by Denise Mina
So: this next part is very difficult to discuss. Legally, the suggestion of one fact causing another fact cannot be implied or we could be sued. So, this part has been phrased carefully by our lawyer and I am now going to read it out to you word for word:
‘Twelve years ago a young PA called Dauphine Loire came to work for Gretchen Teigler. Loire has barely left her side since. The two women are very close.
‘Unrelated to this: around the same time a whistle-blower in a Spanish football club made allegations about financial irregularities. Despite events which might, cumulatively, be regarded as a campaign of intimidation, the man continued to make allegations online and in interviews with local journalists. The whistle-blower claimed to work for the accounting firm which audited the football club.
‘Fact two: this whistle-blower was threatened with legal action by the parent company of the football club.
‘Fact three: the man died. His house caught fire but an unexpected torrential rainstorm quenched the flames. Fire investigators found his body only partially burned. At post-mortem he was found to have been murdered before the fire began. His throat was cut. If the freak storm had not extinguished the fire, the murder would never have been uncovered. That murder remains unsolved.
‘Unrelated to that fact is this: a well-known print publication was sued last year for wrongfully speculating about that death. That print publication lost their case, paid damages and has now ceased to exist.’
It was the closest thing I had ever heard to outright allegations against Gretchen Teigler. Trina Keany was either very brave or very stupid. It was a small-time podcast. She probably didn’t have access to a legal department. If she had an editor or a parent company protecting their capital she would have been stopped from saying it. I thought she was making a dangerous mistake.
But we’re not going into all of that. That’s nothing to do with our story.
Anyway. This was ancient history when Leon and Gretchen started going out together. They were fifty-seven and forty-eight respectively, had moved in the same social circles for some time before they were romantically involved. They were married in Paris. There were two witnesses: her PA, Dauphine Loire, and a secretary in the office of le marié.
Gretchen didn’t respond to press enquiries about her wedding. Leon said they had got married and were very happy. It took everyone by surprise. No one even knew they were dating.
This was no marriage of convenience. It changed both of their lives fundamentally.
In the first few months of their marriage Gretchen was being seen in public and even attended a couple of parties. She began to travel for pleasure, always with Leon. They visited Switzerland and India. They travelled to Freiberg, met distant family and they went out to Parisian restaurants in public, that is to say she didn’t have them shut down for a private meal but ate in front of other people, with other people, apparently at Leon’s behest.
Leon put his Sandbanks house on the market, asking price twenty-one million. He was moving to Paris to live with Gretchen.
If Leon was good for her, Gretchen seems to have been a good influence on him too. He had always been an absent father but he now made time to see Violetta and Mark away from their mothers, sometimes with Gretchen, sometimes alone. They developed relationships. Both kids admitted that these interactions were not easy, they were getting to know each other, working through resentments and difficulties. Violetta seems to have found it particularly hard. There was a lot to get over. She told friends that she didn’t like him, he was vulgar and dumb and stupid. But Leon persisted.
Is it possible that these lifestyle changes got too much for Leon? He was in his late fifties, Gretchen was in her late forties. Change is hard. Leon seemed to be reviewing his life, picking over everything that had happened to him. What if he didn’t like what he saw? Could he have been suicidal but afraid of leaving his kids behind? There was no guarantee that Gretchen would support them.
It is fair to say that Gretchen is attention-shy and the exposure of an investigation into Leon’s death may have seemed too much. She didn’t apply for the generous insurance on the Dana, perhaps to avoid the exposure of opening the case again. Or maybe she is just the richest woman in the world, was grief stricken and asked her staff to overlook the debt. Neither the police nor the press approached her, it was as if she had been cut out of the story all together.
There are so many threads left hanging in this case.
In an interview given to a German TV network, a local St Martin man, who rented his Airbnb room to Mark Parker the night before the Dana arrived, was walking on the dock on the night of the sinking. He told the reporter that he saw a girl in a stripy dress cast off the ship. He said she had long blonde hair. This interview has now disappeared from the TV company archives and was only ever mentioned on Reddit by people who saw it broadcast at the time.
Amila and Sabine had saved only one-third of their stake to open a bakery. Just months after Amila is convicted Sabine opens a bakery.
And what happened to the diamond necklace? That was never mentioned again.
I said at the beginning of this series that when you look at the facts of this case, the court’s findings were impossible.
This is what I think happened: I think Leon deliberately orchestrated that night so that he was alone with his two kids. He could sail. He knew the Dana. He had access to the engine room and could have planted the explosives. He also had access to the food and the champagne.
He planted the explosives and drugged the champagne. Then he told Mark to go downstairs, maybe got Violetta to cast off and go downstairs while he stayed in the wheelhouse. I think he piloted the ship out to sea and set the course. If the drugs were starting to have an effect he may have become confused and forgotten the radio and the lights. I think he got the kids into the dining room, closed the door, served the food and, after they all passed out, the explosives in the engine room finished the job.
