Jeremiah's Bell

by Denzil Meyrick

  Daley thought for a few moments. ‘Nothing to do with keeping your pips, then?’

  It was Scott’s turn to think. ‘I’ll no’ lie tae you. Yes, that was mentioned. But I don’t gie a damn aboot rank. I know I’m lucky I’m still in the job, never mind an inspector. If you think that’s how I’m rolling wae this then you and me aren’t as close as I thought we were, Jimmy.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Brian. I knew they’d have eyes on me. I was just surprised that it was you who was looking. I suppose you are the obvious choice, though.’

  ‘And just as well, don’t you think? You know fine I’ll no’ write anything that will take you doon. Fuck, I’ll let you see the bloody reports before I send them. Better still, you can write the bloody things yourself !’

  ‘Ha! I don’t think I’d manage to replicate your prose style, Bri.’

  ‘That’s a dig at me, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Scott chuckled to himself.

  When they reached the bay where Rowan Tree Cottage was situated they could see the flicker of torches on the hillside. It was obvious that Thorbin Doig hadn’t been found.

  ‘Another night out in temperatures like this, well . . .’ Daley left the rest unsaid.

  Constable Murray met them at the cottage, where he stood guard at the front door. Whether it was the night air, or just the low temperature, the stench of rotting seaweed wasn’t so pronounced.

  ‘Anything to report, Murray?’ said Daley.

  ‘No sir, nothing at all. Not even a trace of the missing man. Aye, and it’s a cold one.’ Murray looked up into the growing darkness.

  ‘You get yourself into the support van and get warmed up. DI Scott and I are going to search the premises while the rest of the family are kicking their heels back at the office.’

  ‘Yes, sir, thank you,’ replied Murray, stomping off into the darkness, his breath rising like smoke from a campfire in the cold air.

  ‘Here.’ Scott handed Daley a pair of rubber gloves. ‘Just in case, like.’

  ‘Wow! Being a DI has certainly improved your adherence to protocols, Brian.’

  ‘No’ really. Sergeant Shaw gave them to me before we left the ranch.’

  Daley pushed open the door to the cottage, and was immediately hit by the musty smell inside. A shaft of moonlight shone through a gap in the filthy net curtains, sending a stripe of white light across the room, the only illumination on offer. Daley thought fleetingly of his wife flickering through a similar one during his recent panic attack. He was still angry with her, but couldn’t, he knew, take the moral high ground. His own affection for whisky had been a problem.

  Scott delved into his pockets and lit one of the big storm lanterns that hung above the mantelpiece. ‘There, we’ve got some light on the subject,’ he said.

  ‘There’s a few things I’m interested in, Brian,’ said Daley. ‘Obviously any pointers to where our missing man might be, but also papers belonging to Mr Doig. Remember Alice Wenger told us that he spent most of his days typing? Well, it stands to reason he must have been writing something. I’d be interested to find out what that is. It might cast some light on what this place is all about.’

  ‘No’ fit for human habitation, if you ask me.’ Scott curled his nose up at the smell and the general air of decay that enveloped the dwelling.

  ‘Well, we’d better get on with it, then’ said Daley.

  25

  Liz Daley was in her kitchen making Ella Scott a cup of tea. She’d decided to have one herself, though the temptation to have a glass of wine or something stronger was compelling. She’d been surprised how supportive Ella had been, so much so that she refused to let Liz go home by herself. With James junior in bed, the pair could have another chat.

  Liz brought the tea through on a tray, along with biscuits and some chocolates she’d found in the cupboard.

  ‘I’d offer you something stronger, Ella, but it wouldn’t really be appropriate under the circumstances, I think.’

  ‘Listen tae me. You’ve no’ got a drink problem, Lizzie. It’s what happened to you that’s causing all this. Bugger me, who wouldnae hit the bottle if they’d been through what you have?’

  ‘Jim doesn’t seem to think so.’

  ‘Does Jim know what it’s like tae be raped? No, he doesnae. I’ll no’ condemn him, mind you, for he’s had mair than his own share o’ troubles.’ Ella eyed Liz carefully for a response.

