Standing Still

by Caro Ramsay

  ‘So ties him to a radiator to burn him in a fire?’ Costello was failing to conceal her admiration.

  ‘So Blondie has a close relationship with him? With the arsonist?’

  ‘But not in a conventional sense. The relationship does not fulfil her. Her life is behind her somewhere. He is easier to profile than her. He’s confident with fire and his family will be disrupted by divorce or separation; his life would have been chaotic. He might have been able to run free as a kid, and nothing destabilizes a kid more than having no boundaries. He would have been truant from school, a runaway from home. And a history of fire-play, a personal experience of fire. Fire to them has a symbolic significance. So look back to any record where the cause of the fire was suspect. One where there was a fatality. If they could tie this man onto the radiator, then he’s fit. Below fifty. So go back forty years. In a five-mile radius of here. You will see the pattern.’

  ‘Bloody hell, there have been ten.’ Wyngate was scrolling through the computer.

  ‘Ten?’

  ‘OK, two of those were in a car that went on fire in the early seventies. Another two …’ He leaned forward. ‘That was a scum landlord—’

  ‘Slum landlord,’ corrected Batten.

  ‘I choose my words carefully.’

  ‘Oh yeah, I recall that. Early eighties, that was.’

  ‘Yes, that was signed and sealed, then three … oh,’ said Wyngate, ‘I think this might be worth a closer look, hang on …’ He typed again, Costello leaned forward as far as she could without pulling the land line off the desk.

  ‘What?’ asked Anderson.

  ‘If we then type the word theatre, as that qualifies as a public building, it brings us back to this morning, back to the Vinicombe Street fire.’

  ‘That’s a long, long time to wait.’

  ‘He has been angry for a long time.’

  They watched as Wyngate’s fingers started flying over the keyboard again.

  Costello snuffled quietly from her desk where she had been scrolling without anybody noticing. ‘What about the fire in Marchmont Terrace?’ She spun in her chair. ‘That might be a good place to start, seeing that was where Mr Hollister was found.’ And she stood up to leave the room.

  ‘Stop!’ Anderson looked at her, coldness in his eyes, his voice was clipped. ‘Where exactly?’

  She pointed to the whiteboard, ‘On there. Bloody read it, why don’t you? I’m away to sort my nose out, I think it’s going to start bleeding again.’

  ‘Where Costello?’

  She realized that they were all looking at her now. ‘Here.’ She marched across the room. ‘Right here.’ She tapped at the whiteboard. ‘Athole Lane. Which runs along the back of the houses on Marchmont Terrace. O’Hare spotted it straight away. It was the rebuild after it went up in flames. Do a search on the name Marchmont fire and fatal, that will bring it up. OK?’ And she walked out, still sniffing.

  ‘Why did we not see that?’

  ‘Why indeed? It was listed as accidental, not arson. Christmas candle set fire to a coat hanging on a hook.’

  ‘There’s a protection order covering the release of further information.’ Anderson shook his head. ‘I don’t know what’s worse. Costello on the ball or her not on the ball.’

  ‘She looks like Coco the Clown with that bloody nose. At least the swelling hides her face. That must be some kind of improvement,’ snapped Mulholland.

  ‘OK,’ warned Anderson, lifting his head up again, ‘thank you Primary Four. What about Marchmont Terrace.’

  Again Wyngate’s fingers skimmed across the keyboard and Anderson wondered how somebody so unbelievably clumsy could be such a good typist.

  ‘OK, so we have a fire in Marchmont Terrace on Christmas Eve, 1989, a candle, blah, blah, blah, all the usual. The couple, the McEwans, who owned the flat, died in the inferno. One victim, Alice Kilpatrick jumped from the window and died from her wounds later, and the other, Derek Kilpatrick, survived. A fire fighter died, Ally McGuigan.’

  ‘And Mr Kilpatrick suffered terrible burns to his face and hands,’ added Costello, returning with a fold of paper towel at her nose. ‘He lives in the secure living facility with Pippa Walker. Which looks right down on to the scene. His room looks right over the gardens. In case I have to spell out everything now.’

