I sank into the other seat. No point waiting to be asked: headmasters were like detective chief inspectors – you couldn’t let them get above themselves. ‘You do understand what I do for a living, don’t you, Mrs…’ There was a wooden plinth in the middle of the cluttered desk with a brass nameplate on it. ‘Elrick. We are rather busy trying to catch a killer.’
Her back stiffened. ‘I see. Yes … well. We need to talk about Katie.’
Captain Corduroy shifted in his chair, hands working overtime. ‘Yes, we definitely do, it’s simply not acceptable.’
‘Your daughter is a disruptive influence, Mr Henderson. I’m afraid I have no option but to request that you make alternative arrangements for Katie’s education.’
‘It’s simply not acceptable…’
I stared at him and he closed his mouth with an audible click.
‘She’s a bright kid: she’s bored having to go at the slower kids’ pace, if you lot—’
‘Please, Mr Henderson, spare us the delusional parental ramble—’
‘She’s a bright kid.’
‘No, she isn’t: that’s the problem.’ A long sigh. ‘Mr Henderson, your daughter isn’t acting out because she’s not being challenged intellectually.’ The headmistress shook her head – still staring out of the window with her back to me, as if she couldn’t be arsed going through the motions again. ‘Sometimes that’s the case, but Katie’s academic track record simply doesn’t support that. She underperforms in nearly every subject. Perhaps you should look on this as an opportunity to move her somewhere she can get more … individual attention.’
Corduroy nodded. ‘And it’s not as if we haven’t tried: we’ve been incredibly patient with her behaviour, given her family situation, but it’s simply not—’
‘What “family situation”?’
He flinched. ‘It … coming from a broken home, her sister going missing, you being a police officer.’
That was it, I was going to knock the wee shite’s teeth down his throat. ‘You listen up, you jumped-up—’
‘Mr Henderson, we’re not talking about a little backtalk, or running in the corridors. In the last six weeks Katie has been in my office twenty times. And given her attendance is appalling, that’s something of a record. Quite frankly—’
‘So she’s a little high-spirited…’
The headmistress kept staring out of the bloody window, as if I was a badly behaved child.
I stood. ‘Are you actually going to have the common courtesy to look at me when I’m talking to you?’
Mrs Elrick turned around. She was older than she’d seemed from the back: a used-looking face lined with creases, a long nose, her hair thinning at the front. A bruise stretched its way across her left cheekbone, half an inch higher and it would’ve been a black eye. Scratches marred her neck – four parallel lines, red against the pale skin. ‘For the last three years we have put up with your daughter’s lying, and cheating, and coming in reeking of alcohol – when she bothers to come in at all – the fighting and the stealing, because we know she’s been struggling to cope with her sister’s disappearance and your divorce. But today I found out she’s been bullying the other children. Not just her peer group: the first years too.’
‘That isn’t true, the other kids are lying. Katie wouldn’t—’
‘When I tracked her down she was forcing a girl half her size to eat a handful of mud.’ The headmistress raised her chin, showing off the scratch marks. ‘This is what happened when I tried to stop her.’
Captain Corduroy nodded like a dashboard ornament. ‘It’s simply not acceptable.’
I grabbed the arms of his chair. ‘SHUT YOUR FUCKING MOUTH!’
He jerked back, hands covering his face.
The headmistress folded her arms. ‘Well, now we can see where she gets it from.’
‘It’s not true, Daddy, they’re lying!’ Katie clutched her schoolbag to her chest like a dead rat. She’d dyed her hair again – jet black and straight, tucked behind her ears, her big blue eyes puffy and pink, a metal crucifix around her neck. Her white shirt was rumpled and stained, the green-and-yellow school tie at half-mast.
‘Get in the car.’ I wrenched open the passenger door.
‘How can you take their word over mine?’
‘Get in the bloody car, Katie.’
Dr McDonald peered out from the back seat. ‘Is everything OK?’
Katie slumped into the passenger seat, then turned her smile on the psychologist. Stuck her hand out. ‘Hi, I’m Katie, Ash’s daughter, really nice to meet you, I love your hair, it’s great.’
