Witness X: ‘Silence of the Lambs meets Blade Runner’ Stephen Baxter

by SE Moorhead

  He lifts his head and she realises he is watching her so she rolls her eyes as she has seen the patients at the hospital do. He wipes his face on his sleeve and composes himself.

  ‘But tonight, I am going to sit with you, I am going to protect your spirit. Tonight is your wake, your vigil, before you leave this world for good, before I send you to be with Elise.’

  Isabel tells herself to focus on staying alive, not to listen to his words. She thinks about her grandmother’s fob watch, the time ticking away. Nothing ever lasts for ever, her grandmother had often said: the suffering, the joy – nothing lasts.

  ‘It won’t be long now. All this will be gone and you’ll be free.’ He almost sang the last word. ‘I wish I could come too, but I need to stay here. I will be a witness to his suffering as he witnessed ours. I have to stay here, make sure he suffers. Then I can be with Elise.’

  He leans over her with a silver necklace in his hands. He puts the pendant in front of her eyes as if to show her. ‘It won’t be long now. Tell my sister how much I love her. Give her this. Tell her all the things that I have done, I have done for her. Tell her not to be afraid.’ He reaches behind the back of her neck and clips the necklace on, then places the pendant at the base of her throat.

  ‘May God watch between thee and me, Elise, whilst we are absent, one from another.’

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  WEDNESDAY 7 FEBRUARY

  5.47 p.m.

  Rosetta had dressed down for the occasion – jeans, a large brown sweater and sheepskin boots. Her hair was up in a bun and she was wearing glasses. She sat nursing a black tea in a basement cafe-bar not far from the police station. Kyra joined her and ordered a coffee for herself.

  It was nearly evening. Kyra had slept heavily until the early afternoon, and then woke feeling hungover to the depressing thought that this was the day, on which Isabel was going to die – and there was nothing she could do about it.

  In one last attempt to help Isabel, she had rooted out the mini-screen that Tom had left at hers. God, had that only been a few days ago? The images of Caylee were so horrendous that she had hidden it in a cupboard, out of sight. She had scoured her files again from the original case. She tried to eat and found she couldn’t keep anything down. Then her day had taken an unexpected turn when Rosetta had contacted her.

  And now here she was, hoping Rosetta would help her to crack the case.

  Kyra had brought the police mini-screen in the hope that she might be able to corroborate some of Rosetta’s information but, before she got out of her car, she realised that it might be too official and put Rosetta off, so she stuffed it into the glove compartment.

  ‘I wasn’t sure if I’d see you again,’ said Kyra. She had hoped, but not expected. She had made it deliberately clear what her name was when she had left Rosetta’s house; all it would have taken was a little research on the hypernet.

  ‘Neither was I.’ She swilled her cup but didn’t drink it. ‘This wasn’t easy.’

  ‘I’m sure it wasn’t.’

  ‘But probably not for the reasons you might think.’

  ‘I’m here to listen.’

  The waiter brought over the coffee and Kyra was impatient for him to leave.

  ‘I couldn’t talk in front of David. He’s a good man, but he doesn’t know about my past. I didn’t want to talk to the police. I know you’re not one of them. I looked you up. You’re a scientist, a psychologist.’

  ‘Yes, but I want you to know that I was working with the police at the time of your—’

  ‘I know, but maybe you’ll understand.’ She took a sip of her drink, waiting until another customer made her way past to the bathroom before talking again.

  ‘But before we start, I need you to make me a promise.’ She grabbed Kyra’s hand. Promise me that you’ll keep my identity a secret. I’ll tell you everything I know, but I cannot, cannot,’ she stressed, ‘lose the life that I have built up because of this case. What I went through … nearly killed me. My husband is a good man. We are respected now in the community. I have a lovely life, one that I could never have imagined … back then. I want to help you get him, but please promise me this.’

  What choice did Kyra have? Rosetta — the key to cracking the case — Kyra’s witness X.

  ‘Of course, I promise.’ She meant it.

