Knife After Death: A chilling crime thriller

by Irvine, Ian C. P.

  What struck Peter was that all the women were very pretty. Very attractive indeed. Mariusz had good taste.

  Peter recognised four of the woman straight away. Three from his dreams, one from Knuttsford: Valentia, the woman from room 326, the woman found in Wales, the redhead from the Grey Mare's Tail, and Carolina.

  There were several others, one of which caught his attention in particular. He held it in his hands for a while, staring at it. Trying to spark a memory. To initiate a vision that would give him a better understanding of who this woman was.

  Nothing. Nothing came.

  Except for one thing. An overpowering sense that this woman was now dead.

  .

  Turning his attention to another little pile, Peter picked up a small black plastic bag. Inside was a picture frame wrapped in bubble wrap, which he undid. The photograph was of an old lady, and Peter immediately knew that this was Mariusz's mother. He looked at the photograph and felt a sudden sadness. Peter put the photograph back into the bubble wrap and bag and quickly put it down.

  .

  Peter turned his attention to a green plastic bag, which he picked up and weighed in his hand. It was quite heavy.

  He opened the bag up and looked inside, surprised by what he found.

  The bag contained several piles of money, all wrapped together by elastic bands.

  There was obviously a lot there.

  Attached to the plastic bands that surrounded each pile of notes, there was a little white cardboard tag. The same words were written on each tag: "For Sam (Carolina's son)".

  Peter took off the plastic bands of each pile, and counted them out. In total, there was £8,000 pounds.

  A present from a father to his son.

  .

  Next Peter picked up a piece of rolled up canvas, which when he unwrapped he discovered unrolled into a long strip, with seven large pockets sewed into it. In each pocket was a knife.

  The number seven immediately popped into his mind.

  Peter shivered.

  The full meaning of the number seven was now immediately clear.

  Seven knives for seven people.

  .

  Peter rocked backwards on his heels away from the canvas. He stood up and walked away from it, trying to calm down, feelings of both nausea and excitement flowing through him simultaneously.

  He stared at the knives on the floor in front of him.

  The excitement won over.

  Almost gingerly he approached the knives again.

  If he had been an Egyptologist, finding these knives would have been like discovering the long-lost tomb of a Pharaoh. If he had been a scuba-diver, it would have been like finding a Spanish galleon full of treasure.

  In his search for the truth and KK, this was the jackpot.

  Peter knelt down and stared at the selection of knives before him.

  Each knife was wrapped up in clear plastic. They were all different sizes. On each knife there was a white tag attached to the hilt, and another photograph placed in each pocket behind the knife.

  Peter pulled out the first knife in its plastic wrapping from the canvas pocket. He was just about to pick up the photograph behind it when he thought better of it. He didn't want to put his fingerprints or DNA all over it.

  What should he do?

  A few minutes later Peter had left his room and was in the kitchen of the pub downstairs, thankfully finding that the landlord had not locked any of the inside doors. He fumbled around in the darkness for a while, and then found what he was looking for: a bag of disposable clear plastic gloves. He had seen the cook in the kitchen wearing some the other day. They were the ideal solution.

  Peter 'borrowed' two pairs and rushed back upstairs to his room.

  Putting a pair in his coat pocket, he put the other pair on and knelt down and took out the first photograph.

  It was of a woman. She was lying on some grass. It was night-time and the photograph had obviously been taken with an old-mobile phone then later printed off somehow. The small flash from the phone illuminated a woman's face, eyes staring blankly open, her throat cut wide open, and blood soaking her face and the grass around her.

  Peter fought the urge to vomit.

  There was a name on the photograph which Peter didn't know how to pronounce. It was in Polish, and beside the name was scribbled a place name, and a date.

  He recognised the woman from the other photograph he had just seen a few minutes ago, his prediction of her death now confirmed.

  The date was almost eight years ago, and the place was a foreign name.

  Was this the first woman that Mariusz had killed? Or was she just the first that he had started to photograph and record?

  Either way, she was 'Number 1' in 'Mariusz's Hall of Infamy'.

  .

  Carefully Peter replaced the photograph and then the knife.

  He took out the second knife and without removing it from its plastic wrapping, he read the name on the label: Sonia Beauchene. A French name. Taking out the photograph behind the knife and looking at it, he immediately recognised the face. The girl from Room 326 in Zermatt. The date was the same as identified in the news paper articles Dieter had translated.

  The photograph confirmed his dreams. It was taken with a proper camera, and showed a girl on a bed, her throat cut, blood everywhere...In fact, the scene was almost identical to part of the vision he had had.

  He had seen this view before.

  In Switzerland.

  With shaking hands, Peter put first the photograph and the knife back into the canvas pocket.

  That was 'Number 2'.

  .

  The third pocket contained a large curved knife, probably a fisherman’s knife. Its handle was white and engraved, and also covered in blood.

  The photograph was of the woman in Wales. She was an attractive woman. In the photograph the knife was protruding from her chest. The label on the knife said "Claire Jones". The writing on the back of the photograph said-'Cardiff'-, and gave a date two years before. 'Number 3'.

  .

