Barry Maitland: No trace

Kathy fell silent. She decided it probably wasn’t a good time to ask him about Dead Puppies.‘I suppose your work would be a comfort.’

He raised his eyebrows as if the idea was bizarre. ‘A comfort? You make it sound like a nice cup of tea. Is your work a comfort?’

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘It is for most people, isn’t it? Something outside of your personal life to concentrate on.’ She had a sudden image of her flat, empty and cold since Leon had left.

‘Why, isn’t it going well, your personal life?’

Kathy blinked, as if he’d caught her out. ‘What about yours?’

‘I asked first,’ he said, and narrowed his eyes, looking at her as if at something to draw. ‘Let me guess, you split up with your boyfriend recently?’

He caught the flicker of surprise on Kathy’s face and added, ‘Doesn’t take a genius.’ His eyes travelled over her head and she felt even more annoyed to sense a blush in her cheek and an almost irresistible urge to run her hand through her hair.

‘That’s good,’ he said, his voice soft and almost seductive. ‘It’ll make you sharp. That’s what pain does. Those other cops who were here earlier didn’t look as if they ever feel anything. I think if anyone’ll find Trace, it’ll be you.’

‘Do you have a girlfriend?’ Kathy asked evenly.

‘I do have a friend actually, yes.’ He didn’t sound very enthusiastic.

‘Have you spoken to her this morning?’

‘Yeah. She’ll probably be over later.’

The crowd in the street had dispersed, Kathy saw. Lights were on in all the windows of the office buildings on the east side of the square, and all the parking spaces along the kerbs around the central gardens were occupied. A small green Ford moved slowly along Urma Street and turned down East Terrace, obviously searching for a spot, and when a parked van ahead signalled it was leaving the Ford quickly manoeuvred into its space. A grey-haired couple emerged from the car and began striding purposefully towards Gabriel Rudd’s front door. Kathy took the stairs down to the entrance hall and reached it just as the officer on duty there got up to answer the doorbell.

‘Len and Bev Nolan,’ the man said to the constable. ‘We’re the missing girl’s grandparents. I spoke to someone on the phone…’

‘That was me,’ Kathy said, and introduced herself.

‘Have there been any developments?’ They both spoke together.

‘I’m afraid not. Let’s go upstairs where we can talk.’

When they reached the first floor Kathy found that Rudd had vanished, presumably upstairs to his studio.

‘Where’s Gabriel then?’ Bev Nolan said, peering keenly around as if she expected to catch him hiding somewhere behind the furniture. Both she and her husband had lean features and trim figures. Their gestures were quick, and somehow communicated the impression of them being used to exercise and hard work. Recently retired, Kathy thought, perhaps still playing a sport.

‘He must have gone upstairs,’ Kathy said, ‘but I’d like the chance to talk to you both, anyway.’

‘I want to hear this from him,’ Len Nolan said, threateningly.

‘Please sit down,’ Kathy insisted, and reluctantly they did. They sat silently, listening intently, as she told them what was known so far.

When she had finished, Len Nolan asked,‘But how did they get in without making a noise? That’s what I can’t understand. Tracey’s bed is right next to the window. She’d have heard someone forcing the lock, surely, and cried out.’

‘It appears that, unfortunately, the window wasn’t locked.’

A growl of fury erupted from Len, and from his wife came a disbelieving cry,‘No!’

‘That useless bastard!’ Len fumed. He leaped to his feet and began pacing, unable to keep still. ‘We warned them, didn’t we, Bev? We said something like this would happen.’

‘That’s right, Len.’

‘But would they listen? Would they?’

‘No, Len.’

‘Warned who?’ Kathy broke in.

‘The Social Services. We told ’em that he’s irresponsible, unfit to be a parent. And that stupid woman told us that so were most fathers, but she couldn’t do anything about it. By God, I’ll have her bloody job for this.’

Len Nolan’s face had become deep red by this stage, and Bev said anxiously, ‘Yes, Len, but let’s hear what Sergeant Kolla has to say. Come and sit down, love, please.’

‘We even took legal advice.’

‘About what?’ Kathy said.

‘About getting custody of Tracey, that’s what!’ Len snapped angrily.‘And she told us we wouldn’t have a leg to stand on without evidence of abuse or neglect. I told her how he forgets to feed her, and lost her in the supermarket that day, and how he and his mates take drugs, and all she could say was…’ and he put on a pathetic, whining voice, ‘…“Get some evidence, Mr Nolan. Get something a court will listen to.” Yes, well, we’ve got that now, haven’t we, but it’s too bloody late!’

‘Mr Nolan… Len,’ Kathy said soothingly, ‘please sit down and take me through this a step at a time. I need to know anything that might be relevant to Tracey’s disappearance.’

‘Yes, Len,’ Bev said, patting the seat of his chair. ‘Sit down, love, and tell the sergeant.’

‘Oh Lord,’he said, rolling his eyes to heaven.‘Where to begin?’

But he did sit down again, and they told Kathy why they believed Gabriel Rudd to be a degenerate worm, as Len put it. No, they weren’t saying he interfered with his daughter, or was deliberately cruel to her, although sometimes they almost wished he were, because then they could have made people act. What they were saying was that he was irresponsible, negligent and completely absorbed in himself.

‘She has a nice home,’Kathy objected,‘clothes, food in the fridge. You should see the way some children live…’

‘Yes, yes, but he simply doesn’t care about her. It’s mental cruelty, neglect. He doesn’t speak to her for days on end. She’s a poor little soul.’

As they talked, pouring out an endless list of niggling complaints about their son-in-law’s inadequacies, Kathy sensed the big grievance that lurked unspoken in the background, and that had transformed disapproval of their son-in-law into outright hatred. Finally she put it to them.

‘Do you blame him for your daughter’s death?’

That brought them up short. They glanced at each other, uncertain how to answer the direct question. Then Bev Nolan said softly, ‘Yes, I do,’ and her husband, speechless for once, put his hand on hers and squeezed.

‘Jane was never really well after Tracey was born. Postpartum depression, the doctors said. They gave her drugs and told Gabe he had to look after her, but he didn’t. Quite the opposite in fact…’

‘Totally,’ Len jerked a nod of agreement.

‘… left her to herself, went out with his friends, didn’t help with the baby, in the night, and her so short of sleep…’

‘We did what we could, of course, but he didn’t like us coming round, made that plain as day. We had some rows, I can tell you.’

‘He drove her to it,’ Bev said decisively, ‘as surely as if he’d pushed her into the canal himself.’

‘And then he set about exploiting her death any way he could,’ Len added. ‘That was the sickest thing, the unforgivable thing, playing the tragic widower. He turned Jane’s death into a public spectacle.’

‘He sued the doctors-there was some question about the drugs they’d prescribed, and in the end they settled, though Gabriel wouldn’t tell us how much for. And then he did that dreadful exhibition about her.’

‘The Night-Mare. It won him that big prize. That’s where this all came from…’ Len waved a hand to indicate the house,‘…from the court settlement and the art prize. He had nothing before that. Always broke when Jane was alive.’