  ‘When was that fire?’ asked Batten.

  ‘1989, are you not listening?’

  ‘Was there a child in the house? That would explain a privacy protection order, if there was a child?’

  Wyngate skimmed through. ‘They had thought there was, but no – not in the house at the time but they did have a son. And no extended family. It looks like he was then protected by the system, can’t blame them for that.’

  ‘OK, OK. So we have “a something” here.’

  ‘The same case or something different? Costello, can you call up the original files?’

  The phone went. Mulholland nodded, said thank you and put the phone down. ‘Well, the Vinicombe Street fire is now a fatal fire. Kenny Fraser died twenty minutes ago. His lungs burned out …’

  ‘Lungs burned out as Blondie cried? I need to think. Wyngate? Costello? Get that board up to date. Find out what happened to that boy, if he is now going out with his girlfriend, killing people and leaving them outside his favourite childhood haunts, then we need to know. I need it all simplified for me when I get back. I am going out for breakfast. I need sugar.’

  ‘Me too.’

  Anderson’s phone went. He answered it, said yes twice, looked at his watch and said yes again. Then put the phone back down. ‘Seems I have been invited to breakfast with ACC Mitchum up at West Central.’ He looked shocked.

  ‘Is this about the cold case initiative?’ asked Costello. ‘With all this going on? That is not good news, Colin, not good at all. Just mind your Ps and Qs. And don’t get egg yolk down your shirt.’

  ‘Oh, you are so jealous,’ said Anderson, standing up and pulling a tie from his jacket pocket, flicking it around to get the creases out.

  The phone went again, Wyngate answered it. ‘OK, yes, I will get to it right now. It was on my list of jobs to do.’ He glanced at the DCI. ‘No, he’s not at his screen right now. Yes, I will tell him.’ He put the phone down and started typing. ‘Sir, you know I phoned down for the CCTV from Vinicombe Street last night. I won’t bore you with the details but the FIO has told us to watch from eleven fifteen to eleven twenty. Blondie. Right there.’

  Anderson came back from the door as the film was downloaded and prepared to play. They were crowded round Wyngate’s screen.

  Costello sniffily reminded Anderson that he was going to be late for the big bad boss. Anderson told Costello to stop her sniffing as it was getting on his nerves.

  ‘I’m claiming industrial injury,’ she muttered.

  The images started moving. The street was dark, busy. They could almost hear the chink chink of glasses and the murmur of quiet conversation from those outside the bars, spilling up on to the outside of the theatre. It was a small building, double fronted windows, old wood behind the glass, and Art Deco sunflower tiles over the door. Anderson couldn’t recall seeing that but it looked as though it had been covered in posters for local concerts and bands until very recently. Then the new owner had bought it and was starting renovations, revealing the old building behind the advertising.

  ‘What is that down the side of the lane there?’

  Wyngate, who was closest, pointed with the top of his pen. ‘I think that is a skip, nothing unusual there. The place was being refurbished.’

  Wyngate had stopped the film. ‘Here – look.’

  And there on the screen as clear as anything was Kenny Fraser standing in the doorway. With him was a woman, turned slightly towards the camera, her head tilted, the collar of her swing coat up to cover her mouth but the angle of her face, the tilt of her head suggested something coquettish, something flirtatious as she led Fraser through the door of the old theatre, picking her way through the t
ools and the rubble. She paused and pulled the dark glasses down slightly. She looked right at the camera.

  Anderson leaned over towards the screen and paused it, freezing the frame.

  ‘Hello, Blondie,’ he said.

  Sandra pulled off her uniform and pulled on her dressing gown before tucking the towel in round the collar. Then she started separating her hair for the dye. She was going blonder. All part of her plan to get out of this tiny council flat. If she was going to make any inroads to a decent life, she needed to get her plan in operation now. Otherwise nothing would ever change, she would always be wiping bottoms and cleaning toilets, folding up pants and unfolding incontinence pads. Used or otherwise.

  She studied her face in the mirror. No idea if she looked like her father. She certainly didn’t look like her mother.

