Read Online Country of the Blind by Christopher Brookmyre - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Christopher Brookmyre
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know she was out. How did you know?"
"She'll be from some major firm. They'll be happy enough to be involved in this case, for the publicity, but none of the big names will want to be seen sticking up for these guys, not at this stage anyway. I mean, given the climate of bloodlust and retribution over this thing, most firms would see their "defence" role as little more than the formality of delivering their clients into the hands of the sentencing judge."
Oh no. He was off.
"Maybe they've got something, who knows," he continued. "But it sounds to me like they're not sure themselves, otherwise it would be one of their famous names talking to the cameras. Instead they'll send in someone junior - ideally photogenic - who can be 'young and idealistic' in pursuing her cause. They're angling. If it works out, the big man takes over and they wheel her out every so often because the cameras like her. And if it goes nowhere, she can be
'inexperienced and naive' in chasing up a blind alley, and the big man can join in the condemnation of the baddies with everyone else."
Jenny glanced up at the clock. She was in real danger of being sucked into his vortex. Time to eject.
"Well, tell you what, Scoop," she said. "I've got to go. Why don't you tune in and find out. I can't. I've just spotted a formidably solid-looking wall down the corridor and I could really do with banging my head against it."
Parlabane sat back on the settee, having wandered around the room for fully five minutes in a second vain attempt to locate the VCR's remote control before admitting defeat and making the gruelling six-foot journey to the telly to start the tape recording. Pulling his legs up on to the settee, an indulgent luxury of Sarah's absence, he felt a lump under one thigh and proceeded to fish the errant electronic device out from between two of the cushions. 38
"Good afternoon," said the newsreader, in a stern tone of voice that suggested it should be anything but; He is dead! He is dead! Anyone caught not mourning to be reported to Conservative Central Office immediately! Parlabane recognised the anchorwoman as one of those media phenomena that just showed up everywhere, like some kind of human corporate logo. Fashion shows, chat shows, consumer relations and even the news, an abject lack of discernible talent, intelligence or personality having proven no impediment to a rocketing career. He distantly wondered for a moment whose cock she had had to suck to enjoy such success, then realised that on this sort of scale, as Hicks would have suggested, it was probably Satan's.
"Inside information may have played a part in the murders last night of Roland and Helene Voss," she led off, subtly relegating the two dead bodyguards to the appropriate proletarian status of Total Fucking Nobodies. "It has emerged today that the four men apprehended at the scene of the crimes may have been assisted by someone connected with the security operations at Craigurquhart House."
Parlabane snorted in mild amusement at her pronunciation, "Craigurkewhart". Right up there with "Tannadeechee". The programme cut to the location reporter, one of their big-story first-team, no doubt dispatched to replace last night's "Scottish affairs correspondent" as this was of national importance and therefore had to be presented in a Home Counties accent and a trenchcoat. He was standing somewhere in Princes Street Gardens. It was nowhere near L&B HQ, but having the Castle in the background was presumably obligatory for broadcasts from Edinburgh - in the same way that, in London, a backdrop of Buckingham Palace wasn't.
"This latest dramatic development followed the arrival of a lawyer representing one of the suspects, Thomas McInnes. Nicole Carrow, of Glasgow law firm Manson & Boyd, gave police a letter she claims was written by her client more than a week before the murders, in which he says he had received vital information about the security arrangements at Craigurquhart House, and
"She'll be from some major firm. They'll be happy enough to be involved in this case, for the publicity, but none of the big names will want to be seen sticking up for these guys, not at this stage anyway. I mean, given the climate of bloodlust and retribution over this thing, most firms would see their "defence" role as little more than the formality of delivering their clients into the hands of the sentencing judge."
Oh no. He was off.
"Maybe they've got something, who knows," he continued. "But it sounds to me like they're not sure themselves, otherwise it would be one of their famous names talking to the cameras. Instead they'll send in someone junior - ideally photogenic - who can be 'young and idealistic' in pursuing her cause. They're angling. If it works out, the big man takes over and they wheel her out every so often because the cameras like her. And if it goes nowhere, she can be
'inexperienced and naive' in chasing up a blind alley, and the big man can join in the condemnation of the baddies with everyone else."
Jenny glanced up at the clock. She was in real danger of being sucked into his vortex. Time to eject.
"Well, tell you what, Scoop," she said. "I've got to go. Why don't you tune in and find out. I can't. I've just spotted a formidably solid-looking wall down the corridor and I could really do with banging my head against it."
Parlabane sat back on the settee, having wandered around the room for fully five minutes in a second vain attempt to locate the VCR's remote control before admitting defeat and making the gruelling six-foot journey to the telly to start the tape recording. Pulling his legs up on to the settee, an indulgent luxury of Sarah's absence, he felt a lump under one thigh and proceeded to fish the errant electronic device out from between two of the cushions. 38
"Good afternoon," said the newsreader, in a stern tone of voice that suggested it should be anything but; He is dead! He is dead! Anyone caught not mourning to be reported to Conservative Central Office immediately! Parlabane recognised the anchorwoman as one of those media phenomena that just showed up everywhere, like some kind of human corporate logo. Fashion shows, chat shows, consumer relations and even the news, an abject lack of discernible talent, intelligence or personality having proven no impediment to a rocketing career. He distantly wondered for a moment whose cock she had had to suck to enjoy such success, then realised that on this sort of scale, as Hicks would have suggested, it was probably Satan's.
"Inside information may have played a part in the murders last night of Roland and Helene Voss," she led off, subtly relegating the two dead bodyguards to the appropriate proletarian status of Total Fucking Nobodies. "It has emerged today that the four men apprehended at the scene of the crimes may have been assisted by someone connected with the security operations at Craigurquhart House."
Parlabane snorted in mild amusement at her pronunciation, "Craigurkewhart". Right up there with "Tannadeechee". The programme cut to the location reporter, one of their big-story first-team, no doubt dispatched to replace last night's "Scottish affairs correspondent" as this was of national importance and therefore had to be presented in a Home Counties accent and a trenchcoat. He was standing somewhere in Princes Street Gardens. It was nowhere near L&B HQ, but having the Castle in the background was presumably obligatory for broadcasts from Edinburgh - in the same way that, in London, a backdrop of Buckingham Palace wasn't.
"This latest dramatic development followed the arrival of a lawyer representing one of the suspects, Thomas McInnes. Nicole Carrow, of Glasgow law firm Manson & Boyd, gave police a letter she claims was written by her client more than a week before the murders, in which he says he had received vital information about the security arrangements at Craigurquhart House, and
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