Death Row

by Mark Pearson

  A light snow was falling, the fat frozen flakes dancing in the air and floating into Jack’s eyes, blinding him. He wiped his hand across them and struggled as fast as he could down the bank, the worn soles of his boots sticking in the slippery mud as he clambered down to the river’s edge. Out in the water Siobhan gripped hard to the edge of a long-abandoned half-sunk barge that stuck out from the raging waters at an angle.

  ‘Hold on, Siobhan,’ screamed Jack as he got onto the barge and picked his way along the narrow edge that skirted the rotting hulk of the cabin. ‘I’m coming.’

  ‘Please, Jack. Please. It’s so cold.’

  ‘I know, Siobhan. Just hold on. I’m coming.’

  Jack made it to the front of the barge, where the engine would have been housed when the boat had been in use many years before. He clambered up into the small forward deck space and, bracing his feet, leaned over the crumbling woodwork to reach down. He could see the naked terror in Siobhan’s young eyes as her frozen hands clung to the rotten woodwork of the hull, clutching at the edges of a gaping hole. The river swirled beneath and around her, like a thing feeding. She whimpered with fear as Jack smiled down at her.

  ‘It’s okay, Shiv. I’ve got you now.’

  Jack held his arm out and stretched it as far as he could go, his fingers reaching.

  Siobhan shook her head.

  ‘Give me your hand.’

  And again she shook her head. Her teeth chattering with fear as she screamed up at him. ‘No.’

  Jack leaned further down, stretching his arm as far as he could towards her, wedging his feet against the side of the engine housing and straining every muscle in his body. He should never have brought her with him to the old mill house. He was supposed to be looking after her but he’d wanted to search it and knew it might not be safe so he had made her wait outside while he checked it out. He thought she’d be safe but he knew he should never have left her on her own.

  He reached out further with his arm. Below him in the water Siobhan was turning blue now with the cold. Her tiny hands were frozen as they clung to the rotting wood of the barge. The water was swirling around her powerfully, tugging at her, hungry to pluck her loose and consume her. Her fingers gripped painfully as a swell raised her and swung her sideways. She looked up at her brother, the tears in her eyes freezing with the cold.

  ‘Help me, Jack.’

  And his hands reached her fingers. ‘Take my hand, Siobhan.’

  And she let go of the wood and grasped at his hand, but the swirl of the water was too much – their fingertips brushed and she was swept out into the river.

  ‘No!’ cried Jack as he watched his sister’s head bob below the surface of the water. ‘No!’

  He jumped down from the barge and ran along the river’s edge, calling out desperately to his sister. He caught a flash of her faded blue dress as it sank beneath the rough eddies of the water and then she was gone. He could hear the sound of a siren in the distance, a shrill note sounding again and again.

  Delaney’s eyes flew wide open and as he sat up in bed he looked at the mobile phone on the bedside cabinet. It vibrated again, rattling against the polished wood and making a buzzing sound. Delaney ran his hand over his forehead. It was drenched with sweat.

  Beside him Kate stirred and looked up at him sleepily. ‘What’s up, Jack?’

  ‘Just a dream,’ he said hoarsely. He picked up the phone and looked at the caller’s ID, then answered it. ‘Hi, Diane. This is supposed to be a day of rest, you know.’ He listened, his forehead creasing as he did so, squinting at the clock to see the time. It was six forty-five. ‘Okay, boss,’ he said. ‘I’ll get there as soon as I can.’

  He closed the phone and looked across at Kate.

  ‘What’s going on?’

  Delaney ran his hand through his hair. ‘God knows, Kate. God only knows.’

  ‘Has something happened? Have they found the boy?’

  ‘No. Not that.’

  ‘What, then?’

  ‘The Catholic church two streets away from Carlton Row. Someone’s been killed.’

  Kate sat up in the bed. ‘Do you want me to come with you?’

  Delaney grimaced apologetically. ‘Would you mind? They’ve phoned the coroner but he’s a few hours away. Might be good to have your opinion.’

  ‘I can’t process the body, you know that? We’ll have to wait for him to get there.’

  ‘Yeah, I know. I understand if you don’t want to do it. This isn’t a pleasant one, Kate.’

  ‘It’s okay. Give me five minutes.’

  *

  It was actually just ten minutes later when Kate walked into her kitchen to find Jack dressed and pouring some hot water from the kettle into a Thermos flask.

