Redemption of the Dead

by Luke Delaney

  ‘Hello, son. Still with us I see.’

  ‘Guv’nor, can I have a word?’ He sensed the confusion in the other men’s faces that a mere plain-clothed-constable should be daring to ask for some of Bannan’s time – especially on a day like this.

  ‘Can it wait?’ Bannan asked without irritation. ‘I’m a little busy right now.’

  ‘Not really,’ Sean told him, his eyes burning with intensity of his need, something Bannan seemed to acknowledge as he turned to the men who were flanking him.

  ‘Give me a minute,’ he told them. ‘This won’t take long.’ The men nodded and gave him quizzical looks before moving away. ‘Alright, son. What is it?’

  ‘I need to see the scene,’ he almost demanded, prompting Bannan to gently take him by the bicep and lead him out of the Enquiry Office and into the empty corridor.

  ‘Listen, son – That’s out of the question.’ Sean went to protest, but Bannan stopped him with a raised hand. ‘Slow down,’ he told him. ‘The scene’s being forensically examined as we speak, even I’m not allowed in there at the moment.’

  ‘They might miss something,’ he argued. ‘But if I could see it then maybe I could make sure they don’t.’

  ‘Sean, you’re a PC attached to what is now a murder investigation – do you really think I’m going to parade you around the scene and have you tell a lot of very experienced people where they’re going wrong?’

  ‘If it helps catch the killer – yes.’

  ‘No,’ Bannan snapped before softening, ‘but listen – maybe I can get copy of the crime scene photographs in a couple of days, when they’ve worked them up.’

  ‘But they would have taken polaroids already,’ Sean reminded him. ‘I could see them now.’

  Bannan shook his head and smiled. ‘You don’t give up do you? Alright, I’ll get you the polaroids and you can tell me what you think.’

  ‘Okay,’ Sean reluctantly agreed, his eyes cast down.

  Bannan rested a sympathetic hand on his shoulder. ‘Don’t be too pissed-off, son – remember what I told you – it’s politics, can’t be helped.’ He gave Sean a pat and started to walk away, but Sean stopped him with a question.

  ‘How did he get in? Was it like I said it would be? Did he wait for someone to get sloppy and leave a door or a window open?’

  Bannan slowed to a stop and turned to face him, his skin suddenly a little paler.

  ‘I was right.’ Sean felt nauseas at the revelation that his prediction had come true.

  Bannan looked him up and down for a few seconds before speaking. ‘Alright. Alright, son. Meet me here tonight. Eleven p.m. My office and keep it quiet. This is between the two of us. Understand?’

  ‘Yes, guv’nor,’ Sean answered with a smile.

  ‘You won’t be smiling later,’ Bannan told him. ‘That much I am sure of.’

  *

  Weak yellow street light seeped through the windows of the basement flat as Sean and Bannan let themselves in through the front door, leaving the single uniformed constable outside to keep journalists and macabre sight-seers away. Sean sensed Bannan reaching for the light switch and stopped him. ‘Don’t turn them on,’ he told him. ‘Just give me a second.’

  ‘The lights were on when she was found,’ Bannan explained. ‘Don’t you want to see it how he saw it?’

  ‘Yes,’ he answered. ‘In a minute, but not yet.’

  Bannan didn’t argue, staying by the front door as Sean stepped a little deeper into hell. ‘Careful, son,’ he warned. ‘Forensics haven’t completed their examination yet. They’ll be back in the morning.’ Sean nodded to himself in the dark and stepped to the side of the hallway, hugging the wall, breathing in deeply, smelling and tasting the scene, the telltale metallic scent of blood – something he was already too familiar with – as he squinted in the gloom, trying to focus on the hallway ahead, seeing small dark patches on the carpet just ahead, the copper taste in his mouth growing stronger as he crouched closer to the largest of the circular patches. ‘Blood,’ Bannan confirmed, reminding Sean that he wasn’t alone. ‘Looks like she was first attacked in the hallway, but probably not fatally. After the initial attack he appears to have dragged her into the living room, where he cut her throat and … well, you’ve seen the polaroids.’ Sean agreed with everything Bannan said, while shaking his head slowly at the horror of what he described.

  ‘How did he get in?’ Sean asked.

