by M J Lee
The doctor was easily fooled too. Early onset Alzheimer’s, he had diagnosed.
Idiot.
He could remember everything, he just wasn’t going to let them know. And his solicitor, clever man, picking holes in the boys’ stories, casting doubt on their memories. They had been young and it was a long time ago.
He was sorry they testified against him. Didn’t they know he could still control them after all these years?
He moved quickly through the aisles, buying the stuff he always bought: eggs, cheese (the cheapest available), pizza, teabags, bread and a curry puff. He always treated himself to a curry puff when he went to the supermarket.
Keeping his head down, avoiding eye contact, not recognising anyone or anything.
That was the way to do it.
He paid at the counter and thought about wandering around the market for some vegetables but decided against it. Too many people at this time of day and anyway, what was he going to do with vegetables? Could they be microwaved like the pizza?
Probably.
He shuffled back across the bridge with his shopping, stopping once more in the middle for a short while to look down at the ducks and drakes paddling on the river without a care in the world. He had been like that once, before the past caught up with him.
But not any more.
A wind sprung up from nowhere. A few drops of rain spattered on the water, followed by a few more, gradually increasing in intensity.
A quick glance over his shoulder and he hustled into the car park, feeling a welcome relief when he saw his car. Next time, he would have to make sure he brought an umbrella.
He pulled out his keys and was about to open the door when he heard a voice behind him.
‘David, David Mulkeen.’
He froze for a moment, uncertain what to do.
Brazen it out, David. Nobody knows you’re here. The rain became heavier.
He pasted a false smile on his face. ‘I think you’ve made a mistake…’
And felt something sharp in the indentation beneath his ear where the end of his jaw met the neck.
‘Just get in the car, David.’
Chapter Forty-Five
‘Shit, just what we didn’t need. Lorraine, forget Bakewell, start getting a team together now.’
‘Include an ARU, boss?’
‘Firearms? Yes. Make it happen.’
‘Chrissy, find out the last known address of David Mulkeen as quick as possible. We’ve got to find out where he is. Rob, hurry up with the check for other deaths in England. I want to know if this bastard has killed anybody else.’
‘On it, guv’nor.’
‘Ridpath, you’re with me.’
She left the room and, rather than wait for the lifts, hurried down the stairs to the MIT floor with Ridpath in close attendance. ‘You think he’s involved in the deaths, boss?’
‘Could be. Getting rid of any of the boys who could testify against him in the courts. At his age, if he was ever found guilty, he’d never get out of prison alive. And that’s before the other cons got hold of him.’
The clatter of her heels on the stairs created a counterpoint to her words.
‘And if he isn’t involved, he will know why it’s happening. Two men from the same football team don’t just die in three days without a reason.’
She stopped suddenly and Ridpath nearly bumped into her. She turned back to look him in the eyes.
‘I’m sorry for doubting your judgement, Ridpath.’
‘It’s OK, boss, I’m used to it.’
She raised her finger and poked him in the chest. ‘But if you ever go behind my back again in an investigation, you’ll be out of the force, out of the coroner’s office and out on your arse quicker than the chief constable awards himself a pay rise. Get it?’
‘Got it, boss.’ Ridpath didn’t bother to explain that if he hadn’t gone behind her back, they wouldn’t now be chasing a serial killer.
He thought it, but didn’t say it.
They reached MIT’s floor and she burst through into the office. ‘You lot, in the incident room now.’
The reaction in the room was electric. Two detective inspectors, three detective sergeants, five detective constables and three support officers stopped what they were doing, picked up their notepads and hurried after Trent and Ridpath into the incident room.
‘Right, close the door.’
Harry Makepeace shut out the world.
‘We have a major operation. Ridpath will take you through the details, but this is the most important case in these offices now. You drop everything else, is that clear?’
The assembled detectives nodded. One of them, Jill Carton, put up her hand. ‘What’s the operation called, boss?’
