A Taste of Ashes (DI Bob Valentine Book 2)

by Tony Black

  ‘Aye, well, I was going to say he’s …’ The old man cut himself off, started to rise from the chair. ‘Hear, you’ll want to grab your tea. Clare has something in the fridge on a plate, do you want me to heat it in the microwave?’

  Valentine waved his father back down, impatience building, said, ‘Just be at peace would you? I’ll grab a bit of cheese on toast.’

  ‘Give you nightmares, at this time of night.’

  ‘Can they be worse than the ones I have during the day? Look, who’s this in the picture, Dad, are you going to tell me?’

  ‘It’s Bert.’ His father blurted out the name like it should have some meaning.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Och, you’ll not know him. It’s Bert McCrindle, no doubt about it, he was your mother’s cousin.’

  ‘He looks before my time right enough.’ Valentine removed the picture from the arm of the chair. ‘A military man?’

  ‘Not really, that’s him on his National Service. He was in the war right enough, out in the deserts of Africa, never talked about it, don’t think it was an experience we’d understand.’

  ‘Well you wouldn’t talk about it, especially if it was traumatic.’

  His father nodded once and then turned away, seemingly mulling the thought over. His heavily lined face started to droop, lose some creases. ‘He was a prisoner of war, y’know. I didn’t know that until your mother told me, it made sense of a lot for me, he was always a funny bloke. I remember one Christmas being at his place dropping off coal, he was in the back garden and we saw this wee rat, just one and nothing special, not like a pit rat, but it rattled him. I’d never seen a man turn so white, the life drained away from him.’

  ‘So he didn’t like rats, I’m not a fan myself.’

  ‘It wasn’t that, son. Your mother told me, when he was a prisoner, they dug giant pits and caged them in, in the ground like, the rats used to run along the top on the wires … it never left him. He was bothered something terrible with his nerves afterwards, always was the whole time I knew him.’

  ‘In some ways, I’m sure, it was as bad as shell shock. There’s a lot goes on in war that we can’t imagine, I’m sure.’

  His father was shaking his head. ‘No, it’s not that. Something else. There was some kind of incident that he endured, I don’t know what it was I can only imagine. Your mother spoke about it once and then she regretted it, saw it as a betrayal to Bert, and I never pressed her on it because it wasn’t something I had any right to know.’

  ‘But we can surmise from Mam’s reaction that it damaged him in some way.’

  ‘That we can.’ He turned to face his son, widening his gaze. ‘But the picture, why have you got a pencil drawing of Bert on the fridge? That’s what I want to know.’

  Valentine exhaled slowly, a rational response was impossible to find. ‘You wouldn’t believe me.’

  ‘Try me.’

  ‘OK. Let me rephrase that, you wouldn’t want to know.’

  ‘I’ve already said I want to know, now will you stop beating about the bush and tell me.’

  ‘Well, don’t say I didn’t warn you.’ Valentine loosened the knot on his tie, pulled it through the collar and started to roll it around his fist. ‘A colleague of mine had worked with what you might call a medium, someone who helps police with their enquiries by, I don’t know what you’d call it, supernatural means.’

  His father stared intently. ‘Yes, yes. I quite understand.’

  ‘And, well, long story short is that this medium, a chappie called Hugh, drew the picture.’ He looked at his father again, wanted to make sure he hadn’t changed his opinion after finding out more. ‘It’s what he does – when he sees spirits he draws them and passes on their pictures to the people he believes they’re trying to communicate with.’

  ‘In the name of God.’ His father’s eyes sunk back in his head, he turned away. ‘I cannot think for the life of me why old Bert would have been trying to communicate with you, Bob. I mean, the mind just boggles.’

  Valentine finished rolling up his tie, rose, and walked for the kitchen door. ‘You’re not alone in that assessment, Dad. But I’m routinely stunned if anything that happens to me makes any sense.’

  ‘Are you off to get that bite?’

  ‘I am.’

  ‘Well, sorry to add to your woes, but I finished the cheese.’

