Hold Hands in the Dark (5 page)

Chapter 9

D
ani had arranged to meet Sam Sharpe on Kennedy Street in Glasgow, outside the impressive stone curved frontage of the St Mungo Academy of Music.

              The American detective was late so Dani bought herself a cappuccino from a stall and sat on a bench where she could listen to the distant rumble of the M6. Finally, she saw him step out of a cab and jog towards her. He wore a thick padded jacket, despite the weather seeming quite mild to the DCI.

              ‘Sorry, Dani. I got held up. Bill and Joy insisted on driving me to the station. We took a couple of sight-seeing detours along the way.’ He gave her a crooked grin.

              ‘Not a problem. I can imagine the scenario well.’

              Sam sat on the bench beside her. She could feel the heat from his body warming her leg. ‘It didn’t take long for me to find out that Victoria Faulkner is now known as Vicki Kendrick. She teaches here at the College of Music.’

              ‘Wow. Do you think she knows her brother is dead?’

              ‘I’m not sure. Did any member of your department inform her?’

              Sam shook his head. ‘Nope. I didn’t even know she existed until a few days back. Because she’d never followed her family to the States, I kinda supposed she was dead, maybe. The lady was certainly off the scene.’

              ‘That’s true. She’d been off the scene for nearly forty years, as far as the Faulkner family were concerned. But in Scotland the woman is actually quite well known. Vicki Kendrick is a renowned concert pianist. Even
I’ve
heard of her and I’m no connoisseur of classical music. She’s been on television a lot and toured the world. According to her website, she played at Carnegie Hall last year.’

              ‘So, she was in NYC. Do you think she visited Dale in Virginia whilst she was there? He never once mentioned he had a famous sister. Geez, you’d think he’d be proud of it.’

              ‘Vicki has travelled all around the world during her career. It seems incredibly odd that she never visited her family in Richmond. It’s not like she didn’t have the resources to do so.’

              ‘Then the woman lacked the inclination to see her folks. The question is,
why
?’ Sam stood up. ‘Let’s go right ahead and ask her, shall we?’

*

The inside of St Mungo’s was just as impressive as the exterior. A flight of sweeping stone steps disappeared up into the second floor. Dani could see that a series of assembly halls and practice rooms populated the ground level.

              A receptionist called up to Vicki Kendrick’s office. She supplied the detectives with a map printed onto a folded leaflet to help them find where they were going. The place was a maze of echoey corridors and marble pillars, each one identical to the last. Eventually, they found the room which boasted Ms Kendrick’s name on a plaque on the door.

              ‘Come in!’ A voice called out brusquely.

              Dani entered first, holding out her warrant card and introducing herself and Sam.

              The woman remained seated. Dani had seen the musician a couple of times on chat shows but in the flesh, Vicki appeared small and vulnerable. Her face was expertly made up and her hair a very natural looking deep auburn.

              ‘Please take a seat. How may I help you?’

              The accent was definitely refined Scots, Dani noted, but her intonation so soft that the effect was fairly generic. She could have originated anywhere in the western world. The DCI could tell that her companion was struggling to connect this rarefied music teacher with his dead friend.

              ‘Ms Kendrick, is it correct that you were born Victoria Mary Faulkner, at the Glasgow Infirmary in the October of 1965?’

              ‘Yes, that is correct. Although, I don’t tend to broadcast my age, Detective Chief Inspector. As a woman in the performing arts you learn very quickly to be a little vague about the specifics.’

              ‘And your parents were Magnus and Susan Faulkner, resident of Crosbie Farm, West Kilbride at the time of your birth.’

              She crinkled her brow, displaying the tell-tale lines that revealed more than a false birth date could ever hope to obscure. ‘Why is this important?’

              Sam leant forward, resting his elbows on his knees. ‘I’m very sorry to inform you, Ma’am, but your brother, Dale, passed away in the line of duty a month back. I knew him well and he served his adopted country with bravery and honour.’

              Dani examined her reaction closely.

              Vicki put a hand to her face and abruptly stood up, moving towards the tall window behind her desk and gazing out at the view of the city it afforded. They allowed the woman a few moments to compose herself.

              ‘When had you last seen your brother, Ms Kendrick?’ Dani asked gently.

              Vicki turned back to face them. Looking pale, but with no tears having been shed, she replied quite simply, ‘the 25
th
July, 1976.’

Chapter 10

V
icki Kendrick had finally ordered up some coffee for the detectives and moved them over to a soft seating area in the far corner of the office.

              ‘Did you know Dale well?’ The woman asked hesitantly, stirring a sachet of sweetener into her drink.

              Sam nodded. ‘He was a friend and colleague of mine for over twenty years. Dale was a very good cop and a great dad. He wasn’t such a success as a husband, but then he sure wasn’t alone in that.’

