by James Hume
Orr opened his notebook. ‘We got a call from the Chief Engineer of Dalmarnock Power Station at 08.12 last Saturday. His team had found a body at their inlet screens. They pump in river water for their cooling systems through screens and filters to remove river debris. They clear them twice a day. They say they find two or three bodies a year on their screens.
‘We went out with a forensic team and examined the body. He had a severe bruise on the right temple, but died from drowning. The power station is adjacent to Dalmarnock Bridge. On the underside of the bridge, across the road from the power station, the team found blood and skin where Thomson had banged his head. His glasses lay on the ground at that point. The PM report indicated severe intoxication.
‘We interviewed his parents, employer, next-door neighbour, and the barmaid and two customers of the Boundary Bar, on the next corner down Dalmarnock Road, where Thomson spent Friday night. In fact, he drank there almost every night. They all said much the same thing. He used to be a cheerful bloke – the life and soul of the party, but got depressed when the RAF turned him down at the start of the war because of poor eyesight. And when his wife left him a couple of years ago to work down south, he got even more depressed. We don’t know where the wife went, but the barmaid knew Thomson quite well, told us where his parents live in Cambuslang, and his father identified the body.
‘We concluded Thomson left the pub on Friday night, severely depressed and drunk, staggered past his close entry, and clambered down the bank of the river to commit suicide. We believe he banged his head on the side of the bridge, and rolled down part of the bank, fell in the river and got caught by the strong flow into the inlet screens. We’ve recorded it as an accidental death while intoxicated. We regard the case as closed, subject to inquest.’
Sandra nodded. ‘Thank you, DC Orr. Now, can I see the case file, please?’
‘Of course.’ He pushed the file across the table to her.
She scanned through the documents, and passed them to Tom. The post-mortem report showed a high level of intoxication. The witness statements backed up Orr’s summary.
‘Right, let’s go and have a look. Do you want to ride with us?’ she asked Orr.
***
The car dropped them in Birkwood Street outside the Boundary Bar. Sandra looked around. ‘Let’s walk up to the bridge and have a look. Then we can come back here.’
Thirty yards along Dalmarnock Road, they came to the close entry at number 811.
‘Thomson lived here, ma’am. One floor up.’
Sandra nodded, but kept quiet about her previous visit to Thomson’s flat, when she accompanied his wife Jane. She remembered Thomson; not a pretty sight.
They walked another thirty yards to the bridge, and Orr pointed out where Thomson had hit his head as he clambered down the bank at the side.
‘Do we have to scramble down there too?’ she asked.
‘No, ma’am,’ Orr replied. ‘Let’s cross the road. There’s a wide set of steps down to the pathway – they’re part of the power station complex.’
‘So, why didn’t Thomson use these steps?’ she asked.
‘We asked ourselves the same question, ma’am. We think he wanted to stay on that side of the road so neighbours couldn’t see him, whereas they could easily see these steps.’
She glanced back and nodded. They had a look under the bridge and then walked back along the path beside the power station until it became a metal walkway and they could see the inlet screens below them – a series of vertical metal bars about a couple of inches apart. The water fast flowed through them into the power station. At this time of day, bits of wood and bracken already blocked the bars.
‘That’s where we found the body, ma’am.’
She looked down at the water flow, with the hum of the pumps in the background. ‘Hell of a place to die, huh?’ The others nodded.
They made their way back to the steps, crossed the road, and entered the close entry at number 811. Orr rang the bell at the house next door to Thomson’s.
The door opened and Orr put on a big smile. ‘Hello, Mrs McGregor. It’s DC Orr again, and my colleagues, Superintendent Maxwell and Inspector Hamilton.’ They all showed their warrant cards. ‘May we come in for a moment, please?’
She opened the door wider. ‘Aye, come in.’
Sandra entered the flat – a living room / kitchen, a bedroom, and a small bathroom between the two. Mrs McGregor, a small, grey-haired lady wearing a flowered pinny, led them into the living room.
Orr opened up. ‘Mrs McGregor, the Superintendent would like to ask you a few questions about Mr Thomson. Okay?’