  29

  As the young man turned the corner he stopped still, stood facing DI Bob Valentine. For a moment the detective stared, who was he? There was a hint of recognition but nothing he could be sure of. As he took two more steps, drew nearer, the man spoke. ‘Bob, we’ve never met but I feel I know you.’

  ‘I don’t think so.’ He sidestepped, moved around the man.

  ‘No, don’t go.’

  A hand grabbed Valentine’s arm, his coat sleeve was tugged. ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘You can’t go.’ The man tightened his grip.

  ‘You realise I’m a police officer.’

  This seemed to provoke hilarity in the man, ‘Of course. There would be no point in my stopping you in the street otherwise. I have important information about the death of the fusilier … James Tulloch.’

  Valentine brushed away the man’s hand. ‘I never released that information.’

  ‘I never said you did. Look, I know lots of things that aren’t public knowledge, can we talk, Bob?’

  Valentine didn’t like the familiarity of first names, he was toying with the idea of arresting the man, taking him to King Street and picking over the information he seemed so free with. He looked around, it was Alloway Street, outside the Arnotts department store, the name had changed but the store would always be Arnotts to anyone with history in Ayr. The town was quiet, beyond quiet – they were the only ones around. He asked himself what time of the day it was and found he couldn’t reply.

  ‘Do I know you, son?’

  A laugh. He opened his hand and led him into the store. They took the elevator to the cafe, they were the only people there. The absence of anyone else unsettled Valentine but he found himself going along with it, not through curiosity, but because he was powerless to do anything else.

  ‘You look a bit confused, Bob.’

  ‘Where is everyone?’

  ‘Not here.’ The man sat down, removed his overcoat and hung it on the chair. ‘And before you ask, here’s not where you think it is.’

  He recognised the man now, the uniform he wore underneath his coat. ‘You’re Bert, the one my dad was talking about.’ His vision blurred, his head ached. ‘The hell’s going on here?’

  ‘Don’t ask me questions, Bob. Just listen.’

  ‘This is insane. Something’s not right …’

  Bert followed the detective’s line of vision, brushed the buttons on his chest. ‘You’re looking for a soldier.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘And you’re looking for a lad that’s missing, but he’s already dead.’

  Valentine’s hands started to sweat, he put them under the table. ‘How do you know this?’

  ‘I just do. And you need to trust me because you’ve no one else. Now listen, find the soldier, he knows what this is about. If you don’t find him there’ll only be more blood.’

  He shook his head. ‘Have you any idea how hard this is for me to believe? I saw a picture of you but you’ve never existed for me.’

  ‘Am I not real enough, Bob?’

  ‘Jesus Christ, you’re asking me that? I don’t know if I’m real enough.’

  ‘I think you know what I’m telling you is real. Find the soldier, he needs help, I know what he’s been through and he can’t handle it on his own.’

  Bert stood up, collected his coat and draped it over his arm. ‘I’m off now, I don’t think there’s much chance of a waitress in here.’

  ‘And where’s here? It’s not bloody well Arnotts.’

  ‘No, it’s more of a halfway house.’ He looked around him. ‘Go on then, don’t waste what I’ve given you
.’

  ‘Wait. You said there was a missing boy, we don’t have a missing boy on this case.’

  ‘But you will. Goodbye, Bob.’ The voice changed as the detective’s name was uttered.

  ‘No. Wait …’

  ‘Bob,’ someone else was calling him. ‘Be quiet. You’ll wake the girls.’ It was Clare. She sat over him in bed, reached for the light. ‘You’re sweating, you were shouting in your sleep.’

  Valentine raised himself on the bed, his heart pounding. ‘I’m sorry.’

  Clare’s cold hand touched his shoulder. ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘No, I’m losing the plot …’

  ‘What?’

  He got out of bed and stumbled to the bathroom, the bright lights stung his eyes. He leaned over the sink clutching his chest and started to splash water on his face and neck.

  ‘Bob, what’s going on?’ She followed him into the bathroom. ‘You’re as white as a maggot, you look like …’

  ‘Like I’ve seen a ghost.’

  ‘I was going to say like you’re having a heart attack.’