Leon killed his kids and himself that night. Sad, but obvious. Gretchen Teigler may have been grieving, she may have been heartbroken, but so are all family members when a murder happens. Whether she made it explicit or implicit, the sheer power of her name directed all of the investigation away from her and those around her. Because of that, an innocent woman languishes in jail. Amila Fabricase will be sixty-one before she gets out of prison. Her partner Sabine is standing by her.
Thanks for joining us for this true-crime series here on the MisoNetwork.
Do you enjoy cooking? With Fast’n’Fresh–
I switched it off.
‘What?’ asked Fin. It was only then that I realised I’d been muttering to myself.
I tutted, ‘Teigler.’
‘Dreadful,’ he said. ‘Why did she do that to her grandmother?’
‘Well, that’s just a taster. Trust me. She’s done much worse.’
‘Like what?’
There was too much to tell and we were fast approaching Skibo Castle.
‘Look,’ I said.
Fin sat up as we took the turn from the main road. The estate wall was low. We could see into the perfectly maintained grounds and buildings. I could almost smell the money, or at least the absence of other smells, which is perhaps what money really smells like.
23
I DREW UP AT the barrier and pressed the intercom. Having worked there, I knew what would be happening inside. The security manager in the Stewards’ Hall would be checking the bookings and sign-outs. Probably using an iPad now, but it was an actual book in my time. He or she might be frowning, wondering who it could be at eleven thirty on a Monday night. Check-ins tended to run from Friday to Friday. He would be looking at the security screen, see me and Fin smiling into the lens.
The intercom crackled. ‘Good evening, madam.’ They said this to let me know they could see me. ‘How may I help you?’
‘Hello, um, I used to work here and I was passing and, I know it’s late but I was wondering if Albert McKay is still the manager?’
‘And your name is?’
‘Anna McLean.’
‘Could you wait a moment, please, madam?’
‘Certainly.’
The mute was employed and we were alone.
‘“McLean”?’ asked Fin.
‘It’s my maiden name.’
‘I didn’t think you and Hamish were married.’
‘We didn’t get married, but I changed my surname to Hamish’s for the kids.’
‘Oh.’ He mumbled, ‘You seem to have a lot of names.’
He obviously hadn’t read the tweets about me. There weren’t many compared to the ones about him, he must have just scrolled past them thinking they were irrelevant but I wouldn’t be able to keep it from him forever. I made a note to get my lies in order.
The voice crackled awake again. ‘Come down to the main house please, madam. Mr McKay said you know where the side car park is.’
The barrier lifted and we drove on a road of flawless tarmac, passing stables on the right, a paddock on the left, heading up an incline. As we crested the small hill the scene opened up as if scenery flats were being raised from below a stage.
First the hills across the water rose into view, pale and round. Then the sea became visible on the left, molten grey with the winking lights of oil rigs in the bay for repair. They stood ankle-deep in the shallow water, like giants wading, home for tea. Lastly, the castle rose up from behind a screen of strategically grown trees.
Fin gave a low ‘whoa’ and I felt a spark of pride as if it were my own house.
The castle was turreted and asymmetric, gloriously uplit by spotlights hidden in the shrubbery. It was built of vibrant yellow sandstone and had lights on in every window, each dressed with matching curtains. Despite the scale, it looked welcoming, like we had been invited to someone’s lovely home for a party.
We drove past and around to the side car park. This was strictly for residents only and was surprisingly empty, just a couple of large cars. I had never been there in November. We got out, locked up and crunched across the thick gravel to the main door. A stone portico, big and high enough to shelter a horse-drawn carriage, shielded the door. The giant storm doors sat open to a stone vestibule with a small cloakroom for wet clothes and muddy hiking boots.
The uniformed doorman greeted us very formally and opened the elaborately engraved glass inner door, inviting us into the house proper.
He left us to go and find Mr McKay.
The central hall of Skibo Castle, I have to say, was the most laughably opulent bit of domestic architecture I’ve ever seen. The room was two storeys high with an elaborate carved wooden gallery running all the way around, leading off into the bedrooms. A giant wood log was burning in the oversized fireplace and giving off a soft heat. Two red sofas flanked it, sitting on a giant Persian rug. But the stairway is where the whole room went nuts. Straight across from the entrance a massive butterfly staircase had a big church organ under its left armpit. The copper organ pipes glinted, reflecting the lazy fire behind us.
At the half-landing, where the stairs bifurcated, was a giant wall of stained-glass images commissioned by Andrew Carnegie. These depicted the good works performed in vivo by Carnegie. It didn’t show him ordering Pinkerton men to shoot at strikers or dodging Frick at parties. It didn’t show mutilating accidents in smelting plants. It showed Carnegie in a frock coat, smiling among adoring workers, doling out advice and being admired by the poor. Once, quite drunk, I stood in front of it with Adam Ross and we laughed for fifteen solid minutes at the many layers of stupidity.
There is so much screamed symbolism in the hall, it was a mercy that I was never there for Christmas.
The doorman came back in and shepherded us through a little door to the dark servants’ corridor. Most of the house is given over to hidden corridors for servants to scurry through and stay hidden. We walked down to Albert’s office door. The doorman gave it a cursory knock and opened it.