  ‘Through the victim’s bedroom window – she’d left it open, for whatever reason. We think he’d been hiding out there a while – in the trees, watching her.’

  ‘He did,’ Sean told him.

  ‘Did what?’

  ‘Hide out there – watching them, waiting – building himself up – praying she wouldn’t close and lock the window.’ There was a silence before Sean spoke again, bracing himself before he did so. ‘You can turn the light on now.’ Bannan shook his head to clear his thoughts, reaching behind for the light switch, pausing as his fingers found it before flooding the hallway with the cruelest of light. Bannan had seen the crime scene earlier that day, when both bodies had been found.

  The shadows on the floor Sean was crouched next to suddenly became imperfect vivid maroon circles, some as much as two inches in diameter, some just tiny drops that had sprayed from her body when she was first stabbed or dropped off the blade of the knife as he retracted the weapon from her abdomen. Most of the blood had dried into the carpet now, but the larger drops, where the blood was thickest, still shimmered with wetness. Sean looked away and closed his eyes, quickly opening them again when images of the maniac stabbing furiously at the woman’s lower body flooded into his mind. He stood and started moving towards the lounge. ‘I need to see where she was found.’

  ‘Just be careful,’ Bannan reminded him, following Sean along the corridor.

  ‘Has the light switch already been checked for prints?’ Sean asked.

  ‘Yeah,’ Bannan told him, ‘all the fingerprint work’s been done.’

  ‘Good,’ Sean told him and flicked it on, revealing a scene that physically knocked the breath from his chest – despite the fact the bodies had been removed. The sofa was soaked with dark red blood – the floor, walls and every piece of furniture were either heavily stained or sprayed with more blood. Even the picture frames, vases and other bric-a-brac bore witness to the slaughter. ‘Jesus Christ,’ Sean exclaimed, trying to catch his breath. ‘The man we’re after’s in an unstoppable rage. Unless we catch him soon there’ll be others – others like this one – others like Rebecca Fordham. Because this is absolutely the work of the same man and this is what he’s been waiting for all these months – the chance to be alone inside with his victim – to be able to take his time.’

  ‘Victims,’ Bannan reminded him.

  ‘Yes,’ Sean acknowledged, ‘victims.’ There was another silence for a few seconds. ‘Did he disembowel her?’

  ‘Yes,’ Bannan confirmed, ‘and more – worse.’

  ‘Then he took some of her, something from her body as a trophy.’

  ‘He’d removed a number of her internal organs and displayed them. The post-mortem should be able to confirm if anything is missing.’

  ‘And did he cover her?’ Sean asked. ‘Not her body, but her face?’

  ‘He did. Why?’

  ‘Because he couldn’t stand her looking at him, her eyes accusing him, hating him for what he was doing, so he covered her – that way he could remember her as she’d been when he’d seen her alive – wanting him.’

  ‘You know what?’ Bannan said, ‘all this, everything you say makes sense – his motivation, the taking of trophies, but what I can’t understand is why the daughter as well? Why the little girl?’

  ‘Power,’ Sean almost snapped at him. ‘That’s why. If he could have he would have killed the other children – the ones whose mothers he raped – the ultimate show of his power.’

  ‘We’re pretty sure he raped the daughter before he stabbed her,’ Bannan told him
in a hushed voice, as if just talking about the four-year old girl was disrespectful or lurid.

  ‘You sure?’ Sean asked, puzzled. ‘I didn’t expect that. Killing her yes, but not that.’

  ‘Maybe you just didn’t want to see it,’ Bannan suggested. ‘Maybe you’ve already seen too much.’

  Sean ignored him. ‘Then he covered her face too – for the same reasons – didn’t he?’

  ‘Her face was covered,’ Bannan admitted, ‘as for the reasons why – who knows. Maybe God does or the devil or … you.’

  ‘I don’t know anything,’ Sean argued. ‘I just put the pieces together and make a calculated guess.’

  ‘We both know that’s not true. You have a gift, Sean. The crime scene comes alive for you. You can see the killer here. You can feel him. You can think like him. It’s a gift, but it’ll be a curse too.’

  ‘Speaking from experience, sir?’

  ‘Maybe. And knock off the “sir” bollocks.’