  ‘That sounds preferable.’ He tried to fill a glass of water but his hands were trembling too much.

  Clare took the glass, filled it and held the water to his mouth. ‘You need to calm yourself.’

  ‘Easier said than done.’

  ‘Come back to bed, try to get some sleep. I’m sure things will look better in the morning.’

  ‘Sleep, are you kidding me?’ He pushed away the glass and staggered back to the bedroom, sat on the edge of the bed. The flesh on his arms was pimpling, he slapped his palms together.

  Clare followed him through. ‘Should I call a doctor?’

  ‘Maybe. Is there a psychiatrist on call at this time?’

  ‘I don’t follow …’

  ‘It all seemed so real.’

  ‘What did?’

  ‘I was there, I mean like the last time … with the Janie Cooper case.’

  ‘That was the little girl that went missing, wasn’t it?’

  ‘Everywhere, I saw her everywhere. Christ above, if this is a rerun of that, I don’t think I can stand it, Clare.’

  ‘The dreams again? The visions, that’s what this is about?’

  Valentine rose and started to pace the room. He needed to talk, to tell someone what he’d been going through. He relayed the story about the man in the hospital room when Agnes Gilchrist died and the visit to Hugh Crosbie.

  ‘Who’s Sylvia?’ said Clare.

  ‘My DS … Why do you ask that?’

  ‘And why is she taking a special interest in your problems?’

  ‘Are you seriously making a thing of this?’

  ‘I’m just asking, because I would have thought your first port of call might have been your wife.’

  Valentine raised his hands. ‘I’ve just told you everything.’

  ‘But you told her first.’

  ‘Yes. She has experience, she’s worked with precognitives before. It was Sylvia who put me in touch with Crosbie.’

  Clare moved from the bed to the other side of the room and started to remove her dressing gown. As she turned back towards Valentine she stared briefly then slit her eyes towards the bedside lamp. She didn’t return her gaze as she got into bed and switched out the light.

  30

  Jade stood in the darkness beyond the hospital car park, just far enough into the copse of trees to be able to see lights burning in the building. The rain had stopped but some drops clinging to the leaves above her managed to dislodge themselves and fall on her. She looked up, towards the pale moon, and the cold night’s wind touched her face.

  She tried not to think about Niall, about the way she had left the flat, but his voice seemed to be following her. He would be OK, he would get over her running off like that, and anyway, it wasn’t his battle to fight. She’d decided that the moment Niall went for Darry with the bat. Her brother had so effortlessly disarmed him, pushed him to the ground, that it was obvious to her Niall was out of his depth. He was a nice boy, a good friend to have and she had needed him once but not now.

  Jade didn’t need to use Niall as cover anymore, she had passed the point where it mattered if her mother or brother found out the truth.

  ‘Jade … Jade, where are you?’ It was Darry.

  ‘Over here.’ She rushed to the fence at the edge of the car park, the grass was long and wet and slowed her movement.

  ‘God, you’re soaking wet, girl.’

  ‘It’s been raining.’ She pushed back her wet fringe. ‘Did you see Mum?’

  ‘Of course I did.’ Darry leant a hand over the fence and helped his sister to climb up. She stumbled at the top wire and he lifted her down. He looked into the field behind her. ‘Where’s Niall?’

  ‘He’s not coming.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘It’s nothing to do with him, Darry.’

  ‘But he was supposed to be helping you.’

  She raised her eyebrows to the sky. ‘He’s just a boy, he can barely look after himself.’

  ‘Jade, is everything OK? You don’t look well.’ He placed a hand on her arm; Jade knocked it away.

  ‘I’m fine. Just wet that’s all.’

  ‘Have you been sick again?’

  ‘No, I’m fine I just told you.’ She started to step away from her brother, ‘Are you coming or are we staying out in the cold and wet all night?’

  Darry ran after her. ‘Wait. We can’t go in there.’

  ‘I thought you said I could go and see her, once you came back.’

  ‘Not now. There’s police in there now.’

  ‘Police? … Why are the police in there?’

  Darry tried to steer his sister away from the conspicuously lit hospital. ‘Come on, we’ll get a taxi out of here.’

