Unlucky For Some

by Jill McGown

“That’s understood, Dr. Castle,” said Judy. “But even the roughest analysis could point us in the right direction.”

  “And it could point you in entirely the wrong direction,” warned Castle. “Arriving at a profile without an in-depth scrutiny of all the available data is the next worst thing to simply jumping to conclusions.”

  “I think,” said Lloyd, his face entirely serious, “that at the moment, we would simply like your theoretical input to add to our own empirical data. A sociopsychological overview, if you will.”

  Tom didn’t dare catch Judy’s eye. Lloyd would have been in trouble with her for that before she was his boss.

  “Very well,” said Castle, entirely unaware of Lloyd’s mockery. “If we can look, in the first instance, at where the crimes have taken place, we see that in each case they occurred in an area where commercial businesses operate in the evening. And in each case, one or more of those businesses is owned by Waterman Entertainment. That suggests, on the face of it, that the perpetrator may have some connection with Waterman Entertainment.”

  “Do you think he’s more likely to work for Waterman than to be a customer?” asked Tom.

  “There is little data from which to extrapolate a possible socioeconomic group for the perpetrator, and it seems that Waterman Entertainment prides itself on appealing to all strata of society, so the status of the perpetrator is fluid.”

  Heaven help us, Tom thought, sneaking a look at his watch. I only asked a simple question.

  “But I tend to think it’s an employee for the simple reason that people usually go out in couples or groups for an evening’s entertainment. I think that the perpetrator would find it difficult to explain an absence to a companion, whereas absences from work, while more difficult to achieve, could be more easily explained. However, the dinner jacket—unless it was worn to confuse us—does seem to suggest a customer rather than an employee. But the whole thing is highly speculative, as Waterman Entertainment outlets seem ubiquitous in Bartonshire, and their proximity could be mere coincidence.”

  If Tom had followed that, then it was nothing more than they had arrived at themselves without using so many syllables to do it. Lloyd made a business of noting something down, and looked with feigned, deeply concerned interest at Castle, as he continued. Judy would kill him if he kept this up.

  “But it’s also the case that this person has an intimate knowledge of the areas in which the murders occurred—the avoidance of any surveillance cameras, the knowledge of his victim’s habits, and so on, shows that. Now, either this is as a result of having worked in those areas for some time and getting to know them and their inhabitants, or of careful and lengthy reconnaissance by someone not connected with these areas. The latter would require the perpetrator to be away for very long periods of time, and if that is the case, he is, I suspect, answerable only to himself.”

  Oh, here we go. He’s a loner with a chip on his shoulder. Well, you could knock me down with a feather, squire, honest you could. How do you boffins do it? Tom knew exactly how Lloyd felt.

  “But even so,” Castle went on, “to acquire such intimate knowledge of every single one of the factors involved in avoiding detection would be a very tall order. I tend to come down on the side of its being someone who has personal and detailed knowledge of the area already, and who only has to pick his victim, as it were. Which again points to someone who works or has worked in all three areas, in the evenings.”

  “A Waterman employee,” said Judy.

  “Possibly, but there are other interpretations, even at this early stage. The perpetrator is a man, I think, partly as a result of the witness to the first murder saying that he saw and heard a man, partly because the tone of the letters suggests a male writer, but more in view of the pathologist’s reports on the second and third murders. In the second murder, he noted that a woman would be unlikely to have the necessary strength to disable a healthy, fit man quickly enough to prevent his fighting back, and there is no physical suggestion that he did. And he was of the opinion that a man—a right-handed man—was likely to have inflicted the stab wound on the third victim.”

  “What about the fact that he’s used a different method of killing each time?” asked Judy.

  “Ah—now that is very unusual indeed, and of course makes my job more difficult, because the method is one of the pointers to the personality of the perpetrator. I think he’s adopting what we might call a best-practice policy.”

