The Secret Dawn

by Solomon Carter

  Yvette George stood a couple of metres to one side of Grant and Sabine Dawn. The couple were sat beside one another, wrists bound and tied by black cables. Sabine craned her neck to look at him. Dawn did the same and a hint of a grin broke across his bloodied face.

  “Took your bloody time, didn’t you?” said Dawn.

  “If you’d stayed at that hospital, you wouldn’t be tied to a bloody chair with a half a gallon of claret all over your face.”

  “But then I wouldn’t be with my wife, would I…?” said Dawn, his words trailing off.

  Yvette George stared at Hogarth and Palmer. Anger filled her eyes, but there were signs of something else too. A wavering, a flickering of sadness and despair. Her confidence seemed to ebb and return. Hogarth saw a dangerous torrent of emotions, all too unpredictable. There was a knife in her hand. A long, sharp knife, capable of running through any vital organ she chose.

  “Miss George. Please,” said Hogarth. “You need to put that knife down. You won’t solve anything with violence. Seriously.”

  “Won’t solve anything with violence?” she said. “Well, I never solved anything with kindness either, did I?” she said. He watched the knife glinting as it moved in her hand. He looked back at her eyes. She stared back at him. Hogarth saw she was trembling but he couldn’t tell whether from fear or rage.

  “I worked for them for years… always hoping for a pay rise, for recognition, for any sign of appreciation at all. I did all the right things. All of them! And what did I get? Sweet FA. The little I’ve ever had from them, they acted like I should have been grateful. Grateful for the crumbs from the table, while they gorged on the fruit of my labours.”

  Hogarth listened and nodded, looking for a way to smooth the situation, to tamp down the woman’s fire.

  “You could have talked to me!” shouted Grant Dawn. “You should have said something instead of all this! Instead of talking you decide to try and kill me! And then Brett! And now this. You’ve lost it, Yvette!”

  “Mr Dawn!” shouted Hogarth. “Control yourself!”

  The woman stepped towards her captives, jabbing the knife at Grant Dawn’s face, letting the point hang close to his eye.

  “I never tried to kill you – not once – you bloody idiot.”

  Dawn frowned as he stared at the blade’s point. He looked up at her as the woman carried on ranting at him.

  Palmer gave Hogarth a look as she took one sideward step along the wall beside the entrance door. Hogarth replied with a subtle sideward nod and took his own half step forward. Nice and easy… subtle as could be.

  “You didn’t try to kill him?” said Hogarth, trying to draw her attention. “Then who did, Miss George?”

  “That’s what I’d like to know, too…” muttered Dawn.

  “I don’t know and don’t care who else this egomaniac’s crossed,” spat George. “That’s his business.”

  “Brett?” said Grant. “Brett could have done it. Lord knows he wanted me out of the way!

  “Brett never knew where this place was,” said George. “He never bothered to look at the records. I’m the only one who knew…”

  “But…” said Grant.

  “Like I said – I don’t care!” she snapped and moved the blade closer. “I only care about what you do next. That’s all. You ruined my life without a second thought.”

  “Look,” said Grant, turning his head away. “I didn’t know, Yvette. I just didn’t know…”

  “Didn’t know? You didn’t care more like! You didn’t care in the least. And that’s why I had to take matters into my own hands… with you gone, it was like a revelation. I knew exactly what to do. But your drunken old soak of a wife wouldn’t play ball.”

  “What are you talking about…?” said Sabine.

  Yvette George swiped the blade towards Sabine’s face and Palmer took another urgent step sideways. The monkey wrench gleamed at her from the desk in the far corner. Hogarth dropped his eyes to the piece of rusting propeller which had landed on the threshold. It was too big, too obvious. It wouldn’t work. He scanned the room and counted the seconds until the coming disaster.

  “You were supposed to be a grieving widow, Sabine, glad of any sympathy you could get,” said George. “But you were already drunk and moody just like you always were.”

  “Moody? Grant was missing. I thought he was dead! And you came around with cheap flowers and chocolates like it was my birthday…”

  “There was no point bringing you drink, was there? I knew you always had a bottle to hand. But a grief-stricken woman isn’t likely to make herself anything to eat. You were supposed to be grateful for the chocolates. You were supposed to eat them.”

