‘I’m not talking about the accident, Inspector. I mean Sandra Millar is suffering from pronounced anxiety, she’s under a serious amount of stress and confusion. Her nerves are bad, she blacks out and she’s got memory loss.’
‘That’s convenient,’ said Valentine. ‘Have you any idea how many murder suspects I interview with memory loss, Doctor?’
‘I don’t mean to make it sound like she’s affecting these symptoms, she’s really not well. She’s likely to be suffering some form of post-traumatic stress, that’s a fragile state for anyone to be in. I’m merely asking you to be considerate of that.’
Valentine turned for the door, grabbed the handle, ‘I’ll bear that in mind, Doctor.’
As the DI opened the door a flat-screen television, suspended on a bracket above the bed, was the only source of light. He flicked the switch on the wall and illuminated the whole room. A huddled mass, curled in the middle of the bed, recoiled.
‘It’s all right, Sandra, you can catch up with the Hollyoaks omnibus on Sunday,’ said Valentine. He walked to the bedside, where he was joined by DS McCormack. Dr Caruthers moved to the other side of the bed and tried to settle his patient. As Sandra jerked upright in the bed her gaze darted between the two officers and the doctor who examined the catheter on the back of her hand.
Valentine was unmoved, he reached over Sandra and retrieved the remote control, flicked off.
‘I hear you’ve lost your memory, Sandra?’
‘Have I?’ her voice was a whisper.
‘Very good, of course you wouldn’t remember that either.’ He put his hands in his pockets. ‘Where have you been, my dear?’
‘I don’t know what you mean?’
‘Since James Tulloch was murdered in your kitchen, Sandra.’
‘Who?’
‘Oh, I see. You’re going to claim you don’t remember your boyfriend, now.’
Her face was impassive. Dark circles sat under her eyes, just above drawn cheeks and the straight, thin line of her mouth. ‘I remember Jade.’
DS McCormack spoke: ‘Where is Jade?’
‘I don’t know. I want to see her. She’s my daughter.’
‘But she’s missing, Sandra,’ said Valentine. ‘Just like you were until we found you rolling about on the High Street this morning. Yes, Jade’s missing. And Darry, your son …’
The officers looked for life in her eyes but nothing showed. The talk seemed to have stilled her nerves, she sat solidly in the bed and didn’t move.
‘I said Darry, do you remember him?’
‘I … I …’
Dr Caruthers intervened. ‘I think you’re confusing her. Perhaps if you eased off a little.’
‘This is a murder investigation, a man’s been stabbed to death … In her kitchen.’
Sandra’s face contorted, the thin mouth widened and she started to whine.
‘I think she’s had enough now,’ said the doctor.
Valentine’s voice rose. ‘I’ll decide when she’s had enough.’
‘No. Actually, Inspector, that decision is mine and I think my patient has had quite enough questions for one day.’
Sandra sunk into her pillow, sobbed into the bedclothes as Dr Caruthers tried to coax her to take a sip of water. The detectives watched, McCormack nodding towards the door; when Valentine’s eyes met hers he shook his head and continued with the questioning.
‘We have the knife, Sandra,’ said Valentine. ‘And footage of you throwing it in the river, what have you got to say about that?’
She mumbled, ‘Jade. I want my daughter. I want Jade. She needs me. I’m all she’s got …’
‘That’s right, her father’s dead too isn’t he? You remember that bit OK.’
Dr Caruthers put down the glass of water and stepped towards the officers. ‘That’s enough now! You can see the effect your questioning’s having on her. I won’t watch her take a complete breakdown tonight, it’s time for you both to leave. Now.’
28
It had been a day to forget for DI Bob Valentine. From the less than enthusiastic report the Glasgow boffins delivered to the encounter with Dino – and the realisation that she was more attached to the idea of sucking up to Major Rutherford than helping the case – things could hardly get worse. Sandra Millar turning up should have improved matters, but after visiting her in hospital it was obvious that she couldn’t be of any use to the investigation. She was clearly not well; even if she admitted to the murder the chances of the fiscal taking it on were doubtful without some forensic evidence too. If it did go to court the defence would have the stronger case. It would be one more thing for Dino to use against him, and the attendant bad publicity would be yielded like a lash on the force. And anyway, Valentine wasn’t convinced that Sandra Millar was the killing type.
He had met many like her before. Demure, hard-done-by women who had snapped after a lifetime of beatings and brutality. Men weren’t immune either, he’d encountered the disorder in both sexes. The usual MO seemed to be that they took the abuse for years, listened to the belittling voice for so long that they believed it, and then almost in spite of themselves some animal instinct arrived and they attacked. It was as if human beings were only able to take so much torture before their programming, or was it just a preference, to fight took over. He’d seen a Kilmarnock woman from way back who had lasted to her seventieth year before spiking her husband’s morning coffee with paraquat then casually calling in the police. She said she had never had such a good night’s sleep afterwards; her conscience was intact. That wasn’t the case with Sandra Millar, she was bothered by something, but what? It was against his experience for someone like her to kill and then crack, normally it was the other way about. Sandra was deep in guilt about Tulloch’s murder, and that confused the DI.
As Valentine put the key in the door to his home he was surprised to see a light still on in the living room. It wouldn’t be Clare, surely; she would have went to bed long ago. As he stepped inside his curiosity subsided as he found his father nodding into sleep in the armchair.
‘Still up, Dad?’ he said.
His father’s head jerked upright. ‘Och, just about. I’ve been dozing off for the last wee while.’ He sat up, put the picture he was holding on the arm of the chair; the action seemed to spark his memory. ‘I called you at work today.’
‘I saw that, sorry I meant to call back.’
‘Not at all,’ he interrupted. ‘I thought it was a silly enough thing for me to be calling you. I didn’t disturb you or get you into bother did I?’
Valentine found the suggestion, after all of today’s troubles, mildly humorous. ‘No, Dad, it’s fine.’
‘It was this, you realise.’ He held up the picture that had been drawn by Hugh Crosbie. ‘What a likeness, it is.’
The detective put his briefcase on the floor and started to remove his jacket. He hadn’t expected a response to the picture, he didn’t really know what he expected to come of it when he took it home. ‘You recognise him?’
‘Aye, well, I was going to say he’s …’ The old man cut himself off, started to rise from the chair. ‘Hear, you’ll want to grab your tea. Clare has something in the fridge on a plate, do you want me to heat it in the microwave?’
Valentine waved his father back down, impatience building, said, ‘Just be at peace would you? I’ll grab a bit of cheese on toast.’
‘Give you nightmares, at this time of night.’
‘Can they be worse than the ones I have during the day? Look, who’s this in the picture, Dad, are you going to tell me?’
‘It’s Bert.’ His father blurted out the name like it should have some meaning.
‘Who?’
‘Och, you’ll not know him. It’s Bert McCrindle, no doubt about it, he was your mother’s cousin.’
‘He looks before my time right enough.’ Valentine removed the picture from the arm of the chair. ‘A military man?’