Hold Hands in the Dark (17 page)

Chapter 42

D
etective Sharpe was beginning to get a little tired of women crying on his shoulder. First, he had to deal with the disgust and disbelief of Toni Faulkner. Now Cassie Sanchez was threatening to fall to pieces in front of him.

              ‘Take a seat, Cassie. I’ll send Pete out for some coffees.’

              The tears had started to slide down her smooth cheeks. ‘I just can’t get my head around it, boss. I read the medical examiner’s report. I saw the photos. Both the McNeils’ skulls had been caved in by a blunt object. Their bones had to be broken in order to stuff them into that refrigerator.’ The detective made a gagging sound. Sam thought she might vomit.

              ‘You need to go home, Cassie. Take a few days off. Fly down to visit your folks if necessary. I don’t mind. Forget about Dale Faulkner. We were all taken in. The guy must have been desperate to do what he did to those old folks, but even that’s not enough to explain the horror of it.’

              An overweight man in uniform placed a takeout coffee cup directly into Cassie Sanchez’s shaking hand. ‘Drink up sweetheart. I put plenty of sugars in there.’

              The woman did as instructed and seemed to calm down a little. ‘I will take some time off, thanks.’

              Sam leant forward. ‘You’ve had a lucky escape. You might have married the son-of-a-bitch without ever knowing what he was capable of. Look at poor Toni. She had three kids with the bastard. Go off and live the rest of your life, Cassie, and never for one goddam minute look back.’

              She nodded. Clearly recognising this as good advice, Sanchez lifted her jacket with one hand and with her coffee in the other, walked slowly towards the door, giving her boss a shaky salute on the way out.

              Sam turned his attention back to the file on his desk. He’d barely had more than a couple of hours sleep in a row since he discovered the McNeils’ suitcases in Dale’s basement. Since then, he’d scoured his old friend’s case files, diaries and appointments going back as far as when he first joined the Richmond PD.

              So far, Sam hadn’t discovered any anomalies. Dale had spent time in the traffic department and in narcotics before joining the homicide division. The detective had a good clear-up rate and was well regarded by his superiors. Dale had experienced his longest stint as a detective dealing with drug law enforcement. Sam picked up the phone and dialled the number of a captain he knew on that floor.

              ‘Hi, David, it’s Sharpe here, from Homicide.’

              ‘Hey, Sam. What can I do for you? Got a drug-related shooting for me?’

              ‘Not today. I’m interested in talking about Dale Faulkner. He worked for you guys for a while, is that right?’

              The man sighed. ‘Yeah, he did. One of my best officers, too. I can’t believe what they’re saying he did to those two old folks.’

              ‘You’ve heard then?’

              David chuckled. ‘You can’t keep anything quiet in a cop shop.’

              ‘I’ve looked through the cases Dale handled. He had a very good clear-up rate. Dale got involved in the prevention side too, didn’t he? Giving talks to high school kids, that kind of thing?’

              ‘Yep, that’s right. Dale actually understood that we were getting to these situations too late. Once the kids were hooked on crack they got sucked into street crime and couldn’t get out again. He got frustrated just mopping up the mess left behind.’

              ‘That type of citizenship doesn’t really fit with a man capable of a violent homicide.’

              ‘No, but Dale had some kind of personal experience of the damaging effects of drugs. That’s why he asked to get placed in my unit.’

              ‘In what way?’ Sam shuffled up straighter in his seat.

              ‘I dunno the details really. He told me about it a long time ago. There was a young girl he knew back on his folks’ farm. She was the girlfriend of his cousin, or somethin’ like that. The cousin went away and left her and this young girl couldn’t get over it. She started shooting up heroin and hanging about the Faulkners’ place making trouble. He said they tried to help her but she was beyond anything they could do by then.’

              ‘What happened to this girl?’

              ‘He never said. But they usually get picked up by a local pimp, start working the streets to support their habit. It’s a sad story, but not an unusual one.’

              ‘Thanks David, you’ve been a great help.’

              ‘Sure, no problem.’ The man cleared his throat. ‘I know Dale did somethin’ real bad, but I’m trying to focus on the good stuff he did, you know?’

              ‘Yeah, me too,’ Sam replied quietly, but he wasn’t really listening any more, his mind was busy running through the information he’d just heard.

Chapter 43

D
ani had spent a few hours tracking down the files relating to the disappearance of Joseph Faulkner in 1974. She had her whole team carefully scanning through the details.

              ‘I wonder if the SIO on the case is still alive?’

              Andy turned to his computer screen. ‘What’s the name, I can try the database?’

              Dani glanced back down at the pile of papers in front of her. ‘DI Maider, Francis P..’

              Andy tapped away for a few minutes. ‘Frank Maider, retired in 1995. There’s no record of his death.’

