What Will Burn by James Oswald (ebook reader web .txt) 📕

Heads close together, their body language was unambiguously conspiratorial. Another complication he could have done without. Not pausing to say goodbye, he slipped out of the room and made good his escape.

45

McLean was almost home, the hot chilli sauce and garlic aroma of the kebab he had picked up en route chasing away the last of the new car smell of the little Renault, when his phone ring tone boomed out through the speakers. A glance at the screen in the dashboard showed a name he would once have happily ignored, but now found himself surprisingly glad to be hearing from. He reached out and tapped the accept call button.

‘It’s a bit late for you, isn’t it, Dalgliesh? I’d have thought you’d be tucked up in your bed by now.’

‘Ha bloody ha, Tony. An’ who’s to say I’m no’? I could be snuggling up wi’ some wee toy boy jus’ the now while you’re home all on your own.’

McLean didn’t like the mental image that conjured. ‘I’m in the car, actually. Won’t be home for ten minutes yet. You just calling to brag about your sexual exploits, or was there a reason for this?’

A moment’s silence, which was probably the reporter taking a drag on her foul-smelling e-cigarette. ‘Aye, look at the two of us, sad old lonely buggers that we are. Working late into the night ’cause we’ve nothin’ better to do.’

‘I’m on my way home from a party, actually. Think I’d rather have been at work.’

‘A party? Who am I speaking to and what have you done wi’ Tony McLean?’ Another short pause, another drag.

‘Kirsty Ritchie got promoted to DCI. About time too, if you ask me. The chief superintendent threw a little reception for her. I think Kirsty would’ve been happier down the pub buying a round for the team. I’d have preferred that myself, but Elmwood’s the boss. We have to do what she says.’

‘Aye, well. It was her I was calling about. See when you mentioned her name and Tommy Fielding’s to me. That was just desperation, wasn’t it?’

‘Am I that easy to read, Jo?’ McLean glanced at the Sat-Nav. He didn’t need it to find his way home, but it was useful for estimating how long it would take to get there, and how much charge the car would have when he arrived.

‘Aye, you are. But you’ve got this annoying way of seeing things other folk can’t, too. Took me a while to join up the dots, but there’s a link true enough.’

‘A link between the chief superintendent and Tommy Fielding?’ McLean indicated without looking in his mirror, slowed and pulled in to the kerb. A car behind him he’d not noticed before revved its engine and blared its horn as it overtook. Through its back window, silhouetted by the lights beyond, he made out a raised middle finger as the driver sped away.

‘Aye, and it’s a good one too,’ Dalgliesh said, blissfully unaware of the drama at the other end of the line. ‘There’s a juicy story in it, I reckon.’

‘And are you going to tell me? Or was this call just so you could wind me up?’

‘Fair enough.’ Another pause, longer this time, and McLean could almost smell the sickly scented vapour. ‘See your new boss was in the Met most of her career, aye?’

‘Yes.’ He looked down at the plastic bag holding his kebab. It was tempting to open it up and start eating, since Dalgliesh was clearly going to take her time telling him what she had found out. On the other hand, there was little chance of him not getting chilli and garlic sauces on the upholstery, and this wasn’t his car.

‘Well, she wasn’t always a high-flier. Started off quite unremarkable, really. Made it to sergeant quickly enough, then seemed to stall. Now, your man Fielding, he was working in London around that time. Getting himself something of a reputation for defending men accused of battering their wives, marital rape, that sort of thing. He was winning a lot of cases, too. Word was he was dodgy as hell, used all manner of underhand tricks to win. Seems some tigers never change their spots, right enough.’

‘Leopards,’ McLean corrected.

‘What?’

‘Leopards never change their spots. Tigers are striped. Thought an educated woman like you would’ve known that.’

‘Ha bloody ha. You know what I mean.’

‘Sorry. How does this all tie in to Elmwood then?’

‘I was getting to that before you went and interrupted me with your fancy zoological accuracies and stuff. See, there was this big case she was involved in. Prosecuting some fancy rich aristo who’d killed his wife. Bloke swore it was an accident, sex games gone wrong, whatever shit he could come up with. He had money, so he called in the best lawyer, which was your man Fielding. He not only got the man off, he ripped the Met prosecution team a new one. Fair enough, they’d bent a few rules getting their evidence, but the only way he could have known that was if he’d either been given or had stolen inside information.’

‘The man who got off? What was his name?’

Dalgliesh didn’t answer immediately, and McLean imagined he could hear her flicking through the pages of her notebook. More likely she was having a drink. He needed one himself, if only because it was never wise to eat a kebab sober.

‘Here it is, aye. Chappy called Angus Trensham. Fourth Baronet Wisby or something. It’s no’ important. He died in a car crash a month or so after the trial collapsed. The thing is, there was an inquiry into why it all went wrong. The DCI and DI on the case both fell on their swords, a couple of senior uniforms too. Well, took early retirement, but it’s the same thing. Only person who came away smelling of roses was young Sergeant Gail Elmwood. She was inspector within a month, superintendent a couple years later. Been on the up ever since.’

‘And she owes that to Fielding, is that what