It was intrusive, having a stranger rummaging through their stuff. Abusive, somehow. Lauren wouldn’t like it.
They rarely had people round to the flat these days. Since Nathan was born and everything that Lauren went through afterwards, the opportunities for socialising had withered. Friends moved away, all of them focusing on their own lives, setting up their little shells, safe from the outside world.
And now here was a police officer, a woman barely out of her teens, going from room to room. Mark saw the place through her eyes, the worn patches on the hall carpet, the dust bunnies under Nathan’s bed, the burnt food stains on the old cooker. It was like putting their whole lives on display, a personal museum exhibition.
Ferguson didn’t appear to know what she was doing. Picking things up, putting them back again. She stopped at some pictures stuck to the fridge by magnets, flipped over a postcard.
This was useless. Shouldn’t they be out looking for Lauren?
Ferguson sauntered through the flat, Mark trailing behind. She went into the couple’s bedroom. Opened and shut the bedside drawers. Rennies and paracetamol on his side. A couple of books on Lauren’s, Pelecanos and Leonard. He could never be bothered to read. Easier to watch the films when they came out.
Ferguson went to the wardrobe. Mark remembered the Browning and the old grass tin, felt a weight descend on him, his eyelids suddenly heavy. No licence, never any licence, the pistol liberated after the war by his grandad. Not handed in after Dunblane either. Stupid, but there you are.
He didn’t want the gun to become a sideshow, a distraction from the search for Lauren.
Ferguson was flicking through Lauren’s blouses, skirts and dresses.
Mark approached and stood close to her.
‘I don’t think there are any clothes missing, if that’s what you’re looking for.’
She turned to him. ‘Just background, really, Mr Douglas.’
‘Call me Mark.’ He edged towards the drawers. ‘Did you say something about needing financial statements?’
‘Please. Any bank accounts, savings plans, mortgage, life assurance, all that.’
Mark hesitated. ‘OK, I’ll go and dig that stuff out. Do you want a coffee? You can wait in the living room if you like.’
‘Coffee would be great.’
Ferguson opened Lauren’s underwear drawer. Shuffled some panties around at the front. Closed it. Then she opened his drawer. Did the same. Pushed it closed.
She missed it.
‘Are you OK, Mr Douglas?’
Mark was standing holding the wardrobe door, eyes closed. ‘Fine.’
‘I realise how stressful this is for you, but the police are here to help.’
‘I know.’
She closed the wardrobe doors, Mark lowering his hand.
‘Now, let’s get that coffee and go through the paperwork, shall we?’
She led him out of the room.
Mark switched the kettle on and went rooting for files. Flicked through and found all the stuff. Brought it back and handed it over. Gave Ferguson a description of Lauren’s car, number plate, her mobile number, then went and got her toothbrush.
‘This seems weird,’ he said, handing it over.
Ferguson placed it in a small, see-through zip-lock bag, then into a pocket.
‘I know it does, but I can assure you it’s entirely routine.’
They got their coffees and moved to the tiny office corner of the living room, really just a desk and a laptop. Mark fired up the MacBook.
‘I don’t have any recent pictures printed out, but I could email a couple to you.’
‘That’s fine.’
Ferguson handed over a card with her email address and phone number on it. DETECTIVE CONSTABLE TRACEY FERGUSON. Tracey with an ‘e’.
Mark clicked down through the picture folder on the desktop. Ferguson picked two and he emailed them to her address.
‘What about your wife’s email?’ she said.
‘She has a Gmail account. I’ve already checked it, we know each other’s passwords. There’s nothing in there that I could see.’
‘I’d like the username and password all the same, so we can check it in more detail later.’
He wrote it down for her. Every bit of information he handed over seemed to make this more real, more concrete. She was really missing. Gone again.
His pulse became loud, thudding in his ears. His lungs seemed to collapse, and he struggled to take shallow breaths. His hands began to shake. He put the pen down and gripped the edge of the desk to steady himself. His vision seemed to roll on its axis.
‘Mark?’
He felt Ferguson’s hand on his, a tiny, bony thing. Not like Lauren’s hands at all. His fingers trembled against the scratchy wood of the desk. The shaking spread up his arms to his body, and he raised a hand to his face. Tears fell on to the desk and he wiped his eyes, trying to regain control.
‘It’s OK,’ Ferguson said. ‘We’ll find her.’
He tried to fill his lungs, then he pulled his hand out from under hers and sat back, blinking away tears.
‘I didn’t tell you last night.’
‘What?’ She was perched on the edge of the desk, close to him. He could smell lemony perfume.
Mark shook his head. ‘Lauren has suffered from depression in the past. Postnatal, after Nathan was born. She disappeared for days.’
‘I see. Do you know where she went?’
Mark shook his head. ‘She never said. I was too afraid to ask. I wanted to know, but at the same time I didn’t want to scare her away again. It was horrible. I think she was in a hotel somewhere, maybe still in Edinburgh, I don’t know.’
‘What about her work?’
Mark’s breathing calmed, his head cleared a little.
‘What about it?’
‘You said earlier about her boss, Mr Taylor.’
‘Gavin, yeah.’
‘You think he was hiding something?’
‘I don’t know.’
Ferguson straightened up, shifted her weight to create distance between them.
‘This isn’t an easy thing to ask.’
He rubbed his eyes. ‘I know what you’re going to say.’
‘Do you think Lauren might be having an affair?’
‘No.’
‘Are you sure?’
He rubbed at his hair. ‘Of course I’m not fucking sure.’ His voice was louder than he expected. ‘I have no clue any more about what she might’ve been doing or thinking, clearly. She’s gone, isn’t she?’
‘OK, take it easy.’
‘I don’t want to take it easy, I want to find my wife.’
‘Look, I’ll pay a visit to the Caledonia Dreaming office, talk to Mr Taylor. I need to get access to her work email and files anyway.’
‘I can’t believe I need to think about this,’ Mark said.
‘I’m sorry.’
‘Now you’ve got me worrying that Lauren was being unfaithful.’
‘I have to ask these things.’
‘Any other ideas you want to poison my mind with?’
‘There is something else I need to ask.’
‘Jesus.’
‘Have you ever given your wife reason to leave?’
Mark rolled his neck and stood up so he was standing over her.
‘Like what? Sleeping around? Hitting her?’
She held out a placatory hand. ‘I have to ask.’
He held one fist in the other, as if clutching an injured bird. ‘Nothing like that. We’re happy together.’
She stared at him for a moment and he looked away, his gaze falling on the laptop screensaver, a picture of Lauren, Nathan and him taken at East Links Family Park, all smiling. He remembered it was a bitterly cold day, they only spent a few minutes feeding the animals then ducked into the cafe for hot chocolates. Ordinary family stuff. Everything called into question now.
Ferguson was shuffling the paperwork against the desk.
‘I’ll have all this copied and get it back to you. And I’ll pay a visit to Caledonia Dreaming. I’ll be in touch soon.’
Mark turned to her. He didn’t like the look in her eyes.
‘What am I supposed to do in the meantime?’ he said.
‘Just try to stay calm.’
Mark wished people would stop telling him that.