by Caro Ramsay
‘She’s never coming home, is she?’
Angie is a computer genius and like most computer geniuses she looks about twelve. Her mum makes us a cup of tea as Angie plugs in the computer and starts tapping away. She asks us for the exact date the file would have been downloaded. We don’t know.
‘The original file is here somewhere.’ She opens it up. ‘One hundred and sixty-eight photos?’ she asks.
‘There were a hundred and twenty-eight on the disc that Rod gave to the police,’ Billy says.
‘Maybe he ditched all the ones that were crap?’ suggests Angie.
‘Why not say so? He said that all he had were there.’
‘Here’s the file direct from her computer,’ I hold out the stick.
‘And Belinda didn’t delete any?’
‘She didn’t have time to go through them before Rod asked for them, so she bunged him the whole lot. Rod has been editing these and the police have never seen the ones he kept back. For whatever reason. Can you save them for me? The ones he deleted from the hard drive?
Angie nods like it’s child’s play.
‘Will he know that we’ve found them?’
‘Doubt it. I’ll just copy them. Do you want a swatch at them now? You can compare them if you want. I’ll run both slideshows side by side. Easy done.’ Angie slips in a flash drive, she copies the smaller file and then sticks the USB stick into her laptop. ‘I’ll leave you to it, I’m going to the fridge for a Coke.’
Billy waits until she has left.
‘This could take a long time, but if these are in chronological order then we just skip to the time when Belinda said Sophie looked a bit upset.’
‘Eleven-twenty? Eleven-thirty? They would be well pissed by then, so God knows how accurate that is.’
‘Go to eleven p.m. Photo one hundred and twelve.’
But all pictures from there to the end are correct, perfectly matched in date and time. So we start working our way backwards. And then we find it; the first non-match was timed just after ten p.m.
Billy turns the laptop round slightly so that we have a good sight of both the images displayed. They are not the same. We go through the photos, clicking back and forth, analysing closely the ones that Rod held back.
Then I notice something. ‘They’re on a pub crawl up Byre’s Road here, making their way to Oran Mor. The photographs indoors are sequential, but there are images missing of those taken out in the street.’
‘Do you think someone was watching them from the street and got caught in the odd image? Look at this one, just a drunk girl lifting her skirt up and a bit of the road behind her.’
‘Looks like Marilyn Monroe. If Marilyn Monroe had been from Easterhouse.’
‘So what or who is it he didn’t want us to see?’
I lean forward. ‘You think Rod has got something to do with all this, don’t you?’
‘With rape, violence against women or children, you should never look far from home. He’d better have a good explanation as to why he has been withholding these pictures.’
The slideshow goes on in front of me. I stop it on a photo taken out in the street. Sophie is hanging her arms around some guy. She has on a short bandage dress, her hair is in its usual going-out straight blonde style, framing the sides of her face. Her make-up is still perfect, she had not been crying. She is happy, slightly drunk. Relaxed. There are no signs of the stress of the previous few weeks on her face. It sends a chill through me. Whatever it was, Sophie felt she had sorted it all out. I feel that she had made a decision and had no idea it was the wrong one. There is something we are missing.
We both look but see nothing. Then I stop looking at the pavement and look at the cars coming along from Queen Margaret Drive. It was late, dark, but the junction at the end of Byres Road and Queen Margaret Drive is chaotic, no matter what time of day it is.
I point at the screen. ‘There.’
‘Where?’ Billy leans in close, giving me a lungful of nicotine air. ‘What?’
‘That Ford Focus. Silver.’
‘And?’
‘A Silver Ford Focus with a dent in the wheel arch. Grant did that. Mum went crazy.’ A thought is forming in my head, a thought I don’t want to think.
‘So Grant was there at his sister’s birthday, so what?’ Billy sniffs a little.
‘He wasn’t invited. What time is this, about ten-thirty?’
‘Who do you think is driving? Grant or Rod? I can’t tell from this angle, it’s a shadow. Anderson can get the image blown up and clarified.’
