The Death Knock

by Elodie Harper

  On the walk into the newsroom the next morning, mist rises from the river and she can feel the autumn chill in the air. It’s early October, and handfuls of russet leaves swirl past her ankles as she crosses the small patch of green outside the Eastern Film Company. Traffic heads past her on the road that surrounds the office, marooning the redbrick building onto its own miniature island. She left the Fiat in the office car park last night, hoping to clear her head on the walk home, and this morning she’s miscalculated the time it will take her to get in. It’s very early; nobody will be there except for Charlie and perhaps today’s producer.

  She crosses the busy road and cuts into the narrow warren of lanes that make up Norwich’s old town. She loiters past The Hive, looking in at the book display, before stopping off at a nearby coffee shop. Andy Williams is playing, making a soothing backdrop to the hiss and gurgle of the coffee machine as the waiter heats up the milk. She thanks him and pays up, sipping the hot latte on her way back. By the time she makes it into the newsroom, her cheeks are red and she feels better about the day ahead.

  All the TV screens are on; various channels showing breakfast television play out silently. The room is nearly empty, although the new trainee is hunched over a computer in the corner. Charlie has his back to her. Sitting perched on the desk beside him is Priya, her furry ankle boots dangling as she leans over to look at his screen. Frankie’s stomach drops. She hopes they’ve both forgiven her. As Priya spots Frankie, she waves her over, then nudges Charlie, who turns round to look.

  ‘Frankie.’ His voice is flat. They are both staring at her, grim-faced.

  ‘What is it?’ she asks, a fluttering in her chest.

  ‘You’d better come here,’ he says.

  She walks towards them and sees the familiar masthead of Killing Cuttlefish on his screen, but he minimises the tab before she can see more. ‘You’ve got to be kidding me. Has the guy complained?’ she asks, incredulous.

  ‘I don’t think she needs to see this,’ says Priya.

  ‘What don’t I need to see?’

  Charlie reaches out and grabs the back of a chair, rolling it along on its wheels until it’s resting in front of her. He pats it. ‘Take a seat,’ he says. ‘Look, I’m afraid that creep Feminist Slayer, or whatever he calls himself, has written a blog post about you. And Priya’s right, you really don’t need to read it, it’s pretty unpleasant. We’ll be putting a call in to report it to the police.’

  ‘The police?’ Frankie thinks of the red light above the camera. So he did have his eye on her yesterday. The consequences of her challenge are so obvious, she can’t believe she didn’t anticipate this. Of course he’s not going to come on the programme and explain himself; much easier to attack her online instead. She’s half tempted to take their advice and avoid reading it, but knows it’s only a matter of time before curiosity makes her crack. ‘Let me see,’ she says more steadily than she feels.

  ‘Frankie,’ Priya says, putting a hand on her arm. ‘I really don’t think you should. He’s just a sick bastard, ranting because you caught him out. Don’t give him the satisfaction of letting his twisted words into your head.’

  She looks from Priya to Charlie, taking in their glum faces. It’s obviously bad. ‘Fuck it,’ she says at last. ‘I’m a hack. We see hideous stuff all the time, this is just a stupid blog post. You know I’ll read it at some point. Might as well be now.’

  ‘Well, I’ll go get us all a cup of tea,’ says Charlie, who can’t have missed the Styrofoam cup in her hand and is clearly only exiting the scene to spare her – or perhaps his – embarrassment. As he moves, she rolls the chair up to his computer and clicks open the tab. The first thing she sees is the image. Her face, digitally bloated and superimposed onto the body of a harpy with shrivelled pendulous breasts, sits above the blog’s title: Fatty Larch gets her Knickers in a Twist.

  She looks up at Priya, raises an eyebrow in a gesture of bravado she doesn’t feel. ‘Well, at least it comes with a flattering photo,’ she says, turning back to read.

  The Eastern Film Company’s fattest female reporter, Frances ‘I’ll-go-on-a-diet-tomorrow’ Larch, has got herself all hot and bothered over this website’s exposure of the Gynocracy’s lies.

