‘She beat the crap out of him, chained him to a stake, throttled him, stuck a tyre around his throat and set fire to it.’ Logan reached into his pocket. ‘Do you want to see the pictures? Want to see what that looks like? ’

Professor Marks’s knees twitched, then drew together, as if Logan had just offered to kick him in the balls. ‘I’m bound by my Hippocratic oath to—’

Goulding lunged for him and Marks squealed, scrambled back into the armchair.

Chalmers was on her feet, blocking the way, one hand in the middle of Goulding’s chest. ‘All right, let’s everyone just calm down. OK? ’

He stared over her shoulder. ‘Tell them, Marks.’

The professor closed his eyes, curled into himself. ‘I took an oath.’

Goulding stared out of the office window, shoulders slumped, one hand on his forehead. ‘Are you really going to arrest him? ’

Logan looked up from his phone. ‘Soon as they fax the warrant over.’

‘Good.’

Thin grey light seeped in through the glass, the room darkening with the afternoon. It was a lot quieter without Professor Marks moaning on about his rights and his chipped tooth. Of course, Chalmers wouldn’t be happy – having to babysit Marks in his own office, making sure he didn’t do a runner for darkest Fife, or the hedonistic fleshpots of Inverurie – but tough. It was character building.

Or at least that’s what Steel always told him when she was handing out the crappy assignments.

Logan went back to his phone. According to the screen, there were nine voicemail messages waiting and half a dozen texts too. Half of which were from Steel:

You rancid wee shite! I’m going to rip your nutsack off and make you wear it as a hat!

You knew I wanted help with this meeting!

Get your arse back here NOW!!!!!!

Again with the scrotum threats. Still, say what you like about Steel, at least she didn’t resort to text-speak.

Delete.

He deleted the other ones too, not bothering to read past the first line, all of which contained at least one swear word.

Goulding cleared his throat. ‘I know dragging Marks down the corridor by the scruff of his neck must have seemed a little . . . unprofessional, but—’

‘You had him in a headlock.’

‘Roy Forman was making so much progress, coming on so well. To just throw it all away like that. . .’ A sniff. ‘Why didn’t you tell me he was the necklacing victim? This morning, when I was interviewing Robert Whyte? ’

‘Didn’t know you knew him. If I did, you couldn’t have talked to Whyte: conflict of interest.’

The next text message was from Rennie, moaning on about how Henry Scott wasn’t there by the time he got to Gilcomston Church, and why was Chalmers always the favourite, and it wasn’t fair. Wah, wah, wah.

Delete.

Next one was from Tim Mair at Trading Standards.