  ‘I know. His health, worrying about his job – other things that you know all about.’

  ‘Your affairs, you mean?’

  Liz hung her head. ‘Yes. Though it’s hard for me to hear, you’re right.’

  ‘I’m no’ here tae rip you tae bits. But I’ll be honest, I never liked the way you treated him. I’ll no’ lie. Jimmy doted on you, so he did.’

  ‘Did being the operative word.’

  ‘I don’t know how he feels now; oor Brian never says a word. Well, anything sensible, anyway. But you’re here, aren’t you? And look what he did to that – that bastard!’

  ‘I’m here because I came here. I’m the mother of his son. I left him with no choice. He’s not been in love with me for a long time. Not since . . . not since Mary Dunn.’

  Ella sighed and took a drink of tea. ‘Well, you can hardly gie him a hard time o’er that, eh?’

  ‘No, I realise that, Ella.’ Liz’s eyes flashed.

  ‘See, that’s mair like the spirit! You cannae lie doon tae this. I know it must eat away at you every day. But feeling sorry for yourself isn’t the answer. Aye, and the drink never helped anyone. I know all aboot that wae oor Brian.’

  ‘I know. It was just a crutch to get over the hard times. To be able to forget it all for a while was bliss. Just to get some sleep.’

  ‘As I said earlier, Lizzie, you need help – professional help. Nobody can be expected to deal with what you’ve had to. These days there are loads of organisations that can help. And when it comes down tae anxiety, well, the doctor can prescribe some pills in the short term – there’s no shame in that.’ Ella reached out and held Liz’s hand. ‘Remember, none o’ this is your fault. And getting help is the sensible thing. I’ve done it myself.’

  Liz looked confused for a moment. ‘You have?’

  Ella sat back in her chair. ‘Nothing like what happened to you, though it was bad enough.’

  ‘You mean you were attacked?’

  ‘As I say, nothing as bad as you experienced. But it stayed wae me for years – I still think about it fae time to time. Mind, Lizzie, I’ve never mentioned it tae a soul.’

  ‘Not even Brian?’

  Ella grimaced. ‘Especially no’ Brian! I know everyone thinks he’s just a loveable rogue. But see if anything happens tae his loved ones – well, I dread tae think what he would dae.’

  ‘Will you tell me?’

  ‘Och, it was years ago. We still stayed in the East End of Glasgow then. You’ll remember the flat.’

  ‘Yes, I do.’

  ‘Brian was on night shift. I’d run oot o’ fags. I didnae think twice aboot it. Even though the weans was just wee, they were both in their beds. The corner shop was open tae ten, so I’d nearly an hour, and it was only a few hundred yards away.’ Ella smiled ruefully. ‘You know me an’ the fags. Anyway, tae cut a long story short, on the way tae the shop there was this wee bit o’ waste ground, you know, where a tenement got blown up in the war; it’s a fancy restaurant now. But at this time it was full o’ bushes, auld bricks and the like. It happened in seconds. I felt someone grab the back o’ my coat.’

  Liz was wide-eyed. The thought of anyone attacking the formidable Ella Scott seemed almost unimaginable. ‘What did you do?’

  He pulled me ontae this piece o’ waste ground and punched me in the face. But something in me snapped. I remembered my faither saying tae me, “Just you kick the bastard in the balls, darling.” He was full o’ useful information like that – especially when he’d had a drink. So as you can imagine we got plenty advice, f
or he was never a day sober.’ She nodded her head, remembering everything. ‘Mind you, I thanked the old bugger that night, so I did.’

  ‘You managed to fight him off?’

  ‘Aye. Just as he was hauling at my jeans, I booted him right in the haw maws wae everything I had. Went doon like a ton o’ bricks, the shite.’

  ‘Well done you!’

  ‘I ran like I never ran before, Lizzie. I forgot all aboot the smokes and just fair pelted hame.’

  ‘And you’ve never told Brian this?’

  ‘No. But I should have done. I should have telt the polis. No man has the right, Lizzie, no man!’

  As tears started to flow down Liz’s cheeks, Ella Scott crossed the floor and held her tight.

