No one knew how many people went missing in Scotland or the UK every year. The best guess was far too many. Some went missing but were never reported, others were reported out but never back in again. The ones old enough to be thought capable of looking after themselves, they could bugger off and go where they liked. More difficult these days of course when every transaction leaves a digital trail but still quite possible to do.
She had interviewed too many distraught parents whose grown-up baby had done a disappearing act and had to tell far too many of them that there was nothing she could do. Not until the kid was harmed or broke the law. If they ended up living under an underpass or begging for change in London then there was a good chance they’d disappear forever.
Henaghan, Hendry, Hegde, Hughes, Hillman, Handoo and Haynes. She wandered round in the room’s harsh white light and hummed the tune to herself as she walked and thought.
She’d already decided that an artist’s impression of this guy wasn’t going to cut it. They were going to need a facial reconstruction. She’d put in a call to a friend, Professor Kirsten Fairweather at the Centre for Anatomy and Human Identification at Dundee University, to ask if her department would do a 3D reconstruct. Kirsten had been only too happy to help and was making arrangements to get the process started. It would, of course, take time, and until then there was no choice but to continue to do it old-school.
Dental records were en route for all seven RHs on her list but she knew they were unlikely to match. None of the seven seemed a fit to the man in the tunnel but their names still worked for her, giving her a beat to work to, the rhythm of the lost.
She left the room and wandered the corridor for a bit, following her thoughts and staring idly into one of the smaller rooms used to counsel bereaved families. It was a halfway house between the living and the dead, all pastel colours and adjustable lighting. Would there be anyone to come and see the remains of the Molendinar Man? Anyone to say yes, that’s my son, my husband?
She turned and retraced her steps, feeling suddenly anxious to be with the evidence bags, to hold the clothes again and see the man that wore them, her thoughts coming together and a puzzle falling into place.
What did the clothing tell her? A mismatch of sizes and quality. The victim was either a man who just didn’t care much about what he wore or didn’t have much choice. She knew plenty of men who didn’t give much thought to their wardrobe, Tony for one, but they generally at least wore clothes that fitted them.
The cagoule with the cut-off label had to be second-hand. It looked it too. The rest was cheap but functional. All except the shoes. They’d been bought new and the man hadn’t skimped on the price.
Clothing worn, definitely seen better days. Maybe worn for longer than the time in the tunnel. A fleece and a cagoule? It wasn’t that cold yet, not unless you were outside a lot. Good shoes that fitted him but not the pattern.
They’d wondered about him being a farmer, a postman or a road sweeper but there were plenty of reasons other than a job for someone to spend a lot of time outside. Perhaps the lack of a job.
She had an idea but the torches, all three of them, didn’t fit in any way that made sense. Still, at least it was a place to start.
With a final crashing note, the song in her head stopped. Goodbye Henaghan, Hendry, Hegde, Hughes, Hillman, Handoo and Haynes. The man in the tunnel wasn’t an RH at all.
Second-hand clothes, worn and dirty. Good footwear an essential. No one to know he’d gone missing. No employer or loved one to call the police. No one can miss you if they don’t know you’re there to begin with.
She picked up the evidence bag with the little wooden key ring in it, staring at the initials and seeing them for what they really were. She signed the bag out and slipped it into her coat pocket, switched off the last of the lights and left the building.
The initials didn’t stand for a person’s name at all. It was a place. And she was sure she knew where.
When she phoned the operations room the next morning, she couldn’t help but sigh inside when it was Fraser Toshney, one of the DCs, who answered. She guessed he’d have to do.
‘Fraser, meet me in the car park in about ten minutes. Never mind why. We’re going to do some visiting. We’re going to start at the Rosewood Hotel.’
‘The down-and-outs’ place? Really?’ He didn’t sound best pleased.
‘Yes, really. And after that maybe every shop doorway between here and Dumbarton. And, Fraser? Take that moaning look off your face. Don’t think I can’t see it.’
‘Yes, Boss.’