  Rosetta looked relieved, let go of her hand and began to talk. ‘I was really angry, hurt, I suppose, when the police didn’t take me seriously. I told them about Jenny. Obviously I was distressed. They used the word “hysterical”. Why wouldn’t I be? It was the worst thing I had ever been through and, believe me, I’ve been through some bad stuff.’ She took another mouthful of tea. ‘It never goes away. I wish I could block it out altogether. I was so freaked out that – I hate to say this but – I took some Lè to help me to cope, I suppose, and to give me the courage to face the police. We weren’t exactly on friendly terms, back then.’

  Kyra gave an encouraging ‘hmm’ and sipped her coffee. An excitement had risen inside her to find some new information, but she knew she had to take this easy.

  ‘I had a problem. I don’t mind admitting it now. You beat yourself up and get into a downward spiral of self-revulsion and using, but I understand now. Addiction – it’s an illness. Who the hell would choose that sort of life?’

  ‘Looks like you’ve turned it around.’ Kyra remembered the cream and gold sofa and Rosetta’s handsome husband. She also thought about Ray Clarke’s transformation. Somehow good had come from bad.

  Rosetta shrugged. ‘I never knew what happened to Jenny. I was so off my face for a while after, and then, when I was lucid, I couldn’t face looking at the news.’

  ‘You never looked it up on screen?’

  Rosetta shook her head. ‘I didn’t even know her second name. Strange how circumstance throws you together with someone and then you bond.’ She put her hands up in front of her, palms up. Kyra couldn’t help comparing them. ‘However short a time … and then you can never forget them.’

  Tom popped into Kyra’s mind.

  Rosetta’s shoulders dropped. ‘She died, didn’t she?’

  ‘I’m so sorry, I’m afraid she did. We found her a week later.’

  Rosetta’s expression was pained. ‘She was so young, so innocent.’ She put an elbow on the table, her hand to her head. ‘I had a bloody good go, you know. I tried to help her get away.’ She sounded defeated but there was a hint of strength in her eyes.

  Kyra nearly blurted out: I know I saw you, but how could she have explained that? Instead she said, ‘Tell me how you came to be there – where exactly was it?’

  ‘I’d been making money, on the game. We didn’t have anywhere like the Scrambles back then, nor the legal houses. We took our chances, me and the other girls. Jenny wasn’t one of us, by the way. I’d never seen her before. God, it was such a cold night, freezing, not like you get now. A punter approached me, said his name was Stephen. I don’t know if that was his real name or not. He seemed … ordinary.’ She shrugged.

  Kyra shook her head, desperate to ask for a description, but she held back time and space.

  Rosetta continued. ‘He said, let’s go somewhere quiet and warm. He knew a good place and he was willing to pay more. I was glad to get out of the bitter chill. I usually worked with my friend, but her kid was sick, so she wasn’t out that night. You start taking things for granted. I’d had a pretty easy ride up to that point, a few punters roughed me up, but I got over it. I had to, as how else was I going to make my money?

  ‘I was reckless back then. I’d had a good job in the city. I was a party girl, got in with a crowd of people who had fun, and I mean fun. Got myself addicted to Lè. It wasn’t as widely available back then as it is now. It was a status symbol. They were all big earners, I couldn’t keep up. It was as simple as that.’

  Kyra had thought Rosetta pristine in her beautiful home, but now the cracks were beginning to show. From this distance, fine lines were visible beneath
her eyes, the hints of grey at the roots, a fragility Kyra had not noticed the first time they had met.

  ‘In the end I was willing to take stupid risks. We went off, in his car, to some derelict set of garages up past the Townsend Factory, up by the Goreham train station.’

  Kyra made a mental note.

  ‘It seemed like it was going to be the usual, straight sex for a handful of cash. But when we got there, he offered me more, a lot more, if I let him tie me up. I wanted the money, needed the money, so he secured my hands with tie-wraps. Looking back, well, it rang an alarm bell. Then I wanted to get it over, get back to my turf.’

  She gave off an air of weariness.

  ‘Do you want a hot one?’ Kyra said, indicating the cup. She was eager to hear the story, but this was probably the first time Rosetta had told anyone about that night, apart from the police officers who hadn’t believed her. This needed careful handling.

  ‘Yes, thanks.’