  ‘Only instant, I’m afraid – short on time.’

  ‘That’s okay. It’s good thinking.’

  At that time of day on a Sunday morning it wasn’t busy on the roads and Delaney told Kate to ignore the speed limits. They made the trip in just over twenty minutes. As they turned the corner of Carlton Row it was still dark, although thankfully not raining, and the street was lit up with the blue lights still flashing on top of a number of police cars that had pulled up outside Saint Botolph’s. There was also an ambulance, which to Delaney’s way of thinking, given the circumstances, was as ridiculous a case of closing the stable door after the horse had bolted as he had ever seen.

  He and Kate ducked under the yellow exclusion tape that had already been stretched across the street thirty yards either side of the church. He was pleased to note that the vultures had not yet gathered, but judging by the people looking out of their windows, some with phones held up to the glass, he figured it wouldn’t be long. Mobile footage was probably being sent even now over the internet and the real press cameras wouldn’t be much longer getting there, he had no doubt of that.

  Diane Campbell was standing outside the church with a couple of uniforms beside her, talking to a man with a blanket wrapped around his shoulders and drinking tea from a plastic beaker. Delaney assumed that he was the priest who had made the discovery, and reckoned the tea would be very sweet indeed.

  ‘Diane.’ He nodded at her briefly as they approached.

  ‘Jack. Hello, Kate. Thanks for coming.’

  ‘Not a problem.’

  ‘Do we know who she is yet?’ asked Delaney.

  ‘We have a shrewd idea but the vicar hasn’t been able to go back in and make a formal identification.’

  ‘Priest.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘He’s a priest, not a vicar.’

  Father Carson Brown looked over at Delaney and Doctor Walker as if noticing them for the first time. He smiled, his face colourless, his lips thin. ‘Another true believer.’

  ‘I’m a true something,’ said Delaney, a little bit more of the soft brogue sliding into his voice. ‘I’m not sure what kind of believer I am any more.’

  The priest looked back at him with haunted eyes. ‘Nor me.’

  Delaney nodded, understanding, and turned to Diane. ‘Shall we go in?’

  Diane held her arm out towards the door and Kate and Delaney followed her into the church. Delaney held back the urge to dip his hand in the holy water. He wasn’t totally sure, but he thought the water might not be classed as holy any more. Would the church need to be sanctified again? As they walked up the aisle to the altar Delaney thought it was entirely possible that that could be the case.

  A woman’s head had been placed on the altar. Severed at the neck. Her eyes were open in a face that had no colour in it, apart from the eyes. Her eyes were a startling blue. Deep Arctic blue. Her head was as bald as an egg.

  Kate stepped forward, putting on a pair of forensic gloves, and placed her hand on the woman’s cheek. It was cold. Extremely cold.

  She turned back to Jack and Diane. ‘She’s been frozen.’

  ‘Where the hell is the rest of her?’ asked Diane and pointed at the woman’s forehead. ‘And what the fuck is t
hat supposed to mean?’

  Delaney looked closer. The letters H O R had been carved on the woman’s forehead. ‘I don’t know, Diane. When I was an altar boy we just had the chalice on the altar and maybe that little bell I had to ring at a certain time in the Mass. Decapitation was a bit too avant-garde for us back in Ballydehob.’

  Diane was too used to gallows humour to comment. ‘Christ, I need a cigarette,’ she said instead.

  ‘Diane!’ Despite himself Delaney was a little taken aback.

  ‘What?’ she said.

  Delaney gestured at the surroundings. ‘You know – we’re in a church.’

  Diane flapped a dismissive hand and pointed at the severed head. ‘Exactly. Maybe this is connected to some kind of devil worship.’

  Kate knelt down by the altar, examining the cut marks at the base of the decapitated woman’s head. ‘Maybe the murderer was spelling out the name Horus.’

  ‘Who?’

  Kate turned round to look up at the chief inspector. ‘Horus was an Egyptian deity. Had something to do with the dead, I think. He was depicted as having a human body but a falcon’s head.’

  Jack looked back at the altar. ‘The fact that her head is shaved …’

  ‘Yes?’ said Kate, gesturing for him to continue.

  ‘You think she might be a nun?’

