Gillian Galbraith - Blood In The Water

‘Why?’

‘It’s hard to say. He was polite, I never felt in danger or anything, but he was so desperate, begging almost, beseeching us. I suggested that he try in Inveresk-there are big houses in that part of the town-but he wasn’t interested, which seemed a bit odd. I thought he wanted to talk, but Ken thought that was fancy on my part…’

An ear-splitting shriek pierced the air and Alice looked round, startled, to find the source of the cry, and saw Davie smiling beatifically at an illuminated lava lamp. Elizabeth Henderson got up and patted his head fondly, and he appeared, momentarily, to catch her eye before returning his attention to his toy.

‘Is he alright?’ Alice asked, shaken, her ears still ringing from the eerie noise. ‘It sounded like he was in pain or terrified of something.’

‘He can’t help it, and I don’t think it means anything. He does it several times a day, sometimes at night too, and we’re just beginning to get used to it…’ the woman replied, handing her a cup of tea. ‘I nearly jumped out of my skin the first time, so did Ken, even though we’d been warned. I thought the boy had been burnt or scalded, hurt in some way, but there he was, smiling sweetly away to himself.’

The kitchen door bumped open and Alastair Watt entered, Donald Mair, now in cuffs, beside him. Both men were breathing noisily and their faces were cherry-red from the exertion of the chase. Mair’s head was bowed and Alice watched as he slowly raised it, took in his surroundings, caught sight of Davie and beamed. When the child, unaware of his uncle’s proximity, let out a little coo of pleasure as a big bubble of red lava erupted upwards, the man’s tender smile broadened. Despite the sweat running down his forehead, the curl of damp hair clinging to his bruised brow and his laboured breath, he appeared happy, as if being with Davie, simply looking at him, was enough for complete contentment.

‘Can I say goodbye to the laddie?’ he asked.

Without speaking, his escort moved towards the child, allowing Mair to accompany him. The prisoner placed his cuffed hands on the boy’s soft curls and twirled the fine, golden hair in his fingers before kissing the crown of his head. Davie’s attention, briefly, left his toy and he gurgled happily again as if aware of a familiar, benign presence at his side.

‘But he doesn’t want a solicitor, Ma’am,’ Alice said to DCI Elaine Bell defensively.

‘He needs one, so get him one anyway. The duty solicitor, please,’ her superior responded.

‘He’s adamant that he won’t have one, Ma’am. I can’t force him. He says he’ll speak to us but he wants nothing to do with “the law”, as he calls them. He knows his rights, and I told him it would be in his interests to have a lawyer in attendance, but he’s unshakeable.’

‘Just get the duty solicitor, Alice. Alright?’

So Alice sat and watched as Mair talked his way into prison, the tape recorder picking up every syllable and every pause, catching every word in order for it to be used against him. His legal representative might have been on Mars for all the attention he paid to her increasingly desperate attempts to protect him from himself. As he spoke it was like witnessing the actual moment when the dam bursts, the instant when the might of all the accumulated water causes the first crack in the massive structure and it forces its way out, splintering and smashing everything in its way.

‘I did do it,’ he began. ‘I killed them and each of them deserved exactly what they got…’ Alice nodded as if she understood, and, encouraged, Mair continued.

‘Teresa’s at rest now. We thought we’d get justice from the courts, but they are not courts of justice-injustice, more like. I know, I was there every day, so I saw it for myself. Teresa was not, WAS NOT, offered a Caesarean section by anyone…’ His voice rose in anger and he looked round as if to ensure that he had everyone’s full attention. Again, Alice nodded sympathetically at him, but she said nothing.

‘I know that. That’s what caused all the trouble, believe me. She was petrified, shit-scared, before Davie was born, she didn’t want to go through it all again, and if she’d known she could have had a section she’d have been at the front of the queue. We’d talked all about it, long before the laddie was born. But that Dr Ferguson said in court, in the actual courtroom, that he’d offered her one and she’d turned it down. Just lies from start to finish, but, of course, it was just her word against his, and you should have seen him, smart suit, smart tie, with the plums fairly falling out of his mouth. He’d even fixed the records, the hospital’s own records. There was no second meeting! When Dr Ferguson said it was supposed to have happened, Teresa, Sammy and the kids were on holiday in Ayr, but Teresa only remembered that once she got home after the trial was over and when she was talking to Granny Annie about it… so that Dr Clarke was lying when she said she’d checked with Ferguson and he’d said he’d offered…’

‘Why?’ Alice asked, ‘Why should Dr Clarke have been lying?’

‘I told you, she must have been lying, because Teresa was not offered a Caesarean section by anyone, I said…’

Alice interrupted. ‘Maybe she was telling the truth. It’s possible that she did ask Dr Ferguson and he, to protect himself, lied to her. She was his boss after all. He wouldn’t want to admit to her that he’d failed in something so important.’

‘Naw,’ he shook his head, ‘they’re all liars. They’re all in it together. Protecting each other, like, protecting the hospital too. And the judge was no better. He believed every word she said. She could have been singing nursery rhymes to him and he would have been happy enough. He couldn’t take his eyes off her, bewitched by her he was, and, make no mistake, she knew it. Smiling at him in her expensive suit and expensive shoes… and poor Teresa could hardly find the money for a new skirt for her own court case. You see, everything went on the kids, and she needed, she really needed that compensation money…’

‘Why did you kill Sammy?’ Alastair asked.

‘Because he deserved it!’ Mair responded immediately and aggressively.

‘Why did he deserve it? We need to know. Tell us, please,’ Alice said, keen to placate him and keep the flow running.

‘Because the wee shite left her to drown when she depended on him. She bloody loved him, too. Sammy was fine when the wean was a baby. Claimed him then, acted the proud dad even, but once things got hard, once the doctors started to say that he wasn’t right, that he would never be right, then Sammy didn’t want to know. Never changed him once, never got up in the night once. When Davie’s screaming began he’d just leave the house… leave it all… leave it all to Teresa. He was a useless cunt but he broke her heart when he left… and he wouldn’t even help her with the court case. She might never have killed herself if he’d stayed. It wasn’t because he’d found out anything… He didn’t know. I checked on that before I killed him.’

‘Found out? Found out what?’ Alice asked, puzzled.

‘That he wasn’t the dad.’

‘Do you know who the dad was?’

‘Of course I know. I was, I am.’

Noting the sergeants exchanging glances, Mair bellowed at them, ‘I know what you’re bloody thinking, but you’re wrong! It wasn’t incest and that’s not why he’s the way he is, it was the birth! I was adopted by Teresa’s parents when I was 10. Okay? You must be sick, the pair of you. I took their name, Mair. We are not blood relations, I’ve got no fucking blood relations. I don’t know how it happened with Teresa, it shouldn’t have, but it did, and just the once, believe it or not. But it was not incest. Davie should have been perfect. You’ve seen him, he would have been, if it wasn’t for those fucking doctors. Teresa and I knew from the moment he was born that he was mine. There’s photos of me as a baby and he was the split. Got the same birthmark even.’