The Impossible Dead

32



Organising this visit had taken several days and more than a few phone calls, but now Fox was driving through the gates of Carstairs State Hospital. Carstairs to many was a stop on the night train between London and Edinburgh. There wasn’t much of anything there – the railway station; a village with a shop; and not far away, the home to many of Scotland’s most violent and least predictable prisoners. He parked in a ring-fenced area, was buzzed through a gate, and entered the main building. A few other visitors had arrived at the same time as him. They looked inured to the security procedures. Palms were checked by a machine. It would show if the visitor had been in contact with drugs in the recent past. A positive reading meant no visit that day. Bags were checked, and there seemed to be a random sampling of mobile phones, a swab identifying traces of illicit substances. The queue shuffled forward. The faces were docile, if strained. One woman had brought her young daughter. The kid clung to her mother and sucked on a dummy she was probably a year or two too old for.

‘Inspector?’ A woman was pushing past the queue. She shook Fox’s hand and introduced herself as Gretchen Hughes. ‘It’s Dutch,’ she explained, as if to intercept a question she was always being asked.

‘Thanks for getting back to me,’ Fox said.

‘No problem.’ She went to a window and retrieved an ID badge for him. Fox reckoned the drill would be the same as at any prison, so handed over his phone at the same time.

‘Donald doesn’t get many visitors,’ Hughes was telling him.

‘He gets some, though?’

‘Not in the past year.’

‘And before that?’

She studied him. She had short blonde hair and pale-blue eyes. There was a plain gold band on her wedding finger, indicating the existence of a Mr Hughes.

‘That sort of information probably requires a formal request.’

‘Probably,’ Fox agreed as she led him past the queue. All he had asked for was a meeting with Donald MacIver. ‘But would Donald tell me?’

‘I doubt you could trust his answer.’

‘Is he a fantasist?’

She looked at him again and gave a wide smile. ‘Have you been reading up on the subject?’

Fox was not about to admit that he had.

‘No, not a fantasist,’ she decided to answer. ‘But he has good days and bad. The medication keeps him on a fairly even keel.’

‘Any subjects I should avoid?’

‘Just be sure to call him Mr MacIver. I worked with him almost two years before we were on first-name terms.’

‘How many inmates do you have?’

She made a tutting sound. ‘Patients, Inspector – please remember that.’

‘Patients usually get better and leave their hospitals,’ Fox replied. ‘Does that happen much here?’

Doors had been unlocked and locked again behind them. Fox wasn’t sure what he had expected. It was a lot quieter than a jail. Plenty of people, but they moved slowly, cautiously. The staff were in T-shirts and looked as if they trusted this new arrival a lot less than they did their regular charges.

‘Where am I seeing him?’ he asked into the silence. He was trying to work out if Gretchen Hughes was a doctor of some kind. Her badge wasn’t giving anything away.

‘His room,’ she answered. ‘He likes it there.’

‘Fine with me.’

A few moments later, they arrived at the open doorway. Hughes tapped on the jamb with her knuckles.

‘Donald? This is the visitor I was telling you about …’

She took a step back so that Fox could walk past her into the room. MacIver was seated at a table. There was space for a single bed and some shelves. An antique map of Scotland had been Blu-tacked to the wall. MacIver was reading a newspaper. He had a stack of them on the floor next to him. He was marking words and phrases with a thick blue crayon. So far, he seemed to have underlined almost every paragraph of the page under scrutiny. There was a chair opposite him, so Fox eased himself down on to it.

‘Do you want anything?’ Hughes asked. Fox started to shake his head, until he realised the question had been aimed at MacIver.

‘Nothing,’ the man muttered, still intent on his task.

‘I’ll just be outside,’ she said, moving away but leaving the door open. Fox studied MacIver, trying to think of him as ‘patient’ rather than ‘inmate’. The man was tall, maybe six three or four, and broad-shouldered. He had long grey hair, reaching halfway down his back, and a grey beard that would have made a wizard proud. The eyes behind the circular spectacles were large, the spectacles themselves smeared and in need of a wipe. His short fingernails were crusted with grime, and there was a slightly sulphurous smell in the room.