‘I don’t know…’
‘How about Operation Douter?’ suggested Ridpath.
Trent looked at him quizzically.
‘It’s the little instrument like a bell people use to snuff out candles.’
She shook her head. ‘Sometimes you worry me, Ridpath.’
‘Pub quizzes, boss, everybody knows that.’
‘OK, Operation Douter it is. Brief the team, Ridpath.’
Chapter Forty-Six
‘Just drive.’ The voice came from the back of the car. It was followed by the touch of the knife on his neck. He couldn’t see who it was. They were sat immediately behind him, their face hidden behind the headrest.
‘But where?’ he asked.
‘Take the A6 towards Manchester.’
‘What do you want? If you want money, just take my wallet.’ He reached into his jacket pocket, pulling out the battered leather wallet his father had given him all those years ago. ‘There’s not much, but take it.’ He tossed the wallet into the back.
‘I don’t want your money. Take the A6 towards Manchester,’ the voice ordered.
David Mulkeen put the car in gear and drove out of the car park, turning left to cross over Bakewell Bridge and back into the town centre. They stopped at a pedestrian crossing. The windscreen wipers washed across the glass. A loud beeping entered the car and a young woman with a child in a pushchair crossed the road in front of them, her head down and her hand holding an umbrella over her child.
Mulkeen’s eyes darted left and right.
‘Don’t even think about it. Before you could make a move, I would have slit your throat. Do you know what happens when you have a cut throat, David?’
Mulkeen licked his lips, saying nothing.
‘I said, do you know what happens when I cut your throat, David?’
The beeping at the pedestrian crossing seemed to get louder.
‘No…’ Mulkeen felt his head being grabbed and the sharpness of the blade kiss his throat.
‘I would draw the blade along your neck, starting below the ear and on the left-hand side, continuing round, becoming deeper as I pulled the blade across, severing the left carotid artery and spraying your blood across the windscreen and dashboard. Your windpipe would be cut so you wouldn’t be able to cry out and the blood flow to your brain would cease. After that, you have just eight seconds to live. Not a pleasant way to die, David.’
A loud, long beep from a horn behind them.
Mulkeen visibly jumped in his seat.
‘Just put the car in gear and take the A6.’
Nervously, he crashed the gears and the car jerked away, turning right onto the A6 after a busy roundabout.
They drove out of town, Mulkeen glancing continually in his rear-view mirror. ‘Where are we going?’
‘You’ll find out when we get there.’
Silence.
The damp Derbyshire countryside raced past outside the car window. Wet grey limestone houses giving way to rolling green hills. An eiderdown of white cloud blanketed the top of the hills.
‘Turn right at the next junction.’
‘Ashford? Why are we going to Ashford?’
‘Just do it. Then take the first left, following the road to Monsal Dale.’
‘Why? Why are you going there?’
The knife against the throat again. ‘Don’t ask questions, just do it.’
Sweat dripped from Mulkeen’s face down onto his shirt. The car’s engine roared as they drove up the hill. The inside of the windows misted over. Once more the windscreen wipers swept across the glass.
‘You really should have done something, David.’
‘But I never touched you. You weren’t my type.’
‘What? Not pretty enough?’
Silence.
‘But I don’t care what you did with those boys. It’s what you all did to me.’
‘I don’t understand.’
‘Take a left at the hotel, and follow the road down into Monsal Dale.’
The car swung around and Mulkeen saw the beauty that was the dale laid out beneath him, a damp mist fogging the red-brick railway bridge.
‘Drive slowly down into the dale. We wouldn’t like to kill a walker in this weather, would we?’
He drove down the narrow, tree-lined lane. At the bottom it levelled out into a long straight road with the River Wye bubbling away over rocks on the left.
‘You can pull up over there.’
He pulled into a small car park on the left, a hundred yards past some houses.