‘Thanks, I like yours too, it’s very goth.’
‘You wouldn’t believe what’s happened – the teachers never liked me in that place, it’s a factory for churning out brain-dead drones – it’s like a complete misunderstanding.’
I thumped myself in behind the wheel and slammed the door. Stabbed the key in the ignition. ‘Seatbelt.’ The headlights cut through the darkness.
‘Honestly, Daddy, I didn’t do anything, it’s all—’
‘You beat up a girl two years younger than you. Seatbelt!’
‘It wasn’t like—’
I stamped my foot on the accelerator and jerked the Renault out onto the road. ‘Is that what we taught you? To pick on people smaller than yourself? Is it?’
‘I didn’t…’ Deep breath. ‘OK, yes, I got into a fight, but you should’ve heard her, she was going on about how all the police are fascists and racists and corrupt and why can’t you catch proper criminals instead of victimizing real people. And I know for a fact it’s because her dad got done for drink driving last week. I was only sticking up for you.’
‘You made her eat dirt.’
Round the roundabout, leaning on the horn to shift a flat-cap-wearing corpse in his bloody Volvo.
Katie was staring at me, I could feel it.
‘What?’
‘You made Uncle Ethan eat dirt. You dragged him out into the back garden and you made him eat dirt till he was sick, then rubbed his face in it.’
‘That was different.’
‘You broke his nose and his arm.’
‘You know that was different!’ Houses flashed past the car windows as I took the rat-run through Barnsley Street. ‘And he’s not your bloody uncle. Don’t call him that.’
‘Mummy called him that.’ Arms folded, bottom lip sticking out.
‘Actually,’ Dr McDonald’s voice was a high-pitched squeak from the back seat, ‘could we slow down? I mean it’s a twenty zone and we’re doing about forty and I really don’t want to die in a car crash, so could we please—’
‘Does your mother know what you’ve been doing? The drinking, the bullying, the fighting? Your teacher showed me letters from the local shops – you’re barred for shoplifting! My own daughter’s a thief!’
‘I didn’t—’
‘I’ve been standing up for you all this time, and you… I believed you.’
‘They’re lying. They’re all lying!’
‘Look out for the bus!’
I jerked the wheel to the right as some moron bus driver pulled out without looking. Roared past him. The bastard had the cheek to flash his lights at me. ‘Lying, stealing, drinking… what’s next: drugs? Or are you already—’
‘You can talk! You’ve been on drugs most of my life!’
Fuck’s sake. ‘It’s medical, it’s different!’
‘It’s always different when it’s you, isn’t it? “It’s different.” “It’s different.” I HATE YOU!’ She thumped back into her seat: legs crossed; arms crossed; staring out of the passenger window; muscles bulging in her jaw; lips moving as if there was something bitter trapped behind them, trying to escape. A tear ran down her cheek, she didn’t try to wipe it away.
Right onto Craighill Drive with its tall sandstone buildings and line of boutique shops.
Ungrateful little brat.
All this time. Playing me for a bloody idiot.
Dr McDonald cleared her throat. ‘I know this seems pretty irreconcilable at the moment, but if you’d both just talk about how you really feel, I mean openly and honestly, I’m sure we could resolve it…?’
Katie kept her quivering mouth shut. I didn’t say anything either.
‘I know you don’t really hate your father, Katie, you’re hurt because—’
‘Shut up, OK? Shut up. You don’t know me. Nobody knows me.’
And that was it. Dr McDonald tried poking her nose in a couple more times, but she was pissing into the wind all on her own.
Chapter 30
Katie’s boots thumped up the stairs, then her bedroom door slammed.
The hall wallpaper was cool against my forehead, but it didn’t stop the throbbing.
Dr McDonald closed the front door. Shifted from foot to foot. Rubbed her arm with a hand. ‘It’s a nice house.’
Much nicer than a condemned shitheap in Kingsmeath.
I dumped Katie’s keys in the bowl in the hall, and made for the kitchen. Fully fitted – had it put in new by this guy who owed me a favour. Would have cost a fortune if I hadn’t caught him nicking building supplies from a yard in town. The fridge was a shiny grey obelisk in the corner, I pulled out the milk and dumped it on the granite worktop. Scowled at it. ‘You want tea?’
