by Anne Bone
Once she had finished smoking and stubbed out the cigarette into an already overflowing ashtray, she stood up and began to collect articles of clothing from the floor, tucking them under her arm. She had to raise her voice to get her husband’s attention, ‘She’s still not back. It’s after eight. Where do you reckon she is?’ she asked him.
He looked at her and registered that eight o’clock was late even for one of their kids to be out on a dark night. ‘None of the quines outside have seen her?’ he checked. She shook her head. ‘I suppose I could put me coat on, and take a wander along the road to see if she’s hanging out in the play park.’
Pam thought that was a good idea and she turned to Kerry again, ‘Kerry, is there anyone at the school that Shona plays with, you know, lass, someone who doesna’ live in our street?’
Kerry looked up from her dolls and thought for a moment. ‘I dinna think so, Mum. Although, she was playin’ with a girl from the Dove Bell houses, maybe she’s gone home with her.’
Danny looked at his daughter. ‘It might have been an idea to have told us that before now. Whit’s her name?’ he asked , his annoyance showing about having to put his coat on and go and search for his errant daughter after a long day spent labouring on the building site.
Kerry thought again, ‘Marjorie.’
‘Aye, okay, but whit’s her surname?’
‘I dunno,’ she answered, not showing much interest, and proceeded to dress her dolly in a dress she had just removed a few minutes before.
Wayne turned his attention to the conversation that was ongoing and disturbing his telly programme. ‘I think it’s Smith, she’s got a brother Tam who’s in the same class as me.’
‘An’ do you know what the address is?’ asked Danny as he grabbed his coat from the cupboard under the stairs.
‘I know which house it is, but I couldna tell you whit the address is,’ he told his father.
‘Well, git your coat on, lad, and come with me, we’ll go and have a gander, and give them a knock.’ He smiled at his wife, ‘Dinna worry, lass, that’s where she’ll be.’
‘Well, fetch her home, and tell her she’s in big trouble from her mum,’ Pam told them as she reached for her fags and lit another.
Danny and Wayne left the house and started out towards the Dove Bell estate, a recently-built private housing scheme. He and Pam had lived in Benview Close for the past ten years; they had been allocated the three bedroom council house just after Shona was born. They had been thankful that they been given the property, as otherwise they would have been falling over each other in the small one bedroom flat they had started their married life in. They had been made up to have some room, but now with two more additions to the family it had become crowded. He did his best to provide for his family, his job was hard graft labouring for a local firm of builders, which meant long days and heavy work. But it paid the bills, although not much else. Things were tight, and Pam would have to go and find some work as soon as Josie started at the school next year.
It was a struggle to make ends meet. The kids were always needing clothes and shoes and when they came home from the school with their knees out of their trousers he could hear their mother give them a row. Kids, they didn’t understand how hard it was to keep them in clothes. Pam did her best, but she wasn’t one for sewing, or cooking if truth was known. She bought ready-made food if she could, and flew at him when he suggested she take some advice from his sister, who was good at making a pot of soup or a hough of ham which could go a long way. Still, she warmed his bed, and as long as no more bairns came along, perhaps things would get better.
When they reached the play park there were a few older teenagers hanging around rattling the swings as they spoke about teenager things. Wayne knew them so he went over and asked whether any of them had spotted his sister. They all shook their heads, and told him that there hadn’t been any sight of any lassies in the park since they arrived.
Danny and Wayne made their way across the road, and around the bend towards the new estate. They had to pass along a path that stretched along one of the new roads that had been built as an entry to the smart houses. Danny knew the way as he had worked on the site when it was being built. The pathway wasn’t well lit, especially the part that went alongside the woods. Wayne was quiet; he was the quieter one of the two lads, a little less harum-scarum than his older brother, who was constantly getting caught at school for misdemeanours.
‘It’s one of those over there,’ Wayne stopped and pointed to a row of semi-detached houses, their lights glowing from the over-dressed windows.
‘Which one is it, lad?’
Wayne stood for a moment and tried to recall which house Tam Smith lived in. He had come up one day after school to call on him to go to the park to have a game of football. ‘It’s that one over there, at least I think it is.’ he told his dad.
Danny crossed over the road, followed by Wayne. They made their way to the front door. The gardens at the front were all this new idea of open plan, not what he would want with all the dogs crapping on the lawn. But then perhaps they didn’t have dogs wandering around here as they had in Benview Close.
They got to the front door and Danny pressed the doorbell which rang out with a tune that went on for ages. They soon heard voices and saw in the semi-darkness the shape of someone approaching the door. It was opened by a small squat man, whose spectacles were perched on the end of nose. He switched on the outside light so that he could peer at his visitors. Danny being tall and skinny rose over the man causing him to look down.
‘Good evening, sorry to bother you,’ he said, ‘I wonder if you could tell me whether my daughter Shona is here please.’
The man looked puzzled. Not that I know of,’ he replied. As he spoke a woman joined him.