  A paid-up Feminazi of the shrillest type, Fatty Larch made a tearful appeal on the local yokel news last night after Yours Truly pointed out that supposed sweetie pie Hanna Raynott-Chivers was in fact a lying little slag. Fatty has a soft spot for slags – being one herself – and seemed to feel that reporting THE TRUTH about Hanna, Lily, Sandra and the rest of them is a crime because they’re dead. Boo Hoo, and a great loss to the world that is, etc. etc. It also seems to have escaped Fatty’s notice that Slaggy Hanna was still alive and well when the first post went up OVER A YEAR AGO.

  Fatty then proceeded to compare Yours Truly to our friend the Norfolk Strangler. Now I’m no particular admirer of the Strangler’s modus operandi, though he does seem to be picking off whores rather than innocent women, so far as I can see. That aside, the last time I checked, blogging and murdering were two separate activities.

  But Fatty seems to feel Yours Truly is involved in some way, so perhaps we should turn her fantasy into reality.

  If you’re reading this Mr Strangler, why not pick off a few more slags, then we can see if their tragic demise makes Fatty’s head explode. I’d watch that on TV. Or better still, why not go for Fatty herself? She fits the slag bill perfectly. Like the rest of her shrieking sisterhood in the MSM she’s a talentless little cocksucker who gets her stories from blowing men in high places. Her cunt’s probably seen more dicks than a hooker feeding a meth habit.

  So if you’re feeling murderous, Mr Strangler, you can find Fatty at the HQ of the Eastern Film Company. Failing that, she lives at the posh new development on King Street. You can enjoy lovely views of the riverside from her flat there as she chokes her last. The cow drives a red Fiat 500, RV65 reg so you should know when she’s home.

  Bye-Bye, Fatty. Enjoy meeting the Strangler. Hope he rapes you first, BITCH.

  Frankie’s face is blazing hot with anger, fear and embarrassment. To her annoyance she realises her hands are trembling. She clenches them to make it stop.

  She’s read much worse than this, but nothing has quite prepared her for the unpleasantness of being the focus of another person’s hate. The tone, which swings from childish to obscene, would be bad enough, but she feels physically sick when it sinks in that this man has posted up her address for any murderous individual to see.

  ‘I’ve been such an idiot,’ she says, pushing the rolling chair backwards from the desk with force. She nearly bowls into Charlie, who is hovering behind her with three mugs in his grasp. He winces as hot liquid slops over one hand. ‘Sorry,’ she says. ‘And I’m even sorrier for what I said on air last night.’

  ‘It wasn’t the smartest thing you’ve ever done,’ he says. ‘But this isn’t your fault. The guy is clearly bonkers, and an absolute arsehole to boot. Even if your live about this website had been totally straight, he’d still have written it. Just calling him out was enough.’ Charlie glances around the near-empty newsroom. There’s no sign of Kiera but he still lowers his voice. ‘And we all know you were encouraged to go after him.’

  Priya nods. ‘Charlie’s right, the guy’s unhinged. Any criticism of his precious world view and he obviously gets the poisoned pen out. I’ve been through his stuff online, and he’s even had a pop at Sandi Toksvig and Jessica Ennis-Hill.’

  ‘But how does he know where I live?’ Frankie says. ‘He must have been physically stalking me before the live. No way would he have had time to find all that out about my address between half six and’ – she looks at the screen – ‘2.16 a.m. when this was posted. And how did you guys see it?’

  There’s an uncomfortable pause. ‘He emailed it to everyone in the management team,’ says Charlie.

  ‘Great. So he knows you all by name?’

  ‘It’s not that hard to work out who we are,’ sa
ys Priya. ‘Not if you watch the programme regularly and do a bit of googling.’

  ‘You’d have to be pretty determined though,’ says Frankie. She looks around nervously. ‘What does Kiera say to all this? Where is she?’

  ‘She’s not in yet,’ says Charlie. ‘But I called her first thing and she’ll be with you when the police are here. They want to ask a few questions, get as much info as they can on this guy.’

  ‘The police are coming to the office?’ Frankie says. ‘Well, that’s great, everyone will have read the bloody thing by lunchtime.’

  ‘If you think anyone here would read that shit and not be on your side, you don’t know us very well,’ says Priya, leaning over and pressing a hand to her shoulder. ‘But we do have to take it seriously, this guy has encouraged a threat to your life. And he obviously knows rather a lot about the programme and who works here. We need to review our security arrangements.’