‘I’ve chosen this place because it’s so beautiful. You know Ruskin, the Victorian essayist, wrote about here. It was one of his favourite places on earth.’
Despite the rain sheeting from the left, Mulkeen saw the river and its overhanging trees, their branches dangling in the water like children dipping their toes before a paddle.
The windscreen wipers squeaked their way across the glass.
‘It’s so beautiful I decided it would be the perfect place to burn you.’
Mulkeen didn’t hear the hammer being taken out of the bag.
He didn’t see it swing from behind and smash into the bone above his ear. Again and again and again.
He didn’t feel his body slump forward and his head strike the steering wheel.
He didn’t feel anything any more.
Chapter Forty-Seven
Ridpath had just finished briefing the detectives when Chrissy Wright came into the incident room.
‘That Mulkeen man is on the sex offenders register.’
‘But I thought he was only interviewed,’ said Lorraine Caruso.
‘He had prior charge from 1995, exposing himself to children outside a school. Back then, a social worker wasn’t convinced of his “cure” and thought he was at risk of offending again, so he’s on it. Apparently he had been coaching schoolboy teams since 1983, had his coaching badges from the Football Association and everything. There’s a note from the social worker that there were allegations, more “insinuations” as she put it, about his activities in the football teams. Apparently he concentrated on young teams, under-twelves and -thirteens. Unaccompanied trips away, sleepovers at his house, that sort of stuff. The social worker didn’t follow up, though; nobody did back then.’
‘Jesus. Between 1983 and 1995 he could have molested thousands of boys.’
‘And that’s just the years we know about.’
‘Anything since 1995?’ asked Ridpath.
‘Nothing in the UK. Apparently he moved to the States soon after he was bound over to keep the peace in 1995. I can check with Interpol if there are any charges in other countries.’
‘Do it, Chrissy,’ ordered Claire Trent.
‘He moved back to the UK in 2010 and, of course, had to inform the register of his whereabouts.’
‘He’s on the register. So what?’ asked Caruso.
Chrissy smiled. ‘It means we have an address. Even better, he’s just informed them of a change of address. Two months ago, he moved to Bakewell in Derbyshire.’
‘Shit, that’s where Tommy Larkin’s body was found.’
Trent was already on her feet. ‘Come on, Ridpath, you’re with me. Lorraine, you take Harry Makepeace. Text me the address, Chrissy, and check his car registration with the DVLA. Is there a telephone number?’
Chrissy glanced back at her printout. ‘No mobile, just a home landline. You want me to ring it?’
Trent was putting on her jacket. ‘Go ahead, but pretend it’s a wrong number and do it from your mobile. I don’t want him to know we’re onto him.’
‘Firearms, boss?’
Trent shook her head. ‘Any record of violence, Chrissy?’
‘Nothing in here, boss.’
‘OK, we’ll do without. And Chrissy,’ she called over her shoulder, ‘let Derbyshire know we’re coming. I don’t want them bleating about jurisdiction. Come on, Ridpath, what are you waiting for? Time you did some proper police work again.’
Chapter Forty-Eight
He was glad of the rain. It drenched his face and hair, cleansing his mind for the task ahead. It also meant there were no hikers out today to see him or what he was doing.
He had a choice, just as Mulkeen had a choice all those years ago.
The man could die at his flat in Bakewell. But the place was small and dirty, not the right location for such an important death.
Or he could kill him here, somewhere scenic, where a terrible beauty could be born. A fitting location for the last rites of Mulkeen. A place where the silence called.
He glanced across at the hire car he had parked here yesterday. The police would eventually check, but the car was hired in Manchester and it would take them a while to make the connection, if they ever did.
By then he would have vanished in the same way he had arrived. In a wisp of smoke-filled air.
Mulkeen was still sitting in the driving seat, his head slumped against the steering wheel. He had to die, they all had to die.
