by Anne Bone
Jenni, drew breath, ‘In Spain… actually, I am not sure whether it is, in fact, business, I think his wife is with him. It’s just what he says when he is not in Aberdeen; we don’t discuss his other life you see. But I know he was going to Spain, and I think that it is more of a holiday and business combined. He is due back at the end of the week.’
‘We understand, Jenni, but are you at all worried whether Mr Davidson may have taken Mary?’
Jenni shook her head violently and replied in anger, ‘Absolutely not!’ She drew herself up and almost spat out, ‘Why on earth would you even think that Marcus would have taken her? He would never, ever put me through any of this… Do you understand? Never!’ With this, she broke down sobbing. Composing herself, she looked through her tears and shook her head again, ‘Please, please can you just find her? She isn’t with Marcus. I would stake my life on it.’
Jane reached across towards the other woman, and attempted to reassure her. ‘We need to ask the questions, Jenni. Children do not vanish into thin air, and often they are with someone they know. So let’s start again shall we? Can you think of anywhere should could be or anybody she could be with?’
Just at that moment, the door opened and Christine entered. She took in the situation immediately. ‘Is there news?’
All three shook their heads. ‘We are just trying to find out whether Jenni could think of any place she could be or whether there may be anyone she could be with. Perhaps you could help?’
Christine disposed of her coat and sat on the edge of the chair, plainly uncomfortable to be asked a question like this. ‘I don’t think I would be much help there. I will say it before Jenni does, we haven’t exactly had a great deal to do with Jenni and Mary over the past few years. In fact, it is only the last couple of years since they have started to visit us.’
Jenni’s look towards her mother told it all. The look was one of distain, ‘I’ll tell them why that is, shall I Mum?’ She turned to the two officers, ‘You see, my dad is disgusted by my behaviour and giving birth out of wedlock, and then, even worse having an affair with a married man. He can hardly look at either me or Mary, it is only Mum that makes it possible for us to have any visits home.’
Christine nodded her head, ‘I don’t think it is disgust he feels, Jenni love, and he is just so disappointed and hoped that when you left home to go to college that you would make something of yourself. He’s quite religious,’ she explained to the officers, ‘and can’t accept a child out of wedlock. Old fashioned, that’s what he is. Although, Jenni, I have to tell you when the police arrived yesterday and told us about Mary being missing, he was upset, he was genuinely so.’
Jane and Dave looked at each other, silently acknowledging that there was a complicated story behind this family. After asking a few more questions which provided no clues about what may have happened to Mary, they advised Jenni that the hunt would continue, with door to door enquiries.
The two officers didn’t speak until they were safely ensconced in the black unmarked car. Then Dave asked the question, ‘What do you think then, Boss?’
‘Do you know, Dave, I don’t know. We do need to check out where Mr Davidson is; there have been a few times when he has had his collar felt, and we know he is not squeaky clean by any stretch of the imagination.’
‘Yeah, I agree, boss. What on earth is a pretty young woman like her doing with an old guy like Marcus Davidson?’
‘Wasting her life, I would think. Mary is nine years old, so there she is hanging on for him, keeping him a secret for all that time. What a life! Still can’t see any reason why he would want to take Mary, because there is one certainty, that by her disappearing, his secret is likely to be blown.’
‘Let’s hope that the door to door will jog people’s minds. We know how easy it is for people to forget or think that the smallest thing is not important.’ Jane sighed deeply and looked out of the passenger window as the car drove through the streets towards police headquarters. Her thoughts were overwhelmingly focused on what else they could do to find this little girl.
Chapter 5
Aberdeenshire
The room is dark and it smells strange. There were no slithers of light any place. I feel about with my hands, I am scared and can’t stop my hands from shaking. I can feel the sheet, it feels crisp, and cold, and it covers my body. It smells new, I can feel the pillow under my head, it feels really soft, it’s like mine, on my bed. I don’t know where I am. Where’s me mam? I whisper her name, then, quietly I say it out loud. Where is she? Where’s me mam? I find my voice and then I call for her, loudly. She doesn’t come, so I shout louder, Mam! Mam! I’m crying now, the tears are wetting my face, falling down my cheeks and wetting the sheet. Mammy, where are you? I am screaming now, my heart is beating fast, so fast I think it’s going to jump out of my body. She still doesn’t come. Me mammy always comes when I shout, when I get a bad dream in the night and shout for her, she comes straight away. But then I’m not in my bed, it’s dark, but I know it’s not my bed, it smells different.
