Where There is Evil

by Sandra Brown

  My father had been furious. I later heard from my mother that he kept repeating in greatly affronted tones, ‘You surely don’t think I did away wi’ her, do ye?’

  My grandfather’s search of the whole house, including the large walk-in cupboard in my parents’ bedroom which doubled as a workshop, was fruitless. He sat, head in hands, and said grimly, ‘You’re in enough trouble as it is. God knows I don’t want further shame brought on our family’s good name, but I’m convinced you’re involved in this. You tell the polis where ye pit that wee lassie, Alex.’

  But my father stuck to his story that the police had seen him, and the child he’d been seen talking to was not the one for whom everyone was now searching. (Later I found that my grandfather had not restricted himself to our home, but had searched anywhere that someone could conceivably hide a small girl’s body. He had insisted on checking the boots of my dad’s bus and car.)

  ‘As if I would do such a thing,’ my father complained afterwards. ‘What kind of man do they think I am, saying I’d lay a finger on anybody? Jist because I’m in bother for the other thing, they’re wantin’ to pin this on to me, too. My father’s right out of order doin’ what he’s done, and I’ve telt him all I know, but he still won’t believe me, so what can I do? You know I’d never harm any wean, Mary.’

  When my mother recounted this conversation to me, years after it had taken place, I felt like saying to her that if the police had spoken to me at the time, and I’d just been a bit older, I would have let them know he was more than capable of harming young children. Moira’s appearance, slim, boyish, with an exceptionally striking smile, I could have told them, was a type much admired by a predatory, unscrupulous male like my dad. Her outgoing personality would have drawn him to her like a magnet, as he liked liveliness in a child.

  My grandmother’s funeral took place on a damp February day in 1992, with a service in Bellshill where she had lived all her life, followed by her cremation at Daldowie near Calderpark Zoo on the south side of Glasgow. Strangely, the crematorium route was lined with policemen who were organizing themselves for the funeral of a respected colleague.

  Afterwards we gathered for what we Scots call the ‘purvey’ – tea, sandwiches, sausage rolls and cakes – in the little hall back at Granny Jenny’s sheltered-housing complex. I travelled there with my friend Irene. As soon as we were alone she sensed that something was amiss. She was horrified when I related my father’s history.

  ‘I’m sure he must have been interviewed at the time, Sandra,’ she protested. ‘They brought in the Glasgow CID, didn’t they? It was in all the papers, and they always round up the local suspects when these things happen.’

  ‘What if they missed him somehow?’

  ‘Surely that’s not possible. If he was out on bail they’d be keeping an eye on him?’

  I was relieved to hear a tiny question creep into Irene’s voice. ‘I’m not convinced he was interviewed, don’t ask me why, but I’m not. What I do know is that I’ve got to decide whether I need to find out or not.’

  The meal in the pensioners’ hall passed without incident. My father sat with his son, another Alex Gartshore and a previously unseen stepbrother, at one end of the room, while I sat at the other with Irene, my mother and my own family. The Canvey Island relatives were in the middle, with my brothers and their wives, and also William, the cousin who had travelled up from Leeds with his fiancée Lily. The only real communication between myself and my father at the table was to pass up photographs that Ronnie and I had taken of Granny Jenny enjoying herself on Christmas Day at the large Victorian house my brothers had bought some years ago, and divided between them. There she was, large as life, laughing and joking in her wheelchair and presiding over Ian and Annette’s white lace-covered festive table. When three photos were put side by side, you could see all sixteen or so happy faces in the glow of flickering Christmas candlelight. A warmer family scene could not be imagined.

  For Alexander Gartshore, here was evidence that the wife and three children he had abandoned in 1965 had not only survived without him but had prospered.

  I noticed that the photographs made a deep impression on my father, the reason for which I understood later when I gathered that he was living in a tower-block flat that could in no way be described as the lap of luxury.