Chapter 8
Sunday morning
Remy was off work. He’d managed less than half a day collecting trolleys at the store before declaring himself sick. And he was, just not in any way he could explain to them.
He’d probably always known that his hobby would get him into trouble one day. Going in places he shouldn’t. Climbing up things he shouldn’t. That’s why the word shouldn’t had been in there. And that’s why he’d always done it.
Now he was paying the price. His old man had always said that nothing was free in this world. There was an old coffee table in his dad’s front room that he’d ‘got free’ by collecting Kensitas Club coupons that came with his cigarettes and then exchanged at the shop in Cambridge Street. Of course, it wasn’t free at all and he paid for it by acquiring progressive lung disease. Not much of a deal really.
Remy wasn’t exactly what you’d call a rebel. No marching to ban the bomb even though he thought they should, no protest against globalization or Starbucks or Nestlé or Disney. He was more of a quiet rebel, a personal rebel, making his protest against the world by ignoring No Entry signs. He didn’t need them to tell him what was good for him or bad for him or whether an old building might fall on his head. It was his head.
Maybe loving buildings was his problem. Or loving Glasgow. Or being a bit weird. People might have thought he was odd if they knew he explored derelict hospitals, old schools or abandoned factories but what the hell would they think if they knew he had found that fucking body?
He couldn’t stop thinking about it. Every time he closed his eyes it was there, its face staring back at his. Those empty eye sockets. The chewed cheeks. That poor bugger killed down there and left to rot. Stuck in that tunnel forever if he hadn’t been down there to find him. Now the cops would be examining every bit of him.
Two years on and off, Remy and Gabby had been going exploring together. Two years in which they’d become best friends but not boyfriend and girlfriend. He was a boy, she was a girl. They were friends. That was it.
They’d trawled the muddy old railway tunnels that ran under London Road where they danced on the rusting remains of an ancient car. They managed to get into the former Woolworths building on Argyle Street and wandered through the basement, the boiler room and the upper floors. They’d roamed the disused Gray Dunn biscuit factory in Kinning Park, searching its spooky warren of floors.
They explored the shell of St Columba’s Episcopal Church at midnight, having their own mass as a full moon streamed through the remaining stained-glass windows. They got into the former Transport Museum where they walked the cobbled street and sat in the Black Maria and imagined they were chasing themselves. They had an impromptu picnic on the rubble behind the façade of the old Woodilee Hospital at Lenzie.
They’d even climbed onto the roof of Glasgow University, clinging on for dear life and trying not to giggle as they looked down on the inner quadrangle and the chapel. They couldn’t believe the little walkways, doors and balconies that were up there. It was a bird’s-eye view of Hogwarts.
It hadn’t all been urbexing. They’d go out for drinks, as friends did. She’d been round at his dad’s flat a couple of times, one Christmas Eve and once for his old man’s birthday. He even got an invite to her sister’s wedding as her plus-one on the strict understanding that everyone would know that he wasn’t with her.
So they stuck to old buildings and a pl
atonic relationship that killed him a little. The year before they’d climbed the Finnieston Crane on his birthday, both with a bottle of beer tucked in their backpacks, and then sat high above the Clyde to toast him being twenty-six. A couple of weeks after that they’d nearly got caught ‘swimming’ in the empty pool of the old Govanhill public baths.
They did all that and much more and yet he never had got round to asking her if maybe, you know, one day, they might actually go out on what normal people might consider to be a date. In a normal place. He knew why he hadn’t asked. In the back of his head he was scared that if he did then she’d say no and it would all be over.
His phone beeped to signal a text. It was her.
Fancy trying to get into the Sentinel Works at Polmadie?
If anyone would know it would be her; she knew him better that anyone else. If he didn’t get his shit together then she’d see through him in two seconds flat. She had this knack of interrogating him, staring at him until he couldn’t stand it any more and he’d crack every time. He certainly didn’t need any of that.
Not feeling well, he texted back.