It’s not ever this dark in my bedroom, even in the middle of the night there’s the light from the lamppost outside. But this room is just black. Where am I? Mam always came, where is she? I stop shouting and listen out to see if she is coming, but it is quiet, not a sound. I wonder if I’m dead, and that’s why mam doesn’t come. Someone at school said that when you die it goes black and you are on your own, so maybe I was dead. My grampie had said something once that always bothered me, something to do with me mam being a sinner cause she wasn’t married and I was born without a dad. I know about sinners; they go to hell. So perhaps I am dead and have gone to hell. That would make sense as, after all, I don’t have a dad and I don’t know why.
I am scared. I don’t want to be dead and be in hell. I think I can’t be dead, my heart’s still beating, and I can feel my breath, so I can’t be dead! Where am I? My tears start rolling down my face again. Oh, where am I?
I try to remember. Then I remember walking through the park from school, I was on my way home to me mam. What happened next? Oh yes, then I felt those hands grab me, I struggled, but the hands were big, big hands holding me, and then, nothing. Nothing until now. Who had the big hands and why can’t I remember anything else? I’m shaking, I can’t stop it. I don’t know whether to try and get out of bed and feel my way around the room. But it’s dark and I am so very frightened.
Suddenly there is a shaft of light. I turn my head to see where it’s coming from. I am relieved that there is some light, it is dancing and pulsating, and making shadows. I turn my head further and then I see him, he is standing in a doorway. He is big, like a giant, I am sobbing; please don’t hurt me, I cry. He comes towards me. I am screaming, Mam, Mam. I pull the sheet up over my head, so I can’t see him. I can feel him coming closer to me.
Then I hear him speak. His voice is quiet, it doesn’t sound scary. He says there is no need to make a noise. That he isn’t going to hurt me.
I can feel him moving in the room. I feel sick, I think I am going to be sick. Then there is a light in the room. The man is standing beside the bed, the light seems to be next to me, I try to shut him out, I close my eyes tight, but then I am compelled to open them and peek out from a corner of the sheet that is protecting me.
He speaks again, he tells me he is not going to hurt me, he says now that I’ve woken up I must be hungry. He pulls the sheet gently so that it comes off my face, and I look at him. ‘I want me mam,’ I tell him, my words are coming out all of a stutter and I am sobbing, ‘Where is me mam?’
He tells me that I am not to worry, that she has had to go away, and she asked him to look after me. He tells me not to worry, but how can he tell me not to worry? What does he mean, me mam has had to go away? Where? I know me mam wouldn’t leave me without telling me she was going, she would never just get up and go, and leave me with this stranger. Not me mam, she must be dead.
‘Is she dead?’ I ask him. He tells me she isn’t dead,
but she had to go away and couldn’t say goodbye. I don’t believe him, me mam would never leave me, she must be dead. Oh no! not me mam! I start crying again, I am sobbing, the tears are running down my face again. He sits on the bed and I feel him patting my head. He is smoothing my hair. I don’t want him to touch me, I don’t know who he is. Me mam is dead, and dead means gone forever.
He sits beside me, lets me cry, then he slowly pulls back the covers and it is then I see that I still have my school uniform on. What about school? I try and stop crying and then I ask him about school, ‘Mrs Brown, my teacher, will wonder where I am,’ I tell him.
He tells me not to worry about my teacher. She knows about me mam, and then he says ‘Guess what, I’m a teacher so I can give you your lessons. Now won’t that be fun?’