Dr McDonald leaned against the door frame. ‘She doesn’t really hate you: she’s upset and she’s lashing out. You’ve always backed her up before, but now you’re on their side, and doesn’t matter if they’re right or not, it still feels like a betrayal.’
There was wine in the fridge, a bottle of gin too. Been a long time… That was the trouble with pills. I closed the fridge door and dry-swallowed a couple of Diclofenac.
‘Would you like me to go speak to her, Ash?’
Stealing, lying, fighting. Pretending my teaching Ethan Baxter a lesson was the same as her beating up little girls.
Dr McDonald shifted her feet. ‘OK, well, I’ll go give it a go, see if I can find out what’s really troubling her. It’s not my field, but if I can get inside the head of a serial killer I can get inside the head of a twelve-year-old girl, after all, they’re not all that different…’
I drank my tea, looking out of the kitchen window at the garden that used to be mine – everything turned into silhouettes in the dim glow of reflected streetlight. The jungle gym I built with off-cuts from B&Q; the cherry tree Rebecca and I planted that never produced a single cherry; the dog house that hadn’t seen a dog in years; the shed that fell down the first two times I tried to put it up…
Upstairs the sounds of Katie screaming abuse came through the ceiling, each one followed by Dr McDonald saying something too quiet to make out down here. And slowly the shouting got quieter, and quieter, until they were barely murmuring.
Looked as if Dr McDonald was right about twelve-year-old girls and serial killers.
I pulled the house phone from its cradle and scrolled through the list till I got to, ‘MUM: WORK’.
No reply. Of course there wasn’t: Michelle was in a meeting.
I pulled out my mobile and sent her a text instead:
Katie got expelled
Been bullying little girls
Attacked a teacher
At home now (rowan drive)
Sounded like crying coming from upstairs.
I emptied the cold dregs of my tea into the sink. Put the kettle on again.
Maybe Dr McDonald would manage to fix Katie? Nice thought.
Spare me your parental delusions.
There was a packet of Jaffa Cakes hidden at the back of the tea-towel drawer – guaranteed safe from Katie. The one drawer she avoided like the plague, in case someone asked her to dry the dishes. At least some things never changed.
The house phone rang – an off-kilter rendition of a waltz. I grabbed it out of its cradle before Katie got there.
Michelle: ‘Katie Jessica Nicol: how could you get yourself expelled? What the bloody hell were you thinking?’
‘It’s Ash.’
‘Oh… I didn’t—’
‘So she’s Katie Nicol now, is she? I thought we agreed.’
A pause. ‘How could you let them expel her?’
‘The headmistress stopped her beating up one of the first years, so Katie went for her – tried to rip her throat out. How exactly was I supposed to gloss over that?’
Out in the garden a magpie settled on the jungle gym, clacking and cawing.
‘You tell that young lady: when I get home there’s going to be hell to pay.’
‘You’re coming home now, right?’
‘For God’s sake, Ash, how many times: I’m supposed to be in a meeting.’
‘I can’t stay, Michelle, you know that. And she’s too young to leave unsupervised. Christ knows what she’d get up to.’
‘Well…’ Silence. Probably chewing on her fingers. ‘I’ll be home at half seven, you’ll just have to sort something out till then.’
‘Michelle, I can’t—’
‘Half seven. I’ll call Mother. She can come up from Edinburgh Monday.’
‘Katie’ll love that.’
‘Katie’s twelve: she’ll do what she’s bloody well told. And if she thinks she’s getting a birthday party next week she’s got another think coming.’
‘Don’t worry, it’ll all be fine.’ The plump tweedy woman with the long grey hair patted me on the arm. ‘You run along.’
‘Thanks, Betty.’ I left her standing in the doorway, marched down the garden path, got back in the rusty Renault and cranked it into life.
Dr McDonald was slumped in the passenger seat, arms hanging limp. ‘Urgh… Thought I was done with teenage angst.’
As I pulled away from the kerb, Betty waved, then stepped back inside the house and closed the door.
