took them inside. We were still in the kitchen when Provan, for all his experience, started to retch. I paused until he had his heaving stomach under control, then led them to the doorway of the living room, through the fat, buzzing flies.
‘Are you sure this is Mr Hodgson?’ Lottie asked, a perfectly decent question.
‘I’m open to correction,’ I admitted, ‘but I don’t see that it can be anyone else.’
‘How long do you think he’s been dead?’
‘Weeks, I’m guessing.’ I went back into the hall and opened a glazed front door. A pile of mail lay beneath the flap in the storm doors. ‘The earliest date on those letters should give you a clue, but let’s leave it to the CSIs to sort them out.’
‘Did ye see any signs of forced entry?’ Provan asked.
‘No,’ I told him. ‘There are none.’
‘How did you get in?’ Mario McGuire’s muffled voice came from behind us, announcing his arrival. I turned; he too was wearing a sterile suit, hat and face mask.
‘I found a back door key in the garage.’
‘It wasn’t unlocked?’ He was surprised, and I knew why.
‘No, and neither was the front door. Which means that whoever killed the guy actually locked up when they left. They didn’t want him to be found in a hurry.’
‘Eh?’ Mann exclaimed. ‘If that’s right, wasn’t it a bit risky to leave him here?’
‘Probably less risky than moving him and chancing being seen,’ I suggested. ‘This house is a cul-de-sac at the end of a cul-de-sac. Hodgson’s neighbours called him the Hermit. The one I spoke to didn’t even know his name, and I’ll bet she doesn’t miss much.’
‘They’ll know his name from now on,’ Mario McGuire observed. ‘It’ll be all over the press tomorrow.’
‘If he’s a hermit, sir,’ Provan countered, ‘how are we going tae get a formal ID that fast?’
‘That won’t bother our communications department,’ the big DCC chuckled. ‘They make their own rules these days.’ He looked at me, giving me a wordless signal that we should leave.
I followed him into the garden happily, having seen enough of Jock Hodgson for a while. He went straight to the point as he ripped off his paper mask and cap, posing the question that I’d been turning over in my own mind.
‘Could this be related to the job you’re working on?’
‘I have no idea,’ I admitted. ‘No, let me rephrase that. I have no evidence of that. I didn’t come here expecting to find Hodgson dead, or even missing. I marked him down as a bloody nuisance of a man who was lazy about checking his voicemail, or who only returned calls from people he knew.’
Mann and Provan had followed us outside, and heard my reply. ‘What do you know about him, sir?’ the DI asked.
‘Not a hell of a lot. That’s what I came here to find out. He was an ex-naval engineer, and in retirement he worked part-time on my client’s stolen motor cruiser, and, I’m told, on a variety of other jobs. I know nothing about any of them. I know nothing about the man, period. Did he piss off one of his other clients? Was he in debt to the wrong people? Was he shagging somebody else’s wife? You’re going to have to do it the hard way, Lottie, and eliminate possibilities until you’ve only one solution left.’
‘That’s fine, Bob,’ Mario said, ‘but leaving aside by-the-book policing and proper procedure, what does your instinct tell you?’
I looked at my old colleague, my old pupil, and I smiled. ‘It doesn’t tell me anything, but it suggests to me that somebody else wants to know what happened to Eden Higgins’ boat.’
‘If that’s the case,’ he pointed out, ‘by rights you should hand your inquiry over to us.’
‘As far as Hodgson’s death is concerned, you’re absolutely correct,’ I agreed.
‘But you’re not going to, are you?’
‘I will if you insist,’ I told him. ‘I have too much respect for you all to do otherwise. But if Hodgson’s death is linked to the theft, or it looks as if it might be, I’m offering to cooperate with Lottie and Dan, if they want. I’ve already got someone working on one aspect of it. I can share her findings if they’re relevant.’
‘Do you want?’ the DCC asked Mann.
‘Of course,’ she replied. ‘I was going to ask Mr Skinner for his help anyway.’
‘I’ll need to tell the chief; I can’t authorise this behind his back.’
‘I took that as read,’ I said. ‘You must tell him. If he has