The office was small; a coal fire glowed in the grate. Bookshelves of grey box files lined the walls. The desk was immaculately tidy, nothing on it but a pen and a notebook, closed. Not even a computer. Albert McKay stood up from his desk and gave a small bow. ‘Miss McLean,’ he said, as if I had just left the room and come back in again for my scarf.
I swear he was wearing an exact copy of the clothes I had last seen him in nine years before: a white shirt, waistcoat, green moleskin trousers and brogues.
We both fought off warm smiles.
‘Hello, Mr McKay. This is my friend, Fin.’
Albert came round the desk and shook Fin’s hand. I could see Albert assessing Fin, looking him up and down, pricing his clothes.
‘Mr Cohen, it’s very nice to meet you.’
Of course he knew who Fin was. It was Albert’s job to know who every potential visitor was. His interest in Fin was deferential which meant that he hadn’t researched him and didn’t know Fin was penniless.
‘What a lovely place,’ said Fin politely.
Albert thanked him. ‘Shall we go to my house,’ he said, but it wasn’t a question and he didn’t ask me why I was there, which seemed strange.
He lifted his jacket from his chair and led us out and down a corridor to a back door.
Outside, we skirted a windless wall of the castle and cut across a grassy verge to a wide private road that led all the way through the grounds. Giant redwoods lined the driveway. The grass on either side was so green and neat that it looked fake. The grounds were very grand, much more so than the house. The castle was set in the Tidy Wilds, a countryside without the smells or rabbit shit or mud. I liked it. I don’t really like the countryside.
I said to Albert, ‘It’s very quiet, isn’t it? I was surprised they let us in through the main house.’
‘Mr Ross called to say you were coming up with Mr Cohen and I told them to let you in.’
‘I need to ask your advice about something.’
Albert hummed. ‘I thought so… Wait until we get into the house.’
We took a turn off the main road, down to the left, on to a path that overlooked the glass dome over the swimming pool. We looked down and I nudged Fin so he didn’t miss the sight of it.
It was dark inside the round glass dome. It looked like a steampunk spaceship neatly parked on the banks of the lake.
‘How is Adam?’ asked Albert.
‘Not dead.’
Albert shook his head, ‘A Lazarean miracle, that boy. Keeps OD’ing and being brought back from the dead. His poor mother.’
‘God, what he’s put her through!’ I said, but we were both smiling. Adam was so likeable that even OD’ing sounded like an amusing foible.
We were some way down the road before I remembered that we had parked back at the castle. ‘Should I move my car?’
Albert thought for a moment. ‘What kind of car is it?’
‘BMW.’
‘What year?’
‘Last year. It’s an X5.’
‘Fine, leave it. We’re quiet at the moment.’
Hamish’s car was fancy enough to be parked in the Skibo guest car park. He would have been pleased.
Albert led us along the road for a short while and then cut across a side lawn. Frosty grass crunched underfoot. Fin looked up and gave a gratifying coo of appreciation.
The cottage had been built as one of the members’ luxury lodges but Albert got to live there because there was a problem with the sauna which was somehow never fixed.
The walls were red-stained slatted wood, left rough at the edges, giving the outer walls an organic, undulating texture. A green porch ran all the way around and the porch overhang was supported by green-stained tree-trunk pilasters, the nubs of amputated branches still discernible.
Albert walked up to the porch and stopped at the front door. His hand hesitated on the handle. Fleetingly, I wondered if he had a boyfriend living with him, or a miniature horse for a wife or something, and felt he should introduce the fact before walking us in. But
he said nothing and opened the door.
I was hyper-vigilant again. I hadn’t had that since I left Skibo. It may have been returning here that brought it all back after all these years. It was very uncomfortable. Everything felt like a potential threat. It was hard to filter noise and sights.
There was no one in there. It was very plain inside, no personal effects or photos anywhere. It looked like a show home but that was Albert’s style. Lux-functional.
He shut the door behind us and asked, ‘Sherry, anyone?’
I teased him, ‘Who drinks sherry?’
‘I do.’ He smiled. ‘Tea then?’
We settled on that and followed him into the kitchen, which I don’t think he liked. There was a single meal from the castle kitchen defrosting on the worktop. It had the calorie count written on the cover and I thought this might be what he was embarrassed about.
We sat at the kitchen table.
‘So, what did you want to ask me about, Anna?’
‘Do you remember a Dutch club member called Lillie Harkän?’
He sang suddenly in a rich baritone: ‘Lillie Harkän, sweet Lillie Harkän,’ to the tune of ‘Lili Marlene’.
I joined in and Fin looked confused.
Albert explained, ‘Ms Harkän was a rather negative lady–’
I clarified: ‘She was a whiny bitch.’
Albert rolled his eyes in an all-too-familiar gesture and told Fin, ‘A rather negative and, sadly, unfortunately mannered lady. Rarely was there an interaction with the staff that did not end in acrimony on her behalf. And so, when we returned to staff quarters to find that softer pillow or whatever, we would sing “Lili Marlene”.’
‘Instead of saying what a cow she was.’
‘Because that leaves you in a bad mood and unable to deliver service to the next guest.’