  Hogarth watched the point of the knife reaching for the woman’s face. Yvette George was beside herself, out of control just as Grant had said. Sabine looked about to lose her eye… Hogarth’s eyes flicked down to the floor before his feet. There was the sliding bolt, screws still hanging from the backplate where it had been once fitted to the door. He glanced at it and looked up to check Yvette George’s position… the distance between blade and Sabine’s eyeball was no more than five centimetres, and probably less, and George’s face had taken on a trancelike aspect. She was grinning as she spoke.

  “Grant was dead. He made it easy. You were supposed to follow him, Sabine. They would have said it was grief. That you drank yourself to death. I knew that, so I looked it all up on the web. I knew exactly how to play it. But you were always so bloody awkward, even then, you wouldn’t play along and do the easy thing. You were supposed to eat those chocolates then die of a broken heart. I would have written you both a wonderful eulogy. But you threw them back in my face. And because of that – because of you – Brett died in your place.”

  Hogarth stretched down, slowly. He picked up the sliding bolt and buried it in his hand. Grant Dawn saw him, terror etched on his sweating, bloody face. He watched and kept quiet.

  “It should have been you, Sabine. It should have been you. You’ve always been a waste of space…”

  Hogarth watched the blade move closer. He raised his hand and aimed at the far wall. He tossed the bolt, underarm. The metal struck a framed coloured print of a Texas gas station. The glass shattered and the bolt clattered onto the red mechanics’ tool cupboard. Yvette George jerked in surprise and the blade swiped down across Sabine Dawn’s face just as she turned away. Hogarth’s heart stopped as he saw a thin red line open on the woman’s forehead and cheek. Sabine screamed but when she opened her eye, Hogarth saw it was intact. George seemed shocked and bewildered. Hogarth launched himself across the floor towards her, keeping his eyes on the blade as he moved. He went in low, raising his arm up for the knife as Grant Dawn wrenched his chair towards Sabine. He twisted his body around to reach and pull at the knot of her bindings. He tugged at the knot, straining as Palmer ran for the monkey wrench on the desk. Hogarth drove his shoulder into the slight woman’s body, but his hand swiped past her wrist, missing a chance to grip and restrain. She groaned as she hit the back wall, but now her knife hand was free. Hogarth knew he was in trouble. He expected the blade to plunge into his back. There was a half second as he waited for the inevitable. He felt the woman struggle against him, and then felt her move to aim the knife. She roared with effort, but Hogarth kept her pinned back. In the next moment, he heard a clank of metal on metal and felt George get knocked back to the wall again.

  “Drop it!” Palmer shouted.

  Hogarth pulled away to see Yvette George’s eyes burning with anger and pain. He saw the knife hanging from her hand and knew Palmer must have parried the blow which would have killed him. But she still had the knife in her hand. She was as dangerous as ever.

  “Drop it!” said Hogarth.

  “Why should I? Where does it go from here, eh? I think we all know the answer to that. I won’t got to prison. Why should I?”

  “Because it’s the right thing to do, Miss George,” said Hogarth. “Like you said, you always did the right thin
g. You’ve made mistakes. Bad mistakes. But you can start again.”

  The woman stared at him and her grip on the knife loosened.

  “Bad mistakes…” said George, tears falling from her eyes.

  Grant Dawn glanced up as he loosened Sabine’s bindings. He whispered into his wife’s ear. “I love you, Sabine. As soon as your hands come free, I want you to run… Promise me you’ll run and keep going…”

  Sabine nodded. She watched Yvette with wide careful eyes. And Yvette George stared right back.

  “It’s all her fault Brett ate those chocolates. The poison was for her. She’s the only one who deserved it…” The woman’s eyes flared and she leapt away from the wall. She broke past Palmer, slashing the air with the knife, keeping Palmer back.