              Dani shot him a sideward glance, but Sam’s expression was jovial enough.

              ‘So, there are children?’ Vicki was struggling even to make eye contact with her visitors.

              ‘Kyle, he’s twenty six and the oldest. Then there’s Lilly, she’s twenty four and Grace, who is eighteen. They’re all grown up now but lived with their mom following the split. Dale was close to all three. They’re great kids.’

              Dani shuffled forward. ‘Is there a reason why you lost contact with your parents and brother?’

              Vicki shrugged her narrow shoulders. ‘When Dad decided that we should move away from the farm I was eleven years old and Dale was eight. Music was already a major part of my life. I’d won a scholarship to a private school in Glasgow that had fantastic facilities for the arts. My parents made the decision that I would stay in Scotland with my grandmother and continue my education here. It proved to be the right choice.’ The woman gestured to her ornate surroundings, as if to illustrate the point.

              ‘But I don’t see why that meant you couldn’t still visit your family in the holidays?’ Dani was genuinely puzzled.

              ‘Virginia is a very long way away and it felt like a million miles in the late seventies. We had little money for air fares in those first few years. I got wrapped up in my playing and began performing at the age of fourteen, the practice was continual. I was close to my gran. It didn’t seem necessary to dwell on the past.’ Vicki put the china cup to her lips, preventing any further discussion on the subject.

              ‘It doesn’t appear worth asking then, if you knew of any reason why someone would want your brother dead, as you’ve had no contact with him in forty years.’

              Vicki shook her head. ‘I really couldn’t say. I’d have thought his death would more likely have something to do with him being a detective than with his life here in Scotland. Dale was only a little boy when he left.’

              ‘Did your grandmother keep in contact with your parents, after they moved to America?’ Dani was determined to persist with this line. She found the way the family had split up distinctly odd.

              Vicki appeared uncomfortable. ‘I suppose she must have done, with my mother, at least. But we never discussed it. Every family has their own way of dealing with difficult situations - that was ours.’

              Sam stood up, indicating that the questioning was over. He put out a hand and shook hers warmly. ‘Thank you for your cooperation, Ms Kendrick. When we’ve got the investigation completed, I’ll send you the details of your brother’s funeral. I really hope you can come.’

*

The detectives found a nearby café and took a window seat.

              ‘Well, that was weird.’ Sam ordered more coffees, with accompanying pastries this time.

              ‘Vicki described the situation that evolved between her and her parents as
difficult.
I wonder what she meant by that.’

              ‘If the family were forced to move to the States for financial reasons, but Vicki chose to stay behind, then that would have caused a serious rift. There would’ve been resentment on both sides.’

              ‘But enough to mean there was no contact between a little girl and her mum, dad and brother for all those years? It just doesn’t feel right.’

              ‘No, it doesn’t. But like the woman said, every family deals with this stuff differently.’ Sam offered the DCI a slice from an impressive looking cream cake.

              ‘Thanks.’ Dani discovered she was starving and gratefully tucked in.

              ‘We’re judging those folk by our own standards. Hell, I can hardly comment. My boys are in Vancouver for Christ’s sake.’

              ‘But you visit them loads and speak every few days. This situation with the Faulkners is quite different. Vicki had been to America dozens of times with her performances, but never once looked up her parents. Now they’re all dead and it’s too late.’

              ‘Yeah, it’s a tragedy whichever way you look at it.’

              ‘And Vicki was very quick to suggest that her brother’s murder had nothing to do with his past here in Scotland.’

              ‘Well, she had a pretty good point there. What could the eight year old Dale Faulkner have done, growing up in a remote farm in West Kilbride that got him executed at gunpoint, three and half thousand miles away and near as dammit forty years later?’ Sam’s expression was incredulous.

              Dani said nothing. Slowly lifting her cup and washing down the sweet, delicious pastry, she was deep in her own thoughts.

Chapter 11

J
ust as Hemingway had threatened, work was carrying on as usual in the huge hanger of the yard where the new warship was being constructed.

              Dani had accompanied her colleagues to the accident site. They had brought a tech team with them, who were currently re-examining the platform from which Tony MacRae fell to his death.

              The DCI gazed around her in wonderment. The workers on platforms, way up the side of the enormous steel funnels looked like tiny wee ants in the distance. She was amazed by the sheer size of the operation.

              Andy noticed her interest in their surroundings. ‘Just imagine, Ma’am, there were shipyards exactly like this one, up and down the Clyde after the war. It’s a tragedy that a whole industry was wiped out so quickly.’

              Dani glanced at him. ‘Do you have a connection to the shipyards?’