So he stared down onto London Road watching people walking back and forth as if nothing had ever happened. For all he knew, Tesco’s car park was covered in rogue trolleys and there was a long line of lazy shoppers just standing waiting for them to magically appear at the front of the store. He couldn’t give a toss.
He wasn’t eating either. Just a couple of slices of toast and some cereal. Sometimes he thought it had all been a weird dream and he hadn’t even been down the tunnel in the first place. That was tempting to believe but he knew the truth. He could still feel the fabric of the guy’s jacket and the sense of the arm crumbling under his touch. He could still smell the body lying on top of him.
He’d washed his hands a hundred times over the past few days. Scrubbed at them, used every soap and shampoo he had. He could still feel it though. Still knew it was there.
Come on loser. U can’t be that sick. I hear the Sentinel is well worth a look.
He ignored it.
Okay if not the Sentinel, how about we go to the old biscuit factory? It’s ur favourite place.
He ignored that too.
Okay please urself. Going on my own. Ur loss.
Great. Now Gabby was mad at him too. How the hell had it come to this?
Chapter 9
Narey and Toshney parked up outside the Rosewood, got out of the car and looked at each other. They’d have been as well painting POLICE on the side of her car. And on their foreheads come to that. Neither of them was wearing uniform but there weren’t clothes plain enough that they wouldn’t stand out a mile here.
It didn’t look too terrible from the outside. It had been repainted in the last few years, a whitewash that hadn’t yet surrendered to the elements, all the letters in the blue signage were currently in place and it had handsome, if worn, art deco features. One step inside though and you saw it was carrying a title it couldn’t justify. This was no hotel.
Instead it held one hundred and seventy guests. Residents might be a better term. Home from home for the homeless. All men. Every one of them a prisoner of drink or drugs or both, signing over their housing benefit to pay for a room in the Rosewood.
The reception area was behind a protective grille, a design feature generally underemployed by the Hilton or the Ritz. The grubby linoleum flooring felt sticky underfoot and there was a sickly smell that seemed to grow with every second. A handful of hard plastic chairs were strewn around reception and looked as welcoming as the man behind the desk.
Shaven-headed with a tattoo running down his neck, the guy was in a blue tracksuit top and grey bottoms. He sported a few days’ dark growth on his chin and a small scar on one cheekbone. Glancing up, he saw Narey and Toshney approach and a silent swear word slipped his lips. This seemingly wasn’t going to brighten his day any further.
‘Help you?’ The question was as grudging as he could manage.
‘We’re looking for Mickey Doig. Is he around?’
The man considered this and seemed to conclude that Mickey was indeed on the premises. He turned and walked a few paces to his left and pushed a door open. As it swung on its hinges, he shouted inside. ‘Mickey! Cops are here to speak to you.’
A muffled ‘Fucksake’ came back in reply. Moments later, an unhappy-looking forty-something appeared, drying his hands on a towel and eyes darting round the room. When they settled on Narey, his face crumpled and another bit of life went out of him with a sigh. He clearly couldn’t catch a break.
He was skinny with close-cropped dark hair and silver-rimmed glasses, maybe just five foot eight, and had a nervous look about him. His green sweatshirt hung loose and the sleeves were rolled up to the elbow.
‘DS Narey. What do you want?’
‘It’s DI Narey now and it’s nice to see you too, Mickey. We wanted to ask you some questions.’
‘Ask me?’ Doig’s tone was defiant. ‘Don’t see how I can help you. I don’t know nothing about nothing. And everything’s above board in here. Completely kosher.’
With that, Doig flashed a look at his colleague behind the desk, the man hanging keenly on every word of the scene in front of him. Narey got the impression that Doig was posturing for Tattoo Man’s sake. Time to split them up.
‘No one’s saying everything’s not legit in here. But I’d like to have a look around. Make sure for myself. That okay with you?’
‘You got a warrant?’ It was the guard dog behind the desk. Narey smiled at him.
‘No we don’t, Mr . . .?’
A sullen pause. ‘Thomas Cochrane.’
