Tooth for a Tooth (Di Gilchrist 3)

the garage.
    The rush of air gave new life to the fire. Flames licked in rising tongues across the garage roof. Beneath, the car seemed to shimmer in the heat. He fell to the floor, hugged the concrete, finding that if he kept his face to the garage floor the smoke did not choke him.
    He wormed along the side of the car, worried that any one of the burning pile of cartons could tip over and trap him. But he made it to the passenger door where he found Betson by feel, lying headlong on the concrete floor. He grabbed his collar, pulled him along the floor like a sack of meat. As he neared the garage door, he knew he could not drag him over the tarpaulin, so he got to his knees, grabbed Betson by his belt with one hand, his collar with the other and hauled him up and over and out into the lane.
    He dropped Betson on to the cobbles and collapsed beside him on his hands and knees, heaving with coughs that seemed to come from the pit of his lungs. A strong hand gripped his shoulder. He grabbed it, ready to tear Fairclough’s throat from his neck, but toppled over.
    Stone cobbles rose up to meet his head with a dull crack.
    He lay there, stunned.
    At that angle, the lane looked as busy as Market Street. Shoes and legs came at him from all sides. A wriggling snake turned itself into a hose that sprayed water from tiny leaks. Something hissed like a rush of air, and the metallic clang of a fire extinguisher told him they were trying to put out the fire.
    A pair of hands helped right his world.
    ‘Is there anyone else inside?’ a man’s voice asked.
    He tried to say, ‘No,’ but coughed instead. He shook his head. ‘Only two of us,’ he managed to whisper.
    ‘He’s badly burned,’ a voice from behind said. ‘He needs to go to the hospital.’
    Gilchrist dragged his hand across his lips, freed phlegm that hung from his chin like slime. ‘A car,’ he tried to say, but it came out as a cough. He cleared his throat, spat a mouthful of soot to the ground. He tugged at the trousers by his side. Warm hands pulled him to his feet.
    ‘You’re bleeding,’ the man said. ‘Are you all right?’
    Gilchrist choked back a cough. ‘A car,’ he said. ‘Did you see a car?’
    ‘What kind of car?’
    Gilchrist pushed away, removed his mobile, dialled the office.
    ‘Put me through to Stan,’ he rasped, and when Stan came on the line, said, ‘Talk to someone in the correct jurisdiction and have them pick up James Fairclough for questioning. You have his home address.’
    ‘On what grounds, boss?’
    ‘On suspicion of arson.’ He eyed Betson. His head and neck looked like charred plastic, and the side of his face shone tight from blistering skin. But it was the stillness of his body that worried Gilchrist. He coughed again, turned to the stone wall and spat black phlegm over the weeds. ‘It could be upped to murder,’ he added.
    ‘Boss?’
    ‘Give me a call when it’s done,’ he said, and hung up.
    He checked Betson’s pulse. Alive, but not doing well. He looked up as a woman rushed towards him, almost tripping in her efforts to reach the scene.
    ‘John,’ she cried. ‘John, are you all right?’ Then she was on her knees, cradling Betson’s head in her hands, sobbing and hugging and begging him to waken.
    Gilchrist faced the garage.
    The fire was almost out, but thick smog continued to roll along the ceiling and swell in black billows from cardboard boxes. A young man powered water from a hose into the smoking depths. Pockets of embers popped and exploded in angry bursts before dying under the onslaught. Even from where he stood, Gilchrist could tell that the car had suffered no significant damage. Paint blistered along the sides and roof, and a box had toppled from one of the piles and spread books over the bonnet like lumps of wood. The very material that had fed the fire had acted like a protective blanket in places.
    He hoped the front end was unscathed.
    He approached the man with the hose, showed him his warrant card and ordered him to make sure no one took anything from the garage. Then he returned to his Merc and removed a pair of rubber gloves from the boot.
    Forty minutes later, he had recovered what he could of the Molotov cocktails, and with the help of a local policeman placed the pieces of glass into two separate boxes. He thought it unlikely that Lothian and Borders Police would be able to lift any prints from the glass, but identifying the bottles themselves might give them a lead.
    His throat