Death in the Black Wood, Oliver Davies [short story to read TXT] 📗

“Alright, Tomnahurich Street it is.” She waited for me to buckle my seat belt, and I dialled Captain Thorne’s number as she pulled out. Allowing the lady the courtesy of a few minutes notice was better than turning up unannounced.

Twenty

Our little visit to the Salvation Army community centre didn’t take long and was not productive. If our man had ever set foot inside the place, none of the staff or visitors who were there that Thursday morning recalled seeing him. I left a copy of the best of our pictures with Captain Thorne, and she promised to make sure everyone who went in there was shown it. She’d do the same with the sketch too once we sent it over.

Douglas made an excellent job of that composite. He sat with Eric McAndrew in the break room for well over an hour, and I made sure we had a good selection of sandwiches and cakes put out to keep the old man happy. Caitlin and I had stopped in at the supermarket to pick those up on our way back from Tomnahurich Street. Caitlin would make sure they were both well supplied with hot drinks too.

Eric seemed fascinated by the whole process. Douglas began, as always, with his computer blanks, getting Eric to pick out the closest face shape from the selection he had on file. The colour of the eyes was next, then their size and shape. Eyebrows, nose, mouth, ears, hair. A virtual Mr Potato Head with plenty of options to choose from. Once they’d got as close as they could with that, Douglas got his sketchbook out and they started working on the little details that didn’t quite match Eric McAndrew’s memory. I didn’t sit in to watch Fisher work, but I had seen the process before.

“It’s remarkable,” Eric said, staring at the completed sketch after Caitlin came to tell me they were done and I went out to see the finished drawing. “I didn’t know you could get coloured pencils in so many shades or blend them like that either.”

“Does it match what you remember he looked like?”

“Aye, uncannily so, in every detail.”

The completed composite was similar to the face they’d put together on the screen, but the man that Douglas had drawn by hand bore far more resemblance to a real person. His finished pencil sketches always ended up looking more like photographs than hand drawn images. The chin was a little wider, the cheeks a little less fleshed out. Thinner lips, extraordinarily realistic eyes… The detailing was incredible. There was also a little mole, just above the jawline on the left side of the face. He looked to be in his mid to late twenties but could have been a little older, or younger. You couldn’t always tell.

“The closer it got to what I remembered seeing, the more detail I could remember. I could almost smell the cigarette smoke as we were doing it.” All I could smell in there at the moment was the fixative spray Douglas had used to make sure nothing accidentally smudged his work.

As Eric had told us at his flat that morning, it was an unremarkable face, but the intensity of that pale grey gaze staring up at me from the paper was both unusual and a little disturbing.

“We’re very grateful for your help, Mr McAndrew,” I told him as Douglas Fisher carefully peeled off the sheet and turned it over for Eric to sign the back, confirming that our witness found the drawing to be an accurate depiction of the man he had seen.

“If it helps you catch the fella, then I’m happy to oblige, Inspector. I didn’t know Dominic for long, but he was good to me. He even helped me with the Housing Association, bought me some groceries, little things like that. I reckon I owe him. As for the man his murderer killed yesterday, well, that’s a crying shame, three poor weans losing their daddy like that. I hope you find the crazy bastard before he harms anyone else.”

“We’ll certainly do our best, you may be sure of that.” Once Eric had his coat back on and was ready to leave, I shook his hand warmly before Caitlin showed him out. The uniformed boys would see him safely home again.

“Cracking job again, Doug.” Our artist was packing his drawing tools away. “Thanks for coming in on such short notice. I hope you didn’t have to cancel a profitable sitting for us.”

I liked Douglas Fisher and my admiration for the quality of his work was unfeigned. Douglas made a decent living with his portrait commissions and the composites he drew for us probably didn’t make any significant impact on his income. A murder suspect was a step up from the usual crop of assailants and thieves we brought him in on too. I suppose the chance to contribute towards getting someone like that off the streets was why he did this work.

“Not at all, Conall, I just rescheduled a client. Another bloody ‘owner and dog’ portrait. I’m getting really sick of those.” He handed me the composite.

“A shameful waste of your training and talent,” I agreed, “but I’m sure you make a lot of people very happy with those. Send your invoice over and I’ll see it gets settled straight away.”

“You can count on it.” He finished packing up his things and slung his laptop bag on his shoulder before picking up his smaller art case. “Impressive memory for detail, that one. I wish all your witnesses were that sure of what they’d seen.”

“You and me both!”

Once he’d gone, I went back to my office to run the sketch through the scanner before filing the original safely away. After adding the digitised copy to the case file, I emailed it to McKinnon and to Shay too. He buzzed me a minute later.

“Think this is accurate?” he asked.

“I’d say there’s a very good chance that it is. As I told you in my