‘Mr MacIver, my name’s Fox.’ Fox could see newsprint reflected in the spectacles. Another paragraph needed to be underlined. MacIver did it with painstaking care, skipping any word he did not deem essential. As far as Fox could see, it was a story about the plans for a new road bridge across the Firth of Forth.

‘They’ve done away with the toll, you know,’ Fox said. ‘The Forth Road Bridge – one of the first things the SNP did when they got into power was—’

‘Call that power?’ MacIver interrupted. The voice sounded as if it was being drawn from the bottom of a well. ‘Power’s exactly what that isn’t.’ Fox waited for more, but MacIver was back at work.

‘What is power, then?’ he decided to ask.

‘It’s something you hold in both hands like a weapon, something you can choose to use to strike at your enemies’ hearts. When you bring light to the deserving and cold darkness to everyone else – that’s power.’

Fox was scanning the books piled on one shelf. Some names he recognised, some he didn’t. ‘I remember reading MacDiarmid’s poetry at school,’ he commented.

‘Christopher Murray Grieve – that was his real name.’

‘You knew him?’

‘We might have crossed paths – there were certain howffs in Edinburgh and Glasgow. Preachers and communists, gentlemen philosophers …’ His voice drifted away and he stopped his work, staring at the page without seeing it. Finally he looked up into the face of his visitor. ‘Have we met before? Should I know you?’

‘No.’

‘Only, I forget things.’

‘My name’s Fox, and I’m interested in Francis Vernal.’

‘He died.’

‘I know.’

‘A martyr to the cause.’

‘You really think so?’

‘When Francis spoke, he could make kings or topple them.’

‘You knew him pretty well, then?’

‘He was that rarest of creatures – a thinker who could do. A man who didn’t just talk about things but worked to make them happen.’

‘He was pretty active,’ Fox seemed to agree.

‘Which was why he had to die.’

‘You think he was targeted?’

‘The man was shot at point-blank range. No more than four weeks later, they came for me. They’d been busy in the interim – planting evidence in my basement. All very impressive when they kicked the door down and came in dressed in their radiation suits. I was wearing pink striped pyjamas.’ He was enunciating with care. What teeth Fox could see were blackened and uneven. ‘Wouldn’t even let me get dressed. And they knew exactly where to look for their “evidence”.’

‘You went to prison at first.’

‘Aye, but that wasn’t enough for them. They could see I was prospering there, talking to the men, opening their eyes to the tyranny.’

‘You got in a fight with another inmate …’

‘He was paid for his efforts. That’s the only explanation as to why I was the one punished! Solitary, then Barlinnie, then Peterhead …’

‘More violence?’

‘More goading and intimidation,’ MacIver corrected him. ‘More of everything that might break the spirit and drive a man towards the madhouse.’ He wagged a finger at Fox. ‘But I’m as sane as you are – take that news with you when you go.’

Fox nodded, as though in agreement. ‘So what did Francis Vernal do exactly? Within the organisation, I mean?’

‘Francis was our one-man brains trust. Lot of hot heads that needed cooling – he was the man for the job.’

‘He looked after the finances too, didn’t he?’

‘He was useful in many ways.’

‘The money came from hold-ups and robberies,’ Fox persisted. ‘You used it to buy guns and explosives?’

‘A necessary evil.’

‘Did Mr Vernal keep any guns in his car?’

MacIver blinked a few times, as though waking from a nap. ‘What are you doing here? Why all these questions?’ He looked down at the newspaper as if he had never laid eyes on it before. ‘Burns said it best, you know: bought and sold for English gold.’ He stabbed a finger against the artist’s impression of the new bridge. ‘That’s what you’re seeing here.’

‘A parcel of rogues in a nation,’ Fox said, finishing the quote while reaching into his pocket. He had the photo from Professor Martin’s book, the one of Vernal with Alice Watts and Hawkeye. He placed it on top of the newspaper, along with the two matriculation photographs of Alice.

‘Francis,’ MacIver said, rubbing his thumb across Vernal’s face. ‘And Alice.’ His eyes widened and he lifted one of the snaps, holding it up and studying it.

‘Any idea what happened to her?’ Fox asked.

The old man shook his head. He was stroking his beard with his free hand. He seemed transfixed by the picture. ‘Youth, energy, beauty – everything a movement needs.’

‘She was sleeping with Vernal.’

‘Alice had many admirers.’