  ‘And there are some positives,’ says Charlie, forcing his voice to sound cheerful. ‘If this guy is trying to make contact with Norfolk’s most wanted, that means he can’t be the killer himself, surely? So the chances are he’s just some creep, howling into the void.’

  Frankie shrugs. ‘I guess, though all that protesting that he’s not murdered anyone could just be a decoy.’

  ‘Well, there is one definite upside,’ he counters. ‘No more self-shooting for a bit. That’s got to be a bonus.’

  Seeing the filthy look Priya shoots Charlie for his lame attempt at a joke, Frankie almost feels better. Then she remembers the blogger’s invitation: You can enjoy lovely views of the riverside from her flat there as she chokes her last. Nausea rises in her stomach and she excuses herself, heading to the bathroom.

  She sits in the newsroom kitchen, slumped over her laptop. Far from it being a bonus not interviewing Brett until later in the morning, Frankie has found there’s little to distract her from fretting. Everyone has been understanding, as Priya predicted, but it’s still embarrassing. She’s moved from her desk to be out of sight, spending time clearing her email backlog and drinking her way through several instant coffees, but she keeps finding herself staring listlessly at the screen.

  All she can think about is the blog. She clicks onto a rival news website, looking at their coverage of the Norfolk Strangler. There’s a new update on the murder victims all being the target of an online hate campaign. Kiera will be delighted at their exclusive getting airtime. No doubt Frankie’s misery will seem a small price to pay for it. Thankfully the blog about her hasn’t been reported. She sits up a little straighter. The blogger is still the story, she isn’t, and unmasking him is a legitimate use of her time.

  She opens the search engine, looking at the empty search bar, not wanting to bring up Killing Cuttlefish onto her screen. Her fingers hover over the keyboard. The site’s odd title is still a mystery. She types ‘women+sexism+cuttlefish’ into the waiting white box, then scrolls down the results. The first only show texts that include women and sexism, but halfway down the page, to her surprise, she sees a suggestion that highlights the third word of her search.

  It’s a link to a page called ‘ON WOMEN’. Beneath the title, a snippet of the relevant text appears . . . and the cuttlefish with its dark, inky fluid, so Nature has provided woman for her . . .

  Frankie opens the page, eyes scanning the blur of words to find the highlighted passage. Random phrases briefly catch her attention as she reads. Women . . . are big children all their lives, something intermediate between the child and the man . . . Just as the female ant after coition loses her wings . . . Hers is reason of very narrow limitations . . .

  Then, halfway through the text, she finds what she’s looking for.

  Nature has not destined them, as the weaker sex, to be dependent on strength but on cunning; this is why they are instinctively crafty, and have an ineradicable tendency to lie. For as lions are furnished with claws and teeth, elephants with tusks, boars with fangs, bulls with horns, and the cuttlefish with its dark, inky fluid, so Nature has provided woman for her protection and defence with the faculty of dissimulation . . .

  ‘Fucking hell,’ Frankie says to herself. She returns to the top of the essay, to see the author of the hideous screed, and catches her breath. It’s by Arthur Schopenhauer. She sits back, remembering the touch of Brett’s hand on her arm as he leaned in, telling her about the importance of philosophy. Is it possible that the man she thought she and Zara were reeling in had in fact played her for a fool? Is this the sort of website a Schopenhauer devotee might set up? Could all Brett’s charm towards women, all those compliments, be a cover for contempt? Then an even darker thought grips her. Perhaps Kiera was right and there was no mystery man at the bar; Brett is covering his own tracks, not for the website, but for something much worse.

  She has the urge to run over to the newsdesk, grab Charlie and tell him she’s too frightened to do the interview. Then she takes a deep breath and closes her eyes. She can’t give in to panic. She goes back to the search results and types in ‘Schopenhauer+anti-feminism’. Immediately hundreds of results come up. She scrolls down the page, breathing out slowly. Brett’s study of Schopenhauer could be pure coincidence; the philosopher is quoted on dozens of sexist websites, along with other famous thinkers of his era. She looks up Schopenhauer’s Wikipedia page and On Women seems to be a very minor, if controversial, part of his work. Perhaps Brett isn’t even studying it. She’s still staring at the entry, trying to dispel the sick feeling from her stomach, when Nick from the sports desk comes over to the table.

  ‘Hey Frankie. There’s a caller come through for you, can you take it?’

