Read Cold Granite for Free Online Page B

open and a breathless PC screeched to a halt.
    'Sir,' he said. 'Another kid's gone missing.'
    6
    Richard Erskine's mother was overweight, overwrought and not much more than a child herself. The lounge of her middle terrace house in Torry was packed with photos in little wooden frames, al showing the same thing: a grinning Richard Erskine. Five years old. Blond hair, squint teeth, dimpled cheeks, big glasses. The child's life was mapped out in the claustrophobic room, from birth right through to...Logan stopped that thought before it could go any further.
    The mother's name was Elisabeth: twenty-one, pretty enough if you ignored the swol en eyes, streaked mascara and bright red nose. Her long black hair was scraped back from her round face and she paced the room with frantic energy, eating her fingernails until the quicks bled.
    'He's got him, hasn't he?' she was saying, over and over again, her voice shril and panicky. 'He's got Richie! He's got him and he's kil ed him!'
    Logan shook his head. 'Now we don't know that. Your son might just have forgotten the time.' He scanned the photograph-laden wal s again, trying to find one in which the child looked genuinely happy. 'How long has he been missing?'
    She stopped pacing and stared at him. 'Three hours! I already told her that!' She flapped a chewed hand in WPC Watson's direction. 'He knows I worry about him! He wouldn't be late!
    He wouldn't.' Her bottom lip trembled and tears started to wel up in her eyes again. 'Why aren't you out there finding him?'
    'We've got patrol cars and officers out there right now looking for your son, Mrs Erskine.
    Now I need you to tel me what happened this morning. When he went missing?'

    Mrs Erskine wiped her eyes and nose on the back of her sleeve. 'He was supposed...supposed to come straight back from the shops. Some milk and a packet of chocolate biscuits...He was supposed to come straight back!'
    She started to cross the lounge again, back and forth, back and forth.
    'Which shops did he go to?'
    'The ones on the other side of the school. It's not far! I don't normal y let him go on his own, but I had to stay in!' She sniffed. 'The man was coming to fix the washing machine. They wouldn't give me a time! Just some time in the morning. I never would have let him out on his own otherwise!' She bit down on her lip and the sobbing intensified. 'It's al my fault!'
    'Have you got a friend or a neighbour who could stay with...'
    Watson pointed at the kitchen. A used-looking older woman emerged carrying a tray of tea things: two mugs only. The police weren't expected to stay for tea, they were expected to get out there and start looking for the missing five-year-old.
    'It's a disgrace, so it is,' said the older woman, putting the tea tray down on top of a pile of Cosmopolitans on the coffee table. 'Letting perverts like that run around! They should a' be in prison! It's no as if there's no one handy!' She was talking about Craiginches, the wal ed prison just around the corner from the house.
    Elisabeth Erskine accepted a mug of milky tea from her friend, shaking so much that the hot liquid slopped over the edge. She watched the drops seep into the pale blue carpet.
    'You, eh...' She stopped and sniffed. 'You don't have a cigarette on you, do you? I...I gave up when I got pregnant with Richie...'
    'Sorry,' said Logan. 'I had to give up too.' He turned and picked the most recent-looking photo off the mantelpiece. A serious little boy, staring at the camera. 'Can we take this with us?'
    She nodded and Logan handed it over to WPC Watson.
    Five minutes later they were standing in the smal back garden, sheltering beneath a ridiculously little porch bolted on above the back door. The tiny square of grass was disappearing under a spreading network of puddles. About a dozen child's toys were scattered about the place, the bright plastic shapes washed clean by the downpour. On the other side of the fence more houses stared back at him, grey and damp.
    Torry