‘It’s Rod.’ I know it. ‘Grant is taller, more powerfully built. That’s his car. He tried to stop us from seeing this. He has lied about where he was that night. Mum was drunk, he sneaked out the house. I’m going to hand this over to Costello and get it enhanced.’
‘She’ll rip him apart.’
‘But if I’m wrong?’ I am finding this hard to accept. ‘There’s no going back from this.’
‘Elvie, think about it. Sophie ran away from something. From the minute you said that only you knew what her plans were, I knew that she was running away from someone in your house. Your mother seems like many women, can’t live without a man in her life. A man is what makes her complete. It’s also what makes her vulnerable. Sophie would have been torn between love for your mum, and her suspicions about Rod. She knew that your mum might just not listen.’
‘You don’t know my sister …’
‘I’m not sure you do, sweet cheeks. I can see the evidence with my own eyes. You have such clarity that you see it but kind of miss the point of what you see. You record but don’t interpret. Your mum is living in a bottle, hiding from something. Sophie runs. Grant has demons that are driving him to self-harm. But Rod copes with everything, sails through it all. He has happily been at the helm of the investigation on behalf of the family from day one and neither you nor your mum have questioned it. He can direct the campaign or misdirect it. Your poor mum. Sophie’s gone, Grant is psychotic, you’ve never been normal, and now we’re about to question the validity of her other relationship.’ He bites his lip. ‘But you must ask yourself: what exactly was the relationship between your sister and your mum’s boyfriend?’
FRIDAY, 8 JUNE
The back of the French Café is crowded. Billy has ordered us coffee and a tea for Costello but it’s taking its time in coming. There is a babble of waitresses at the machine, lots of talking but not much movement.
Costello is wearing a plain navy blue suit with a mandarin collar; she must be due in court later today. She glances at her watch and swears at Billy. ‘So I should thank you for bringing me this!’
‘Calm down petal, be nice,’ says Billy.
Her sarcasm is well honed. ‘Sorry, yes, you’re right, of course. I should thank you for bringing me this. I seem to spend all my time in there playing office politics when you two are out doing the job I thought was mine.’ But she smiles, and it knocks about ten years off her. ‘Elvie, have you actually witnessed anything untoward between your sister and Rod Banks?’
‘Would she know?’ mutters Billy.
‘Not at all. She would have punched him if he’d tried something.’
‘Family trait,’ says Billy. ‘But you’re not the best judge of character, Elvie.’
‘What do you mean?’ I ask.
‘Sometimes it can be difficult to see your own family as others see them. One person’s “outgoing personality” can be another’s “outrageous flirt”.’
Costello puts her hand up to stop Billy. ‘I’m more interested in why Rod stays in that house. Your mum is an alcoholic, Grant is a nutter, so what’s in it for him? And you’re never there so you really have no good idea what goes on.’
The image of Sophie in the garden, in her bikini, teasing Eric, quiet, kind teddy bear Eric, flits through my mind. ‘Sophie was a lawyer for women’s rights, she worked for the refuge, she was not a victim so …’ They are saved by my phone going. It’s Mary, wishing me a good time th
at night.
‘It’s not a date, it’s only Eric!’ I reply, confused. Mary never phones me for things like this.
‘Well, you must tell me all about it one day. Thanks for all you’ve done, Elvie. OK? Better go, bye. Just … thanks.’ And she rings off.
I stare at the phone. ‘Odd! Very odd for Mary.’
‘Mary is odd,’ says Billy. ‘Anyway!’
‘Yeah,’ Costello says. ‘It’s a line of enquiry that we must follow. And these,’ she puts her hands flat on the disk we have just given her, ‘will be a great help. We will tread very carefully.’
‘There was no sign of Sophie ever having been at that flat with Mark Laidlaw?’
‘None at all. And no sign that she was in that car. Elvie, ninety-five percent of people who disappear do so of their own free will. Sophie was a bright girl; maybe she went because she didn’t want to break up your mum and Rod, maybe something happened between them, maybe something did not. We still haven’t found the clothes that she took that night.’
‘Someone sent you that ankh.’