Mrs McGregor shrugged. ‘Aye, it’s okay, but I told you all I know at the weekend, son.’ She turned to Sandra. ‘I did some shopping for Tommy, but he never got over being rejected by the RAF. And then his wife left him.’
‘Do you know where she went?’ Sandra asked.
Mrs McGregor shook her head. ‘No. She’d some important job down south. Don’t know where. I don’t think he knew either, or maybe he just didn’t care.’
‘Did he ever have any visitors?’
‘No. Well, apart from his mates from the pub. They’d sometimes come back with him and play cards and have a few beers, but I never saw him with anyone else.’
‘Did you ever see anyone at his door?’
‘Ach, there’s always people at the door – selling insurance or other rubbish.’ She stopped. ‘But, now you mention it, there was a man at his door last week. I thought someone had knocked at my door, and opened it, but he’d knocked at Tommy’s door. He asked about Tommy. I told him he worked overtime till eight, then would probably go to the pub. “The one on the corner?” he asked, and I said yes. He was a friend of a friend of Tommy’s, and in Glasgow for a few days. He’d promised to pass on his friend’s regards.’
Sandra’s heart leaped, but she kept her face straight. ‘Could you describe this man?’
Mrs McGregor thought for a moment. ‘About the same height as him,’ she indicated DC Orr, ‘but broader. Pleasant face, nice smile, but he spoke funny – like a foreigner. And he didn’t know what Tommy looked like. I had to describe Tommy so he’d know him in the pub, because, as a pal of a pal, he’d never met Tommy.’
‘Can you remember when that was, Mrs McGregor?’
She shook her head. ‘Wednesday or Thursday last week. Maybe Wednesday, round about half seven, I think.’
‘Good. Now, I’d like to show you some photos. Could you have a look at them and let me know if one of them is the man you spoke to last week?’
Sandra went into her bag and pulled out the photos from Lincoln. She passed over the one with the dark-haired man.
Mrs McGregor studied the picture, then shook her head. ‘No, it’s not him.’
Sandra passed over the other picture. Mrs McGregor glanced at it and said, ‘That’s him. He’s definitely the man at Tommy’s door last week. Who is he?’
Sandra glanced over at Tom and smiled. DC Orr’s jaw had dropped. ‘I’m afraid I can’t say, but thanks for your help, Mrs McGregor. We really appreciate your time.’ She handed over a card. ’Just call me if you remember anything else.’
Mrs McGreagor smiled and looked pleased. ‘Oh, you’re welcome. Glad I could help.’
Sandra put the photos in her bag, and stood up. As they left, Sandra asked Orr if he had the keys to Thomson’s flat.
‘Yes, ma’am, got them here.’
She turned to Mrs McGregor. ‘We’ll just have a look at Tommy’s flat for a few minutes, Mrs McGregor.’
‘Oh, okay,’ she replied, and closed her door.
They went into the hallway, a double bedroom to the left, then a long bathroom, then at the end on the left, the kitchen / living room, which had a bed recess in it. The hallway then led to the right into a large front room with an oriole window, at more or less the same height as the top deck of passing trams. Sandra looked across to the power station and the bridge over to the left. A bed recess in thi
s room had a couple of teddy bears on the bed.
She turned to the others. ‘I want to go to the car and make a phone call. Could you look around the flat and see what booze Thomson had here? He got tanked up on Friday night, and I want to know if he came back here after he left the pub.’
‘Right, ma’am. Will do,’ said Tom.
Sandra left the flat, went back to the car and picked up the radio phone. She got connected in a few seconds.
‘Doctor Paterson.’
‘Colin, it’s Sandra Maxwell here.’
‘Hi Sandra. What can I do for you?’
‘You know the PM report on the body fished out of the river on Saturday?’
‘You mean Thomson?’
‘Right. He’d a very high alcohol level. Could it get that high on beer or would he have had spirits as well?’
‘Oh, beer’s as weak as water these days, Sandra. He’d have drunk spirits.’
‘How much, roughly?’
‘I’d say he drank about half a bottle of whisky before he drowned.’
‘Thanks, Colin. Appreciate your help as always.’
