[Kitt Hartley 05] - A Witch Hunt in Whitby

by Helen Cox

  ‘And they have links with the occult?’ said Kitt.

  ‘In a manner of speaking,’ said Arnie. ‘There’s a bloke in a care home over in Sandsend. It’s a sad story, mind. His name’s Cyril. Think ’is last name is Armitage. He seems like a lovely little chap.’

  ‘But he’s been acting strange lately?’ said Grace.

  ‘He’s been in a few times over the last few months and bought a series of books about witch hunts and witch hunting.’

  ‘Lots of people are interested in that topic,’ said Kitt. ‘I’ve read a few books on the subject myself over the years.’

  ‘What ’aven’t you read about?’ said Grace, shaking her head.

  ‘Oh aye, but not everyone interested in that subject believes themselves to be the reincarnated spirit of James I himself.’

  ‘He . . . really believes that?’ said Kitt.

  Arnie nodded.

  Kitt frowned. ‘Hmmm. Mr Dick.’

  Arnie cleared his throat and Grace looked at Kitt sidelong. Once she noticed their reactions, Kitt clarified: ‘From David Copperfield. Charles Dickens? Mr Dick thinks he has some sort of strange psychic link with King Charles I.’

  ‘Oh, oh, I see,’ said Arnie. ‘Well, yes, it might be something like that. But I’m afraid the cause isn’t anything to do with psychic energy. Poor bloke has early onset dementia, Alzheimer’s, from what I understand. I think the doctors have put him on a small buffet of tablets to manage it as best they can. If you ask me, though, just from what I’ve seen, like, the dosage is a bit too high. He doesn’t seem very lucid.’

  ‘The poor man,’ Kitt said, shaking her head. Her maternal grandfather had suffered from Alzheimer’s before he’d passed about a decade ago. She had never quite recovered from the abrupt changes in his behaviour and how difficult it had sometimes been for him to recognize those who loved him. Heartbreaking didn’t even begin to cover it. ‘The medicines to manage such symptoms only provide temporary relief and there are usually side-effects.’

  ‘Aye, well, he has a carer with him when he comes into the shop because he’s perfectly lucid one minute and the next he’s talking about cleansing the earth of witchcraft,’ said Arnie. ‘Apparently, a few years back now, just before the dementia set in, he did some am-dram and played James I in one of their productions. What was the name of the play? Oh, yes, that’s right. The Curse of James I, A Musical.’

  ‘Sounds . . . interesting,’ Kitt said, keeping her tone as polite as possible.

  ‘I didn’t see it myself but at the time it did quite well for reviews in the local press; well, you know, for amateur theatre. It was written and directed by a local too. Stella Hemsworth. She had a bit of an acting career once over – mostly regional TV and adverts – and now she runs the amateur dramatics company in Whitby. That play was her directorial debut, if I recall.’

  ‘And performing in this play has had some effect on Cyril’s state of mind?’ said Kitt.

  ‘There were a few gory scenes in it from what I heard but I’m not sure if it’s quite right to say the play had an effect on him. His carer thinks he’s got himself muddled and relives the play in his head sometimes.’

  ‘Yes, sadly that can happen with people managing dementia,’ said Kitt. ‘And, of course, there’s so little support now for those with mental health issues that anything like that can be a real challenge, especially when it first happens. But the man you describe sounds more confused than anything else. I’m not convinced he’s a viable suspect even if he does spend some of his time believing himself to be James I.’

  ‘I’m not big on my history but I’m guessing James I didn’t like witches much,’ said Grace.

  ‘I think it’s fair to say he was somewhat obsessed with them,’ said Kitt. ‘There were hundreds of witch hunts and witch trials during his reign.’

  ‘So this bloke believes he’s the reincarnated spirit of a guy who made it his mission to wipe out witches?’ said Grace. ‘Since every victim has had some link with the occult, isn’t that a motive? Or, at least, a sort of imagined motive?’

  Arnie shook his head. ‘I felt obliged to mention him because of his delusions but Cyril is quite a frail man in his early sixties, and besides the fact that he seems completely harmless, I don’t think he’d have the physical or mental capacity to pull off these murders. The killer has been meticulous. Cyril, well, sometimes he’s with it and sometimes he’s not.’

