Free Thursday legends - Skinner 10 by Quintin Jardine

bones showed where they had been snipped or sawed off. He
switched his attention to the other end of the rug. Two bare feet protruded:
the big and little toes had been severed on each.
    'Fuck,'
he swore quietly, feeling his stomach prickling. He decided to touch nothing.
The rug was stuck fast to the branch which was itself solidly based in the
river: there was no chance of anything floating away. Taking care not to slip,
he turned and waded back across the river, scrambling, with some difficulty
since his feet were slippy with mud, back up the embankment.
    Rhian
was standing by the fence. Everyone else was standing around the barbecue, but
no-one was eating.
    'What
is it?' she asked.
    'Male,
human and very dead,' he answered, grimly. 'What we in the business call a
stiff. It had to happen tonight, too, and here. Just great for poor wee
Margot's birthday. Do me a favour. Fish my cell-phone from my shirt pocket. It
was a bit pricey so I don't want to muck it up.'
    She
did as he asked. He switched it on and pressed buttons in sequence to call a
short-coded number. 'Aye?' came a gruff voice as his call was answered.
    'Dan,
it's Andy Martin; glad I caught you. I'm at home, or rather next door, at a
birthday party. We've just had an unwelcome extra guest.'
    'Why's
he unwelcome?' asked Detective Superintendent Dan Pringle, commander of CID in
Edinburgh's city centre.
    'Because
he's fucking dead, and floating face down in the Water of Leith.'
    'Suicide?'
    'Would
I be calling you if it was? No, this is definitely not suicide. We'll need
photographers, and suited divers to get him out. He's stuck under the Belford
Bridge. It's not very deep, but it's mucky down there. Even as I speak I've got
half a hundred weight of slime clinging to me.'
    'You'll
be lucky if that's all it is,' Pringle chuckled, darkly. 'Okay, I'll get things
moving. Should I have Belford Road closed off?'
    'I
reckon you should, for a while at least. I'll put an end to the party; it'll
get hellish busy down here very soon.'
    'Won't
we need statements from everyone?'
    'Only
one, I reckon, and she lives here. You get on with it and I'll see you
shortly.'
    'Fine,
but do me a favour, Andy.'
     
    'What's
that?'
    'Wash
the shit off before I get there.'

10
     
    Bob
Skinner looked at his sons as they played on the grass, on the lawn which
overlooked the sea. It had been a hot day and it was still warm inside the
house. Normally, young Jazz would have been in bed at a few minutes after nine,
but that evening he had been even more full of energy than usual, by no means
ready for sleep.
    Bob
had given up all thoughts of Saturday golf; instead he had visited Chief
Constable Sir James Proud, to brief him on the facts - all the brutal, bloody
facts - of Alec Smith's death. Proud Jimmy had been desperate for a role in the
aftermath, and had been insistent at first on going to North Berwick to see for
himself. However Skinner had persuaded him that Maggie Rose had had enough
top-level presence at her headquarters; he had made the point also that if the
head of the force were to visit this murder scene when he did not routinely
turn up at others, then he might be accused of implying that the killing of an
ex-policeman warranted special treatment.
    Instead,
the Chief had decided that he would visit Alec Smith's estranged wife, whom he
had met once at a formal police event. Content with that, Skinner had run the
former Mrs Smith to ground through the Police Pensions Office records and,
after making sure that she would be home, had called up a car to drive Sir
James to Penicuik, where she and her new lover had settled.

'Just
remember, Jimmy,' he had warned, as the patrol vehicle had been about to leave.
'Keep it a bit formal.'
    'Come
on, this is a sympathy visit, Bob. Why should I do that?'
    'Because
the woman hasn't been eliminated as a suspect. You'd better ask her when you
see her whether she and Alec were on reasonable terms ... and just find out quietly where she and her boyfriend