‘Who did you say?’ she asked, peering at the long tall lanky man, who carried dark stubble around his chin.
‘Shona, my daughter Shona Cameron, I believe that she’s friends with your daughter Marjorie.’
‘Well, that’s right, they do play together at school a bit. Marjorie’s in the year below her, but she’s not been to school for the past couple of days, she’s been in bed with an awful dose of flu. So, no, we definitely haven’t seen your daughter today. Sorry we can’t help you, I hope she turns up,’ said the woman. She smiled sweetly at them before she closed the door. They didn’t hear the comment from her to her husband that she wouldn’t be terribly happy to have Shona Cameron as their daughters playmate, given she came from that scruffy council scheme.
Danny was now worried. He turned to Wayne and spoke quickly, ‘Come on, lad, we better get back. We’ll bang on a few of her other pals’ doors on the way back.’ He started off walking briskly towards Benview Close; Wayne had to almost jog to keep up with him.
Twenty minutes later they arrived back home, Danny throwing open the front door and shouting to Pam. ‘Is she back?’
Pam appeared in the hallway looking slightly anxious, ‘No sign of her. Oh bloody hell Danny, where the sodden hell is she? Hadn’t her pal Marjorie seen her at all?’ she asked, taking a drag of her cigarette and blowing the smoke out purposefully, without noticing how her youngest son swatted the smoke from his face.
‘Nay, she hadn’t been to school herself for the past couple of days, so she hadn’t had sight of her. The lad and I banged on a couple of her pals’ doors to check. Nobody’s seen her since school. I am going knock on next door to see if they’ll let me use their phone to call the Bobbies.’ He disappeared again.
*********
Jane Lewis was relaxing on the sofa. She was back living on her own again, her marriage had not survived the last few months. She had been sad, but really it was a relief when Sean told her that he had had enough. She hadn’t been that surprised, the arguments had gathered momentum to become full-scale rows, where he would challenge her that she didn’t love or care enough about him. At first she had disputed this and reaffirmed that she did indeed love him, but she started t
o question whether this was so. Eventually, she had admitted to him and to herself that her feelings had changed, and they agreed to separate. The sadness that her marriage had failed began to filter into a sense of peace. She could resume her old ways of being able to return home from work to a stress-free environment.
She had just watched the end of the ten o’clock news when her phone rang. It was late for any of her friends or family to phone, so she guessed rightly it would be work. It was the duty sergeant and her heart lost a beat when she heard the words, ‘Sorry to call you, mam, but we have had a report that there is a ten-year old lassie gone missing.’
‘Where from?’ she asked.
‘Elgin,’ she was informed. ‘The duty inspector up in Elgin, Inspector Tim Blair, asked me to contact you mam, and he wondered whether you could phone him.’
She sat down by the phone and took a deep breath; surely it couldn’t be happening again. She immediately dialled the direct number for Tim Blair, an old friend she had worked with prior to his transfer to Elgin. He answered on the second ring and explained that the child hadn’t been seen since school; the parents had only reported her missing an hour ago.
‘Didn’t they realise she was missing?’ Jane asked.
‘No, apparently they didn’t notice until supper time, and then thought she had maybe gone to a friend’s house after school. But there has been no sign of her. I just wanted to pick your brains, Jane,’ he said, ‘I know you’ve had experience of this before.’
‘Do you want me to come up?’ she asked. ‘Probably be tomorrow though, as I will need to get the governor’s agreement.’
‘Jane, I will certainly flag it up with our Super here, and request that you do.’ With those final words, she hung up and sat for a moment, thinking. Surely it would be totally unconnected.
She didn’t sleep much that night, and at five she gave up, got up, showered and made her way into Queen Street. It was still dark and she collected a coffee from the canteen on her way up to the control room. She knew that the officers in the control room would have the most up-to-date news of what was going on, and it was just at shift handover so she could hear what had happened overnight. Elgin was a town seventy miles away from Aberdeen, and a separate division of Grampian Police, but they still worked together even though there was a separation by miles.
The officers acknowledged her presence. It was unusual to have an officer of her rank attend their handover, but they all knew why. She heard that the overnight searches had been inconclusive; they hadn’t located the child, Shona Cameron. That was not the news she was hoping to hear. A night out in the open during the end of October could be cold and bad for adults let alone a ten-year old child.
She left the control room and made her way up to her own office, switching on the desk lamp rather than the overhead florescent strip. It was still dark and she sat drinking her coffee, sorting out the latest pile of paperwork that seemed to breed on her desk. She never seemed to get to the bottom of surveying and signing papers.
An hour later, her phone rang and she picked it up to hear her superintendent’s voice at the end of receiver. ‘Looks like we have another one, Jane.’ He spoke with a soft highland lilt. ‘I have agreed that you’ll go up and assume the role of SIO, is that okay with you?’ He was well aware of the toll of investigating another missing child. ‘Let’s hope that this one will have a more positive outcome.’