  ‘We certainly can’t jump to conclusions just because of his mental health status,’ said Kitt. ‘It’s a strange obsession for a person to have but from what you’ve said, it doesn’t sound like he’s our man.’

  ‘And that leads me on to my second suggestion. I know the police releases about the killer have all said it’s most likely to be a man, but what if the person you’re looking for isn’t a man at all?’ said Arnie.

  ‘How do you mean?’ said Kitt.

  ‘There’s a tattoo shop in the old town called Squid Ink, it’s run by a lass called Ayleen Demir.’

  At the mention of a tattooist, Kitt’s senses stirred. Tattooists were on their list of businesses to interview after what Rebecca had told them about the needles. Of course, Ruby had also asserted that tattoos were involved but Kitt, having seen so many of the old woman’s visions come to nothing, was less convinced by that.

  ‘And there’s something unusual about this woman?’ said Grace.

  ‘She’s very open about the fact she’s a white witch – probably goes down well with her customer base, to be honest,’ said Arnie. ‘But she let slip once to someone in the town that her parents died when she was young. You know what town gossips can be like, and I don’t know all the ins and outs, but apparently they died in a fire and the fire service couldn’t get to the bottom of how the fire started. It was suspected arson, I think.’

  ‘And this happened in Whitby itself?’ said Kitt, making a mental note to see what records they could pull up about the incident.

  ‘No . . . she didn’t grow up in Whitby, moved here a few years back. From what I’ve heard, just from town talk, she grew up in the Dales somewhere. Wensleydale maybe? Or Sandersdale? At any rate, it’s one of them two. The people I come into contact with are perhaps more superstitious than average but there are folk about who think she might have had something to do with her parents’ deaths.’

  ‘They think she started the fire on purpose?’ said Kitt. ‘That she meant for her parents to die?’

  ‘I’m not saying it’s true,’ said Arnie, raising his hands in the air, ‘but there are folks who think she might have started the fire through supernatural means. Whether there’s owt to that or not, if a person did somehow manage to get away with a crime like that at a young age, it might make them believe they could get away with anything.’

  Ten

  After leaving Arnie’s shop, Kitt and Grace spent the next half hour walking up and down the cobbled streets of Whitby’s old town, keeping a close eye on Squid Ink Tattoo Parlour. They had passed the window several times over before they saw an opportunity to speak to Ayleen Demir alone.

  Usually, walking the quaint streets of old Whitby would have been no hardship but Kitt was already feeling the weight of this case taking its toll. In particular, her eyes stung after getting so little sleep the past few nights. It had been some months since she had lain awake, unblinking and wracked with worry. The sense of time slipping so quickly through the hourglass dulled the usually vibrant pleasure of walking those cobbled backstreets. Grace had managed to rouse some enthusiasm for the windows packed with chunks of handmade fudge, jewellery set with Whitby Jet and the famous Lucky Ducks that very few visitors to the town could resist taking away with them as a memento of their time in this quaint little corner of the coast. Kitt, however, had felt vacant and zombie-like as she trudged along, unable to appreciate the little things that would on any other day have raised her spirits.

 
‘Courage, girl. Strength, metal,’ she muttered to herself as she opened the door of Squid Ink Tattoos. And on repeating that well-loved family phrase that her parents had said to her on so many desolate occasions, Kitt stood a little taller and did what she could to pull herself together. Some people seemed to go out of their way to ruin things for others. But, Kitt decided, she drew the line at someone ruining Whitby. Even if they were a serial killer. If she failed, she would never again be able to wander through the whale bones on the West Cliff, buy a sausage roll at Botham’s, or watch the fisher folk grapple with live lobsters in the harbour without thinking of her lost friend. Her only choice, as she understood the situation, was to bring this murderer down so that she could forever associate the town with her triumph.

