Bridge of Sighs, Excerpt Three:
Thursday the 4th of June

After driving past it twice with Jenny and failing to see Vince Walker’s house, Callum had formed a mental image of what a ‘big house in a copse of trees’ might look like in reality.

This time, Callum turned through the gateway and followed an overgrown drive downhill for a short distance and then round a right-hand curve between trees to a parking area in front of a house built from dark grey stone. Callum could see why Angus had described it as a big place, and perhaps why he might use the word ‘mansion’, but it was still more modest than the house Callum had in his head.

Callum had set out that morning fully prepared to gain access to Vince Walker’s house by picking a lock if necessary. His meeting with the senior officers in charge of the case had been unexpected, but had offered the opportunity to do things more legitimately. There had been a risk involved. If they’d turned down his request, it would have made reverting to his original plan much more problematic. But they hadn’t.

Callum walked round the outside of the house, which to his mind was more like a 19th-century manse than a mansion. It needed a lot of work on the windows, the gutters looked dodgy in places, and nothing had seen any paint in a very long time. More positively, the stonework looked good to Callum’s inexpert eyes, and he always loved crow-stepped gables. Callum cast around for any outhouses, but beyond a detached stone garage that was empty of cars, if not of junk, the house stood on its own.

Although the house was invisible from the road because of its envelope of trees on three sides, it was completely free of them to the south-west, where the ground dropped away quite steeply to give a great view over Loch Broom to the peninsula beyond. This gave its rear face a beautifully sunlit aspect.

If Callum had needed to get in unofficially, he’d have gone for the Yale lock on the side door, which looked like it led into the kitchen or a utility area. Instead, he unlocked the chunky padlock on the boarded-up front door and entered that way. Callum had no idea what he was looking for, but he went through the house as thoroughly as he could. He’d donned a pair of disposable forensic gloves and overshoes before touching anything and brought a torch with him. As he was there with the knowledge of the police, he could also use the lights, which were working, and they helped in the darker front rooms of the house.

Callum’s overall impression was of a house he would not have enjoyed living in. The furniture was a mix of old and tatty on the one hand and new and minimalist on the other. The interior of the house had been decorated at some point in the not-too-distant past, but in plain light tones that didn’t suit the building.

He knew that the police had been there before him, and although they’d clearly been careful, there were signs of the contents of drawers and cupboards being moved. Callum lost track of time, but after a couple of hours of careful work looking at what had been left behind after a hurried exit, he decided that he agreed with the general conclusions the police had reached about those living here. To his mind, there had only been one long-term permanent resident, a male who used the master bedroom and en suite and was trying to conceal his greying hair. This was a man’s house, with very little in the way of the feminine touch in the main living areas. There had also been a couple staying here, a man and a woman, who shared the second-largest bedroom and its en suite. They’d left only faint traces of having been here, as if they were living out of travel bags. The house had four further smaller double bedrooms, two on the first floor and two in the attic, with each pair sharing a bathroom.

Callum could see why the police had been unsure whether four or five people had been in residence. There were signs that one of the other rooms on the first floor had been used by a woman, but also the suggestion in the contents of the main bedroom’s en suite that a woman had spent nights with the first male. The doubt over numbers in Callum’s mind was down to uncertainty about whether it was the same woman who slept in two different places at different times, or two different women. The other bedrooms were neat and tidy, with the beds made up, but felt lifeless. Callum suspected they’d not been used since being cleaned after the last retreat had taken place here. He understood why DCI McCulloch had asked for anyone who had attended the retreat centre at any time this year to get in touch.

Callum wondered whether the police had thought to collect DNA samples from the personal traces that did remain. At a trivial level, it would show whether the woman with her own bedroom also spent some of her time sleeping with the first male. At a much more significant level, it might help identify some of the residents. It was a question he’d suggest Trevor might pass up the line the next time they spoke.

More widely, he could find no belongings that might be tied to a specific individual, except for those of the first male, who, in Callum’s mind, was without doubt Vince Walker. The occupants of the house may have been in a hurry to leave after Sheree Reid was killed in Inverness, but they’d been careful about what they left behind.

Before he left, Callum returned to the one room in the house that seemed most interesting. A study on the ground floor offering views to the south-west appeared to have been searched much more thoroughly than anywhere else. Books had been pulled off shelves, and a large pile of mail, magazines and brochures seemed to have been swept off the leather-topped desk onto the floor. Callum shuffled through what was there. It was an odd mix of stuff, but nothing formed any patterns he recognised. Beyond seeing from an unopened envelope that Vince Walker was a subscriber to Private Eye, Callum learnt nothing that he didn’t already know. Callum thought that Vince Walker’s personal documents and financial records must have been kept in the study, but the drawers in the desk were empty, so either he took them with him when he left, or the police had removed them when they searched the house.

Once he was back outside, Callum ensured the front door was secured and then walked round the outside of the house again before returning to the Renault.