  While Daley was carrying out a search of the living room, Scott was making his way through the rest of the cottage. The first door he opened was the bathroom. It was surprisingly clean, not what he’d expected at all. An old iron bath sat against one wall, with a cracked sink between it and a WC. One bar of carbolic soap was perched on the sink in a soggy pool; there were no fancy toiletries, deodorants, talcum powder, aftershave or perfumes. The Doigs clearly believed in the doctrine of soap and water alone.

  He opened an old tin bathroom cabinet above the sink. Five wooden toothbrushes of various colours sat in an old mug alongside a round tin of toothpowder. He remembered his old aunt using such a product, but hadn’t seen anything like it for years. The antiquated dental paraphernalia aside, some disposable razors and a silver cutthroat were arranged in a pocket on the door alongside a shaving brush, its bristles worn to a stub.

  All in all, the bathroom added to his feeling of stepping back in time. He checked under a bundle of towels sitting on a low white table, but it was clear there was nothing of interest to be found in the smallest room in the house.

  Across the hallway was another door. Scott crossed it and entered the room, his torch flashing around in order to make sense of the place as quickly as he could. An iron double bed backed solidly on to a wall of peeling, faded wallpaper. Across from it sat a small chest of drawers and a large built-in cupboard. Scott searched amongst the few coats and jackets, checking every pocket. All he found was a couple of coins and what looked like an old shopping list.

  Moving to the chest, Scott made his way through the top drawer of three. It was deep and contained four pairs of faded underpants, two tatty shirts, a couple of pairs of moleskin trousers, a thick blue jumper and some socks, three pairs all rolled up into balls. This was clearly the domain of the late Mr Doig. His wardrobe could hardy be described as extensive. But then, everything in this house seemed pared back to the essentials.

  In the next drawer were the meagre belongings of Mrs Doig. A similar collection of worn underwear, three neatly folded dresses of a design that had long since become unfashionable, stockings, a couple of headscarves and a knitted shawl. Scott felt as though he was searching through the nineteenth century. These feelings aside, there was nothing of interest to be found.

  The bottom drawer was different. It was a depository of odd bits and pieces: an old tobacco tin, a rusted spanner, a pack of playing cards, a rusting tube of glue, some pens, and a cardboard box half the size of a shoebox. Scott prised off the lid and delved inside, holding his torch under his chin to give him two free hands as he lifted out some old photos. One was of the Doigs taken many years ago, he reckoned. Though his only sight of Mr Doig had been when he was lying dead at the bottom of a cliff, he could still just about picture him in the younger man. Beside him, with a full head of long hair, a pretty frock but the habitual scowl, the figure of Ginny Doig, looking younger but as formidable as she had when she’d ejected him from this very cottage a few hours earlier, was unmistakable. ‘Smile a while, eh?’ muttered Scott to himself.

  The next photograph was of four children: three boys and a girl. Scott stared at the thin little figure standing beside one of her larger brothers. Unlike her mother, Scott could see only a fleeting resemblance to Alice Wenger in the face of the child that must be Alison Doig. Her hair was lank and her dress was too big, hanging off her spare frame like the cast-off of an older child.

  The three boys looked bright-eyed as they smiled into the camera. They were clearly of descending age, and Scott reckoned the largest of the three was definitely Thorbin Doig, now missing. As he stared at the photograph in the torchlight, he was struck by how alive, how vibrant they seemed compared with the bloated, blank-faced men he’d met at Rowan Tree Cottage. If anything, Alison looked the most downtrodden, with a sullen, almost vacant expression. How things had changed.

  He looked through some other faded colour images of the children, all in much the same style, on the beach, in a small boat, or sitting round the table that still dominated the room Daley was searching. In each one, it was clear that Alison Doig was not a happy child, while her brothers appeared carefree, animated and content.

