The Bird That Did Not Sing (DCI Lorimer) (15 page)

T
here was something she ought to know, something she
wanted
to know, a feeling like a pain gnawing away at her insides that Shereen recognised as a guilty conscience. What had happened to the other girl? It was weeks ago now and she’d been told in no uncertain terms to keep her big fat mouth shut, or else.

Shereen still remembered the night when the girl they had called Celia had tried to escape from the flat, her tear-stained face turned to the older woman, eyes pleading for help. Then the door had banged shut, the footsteps receding until she could hear no more, only the distant sound of a car revving up on the street below.

Since then she had scanned every newspaper she could find, sitting for ages in the library or nursing a mug of coffee in Starbucks, but no report had ever appeared about the missing girl. Perhaps, Shereen thought, they had sent her back home; but she was only deluding herself with such hopes, she knew that. They had done something to Celia, something bad. She had seen the way the two men refused to meet her eyes later that night, a sure sign of their guilt.

‘Just look after Asa,’ one of them had told her gruffly when Shereen had dared to ask about the other Nigerian girl. ‘You do your job and we’ll do ours,’ he’d said, his voice low so that the other man would not overhear him. ‘Know what happens to a singing bird?’ he said.

‘What?’ Shereen shook her head. What the hell was he talking about?

The man looked at her intently, fingers rolling a folded newspaper.

‘A singing bird is never allowed to live. Everyone knows that,’ he whispered, twisting the paper slowly until it began to tear at the edges.

Shereen had shivered, hands covering her throat in a protective gesture.

Soon afterwards Asa had appeared to take the other girl’s place and Shereen recalled the way the young girl had smoothed the cover on the bed as though she had sensed someone had been there before her. Watching her grow in confidence had given the big woman a spurt of pleasure, enough to put Celia out of her mind, for now at least.

There had been a few clients climbing these tenement stairs now, Asa silently enduring their overtures; no doubt the pills she’d been given helped to put a veneer on these sexual encounters. Shereen had washed the bloodstained bedding after her first night, the girl’s stolen virginity clear for anyone who cared to see. She’d had to do the same the morning after the big man had satisfied his lust in an attempt to purge the memory of whatever he had done. Asa’s eyes had been dull as she’d sat fidgeting at the breakfast table and there had been no exchange of words between them. It was as if her spirit had been broken in some way, and the older woman had longed to take the girl into her arms, soothe her with false hopes. But she had done neither of those things. Shereen was a part of the young Nigerian girl’s pain, powerless to prevent it happening, and she hated herself for it.

Professor Solomon Brightman turned the page of the book he was reading, then put his hand back against his chin, a thoughtful look on his face. Nobody had invited him to do this background research, no pay cheque would tumble through his letter box with a thank-you letter from the police, but nevertheless he had decided to look into what he could find about child trafficking. One author had suggested that the statistical rise in such activity coincided with major events in or around the cities where trafficking took place and Solly’s interest had been piqued.

It was now May, and the Commonwealth Games were a matter of weeks away. Glasgow was filled with colourful signs. Everywhere he went there were posters and banners with the ubiquitous kilted mascot grinning from each and every one of them. At first the psychologist couldn’t help but grin back; the whole city seemed to be filled to the brim with a sort of wondrous anticipation.
Don’t
knock
us!
We’re
as
good
as
the
rest
of
them!
these banners seemed to be saying, and it was true. The news filtering out from the 2014 committee was all good. The athletes’ village had been completed to the highest of standards and would help in the regeneration of Glasgow’s East End; figures were already suggesting that tourism to Scotland was expected to achieve an all-time high and the number of Games workers in paid employment just kept rising and rising.

It was hard, therefore, to imagine a darker undercurrent to this city he had grown to love, a seamier side where underage girls were groomed to satisfy the sexual lusts of those visitors who were looking for a good time in more ways than one. Solly had even spoken to a psychologist friend who worked at the detention centre where illegal immigrants were placed prior to being repatriated to their homelands. His friend had some concern about a young African girl. Hints about an organisation had been given, no more than mere rumours, she had told him. Nothing substantial, no evidence that was worth taking to the authorities. But she was sure that something was happening, and Solly believed her.