              ‘See if you can find out where he is now, would you Andy?’

              ‘Sure.’

              Dani looked again at her notes. ‘Joseph Faulkner, known as Joe, was a sheet metal worker by trade. He was thirty five years old when he went missing. Judging by the photos in the file, he was dark in colouring and good looking. I’d be amazed if there wasn’t a girlfriend somewhere.’

              ‘Several witness statements were taken from the Kingston Bar on Govan Road where he was last seen.’ Andy flicked back a few pages. ‘On the 19
th
December 1974.’

              ‘Joe had digs near the Southern General Hospital. The police never worked out whether he reached home or not that evening. He had plenty of belongings and his passport in the flat. But his wallet was missing along with him.’

              ‘Did Joe have a car?’

              Dani turned over several sheets. ‘It doesn’t seem so. His digs were near enough to the Ferris Brewer yard for him not to need one.’

              Andy looked up from the page. ‘If he travelled to the Faulkner place in Portencross, after the time he was last sighted, how did he get there?’

              Dani considered this. ‘Where did the other brother live – the older one?’

              ‘Keith Faulkner?’ Andy had to fish out his notebook for this information. ‘He died in a nursing home in Kilmarnock in 2013. I’ve no history of his former addresses, but I can find out.’

              ‘Can you do that? For now, I think we can assume Keith was in the Glasgow area in ’74. There were three brothers in that Christmas photograph I saw. Maybe Keith gave his brother a lift down to Magnus’s place?’

              Andy nodded. ‘It makes sense.’

              Dani rested her head in her hand. ‘Joe Faulkner was working at the Ferris Brewer Shipyard in 1974. He was a shop steward and must have been involved in the industrial disputes which went on during that time. Do you remember what it was like back then?’

              ‘I was only a bairn. But the people Sam and I interviewed in Portencross and Seamill spoke about it. Most workers were on a three-day week. They said the rolling power cuts were the worst. I remember my Ma talking about sitting in a hairdressers in the semi-darkness, her sopping wet hair dripping down the back of her neck, waiting for the electricity to come back on.’

              Dani looked up some information on her smartphone. ‘There were shortages of certain goods. People were panic buying candles for the power cuts. Folk had to boil kettles on open coal fires to get hot water. It sounds like a terrible time to be living through, like a war was going on or something.’

              ‘It
was
a type of war, I suppose - between the unions and their bosses.’

              ‘The old world and the new having a showdown.’ Dani crinkled her brow. ‘Magnus Faulkner and his wife provided food parcels for strikers at the steelworks on the Clyde. We assumed they did this because of their link to Joe. But it must have been a strain. They would have been struggling to support themselves during that tough time, let alone providing handouts to others.’

              ‘Perhaps Joe was pressurising his brother into contributing. Maybe Magnus finally had enough. It wasn’t
his
cause, after all.’

              ‘The situation reached a head that Christmas. Magnus told his brother that he couldn’t support the steelworkers any longer. He was going to concentrate on his own family from that point onwards.’

              ‘Joe was hot-headed, dedicated to his men and to keeping the ship-building industry in Scotland alive. The two men fought. Magnus may have been defending himself.’

              ‘But either way, Joe wound up dead. They got rid of his body and denied ever seeing him.’

              ‘Were the whole family involved? Even the wife, the kids?’

              ‘They must have been. Perhaps they saw what happened, were caught up in the argument, maybe even the violence.’

              Andy shrugged his shoulders in frustration. ‘This is just conjecture, wild theories. We’ve got absolutely no way of finding out the truth. All the possible witnesses are now dead.’ He counted them off on his fingers. ‘Magnus, Sue, Keith, Maeve, Dale and even Vicki – all gone.’

              ‘But maybe there’s still one more person who knows what happened. Another witness. The one who’s searching for justice, coming back to make sure the others pay for what they did. That’s who we need to find.’

Chapter 44

S
am’s flight had landed in the early hours of morning. He couldn’t check into his hotel until much later in the day, but he didn’t plan on wasting the time.

              After speaking with David in Narcotics, Sam went back to his notes. He was certain that when Dale had talked about a young girl hanging around his parents’ farm, he was meaning Crosbie Farm in Scotland, not their place in Virginia.

              Sam decided that Dale’s secret must have something to do with her. Perhaps she overdosed at the property and the Faulkners were unable to save her? Sam didn’t know for certain, but he felt he had a strong lead with this information.

              If the incident happened before the Faulkners took off for the States, then he was looking at the early seventies. Sam’s first port of call was to check out all the drug hostels and rehabilitation centres in Glasgow. It was a long shot that they would have records going back as far as forty years, but he didn’t have anywhere else to start. It was a needle in a haystack sort of task. But then Sam quite liked those.