  As we left, my father suddenly planted an awkward kiss right on my lips, then pecked my mother’s cheek. While we were recovering from this belated display of affection, we were bundled into cars to travel the few miles between Bellshill and Coatbridge.

  I was more puzzled that William and Lily had moved out of Gran’s home to my brother Norman’s. Lily was in a highly emotional state, weeping profusely, which I thought peculiar since she hadn’t known Granny Jenny very well.

  I was aghast when she told me that my dad had made persistent sexual advances towards her. She said, ‘William gave ’im a talking to, but it were no good – he wouldn’t give over at all, acted as if it were all a big joke and I were making a fuss about nothing.’

  ‘Why didn’t William just thump him one so he got the message?’ I asked.

  ‘Well, he is his uncle,’ she sobbed through her tears, ‘but I couldn’t stand much more of it, and then the final straw was when he comes into our room wanting to sleep in beside us—’

  My jaw dropped and so, nearly, did the teapot.

  ‘It were the sound of your gran’s zimmer. He said he could ’ear these ghostly sounds in ’er bedroom, and he were frightened to sleep all by himself. We told him it were just the wind or the plumbing but he was certain it were ’er.’

  William had told him to get lost, and they left the house at the first opportunity.

  Later, I decided to speak to my brothers and their wives about what Lily had said and the awful dilemma in which I now found myself. Shock registered on all the faces looking back at me as I said we had to do something about this man. No one was safe from him. No women and no female children.

  Both my brothers sat as if turned to stone.

  I broke down when I explained how our conversation had ended, and told them my deepest suspicions, that our father was responsible for the disappearance of Moira Anderson.

  The reactions round the table varied from incredulity to bewilderment to open hostility at the very idea. At first, Ian showed utter disbelief. His voice rose. ‘You can’t ask me to believe that our father calmly drove around in his bus after doing something as horrendous as that – nobody could carry on doing their job quite normally as if nothing had happened.’

  It was like a kick in the stomach, but I understood how he felt. I, too, had wanted it all to go away and be a bad dream.

  I pointed out to Ian that criminals do go about their business after they have committed offences and they do not have a label tattooed on their foreheads saying THIEF or RAPIST, but I could see that I was asking him and Norman to think the unthinkable.

  One of my sisters-in-law asked me furiously, ‘What do you hope to gain from opening all of this up again after all these years? Her family have probably forgotten all about it by now. Why upset everyone?’

  ‘What do you mean?’ I gasped. ‘Her family’s never known what happened to her – we can’t just sweep this under the carpet as though it was never said. I can’t accept that what you’ve just said is true. You would never ever get over your child disappearing. What if it were Michelle or Lauren?’

  I was so aware that we had our children, but the Andersons’ little girl had disappeared for ever. My reference to Michelle and Lauren had a sobering effect on everybody: the thought of either of them going missing and never coming home was unbearable. I could see Norman nod in agreement.

  He and Ian then remembered that my father had said some odd things in the past few days. They had felt obliged to let him accompany them on all the various duties that have to be performed after a death. He had sat in the car and seemed a little confused about landmarks, they agreed, not recalling that the Coatbridge Hotel was
near Drumpellier golf course. It was likely, they said to me, that all this stuff he’d said about Moira Anderson could be put down to senility.

  I pointed out that some confusion about landmarks after a gap of almost thirty years was not unreasonable, and that as someone who had taught umpteen courses for Lothian Region’s social work department on dementia to carers who deal with clients with Alzheimer’s disease, I was clear that my father was not a sufferer. In vain I tried to get through to the shocked group round the table that the truth would have to be confronted and exposed. One sister-in-law rounded on me, ‘It’s all right for you. You don’t live here any more! You changed your name to Brown and now you live in Edinburgh. We have to live here, not you. Everyone knows Norrie and Ian because they drive taxis. We have to think about our kids going to school, everybody looking at them. You’ve made up your mind that he’s guilty, and that’s it. You’ve absolutely no proof and he’s told you he’s been interviewed for it. Leave it well alone.’