Dr McDonald closed her eyes. ‘She seemed nice.’
‘Lost her husband twenty years ago, more or less adopted Michelle and me when we moved in.’ And as long as she stayed away from the gin in the fridge, everything would be fine till Michelle got home. ‘You sure you want to go back to the door-to-doors?’
‘As opposed to?’
‘We should be concentrating on Steven Wallace.’
‘Well … we could do that, but there’s still a chance he’s not the Birthday Boy. Fitting the profile doesn’t make him guilty.’
I opened my mouth, then shut it again. Get too obsessed with Steve Wallace and the real Birthday Boy might get away. And look what happened to Philip Skinner. ‘Yeah, maybe you’re right.’
I headed back through Blackwall Hill, across the Calderwell Bridge, and took a right into Castle Hill. Still nothing from the passenger seat.
‘Going to tell me what you and Katie talked about?’
Dr McDonald shrugged. ‘Need time to process it.’
God, that was positively monosyllabic for her.
Mr Billy Wood – Flat 4, 25 McDermid Avenue
‘And you’re sure you didn’t see anyone or anything suspicious yesterday?’
Mr Wood scratched at his beard. Dandruff drifted down onto his baggy Dundas University sweatshirt. ‘Nah, was doon at ma sister’s till midnight. Look, have youse got a card in case anythin’ else happens? Them wee shites from over the road keep settin’ fire to ma wheelie-bin.’
Mr Christopher Kennedy – Ground Floor Right, 32 Jordan Place
‘Can I see the photo again?’ Mr Kennedy took off his little round glasses, polished them on his shirt then popped them back on again. Peered at the photo of Hannah Kelly. ‘Aye, I recognize her. She’s that girl who turned up dead: it was in all the papers.’ He passed the picture back to me. ‘Hold on, I’ve got a copy of the Post kicking around in the living room – you can keep it if you like?’
Mrs Kaitlin Fleming – 49 Hill Terrace
‘Oh, no we’ve lived here for donkeys: long before they threw up th
ose bloody flats. It’s a disgrace, isn’t it? I mean, why the council doesn’t evict the lot of them is beyond me.’
‘Just…’ I held the list up again. ‘Just take another look and tell me if you saw anything unusual on any of these dates…’
‘How many more?’ I leaned back against a tree, looking up through its bare branches at the dirty-orange sky.
Dr McDonald checked her list. ‘Nineteen.’ Breath hanging around her head in a cloud of pale mist, glowing in the streetlight. She tucked her hands into her armpits and stomped her feet.
‘This was your idea, remember?’
My phone rang: ‘RHONA’. I jabbed the button.
‘Sorry, Guv, been interviewing sex offenders all day. Got a missed call from you on my mobile – what’s up?’
‘Don’t worry about it. Wanted you to run a PNC check on Steven Wallace, but someone’s doing it.’
‘Oh. OK.’ A pause. ‘Isn’t Steven Wallace that wanker on the radio? Saw him on the telly being interviewed by STV – kidding on he’s some sort of Birthday Boy expert.’
I stared up at the branches again. Frowned. PNC checks…
‘Guv?’
‘You did three PNC checks on Birthday Boy victims’ families.’
‘I did?’
‘According to the computer.’
‘Oh…’ Some rustling. ‘Any idea when?’
Sabir’s spreadsheet was sitting on Dr McDonald’s laptop somewhere, but could I remember the details? ‘Do me a favour: tell Weber I won’t be in tomorrow morning, we’re still following up on those door-to-doors.’
‘Got some sausages and bacon and black pudding in for breakfast. Anything else you fancy?’
‘No, I’m…’
There was someone watching us – a hairy man in a dark anorak, pointy nose, digital camera hanging around his neck, standing next to a people-carrier parked on the other side of the street. Little bastard wouldn’t take a telling.
I stepped into the road, and he flinched. Backed up a step. Then dug a set of keys out of his pocket, fumbling with the driver’s door lock.
‘Guv? Everything OK?’
I hung up, stuck the phone back in my pocket, balled my fists. ‘Right, you little shite.’
Birthdays for the Dead Page 24