  ‘No. I want to see Mum.’ She yanked her arm away and started back towards the hospital.

  ‘Jade, that’s not going to be possible. That copper was fuming, in a minute or two the place is going to be crawling with police. Now come on, we need to get going or we’ll be locked up.’

  ‘We haven’t done anything.’ She struggled with her brother, a woman in a blue Corsa rolled down her window and stared over.

  ‘Jade, you’re making a scene. Calm down.’

  ‘I want to see Mum, you’re hurting my arm.’

  ‘Jade, I mean it. We need to get out of here.’

  Her voice rose, ‘Why? What have we done? Why are the police with Mum?’

  ‘Jade, I’m supposed to be in barracks. They’ll break my bloody legs for this.’

  Darry’s mention of the army stopped his sister’s struggling. He’d risked a lot for her and he saw that she understood that. ‘They think she did it, don’t they? The police think Mum killed him.’

  Norrie Leask leaned onto the dashboard and pointed to the turn-off, ‘Here, Joe, take this one.’

  ‘You sure now?’

  ‘They all look the bloody same to me, especially in the dark.’

  ‘Cumnock countryside’s a black hole in the daylight as well.’

  ‘Those miners must have wanted to stay underground, bloody shite-hole.’ The car shuddered on the uneven track, slowed by a shallow trench and scattered gravel. ‘Aye, this is the spot. That’s the milestone for the old road pithead, there.’

  ‘You sure no one ever comes out this way?’

  Leask put another hand on the dash, steadied himself as the track got bumpier. ‘Are you kidding me? Why would anyone come out here? It’s an abandoned pit. Fraught with danger these places, we could be taking our lives in our hands just driving up here.’

  Joe fired him a glower. ‘Now you tell me.’

  ‘Look, it’s like this, if you want to keep him in the boot, stinking out your car and marking a big pointy finger to plod then be my guest. Me, I’d sooner not do time for this wee arsewipe.’

  The car halted abruptly. Joe yanked on the handbrake and flicked his cigarette through the open window. ‘Right, that’
s it. We can see the pithead from here. We’ll carry him.’

  ‘We? Who pays your bloody wages?’

  Joe released the lock and pushed open the door. ‘I don’t remember that bit in my contract about disposing of dead bodies in the night, remind me about that, time-and-a-half is it?’

  ‘Aye, that’ll be right.’ Leask exited on his side of the car. ‘I want a pint out of you for this, mind.’

  The pair walked around to the rear of the vehicle, their shoes sunk into the wet earth. Neither carried a flashlight, the only illumination came from the car’s headlights. As he opened the boot Joe stared into the deep space, located the white-skinned features of Niall. The body was an inconvenience, it might once have been alive – a human being – but the connection had been lost. ‘Just looks like he’s sleeping, there.’

  ‘He does as well.’ Leask, turned his head to the side, squinted. ‘Doesn’t look too bothered about it all.’

  ‘He was bothered when I had the pliers on his fingernails.’

  ‘That’s what I mean, the boot of a car’s an improvement on his last few hours. Christ, are we going sentimental here? Let’s get the wee shite in the ground. He’s served his purpose.’

  The two men reached in, grabbed arms and legs and lifted Niall’s body from the car, in one clean heave.

  ‘There’s nothing to him,’ said Joe.

  ‘Well his mammy’s meat pies will not save him now.’ He nodded towards the pit-face. ‘This way.’

  They walked a few yards, the wet ground sinking beneath them. Joe’s foot became trapped in a mud-hole, his knee headed skyward as he yanked his foot out. ‘I’m just waiting for this ground to open up and swallow us. Can we not just dump him?’

  ‘No. He’s going down the shaft. Are you stupid?’

  ‘But if nobody ever comes here, who’s going to see him?’ Joe lost his footing again on the uneven surface. ‘Look, that’s nearly another shoe away. They’re Timberland you know, hundred pounds a pair.’

  A little rain started to smatter their faces. ‘Oh, that’s all we need. I’m away back to the car.’ Leask dropped his end of the load.

  ‘Hey … no way.’