  ‘There’s things I know about him that you don’t,’ I said at last, very slowly. ‘I can’t see why you’re this upset when he wasn’t your dad, and you never knew him, but I want to find out if he was actually interviewed. I don’t think he was, somehow, and I’m sure he knew her. He slipped through the net at the time. Not only did he serve a sentence in Saughton in Edinburgh for the girl who was the babysitter, he’s responsible for Moira Anderson and managed to get away with it.’

  Chapter Fourteen

  The day after the funeral, my father and his son had gone. All that was left to show that he had been there was a letter in which he apologized for their ‘shabby behaviour’ in not staying to help. This is how I came to obtain my father’s address in Leeds.

  Once again, he had disappeared out of my life as suddenly as he had come, as usual leaving a trail of havoc, but this time I was far more able to deal with it. I told Ronnie the details of the conversation and my father’s behaviour with Lily but I could not bring myself to talk to my mother. Ronnie told me that whatever I decided to do he would support me all the way.

  The next few months were a nightmare of pain and confusion, and the only thing that kept me based in reality was work. I drove back and forth to the college campus in Livingston as if on automatic pilot. I felt that my demeanour there was normal, my breathing unhurried, but, of course, many colleagues noticed a difference in me, but put it down to sudden bereavement, knowing that I had been close to my grandmother.

  Then, my concentration deteriorated. I had a car accident and my handbag was stolen from my office, with the family snaps we had taken at Christmas. While I could pull myself together enough to phone banks and let our minister, George Grubb, know that a set of church and Sunday-school keys were missing, I could not cope with the loss of those irreplaceable photos and their negatives. I was inconsolable, but would not listen to my husband’s advice to take some time off work. I couldn’t sleep, I lost weight and I was irritable with Ross and Lauren. My inability to concentrate, particularly when driving, became frightening. I would drive through to the Scottish Vocational Council’s headquarters in Glasgow, where I was one of a small national team developing a new childcare course, and realize I had driven over forty miles on motorways without registering one landmark or road sign. I would find I hadn’t checked the petrol indicator. The situation couldn’t go on.

  I made an appointment with our doctor, Brian Venters. By the time I was called, I was like a wet rag. I couldn’t think straight, I couldn’t look at anyone and, even worse, when he asked me cheerily what he could do for me, I burst into tears. Not a word emerged as he gently asked me what was wrong. It was as if the most enormous stone was lodged in my throat. Twenty minutes passed, in which I attempted to speak several times. Nothing came out. Just when I was positive that our GP would suggest I stop wasting his and everyone else’s time, I blurted out that it was to do with my father. Another five minutes of racking sobs followed. Then, somehow, I managed to disclose some of what I had seen my father do when I was a child, of what had happened to my friends. He closed his eyes. I told him of my father’s sentence and how I had only found out at the age of thirty-six. I explained how my grandmother’s death had brought my father on the scene again and, haltingly, repeated the conversation where he had linked himself to Moira. When I stopped, Brian swore under his breath and said, ‘I see people in here regularly, Sandra, whose families have been destroyed by child abuse, but this bastard takes the biscuit. Obviously you’re in a state because as well as your grandmother’s death – and it sounds to me as if she was the glue holding you all together to some extent – you’re also having to deal with making a decision about what you’re going to do about this disclosure he’s made. Right?’

  I agreed, and explained about my sleepless nights. ‘I can help with the sleep getting back to normal,’ he stated firmly, ‘not through medication, just through some relaxation exercises I can show you. But also you need some very good counselling, someone to listen to all that has happened to you, including your early childhood, and I know just the person. Ashley is her name and she’ll come to your home.’

  Easter 1992 came and went, and so did the first of our sessions, but even before I met Ashley, a tiny, neat little person with bright eyes and silver blonde hair, I had already taken a further step on the road down which I was being slowly drawn. I had told my husband I was certain that I should take the information I had to the police and have my dad’s claims checked out. I could not live with keeping such things to myself, where they would lodge in my conscience for ever. I was aware of the huge weight of responsibility involved in going to the police, and knew the likely negative reaction of my family. Ronnie and I had talked it through and I was clear that, while there was a risk of relatives being shattered by my disclosure, other lives might finally heal.