‘Including yourself? Did you ever hear from her afterwards?’

‘She did the right thing. They assassinated Francis and then came for me. Alice went underground.’

‘And Hawkeye?’ Fox leaned forward a little to tap the photograph. Hawkeye arm in arm with Alice.

‘Still out there, I dare say. Somewhere in the world where there’s a cause worth fighting for.’

‘Did you know his real name?’

‘He was always Hawkeye.’

‘Does no one from the old days keep in touch?’

‘Why would anyone want to come see me? I’ve nothing to offer.’

‘I spoke with John Elliot recently. He’s not exactly gone underground, has he?’

‘I’ve seen him on the television.’

‘He’s never visited?’

MacIver shook his head.

‘That photograph’s from a book,’ Fox went on. ‘It was written by an academic called John Martin.’

‘Like the singer?’

‘Different spelling. He asked to speak to you and you turned him down.’

‘Did I?’

‘That’s what he says.’

MacIver shrugged. ‘I don’t remember him.’

Fox thought for a moment. ‘Does the name Gavin Willis mean anything to you?’

‘Gavin Willis?’ MacIver rolled the words around his mouth. ‘Gallowhill Cottage?’

‘Yes.’

‘Beautiful spot. Somewhere over in Fife …’

‘Near Burntisland. Gavin was a policeman when you knew him.’ MacIver nodded. ‘And a sympathiser?’ Fox paused. ‘More than a sympathiser?’

‘Never an active member.’

‘He got guns for you, though, didn’t he? Maybe kept them at the cottage until you needed them. And I suppose he could get rid of them for you too, when occasion demanded.’ After a bank job, say: who was going to notice an extra handgun going into the furnace? Evidence destroyed … ‘Gavin held on to Francis Vernal’s car, Mr MacIver. Why would he do that?’

‘Clever man,’ MacIver said quietly. ‘I always wondered …’

‘Wondered what?’

‘Whether anyone found the money.’

‘The money from the armed robberies? A few thousand, wasn’t it?’

‘That’s what they said. They didn’t want the public to know.’

‘Know what?’

‘We were good at what we did. We sent anthrax to the highest in the land, razed government buildings, held up banks and armoured cars …’ He smiled at the memory. ‘We were several hundred strong, and I’m the only one they ever locked up.’

‘How much money was in the car, Mr MacIver?’

‘Thirty or forty thousand.’ MacIver paused to think. ‘More or less.’

‘Did he keep it in the boot?’

MacIver nodded. ‘Below the spare tyre.’

Fox remembered Tony Kaye crowbarring open the boot and lifting the perished tyre – nothing underneath.

‘You’re sure about that figure? Thirty or forty?’

‘A lot of money back then.’

Fox nodded in agreement, recalling the price of an Edinburgh flat in 1985 –thirty-five thousand. Was it money worth killing for? Of course it was; people had died for far less.

‘There are bombs going off right now in Scotland,’ he told MacIver. ‘You think the bombers are justified?’

‘Justified is an interesting word – we could spend a year and a day debating it.’ MacIver fixed Fox with a stare. ‘They have a cause, they have passion and commitment. They have seen the systems around them fail, yet the status quo remains. Frustration turns to anger and anger to a sense of injustice.’

‘That’s how you felt back in the day?’

‘We all felt it!’ MacIver’s voice was rising as his agitation grew. Suddenly Gretchen Hughes was in the doorway, flanked by a couple of orderlies.

‘Is everything all right?’ she asked.

MacIver was on his feet. He stared down at the newspaper with all its underlined paragraphs, then snatched at it and began tearing it to shreds. The orderlies moved forward, Fox making room for them.

‘Betrayed and given trinkets?’ MacIver was spluttering. ‘Call that power? Why not call it what it is?’

Hughes’s hand was on Fox’s arm.

‘Time for us to leave,’ she said.

Fox stood his ground. ‘What is it?’ he asked MacIver. The hand on his arm tightened.

‘I think that’s quite enough, Inspector.’

‘It’s a kind of death,’ MacIver stated, voice shaking. ‘And we’re paying for it. Mark my words – we’re paying for it …’ He slumped down on his chair.

‘You need to go now,’ Hughes was telling Fox.

‘I’m going,’ he assured her, backing out of the room.