I wait a while and then watch him go back through the door, and then I slowly climb out of the bed. I sit on the edge of the bed and put my feet on the floor. I try and stand, but my legs feel like jelly, all wobbly and I am not sure whether they will hold me up. I test them out. I put one foot in front of the other, and they do hold me, so slowly I start to walk towards the door and follow him.
It was a funny door, it didn’t seem like a normal one, it was small and the man had had to duck to get under it. I manage it, though when I go through it I see that there is a sort of a corridor and I follow it until I find myself into a brightly-lit room.
I look around it; my eyes are hurting as it is so bright, coming from the semi-darkness of the other room. I stand and look around me. It seems like I am in a big kitchen: over on one side there is a sink, and next to it there is a big cooker. Over the sink there is a window, but the curtains are shut so I don’t know whether it is day or night outside. There are lots of cupboards and worktops, with a kettle, mugs and plates sitting out on top. There is a round table and it has four chairs placed around it. He is there, watching me and beckons me to sit on one of the chairs. I do and he shows me that there are boxes of cereals and tells me to choose one. I don’t feel hungry but? I will do as he says, so I pick one, a box of sugar puffs. I like sugar puffs but Mam doesn’t let me have them at home, she says they are full of sugar and bad for my teeth. Mam. Then I remember she has gone, and she must be dead, so she’ll never tell me not to eat them again. Oh Mam! I am crying again, and he tells me to stop and eat my sugar puffs. I can’t help it, the tears are plopping into my bowl. I am eating my tears.
He is sitting on a chair opposite and watching me. I look at him. He is tall and has short silver hair. His face is pale, and his skin is smooth, he doesn’t have any sign of whiskers. He is looking at me, and he has green piercing eyes, they remind me of cat’s eyes, green and staring. He has a long pointed nose; it looks like it is too big for his face. His ears stand out; they are pointed at the top and remind me of those of the elfin in my Christmas story book. He is smiling at me, and I don’t want him to smile like that, like he was pleased that I was here. I don’t know who he is, and I don’t know why me mam would have left me with him. I keep my eyes focused on him and try to swallow the cereal. It doesn’t taste nice, it tastes like cardboard, but I chew and swallow.
He asked me whether I would like some milk, and I nod. I watch him pick up the milk jug and pour milk into a glass, his hands are shaking. Perhaps he is scared too, I think. He picked up a mug and drank from it, and then filled it again with brown tea from a blue stripped teapot that sits on a little raised metal plate.
While he is drinking his tea, I take the chance to take my eyes off him and glance around the rest of the room. It is a big room and not only is it a kitchen but it looks like it is a sort of sitting room too. It has another part to it: there is a fireplace where a fire is glowing and burning, just like the one in my nana’s house. There is a little settee and two chairs that sit on either side of the fire. I notice that the corridor that I had come along also has a large book case beside it, and the bookcase is stacked with loads of different sizes and colours of books. The man had said he was a teacher, so no wonder he had loads of books.
He spoke then, ‘Now my little friend, I am going to tell you how it’s going to be, and as long as you follow the rules then we will get along fine.’ He took another sip of his tea and then continued. ‘I know you must be wondering about why I was chosen to look after you. Your mother asked me to do so. She would have introduced us, but she had to go and it was an emergency. She asked me to keep you safe and I will do, but you have to be a good girl and do exactly what I ask you to do without any questions. Okay?’
‘What happened to me mam? Why did she not tell me she was going?’ The man doesn’t answer for the moment; I watch his Adam’s apple bob up and down before he does. ‘Now as I said,’ he tells me, ‘it all happened very suddenly and she chose me because I am a teacher and because she knew I would look after you.’
He tells me the rules. ‘First rule is when I tell you to go to your room you do so without any argument. Second rule is that you have to remain in the house at all times, and the third main rule is if anyone comes to the house, you have to be silent. Do you understand?’ I nod, even though I don’t really understand anything about this.