She went back to Thomson’s flat and found Tom and DC Orr in the kitchen.
‘What did you find?’ she asked.
‘Just a few bottles of beer in the cupboard, ma’am, and a couple of empties in the bin.’
‘Right. Well, I’ve just spoken to the pathologist. He reckons Thomson drank a half bottle of whisky before he drowned. Hence the high alcohol reading. So, if there’s no whisky here, then either he bought it himself or someone gave it to him. Let’s get down to the pub and see what we find there.’
Orr shook his head. ‘Jesus, I’m sorry we missed all this, ma’am.’
‘Oh, don’t beat yourself up, DC Orr. You started with a body and worked your way back. We’ve started from a different point you couldn’t know about.’
They walked into the saloon of the Boundary Bar. It was very quiet, with only a couple of men sat in the far corner. It sounded busier in the adjacent public bar. The barmaid looked up as they approached. A busty, blowsy woman in her late twenties, with big hair, big eyes, big mouth and a big smile. Typical barmaid, thought Sandra – attractive enough to lure the punters and hard enough to deal with them. DC Orr did the introductions again, and the barmaid, Peggy McLeod, indicated a quiet part of the saloon where they could sit.
Sandra opened up. ‘I just wanted to ask you a few questions about Tommy Thomson.’
Peggy nodded and looked down at her hands in her lap. Was there a hint of a tear in her eye? Sandra wondered.
‘How well did you know him?’ Sandra asked. Good barmaids often knew lots of private stuff about their regulars.
Peggy looked down at her lap again for a few moments. Then looked up at Sandra. ‘Well, we were in the same class at primary school in Cambuslang, so I’ve known him twenty-odd years.’ She went quiet for a moment ‘And okay, we had a bit of a fling. Has somebody blabbed? Is that why you’re back?’
‘Well, it’s not, actually. But now you’ve mentioned it, could you tell us about it? How long did it last?’ Both Tom and DC Orr wrote in their notebooks.
Peggy sighed. ‘Oh, maybe two and a half years ago now? His wife had left him to work down south. He was already depressed because he couldn’t get into the RAF, and his kids lived with his parents in Cambuslang. I don’t think he got on too well with them either. So, he just sank lower. I tried to sympathise and one thing led to another. Moved in with him for a while, but it didn’t work, and I moved out after a couple of weeks.’
‘What went wrong?’
She sighed again. ‘Tommy was bright and cheerful, always up for a laugh, sometimes even the life and soul of the party here in the pub. But at home, he became cynical and sarcastic, and difficult to live with. I’d already had my fair share of that type of man, so I bailed out. And the sex wasn’t great either. It just didn’t work, sadly.’
It had always surprised Sandra how some working-class women in Glasgow talked openly about sex, and often described practices she herself found unimaginable. Her own limited experience of sex with the love of her life, before he’d been killed ten years ago, had been gentle and tender and loving, and she initially assumed it was like that for everyone. But clearly not. At least this woman spared them the details.
‘So, how did you moving out affect him?’
Peggy thought for a moment. ‘It didn’t help, obviously. But sometimes you take daft decisions on the spur of the moment and then pay the price. What do they say – marry in haste, repent at leisure? It was kind of like that. I regret it now.’
‘Well, thanks for being so open. Do you know what happened to his wife?’
‘She came back to Glasgow after the war, but she never got back with Tommy again. I think she lived with her parents in the West End somewhere. But she’s just taken the kids and gone off abroad this time. She’d to let him know her address and phone number, but she hasn’t. And he got depressed again.’
‘So, he didn’t know where she went, then?’
‘Oh, he knows the town. He told me, but I can’t remember. Something burg, I think.’
‘Did he say what she went there for?’
She shook her head.’No. I don’t know.’
‘Okay. Can I turn to last Friday night? I understand Tommy came in here most nights and was a heavy drinker. Is that right’
‘Yeah, he did come in most nights. We’d cook up a simple meal for him when he arrived. Jeanie’s a wiz with powdered egg. But he wasn’t really a heavy drinker. Maybe a couple of pints midweek and a bit more on a Friday and Saturday.’