  I wondered about speaking to a long-standing friend, Billy McCloy. Now a police inspector, he had become a leading member of Coatbridge and Airdrie Operatic Society, the amateur club in which I had been involved for some ten years. He’d married Fiona, who had been at Gartsherrie Academy with me both as pupil and teacher. I’d known Billy since he had joined the police, and we had attended each other’s weddings.

  Billy and I met at his home. An Airdrie boy, he knew much of the background to Moira Anderson’s disappearance. We agreed, however that neither of us could recall a bus ever being involved in the case. That crucial sighting had been overlooked by both police and public in 1957.

  I told Billy I needed him to check if Alexander Gartshore had or had not been interviewed in 1957. I implored him to go through the records without anyone else’s knowledge. Slowly Billy explained that it wasn’t as simple as I thought: records from the fifties would not be to hand. He would need a reason as to why he wanted to trawl through them. I asked him to check the police computer files to discover if my father had been in any further trouble down south in the seventies and eighties. He groaned. ‘Sandra, it’s more than my job’s worth to do that. The best thing is for me to speak to someone you can trust who’s based here in Airdrie, and they’ll visit you in Edinburgh, take a statement, and that way you’ll find out what you need to know, but I can assure you, if what you’re saying is right, there’s no way they’ll have missed your dad at the time. He’s bound to have been interviewed.’

  I agreed. A few days later, Billy’s colleague rang me and made arrangements to visit my home. I organized the children to go on a holiday treat that day to the newly opened leisure centre in Coatbridge. They had just gone off, full of excitement, when two plain-clothes policeman arrived. One was thick set, dour and gruff-looking, older than his buddy, while the other was handsome and noticeably fit, probably around my own age, with a lively, intelligent face. The voice on the phone had been friendly, but my heart sank slightly as they stood on the step, grim-faced. Their handshakes, though, were firm and positive. Both men settled in our family room at the back of the house and I made us a cup of tea before the interview began. Jim Mc
Ewan introduced himself as Detective Inspector, and indicated that his companion was Bobby Glenn.

  Jim outlined a little of what he had gleaned from Billy McCloy, then leaned forward and tapped a large box file which he had carried in with him. My heart gave an enormous leap, as I saw a slightly dusty but still legible label marked ‘Moira Anderson Enquiry, 1957’.

  ‘What I can tell you categorically before we take a formal statement, Sandra, is that we have combed through the original investigation files which you see here, and there is absolutely no trace of an Alexander Gartshore ever being interviewed at that time or later. No trace. What I can do is show you that, indeed, contrary to what a large number of people seem to recall about this girl’s disappearance, there is a confirmed sighting of her, in fact, several of her being on a local-service bus after the time given out by the officers then carrying out the inquiry, who did not choose to make this public at the time. It hardly featured in the press. I think you may be interested to read this page.’

  He passed me the bulky file with its yellowing entries. Nearly forty years on, I read James Inglis’ statement that she was the child to whom he spoke – he knew all three sisters and was unlikely to have confused Moira with Janet, despite their resemblance. Janet, in any case, was away from her home. The incident had stuck in his mind because while he had been sheltering in a doorway opposite the bus stop she, a typical child, had played in the snow.

  For reasons best known to themselves, MacDonald and McIntosh dismissed Inglis, and made no attempt to interview the bus driver; they also put aside the statement of the woman although she was clear that Moira had not only boarded the bus, but might have sat at the front near the driver to speak to him. She herself had walked much further up the middle aisle of the bus and had sat near a side door at the back, by which she later left. She said she could not be sure where the little girl got off, but had the impression that she was still there when she disembarked. Her statement was not fully investigated, although she was a policeman’s wife, from Irvine Crescent, near Moira’s granny.