was blinking. I hit the play button thinking that the dispatcher might have an update for me. Two messages. The first one was from a cop in Caernarfon who thought he might have some information on a stolen Kawasaki quad bike that I was investigating. I hoped that he was wrong. Caernarfon was way the hell to the north, and the geographical limits of this case were already stretching me.
The second message was even less welcome.
‘Capaldi, it’s Mackay, we need to talk.’
The voice was Scottish, clipped, and to the point. Mackay was ex-SAS and we went back a long way. Every time he resurfaced in my life trouble happened, albatrosses fell in flocks from the sky. Currently, he was only hopping along the fringe, having become my ex-wife’s current lover.
It hadn’t really upset me when he had taken up with Gina. In fact, it had had the beneficial effect of keeping both of them off my back. The trouble was that she, at this point in the orbit of our relationship, unjustifiably in my opinion, felt that I was the sack of shit in her life. Now I could start to worry. What poison had she managed to work into Mackay’s system concerning me?
I double-checked the lock on the caravan before I went to bed. It was a token gesture, a fruit-juice carton would be more secure. After Mackay’s call, I knew that I was going to be crediting every sound that I heard out there tonight with having army training.
I sent a flighted wish out into the night for the woman in the minibus to be safe. I didn’t include the guys. They had got themselves into it, and I wanted to retain enough juju in my system to keep Gina and Mackay out of my life.
The telephone woke me too early on Sunday morning. I registered wet windows, grey sky, and the branches of the riverside alders drooped and dripping as I lurched to the dining nook to answer it. On mornings like this I truly missed the city, where you could pretend that weather didn’t exist.
‘Glyn Capaldi,’ I grunted.
‘Sergeant, a minibus was hijacked last night over at …’
‘I know,’ I interrupted him, ‘I left a message for you to keep me updated.’
He went silent for a moment. ‘We’ve found it,’ his tone changing to eager.
Overnight, the isobars had packed together and the wind was coming strong out of the northwest. And cold. The rain that stung my face as I opened the caravan door was thinking about applying for an upgrade to sleet.
I went out of town on the mountain road, climbing up to open hill country. Scrub grass, sedge and heather, with grey, lichen-splotched boulders crumbled in for texture. It was a big, scrappy geography up here.
The minibus was parked on a narrow lane beside a small arched bridge near the junction with the mountain road. There was a marked police car close by. Uniform locals. I recognized the man who was making a point of watching my approach. Sergeant Emrys Hughes. We knew each other. He didn’t like me. It wasn’t a complicated issue, just a matter of his boss detesting mine. The fact that I didn’t like my boss either didn’t seem to help.
He shouted something up at me as I parked on the splay. I ignored him. I wanted to take in an overview of the scene before I got involved in other people’s perceptions.
The minibus was parked, neatly squared off, on a patch of compacted gravel. It hadn’t been abandoned. Thought had gone into where and how it had been left.
Emrys turned away from me. He must have shouted something else, because two more uniforms appeared from behind the minibus, where they had been sheltering from the wind. Emrys issued an instruction, and one of them came over the bridge, and up the slight incline towards me. I smiled to myself, recognizing a troop movement.
He had his head lowered, and kept his face slanted away from me to keep the rain out of his eyes. I gestured for him to go round to the leeward side and dropped the passenger window. He lowered his face to the opening. Lanky and young, his eager expression overcompensating for his nervousness. ‘Sergeant Hughes told me to tell you that we’re in control of this.’
I leaned across the seat towards him and grinned. ‘Sergeant Hughes told you to tell me to fuck off?’
His face dropped. ‘No, Sergeant, not at all.’
‘Where are the people from the minibus?’ I asked before he could recompose himself. ‘Have you managed to get them down off the hill?’
He looked confused, and shot an involuntary glance at Emrys. ‘There weren’t any people.’
‘What were you doing round the back of the minibus?’
‘Sheltering.’
‘Had you checked for footprints, any other evidence, before you trampled the area?’
His brain mired on that one. I didn’t wait for an answer. I got out of the car and fought my way into my coat, the wind whipping rebellious life into the sleeves and tail. It was even colder out here. The young cop caught up with me, trying to get my attention, but not quite daring to come abreast. I ignored him.
‘Morning, Sergeant Hughes,’ I called out affably.
He glared at me stonily. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘I got the call.’
He scowled. ‘There was no call. Not for you. This isn’t a CID matter, Capaldi. We’re handling it.’ As usual he put a heavy stress on my name. As if he had had a grandfather die on the Anzio beaches and I was somehow to blame. Emrys Hughes was a big man, with black, wavy hair, craggy features, and a mosaic of broken veins in his cheeks. His square bushy moustache and matching set of eyebrows looked like they might have been lifted from an identikit box.
I inclined my head towards the minibus. ‘Have you put in a request for a SOCO team?’
‘Why would I do that? This isn’t a crime scene.’
‘The minibus was stolen.’
He shrugged. ‘And now it’s here.’
‘So what’s your plan of action?’
‘I’ve put a call in to contact the owner and get him to come up here with a spare set of keys.’
‘You intend to move it?’ I deliberately pitched my tone to needle him.
He struggled to keep his temper. ‘It went missing. Now it’s been found. Happy endings.’
‘It was stolen, Sergeant.’
‘I know the owner. I’m sure he won’t want to press charges.’
‘Someone was drunk in charge of a stolen minibus last night.’
He pulled a fat face and shrugged.
‘Where are they?’ I asked.
He leaned his face in towards mine, lowering his voice. ‘I know these people, Capaldi.’
‘If you haven’t been able to make contact with the owner yet, how did you come by the passenger list?’
He flashed me a pitying
