Free A Deviant Breed by Stephen Coill

tailor by trade, but there’s not a lot of call for it these days.  Most of his business is in kilt hire and formal wear for weddings and so on.’
    ‘Cannae mistake a good cut; a man of your height and frame – anything off the peg would never sit so well.’
    Dunbar heard Tyler chuckle as she rounded the car.  ‘No, if the jacket fits the trousers don’t and vice versa,’ he agreed, aiming the remote.
    ‘Precisely, I have a similar problem,’ Archie explained.
    Dunbar turned and eyed him curiously.  Archie English was hardly a type likeness for himself.
    ‘Off the peg disnae cater for the portly either,’ Archie chortled patting his stomach whilst scanning the street.
    What was he looking for?  Dunbar wondered as he found his eyes following Archie’s.  Archie was not at all embarrassed by their presence as some are when the police pay a visit. That said, for a start, they had arrived without fanfare in an unmarked car, Dunbar’s BMW.
    Tyler got in and as he opened the door, Dunbar spotted what Archie was looking for – Ruth ‘The Truth’ Linklater of the East Lothian Herald heading in their direction. 
    She waved and Archie responded.
    ‘DCI Dunbar – Alec!   Got a minute?’ Ruth shouted, much to Archie’s obvious disappointment.
    ‘No!’ Dunbar snapped before dropping into his seat and starting the engine.  Ruth was scurrying towards his car as quickly as her heels would allow, digital recorder in hand and thrust forward.  Dunbar pulled away and smiled when he saw her mouthing expletives in his wake.  In keeping with the interview, Archie English was concerned with only one thing .  The search and discovery of the site, the archaeological dig and now the homicide enquiry; everything that was happening was down to him – and all about him!
    ‘Who’s that, the fashion editor for Scottish Vogue?’ Tyler asked with a grin.
    ‘Shut up!’
    She hesitated before asking, ‘So when will we be arresting him, sir?’
    ‘On what grounds?’
    ‘What!? Are you kidding?  He practically....’
    ‘Gave us a local history lesson, not a confession.’  Dunbar cut in.  ‘Oh he’s getting off on it I’ll grant you, but....’  Dunbar allowed that thought to hang unspoken. It was too soon to draw any definitive conclusions.
    Still a little surprised by Dunbar’s lack of interest in Archie she pressed him.  ‘And if the skull turns out to be a member of the Humes Clan?’
    Dunbar’s eyes narrowed. ‘Let’s not go there until we have to.’
    ‘Then we should have a word with this, Wilson Farish chap?’
    ‘His former tutor.  Why?’
    ‘Aww’ c’mon, sir.  Archie has to be our prime suspect.’
    ‘Getting ahead of yourself, Briony.  He’s an obsessive-compulsive loner with a fetish for the more nefarious characters and salacious aspects of what he perceives is his bloodline, and even that, by his own admission, sounds tentative.’
    ‘And that doesn’t ring any alarm bells with you?’ She asked.
    Dunbar cocked his head. ‘Not hearing any, but by all means – go see his teacher. What we will be doing, is exploring this website he’s set up and his Debatable Society blog.  I’ll put the tech boys at Fettes on it.’
    ‘If it is him, he wouldn’t be the first psycho to draw attention to his crime.  Murders such as this demand an audience. And I got the distinct impression that is what he feels he is lacking; not only that – he didn’t seem keen on the idea of us going to see his old tutor, Wilson Farish.’
    Dunbar smirked and glanced sideways at her.  ‘Why wait the best part of ten years then?  No, his obsession is with the history, in particular – his own family history.  People don’t seem to figure largely in his life.  Certainly not enough for him to go around killing them.’
    ***
    Tyler was left a little bemused by Dunbar’s reluctance to even consider Archie English as a suspect.  According to all that she had read on the subject and discussed during her