Birdman

by Mo Hayder

  The momentum slid him onwards into the ditch, hands out, the fence rushing towards him. He dug his heels in and his fingers found the smooth wire between the barbs—he stopped inches shy, heart hammering. Instantly he caught his balance and whipped around, panting, ready to fight,

  But two yards away, Bliss had not been lucky.

  His weight had been taken by the fence; he swayed gently, feet flat on the floor, knees slightly bent, puppet arms lifted. The barbs had stitched into his skin, to his hair, deep under tender ligaments. He made no noise, only blinked once or twice—his expression quiet, intense.

  Slowly Caffery lowered his hands. ‘Bliss?’

  No answer.

  Jesus, now what?

  A tentative step closer.

  ‘Bliss?’

  Why isn’t he struggling?

  Malcolm Bliss’s face was patient, serene—only his jaw worked, subtly—as if he was concentrating—working hard on keeping perfectly still. With a shiver of recognition, Caffery understood.

  Movement means pain for him. He’s trapped.

  He let out his breath.

  Here it was—trapped and delivered to him. His quarry made flesh. Birdman.

  Trembling, he wiped the sweat from his forehead and leaned in—careful not to relax, not to put too much faith in this unexpected switch of luck. Bliss—rigid in his wire bridle—stared docilely ahead as Caffery inspected him, swiftly, precisely, running his eyes across the lattice of barbs, tracking what hurt, why it hurt and what lever it afforded him. He charted countless minor wounds, small but insistent, before he found it—the fulcrum—a single barb, burrowed deep into Bliss’s neck. No blood yet, but the pink flesh that rose around it pulsed gently. The carotid artery—ready to be tapped and drained.

  ‘There,’ he whispered into Bliss’s face, resting his fingers on the wire. ‘There‘s the key.’

  He drew the wire gently downwards—testing where the pain began. Bliss breathed in through his nose, tolerating this childish gesture—closing his eyes patiently, as if this was not pain to be endured but merely a humiliation doled out by an infantile bully. Caffery released the pressure briefly, and twisted the wire in the opposite direction.

  ‘It’s the coward’s way, Mr Caffery,’ Bliss said suddenly, his voice gummy and tight. ‘The coward’s way.’

  Caffery pushed his face closer. ‘Have you done it? Is it true? Have you killed them?’

  ‘Yes.’ Bliss closed his eyes. ‘And fucked them too. Don’t forget that.’

  Caffery stared at him—his fingers frozen on the wire. Over the treetops the helicopter banked suddenly, away from the bungalow, heading for the road. The clatter grew louder—shaking the ground and springing raindrops from the trees, but Caffery remained rigid, registering nothing above his own anger, staring into Bliss’s face, feeling through the opportunity, so swollen and alive with it that his eyes began to water.

  And then, abruptly, it was over. Gone.

  He breathed out, wiped the sweat from his face and shook his head, heart heavy. He murmured something under his breath, released the wire and without another look at Bliss, climbed slowly back up the ditch.

  The helicopter passed. Essex stared up at grey sky beyond shifting silvery leaves. A bird circled, tilting its eye to watch him. His heart followed its cellular instinct and struggled on, pumping the last useless spoonfuls of sap out of the holes in his wrists.

  Odd, he thought, I can’t feel the rain on my face. Why can’t I feel it landing on my face?

  Twenty seconds later his heart, its inside walls sticky, webby, almost dry, shuddered a little and stopped. The rain came in clear pellets, hard as glass balls bouncing off his open eyes.

  The helicopter missed Caffery and Bliss—it passed a quarter of a mile away from the ditch, continuing on, following the road towards the estuary.

  Far below, under the tree cover, Caffery had reached the lip of the ditch when something made him pause.