  It had started with her mother and her first broken hip. Initially she had been glad to move back to the family home after three years of independence – the family home, her mum’s home. That had taken a few years, then Jimmy Pinkett from across the landing had suffered a stroke and his son immediately buggered off to Australia. Somehow Sandra had slid into caring for him as well. Then old Ina downstairs broke her hip; at least her son had asked Sandra formally to look after his mother, and paid her, giving her a day off a week on the day when he could make it over from his house in Stirling. And Sandra was good at looking after Ina. When she eventually went into a care home, Sandra promptly inherited Ina’s wee sister, who lived round the corner. And when she passed away, Sandra started doing the shopping for her neighbour and so it went on … and her life slipped by. But Jimmy Pinkett was always the troublesome one. He gave her a look, a look that got more intense after Ina’s sister passed away. As if he knew.

  ACC Mitchum was not in a good mood. Anderson had not even sat down when the boss threw the early edition of the Daily Record over to him.

  Claire’s picture was on page four, full colour. Anderson sped-read the feature. His own daughter had played an important role in the abduction of the boy now identified as David Kerr. It made much of the story of her father and the fact that he had inherited the house on the hill. There was also a picture of Irene Kerr looking very attractive and vulnerable next to an old photograph of Anderson looking gaunt and tired. Anderson was described as having a troubled home life.

  Anderson closed the newspaper and handed it back, seething quietly.

  ‘As far as I know, there have been no legal issues over you inheriting the house on Kirklee Terrace on the death of Helena McAlpine, so I am now wondering who is stirring this up.’ The ACC sat back, speculative, not his normal dominant style, almost chatty. ‘And why?’

  ‘Some people have very small lives. And smaller minds.’

  ‘I wondered why that man was also vaguely suggesting that you, DCI Anderson, should be removed from this case. And now we have this in the paper.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘James Kirkton.’

  Anderson snorted.

  ‘You do see that he has a point, you know. Dragging your daughter into all this.’

  ‘She witnessed the abduction, it would be negligent if we didn’t speak to her. You can’t have it both ways.’ Anderson snorted again. ‘I can’t help thinking what the hell it has to do with him—’

  ‘Everything to do with him and his pursuit of the safer society. Kirkton is trying to ingratiate himself into Police Scotland. He’s already in at the fiscal’s office, sitting on every committee. Now he’s onto us. Or maybe onto you.’

  ‘In what way?’

  ‘It’s about you. He wants you off the case.’ ACC Mitchum swung back on his chair. ‘And I can’t figure out why. I think he’s trying to derail your career. Is there something personal going on here that I should know about?’

  ‘Not that I know of.’ Anderson laughed slightly. ‘No offence, sir, but it’s rumoured that the cold case initiative is exactly that. Maybe not my career derailing but certainly putting it in a siding, so if he is so convinced I’m such a threat to his safer society, why not just let it be?’

  Mitchum avoided the question. ‘Stay on the case, that’s an order. I really don’t like politicians telling me how to do my job.’ He indicated that Anderson should leave. As he was at the door, the boss said, ‘And Colin, keep an eye on Claire, will you? That’s another order.’

  Costello’s response to Anderson’s relaying of the conversation was to put a picture of Kirkton on the whiteboard. They laughed and Wyngate reached up to take it down again.

  ‘No, leave it there, Wingnut, that man has been all over this from the start, so he’s involved somewhere. He’s right in somebody’s pocket, causing us problems,’ Costello said.

  Anderson collapsed into his seat. ‘Where is David Kerr? What are we not seeing?’

  ‘We are not doing anything wrong, Colin, it’s that they are ahead of us and we can’t get at them or her. We have no location, nothing. He, she, they have a property to keep them in, a property that has wee green men in the roof. Any ideas?’

  ‘But there is something we are missing.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘If I knew we wouldn’t be bloody missing it!’ He ran his fingers through his hair. ‘OK, back to basics. Wyngate? Mulholland? Stop stuffing your faces with toast and get Sherlock all over this, try and get something that is not nonsense. Pure fishing, but … hey ho …’ The buzzer interrupted him. It was Graham from reception. ‘Here’s somebody who might have news for us. Mathilda McQueen, forensic scientist extraordinaire.’