  ‘Sorry,’ Sean apologized before moving closer to one of the chairs opposite and crouching next to it, leaning in close, staring at the empty seat, his eyes narrowing with concentration.

  ‘Problem?’ Bannan asked.

  ‘The blood spray pattern on this chair doesn’t seem right.’

  ‘So you’re an expert on blood spray patterns as well now are you?’

  ‘You don’t have to be – you just have to look.’ He pointed at the blood sprays on the chair. ‘Here, on this middle area of the seat, the patterns don’t match the blood sprays on the rest of the chair or the other furniture.’ He gestured his hand over the table and chair next to where he crouched. ‘It’s as if the heavier sprays of blood have somehow been broken – here and here and here.’ He pointed to the inconsistent patterns as he explained. ‘It’s as if something, or someone was sitting here, but these other finer sprays are unbroken, so …’ Sean stalled, his inexperience beginning to tell.

  ‘The finer spray marks would have been caused when her throat was cut – when her pulse was still creating enough pressure to send even the tiniest of drops from the sofa to the chair,’ Bannan helped him. ‘The larger drops would have been literally thrown there by the killer as he went to work on her after she was dead – the drops flicking and flying off the knife and his hand. But what does that tell you, son? What picture’s that painting?’

  ‘The doll,’ Sean said, remembering the doll from the crime scene photographs of the Rebecca Fordham murder. ‘He placed the doll so it could watch him, but here he had the child.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘And the distribution of the blood means the child wasn’t sitting here when he cut the mother’s throat – when he killed her – but she was when he did the rest.’

  ‘Good,’ Bannan told him.

  ‘So he killed her, then he went to get the child from her bedroom and brought her back in here. He made her sit, and he made her watch. Once he was finished with the mother he took the child back to her bedroom and killed her, but not before he … Jesus Christ – the child’s last few moments on this earth – her last minutes must have been … Did anyone hear any screaming – a child screaming?’

  ‘No,’ Bannan admitted.

  ‘Then she didn’t. The report says her mouth wasn’t covered or taped, so she didn’t scream or call out.’

  ‘Traumatized into paralysis,’ Bannan explained. ‘It’s not unusual in children when they witness anything even close to what this one had to see. Poor little cow. I’ll have the lab work up the blood spray patterns and check the daughter’s clothes for traces of her mother’s blood – see if your theory is right.’

  ‘Not just my theory,’ Sean challenged him. ‘You’d already worked it all out, hadn’t you? Everything I’ve said – you already knew it?

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘Then why bring me here? Why let me repeat everything you already knew?’

  ‘Because I wanted to see. I wanted to be sure.’

  ‘Of what?’

  ‘Of you. I wanted to be sure you’re what I think you are.’

  ‘And what’s that?’

  ‘A rare type of animal, Sean. A very rare animal indeed.’

  ‘What does that mean – exactly?’

  ‘You’ll see,’ Bannan told him without offering further explanation. ‘In time you’ll see. Anyway, you finished?’

  ‘I suppose so.’

  ‘Good. Now we can get out of here. You can fill me in on the rest of your insights on the way back to the nick – if you have any.’

  ‘Fine,’ Sean agreed. Just being in the flat was becoming unbearable. ‘Although there’s one more thing – you said the fingerprint work had already been done?’

  ‘It has. Forensics like to get it out the way first. Tomorrow they’ll be going for hairs and fibres.’

  ‘Did they find any? Fingerprints?’

  ‘Yeah – plenty, but they look as if they’ll be from the victims. We can’t be sure until they’re worked up properly, but it appears we’ve blown out on finding a print from the killer.’

  ‘No,’ Sean said, shaking his head. ‘Once the killing started he wasn’t thinking about not leaving his prints. He was in a frenzy by then. Even if he was wearing gloves at first he would have taken them off. He couldn’t have stood having a barrier between their skin and his, just like he couldn’t with Rebecca Fordham.’

  ‘We can’t get a fingerprint off skin, son,’ Bannan reminded him.

  ‘No,’ Sean agreed, ‘but when he went from here to the girl’s room he wouldn’t have put them back on and he must have touched something. He must have. Was her bedroom door open or shut?’

  ‘It was closed.’