Across the city Acting Detective Inspector Alistair Wilson stared at the latest report sheet on his laptop and swore under his breath. Nothing was coming right in this case, nothing at all.

‘Evidence, we need some evidence,’ he muttered darkly. But each time his team had come back empty-handed from the flat, the neighbours round about and the theatre where Gilmartin had spent his last afternoon. He had nourished hopes of a breakthrough when the tox report had mentioned the ginger wine.

‘It’s dark and sickly sweet,’ he’d told his colleagues, ‘a perfect base in which to mix a cocktail of drugs.’ The fact that it was normally a seasonal drink, found in the shops for New Year’s celebrations, had presented some difficulty, though when his wife, Betty, had reminded him that a cordial could be purchased to make the stuff at home, Wilson had become more positive. ‘If we find the bottle, we can test for prints,’ he’d told the team. But a careful search of the premises had produced absolutely nothing: no half-empty bottle, not even one that had been emptied then washed. Like many city flats, the one rented by the Gilmartins had a chute for rubbish, the large bins in the basement being collected on a weekly basis. Unluckily for the investigating team, the collection had taken place the Monday after Gilmartin’s death, so there was nothing at all to show if a bottle had been disposed of in that way.

‘Maybe they brought it and took it away again,’ McEwan had suggested, after one discussion about whether there had been more than one person involved in the murder. Wilson had merely grunted and gone back to the laborious work of finding CCTV footage in the area round about.

But here again he had drawn a blank. No images of Charles Gilmartin in the company of other people appeared in the grainy videos, just one of the man entering the building alone at six minutes past six, the time duly noted in Wilson’s report. He must just have missed his wife, as she had left round the back of the flats by taxi, though no CCTV footage covered that part of the complex. But Gilmartin couldn’t have spent the rest of the evening on his own, Wilson thought, despite the fact that no other figures had been seen following him, none but the residents who lived there and, much later, Mrs Gilmartin herself. But by that time, he was dead, Wilson reasoned. There were no internal cameras to snoop along the corridors or the lift and so he’d had to think of other ways a killer might have entered the building. Or had he been there all along? Were they looking for another resident, perhaps? But a door-to-door trawl had come up with nothing, most of the residents having sound alibis for their whereabouts on a Friday night, while those who had been on their own, like the eighty-five-year-old lady downstairs, appeared from the further checks that had been carried out to have no reason to poison the impresario.

And despite the dangling carrot of a reward, the press release had only brought time-wasters into their orbit.

It was more than puzzling, Wilson had confessed to his wife; it was frustrating, especially as this was a case where he had been appointed SIO and solving it might lead to a late promotion, something he and his wife had dreamed about for long enough now. The extra money in his pension would be a boost when he retired.

‘What about the wife?’ Betty had asked. ‘Isn’t poison supposed to be a woman’s weapon?’

Wilson had shaken his head. They’d been sitting in front of the TV, Betty watching her favourite television adaptation of Agatha Christie’s Miss Marple, when she had made the comment.

‘She’s got about a hundred alibis for the time of her husband’s death,’ he told her grumpily. ‘Lorimer included.’ And Betty had shrugged, said
oh
well
, and continued to stare at the screen.

It was Kirsty who had posed the other question, one a cop would ask:
who
benefits
from
his
death,
Dad?
And he’d told her. The sole beneficiary in Gilmartin’s estate was his wife. No children, no previous marriage, nobody else who would inherit what was an astonishingly large amount of money. He remembered how Vivien Gilmartin had shrugged as though she were completely indifferent to such wealth. ‘How can I enjoy it on my own?’ she had asked him, her fingers reaching for another handkerchief from the box thoughtfully provided by Maggie Lorimer. And Wilson had nodded, silently thinking of how he would feel if it had been Betty. His world would be empty without her, and no material benefit could ever compensate for that kind of loss.

