She walked across to Discovery Point, where Captain Scott’s Antarctic exploration ship was permanently docked. It was a big tourist attraction for the area and Narey couldn’t help but think that being built to cope with winter at the South Pole was pretty handy preparation for a long winter in Dundee. The ship had been built in the city, right enough, so the people who put it together obviously knew a thing or two about surviving in a cold climate.
Her dad had taught her all about Captain Robert Falcon Scott and his Antarctic expeditions on the Discovery and the Terra Nova. She’d thrilled to his tales of the race to the Pole, of being beaten there by Amundsen and of Captain Oates saying that he was ‘going outside and may be some time’. Her dad was her own Captain Scott, her hero.
Narey instinctively reached for her mobile, feeling the need to hear his voice. She listened as it rang and rang, before finally going to voicemail but she hung up without leaving a message. She paced back and forth in front of the Discovery, looking up to the heavens to see the snow tumbling towards her, sticking out her tongue and catching flakes the way she had when she was little.
She phoned back and this time it was answered on the fourth ring. The voice on the other end sounded very small and a little afraid.
‘Hello?’
‘Hi Dad. It’s Rachel.’
A long pause. ‘Who?’
‘It’s Rachel, Dad.’
‘I don’t know a Rachel.’
‘Yes you do. I’m your daughter.’
‘Daughter? I don’t have a daughter. Who are you? Why are you saying this?’
‘It’s okay, Dad. Don’t worry. Look, I’ll call you later. Okay?’
‘No! Don’t call me. Don’t. I don’t know you.’
He hung up on her.
She stood in front of the ship and let tears run down her face, breathing hard, telling herself she was away from him for a good reason. She was there for him. She just wasn’t there for him.
She wandered away from the riverside and back towards the city centre, her collar turned up fruitlessly against the snow. People were hustling past her on either side but she’d rarely felt so alone. Tony was only about ninety miles away but it felt as if he were on the other side of the world. How far away would he want to be when she told him about her planned changes for their relationship?
In the end, the call from Kirsten came much earlier than Narey had expected. The professor had been in the lab since before it was light and she phoned to say that if Narey headed over to CAHiD, then the girl would be ready by the time she got there.
The College of Life Sciences was on Dow Street, only a ten-minute walk away and she hurried straight to it. The white, six-storey building looked impressively anonymous from the street but it held one of the leading centres in its field in the country, if not the world. Narey was shown up to Kirsten’s lab, a keen surge of expectation running through her and the adrenalin taking over from the despair she’d been feeling about her dad.
‘Wow, you were quick,’ Kirsten smiled from behind her computer screen as Narey came through the door. ‘Did you run?’
‘A bit,’ Narey admitted. ‘Is she ready?’
‘Almost. You caught me out slightly but… I’m just refining the skin tone to make sure… yes, okay. I’m happy with that. Do you want to see her?’
Narey knew she had no simple, satisfactory answer to a question like that. She was aching to see the girl but she was also scared about where it might lead. Be careful what you wish for, that’s what they said. Instead, she settled for a simple unsatisfactory reply.
‘Yes.’
Kirsten grinned and beckoned her to the other side of the screen. As Narey walked round the terminal, there she was, looking back at her as if she were real. Lily. Barbie. Fully formed, three-dimensional, not living or breathing, flesh but no blood. It was incredible. In little over a day, she had been transformed from skull to face, turning on the screen in front of them, all but alive from every angle.
‘There is some guesswork, of course,’ Kirsten warned. ‘But we have some very clever software and we can be confident it’s accurate. This is how she looked.’
Narey almost unconsciously took the seat in front of the screen and just sat there, staring at the girl. She watched her revolve slowly before her, still wondering who she was but knowing they were now so much closer to finding out.
‘Can you give me an image of this that I can send to Strathclyde?’
‘Of course. One touch of a button.’
‘Great. I want to send this to my DC. She’s the one who has been going through all the missing persons data. If anyone is going to be able to put a name to the face quickly, it’s her.’
Two minutes later Narey had Julia Corrieri on the other end of the phone and they were waiting for Barbie’s face to appear on her computer screen in Stewart Street.
‘What’s happening down there today, Julia?’
‘Pretty quiet at the moment, Sarge. I’d just come in to go through these files one more time before I go over to Vancouver Road to take over guard duties at Greg Deans’ house.’
‘How is he?’
‘Scared. Scared and very annoying. He is always… Hold on. It’s here.’
There was a tense silence on both ends of the line as the image unfolded before Corrieri.
‘I know her, Sarge. She’s on my list, I’m sure of it. Her name is…’ Corrieri paused to make sure she was right. ‘Claire Channing. She’s from somewhere in the north of England. Wait a mo, let me…’
On the other end of the phone, Narey puffed out her cheeks while Corrieri shuffled through some papers. It wasn’t impatience at the DC’s actions; it was tension, pure and simple.
‘Yes,’ Corrieri confirmed jubilantly. ‘Claire Channing. Born in May 1976. She was from Whitby in North Yorkshire. Her parents, Edward and Emily Channing, reported her missing in September 1992, the year before. And yet… sorry, hang on, Sarge.’
Narey could hear Corrieri softly reading aloud and sounding as if she had repeated it to make sure she had heard herself correctly in the first place.
‘Okay, Sarge. I could be wrong. The initial missing person’s report from North Yorkshire Police is the one that has the photograph attached but there is a follow-up from 1994 after the body was found on Inchmahome. They went back to the parents just in case but were told that it definitely wasn’t her. That was the last they had on it.’
Shit. Why could nothing ever be simple, Narey thought.
‘Email me the photograph of the Channing girl, Julia. But what’s your take on it looking at her?’
‘Well, I mean… I’m sure it’s her, Sarge. The likeness is very strong. I’d say that unless Claire Channing has a twin, then it’s her.’
Within minutes, the image from the North Yorkshire file had been spirited back up the line to Dundee and popped up on the screen before Narey and Fairweather. It was stunning. Narey couldn’t help but smile at the look of satisfaction on Kirsten’s face. She and her scanner and her software had done a remarkable job.
Narey sat in her car and pulled out her mobile, her overnight bag in the boot, ready to make the drive back south to Glasgow. First she called Tony and told him about Claire Channing and what she wanted him to do. Then, taking a deep breath, she hit another number, dreading it but needing to do it before she went any further. It rang.