Eye for an Eye

kicking a ball across the road, an old lady searching her opened handbag.
    It struck her then that she had not even noticed what the man had been wearing. If she was ever asked, all she could say was something dark. Perhaps an anorak. And that he had looked young.
    She glanced at her wristwatch: 8:55. Cindy would be along any moment. She flipped over the closed sign and unlocked the Yale. She opened the door as she always did, to make sure the handle worked from the outside. Last year it jammed and the shop had been open for an hour before she realized customers were turning away.
    She gripped the outside handle then let go with a squeal of disgust. She looked down at her hand in disbelief then rushed through to the back of the shop and vomited into the wash-hand basin.
     
    At the conclusion of MacMillan’s interview, Sa handed the micro-cassette tape over for transcription. Once it was in report format, MacMillan would be asked to review it then sign it as his formal statement.
    Meanwhile Gilchrist checked with the CCTV officer, only to be told that the system had blacked out during last night’s electrical storm. Gilchrist wondered, as he made his way to DCI Patterson’s office, if that was one reason the Stabber attacked only during wild weather.
    ‘The ACC’s been on the blower,’ Patterson told him. ‘And the shit’s piling up, Gilchrist. McVicar doesn’t want to hold a full press conference yet. In the meantime you are to make a preliminary statement to the media. They’re waiting in the car park. With me so far?’
    ‘Yes, sir.’
    ‘You are to feed them crumbs, Gilchrist. Teeny-weeny crumbs. You got that?’
    ‘Will you be present, sir?’
    ‘Only you.’ Patterson’s lips almost pulled into a smile, and Gilchrist felt as if he was being set up. ‘Tell them a full press conference will be held in the lecture theatre at HQ this afternoon. And try not to fuck up this time. Oh, and Gilchrist ...’
    Gilchrist raised an eyebrow.
    ‘... see me when you’re finished. There’s something we need to discuss.’ And with that, Patterson returned his attention to a file on his desk.
    With grim resolve, Gilchrist walked along the narrow hallway to a door that opened onto the car park. Patterson wanted to discuss his resignation, he was sure of it. But first, he had to fight off a pack of hyenas with teeny-weeny crumbs.
    Gilchrist hated press conferences, hated being centre-stage, a problem that first developed at school. At thirteen he had towered above his classmates, a gangly pimpled youth with bony shoulders stooped in a constant battle to avoid standing out. Girls giggled and whispered whenever he walked into class and, convinced he was a freak, he could not look anyone in the eye without blushing. He grew only one more inch, to hit six-one by fourteen. And that was it. No more growth spurts. As his friends caught up, his embarrassment eased off. But even now, thirty-one years later, he still suffered from the occasional flush.
    He stepped out into a drizzle as fine as mist and scanned the sea of faces. Portable lights were set up by the entrance archway, where four cameramen balanced mobile cameras on their shoulders. Gilchrist repressed a grimace as the unkempt figure of Bertie McKinnon wriggled to the front of the crowd. A local journalist renowned for his fiery polemics on anything he regarded as abuse of public office or waste of public monies, murder investigations were not his forte, but that had done nothing to stop him pouring vitriol on the perceived shortcomings of Fife Constabulary.
    Gilchrist avoided McKinnon’s feral stare, mounted the makeshift podium, braced himself and started to speak. He confirmed that a body had been found by the harbour and that the Stabber was a suspect, then parried a barrage of questions that demanded gory details, reporting only that the MO was indeed that of the Stabber. He fought off the persistent clamour for the victim’s name, refusing to reveal the identity until the family had been notified.
    Then he heard McKinnon’s voice, harsh and rough as a smoker’s bark.
    ‘If you can confirm nothing else, Inspector, can you at least confirm that you are no closer to catching the Stabber than you were when his first victim was found in Thistle Lane?’
    ‘Every day brings us closer,’ Gilchrist replied.
    ‘Four months later and you’re no further on.’
    ‘I can assure you he will be caught.’
    ‘But when, Inspector? The public need an