  The fourth was the redhead in the field, now lying beside the Grey Mare's Small Tail. The photograph was of an attractive woman lying on her side, the heavy knife now in Peter's hand stuck in her chest. Her eyes were closed. She seemed peaceful.

  Peter looked at the hilt of the knife. It seemed to have been engraved with symbols from some eastern country. Was the knife Japanese? Chinese?

  He turned the label over to read the name and froze.

  There were two names on the small piece of white card, attached to the knife by a piece of white, thick cotton.

  The first name said "Carolina Archer". It had been written in pencil and then scored out, and underneath another name was written in pen, "Elaine Howson".

  The implication was clear, and confirmed what Peter had realised earlier that night. Mariusz had originally planned to take Carolina up to the beautiful Grey Mare's Small Tail, make love to her, and then kill her. Instead, she had saved the life of herself and of her son by announcing she was pregnant.

  Mariusz had then found another victim for the knife.

  It seemed that he planned each murder, and chose the victim for the knife, not the knife for the victim.

  Suddenly Peter understood.

  This was not a collection of knives. This was a Gallery.

  A Gallery of Death.

  Each victim personally selected for execution for a particular type of knife.

  Mariusz had made a study of death, and an art form out of its performance.

  Peter shuddered.

  Lucky Carolina.

  Poor Elaine.

  Elaine was 'Number 4'.

  .

  No. 5 was Valentia. He recognised the photograph in the canvas pocket as soon as he had removed the knife, and before he had even taken it out of the canvas pocket.

  He picked the photograph up. Immediately the vision and the scene of her execution rolled before his eyes. Peter went with it, gripp
ing the knife firmly as he experienced it, closing his eyes tightly to experience and see it to its best effect.

  Once again, the vision started to arouse him. As he realised this, he considered opening his eyes and stopping the vision, but instead, he went with the vision. His arousal grew.

  Suddenly, Peter realised what he was doing.

  "No, NO!!!!"...He opened his eyes, dropping the knife and the photograph on the floor and walking quickly away.

  "What the fuck is happening to me?" Peter almost shouted.

  He stared at the knife and the photograph on the floor.

  For a second he considered having a cold shower to wash away his guilt and his thoughts. To dampen his arousal, and purge himself.

  In the end however, he knelt down beside the knife, picked it up and looked at the label through the plastic covering. Valentia Chlebowski. Polish. The date on the photograph confirmed the date she was murdered last summer.

  Something on the knife caught his attention. He looked at it more closely, pulling the plastic back a little and stretching it out so he could see more clearly.

  "Fuck...the knife has still got blood on it!"

  He quickly pulled out the first two knives and examined the blade's more thoroughly. They both had blood on them too.

  "Eughhhhh!" Peter said aloud, putting them back into their pockets.

  Valentia was 'Number 5'.

  Placing Valentia and her knife back into the Gallery of Knives and Death, Peter hesitated before pulling out the sixth. A large knife with the symbol of the German SS on its hilt, it was his favourite of them all. He held it tightly trying to imagine who had owned it before Mariusz. How did it come into his possession? It balanced well in his hand.

  He could see immediately that the blade was covered with dried red blood. On its handle another little tag was inscribed with a name in blue ink: Gary Roberts. He had died last September.

  Transferring the knife into his left hand he picked out the photograph. It was a photograph of a man lying on a sheet of black rubber, dressed in a German uniform.

  Another piece in the jigsaw puzzle had been found.

  Peter looked at the photograph a bit closer. The face...the face in the photograph was somehow very familiar. He had seen this man today somewhere else...where was it?

  Then it was there...the place he had seen him before... Peter had seen him in the photograph of the climbers that he and Carolina had looked at earlier on in her living room.

  Unless he was mistaken, Gary Roberts was one of Carolina's boyfriends!

  He thought about this for a moment. What were the chances of a victim of Mariusz's just coincidentally being a boyfriend of Carolina?

  None! Zero.

  Obviously Mariusz had targeted him because he had been a boyfriend!

  Why?

  After Mariusz had split up with Carolina, had Mariusz seen her going out with Gary Roberts and then got jealous? Had Roberts mistreated Carolina somehow and Mariusz had punished him?

  What was the reason?

  And why did he make him dress up as a German soldier?

  It was almost definitely some sick re-enactment of the scene in 'Saving Private Ryan?' But why did he reverse the roles?

  What would happen when Carolina found out that Mariusz, the father of her son, had killed Gary?

  Shit...this was all so fucked up!

  He put the knife and photographs back. Gary Roberts was 'Number 6'.

  .

  Peter looked at the seventh pocket. Who was this going to be? Who was 'Number 7'?

  He picked out the knife and held it in his hands. "Wow..." Peter said almost in admiration,"...it's so light!" The knife was in a plastic container. It was white, clean, no blood of any sort. A white label was attached to the hilt as with all the others, but when Peter looked at it, he found that it was empty. No name had yet been written on the tag.

  The knife had not yet been assigned to a victim.

  Peter stared at the weapon in his hand. It was brand new. Not yet used. The plastic wrapping around it was probably the original wrapping that it came in.

