Free White Death by Ken McClure

while you’re up there. She’ll give you details on the way out along with the file.’
    ‘On my way.’
    Jean Roberts smiled when Steven emerged from Macmillan’s office and brought out a folder from the top drawer of her desk which she handed to Steven. ‘All we have on the Edinburgh case. Feel good to be operational again?’
    ‘I guess,’ smiled Steven. ‘Sir John tells me you were arranging accommodation?’
    ‘Yes, he said he wanted it to be somewhere discreet where your presence would hopefully go unnoticed. I’ve booked you into a B&B in a lovely Victorian building just north of Edinburgh’s New Town called Fraoch House – Fraoch means “heather” in Gaelic. My sister and I stayed there last year when we went up for the festival. It has everything you’ll need. I’ve included directions in the file.’

FIVE
     
     
    It was raining when Steven’s flight touched down at Edinburgh airport and the chill wind that caught the side of his face when he stepped out from the aircraft brought back memories of times past in Scotland’s capital. He had mixed feelings about the city. He’d had some good times here with Lisa when they’d come through from Glasgow – as they often had – to visit theatres and galleries but he’d also had some bad when past investigations had brought him into conflict with people who could only be described as plain evil. Glasgow, where he and Lisa had lived for a while, wore its heart on its sleeve while Edinburgh hid its face behind net curtains.
    A poster on the wall of the terminal building proclaimed Scotland as the ‘best small country in the world’ while a series of overweight and unsmiling ground staff wearing fluorescent waistcoats herded passengers into snaking queues and shouted at them to keep mobile phones turned off.
    ‘What the hell do they want this time?’ grumbled the man in the queue beside Steven. ‘Boarding pass? Passport? Shoe size? Inside leg measurement?’
    Someone else in the queue whispered, ‘Passport.’ And the fact that she’d whispered it made Steven realise just how much people had come to fear and dislike authority in airports. Security – or imagined security – had no sense of humour at all and common sense was an alien concept to those charged with implementing it. Anyone displaying dissent would end up in very serious trouble. This in itself was a terrorist victory of sorts.
    ‘Where to?’ asked the taxi driver.
    ‘Fraoch House in Pilrig Street,’ replied Steven, reading from the note he had in his pocket.
    The driver drove without comment, something that suited Steven as he’d had more than enough of taxi drivers’ philosophy over the years. Silence was just fine. He could enjoy the sights instead of listening to a treatise on the Iraq war or the virtues of proclaiming Scotland an independent nation, not that the sights today were particularly welcoming but maybe that was the rain. Everywhere looked nice in sunshine. Anywhere could be depressing in the wet.
    The driver uttered his first words as they came to a roundabout at the head of Leith Street when a woman driving a 4x4 swung out in front of him. ‘Bloody loony! No wonder she needs a 4x4 to keep her arse safe!’
    Steven didn’t comment and silence was resumed until they pulled up outside Fraoch House. ‘There you go.’
    Steven paid the driver and tipped him well. This brought a smile that looked like an unnatural act.
    ‘Steven Dunbar.’
    ‘Gavin Houston,’ said the smiling young man at the desk. ‘Welcome. I’ll show you to your room.’
    Steven had been a bit apprehensive about what a B&B that Jean Roberts and her sister enthused about might turn out to be, but the place was clean, modern and comfortable. It even had wireless broadband available which he used to connect his laptop to Sci-Med to check for any messages. There were none.
    Despite having given it some thought, Steven had not yet decided on his first move in the investigation. He wanted to avoid