Now he was staring at his screen again, trying to work out who could have possibly entered the flat that night, a niggling voice telling him that this was one case that might remain unsolved due to lack of evidence. He’d be branded as a complete failure, but worse than that, he would be letting down the detective superintendent, a man he considered his friend as much as his colleague, and that rankled more than anything. Tomorrow he would be heading down to London in the hope that some of Gilmartin’s theatrical colleagues might throw some light on to why this man had been killed. The thought of the long rail journey and nights spent in a cut-price hotel depressed him. This should be a job for someone more senior, he told himself, not for a DS who had begun to count the time until retirement.

‘
W
hy not?’ Rosie asked her husband as she lifted a pile of Abby’s clothes from the tumble dryer. ‘Lorimer wouldn’t mind, I’m sure of that.’

‘But the Chief Constable might,’ Solly murmured, thinking of the budgetary constraints of policing. Hiring a profiler for the case of one unidentified girl was very unlikely indeed.

‘Well, you aren’t looking for remuneration, are you?’

Solly smiled, his brown eyes twinkling through the horn-rimmed spectacles. ‘No,’ he said at last. ‘I just want to let him have a few facts. Perhaps his team already knows about it, though. I might look a little foolish. As if I were teaching my grandmother how to suck eggs.’

‘If I were that girl’s mother, I’d want every single fact laid out before the police, no matter where it came from,’ Rosie told him. She sighed. ‘Poor wee soul. More than likely her parents sold her to buy basic essentials. We don’t know how fortunate we are in this country,’ she added, looking at all the little garments on her lap. Abigail Margaret Brightman was spoiled for choice when it came to wee dresses and cute outfits, partly because her godmother, Maggie Lorimer, couldn’t resist passing the window of the Monsoon children’s department and often brought Abby a new frock with matching tights or a patterned cardigan. Then again, Rosie herself liked to browse the internet for new clothes for her little daughter. For an instant she felt a pang of guilt; the amount of money this pile of clothing folded on her lap had cost would feed several African families for a year or more.

‘All right. I’ll do it,’ Solly said. ‘An email first, I think, just to give him an idea of what I have found so far. Anything else would be intrusive.’

Rosie watched her husband as he left the room. There was enough paperwork on his desk here and at the university to keep him occupied for weeks, but still Solly wanted to find time to help in this case. Had it been her fault that he had become involved? Probably. Talking about the girl after the post-mortem, Rosie had made some observations on the likelihood that the dead girl had been lured into prostitution. ‘Maybe she was killed because she was pregnant,’ she’d wondered aloud one evening. Then the discussion had begun and her husband had followed it up by reading around the subject then talking to his colleague at the detention centre.

In the study next door, the professor of psychology tapped out a message to his friend. Lorimer would take it the right way, wouldn’t he?

They must know, Solly thought, pressing the send button. Surely they must know about such things going on in the city?

The sound of the door closing made Asa sigh with relief. The last one had gone and now she could have a shower before trying to sleep for what was left of the night. These acts of sex bothered her less nowadays, though sometimes one of the men would be rough and deliberately want to hurt her, the sound of her screams urging him on. Tonight it had been better than usual, just three men who had come into her room one after the other, speaking words she didn’t understand, but with voices that sounded as though they meant her no real harm. The last one had called her by name;
Asa,
he’d said, stroking her face gently, as though he had known her from a previous life. She had pasted on the false smile, just as Shereen had instructed her, lain there in the flimsy undergarments waiting for it to take place, desperate for it to finish.

Shereen kept the door unlocked afterwards so that Asa could shower and freshen up, then the bolt would be slid shut and the girl would lie awake, wondering what had brought her to this place. But tonight would be different. She could hear the sound of voices coming from the television, recognising the background music to the programme that Shereen watched faithfully. And tonight she was alone. Neither of her two African jailers was in the flat. It was the perfect opportunity for the girl to creep out unnoticed.

She dressed hurriedly, stuffing spare underwear and socks into the pockets of the fleece jacket that Shereen had bought for her. Twice she stopped to listen, but the only sound she could hear was from the television in the far room.

It was safer to leave the bedroom light on, confuse the older woman for as long as she could, Asa told herself, slipping into the bathroom and reaching out to turn on the shower tap. The noise of the water cascading into the empty bath drowned out all sound along the corridor. She closed the bathroom door behind her, hoping Shereen would fall for the ruse.

