The crushing weight of sadness came from Abby herself. I could feel it everywhere. She was still in the house. Some part of her, at least, was still in the house. And if she wasn’t actually physically there, then it meant she was dead, and her spirit had come home to be with her family. To mourn her own passing.
I got no more than that. I couldn’t ask her what had happened or where we might find her body. I couldn’t physically see her. It was just the sense of her, so strong that I was surprised that no one else could feel it.
I didn’t ask, of course, but I could tell. No one else looked like I felt. The family were still that stressed, horrible, jumble of dread and hope.
We identified the killer shortly afterwards, and I mean, twenty minutes afterwards. Identifying usually doesn’t take long. Building a case is where the time goes.
She’d had one boyfriend in her life, they had split up three months previously. Her decision. I went round to talk to him. He’d already shut down. He had to expect that the police would be at his door as soon as she was reported missing. He’d been dumped, and no matter how amicable the parents made it sound – and not for a second did they implicate him, as the only time they sounded upset with Abby was at the thought of her ending her relationship with this kid they were very fond of – that’s your motive right there.
Some seventeen-year-olds might be capable of the cool lie. Not many, I wouldn’t think, but some will be. The ones who are due to be true sociopaths throughout their unkind lives. Everyone else though is going to give themselves away, and the only way to avoid doing that is to shut down. Completely.
The boyfriend could barely speak. He looked me in the eye, but his eyes were dead. He gave nothing away, except that he gave everything away. He didn’t look like he was in shock, he looked like he was trying not to talk.
There was no satisfactory conclusion, on any level. We found Abby’s body in a small burn beyond Evanton. Not concealed particularly well. Bruises on her arms, bruises on her legs. She’d been raped and strangled. We can’t say what the boyfriend had been thinking because he never admitted it. He stayed shut down. Never spoke in court, never answered a single question. We had the evidence from her body. We had DNA. We had fingerprints. We had the e-mails he’d been sending her. There was no question.
The last time I was in Abby’s house the place was enveloped in sadness, but now it was everyone, and it was everywhere. So much grief, it was hard to tell if she was still there, seeking solace with her family, bereft.
That’s what the rest of their time on earth will be. A time of mourning. Their daughter is dead, and their lives will never be the same. I see these people around town today sometimes, seven years later. They haven’t recovered now, and they never will.
11
Standing on deck as the ferry moves slowly past the Estonian coast towards the Bay of Tallinn. Kuusk beside me, a cigarette in his right hand. We’re in the No Smoking section, but no one seems to care.
Low, grey cloud. Moisture in the air, but not actually raining. Bitingly cold. I don’t have the clothes for this weather. One of the consequences of packing in haste. I thought, we’re pretty far north in Dingwall, Tallinn probably won’t be too much different. Apart from being a couple of hundred miles out, it was a stupid assumption anyway, Britain being warmer than just about everywhere of equivalent latitude on the continental masses.
Wearing a short blue jacket, three layers underneath, hands thrust in pockets, suitcase on the deck beside me.
The great white hulls of the ferries in dock are the first we see of Tallinn, and then the few towers and spires emerge from the murk.
‘Bad day, or is it always like this?’ I ask.
Kuusk smiles, takes a final puff of the smoke and then flicks it over the side.
‘It’s November. The most miserable month. Days are short, weather is cold and wet. The suicide rate soars. Everyone is sad.’
‘You’re talking it up.’
‘It’s better when the snow comes. Sometime in December through to April, there’ll be snow on the ground. The place looks a little better. At least in the parks and on the roofs. Not so much on the roads. They just get to looking dirtier. Dirty snow is as depressing as this.’
The boat has turned, and suddenly the port is appearing quickly out of the gloom.
‘So, what’s with you?’ he asks. ‘You’re a tough one to fathom.’
‘What d’you mean?’
‘I’ve read the stories. All these maverick British cops. They all have something. Drugs, alcohol, women… What’s with you?’
‘I don’t think I’m a maverick. I’m just a guy.’
‘You don’t drink?’
‘Wine. A little bit. Can quite happily go a week without it.’
‘Drugs?’
‘Never.’
‘Women?’
Shrug.
‘Last one was pretty awful, so I’ve steered clear for a while. Someone’ll come along eventually, I expect. Most women I meet seem to be married with kids.’
‘Sometimes they’re the most fun.’
I smile. He’s probably right. Think of Mary, sitting behind her desk back in Dingwall.
‘You must have something,’ he says, persisting.
‘Sometimes I play chess on my iPad.’
‘Ah, chess genius.’
‘I play on the third level out of ten.’
He takes another cigarette from the packet, contemplates it as though he might decide not to light it, and then puts it in his mouth and cups his hands around the lighted match.
‘You have a tortured back story?’ he asks, after his first long draw.
‘No.’
‘Abused childhood?’
‘No.’
‘You like music, maybe? Opera? Your lot usually like opera, that kind of thing. You know, so you can drive to a murder scene listening to the Flower Duet from Lakmé.’
‘I think you’ve been watching too much TV.’
‘You must like music. Everyone likes music.’
‘Turin Brakes.’
