Summoning the Dead (DI Bob Valentine #3)(9)

‘That was the big old building, next to the farm. The one that’s all boarded up now?’

Valentine nodded as he walked. ‘It used to be a reformatory for boys in Victorian times. I think they called it an approved school or something when I was a kid. It’s always been one of these places for wayward kids, boys waiting in custody and so on. I don’t know that much about it, except that it closed at the end of the eighties, some scandal involving the staff and the boys.’

‘Child abuse?’

‘Something like that. I don’t know the details.’

‘But would Keirns have been there then?’

Valentine had reached the door. He gripped the oversized handle. ‘I suppose he must have left by then. But not by long.’

The vestibule was tiled, a broad mosaic in mostly terracotta, greens and blacks. Every tile had a chip or a crack; some were missing altogether. Damp coats hung steaming on old hat pegs, whilst wet umbrellas stood in the stand and clung to the window ledge. Beyond the heavy oak doors came the sound of dour preaching in a west of Scotland accent. Occasional coughs broke in-between the gaps in the speech.

‘OK, come on, what’s the worst that can happen?’ said Valentine.

‘Well, the place could come down on us for a start.’

‘You’re not making this any easier.’

‘I’m just saying . . .’

‘Well, don’t.’





5

Valentine’s father wasn’t hard to spot, being tall and gaunt, stooping slightly above the others with their hymn books out. He didn’t seem to notice the officers at first and kept singing, but when they reached his pew and started to crab crawl their way towards him he appeared perplexed.

‘Is it the girls, Bob?’ he whispered.

‘What?’

‘Has there been an accident?’

‘No, Dad. Nothing like that.’

A shuffle of bodies indicated the end of the hymn; a few glanced at Valentine and McCormack.

‘Dad, we’re here on police business.’

‘I don’t understand.’

‘I don’t have the time to explain.’ Valentine felt conscious of causing a stir. He looked to the front and tried to blend.

‘Surely it’s nothing to do with Sandy’s burial.’

‘No, it’s nothing to do with that. Well, it is and it isn’t . . . look, which one down there is Garry Keirns?’

‘Garry Keirns.’ His voice came at the normal volume and caused a woman in a bobble hat from the row in front to turn around.

Valentine’s father lowered his tone. ‘Why do you want Garry?’

‘Which one is he?’

The old man pointed to a seated figure at the end of the front row. He was close to fifty years old with greying red hair that covered his collar. Valentine noticed he wasn’t wearing a suit like the others seated nearby, but jeans and a tired-looking anorak.

‘The one in the pale-grey jacket?’ said Valentine.

‘That’s him, yes.’ His father placed a hand on Valentine’s arm. ‘Please, Bob, don’t interrupt the ceremony. Let them get Sandy in the ground first.’

‘Dad, I have a job to do.’

‘These are your people too, son.’

‘If you’d just seen what I have, that wouldn’t count for much.’

‘Whatever your reasons, let them grieve. A family has a right to bury its dead.’

The congregation rose again. The pall-bearers were surrounding the coffin.

‘OK, Dad. But after that we’ll have to move. I’m not here to embarrass you.’

‘You have your job to do – I’m quite sure you’ve weighed the consequences.’

His father’s pale eyes gazed at him for a moment and then he got up to follow the others into the churchyard.

Valentine rose to follow him but was held back by DS McCormack. ‘You might be better putting a bit of distance between you.’

‘I think I’ve already done that.’

As the detective moved off he felt McCormack grip his arm again. ‘Seriously, you should hang back, give him some space.’

‘You think that’ll spare his blushes?’

She shrugged. ‘It might, a little.’

‘Sylvia, you don’t know Cumnock. I’m already the talk of the steamie just for being here. I knew that the second I walked through the door.’

The crowd followed the pall-bearers and the coffin to a prepared piece of ground in the graveyard. Two men stood under a bare elm, shovels propped behind them on the tree’s bole, waiting to bury the deceased’s remains. As the minister made his dour chants, the sky seemed to clear and weak sunlight broke the clouds. It was a temporary affair, however, and by the time the coffin had been lowered and the first sod cast, the grey wash had returned.

Valentine and McCormack stood a respectful distance away, behind an elderly lady who dabbed her eyes with a white handkerchief and a bull-necked man who accompanied her, supporting her elbow with both hands.

When the gathering started to disperse, Valentine felt a surge of panic in his chest that he might lose sight of Keirns, and then he spotted him and jogged down the crowd’s flank, against the flow of movement. All eyes followed him, and at the end he met his father, who was shaking his head at the mild commotion.