  “No!” shouted Hogarth. He leapt in as Yvette George turned towards Sabine Dawn, but she was wild and too fast for him. The black wires dropped to the concrete and Sabine Dawn’s wrists came free. The woman lunged upwards from her chair as Yvette came for her. Sabine tried to leap to one side to avoid her. She made to get past the woman, but George moved to block her way. The knife came for her again, and Hogarth reached to block it, but it swiped his fingers and drew blood. In the next instant, the knife disappeared between their bodies. Sabine tried to pull away, but Yvette George pulled her back, and seized her shoulder. There was a frenzied struggle and Hogarth looked for a way in – a way to pull Yvette back before Sabine was stabbed. But it was impossible. Sabine twisted back as Grant fought with his bindings. Sabine fell against the wall in their struggle, and then came a scream. Sabine’s arms tensed around Yvette George’s shoulders as she pressed Sabine against the wall. There was a moment when nothing happened. No scream. No sound at all. And when the moment passed Yvette George collapsed, her knees buckling. She fell back, her hand clutching her stomach and the bloody blade clattered to the floor. Sabine stood against the wall, her body shaking. There was blood all over her hands and her body but none of it was hers. She covered her mouth with her hands then took them away when she saw the blood.

  “I didn’t mean to… I was just trying to… you saw me…it was an—”

  “It’s okay, Mrs Dawn. We saw everything,” said Hogarth. He dropped down to kneel beside Yvette George. The woman looked up at the ceiling and made gasping breaths as blood sluiced from the wound in the centre of her stomach.

  Hogarth pressed a hand to the wound and pushed hard. The woman screamed again, but it was all he could do to stem the blood.

  “Palmer! Call an ambulance! And get some backup in here now.”

  Palmer nodded and put the call in. She tugged at the cable binding on Dawn’s wrists as she was connected, her mobile phone pinched between her shoulder and her chin.

  “Ambulance please…” said Palmer. “Yes, it’s a medical emergency. Knife wound to the stomach. And the victim’s bleeding badly…”

  Grant Dawn looked at Hogarth. Their eyes met across Yvette George’s stricken body. The woman’s breaths were light, her groans fading to a whimper. Grant Dawn nodded to Hogarth, and for the very first time, Hogarth sensed his gratitude. But he was more concerned about Yvette George. Her eyes were rolling. Her life seemed to be slipping away. It wasn’t the ending he had hoped for. But these were the cards he’d been dealt. And because Hogarth was a fatalist, he knew they couldn’t have fallen any other way. He watched the blood rising between his fingertips and pressed harder still. The woman should have been in agony but this time Yvette George didn’t even whimper.

  Twenty-four

  Just some slashed up fingers. Nothing that a bandage and a spot of Germolene couldn’t fix. Recalling how things had ended up in the Baba Sen case – getting chased down an alleyway by a gangster and a gunman – Hogarth reckoned he’d got off lightly. And considering what she’d done, Yvette George was getting off lightly too. By the time two paramedics arrived she was unconscious, and looking at the blood all over the concrete, Hogarth believed it was no better than fifty-fifty whether the woman would bleed out or live. Sabine Dawn went off to retch in the corner, but Grant Dawn had watched. Whatever anger was in the man seemed to be sated by the sight of a punishment more severe than any he could have dreamed up. His first enemy was dead – Brett Reville – thief, embezzler, usurper-in-waiting. And now the one who had pulled the strings was taken care of too. As the paramedics worked on George, Simmons arrived to assist with taking statements. The next half hour went by in an adrenaline fuelled blur of duties and taking statements, but before long, the chaos started to peter out. Yvette George was taken away, and the Dawns were removed for care and questioning. By that point Hogarth had given up caring whether he would get in trouble because of Grant Dawn and Max Simmons. Nothing seemed to matter much at all.

  But such feelings never did last long.

  And though things things turn out well, the nightmare scenario never came to pass.