‘I don’t know them. They’re a band?’
‘Yes.’
Another puff.
‘I don’t know them,’ he says again.
‘I can let you hear some on my iPod.’
‘Cool. What did you do before?’
‘You mean my last case?’
‘No. Before you joined the police.’
I wonder about asking him some questions, but somehow it would seem disinterested. Only doing it because he was asking it of me.
‘Security services.’
No harm in saying. Not now. Been so long. And the security services don’t care. They more or less have photographs of their staff on their website nowadays.
‘MI6?’
‘Yes.’
He nods, the smoke breathed out through his smile.
‘I knew it. A spy. You must have seen bad stuff.’
Shrug.
‘Some,’ I say.
‘Traumatised.’
‘I don’t think I am, but if it makes you happy for me to be, then you can have it. At least it’s something. Pretty boring otherwise.’
He nods. He leans forward on the railing, takes another puff and then flicks the half-smoked cigarette into the sea.
‘I didn’t need that one,’ he says.
* * *
John Baden has spent the weekend in a military hospital to the east of the city. We go straight there. Kuusk asks if I want to check into my hotel first, but as it’s not much after ten in the morning, there’s nothing I would do when I got there. I sling my bag in the boot of his car, and off we go.
We drive round the sweep of the Bay, the ferries behind us, along the path of the promenade towards and past the marina.
‘Must be nice in the summer,’ I venture at some point.
Kuusk doesn’t respond. Lost in thought, or nothing to say. Any place by the sea that isn’t nice in the summer must be making a positive effort not
to be.
* * *
Baden is sitting at a table in white hospital clothes. He has a cup of coffee and a packet of cigarettes. The air in the room is smoky. A window is open slightly, letting in something of the bleakness of the morning.
He looks thin, distant, detached. If his story is true – and even suggesting that it might be sounds false, because how can it be – then he’s going to get to the part where it all becomes too much for him and he has to completely withdraw.
Perhaps someone made him believe he was John Baden, that brainwashing was part of the process of captivity. Why anyone would do that, of course, adds another layer of questions thicker than the meagre explanation that spawned them in the first place.
Face drawn, eyes faraway, cigarette in right hand, hand shaking slightly. Left hand firmly clutching an empty cup.
‘Can I get you another coffee?’ I ask.
A moment, and then he looks at me, looks at his cup.
‘You’re the one from Scotland?’
‘Yes.’
‘You don’t sound it.’
‘I just work there.’
There’s no sixth sense with this guy. Nothing there to latch on to.
‘Who’s top of the league?’ he asks.
Well, there’s a question. Safe, neutral, natural.
‘I’m sure one of the Estonians could have told you who was top of the Scottish league. At least, they could have found out for you.’
There’s a nurse, maybe a kind of security nurse, standing in the corner. She reminds me of Rosa Klebb, which must be some sort of appalling racist profiling on my part. But she does. I wouldn’t leave anywhere that she didn’t want me to leave.
‘I didn’t think of it until now,’ he says.
‘Celtic.’
He nods.
‘Rangers went out of business,’ I add.
That, at least, brings a flicker.
‘What d’you mean?’
‘Went under. Got demoted to League Two. Division Three as it was back in your day. Haven’t quite made it back to the Premiership yet.’
‘Shit,’ he says.
Holds my gaze for a second, then lowers his eyes. He’s a typical football supporter from Dingwall. Not actually interested in Ross County. I think of telling him about County being in the Premier League, and then decide not to.
‘I’ll get the coffee,’ I say.
‘Could I have a cup of tea?’
Staring at the floor as he asks.
‘I mean, a proper cup of tea. British. Not the stuff they drink here.’
* * *
Check the time. Have been in here just over twenty minutes. My coffee finished, bar the dregs. Baden drank his tea in five minutes. Found a guard with some Tetley lurking in his cupboard, two years out of date. How does tea go out of date?
Do they put these overly prescriptive use-by dates on food in fear of the health and safety brigade or because they want you buying their product more frequently than you would otherwise need to? They want the turnover that’s at odds with food sitting in your cupboard and fridge.
We’re not saying much. There’s no rush. He’s been gone twelve years, no hurry now. I wasn’t despatched with any instruction to get things sorted out and be back in time for Wednesday morning round-up.
‘What was your favourite book?’
He glances at me, looks away again.
‘You said you were given old books to read. Which was your favourite?’
Pause. Come on, now, that one’s not too hard.
‘Pride and Prejudice, he says’. ‘That’s kind of stupid, isn’t it?’
‘Everyone likes Pride and Prejudice.’
Another silence. His eyes look off to the side, but there’s something there.
‘How did the wars go?’ he asks, his voice soft, the words placed gently into the room.
‘Which wars?’
‘Afghanistan. Iraq.’
They would just have started when he went missing. And was found dead. Keep having to remind myself of that fact, so natural does it seem sitting here, with someone saying they’ve been out of touch all this time.
‘Not great,’ I say. ‘We tried ending the Iraq one and it just came back. Afghanistan, not so different. Anyway, there are other wars now. Lots of wars. The Pope called it World War Three by stealth.’