She ended the call, and then made several others to inform her team at Queen Street that she would be going up to Elgin. She phoned Tim before she left and told him what he already knew. He sounded tired but reassured that, as he said, the cavalry were on the way. Before she left Aberdeen she called into her flat to collect some clothes and wash bag. She had a feeling that it might be a while until she set foot in her home again.
Chapter 30
Elgin
The following morning the Cameron household was chaotic, even more chaotic than usual. The children were roaming around trying to be invisible while still getting in the way of the adults. Sam had taken on getting some breakfast sorted out for his younger siblings, his mother was prostrate on the sofa weeping and wailing. She had two of her friends who had arrived early this morning to give her support. His dad was out with some of his mates from work, helping the police search for his sister. Kerry and Josie had gone to bed late the night before, and when they had woken they were hungry, whereas he and Wayne had stayed up most of the night. Neither he nor his brother could sleep, and even if they had been able to, it would have been doubtful whether it would have been possible with all the comings and goings. None of them were going to go to school today, it was too late anyhow.
Josie was whinging. She didn’t want Weetabix, she wanted Rice Krispies, she wouldn’t have it that Weetabix was all there was. He told her to shut up and stop her noise. She went off crying to her mum in the sitting room, but was immediately sent out again with a flea in her ear. His mum’s friend Gladys followed her and told him to stick the kettle on again as his mum could do with a brew. He did as he was told, but when he went to take another tea bag out of the cupboard he found the box was empty. He went to the sitting room and put his head around the door to tell them, only to be instructed that he was to take some money from the tin at the top of the cupboard, and to send Wayne to the shop to buy some more. Wayne groaned, he was knackered, but didn’t argue. Actually, it would be good to get out of the house for a while.
All the neighbours in the street were trying to do their bit, regardless of what they thought of the Camerons. It wasn’t customary for the neighbours in Benview Close to be so cohesive, but at times when one of them was in trouble, then, they all pulled together. It was terrible that wee Shona Cameron was missing; nobody would want that for any family. The men in the street, who were not working, and there were a few of them, were out searching with the police, trying to locate the wee girl. The women were busy making cups of tea and delivering them to the search party when they passed. They also took the opportunity to gossip and speculate as to where Shona could be.
Pam Cameron was not exactly the most popular woman on the street; she was often heard shouting her mouth off and telling anyone who crossed her that they could fuck off. Her bleached blonde locks with their two inches of black roots that resembled rat’s tails often drew looks and whispers that surely the woman hadn’t put a comb near it for months. Pam could be heard the length and breadth of Benview Close, often screaming at her kids or Danny. She would spend her weekends up at the Legion spending Danny’s hard-earned money on the bingo, and swallowing vodkas flavoured with coke. She always had a fag hanging out of her mouth and was regarded as a slovenly housekeeper. Anyone who did get invited into the house looked around them in dismay as there was clutter everywhere, and the kitchen’s hygiene standards were non-existent.
It wouldn’t be the first time that a police presence would be seen at twenty Benview Close, but this was usually due to Danny’s and Pam’s fights. Either he or she would return home worse for wear, and they would end up having a barney. Danny was seen as a hard-working man, and that he liked to have a few pints on a Friday night was an accepted practice, but people didn’t think it right that Pam should be doing the same of a Saturday night. The problems came when themselves. The sparks would fly when they returned home in the early hours of the morning. Their bawling and screeching would result in waking not only their own kids, but everyone else’s too.
The neighbours felt sorry for the kids as they seemed to be left to their own devices when this happened. No one would have admitted they had been the one who had phoned the social work department to report the kids being left on their own, and that call had led to a visit from social workers. None of the neighbours knew what discussions had taken place within the house, but they knew they were being blamed, as after the social workers had left, Pam went from house to house knocking on doors, demanding to know whether they were the one who had called the authorities.
Danny did have some re
gard in the neighbourhood; he did go to work and do his best. He was a local lad who had been a bit of a known fighter in his early twenties, good looking, tall and lanky. At that time he would also have been considered a bit of a lad with the girls. Where he had found Pam no one knew, but she wasn’t from Elgin. Wherever it was, all were in agreement that she was as rough as they come.
The kids were okay, they could easily give a bit of back chat, but given what they had to contend with at number twenty, they could be forgiven. They often looked a bit scruffy and their clothes could have done with being washed more often. They were often left to wander, and so when they heard that Shona was missing, they hadn’t given it much thought, at first that is, but now it was different. A kid her age shouldn’t be out overnight, and speculation was starting as to whether someone had got her.
Jane Lewis had arrived at Divisional Headquarters in Elgin, and had been briefed on the search. Tim was still there looking stressed and was pleased to welcome his old colleague. He knew she was good and admired how she had risen in the ranks so quickly. He regarded her as an asset to the force. He escorted her to his office, calling out for coffee to be brought in to them.
She looked around the small cluttered office and recalled that Tim was never one to keep things tidy. She sat down on one of the chairs and inquired about what had been done so far.