  On entering the shop, which she noted was still empty – even Ayleen wasn’t to be seen at present − Kitt was struck by the dramatic nature of the decor. She and Grace had caught glimpses from the outside as they had sauntered past, but each time they had been focused on just one detail: was Ayleen in the shop alone? It was hard to ascertain that and take in the environment without making it obvious they were looking in. Thus, several salient details had passed Kitt by. Every wall in the place was painted black. It was clear from the wicker pentagrams, tall black candles, triple moon symbol ornaments and goddess figurines arranged on a shelf behind the counter that Ayleen was in no way trying to hide the fact that she was a witch from her customers.

  The most striking details, however, were to be found on the remaining walls which had designs stencilled onto them. One of the designs was of a giant squid, which given the name of the shop wasn’t surprising. At the other end of the shop, though, a vampire had been traced onto the wall. A vampire that stood so tall he almost stretched from floor to ceiling. Both of the stencils had been filled in with purple paint.

  Purple paint? Kitt’s breath caught in her throat.

  ‘Are you all right? Clear your throat if everything’s OK, sneeze if it isn’t,’ Grace hissed over the earpiece Kitt had hooked up before turning onto Sandgate, the street on which Ayleen’s shop stood. It had been decided that Kitt would interview any suspects alone so that Grace could take a second undercover pass at them if required. Grace was stationed just round the corner at the swing bridge, which connected Whitby’s old town with the new. Far enough away that the pair wouldn’t be connected if Ayleen got suspicious about the sheer number of questions Kitt wanted to ask her but near enough that she could come running if Kitt had cause to use their code word.

  Grace must have heard her reaction to the paint and become concerned. As instructed, Kitt cleared her throat to offer her assistant peace of mind that she was in no immediate danger and then looked closer at the designs on the wall, trying to gauge if it was the same colour as the mark she had seen on Ruby’s door. It seemed like a very close match indeed.

  ‘Hello there,’ a voice said, giving Kitt a start. She turned to see Ayleen standing behind the counter. She must have appeared from one of the back rooms when she heard the bell on the door tinkle. Kitt and Grace had checked the shop’s website for a photo of her beforehand to ensure they made a positive ID.

  ‘Oh, hello,’ said Kitt, ‘I was just admiring your wonderful decorations.’

  ‘They’re great, aren’t they? I can’t claim credit, I’m afraid, it’s the work of a local artist.’

  ‘Oh, I must have their name, these are fantastic,’ said Kitt. In truth, an artist being in possession of paint was not exactly what you might call incriminating evidence. If someone was running around Whitby with a pot of paint that was an exact match to the paint favoured by the killer, however, Kitt wanted to know who they were.

  ‘Joel Mendoza, he’s got a website. Should be easy enough to find with a quick search.’ As she spoke, Ayleen scraped her long purple hair out of her face. On seeing her in person, Kitt couldn’t help but notice that, just like the graphics on the walls, it was almost the same shade of purple as the paint used to mark the doors of the Vampire Killer’s victims. Purple was something of a theme in this place, it seemed.

  ‘I’ll be sure to look him up, thank you,’ said Kitt.

  ‘Not a problem. So, is there something I can help you with today?’

  ‘Arnie wasn’t sure whether Ayleen grew up in Wensleydale or Sandersdale,’ Grace said. ‘Try and drop them both into the conversation and see how she reacts. If there’s anything to these rumours about her offing her own parents, she might give herself away without realizing it.’

  ‘I’m feeling a bit impulsive today, and I wondered if I could look through some designs you have for a modest-sized tattoo,’ said Kitt, while trying to figure out the best way to drop the two areas into the conversation.

  A dent formed in Ayleen’s bronzed forehead as she frowned. Kitt wondered for a moment if she wasn’t the most convincing punter in a tattoo shop and whether she should have found a way of dressing up for this part. Now that she thought about it, they’d passed several shops that sold gothic or new-age clothing. Even if she’d just bought a black jacket and a pair of sturdy boots that probably would have been more convincing than the jeans and woolly pink cardigan she had thrown on that morning.

  ‘We’ve got several books for you to browse through,’ Ayleen said, losing the frown and fixing a smile on her face before handing Kitt a thick black folder. ‘Here, start with this one. Those are our smallest designs.’

  ‘Probably best to start small with it being my first tattoo,’ said Kitt, opening the binder.