              The American detective had already compiled a list of numbers and addresses on the plane. He zipped his jacket up tight to the neck and headed towards the centre of town.

*

Andy walked up to the door of the porter’s lodge and rang the bell.

              After a short wait, a woman slid back a plastic screen and peered out. ‘Who are you here to see, love?’

              ‘Frank Maider, number 16.’ Andy held up his ID.

              ‘Fine, go straight ahead and to the left. Frank’s place is one of the bungalows opposite the fountain.’

              ‘Cheers.’

              The retirement community on the outskirts of Castlehead was comprised of several streets of purpose built bungalows. The leafy areas were well maintained. Andy could see there was a clubhouse and bowling green. He knocked at the door of number 16.

              The man who answered was tall and lean. He wore a snazzy red shirt underneath a golfing jumper. ‘Morning DS Calder, please come inside.’

              Andy knew that Frank Maider was seventy nine years old, but judging by appearances he seemed younger. ‘Thanks for seeing me at short notice Mr Maider.’

              ‘Not at all, Detective Sergeant. I never stray far from my wee home these days.’ Frank headed straight for a small but functional kitchen. ‘Cup of tea?’

              ‘Aye, please.’

              ‘You’re looking back into the Faulkner disappearance?’ Frank glanced over his shoulder at his guest.

              ‘That’s right. We think the case may relate to a couple of murders we’re investigating now.’

              Frank gestured for Andy to take a seat in the lounge. ‘I always thought that case would rear its head again in the future.’

              ‘Why is that, sir?’

              ‘Because Joe Faulkner was a prominent member of the union back then, a real firebrand. His speeches were the cause of much of the industrial action and disturbance at Ferris Brewer during those years. My superior spat blood at the sound of his name.’

              ‘So you thought there was more to his disappearance than a drunken encounter with some villains on the river bank?’

              ‘Och, there was no evidence for it. Joe Faulkner just dropped off the radar after the 19
th
December ’74. We’d no witness statements claiming to have set eyes on him from that date onwards. Not even his family. I assumed he was dead, especially with the number of enemies the man had. I just wished we could’ve found a body at least.’

              ‘Enemies amongst the shipyard bosses, you mean?’

              ‘Aye, and more besides. Joe was a drinker and a jack-the-lad.’

              ‘Did you interview Joe’s brother and sister-in-law in Portencross after the disappearance?’

              ‘Aye, I spoke to them myself. A nice family. The other brother, Keith, he was a shifty type, but we couldn’t ever pin anything on him. The folk at the farm were decent people. But none of them had seen the man for at least a month. There were dead ends everywhere you turned in that case.’

              Andy sat back on the floral sofa and sipped his tea. ‘You said Joe was a jack-the-lad. Any girlfriends on the scene?’

              Frank glanced nervously about him, as if there may actually be someone else listening. ‘There
was
a line of enquiry that I was pursuing at the time, but it was on the hush-hush. Based mostly on rumours I’d picked up.’

              Andy clutched his mug tightly. ‘Oh, aye?’

              ‘We interviewed a few of Faulkner’s workmates. They all kept talking about a young squeeze that Joe had back then. We’re talking
very
young.’

              Andy narrowed his eyes. ‘
Illegally
young?’

              Frank whistled. ‘Fifteen, maybe sixteen years old. I couldnae make a proper connection between this and his disappearance.’ He put a veiny hand to his stomach. ‘But I had a feeling this relationship was important. I just knew.’

              ‘Surely a fifteen year old lassie couldn’t have been responsible for the disappearance of a well-built thirty-five year old man?’

              Frank shook his head. ‘No, of course not. But it was who Joe’s co-workers claimed the lassie
was
that sent little shivers down the back of my spine.’

              ‘Who was she?’

              ‘Only the daughter of one of the most powerful men in the shipworkers’ union back then. He became the General Secretary, for Christ’s sake. Joe must have met her through him, at a meeting in his house maybe. Whichever way it was, that relationship was a dangerous one for Faulkner to be pursuing. It was always my theory that the father found out and had him ‘dealt with’. Of course I can never prove it. Then he was gunned down in the early eighties.’ Frank lowered his voice to a whisper. ‘It was only
Alec Duff’s
daughter Joe was having it away with. That’s why I expected this case to come around again one day. I can’t recall the lassie’s name, but I hear the Duffs had terrible problems with her after Joe was gone. Drugs and other stuff. Too much too young my Sheila always used to say.’

              Andy was already on his feet. ‘Nancy.’

              ‘What was that?’

              ‘Alec Duff’s daughter is called Nancy.’

              ‘Yes, that was it. Pretty name.’

              ‘I’m sorry sir, but I’m going to have to get going.’

              ‘No, that’s fine. My visitors never tend to stay very long. I’ve got used to it.’