Then, holding her breath, Asa crept along the hallway, opened the big door and slipped silently out into the night.

Should she close it? Risk the sound echoing through the flat? For a desperate moment the girl hesitated, then she pulled it shut behind her, shuddering as the noise reverberated in the stone landing. The stairs wound down and round, three landings with doors on either side that made Asa’s eyes widen in fear lest someone should suddenly open one up and see her trying to escape. At last the bottom of the final flight of stairs approached, a space shrouded in darkness, shadows deepening in the corners, making her peer into the gloom in case someone was lurking out of sight. But there was nobody. And as Asa stopped to catch her breath, her throat constricted in a moment of sheer panic.

She had no idea where to go.

In front of her stood the big main door where her clients called for Shereen on the intercom, something the big woman had tried to explain to Asa in a charade of mimes. Beyond lay the kerb where she had been bundled several times into the car. If she could run fast along this grey street it would lead to the bigger road where Asa had seen shops and brightly lit buildings. On the last journey she had tried hard to take note of all the places between the flat and the city, though the signs that were written in English meant nothing to her.

The idea had come to her when they had passed two other vehicles; one was a black cab with the word
TAXI
emblazoned in yellow light, the other a big white car whose blue light flashed from its roof,
POLICE
written clearly on the paintwork. If she could find one of these, Asa reasoned, she might be taken to a place of safety.

Asa glanced behind her, noticing for the first time a narrow passageway that ended in a smaller door. Where did that lead? Should she make her escape a different way after all?

At that moment the sound of the buzzer made her jump.

Someone was at the door!

Heart thumping, Asa pressed her thin body against the wall, sliding into the shadows, feet taking her silently towards the back door of the close.

As the main door opened, she stood completely still, hardly daring to breathe. Would they see her hiding in the shadow of the stairs? She closed her eyes, willing the footsteps to pass her by, hearing the door swing shut again with a bang.

As the sound of the steps receded, Asa risked opening her eyes. He was gone!

Her hand felt all around the back door, seeking a lever or a handle, anything that would open it for her. Then her fingers closed around a hard, cold ring and she tugged, hoping to feel the door open. When nothing happened, she twisted it one way, then the other.

She let out a gasp as the door opened, cold air from the night streaming in, the faint glow of orange light from nearby street lamps illuminating the patch of grass that lay between this door and what looked like a high stone wall. She let the door close behind her, holding it carefully until she heard a dull click. Then she stood still, watching as her breath made faint ghosts in the night air.

It was wise to let her eyes become accustomed to the darkness. This was something the African girl had known all her life. Where she had come from, the stars lit up the sky, wheeling on their mystical courses. But here they were dimmed by that smouldering haze like a dust cloud hovering on the edge of the horizon.

At last shapes began to emerge and the girl could make out the barbed wire snaking across the top of the wall, a concrete shed containing dustbins placed at the far end of the path. There was no gate. No door leading from the back of the premises that she could see; just shrubs and trees straggling against the wall.

Asa crept on silent cat feet towards the shed, then stopped beside the wall where a tumble of ivy cascaded down to the ground. She blinked. There
was
a door. It had been hidden from her sight by the foliage, but now she could see the old wooden structure merging into the grey stones.

She pulled, but the door stood firm.

Once again she searched desperately for a latch, but her fingers found only an ancient keyhole set into the jamb of the door. With a sigh of despair she realised that the back gate must be locked from the outside.

Looking up, she saw that it, too, was covered in a curled strand of wire. No doubt the intention was to keep out intruders but, she realised with sinking heart, it also served to contain any prisoner trying to make an escape.

Suddenly she saw a light go on in the topmost flat and heard voices calling her name.

Shrinking back against the shed, Asa knew she had very little time to decide on a plan of action. Her feet found the lid of the first bin and she scrambled up, nails digging into the edge of the shed roof as she levered her body upwards.

Light shone from the back door.

‘She’s there!’ a man’s voice cried, and Asa saw a figure running towards her.

There was no time to think. No time to hesitate.

Biting back a cry as the barbs cut into her hands, she leapt over the wall and fell heavily to the stony path below.