‘And the Night Hunter has never sent back trophies. The ankh might have been sent by someone in the house, you know that much, Elvie. We have no evidence one way or the other whether she took it with her or left it. It doesn’t move the situation on.’ Costello’s bitten fingernails are drumming the table top.
‘Elvie, if I lived in that house I’d run like fuck and never stop,’ says Billy. ‘You got out but Sophie stayed – why?’
‘Keep your friends close and your enemies closer,’ suggests Costello.
‘Any news on the hair?’ Billy asks. ‘Dog hair. Russian Bonzo.’
‘It got us nowhere. We checked out the two breeders that are registered in this country and all their dogs are accounted for, and are no exact match. The dogs are so rare over here that each dog’s DNA is kept on their own database so that closely related dogs don’t breed. They have the distant relatives of the dog the DNA came from, a Pasternak dog, but have no knowledge of the dog itself.’
‘And a hair of a dog of that family was found on Natalie’s body in October 2005?’
‘Yes. But that could be four generations ago. Somebody is freelance breeding these dogs so they are not on the register. It will be corroborating evidence once we find the Night Hunter, but it doesn’t …’
‘Move the situation on.’ I’m getting a bit tired of hearing that phrase.
‘I spent all night reading the Natalie Thom file … you recall it?’ asks Costello.
‘Of course I do. The hair was found on her after she had changed into the Snow White costume, not on any of the clothes she was wearing before,’ Billy adds quickly. ‘The costume was straight out of a posh hire shop, just dry cleaned. Conclusion was the killer left the hair. Natalie and Mary parted company in the pub, Natalie went to her flat, got changed and cut across the park to go to the party. She never made it.’ He chews on his lip, dragging up unpleasant memories. ‘Oh, I had plenty of sleepless nights thinking about it and burn marks on my arse where I was pulled over hot coals for it, but that’s a damn sight better than having marks on your arse from sitting on the fence, Costello.’
She ignores him.
‘Maybe the same killer has refined his style a little. Instead of hanging around in the park, he sends the dog after them?’ I am thinking out loud.
‘Do you think I can take any of this to Anderson?’ Costello counters. ‘He’s being so cautious. Budget-wise, I mean.’
‘Well, if he doesn’t want to take it any further, tell him that I’m applying for access to that evidence so that I can have it tested at my own expense,’ says Billy. ‘I can pull strings. Certified lab, of course, all kosher and above board.’ Both Costello and I turn to look at him. ‘I’m serious. I’m working for Gilly’s mum – I can apply to have evidence examined.’
‘You really believe that there is something in pursuing that as a line of enquiry?’
‘I really do. I’ve twice your experience, petal. There’s something in Natalie’s case that is an echo of this. Tell Anderson you need to get that dog hair retested. And if you stick with it, we’ll level with you.’ And he told her everything, about Sophie disappearing, planning to come back, about Goblin Market. Then the fact that she did not come back. Taking us all back to square one. I watch his mouth open and close, not believing the words that are coming out, all my secrets, all Sophie’s confidences.
Costello listens, I can hear her teeth grinding.
‘Now you know all there is to know.’
‘Like I said originally, Sophie needed to get out that house: they’re a bunch of nutters in there. That is a mile away from women being attacked by dogs and left to die on remote hillsides.’ She shakes her head slowly from side to side. ‘There is no Sophie case, is there? She’s just decided not to come back. I’ll tell you what, I’ll work on the real victims: Lorna, Gillian, Katrine. Sophie is of no interest. No interest to me at all.’ Costello starts waving her finger around again. ‘Or she might be, but as suspect not victim. Suspect in the death of Mark Laidlaw.’
‘Way out of line, Costello.’
‘Mark Laidlaw is dead, drowned with a bump on his head.’
‘That rhymed.’
‘Oh, fuck off,’ she hisses quietly, picking up the disk and flicking her hair from her forehead. The little scar appears like an angry smile. ‘And one more thing – if you have anything else, do you mind telling me about it, Miss McCulloch? Anything that you think might be relevant, share it with me. Or I will be back with DCI Anderson and have you charged with withholding information or perverting the course of justice or wasting police time or anything else that I can think of. The fiscal will throw the friggin’ book at you.’ She leaves, the door closing behind her with a resounding thump.
