focussed on the perimeter – if you were already inside you could go where you liked: no one would know. And once it’s packed away in here, who’s going to notice an extra couple of joints?’

      Faulds nodded. ‘Show me the bone mill.’

      The rendering plant had been down for four days, but the smell still permeated everything, overlaid with the chemical reek of trichloroethylene. ‘The question we have to ask ourselves,’ said Faulds, staring up at one of the new security cameras bolted to the bone mill wall, ‘is how the Flesher managed to get into a working abattoir without anyone seeing him.’

      He started up the stairs, making for the hoppers. ‘He’s a big man. He stuffs the bones and offal in a bin bag – something heavy duty, thick plastic so it won’t split – throws it over his shoulder and humps it up here. Can’t see him doing that in the middle of the day, can you?’

      Logan followed him up to the top of the stairs. ‘DCS Bain did a walkthrough.’

      ‘Did he now?’ Faulds leant on the railing, staring down into the trough at the toothed screw at the bottom. ‘And what conclusion did the great Chief Superintendent come to?’

      ‘The Flesher probably has ties to the cleaning company that does the offices.’

      ‘Clever. So he’s got an excuse to be on the premises in the middle of the night, get a vehicle close to the building, and nobody’s going to look twice if he’s seen carrying bin bags.’

      ‘We interviewed everyone who works for them: full-time, part-time, and casual. No joy. Bain’s widened the net to friends and family.’

      ‘Worth a try I suppose.’ Faulds pushed himself upright and headed down the stairs. ‘But it’s not a cleaner.’

      ‘How do you know?’

      The Chief Constable stopped and turned to look at Logan. ‘I’ve been chasing the Flesher for over twenty years.’ He smiled. ‘Who knows him better than me?’

       44

      The walls pulsed in the darkness, she could feel them, making the air taste of sparklers. Heather lay on her back, one arm thrown across her face, the pressure keeping her