  He pressed his temples, as if there was a pain under the skin he could massage away. He turned and stared for several seconds at Bliss, waiting patiently—ornamented in blood and fluid. A bullfinch, attracted by the object tangled in the wire, had appeared a yard away in a sycamore sapling. It was no bigger than an infant’s fist. It blinked, assessing for food, head on one side. Caffery stared at it for a long time before drawing a deep breath, slithering down the ditch again, pulling his shirt down over his fingers and taking the wire in his hands.

  A thin, vivid spray filled the air—the vessel was pierced. Bliss squealed and jerked; his feet danced—hands jagged reflexively towards his neck. Caffery held his breath, tightened his grip and the vessel popped audibly, pushing a liquid rope of blood onto Bliss’s white neck and hair.

  Caffery stood back and watched quietly, absentmindedly pressing his black thumbnail into his palm, as Bliss’s vitality emptied onto the ground. The detail that this was a life finishing didn’t touch him—instead he felt only triumph, light-headed triumph.

  Afterwards he counted to 100 to make sure it was over. Then he turned away, straightened his shirt and climbed back up the ditch.

  Sergeant O’Shea’s men found Joni’s body blocking the narrow hallway. A quick glance told them she was dead. No-one could have lived with these injuries; her spine was clearly snapped and a broken bottle had been inserted in her vagina. Quinn went into the bungalow with the camera crew. After twenty minutes she reappeared, grim-faced, to escort Caffery and Maddox inside.

  ‘He’s left the other one in there.’ She shone a torch down the darkened hallway. ‘In the living room.’ Quinn stopped and turned to them. ‘You sure you want to see this?’

  ‘Of course,’ Caffery muttered. His shirt was wet with rain and blood. ‘Of course.’

  Quinn pushed the door open.

  There was the smell of a holiday chalet about the room. The blinds were drawn, the furniture upright. Bright flowered cushions were propped on wicker dining chairs. Someone had been having a birthday party, a child’s birthday party. Birthday cake was smeared on the table. The balloons bobbing against the ceiling were spattered with blood.

  ‘Here.’ Quinn stepped into the room. ‘Turn round and you’ll see.’

  ‘Where?’

  Quinn shone the torch over the saloon doors and up to the kitchen ceiling.

  Maddox drew in a breath. ‘Oh, Christ.’

  She had been suspended, face down, like a tarpaulin swinging above the kitchen. Electric flex was wrapped around her wrists, looped up through a single hook in the ceiling, and wrapped back around her ankles. She was naked, except for a sheaf of clingfilm wrapped around her head and shoulders. Mummified. A thin stripe of daylight shone across blood-streaked thighs.

  Quinn put her hand on Caffery’s arm. ‘Forensics, sir.’

  ‘No.’ He stepped into the room.

  ‘Jack,’ Maddox warned. ‘Jack. We need forensics in here first. Jack—’

  Caffery crossed the room slowly, the big muscles in the top of his chest contracting, his body instinctively sealing up its response. Underfoot the lino was tacky. His toes brushed against the metal room divider and he stopped, his hands on the swinging doors.

  The grotesque creation twisted slightly, as if touched by a breeze. Under the clingfilm Rebecca’s face was squashed and swollen.

  Slowly, minutely, Caffery allowed himself to breathe.

  Your imagination, Jack—see—it’s not the Goliath you believe—it could never have invented this. And you really believed you wanted to find Ewan. You really thought you wanted to see.

  A single pendulous drop squeezed out between a flap in the clingfilm under Rebecca’s nose.

  ‘Becky?’ The tear dropped onto the lino. ‘Becky?’

  A vein in her neck twitched.

  ... 53

  Rebecca was treated at Lewisham General. Caffery had refused to let her go to St Dunstan’s. There were CT scans, angiographies, blood transfusions. Ninety-four hours elapsed before the ITU consultants could be sure she woul
d live. As soon as he got the news Jack made the decision he had been pondering. He played God and jury, weighed judgement in a personal court, and chose, quite calmly, not to confess to Bliss’s killing.

  For four days he had been considering his options: disciplinary proceedings, hearings, internal enquiries. A criminal conduct dismissal and an independent trial. He tested these against letting it rest, letting the world go on believing that Bliss had died in the accident—before he could be reached.