‘Not a happy bunny is she?’ I say.
‘She didn’t mean any of it.’ Billy seems thoughtful. ‘If she’d meant it, there would have been two of them. When she’s on her own she’s safe, we can deny everything. You’re good at that.’
‘So we’re OK, then.’
‘Unless she comes back with Anderson, of course. Then we are in the shit.’ Billy sips his coffee. ‘She took the disk though.’
The meal at the oyster bar at the top of Loch Fyne starts awkwardly but Eric is well known and there’s a fair amount of chat with a senior waiter about rainfall and salmon as if the two are connected in some way. Eric is caught between being my friend and staying loyal to his mate Rod. The cops have been to see Rod about the pictures, so Eric knows I’ve been sneaking about behind his back.
‘Rod says he’s fine with it. He knows he was daft not giving the cops all the photographs, but he was going through them and put all the dully lit ones to the side, just that most of them were exterior. He never put them back. You know that he’s turning over every stone. He knows you’re doing the same thing.’
‘He didn’t help, not handing over all the pictures.’
‘Different stones. Well, he’s told his story and the police are following it up. He was in Partickhill nick for three hours. He wants you to know that he’ll move out the house until this is sorted.’
‘Mum won’t let him. I don’t care if he stays.’
‘He knew there was something wrong with Sophie. He was concerned, that’s why he followed her. Once they walked through the front door of Oran Mor, he judged she was safe and came home. The CCTV will follow the Focus. It will put him in the clear. If he was her real dad, his actions wouldn’t be questioned, would they?’
But he’s not her dad. ‘OK.’
‘You know him, Elvie. You know he’s OK. He’s smoothed it all out with the police.’ Eric changes the subject; he’s not one of the world’s natural conversationalists. How am I finding working with Mary and isn’t wee Charlie great? ‘Mary is like your sister in many ways, always a kind smile and a kind word for everybody. She’s good for Alex, better than any of his other women were.’
‘You’ve known him a long time.
’
‘Back to our days at uni … Oh, here’s my sea bass. Just look at that.’ He pokes his fork at the poached egg, watching the yolk swell and burst.
I turn over my bream with my knife. I think what Costello said about Soph, ‘Is that how you really see her? Soph and Mary?’
Eric thinks for a minute. ‘Yes. OK, maybe a bit higher octane than Mary. More of a Ferrari than a Focus.’ He smiles, pleased with the metaphor. ‘Magda was pure bred Ferrari.’
‘My memories of her are vague.’
Eric’s face falls. ‘Your mum was so kind when Magda left. I feel I should have helped more, over this. All this Sophie stuff.’
I try to think what he means. I take a mouthful and let the fish flake in my mouth, waiting.
‘I do feel for you. It’s very painful, but time passes …’
‘And you don’t want to revisit the past?’
Eric nods. ‘I’m aware of the pain of Not Knowing. That’s a phrase that’s bandied about a lot, but few have felt that pain. I was upset when Magda left but then the police showed me proof that one of her credit cards was being used – she’d bought a pair of shoes, expensive ones in London. That was very “her”. It was upsetting, finding that out, but … I thought, well, I suppose the same things that cross your mind every time you think about Sophie. How could she do that? Why did she not say? I couldn’t sleep for thinking that I had done something wrong or let her down. I had to know. I was talking to Alex and he offered to look for her. I now know what it means to own a security company. Not just security guards; it means that he can find anybody anywhere. Within two weeks he found her living in Stoke Newington with one of the jobbing brickies who’d been up landscaping the garden for me. I should have known, in my garden all day but nothing ever got done. But once we found her, she stopped using the credit card, she moved, she went under the radar. She drew a line under it.’ He smiles at me. ‘But it was a relief in a way. I knew she was well and it wasn’t what was important to me that mattered, it was what was important to her. She left me, the house, the croft behind.’ He shrugged.