Then to my surprise he says I am going to call you Heather, and you will call me Uncle Don. ‘You got that?’he is looking directly at me; I can feel his cat’s eyes boring into me, so I nod. I don’t want to be called Heather, I like my name. It’s the name me mam called me, but then she has gone and left me with him. Who is Uncle Don and where has he been all of my life? I am not going to ask him. I don’t think he will like it. And then he said, ‘And finally, we will spend time each day doing some lessons so that you won’t get bored.’
I nod again and he waited until I finished my sugar puffs and drank my milk and then he told me to follow him. I followed him out of the door opposite the sink and he opened another door and there was a bathroom. He told me to use the toilet. I thought he was going to stay and watch me, but he doesn’t, he leaves me to pull my knickers down and pee. It’s a long pee and I think it is a relief. He must have been waiting outside the door, because when I finished peeing and pulled my knickers up and flushed the toilet, he came back in. He was carrying some clothes in his hands.
He tells me that he thinks that these will fit me, they are new. He then puts them on the towel rail that is warm. He bends over the bath and puts the plug in the plug hole, he turns on the tap and soon the room is full of steam. I watch him as he turns the hot tap off and turns on the cold one, he put his hand into the water to see how hot the water is. Me mam did that; she always told me to make sure the water wasn’t too hot before I got into it. Hetells me to get undressed and get into the bath. I don’t like it; I don’t want to take my clothes off in front of this strange man. I don’t look at him, and start to unbutton my dress; my fingers feel all funny like they won’t work properly. I glance at him, who is this Uncle Don?
He seems to realise I didn’t want to take my clothes off in front of him, so he tells me that he will leave me to get on with it, and to get into the bath and make sure I wash myself properly. He shows me a big white fluffy towel that is hanging on the rail, beside the new clothes, and tells me to dry myself when I finish. I quickly take off the rest of my clothes, removing them as fast as I can and leaving them on a pile on the floor. I lower myself into the bath and feel better as I feel the warm water flow over my body. I like having a bath, and normally I would wash myself and then lie in the water playing with my plastic ducks, the ones that Santa had brought me last year, a whole family of different coloured ducks and they would float around my head until I pushed them under the water, only to see them bob up again. I find the soap, it is pink and smells okay. I begin to smooth it over my body and wash myself, just as Mam had showed me to do.
As I lay in the bath I looked around me. The bathroom is a pretty shade of blue. There is a bathroom cabinet, just like we have in my bathroom at home. It reminds me of home. There are blue and white checked tiles on the wall and the window has a thick bli
nd pulled down.
I continue to lie a little longer, but then I hear footsteps outside of the closed door. He, Uncle Don, asks me whether I am finished. I pull the plug and watch the water drain from the bath. I stand up and climb out of the bath, quickly grabbing the towel off the rail. As I pull the towel around me, the door opens and there he is standing, watching me.
‘Well, Heather,’ he said as he speaks to me, ‘that’s better, isn’t it? Nice and clean.’ He enters the room and passes me a pink garment from the pile and I realise it was a nightie. He tells me to put it on, and I dry myself off as quickly as I can. I am not really drying some places properly, like I know Mam always tells me to do. But I don’t want him to see me. I place the nightie over my head and I am pleased that it is long as it falls right over my body. It is of warm thick material and I feel sort of protected by it. He then passes me a pair of slippers which I put on my feet. They are a little bit too big, but they are warm and fluffy. Finally, he passes me a thick pink dressing gown. It has a belt that I tie around my waist. It must be night time, I think, but then I have just had my breakfast. None of it feels right.
He tells me to follow him and I do. We go back to the kitchen come sitting room and he sits on one of the chairs by the fire. He tells me to sit on his lap. I am not sure about doing this, it doesn’t feel right, but he smiles at me, and tells me there is nothing to worry about. He has a hair brush; he tells me that he is going to brush my lovely long hair.
Chapter 6
Police Headquarters Aberdeen
Queen Street Police Headquarters was buzzing with noise, a highly-charged tenseness and anxiety seeped into the atmosphere. Jane Lewis sat in her office looking across the desk at Dave Rogers, he more so than she had deep lines of tiredness and worry plastered across his face.
‘So Dave, tell me, do we have any leads?’