‘Did he ever take spirits?’
She shook her head. ‘I’ve never known Tommy to have spirits – not even at New Year. Whisky’s too expensive for this area.’
‘So, what about Friday, then? Was he more depressed than usual?’
She thought for a moment and frowned. ‘No, I don’t think so. He’d a new audience last week. If anything, he seemed perkier than usual.’
‘What do you mean – a new audience?’
‘Well, the regulars here get a bit fed up with Tommy’s recycled jokes and funny stories – they regard him as a bit of a bore. But there was a stranger in here last week. He gave Tommy a new audience for his jokes. That’s what I mean.’
‘When did this stranger come in? And could you tell me about him?’
She paused and thought. ‘He came in last Wednesday – a week ago tonight – maybe a bit later than this? Sat at the bar and chatted. Really nice lad. A bit of a charmer, to be honest. Mid-twenties, maybe? An engineer from Amsterdam. He spoke good English, though. He worked with boiler controls, and was here for a few days at the power station.’
‘Do you know his name?’
‘Yeah, it’s a funny name. I’ll write it for you.’
Tom turned over a page in his notebook, and passed it to her. She wrote on it and passed it to Sandra. She’d written, ‘Pieter van der Huizen’.
Sandra looked up at her. ‘How did you get this?’
‘Because when he told me his name, I thought he said “housing” and I said, “That’s a great name. Can you get me a house?” I mean, me and my boy still live with my mother in a room and kitchen. It’s not easy. So he wrote his name down for me.’
‘What did he write it on?’
‘On a newspaper. It was lying on the bar.’
‘Do you still have it here?’
‘No, it went out with the rubbish. It’s long gone.’
‘And did Tommy meet Pieter that night?’
‘Yeah. Tommy came in about his usual time – around quarter past eight – saw me talking to Pieter, and kind of butted in. I think Tommy feels – well, felt – something still between us. Anyway, I introduced them and they started to chat, so I left them to it.’
‘What did Pieter drink?’
‘Half pints of beer.’
‘Do you know where he stayed?’
‘He said a small hotel near Queen�
��s Park. I mean, there’s no hotels east of Glasgow Cross, so he’d have to stay somewhere else.’
‘Did Pieter stay till closing time?’
‘No. He left about nine. Said he’d some work to do, but he’d see us the next night.’
‘And did he come back on the Thursday night?’
She nodded. ‘Yeah, it was like a re-run of the Wednesday night.’
‘Did he ever ask about Tommy’s wife at all? Ask where she is?’
She frowned. ‘Tommy’s wife?’ She shook her head. ‘No. Well, it might have come up at one point. But as I said, I don’t know where she is.’
‘Okay, so about Friday night? What happened then?’
‘They met up again, this time with Billy and Jackie, two of Tommy’s mates. The four of them sat in the corner over there and played dominoes, with lots of shouts and laughter. I threw them all out at ten with the rest of the punters.’
‘Apart from Pieter, were they regular mates of Tommy?’
‘Yeah. Usually four of them met every Friday. Haven’t seen the other one, Davy Wilson, for a while, though. Got injured at work. Tommy looked after Davy quite a bit.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘Well, Davy had problems with life in general. He didn’t really read or write, and so Tommy tried to help him as much as possible. Treated him more like a brother.’
‘I see. So, back to Friday night. Pieter stayed till closing time?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Did you see where they went afterwards?’
‘Well, as I closed the doors at ten past ten, I heard singing outside. Now, that’s a no-no in Glasgow pubs, so I went out and found it was Tommy and Pieter. You know the song, My Lily of the Lamplight? Well, Birkwood Street still has gas lamps, and that must have inspired them. I told them to shut up and bugger off. Pieter said something like “Right. I’ve got to go and pack. Got a train in the morning,” He waved to everybody and walked across to the tram stop to go into the city.’
‘Did you see him get on a tram?’
‘No, I came inside to help clear up.’
‘And Tommy? Where did he go?’
She looked across at DC Orr. ‘As far as I know, Billy and Jackie said they saw Tommy walk up Dalmarnock Road towards his close.’