  The last photograph was older – much older. It was set in a small silver frame. A rough-looking man, possibly in his late thirties, stood beside two small boys, one perhaps early to mid teens, the other younger. They were standing on a hillside beside a pile of driftwood, set together like the makings of a camp fire. Scott reckoned that judging by the style of their clothes the picture must have been taken some time before the Second World War, but it was hard to tell. In the man’s face he could see an echo of the Doig son who’d unceremoniously pitched him out of the front door and on to the filthy yard earlier. Grandfather, great-grandfather? He wasn’t sure. But he was certain that these were relatives of the present-day Doig family.

  There were only two more items in the cardboard box: a business card and what looked like the broken hilt of a knife. Scott donned his reading glasses and peered at the card in the torchlight. Williams, Strong & Hardacre, it read, Solicitors and Notaries. Though the card was old, he vaguely recognised the name of the firm, which was located in Edinburgh, and was sure that they were still in business. As a police officer, he had found that the names of legal firms tended to become fixed in the mind – even of the Edinburgh variety. He took out his notebook, and leaning on the top of the chest of drawers made a note of the firm’s name and address. He then placed the business card back in the box and pulled out the knife hilt. He jumped in surprise when he pressed a small metal button near a silver band on the wooden handle and a vicious-looking blade shot from within. It gleamed in the light of the torch and had evidently been well looked after; the stiletto knife’s operation was slick and well oiled.

  ‘You could take someone’s eye oot wae that,’ said Scott to nobody. This place was beginning to give him the creeps. Knowing Daley wanted to leave the house looking as undisturbed as possible, he took pictures of the knife and the photographs on his phone, retracted the blade, and made sure the contents of the box were placed back in much the same order as they’d been in when he’d found them.

  He checked under the base of a candleholder on the chest of drawers, then another on a nightstand, without finding anything. He was about to leave when he realised that he’d not checked under the bed. Warily, wincing at the pain in his arm from the graze inflicted when he’d landed in the yard, he knelt down and directed the beam of the torch into the dark recess.

  ‘Fuck!’ he roared as the light flickered over the shape of a body.

  Having heard the oath from the next room, Daley rushed in. ‘What’s wrong, Brian?’

  ‘Take a look,’ he said, looking ashen-faced in the light of Daley’s torch.

  The big detective sat on his haunches and looked under the bed. Sure enough, he could make out a head and a rough torso. ‘Here, give me a hand to get this out, will you?’

  ‘You’re keen, big man. If it’s a body, should we no’ just leave it where it is for SOCO?’

  ‘Have a feel, Bri.’ Daley tugged at the object under the bed, revealing the featureless head of a dressmaker’s dummy. When they managed to haul it out fully, it was clear that the dummy had a metal stand in place of legs a
nd a rough imitation of the human form made from stuffed cloth, designed to be used as a template for making or altering clothes.

  ‘That’s a relief,’ said Scott. ‘I thought that was your man lying deid under there, Jimmy.’

  ‘Mrs Doig’s clearly as good with her hands as she is with her fists, eh?’

  ‘Aye, sure enough.’

  ‘Wait!’ said Daley, this time in a loud whisper.

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘Can’t you hear that?’ Daley’s voice was even lower now.

  Above their heads, floorboards were creaking.

  26

  Vito Chiase was as stiff as a board as he walked down along the concourse of Glasgow Airport. He’d been through security, a process he always hated. Having no respect for authority, he found the blank-faced staff at airports particularly annoying. He wondered if it was the same in Scotland as it was back in New Jersey. For sure, there were plenty airport officials on the take at Newark. In days gone by he’d had half of them in his pocket.

  Having only on-board luggage he was spared the wait at the carousel, so hobbled straight out into the growing dusk of a Scottish evening for the first time in his life. His flight had been delayed for two hours due to ‘technical issues’, and when he’d eventually changed planes at London Heathrow, the stopover had also been longer than he’d expected.

  But, as he’d been instructed, he managed to text his difficulties to the number he’d been given to inform those awaiting his arrival of the delay. Sure enough, within seconds, he’d received the reassuring if brief reply, No problem. Chill. Why did people talk that way now?

  He shaded his eyes from the flickering sodium lights and looked around. A thin man in a shell suit was standing with the name Mr Chasey written on an old piece of white card. Shrugging his shoulders, he made for the man.