Macbeth

‘And that’s why they fuck it up,’ said a detective with nervous twitches around his nose wearing a shoulder holster over a white polo neck.

Laughter. Short-lived.

‘What do you reckon, Caithness?’ Duff said.

She shrugged. ‘Detection is not my field of expertise, but to me it seems pretty obvious that they needed to take something to calm their nerves, but they don’t know a lot about drugs, so they messed up the dosage. During the murder the drugs worked as intended. Their reflexes were still fast, but the nervousness was gone, and the clean cuts show a steady hand. But after the murder, when the chemical really kicked in, they lost control of the situation. They wandered around getting blood all over themselves and in the end both simply fell asleep in chairs.’

‘Typical,’ said the polo neck. ‘Once we nabbed two doped-up bank robbers who had fallen asleep in their getaway car at the lights. I’m not kidding. Criminals are so bloody stupid you can—’

‘Thank you,’ Duff interrupted. ‘How do you know their reflexes were still fast?’

Caithness shrugged. ‘Whoever made the first stab managed to remove their hand from the knife before the blood spurted out. Our blood-spatter analyst says the blood on the handle is from the spurt. It didn’t run, drip or get smeared on.’

‘In which case I agree with all your other conclusions,’ Duff said. ‘Who disagrees?’

No reaction.

‘Anyone agree?’

Mute nods.

‘Good, let’s say that answers that then. Now let’s go to the other loose thread. Malcolm’s suicide.’ Duff stood up. ‘His letter says that the Norse Riders threatened to kill his daughter if he didn’t help them kill Duncan. My question is: instead of doing as Sweno and the Norse Riders want and taking his own life, why not go to Duncan and have his daughter moved to a safe house? Threats aren’t exactly something new for the police. What do you think?’

The others looked at the floor, each other and out of the window.

‘No opinions? Really? A whole Homicide Unit of detectives and no—’

‘Malcolm knows Sweno has contacts in the police,’ said the chair rocker. ‘He knows Sweno would have found his daughter anyway.’

‘Good, we’re up and running,’ Duff said, bent over and pacing to and fro in front of them. ‘Let’s assume Malcolm thinks his daughter can be saved by doing as Sweno says. Or by dying so that Sweno no longer has any reason to kill his daughter. OK?’ He saw that none of those present had a clue where he was going.

‘So if Malcolm — as the letter suggests — cannot live if either he loses his daughter or he becomes an accessory to Duncan’s murder, why didn’t he commit suicide before Duncan was murdered and save them both?’

The faces gaped at him.

‘If I might...’ Caithness began.

‘Please, Inspector.’

‘Your question might be logical, but the human psyche doesn’t work like that.’

‘Doesn’t it?’ Duff replied. ‘I think it does. There’s something about Malcolm’s apparent suicide that doesn’t tally. Our brains will always — with great accuracy and based on available information — weigh up the pros and cons and then make an irrefutably logical decision.’

‘If the logic’s irrefutable, why, despite having no new information, do we sometimes feel remorse?’

‘Remorse?’

‘Remorse, Inspector Duff.’ Caithness looked him straight in the eye. ‘It’s a feeling in people with human qualities that tells us we wish something that we’ve done, undone. We can’t exclude the possibility that Malcolm was like that.’

Duff shook his head. ‘Remorse is a sign of illness. Einstein said proof of insanity is when someone goes through the same thought process again hoping to get a different answer.’

‘Then Einstein’s contention can be refuted if, over time, we draw different conclusions. Not because the information has changed in any way, but because people can do that.’

‘People don’t change!’

Duff noticed that the officers in the room had woken up and were following attentively now. They perhaps suspected that this exchange with Caithness was no longer only about Malcolm’s death.

‘Perhaps Malcolm changed,’ Caithness said. ‘Perhaps Duncan’s death changed him. That can’t be ruled out.’

‘Nor can we rule out the possibility that he left a suicide letter, threw his police badge in the sea and did a runner,’ Duff said. ‘As regards human qualities and all that.’

The door opened. It was an officer from the Narcotics Unit. ‘Phone call for you, Inspector Duff. He says it’s about Malcolm and it’s urgent. And he only wants to speak to you.’

Lady stood in the middle of the bedroom looking at the man sleeping in her bed. In their bed. It was gone nine o’clock, she’d had her breakfast a long time ago, but there was still no life in the body under the silk sheets.

She sat down on the side of the bed, stroked his cheek, tugged at his thick black curls and shook him. A narrow strip of white appeared under his eyelids.

‘Chief Commissioner! Wake up! The town’s on fire!’

She laughed as Macbeth groaned and rolled onto his side, his back to her. ‘What’s the time?’

‘Late.’

‘I dreamed it was Sunday.’