  Hogarth was relieved to hear that Grant Dawn stuck religiously to his story as the man who had crawled away from death to hole himself up in an empty barn for two whole days and nights of lonely recovery. And his latest injuries – the contusions to his face and head – only added to the plausibility of his story. No one would look too closely at his story anymore – not with a genuine murderer caught red-handed… even if the murderer in question had killed the wrong person. Motives were soon peeled away by questioning. Sabine Dawn’s death had been intended to clear the way for a nice, neat company takeover. After the husband and business owner had already left his mortal coil, why would anyone object to Reville and George taking on the business in memory of their employer? The business would have been passed on to them in a caretaker role. A cheap purchase would have come next, followed by a miraculous financial recovery as the newly renamed Grant Dawn Social went from strength to strength, justifying the couple as rightful heirs. It was a neat and dastardly plan from a woman who had turned a hidden bitterness into a secret mission. But it began to unravel from the moment Grant Dawn crawled away from his car wreck in the murky cold waters of the Roach. The idea was a smart one, but it was stillborn, its only purpose to trap its owner. And somehow, after two near death experiences, Grant Dawn lived again. And the name of Grant Dawn Social was about to survive too. As Dawn said himself: “The name can’t be traded after all the publicity Yvette’s just given us. We’re practically famous.”

  And they were.

  The evening news came with interviews of the surviving couple. They made the front pages of the red top dailies, and there was the prospect of an interview on BBC’s The One Show. They were becoming big potatoes. Even Hogarth and Palmer made the news. Hogarth gave the briefest of uncomfortable TV interviews, and grudgingly squirmed at the implied praise of the reporter. Mainly because only half of what he said was true. It didn’t sit well in his gut, but the story had to stick. The villains were caught, justice was done, so what did the rest matter in the long run? But Hogarth wasn’t so stupid or so blasé. Deep down, he knew it all mattered. It didn’t feel good, and in the chaos of the interviews, the attention, the feeling of being ill-at-ease remained with him. He knew it would be a good while yet until his latest folly nestled down alongside all the unpleasant memories of cases past. Another lucky escape, then. Another brush with death. He found himself looking forward to seeing Liv Burns for the sheer escape from the grind. The grind of self-punishment and sensory overload that the job had become. A warm kiss, the sense of skin on skin would distract him from the real world for a short time at least And for now, that would be enough.

  It wasn’t until four o’clock in the afternoon, still working through the reports, interviews, and witness statements – after discussions with Ivan Marris and further research into potassium chloride – that PC Heybridge finally appeared before his very eyes. And the man looked nothing like the officer Hogarth had imagined. The Heybridge of his imagination was a rigid pencil-neck, a nasal jobsworth who would probably enjoy stamp collecting or bird watching. Or maybe classic British motorbikes. Certainly something
Hogarth had no interest in. But when the man appeared and introduced himself, Heybridge was a burly, hairy-armed man with a grey-peppered beard and sincere green eyes. Heybridge smiled at him with admiration.

  “You did a hell of a job, sir. Congratulations. Pardon me for saying… but at the start, I did hear a little word that you were a bit of a maverick… I can admit now I was a bit worried about having you as SIO for the Paglesham incident, but I have to say, it’s been a real privilege to be involved on the periphery of such a big case.”

  Hogarth was still reading the man when Heybridge offered him a thick-fingered hand to shake. Hogarth accepted his hand with confusion and let the man pump it a few times. It took Hogarth another moment to compose a reply.

  “The wider case… yes, PC Heybridge. Well, we’re all very pleased that no one else got badly hurt – and it seems the main suspect will survive for the court case.”

  “Very good, sir. Very satisfying. Although…” Heybridge tapped the paperwork in his hand as he offered it to Hogarth. “I’m not sure you’ll find anything else in this matter quite so satisfying.”

  “What do you mean, Heybridge?”

  “I can tell you now… or you might like to read if for yourself. Like a lot of things in life, not everything is what it seems, eh?”

  “A traffic cop with the brain of a sage, my, my, you are a rare find,” said Hogarth.

  “I should get you to speak to my wife,” said Heybridge, grinning.

  “Please don’t wish that on any woman,” Hogarth replied.

  Heybridge smiled. “Once you’ve signed that off, I think we’ll be able to conclude the car incident side of the case – then I can get on with other matters.”

  “Sounds good,” said Hogarth, looking at the dossier with narrowing eyes.