  Kate considered it. ‘It’s possible. The priest didn’t seem to know a great deal about the woman except he thinks she must be the volunteer cleaner. Apparently she only worked at night, when no one else was around.’

  ‘Maybe she’s an ex-nun,’ said Delaney. ‘Maybe if this is some kind of ritual killing, a Satanist sacrifice or the like, it gives more power or energy to the spell if the sacrificed person is religious.’

  ‘Might make a sick kind of sense, I suppose,’ agreed Kate. ‘Wouldn’t they have painted a pentagram or something, though?’

  ‘Satanists in Harrow on the Hill, decapitating bald nuns and desecrating churches!’ Diane sighed heavily. ‘Sweet Jesus, as if we haven’t got enough on our plates already!’

  ‘So the thing about this Horus fellow having a human body but a bird’s head – is it significant, do you think?’ Delaney asked Kate.

  ‘It could be. If that’s what the letters mean. But we have no way of knowing that yet.’

  Diane yanked a packet of cigarettes out of her jacket pocket and snapped one into her mouth. ‘Great,’ she said. ‘So the rest of her body is somewhere having a hawk’s head grafted onto it by some devil-worshipping Egyptologist.’

  ‘Don’t even think of lighting that, Diane,’ said Delaney.

  ‘Jeez, Jack. Of course I’m not going to light it: this is a crime scene. Anyway, I thought your Catholicism was in the lapsed category?’

  Delaney looked over at the row of saints marching along both walls, preserved in fractured and coloured glass, their eyes glowing now that dawn had finally broken from outside and shards of light were piercing through the dark clouds that still hung low over the church.

  ‘I’m a betting man, boss, you know that. Let’s just say I like to cover the odds.’

  Robert Duncton and a woman whom Delaney had never seen before came into the church. The woman was in her mid-thirties, about six foot one or two tall, with short cropped blonde hair. She didn’t seem to be wearing make-up and it didn’t stop her being strikingly attractive – she had cheekbones you could have sliced cheese on.

  ‘Step away from the evidence, please, Doctor Walker,’ said Duncton.

  Kate stood up and fixed him with a cool look. ‘She’s still a person, detective inspector.’

  The tall woman held out her hand to Delaney. ‘You’ll be Jack Delaney?’

  ‘That I will,’ he said, almost smiling as he felt Diane’s frowning gaze upon them. Her displeasure might not be merely a matter of breach of professional etiquette, he guessed. Diane Campbell admired a pretty woman just as much as the next man.

  ‘Sergeant Halliday,’ the tall woman said, introducing herself. She smiled, revealing a row of teeth as neatly arranged as a march by the Grenadier Guards and as white as a Lyons sugar cube. ‘Emma. I’ve heard a lot about you.’

  ‘Ahem,’ said Diane Campbell with a stage cough.

  ‘I’m sorry, chief inspector,’ said the sergeant. She smiled again, holding her hand out once more. ‘I’ve heard a lot about you as well, this time all good.’

  Diane nodded wryly and shook Emma Halliday’s hand.

  ‘Well, isn’t this lovely?’ snorted Duncton sarcastically. ‘Shame we can’t all have a cup of tea and an iced bun!’ He glared across at Kate, who had produced a camera and was firing off shots, her flash lighting up the church like bolts of lightning. ‘But now that we’ve all met, can we stop contaminating my crime scene and keep the area clear for SOCO and the forensic pathologist?’

  ‘He won’t be here for another hour at least.’

  ‘The evidence isn’t going anywhere.’

  ‘I beg to differ,’ said Kate.

  ‘I beg your pardon, Doctor Walker?’ said Duncton, incredulous.

  ‘The head – it’s already melting.’

  ‘Melting? What on earth are you talking about?’

  ‘The head was frozen. In fact, I would say that the whole body was frozen or at least chilled significantly before the head was removed.’

  ‘Why do you say that, doctor?’ asked Sergeant Halliday.

  Duncton glared at his assistant but let the question stand.

  ‘The cut marks. The flesh is already softening. Kate took another few shots. ‘In an hour’s time you won’t be able to get this detail.’ She stood up again and pointed at the altar cloth under the severe head. ‘Very little blood seepage.’

  ‘Because the head was frozen?’ asked Delaney.

  ‘Partly. Probably also partly due to the severance taking place post-mortem and the subsequent exsanguinations taking place in a different location.’