  The last thing she feels like doing is speaking to a random right now, but she can’t hide from one of the most basic duties of her job. ‘Did they say what it was about?’

  ‘It was a guy wanting to talk about Donald Emneth.’

  ‘OK. I’ll go to my desk and you can put it through.’

  She heads back into the newsroom. Nobody stares at her; everyone seems busy with their own story or deadline, just as they always are. She sits at her desk, nodding at Nick. The phone rings and she picks up. ‘Frances Latch here.’

  ‘Miss Latch, my name’s Grant Allen, I’m calling about your report on Donald Emneth.’ The speaker’s voice is harsh. A smoker, she thinks.

  ‘Which report would that be?’ She tightens her grip on the receiver, steeling herself for the complaint or conspiracy theory she feels sure is coming next.

  ‘The one when the hooker said he was all right.’

  ‘Okaaaay,’ she says slowly, hackles rising at his choice of word. ‘What about the report?’

  ‘The hooker had a point. He’s been released without charge, but the man’s still had his name trashed. It’s outrageous. I’d like to come on your show and talk about it. That’s what I do, see? My organisation, Justice for Jailbirds, it’s all about giving the other side of the story . . .’

  ‘But Mr Emneth hasn’t been to jail.’

  ‘He spent a night or two in the cells, didn’t he?’

  The voice on the phone sounds aggrieved. Frankie rubs one hand across her eyes, wishing she hadn’t picked up. She softens her voice. ‘Yes, that’s true. Listen, Mr Allen, what you say sounds very interesting, but there are strict rules about what we can and can’t report when a case is active. This is a live murder investigation and we have to be very careful we don’t prejudice any future trial . . .’

  ‘Yes, yes, I know all that,’ says Grant Allen, tetchily. ‘I’m not a fool. But he’s been released without charge. He’s no longer a suspect. So it’s fine to run a story on how he’s been treated badly.’

  It’s Frankie’s turn to feel annoyed. ‘There’s currently one woman missing and three dead,’ she snaps. ‘Whatever injured feelings Mr Emneth may have don’t really compare, do they?’ There’s silence on the other end of the phone. ‘Mr Allen?’

  ‘I heard you. Not sure that’s a very responsible attitude for a journalist though. De
faming somebody doesn’t matter because it’s not as bad as murder, is that what you’re saying?’

  Frankie doesn’t feel up to this today. She looks round at the newsdesk, desperate to palm her irritating caller off onto Charlie. For once the workaholic editor’s seat is empty. ‘The Eastern Film Company hasn’t defamed anyone,’ she says. ‘And I didn’t mean to sound abrupt. I’m not dismissing Mr Emneth’s situation, I’m sure it’s all been very stressful for him, but I don’t think our viewers would be too sympathetic to hearing his story right now. Maybe when the real killer is caught, we might talk to you again about running something on the issue then?’

  ‘If that’s the best you can offer, I suppose it will have to do.’

  Frankie makes a mental note never to speak to the man again. ‘Thanks for your call, Mr Allen,’ she says sweetly. ‘Have a nice day.’

  The police turn up half an hour before she’s meant to be meeting Brett. She texts to apologise for delaying the interview and he sends back a string of kisses, which makes her cringe. She tells herself he might be like that with everyone.

  The two police officers suggest speaking somewhere quiet, and Kiera shuts them all into her office. The glass is frosted for privacy but it still feels like passing buses are going to rattle the windows off their hinges. Frankie has sat in this room many times with her old boss David, for annual chats about career goals or to bounce around ideas for longer investigations, but it no longer feels familiar. All trace of his personality has been removed. The framed Norwich FC shirt he had on the wall is gone, leaving just a dark rectangle where it prevented the wallpaper from fading. Kiera has not yet moved anything personal into the room to replace it.

  Frankie wishes it were Charlie here, rather than Kiera. Her boss is sitting, naturally enough, at her desk, but it has created a curious power dynamic with Frankie and the two policemen ranged round her, as if she is conducting the interview. DI Tom Osmond and DC Dan Avery have been friendly enough so far, commiserating with her over the unpleasantness of it all, though the older man, Tom Osmond, seems to be listening less attentively than his junior partner. Frankie is relieved she’s never filmed either of them, or had a chance to piss them off with an awkward news report.