  Now he told himself that this self-preserving choice could, paradoxically, give him a new weapon. He had killed and not confessed—he was now the predator who knew his quarry. He could stand upright and invisible in the killer’s own amphitheatre. The decision made, he surprised himself by adapting quickly—by the time Bliss’s inquest rolled around Caffery was effortless in his lies, nailing the coroner’s gaze down as he delivered his neat string of untruths.

  Odd how calm you are. Is that all there is to it? Is it really this simple to lie and be believed?

  But, seamless as he imagined the change, Rebecca wasn’t deceived. She saw immediately that he was carrying something new—she had touched his face on her first day of consciousness and said simply, ‘What?’

  He pulled her hand to his mouth and kissed it. ‘When you’re well,’ he murmured. ‘As soon as you’re well, I promise.’

  But it was slow; there had been three more blood transfusions before she was out of danger and ten days later she remained too weak to accompany him to the funeral. So he drove alone out to the small Suffolk church and sat parcelled into a cold pew next to Marilyn Kryotos, uncomfortable in his hired suit.

  Two pews ahead, Essex’s mother sat dry-eyed, too bewildered to cry, pinpoint butterfly bows shivering in the netting of her hat. Caffery had found himself embarrassed to see Essex’s features so carefully distributed between her and her husband, as if it was a vulgarity for them to show themselves amongst the arum lilies in the nave. He wondered if he would recognize his own face meted out between his parents if he ever saw them again. He wondered what sort of hat his mother might wear to a funeral, and the realization that he had no idea, no sense, made goosebumps rise on his arms.

  The canticles began. Kryotos inched forward on her pew next to him, resting her elbows on the prayer-book ledge. She dropped her head.

  ‘Mummy?’ Jenna, in a small black velvet dress, black tights and patent button-over shoes, slipped off the pew and clung to Kryotos’s leg, staring worriedly up under her hair. ‘Mummy?’

  On Kryotos’s right Dean sat quietly, pulling at the collar of his first adult shirt. He was embarrassed. None of them could pretend not to notice the tears darkening the tapestry hassock at Kryotos’s feet.

  Caffery remembered that feeling: like Dean, staring at his mother’s tears falling from under the curtain of hair, feeling her shiver as she prayed, prayed for God to find Ewan.

  ‘It’s a crap excuse for not living your life.’

  The words came with such clarity that he touched his forehead, holding his hand against his face, concerned that others might see his expression.

  ‘You’re supposed to have let it go by now—moved on.’

  Wasn’t this, he thought, what they’d all been saying in their own ways, the women, the girlfriends, over the years? Maybe they had been justified in their fury, maybe they knew better than he did about what to hold on to, what to allow to drift away. Here he was: thirty-four years old. Thirty-four and he still didn’t know how to play the game, the big, important game. As if he hadn’t fully inhabited his life but had sat looking the opposite way, watching and planning, trying to make amends, trying to trap the past, while his life played itself out over his shoulder. He could let it go on, continue to scratch at it—rise to Penderecki’s bait, allow him to reinvent ways to keep the torment fresh—and trek on, alone and childless in this life. Or—

  Or he could choose to drop the battle.

  As the minister started the commendation—hushed, gently dipping—Caffery leaned forward very suddenly. Kryotos wiped her nose and looked up.

  ‘What?’ she whispered, putting her hand on his arm. ‘What is it?’

  He was staring into mid-air as if a ghost had risen from the transept up into the fan vaulting.

  ‘Jack?’

  After several seconds his face cleared. He sat back in the pew and looked at her.

  ‘Marilyn,’ he whispered.

  ‘What?’ He smelled so clean. She waited while they stirred; all those little life facts that he made her regret. ‘What is it?’

  ‘Nothing.’ He smiled. ‘Something crazy.’