  Five minutes later, Mathilda, all four feet ten of her, had centre stage and was in full flow. ‘Interesting DNA. The body’s DNA is on the jumper, obviously.’

  ‘Obviously.’

  ‘And David’s because it was his jumper. Then we tested the DNA on the upper sleeve as we see on the film quite clearly that Blondie grabbed him by the upper arm when he toppled off the chair. Pressure of contact was heavy but was for very swift duration. So it gave us enough recoverable DNA to match way back to a fire on Christmas Eve in1989. A familial match, but that really means very little. Somebody who was at that house when it went on fire was related to somebody who may have brushed shoulders with David when he was wearing that jumper; it means no more than that. The only survivor of that fire lives in Athole House old folks’ … sorry, secure living facility.’

  ‘The one-eyed guy that gave me the creeps.’

  ‘You did say that you thought there was more to him than meets the eye. If you pardon the expression,’ said Mathilda with a smile. ‘Basically it takes us nowhere. But it could prove the link; somebody in the house that went on fire, at some point touched that jumper. But it was a tiny trace.’

  ‘And if you think about the fire up on Vinicombe Street, that connects the Blonde, surely?’

  ‘Very tentatively. Nobody called Pauline Gee, or Pauline anything, fits the script for this.’

  ‘No, but it was the sunflower theatre, so that must be a link surely, somewhere in all this.’ She pointed at the board.

  They looked at her. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘It has sunflowers over the door.’ She pointed to the wall, to the picture of David’s phone.

  ‘He must be related to them, the theatre people, in some way, surely?’

  ‘Who? That’s David’s phone, it was found in the street. There’s nothing on it to connect it.’

  ‘Really?’ said Mathilda, who looked very clever. ‘The chap who found the phone, his name? Do none of you cook?’ She looked rather exasperated. ‘The Jerusalem artichoke is a bastardization of the words “sunflower artichoke”. The Italian for sunflower is girasole … the girasole artichoke becomes the Jerusalem artichoke … so the children’s theatre was run by the Girasoles. Hence the sunflowers outside.’

  ‘Right round the front door,’ said Anderson enlightened.

  ‘In the Art Deco tiles? Yes. And then this young man, Mr Girasole, calls up and gives you the phone …?’ She opened her hands. ‘Don’t you get it? H
e must be one of them.’

  The mood in the room lifted.

  Anderson got to his feet, then sat back down again. He closed his eyes. ‘Wyngate, get that list of cold cases off my desk. Blue folder. Blue folder quickly!’

  He flicked over the pages, running his finger down the list. ‘There you go, I knew I had seen it somewhere. Wyngate? Girasole. Murdered. Try to find it …’

  Wyngate hadn’t even got as far as typing in the date of birth when the screen came alive. He watched as the computer made connections. Somebody called Pietro Giuseppe Girasole, aged nineteen, had been found dead, lying against a fence at the back of Ashton Lane. The file had remained open but not been active for many years, until selected for cold case status and a DNA review. The death was New Year’s Eve 1999.

  ‘That was the night they were going to boogie,’ muttered Mulholland, then he remembered that Prince was dead as well.

  Mulholland read the case summary, the only thing that was available to him. He noted that the original case file had been removed by none other than somebody called DI A. Jeffries. It had been signed in and out a few times over the years.

  ‘So Alistair Jeffries had been on the case. Literally,’ said Costello, ‘and he knows Kirkton.’

  ‘So we have a Pietro Girasole dead at nineteen, now we have an untraceable Pauline Gee who may or not be Blondie.

  Mulholland updated them. ‘Our Pauline Gee is not on any electoral register. The social media and the IT guys are now working on the basis that she’s fictional and we’re tracing URL addresses to find the location of the computer she’s using. It’s very easy to hide in the virtual world. She’s doing all this Facebook crowd funding appeal stuff. And Batten said that Blondie is emotional and the emotion is turning vengeful. Pauline, however, is very, very angry. Some of her ranting on Facebook is bloody impressive.’