  ‘You’re wiser than most of my first-time clients,’ Ayleen said, widening her smile. Unlike many people, she had a smile that reached her eyes, making them twinkle. In fact, on first impressions alone, even despite the similarity in her hair colour to the marks on the victims’ doors, and her dubious choice of decor, Kitt found the woman most approachable. In her red corseted peplum top and black leggings, she was dressed in a way that would undoubtedly appeal to anyone of the gothic persuasion. But the look wasn’t so exaggerated that it was off-putting or intimidating. This probably made customers feel more at ease when taking the leap of permanently marking their bodies. But it struck Kitt that it might also make anyone feel safe with her, say a potential victim, should she wish to deceive anyone.

  ‘My sister has quite a few tattoos,’ said Kitt. ‘And after she gets one it’s all she can talk about for about two weeks, so I’ve got indirect experience.’

  Mal also had a tattoo, of course, and she’d always found it a rather fetching feature on him. But that was a complicated subject to bring up, given the tattoo was of his ex-wife’s name and that ex-wife had died at the hands of a serial killer.

  ‘Do you have any ideas about what kind of design you’re looking for?’

  ‘I was thinking of maybe getting a butterfly,’ said Kitt, seeing an opportunity to test Ruby’s improbable theory. If Ayleen had a butterfly tattoo, she might show Kitt as a means of making a sale. Kitt hadn’t been under the other-worldly spell of Whitby quite long enough to interpret such a coincidence as hard evidence but by the law of probability one of Ruby’s suggestions had to pan out at some point.

  ‘I think a giant skull on your left arm would be much more you,’ said Grace, giggling over the radio channel.

  Kitt was no longer surprised by her assistant’s giddiness, even in situations as serious as these, and did all she could to ignore the interruption.

  ‘One of our most popular designs, that,’ said Ayleen.

  Inwardly, Kitt vowed not to let anyone know that she had, even for a split second, given one of Ruby’s theories any consideration. If a butterfly was one of their most popular designs it was hardly narrowing their field of suspects. That level of ambiguity was peak Ruby.

  ‘I can imagine. I met a lady recently on a trip to Wensleydale who had the most beautiful butterfly tattoo. I should have taken a picture,’ Kitt said, keeping a close eye on Ayleen to see if the mention o
f Wensleydale in any way sparked a reaction.

  But no, nothing. No change in expression. No flutter of the eyes. No tensing of the body. If town talk here was in any way reliable, Ayleen must hail from Sandersdale.

  ‘I have a few pictures of tattoos I’ve done on my phone, you know, for Instagram purposes, but I don’t think I’ve taken any butterfly shots recently,’ Ayleen said, picking her phone up off the counter and scrolling through her pictures. ‘Nope, sorry about that.’

  ‘Oh, not to worry. I’m not sure I’ll make my mind up today,’ said Kitt. She had no intention of leaving this shop with a tattoo, even in the spirit of undercover work, so it seemed best to sow the seeds sooner rather than later that no money would be changing hands here. ‘But I live over in Sandersdale, so it’s only a few hours’ drive, easy to drop back another day. And a scenic drive it is too.’

  At the mention of Sandersdale Ayleen’s smile faded and her eyes became sorrowful, watery almost. ‘Whereabouts in Sandersdale are you?’

  ‘Just settled in Ravensgarth about a year ago,’ said Kitt, deciding if she was going to lie, it was probably best to lie about somewhere she knew well. Lying wasn’t her strong suit, which of course was a commendable quality in a person. Unless you were trying to catch out a serial killer. Then it was something of a liability.

  ‘I grew up in that general area, gorgeous country round there. Haven’t been back for many years now, like.’

  ‘Oh, it’s worth going back if you can,’ said Kitt. ‘Nothing like the bracing air of the Yorkshire dales in your lungs, and of course the falls at Ravensgarth are something else.’

  Ayleen shrugged. ‘Not all the memories I have of that place are pleasant ones.’

  ‘I’m so sorry to hear that,’ said Kitt, her voice as gentle as she could make it. She needed Ayleen to think of her as a sympathetic stranger. Someone she might feel safe to confide in. ‘I hope I haven’t put my foot in it. It does, I’m afraid, seem to be my specialty.’