‘We don’t have a warrant, Mr Cochrane. Only looking to give the premises a quick once-over. That a problem?’
It seemed that it was. ‘I thought you wanted a word with Mickey.’
‘We do. A word about the hotel. We can do our talking while we’re walking. Okay?’
Cochrane shrugged sourly. ‘I’ll need to phone the owners. Let them know.’
‘Of course, sir. You do that. In the meantime, Mickey can give us the guided tour.’
Narey turned her back on the desk, gesturing for Toshney to follow before Cochrane could argue any further. She then flipped out her thumb and suggested that Doig get moving. Mickey sighed theatrically and looked over at the desk, his hands held out wide. What choice did he have?
Doig led them to the harshly lit smoky stairwell and began to climb, his shoulders suitably slumped. ‘Just keep walking, Mickey,’ Narey whispered behind him. ‘We’ll talk further up.’ Doig nodded.
Footsteps above their heads signalled someone descending. Narey and Toshney looked up to see the soles of worn trainers coming unsteadily down the stairs. A tall, bulky man followed, shuffling one step to the side for every one forward. He stopped, peering down to study them from behind thick spectacles. He swayed in thought.
‘Got any dolly on youse?’ he slurred. ‘Methadone, any of youse?’
‘For fucksake,’ Mickey huffed, clearly not impressed by the man’s timing. ‘Down the stairs, Billy. Away with you.’
The man flattened himself against the wall, hearing the warning in Mickey’s voice, and watched him and the cops walk on by. ‘Nae problem. Was only askin’. Not a problem.’
Narey waited until they’d climbed a few more steps. ‘Everything kosher, that right, Mickey?’
Doig sighed. ‘I only work here. I don’t make the rules, I don’t make this dump the way it is and I don’t make these guys the way they are. I just do what I’m told.’
‘The get-out clause for arseholes everywhere,’ Toshney chimed in.
‘Look, what is it you want? DI Narey, I thought you and me were square.’
‘Square?’ She laughed. ‘You know that’s not how it works, Mickey. Keep walking. You don’t want it to look like you’re helping us out. You just want to be sure that you do. We’re looking for someone that’s maybe been living here.’
Doig raised an eyebr
ow nervously. ‘Living here? Name would be at the desk. Everybody’s registered. Have to be to get benefit paid by the council.’
‘Yes and the money straight into the owners’ pockets. No, we don’t know for sure that he’d been living here. You tell us.’
Doig glanced around. ‘Tell me.’
‘He’s in his early thirties. Reddish fair hair. Five foot eleven. Quite fit. Wore a light blue cagoule and a navy-blue fleece. Carried a grey-and-blue Nike backpack.’
The man’s eyes stretched in disbelief. ‘That’s all you got?’
Narey and Toshney looked at each other. ‘Pretty much. We don’t think he was an alcoholic or an addict.’
‘Was? This guy dead?’
Narey nodded.
Doig threw up his arms. ‘Listen, I don’t know this guy. Description means nothing. If he wasn’t a boozer and wasn’t using then he wasn’t staying here. Them’s the only kind we got.’
‘The description doesn’t ring any bells?’ Toshney asked him. ‘In here or anywhere else? DI Narey, did I imagine this or did you say something to me about still knowing where Mr Doig’s lock-up was?’
‘Fucksake . . . I’m not always on duty, I don’t know everyone we’ve got. Okay, look, come and I’ll get you to talk to Walter if he’s here. It’s not lunchtime yet, chances are we’ll catch him before he’s out of things. Walter’s old-school. Just the drink for him. He goes outside more than any of them and knows most of the guys in Glasgow. If anyone can help you it’s him. I’ll introduce you then I’m out of it.’
‘Mickey, you’ll be out of it when I say you are.’
Doig led them down a dingy corridor, the walls dirty and wallpaper torn. Halfway along, he skirted to one side and avoided a pool of vomit drying on the patterned carpet. ‘Not my job,’ he muttered before they could ask.
In Place of Death Page 5