              Andy shrugged. ‘My Da’ had a few cousins who worked on the big ocean liners back in the fifties. They were both involved in the walk-outs that took place during the late sixties.’

              Phil tutted under his breath. ‘Those men signed their own death warrants,’ he muttered.

              Andy spun round. ‘What do you mean by that,
sir
?’

              ‘Well, when folk are trying to cope without power for three days a week and piles of rubbish are lying around the streets, twitching with rats, public opinion is hardly going to be sympathetic to yet more industrial action. They actually made it easier for the government to shut those shipyards down.’

              Dani could see that Andy’s face had reddened with anger.

              ‘Jimmy Reid’s ‘work-ins’ did the opposite of that. His union men made sure they completed orders and kept tight discipline. The public were totally on side. Even Heath’s government in ‘72 had to give in eventually and keep the Govan yards open.’ The DS had his fists clenched down by his sides.

              ‘Only for a short while. They were simply delaying the inevitable.’ Phil petulantly kicked the pointed toe of his shiny shoe against a crack in the concrete floor. ‘My parents recall that era very well. It was a difficult time for most hard-working Scots. My old grannie nearly froze to death in her bed one night, when there was no electricity for the heaters.’

              Dani held up a hand. ‘I don’t quite see where this discussion is going to get us. We’re here to find out what happened to Mr MacRae, not recreate the class conflicts of the seventies.’

              ‘Tony’s father-in-law was Alec Duff, one of the most prominent union men of his generation. Perhaps that had something to do with the foreman’s death?’

              Dani shook her head. ‘I don’t think so Andy, the power of the unions is long gone in this profession. It doesn’t sound like Tony was a rabble-rouser. He was desperate to fulfil this order and keep his job.’

              One of the techs clambered down from the platform and approached the officers. ‘We can see where the scaffolding had become unsafe, Ma’am. A metal clip had snapped right in two, but it’s been fixed recently. One of the workers showed us where a new clip had been secured over the broken piece. He said it was done yesterday.’

              ‘So, our
friend
Raymond Hemingway has been tampering with the scene,’ Andy added with venom.

              Dani shot a glance at Phil, to see how he would react to this. The DI’s expression remained impassive. She turned back to address the technician. ‘Finish up with your evidence gathering, will you, Todd? Then we can get back to Pitt Street and send any samples to the lab. We’ll let the management at Hemingways squirm for a week or so longer whilst we await the results. Then I think we’ve done all we possibly can for poor Mrs MacRae.’

*

Dani had been keeping a close eye on Phil all day but couldn’t fault his actions. Everything was done by the book, as it always was with the DI. He certainly was the last person she would ever suspect of being corrupt. She and Andy had known the man for nearly fifteen years. He wasn’t a working class warrior like Calder but Phil had his principles nonetheless.

              With James out of the flat, Dani filled her evening reading an online biography of Alexander Duff, Nancy MacRae’s father, on her laptop.

              Duff had been born on the Southside of Glasgow during the Great Depression of the 1930s. His father had served in the navy during the Second World War and was a welder by trade. Alec followed in his father’s profession and worked for several of the large shipbuilding firms in the sixties before becoming a shop steward in the Marine Workers, Shipbuilders and Designers Union. Duff was known for his toughness and staunch principles, earning him the role of union secretary in ’72. This was the position Alec had held until his murder at the Ferris and Brewer strike in ’82.

              Dani had been too young to remember the news coverage at the time, but had certainly watched documentaries about Duff since his death. He was gunned down by a shipworker at Ferris Brewer called Eddie Lambert, who’d been driven half mad by trying to support his large family on strike pay.

              Lambert went into hiding after the shooting but was found by police at the home of an associate in Govan a week later. The man was convicted of murder in the spring of 1983. He died of lung cancer in Barlinnie in ’98.

              She shook her head solemnly. The entire situation struck her as tragic. These men were fighting to cling onto an industry that was doomed. The British government in the eighties was hell-bent on closing the yards. Just like the miners in ’84, these workers were fighting a futile battle. It was the families who suffered most. Whether it was a battle that still needed to be fought depended upon your view of history.

              Dani finished her glass of wine and stood up, deciding she may as well get an early night. Then came a sharp knock at the door. James had his own key and would simply have let himself in if he was returning earlier than planned.

              She pulled her oversized cardigan more tightly around her body and padded down the corridor, placing an eye up to the spyhole, pausing for a fraction of a second before opening up.

              Sergeant Sam Sharpe stood on the doorstep.

              ‘Is there something wrong with your hotel?’ Dani wanted to be jovial, but this nocturnal visit was most unwelcome.

              ‘No, it’s great, actually. There’s been a development, can I come inside?’

              Dani took a step back, sighing with resignation as she allowed the American to brush past her into the flat.