  ‘Are you saying her head being chopped off wasn’t the cause of death?’ asked the female sergeant.

  Kate shrugged. ‘Impossible to tell at this stage.’

  ‘But it wasn’t done here?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Which is why we need to wait for the pathologist,’ said Duncton.

  ‘No …’ said Kate again.

  ‘It’s why we need to find the missing body,’ said Emma Halliday.

  ‘Quite so,’ agreed Kate and smiled at her as a teacher might smile at a bright student.

  ‘Let’s just remember that we are the lead on this investigation here,’ Duncton barked at his sergeant, trying to recover some ground.

  Delaney’s mouth quirked in the faintest of smiles. He was pretty sure Duncton didn’t like the fact that his sergeant was taller than him and he had to look up at her when trying to assert his authority. ‘Nobody gives a shit whose collar it is, Robert,’ Delaney said. ‘All we care about is finding the sick fucker who has done this and finding the missing boy.’

  ‘If the two are related,’ replied Duncton.

  Diane snorted. ‘Yeah, they’re not related – and if my granny grew a cock she’d be my grandad.’

  Delaney nodded. ‘Garnier is at the heart of all this, depend on it.’

  ‘What I depend on are the facts, inspector. It’s called good police work.’

  ‘Do we know who she is?’ asked Emma Halliday

  Diane Campbell shook her head and pointed at the bucket and the basket of polishes and dusters that was to the side of the altar. ‘We think it was the cleaning woman, but the good Father didn’t look too closely. We’re waiting for him to come in and make a formal identification.’

  Duncton walked over and looked into the bucket, grimaced and moved away. ‘Let’s get him back in, then.’

  *

  If any colour had returned to Father Carson Brown’s face in the time since he had last let his gaze fall upon the severed head that still sat in the centre of his altar like a blasphemous obscenity, it had drained away again now. He still had a b
lanket draped around his shoulders. The comforting hand of Sergeant Emma Halliday rested on his left one as she guided him reluctantly back up the aisle to the altar.

  ‘Just take your time, Father.’

  ‘Okay.’ The priest knelt down and made another sign of the cross on his chest. He stood up, his gaze raised and fixed on the benevolent eyes of the crucified god above the altar. A few steps further and he stopped in front of the small raised dais, took a deep breath and looked down.

  He held his unblinking gaze for a moment or two as he stared at the unfortunate woman’s head, taking in the absolute horror of it. Her skin had more colour now – some red veins were standing out against the mottled blue skin. Tears formed in his eyes and he did nothing to blink them away. ‘Yes, it’s her,’ he said simply.

  ‘What’s her name?’ asked Duncton.

  ‘It’s Maureen Gallagher,’ said Father Carson Brown.

  ‘Sweet Jesus,’ said Diane Campbell.

  ‘And who is she, then, apart from being the church cleaner?’ asked Duncton, puzzled.

  Delaney gave him a flat look. ‘She was the only person ever to visit Peter Garnier in prison,’ he said. ‘She went to see him once, six months ago.’

  Duncton blinked his eyes rapidly as he took it in. ‘So why in God’s name has she ended up decapitated and placed on a church altar a hundred yards from Carlton Row?’

  ‘None of this is in God’s name,’ said the priest, turning away from the altar.

  ‘Somebody is sending a message?’ Emma Halliday speculated.

  ‘To who?’ asked Duncton.

  Delaney shrugged and looked at the priest who, puce-coloured and breathing deeply, was holding onto one of the pews facing the entrance to the church.

  ‘I guess that’s what we need to find out. And quickly.’

  *

  DI Tony Bennett sat on the edge of his bed and pulled on his right shoe, tying the laces neatly. He put his foot down and winced slightly, leaning forward to rub his ankle. It was still slightly swollen but the pain was easing. He popped a 400mg capsule of ibuprofen out of the foil strip, put it in his mouth and swallowed it with a drink of water from a pint glass that he had by his bed. He put the glass down and picked up the book that was beside it. It was the Good News version of the New Testament. He opened it at random and read a few verses to himself. He put the book back on his bedside cabinet and looked around the bedroom. It was a plain room in a one-bedroom apartment: one window looking out over a back garden that he didn’t have access to, a wardrobe, a chair with curved wooden armrests and a red cushion on it by the window. No decorations at all apart from a small wooden crucifix above his bed.