  Yardley certainly might call it that, thought Tom. He doubted that Judy would. But maybe it was some sort of infection that got you once you reached the higher ranks. Still—she was just an Acting Superintendent. Perhaps she was immune. He hoped so.

  “He is asking himself what the best way to kill this particular person would be. A man reaching back into his car for the bag of money he intends depositing in a night safe puts himself in a perfect position to be strangled from behind. A man lying semi-conscious, leaning against railings, would have to be handled in order to be strangled—his head would have to be lifted, or he would have to be strangled manually. Either way, it would require direct contact, and he could wake up, bite, fight back. Even if he didn’t, handling him directly means that traces could be left at the scene, and on the perpetrator’s clothing. Much simpler, quicker and easier just to stab him.”

  “You’re making him sound like a professional killer,” Judy said.

  Castle nodded. “I think in a manner of speaking, he could be. You’ve been asking people about their hobbies, I believe, and there are those whose hobbies include killing. Look at the physical evidence—the fishing knife used in the third murder, and the choke-collar used in the second. The knife speaks for itself and the choke-chain could suggest a familiarity with training dogs—something a huntsman might well use to train foxhounds. Of course, anyone could buy the items used, but not everyone intent on murder would make those their weapons of choice.”

  Tom was very glad that young Stephen Halliday had finally been cleared of suspicion, because that would have been another nail in his coffin. He dispatched animals. But not rabbits that ran out in front of his motorbike. And anyway, everyone seemed to shoot in Stoke Weston. “Waterman employs a lot of people from the village he lives in,” he said. “And that’s real hunting, fishing and shooting territory. Farming, too.” Despite himself, Tom was growing genuinely interested in what this man had to say, and he could see from his face that so was Lloyd. “So there’s no shortage of candidates there.”

  “The victims seem random,” Dr. Castle went on. “Male and female, no sexual assault, no theft. That, and the circumstances surrounding the murders, suggests that they are chosen purely for ease of killing, which in turn suggests that the murders themselves are almost incidental. They are like moves in a game. And that leads us to the letters.”

  “What do you make of them?” asked Judy. “Psychologically?”

  “What they say is unimportant, I think. The most significant point is that they are addressed not to the police, but to a man who came to prominence by solving a series of murders for which the wrong man had been arrested, tried and convicted. We have to ask ourselves who might want to challenge him to this sort of duel.”

  “He did witness the first murder,” said Tom. “Couldn’t that be what prompted the duel?”

  “It could. But I believe you have entertained the idea of the first murder having been engineered in order that he might witness it. If that is the case, we would be looking for someone who perhaps had a score to settle in the first place.”

  “We’ve eliminated the possibility of anyone connected with Challenger,” said Judy.

  “Have you looked at any of the police officers connected with the original inquiry? Could one of them be working here now?”

  There was a silence as they digested the possibility that one of their own was murdering these people. Tom wondered briefly about Yardley himself, but no—he hadn’t worked on the south coast. Had he? He’d read his profile when he’d been
appointed, but he couldn’t be sure. Was there more to his stepping down from this inquiry than they thought?

  “No,” said Judy. “We haven’t.”

  “It’s something you might want to check. If this man transferred, he could have worked in Bartonshire for almost twenty years, walking the beat, perhaps, in those towns. He would know forensic procedures, and how to avoid them. He would have the theoretical knowledge at least of how best to kill with the least likelihood of detection, and he could well harbor resentment for having been made to look foolish. Given that we are dealing with a disturbed personality—when he heard that Mr. Baker was here, he might have devised this plan to get his own back.”

  They all looked at one another, all, Tom knew, trying desperately to think if any of their long-time colleagues had worked down south at any time.

  “But while it’s worth checking out, I think it’s probably fanciful,” added Castle. “For one thing, I seriously doubt that the first murder was part of this challenge, or I think a letter would have preceded it. The fact that the first letter came after that murder suggests, as DI Finch said, that Mr. Baker’s presence at the scene prompted what followed. I offer it merely as a line of inquiry that you might want to check out.”