  Kyra called the waiter over and ordered another. Rosetta disappeared into her memories for a moment. Would Rosetta be willing to use CASNDRA? Would that enable Kyra to access the sort of information needed to catch this killer?

  She waited until the waiter brought the tea and they sat for a while drinking in silence. To Kyra’s relief, Rosetta began to speak again.

  ‘He tied me up and then he sat down on the ground and started talking to me. I thought he was just one of those lonely wankers who wanted to chat and, to be honest, I didn’t mind as I can listen with the best of them. It’s better than having to … you know. I was happy at first, but then I started thinking: if he only wants to talk then why has he tied me up?’

  ‘Can you remember what he was talking about?’

  ‘He told me that he had to do this. He said she deserved better.’

  ‘Who did he mean?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Then he said,’ she stopped speaking for a moment, swallowed hard. ‘He said …’ She stopped again.

  ‘It’s okay,’ Kyra put her hand on Rosetta’s.

  ‘He said I was a terrible mother.’

  Kyra drew back, surprised.

  ‘I didn’t know you had kids.’

  Rosetta’s face was like stone. ‘I did, once. A daughter, Gabriella. They took her from me: Child Welfare,’ she said, her face like stone.

  ‘I am so sorry, that’s awful,’ Kyra said.

  ‘No, it was the right thing to do at the time. I see that now. I was living in a house with three other people. We were high most of the time. One day, I found Gabriella in her cot. She wouldn’t wake up. The medical team reported me to the authorities. When she was well enough to leave hospital, they took her to live somewhere else.’

  ‘But you never got her back?’

  She shook her head, a split second of pain in her eyes, and then she took a deep breath and straightened up.

  ‘I thought about it. But I decided against it for two reasons. One is very selfish – I don’t want anyone knowing about my past. My husband doesn’t know I had a child. How could I bring her home with me when it would mean I would have to answer all sorts of questions? About a year after … I was in rehab, trying to get myself cleaned up. I started working for a charity to help women who had been … in my situation and that was when I met my husband – at a fundraiser. I lied about where I had come from, what my life had been like before I’d met him. Which is why I lied to you when you came to my house. I’m terrified he will find out. When we first got together I sort of hinted that I’d been wild in my youth, but I didn’t tell him exactly how wild. He said it didn’t matter, we were together now and we needed to forget about the past. I was grateful that I could make a new start, and grateful to meet someone who loved and respected me as a person.’

  ‘You love each other?’

  Rosetta smiled and her face changed altogether.

  ‘You’re lucky.’ And, for a moment, Kyra had a tiny insight into what she could have had with Tom, and it hurt.

  At this point, she abandoned the idea of using CASNDRA with Rosetta. Some things were best left buried.

  ‘You don’t have any other children?’

  She shook her head. ‘I told my husband before we married that I couldn’t have children. It’s not really a lie. I can’t have them because I don’t deserve them. That man, he was right about me being a terrible mother. I didn’t want to ruin another child’s life.’

  ‘What was the other reason you didn’t get her back?’

  ‘Gabriella would be settled now. She didn’t need me coming along and messing it up again. I couldn’t face my daughter if she ever found out who, what, I used to be. She would hate me. I found out that she is with a lovely family, she has brothers and sisters, her adoptive mum is a teacher, they even have a pet dog. I don’t want to spoil that.’

  Kyra thought how much that made her a good mother, sacrificing her own feelings for those of her child’s.

  ‘But how did he, Stephen, know you were a terrible mother?’

  Rosetta’s expression became perplexed.

  ‘I’ve thought about that so often, but I don’t know. Maybe he knew about Gabriella somehow?’

  ‘You didn’t tell him about her, or give anything away by accident?’

  She shook her head.

  ‘He did all the talking. Probably because he knew he had planned to kill me, so he could say what he wanted.’ Her eyes flared with strength again. ‘But I wasn’t ready to die.

  ‘He talked about his own mother. He said his mother never protected them from the bastard. That’s the word he used. He said she left the bastard to beat him and his sister. He said mothers who didn’t protect their children were the worst. He said I didn’t protect my child.’

  ‘Did he say anything else?’