He doesn’t ask where. He lifts his cup, which he hasn’t done in the fifteen minutes since he finished it. Looks inside, places it back on the table. Not the time to ask him if he wants another.
‘We need to talk about Emily,’ I say.
Nothing on his face. He’s staring at an indistinct point on the floor.
‘We need to talk about Emily.’
‘I know. I find it hard to think about her.’
‘Why?’
Slight movement of the jawline, teeth pressed together.
‘There’s too much.’
‘Too much what?’
‘Too much to think about. I can’t go there. Can’t think about what’s happened to me, and put Emily in the same story. She’s not part of it any more. She’s not part of my life any more, even if I want her to be, even if by some miracle she’s still out there, wanting me to be.’
‘How long were you together?’
‘From day one of university. Stood in the lunch queue together and bang. Four years at Aberdeen, then three years living in Marybank. Every morning having breakfast, looking up at Wyvis. Thinking it was ours. The mountain was ours.’
Pause.
‘Then we came here.’
‘Whose idea was it?’
‘Emily’s. Had been talking about it for a while. Trying to get me to take a break.’
‘Why the Baltics?’
‘She loved the idea of it. Neither of us really wanted a beach or the sun.’
‘You think she was involved in you being taken?’
Furrowed brow, he looks at me. Shakes his head.
‘No.’
‘You haven’t asked whether she was ever taken. Why haven’t you asked that? Did you not presume she was grabbed at the same time?’
His face relaxes, he looks away and again loses himself in the indistinct spot.
‘I did for a while. Assumed I’d be seeing her. Never did. Over time… I don’t know, I thought everything there is to think. I asked myself if she was involved, just as you did. But I couldn’t believe it. I don’t know how long I considered that, but I never believed it. And the thought that she was being held like me… Maybe she was. Maybe she is. Maybe she was in the next room all the time.’
He looks up, some sort of spark starting to come.
‘She was never taken?’
‘No.’
‘You’ve spoken to her?’
I shake my head.
‘I headed out here as soon as they brought you in. I haven’t spoken to home yet. They hadn’t located her when I left, but they might have by now. Certainly, twelve years ago, she spent… she looked for you. She was questioned, and no one thought she had anything to do with your disappearance.’
‘You hesitated.’
‘Yes, I did.’
‘Why?’
‘I’ll tell you later.’
Don’t let them start asking the questions. Also worth noting, don’t hesitate at the wrong moment.
‘Why are you only just getting here then?’ he asks. ‘Did you take a boat?’
‘Two boats. And a train.’
12
Mid-afternoon. Tired. Travelling will do that, regardless of whether there are any time zones and regardless of how much sleep you’ve had. We’re headed back towards town, back to Kuusk’s HQ, but I get him to stop along the Bay, so that we can take in some fresh air for a while. Just after three o’clock, already getting dark. Two hours ahead, so UK time I’d just be about to have lunch. I’m not normally tired at one in the afternoon.
Biting cold, but it’s waking me up. The air has cleared a little, but the wind is still coming in off the water
. The sky is the same flat grey. The cold is the kind that it’s hard to imagine any amount of clothing protecting you from. Piercing, slicing. You feel it deep inside, like someone is pouring ice water into your veins.
The sea is calm. I’ve barely seen a wave since leaving Aberdeen. To the left the port. The bay sweeps away to the right. On the horizon there’s a large, low-lying island, barely visible. Everything is grey, making it hard to tell the difference between sea, land, and sky.
‘We need to try to get him to find where he was held.’
‘Of course.’
‘You have any ideas, from what he said, where to start?’
‘We know roughly where to start, yes. I don’t hold out much hope, but we will try. Tomorrow, naturally, when there is daylight.’
‘If you can call it daylight.’
He laughs. He pulls his coat in a little tighter. He seems no better dressed for the weather than I am. He probably wasn’t expecting that I’d suggest a walk along the promenade. Looking along the length of it, as far as we can see in either direction, there is one woman walking a dog, and that’s it.
‘I need to buy a coat,’ I say. ‘Let’s go back to HQ, speak to your boss. I’ll call home. Maybe they’ve found Emily. I don’t know how much use it would be if she actually turned up here. You know, if she didn’t run a mile first.’
‘She might know if it’s him.’
‘Yes, there’s that,’ I say, but the idea of that moment, of her walking into the room to see him, feels so bad, so uncomfortably wrong, that I don’t want to think about it.
‘So, we can go back to the car now?’ he asks.
‘Yes.’
‘Thank God.’
* * *
Standing at an office window, fourth floor, looking down on the back of a bleak portside scene. Bare trees to the left, a car park, the back of probably empty warehouses, and a view through to an unused dockside. Between here and there a small area of redevelopment, a pedestrian and cycling track, which might look all right in summer, but not so much on a grim November’s day.
Have been looking at it for five minutes when the door opens, and I turn to see Kuusk following his boss into the office. Superintendent Stepulov. Again, she seems young for her position. Long dark hair hanging loose, dark rimmed spectacles. Slimmer even than Kuusk, and I’d already regarded him with some resentment.
Song of the Dead Page 4