  “Do you have a theory as to what this challenge is all about, if it isn’t someone with a score to settle?” asked Tom.

  “Hardly a theory. But it seems likely that the perpetrator is local, and it could be from someone who resents Mr. Baker, not because he solved a series of murders twenty years ago, but because he is in some way interfering with the perpetrator’s life here and now. But it would have to be resentment to the point of obsession to cause the murder of three innocent people.”

  Judy looked up from the notes she was making. “I’m not clear on how murdering three people who have nothing to do with Tony Baker means that the perpetrator is getting some sort of satisfaction, whether it’s a personal or a professional resentment. How does that affect Tony Baker? No one expects him to solve these murders—not even the press. We’re the ones who are getting it in the neck for making no progress. So what’s the point of this duel?”

  “We’re dealing with a disturbed mind,” said Castle. “He possibly feels that it will diminish Mr. Baker in the public’s eyes if he can do nothing to prevent murders being committed ‘right under his nose’ as the letter says.”

  “I understand Baker is actually trying to solve these murders,” said Lloyd. “If the perpetrator knew that, once challenged, Baker would feel compelled to do that, would it make any more sense?”

  Castle shook his head. “Not to me,” he said. “Not as things stand. It can’t harm Mr. Baker if he fails to apprehend the murderer, and can only raise his stock if he does. But, as I said, we are dealing with a disturbed mind, and the logic of it might have no bearing on his actions. My personal belief is that the challenge will have a purpose, and that discovering that purpose might lead you to the perpetrator.”

  “Could Baker himself be writing these letters?” Judy asked.

  “Well, that’s obviously a possibility, but I come back to the fact that I believe the duel will turn out to have a specific purpose. The murderer carrying on a duel with himself would seem to be even more pointless.”

  “It’s got him on the TV a lot,” Tom said.

  Castle nodded. “It has, but it did that as soon as the first letter was received—there would have been no reason for him to kill again, if that was the motive. And Baker is a very successful man—I doubt that he was in need of a career boost.”

  “What about the disposal of the weapons differing each time?” asked Judy.

  “I’m inclined to think that expediency rules the day with this man,” said Castle. “If I’m right that the first murder wasn’t part of this challenge, he may not have taken the elaborate precautions he took with the subsequent murders. He may have been fearful of fingerprints being found, so he removed the weapon from the scene. In the second incident, it was undoubtedly expedient to leave the choke-chain in situ, rather than run the risk of it being found on his person, should he be seen in the vicinity of the murder. A choke-chain minus a dog would be hard to explain away, and could easily be matched to the injuries received by the deceased. It was definitely best to leave it where it was.”

  “Then why put the knife in a padded bag and dump it in a bin that he must have known would be searched, rather than leaving it where it was?” Judy asked. “He was seen putting the package in the bin, and that was a risk he needn’t have taken.”

  “That point is significant, I am sure. Why it should have been a more desirable thing to do than leaving the knife with the body, I don’t know. But I think he believed that it was. Everything about this man says he does nothing without a purpose, and never acts without thinking, which is why I’m certain the duel itself has a purpose. He makes meticulous plans, and follows them, I’m sure, without deviation, no matter what. Indeed, your best chance of catching him might well be if something goes wrong with his plans that he was unable to foresee—I don’t believe he’s someone who can think on his feet all that well. Everything has been carefully thought out beforehand.”

  “But the first murder is different, isn’t it?” said Lloyd. “Whatever its motive, it seems to have been opportunist, spur-of-the-moment. You think that he had to remove the weapon because it would have his fingerprints on it. Would a man such as you describe—one who does nothing without a reason and without careful forethought—would such a man commit such a crime?”

  “Now you come to mention it, Mr. Lloyd—no, I doubt very much that he would.” He looked irritated at having been caught napping. “This is the sort of thing that I thought might happen if I had to report to you earlier than I would choose.”