  ‘No, because at that point, I heard a noise at the back of the garage. It sounded like an injured animal, but then I saw Jenny tied up against some pipes. That’s when I really freaked out. I mean, what sort of person would have two women tied up in a garage? She was in a right state and she begged me to help her, but what could I do? Stephen started to get agitated, walking up and down between the two of us, ranting. He spoke kindly to her. He said he didn’t want to lose her, said she was so important to him. He kept calling her another name, Ellis? Elise? A good girl, he said, should be loved and feel loved. A good girl, he said, deserved her mother’s heart. I don’t know what he meant by that. Do you?’

  Kyra shivered.

  ‘How did you get away?’

  ‘He’d injected me with something to keep me quiet, but I’d taken so much shit over the years, I don’t think he realised how immune I was to it.’ She started to breathe heavily and pull at her hair. ‘I can’t believe he did this to me!’ A few people glanced over at her distress.

  ‘You’re safe now,’ Kyra tried to soothe her.

  Rosetta glanced around self-consciously and then quietly hissed, ‘He said he was going to give her my hands!’ She briefly lifted her prosthetic hand from her lap. ‘He came at me with some kind of saw and started to hack at my wrists. That was why he’d tied me up. He was really close and even though the pain was excruciating, the drugs took the edge off. I managed to headbutt him, right on the bridge of his nose. I was bleeding all over the place, but he was stunned and I managed to get free. He’d cut the ties when he was trying to cut me.

  ‘I ran over to Jenny and freed her with the saw. She ran out while I struggled with him. He hit me then, and I fell backwards, and he ran out after Jenny. There were bricks lying around, I picked some up and threw them at him, to try to help her get away. I made a run for it. I thought she’d got away too. I thought she’d got away.’ Her voice trailed off.

  ‘I’m so sorry, Rosetta. You tried your best, under those circumstances, no one could have done more.’

  She seemed comforted a little by these words.

  ‘I came back a bit later, once I was sure he had gone. What if Jenny was still alive and I could help her? But by the time
I got there, the ambulance was driving away.’

  ‘Ambulance?’

  ‘Yes, someone must have heard the screaming and called it in.’

  A seed of doubt blossomed in Kyra’s gut. Jennifer Bosanquet had been found floating in an outdoor lido by an early morning swimmer who had called the emergency services. If she had been found at the garage Tom would have known where Ray claimed to have seen something. There would have been photographs in the digital files she had studied that morning. There would have been a police search at the garage, forensic evidence …

  What Rosetta was telling her didn’t fit the picture.

  ‘I went to the hospital myself afterwards but they couldn’t save my hand.’ She lifted her arm again. The colour of her prosthetic matched her skin perfectly, the fingers bent at natural angles, the nails painted the same golden-pearly colour as the nails on her other hand.

  Unless Rosetta was mixed up about where she had seen the ambulance. Maybe it hadn’t been at the garage, but at the hospital? She had been traumatised and confused; she had been a Lè user after all.

  ‘Does anyone ever ask how it happened?’

  ‘Most people don’t mention it, but I see them staring sometimes. I say it was a car accident.’

  ‘Rosetta, I can’t thank you enough for coming to talk to me. You’ve given me more information than we’ve ever had. I am so sorry that no one listened to you back then.’

  ‘I couldn’t bear this happening to someone else.’

  ‘You’re taking a big risk. I appreciate that.’

  Rosetta nodded gravely. ‘He needs to be caught but, please, let the old me stay hidden.’

  ‘Of course.’

  She suddenly gripped Kyra’s hand, her eyes pleading. ‘Catch him! For Jenny’s sake.’

  Something almost electrical passed between them as Rosetta’s hand rested on hers.

  Kyra left the cafe-bar with one destination in mind.

  The garage.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  WEDNESDAY 7 FEBRUARY

  7.19 p.m.

  Kyra stood in the dark yard, in front of an old black wooden door, the one that she had already seen once through Ray’s eyes. She knew for sure this was the garage where she had seen Rosetta, Jennifer, and the killer in the transference with Ray and now she was looking at it in real time. Unlike the transference, however, she was able to move around at will and walk freely between the two sets of garages which stood facing each other. The scientist in her knew that all the forensic evidence would be gone after so many years, but she wasn’t going to give up. Not now.