The pout turned into a smile. ‘Oh. That’s OK then.’ Tufty poked at the screen. ‘I did also research every burglary in the Greater Aberdeen Area for the last six months. In case our victim is of the cat-stealing variety. Then I did a geographical analysis, cos you can totes profile someone based on where they dump a body. Did you know most people won’t cross running water to do it? Like they iswitchesor something.’
‘Are you getting to the point, or do I have to beat you to death with your own truncheon?’
‘Right: results.’ He scrolled and scrolled and scrolled some more. ‘Here we go. Missing persons is a dead end: we’ve got a schoolteacher – female; a bus driver – in his sixties; a fifteen-year-old girl; a violinist – five foot four; and a mother of two. None of them matches our victim.’
‘Anyone work in a tattoo parlour?’
‘No. Should they?’
So much for the gloves being a clue. ‘Apparently not.’
‘Oh, OK. Which leads us ontoburglaries.’ Poke, scroll, fiddle. ‘There’s heaps and heaps of shopliftings, but we can discount all of those, cos people don’t usually do it in the middle of the night. And the only places still open are twenty-four-hour supermarkets, casinos, clubs, and all-night petrol stations. And theyain’tgonna kill someone for robbing them.’
Oh, to be a naive wee PC again.
‘Yeah...’ Logan took a scoof of chilled coffee. ‘Remind me to introduce you to the guys who own Secret Service, on Windmill Brae. Steal fromtheirclub and we’re fishing you out of Rubislaw Quarry. In bits.’
‘And then I did a pattern analysis to see when and where the break-ins happened, cos I was told to look for our victimgoing on a spree. And that does give us these.’ He held his phone out again, showing a map of Aberdeen with clusters of red dots superimposed over it. ‘Biggest splodges are multiple hits on the same night.’
Not amassiveamount of help.
‘Suppose it’s a start.’
‘And then I did put myThinkingHead on.’
A pair of figures emerged from the marquee, not wearing the standard white SOC Tyvek suits, but pale blue ones. Or ‘going the full Smurf’ as it was known.
‘And my Thinking Head did ask: “Who else does wear all black, Lovely Tufty, but does not burglarise cats?”’
The lead Smurf stopped, just inside the cordon, and threw back her hood. Took off her safety goggles and mask, then shook her hair free. Which didn’t help much, because it was stringy with sweat. Isobel needed her roots done, too – the greys were beginning to show. But the crows’ feet and laughter lines didn’t change the fact that she was still a very attractive woman. Until you got to know her.
‘AndIsaid, “I does has no idea, Mr Thinking Head. Who?” And my Thinking Head did go: “Muggers!”’
Smurf Number Two performed the same unhooding procedure, only with far less catwalk-model poise. But then Sheila Dalrymple was one of those tall, thin,angularpeople, who seemed to be constructed entirely out of coat-hangers; with trendy glasses and a wide flat face. Carrying their mobile pathology kit in a blue plastic evidence crate.
‘And I did said, “That’s a very clever point, Mr Thinking Head.” Because Mr Thinking Head is very clever indeed.’
Isobel said something to one of the Scenes team, pointing back towards town.
They nodded, then scuttled off to make a phone call.
Tufty held out his phone again, where a couple of smalldots were superimposed on a map of Duthie Park. ‘So I did a search on muggings in the vicinity, because if you mug someone you mug them when they’re on foot, right? Cos it’s hard to mug someone who’s in a car. They can just drive away.’
Instructions issued, Isobel scrunched her way across the pebbles to the common approach path.
‘Only there wasn’t a lot of them, when I checked. I think muggers want somewhere with more foot traffic after dark, and the park isn’t really a shortcuttoorfromanywhere.’ A wee shrug. ‘Sorry.’
Isobel clambered up the steep bank to the lay-by, with Sheila struggling along behind her – having a lot more difficulty, carrying that crate.
Logan lowered his voice to a whisper and sidled closer to Tufty. ‘Try to not say anything stupid, OK?’
Isobel pulled herself over the railing, snapped off her purple nitrile gloves, and nodded at the pair of them. ‘Acting Detective Chief Inspector, Constable.’
A wave from Tufty. ‘Hi, Doc.’
She gave him a scowl in return. ‘That’sProfessorMcAllister.’ Then started towards her filthy Range Rover, but Logan held up a hand, blocking her way. Politely.
‘Anything you can tell us?’