It was the only way he could be free. That was what the psychotherapist had told him. Kill the memories, erase them from your mind. He had meant it metaphorically, of course, because he never understood the meaning of his own words.
If he really wanted to be free, they all had to die. Not in the imaginary world of his mind, but in the real world. The world of cruelty, loss, sadness and desire.
Their world.
Only then could he be free.
He lifted the boot lid of the hire car to bring out the prepared kit for this job. He took out the blue plastic gloves and slid them carefully over his fingers.
The spray can was lying on its side. He shook it, hearing the widget inside rattling up and down. He bent down in the rain and wrote a large ‘P’ on the door, followed by the other letters.
He stood back and admired his handiwork. ‘PLAY THE GAME.’ A fitting epitaph for all of them.
The gallon container of methylated spirits was sitting in the back. He opened Mulkeen’s door and sprinkled some of the pungent liquid over him and over all the seats. He wound down the window slightly before walking around the car, pouring the rest of the liquid over it.
He had to work quickly before the rain washed it off or diluted it too much. The meths inside the car should still create the effect he wanted, but it would be more spectacular if the metal was torched too.
He unwound the long cloth rag, stuffing one end of it into the open petrol tank and leaving six inches hanging down.
He was ready now.
He had always been ready.
Chapter Forty-Nine
‘Alan, how long till we get there?’ Claire Trent leant forward to ask her driver.
‘About ten minutes, boss.’
Ridpath stared out of the window, his body tense. This is what he loved: the moments before an arrest when the adrenaline was coursing through his body like a drug and his senses were alive and alert, sensitive to the slightest sounds, the smallest movements.
They had blue-lit the drive all the way from Manchester, racing through traffic lights, dodging traffic, even ignoring a one-way sign near some roadworks in Dinting. The lights flashing a warning to all motorists and the sirens screaming at them to get out of the way. A drive that should h
ave taken over an hour through some of the most beautiful countryside in England took less than thirty minutes.
Even after they hit rain near Hayfield, Alan kept the car’s engine racing, staring out through the windscreen wipers with a fixed smile on his lips.
Inside the car was silence. Neither Trent nor Ridpath spoke to each other. Between them the tension was stretched as taut as a drum skin.
What would they find in the house? Was Mulkeen the killer removing all those who could testify against him? But why now? And what if he wasn’t there?
Trent’s mobile rang and she put it on speaker.
‘Hi boss, it’s Chrissy.’
‘What is it?’
‘I checked with the DVLA. A car is registered under Mulkeen’s name. It’s a Vauxhall Corsa, registration WU64 XHE.’
‘Great, well done, Chrissy.’
‘But there’s more, boss. I passed the number to Derbyshire Police and one of their patrol cars spotted the vehicle near to a place called the Monsal Hotel just five minutes ago. A driver matching Mulkeen’s description was seen at the wheel.’
‘The Monsal Hotel is two minutes on the right, boss,’ said Alan from the front seat.
‘Great, Chrissy.’ Trent ended the call. The car surged forward, pushing Ridpath further back into his seat. It roared uphill, cresting a rise in the road. All four wheels seemed to lift for a moment before coming back down to earth.
Up ahead a cluster of buildings, one looking almost alpine rather than English.
‘The Monsal Hotel, boss.’ Alan swung the car round to the right and it screeched to a stop. Trent and Ridpath jumped out, running towards the building on the left. A few bedraggled walkers, rain dripping from their bright yellow ponchos, stared at them.
No car.
Ridpath ran towards the car park. No Vauxhall Corsa.
He raced back to rejoin his boss, coming out of the hotel. ‘Nobody called Mulkeen inside.’
Thirty seconds later, Lorraine Caruso’s car arrived in a blaze of squealing brakes and flashing blue lights.
Ridpath ran to a low wall overlooking the dale. Down below, the river wound its way through a deep valley. On the left, a disused railway line and bridge. Trees grew in abundance and, despite the rain, the whole place had a stunning beauty.