Dead Cold Mysteries Box Set #3: Books 9-12 (A Dead Cold Box Set), Blake Banner [reading in the dark TXT] 📗

will find no gunshot residue on his hand or his sleeve, just as in the first case.” I pointed at Charles Gordon Jr.’s head. “The entry wound shows no sign of singeing from a contact shot. The trajectory of the bullet, even from a cursory examination, is clearly at a forty-five degree angle and must have been fired from over by the fireplace. All of these facts are identical to the old man’s case. So, even if you accept, which I do not, that the original case was a freak occurrence, the odds against it happening twice, in the same family, in the same house in the same room, are so astronomical as to be impossible. All of which adds up to one thing. This was a murder, staged to look the same as his grandfather’s, and that means whoever did this knows how the old man was killed.”

He stared at me wide-eyed. “Dear God…” Then his face creased into disbelief again. “But why? I mean, he was a twat, but he was a nice guy. There was no harm in ’im. You wouldn’t want to kill him!”

A sudden thought made him point at me and then at Dehan. “An’ your notion that I shot him through the window, by mistake, is just plain stupid! He was clearly shot from one o’ them chairs, an’ at that distance there is no mistaking the son fer the father!”

“I know.”

“What?”

“We just wanted to know which way you jumped.”

“You bastards!”

“You’d better believe it.”

“I’m a doctor! Ah don’t fuckin’ kill people.”

Dehan snorted. “I don’t believe that’s a defense at law, even in Scotland.”

He sighed and seemed to sag. Then he hunkered down and opened his black bag. From it he took a form and, after a brief examination of the body, made out the death certificate. After a moment he looked up at me. “Time of death?”

I shrugged and looked at Dehan. She said, “Some time between… You, me and the major were the last people to see him alive, and that was, what, shortly before six?”

I nodded, “And Armstrong found him at shortly before eight. So that’s your time of death. Where were you at that time?”

He scribbled on the form. “You know where I was. I was on my way here, I was shouting at Gordon Sr. and I was on my way home, while my wife stayed behind to play house with the Laird.”

“It’s not a great alibi.”

“Yeah, well, if I’d known ah was goin’ to need one, I’d of prepared a better one.” He stood. “I’m no stupid. If I was goin’ to kill him, I wouldn’a stood shoutin’ at him in the bloody hall. Besides…” He shook his head. “Whoever killed him intended to kill the son, no the father. There was no mistaken identity here. Whoever killed him was sitting in one of them chairs, lookin’ at him. How they got out, tha’s the mystery.”

“Do you mind sticking around for a while?”

“What for?”

“Pamela might need you. Also, I’d like to have you around until I’ve finished asking all my questions.”

He sighed, then nodded. “Fine, but I’m warnin’ you. If that bastard starts on at me…”

I interrupted him. “Don’t say or do anything you’re likely to regret, Doctor. There has already been one tragedy tonight. Let’s try and avoid another.”

He left the room and crossed into the drawing room, closing the door behind him. I stood staring at the two chairs while Dehan stared at the body. She said suddenly, “He has no motive.” Then she shrugged. “Fact is, nobody has a motive. He said it himself, why would anybody want to kill him? He was just a sweet, bumbling, inoffensive guy.” She looked at me for confirmation that I agreed and I nodded absently. “Plus,” she went on, “How old is this killer? Let’s say he or she was twenty back when they killed Old Man Gordon. That makes him or her sixty now, which narrows the field right down—to his mother, his father and Bee. Or the major! None of them is credible, Stone.”

“Mhm.”

“And then there’s opportunity. How the hell do we establish opportunity when we have no idea how the crime was committed?” She gestured at the two chesterfields with both hands. “He is sitting in one of those two chairs. If he is right-handed, logic dictates it is the chair on our left, over there, which gives the correct angle and trajectory for the shot. But apparently this shooter is invisible, because Old Man Gordon was peacefully reading his book and didn’t notice the guy sitting in his chesterfield aiming a gun at his head; and Charles Jr. was, what, doing his accounts? He didn’t see the guy holding his father’s Smith & Wesson either. And after the invisible man or woman with the gun had shot them both, he just beamed up to the Enterprise, like he had never been here. How the hell do we establish opportunity when it is impossible to show how the killer was even here?”

I blinked at her, then smiled. “That’s the clever bit about this whole crime, Dehan. The killer never was here.”

FIFTEEN

We switched off the light, locked the study, and made our way back to the drawing room. As we entered, Bee stood and came toward us with her left hand over her heart and her right hand reaching out for me.

“Carmen, Stone, Detectives, forgive me, but I am not as young as I once was, this has all been a frightful strain on me, you have seen Pamela and Dr. Cameron, could you not take my statement now, and let me get some rest? Perhaps the doctor could give me something…”

“Of course, Bee.” I smiled and gestured toward the dining room door.

Behind me I heard Sally’s voice, harsh and a little shrill. “How long is