  “So the first murder probably wasn’t committed by the same person at all,” said Lloyd.

  “Two murderers?” said Judy. “We’re having enough trouble finding one.”

  “But it makes sense, doesn’t it?” Lloyd turned to her. “You said yourself that it looked like a mugging gone wrong. Freddie said that the assailant was very unlikely to have intended to kill Mrs. Fenton. So what if that’s just what it was? What if the mugger was scared off by Tony Baker, and did just drop the money, which happened to fall the way it did?”

  “Well—I did concede that the money falling the way it did was about as likely as a yellow blackbird, but go on,” she said.

  “Tony Baker tells his editor that he’s witnessed a murder, and something that would have been strictly local news is splashed all over the front page of a national. And then . . .” Lloyd tipped his chair back, swaying gently as his theory evolved. “And then someone who might never have heard of the South Coast murders, or of Tony Baker, reads all about it, and is excited by the idea—Baker says that serial killers are born, not made. Something triggers it, he says. What if that was the trigger?” He swayed gently back and forth as he thought. “This person thinks what fun it would be to kill people right under Tony Baker’s nose, and that’s what he does. He kills people when he knows Baker is in the vicinity, making it look superficially like Mrs. Fenton’s murder by not stealing whatever money he finds, and making that obvious by scattering it on the body. When he writes to Baker, he takes the credit for the first one while he’s at it, so that it looks as though he knew Baker was there all the time, and was already one step ahead of him.”

  It was true, thought Tom, that neither Judy nor Freddie had been happy with the first one being deliberate murder. His own theory had been that since one blow had done the job, the assailant didn’t bother hitting her again, and in view of subsequent events everyone had gone along with that, but murderers generally preferred to make certain. Lloyd seemed to be on to something.

  “He might not even be local,” said Lloyd.

  “No,” said Judy, the flaw-spotter. “He has to be local. If he didn’t commit the first murder, how did he know to leave the money on the victims’ bodies? Someone must have told him about h
ow Mrs. Fenton was found.”

  “It’s certainly more than possible that someone else committed the first murder,” said Castle. “In which case, the Waterman connection could be quite spurious—the locations being chosen simply because they mirror the original murder.”

  Judy nodded. “So . . . to sum up?”

  “Well, it’s summing up in the middle of the trial,” said Castle. “But you could—I stress could, particularly in view of Mr. Lloyd’s contribution—be looking for someone—perhaps, but not necessarily, a Waterman employee or customer—who works or engages in recreation in the evenings, in all three towns, who is literate, with a knowledge of killing, possibly as a participant in field sports, and with what amounts to an obsession with Tony Baker. But it’s quite possibly nonsense, I warn you.” He closed the file in front of him, and sat back.

  “Well, thank you, Dr. Castle,” said Judy. “That’s been very thought-provoking.”

  “If you have any other questions, I’ll be pleased to try to answer them, but what we have discussed covers everything I have in my notes. And I beg you not to act precipitately on anything that we have discussed here today, because this is a crude, fuzzy snapshot, and it could be a snapshot of the wrong man.”

  Tom left the meeting finding it quite difficult to come to terms with the fact that he thought Dr. Castle had made a useful contribution to the investigation. Damn it, he’d be worrying if he was sufficiently highly customer-oriented any minute.

  “So that puts Scopes back on the list,” said Judy, as they walked along to their offices. “Though I hardly think he’s serial-killer material, and only half the snapshot applies to him. Tom, I think you should speak to him and Tony Baker tomorrow. Lloyd’s volunteering to spend the day going through the staff records with me to see which of our colleagues worked on the South Coast murders, aren’t you, dear?”

  “If you’re sure I’m not too humble for that job, ma'am,” said Lloyd.

  “I’m going to get this all weekend,” she said to Tom. “Because he feels miffed. Can I come and stay with you?”