  He unwrapped the knife, picking it up carefully and examining it.

  The knife was undoubtedly very strong, rigidly constructed and the blade was about eighteen centimetres long. Yet it was so incredibly light. The blade was sharp, but obviously not made of metal. It was some kind of hi-tech weapon, maybe something the military were now using. Was it ceramic? Toughened glass? What?

  What was its purpose?

  A knife that was not metal? Why?

  Then the answer hit Peter square in the eyes: it was a knife that would not set off a metal detector!

  The sort of knife that you could take with you anywhere without setting off an alarm.

  The sort of knife that you could sneak onto an airplane.

  The implications of such a knife struck concern into Peter. What happened if terrorists started to use these?

  Who had made this? And why?

  And why and how had Mariusz got it?

  Okay, so it was an amazing knife. One of a kind. Granted. But had Mariusz bought it for a purpose? And if so, what purpose?

  Had he already chosen a target?

  Peter looked at the weapon in his hands. Studying it.

  He looked at the canvas "Gallery" in front of him, ...it was all there. A knife, a victim, a record of when and where...

  Except for this one. This was a virgin knife.

  Peter made a decision.

  He would give all the other knives and information to Alex. The police would be able to match the blood to the victims and the DNA to the killer. Once and for all Peter would be cleared.

  Peter would, however, keep the new knife. Maybe he would hand it over later, but his immediate thought was to write an article about this new weapon for the Evening News. People ...airlines in particular...had to be warned about this!

  Setting the knife aside on his bed, Peter turned to the last item on the floor in front of him: a brown envelope. He picked it up, opened the lid and took its contents out.

  As he held the contents in his hands, Peter shivered violently and his pulse went through the roof...he felt suddenly light headed and giddy, and started to breathe deeply, trying to bring his body under control.

  Fuck...he felt weird...

  Slowly, be began to pull himself together...to calm down...to feel okay again.

  Then he turned his attention back to the object in his hands.

  A passport.

  Slowly Peter opened the passport to the back cover, to where all the details of the owner were displayed. He turned the passport around in his hands so he could see and read it properly.

  A face stared back at him that was both familiar and foreign. It was a cold, distant photograph of a man showing no emotions, no feelings. A typical passport photograph designed to show the face and not the person.

  Mariusz was young. Good looking. Handsome.

  Peter shivered again.

  This was the man that was inside him. This was the face of the serial killer and murderer whom he had been hunting down, tracking down like a dog.

  He had found him. At last, it was over.

  Peter had found Mariusz. KK had been unveiled.

  His eyes turned from the photograph to the typewritten details on the page.

  His family name was Bujnowski.

  His first name was ...what? no...his first name was not Mariusz...it was Maciek!

  Maciek?

  Peter stared at the photograph again.

  'Maciek Bujnowski? '

  He lifted the photograph closer, examining the eyes. He read the name again.

  For a second Peter was confused. Was Carolina wrong? Had Valentia been wrong? Was Peter wrong? Had he got the wrong person? Was this the passport of the killer? Was this Mariusz?

  He flicked through the passport, and immediately a Polish identity card fell out, and a driving licence.

  Both had photographs of the same person on them. And the s
ame names.

  Maciek Bujnowski.

  Date of birth, 3rd March 1984. Maciek was 29 years old.

  What did this mean?

  ...and then an idea occurred to him. Carolina could look at the passport and confirm whether or not the man in the photograph was Mariusz or not!

  He got up to leave, to run straight back round to Carolina to her house and knock on her door and wake her up,... but just as he was about to grab his coat, it suddenly dawned on him.

  It all made sense now.

  Mariusz and Maciek were one and the same.

  Mariusz was a false identity. What was it that Doctor Jamieson had said on the video call? The person whose body they had found and from whom Peter's kidneys had been donated was a 'ghost'. He had no real identity. No one could identify who he was. No one. Which was exactly what you would expect from a serial killer, as Peter had then suggested to them.

  No one could identify who Mariusz really was. No one. Except Peter.

  From the information that Peter now held in his hands, Peter had it all.

  After an initial false start, Peter finally had the truth.

  KK meet Mariusz meet Maciek Bujnowski.

  Got you!

  Chapter Eighty Eight

  .

  .

  Edinburgh

  May 8th

  3.30 a.m.

  .

  .

  Mat got up out of his bed and switched his TV on. He couldn't sleep.

  "Bloody jetlag," he swore aloud.

  He had already had two whiskies from the minibar, but that still was not enough to tip him over the edge into sleep.

  He was too wired, and his body clock was still telling him that it was only 10.30 p.m. Mat was a night owl, he never went to sleep before 1 a.m. normal time, so at this rate he probably wouldn't fall asleep for hours yet!

  There didn't seem to be anything on British TV at this time of the morning, so Mat made a decision not to waste any time and to try and work for a while.

  Top of his list was to find a gun.

  Earlier on that afternoon he had bought a pay-as-you-go SIM card in a supermarket, topped it up, and made sure it was all working. Now he pulled out his notebook, looked up the number of the local contact he had been given in the States, and placed a call.