  After the wake he drove back to London—fast through the flat, sunny Suffolk fields. By the time he got home the day had slipped across to early evening: above the little terraced house the sky was streaked orange.

  Jack hadn’t been in Ewan’s room for more than two weeks—now he went there without hesitation, throwing all the empty files into a binliner, tying it up, carrying it into the street and dumping it in the wheelie bin. He wiped his hands, went back into the house, removed his jacket, found a claw hammer in the cupboard under the stairs and unlocked the back door.

  The garden had found its rhythm now July was near. Roused by the summer sunshine, it was blown full with life—brilliant acrylic-coloured flowers dotted the beds and the Rosa Mundi, planted by his mother and now in its thirtieth year, stood quietly next to the fence, its sugar-pink medieval blooms unfolded like babies’ hands. Jack ducked under the willow, went straight to the old beech and dropped the hammer in the grass at his feet.

  Do it. DO IT. If you think about it now you’ll waver.

  He rolled up his sleeves, took a deep breath and gripped the lowest plank—levering it up against the trunk. It was weak and rotten. It almost leapt away from the tree—shooting a cloud of lichen onto his shirtfront.

  No hesitating.

  He carried the wood a few yards along the fence and hoisted it over, letting it drop into the deep undergrowth. He wiped his forehead, returned to the beech and started on the next plank.

  The hammer lay unused in the grass and the shadows lengthened. Before long his palms were raw, sweat-streaked, his shirt was covered in moss and a solitary plank dangled from the tree’s flank. As he closed his hands on it, taking a step back and bracing himself, something made him pause. A new and uneven element had attached itself to his horizon, changing the evening in the space of a breath.

  He released the plank and looked up.

  Drawn out of his house by some stale instinct, some old awareness—as if he could smell the change in Jack’s intent—Penderecki had appeared in the garden across the cutting. He stood at the fence, in his braces and stained Aertex vest, chewing and scratching the back of his head, his jewel-bright eyes blinking and watching.

  Jack took a deep breath and straightened. Ordinarily he would have walked away, or, worse, been drawn in. But now he stood straight and cool—meeting Penderecki’s eyes square-on. In control.

  No trains passed. No sounds. Reflected in the windows of the terraced houses, bright evening clouds floated above the trees. A seagull, blown off course from the Thames, circled overhead eyeing the two men. And then Ivan Penderecki’s eyes flickered.

  It was little more than a shadow but Jack saw it.

  It meant the scales had tipped.

  He smiled. Smiled slowly, his heart rising. He took a step back and in a single move wrenched the plank up from its moorings. He carried it to the fence, paused long enough to make sure Penderecki was still watching and flung it ten feet or more into the undergrowth. Along the ‘death trail’. The last place he’d seen Ewan.

  The plank landed, bounced twice, momentarily visible above the grass heads and cowslips, executed one more cartwheel and came to rest, out of view beneath the green. He wiped his hands and looked up.

  Good.

  Penderecki’s expression had changed.

  He hesitated for a moment, tapping his fingers on the fence, lizard eyes lowered,
flickering uncomfortably from side to side. Then quite suddenly he hiked up his braces, spat into the cutting, wiped his mouth and, without looking up, pushed himself away from the fence. He turned—his back rigid now, arms stiff at his sides—and walked with scientific precision straight back to the house. Closed the door neatly behind him.

  Across the cutting, Jack—dressed in the second mourning suit of his life, sweat darkening the shirt—knew it was over. He dropped his head and stood against the fence, hands linked in the wire, his heart slowing while the evening gathered around him.

  Suddenly a commuter train roared by, dotted with city workers late from the office. He looked up, astonished. As if the train was the last thing he had expected to see on a railway line. He stretched forward and watched the train’s yellow rump dwindle in the distance. When it had disappeared under the Brockley bridge he continued to watch the little shimmer of movement for a long time, until he didn’t know if he was looking at sky or evening heat or a trick of the light.

  He went back into the house, changed out of the suit, showered and drove to Lewisham Hospital.

  THE END