  ‘Do you have children?’ Sean asked.

  ‘Yes,’ Bannan answered cautiously. ‘All grown up and gone now.’

  ‘But when they were young, would you close their bedroom doors when they slept – would your wife?’

  ‘No. We’d leave them slightly open.’

  ‘Is that what most people do?’ Sean asked, forgetting he could be betraying his own past.

  ‘Don’t you know?’ Bannan asked. ‘Didn’t your mother leave yours open?’

  Sean glared at him momentarily, the anger of his childhood almost erupting to the surface. ‘Of course,’ he lied, ‘and so did Lindsey Harter, so she could feel close to her child while she slept. He closed the door, after he’d … he closed the door. Have forensics check the door handle again – especially the underside and the panels of the door, on the hallway side. He may have pushed it shut with the palm of his hand.’

  ‘Forensics won’t like to be told to go over old work.’

  ‘They dusted for prints while the bodies were still in-situ – that must have been very distracting. Mistakes could have been made.’

  ‘You’re telling me,’ Bannan said. ‘A woman from the forensic team has already gone off sick with stress. I don’t think we’ll be seeing her again anytime soon. I’ll get them to check again. They won’t like it, but what the fuck.’

  ‘Good,’ Sean agreed. ‘So what’s next?’

  ‘Remember the Historical Criminologist from the Fordham Team?’

  ‘The one who’s wrong?’

  ‘Whatever. I’m meeting her tomorrow, in the morning. I’d like you to be there, but you have to mind your temper. Agreed?’

  ‘I wouldn’t miss it for the world.’

  Chapter Five

  Bannan sat behind the large, cheap desk in his usual office at Shooter’s Hill Police Station, dozens of files, mostly marked confidential, others marked for General Registry, adorning the worktop, but all meticulously stacked in order – a tower of in-and out-trays acting like book ends holding the line of cardboard folders upright. Other than that the only things Bannan had in front of him were two pink cardboard folders, both lying open. Professional-looking crime scene photographs topped one file, whereas the other still had to make do with polaroids. One file related to the murder of Rebecca Fordham and the other to the murders of Lindsey a
nd Izzy Harter. The two sets of photographs echoed each other closely.

  Sean watched Bannan studying the files, noting the neatness of his desk and the slow, steady way he examined the two cases – an ordered mind behind an ordered desk. He wondered if he would ever become as Bannan was – organized, tidy, precise. He doubted it. He looked at his watch – it was already nine thirty a.m.

  ‘What time’s she supposed to be here?’ he asked.

  Bannan answered without looking up from the files or at his watch. ‘Nine o’clock. She’s already half an hour late.’

  ‘What you going to ask her when she gets here?’

  ‘I’m going to show her the polaroids from the Harter scene and ask her if she thinks it could be the same killer as Rebecca Fordham’s. If she says no then I’ll know she doesn’t know what she’s talking about. If she says yes then we’ll find out if she’s brave enough to admit she’s wrong about Ian McCaig.’

  ‘And undermine her own career and standing,’ Sean told him, ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘We’ll see,’ Bannan replied, still not looking up. A sudden, loud knock at the door made Sean jump and set his heart racing. ‘Come in,’ Bannan called out.

  The door yawned open revealing a tall, strong-looking uniformed sergeant in his fifties – greying beard matching his grey hair. ‘A Doctor Patricia Hooper here to see you, sir.’ The sergeant stepped aside and allowed a slim woman in her late forties wearing a tailored suit to walk past him and into the office. As soon as she had, the sergeant closed the door on her just like he’d closed the cell door on hundreds of prisoners before, leaving her alone in the room with Sean and Bannan. After she’d cleared her throat she crossed the room to Bannan’s desk and stretched out a hand. Bannan leaned forward and accepted it, but didn’t get up, gripping Hooper’s hand firmly, but more gently than he would have a man’s hand. Eventually he released her and pointed to a chair.

  ‘Please, take a seat.’ Hooper sat looking awkward and placed her old brown satchel by the side of the chair while glancing at Sean from the corner of her eye. Bannan noticed it. ‘This is PC Sean Corrigan. He’s assisting me with … certain elements of this case.’ Sean neither moved nor spoke – he just stared at the woman with barely-concealed mistrust.