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it, yes, it could have been done by an auxiliary knife.”
    I smiled. She knew that I had a long-standing habit of suspecting the Council’s lackeys.
    The photographers moved back.
    â€œWe’re done on this side,” one of them said.
    â€œLet’s turn it over then,” Sophia said, pulling on transparent gloves. She leaned forward and lifted the arm up and over. “Ahha. Look at this, Quint.”
    â€œWell, well. This should help us find the victim.” I took out my magnifying glass and held it over the tattoo that ran the length of the inner forearm. “The guy this came from is one of the Leith Lancers.” A nine-inch spear had been applied in red ink. It pierced a heart bearing the letters “L.L.” and the motto “Fuck the Guardians” in black.
    â€œScum,” Sophia said, so vehemently that the Medical Directorate photographer almost dropped his camera.
    I nodded. “They’re about as vicious a gang of headbangers as the perfect city’s produced.” I raised my hand to silence her objections. “But they’re keen on drinking stolen booze until they’re legless. Why the hell has one of them ended up armless?”
    That wasn’t even the half of it. What I now needed to look into was how the severed limb got into the city’s top-security VIP accommodation. Davie and I spent a couple of hours supervising the taking of statements and, in the cases of guard personnel, the virtual interrogation of potential witnesses; strongarm tactics, so to speak, are par for the course with auxiliaries who are under suspicion, even of nothing worse than incompetence.
    Except there didn’t seem to be any witnesses. Sentries had been on duty on every landing, as well as in the entrance hall and on the main esplanade checkpoint, at all times. None of them had seen any suspicious individuals, not least any carrying a long, fleshy object. The only people to have been allowed access to this part of the building after the other occupants went to the reception were the Glasgow leader Andrew Duart and his assistant. They’d arrived at eight thirty-one p.m. The scene-of-crime squad was gradually extending its activities to the hallways and other flats in the block. So far they’d found no obvious traces of the intruder: no spots of blood, no sign of breaking and entering, no missing digit. They’d been dusting for fingerprints but those they’d found and checked all came from guard and cleaning staff.
    Around four a.m. Davie and I sat down to compare notes in the empty apartment next to the administrator’s. There were eight in this block: four occupied by the Oxford delegation and one each by Duart and his sidekick, leaving two vacant.
    â€œNot much to go on,” the big man said dispiritedly. “None of the sentries reports anything out of the ordinary. All the human and vehicular traffic logged entering and leaving the castle area has been accounted for.”
    â€œHuman and vehicular traffic?” I said ironically. The City Guard has a robotic language of its own.
    â€œYou know what I mean,” he muttered.
    I looked at my notes. “The three Oxford academics are no help either. They weren’t here during the evening, and their rooms are clean and secure.” Professor Raskolnikov had tried to pick my brains about the investigation but I deflected his questions.
    â€œWhich leaves the guys from Glasgow,” Davie said, his brow furrowed. “What do you think they’re doing over here?”
    â€œAttending the prison opening, I reckon.”
    â€œNo, I mean why have they even been allowed into the city? Remember the hassle we got after we’d been over there.” There was bitterness in his voice. “As far as some of my superiors are concerned, I’ve been a pariah ever since.”
    I nodded and led him out into the corridor. “You’re not the only one.” I grinned at him.