Blood of the Innocents

by Collett, Chris

  After issuing instructions, Mariner left Sergeant Pete Welford to supervise the search, while he and Knox walked along to the hut at the barrier to talk to the security guards who had been on duty on Tuesday afternoon. Not that Knox was much help. He seemed to be having problems focusing on anything today. One of the security guards thought he remembered having seen Yasmin on occasions but not every day, and he couldn’t recall seeing her on Tuesday.

  The problem was that this wasn’t unusual. The guards didn’t stay in their hut all afternoon, especially in this sort of weather, when the flimsy structure offered little relief from the heat. And at this time of year, when there were fewer students, most people coming in and out would have their own passes. The rules were more relaxed and it was not unusual for them to leave the barrier raised for lengthy periods of time. Neither man had noticed anything out of the ordinary on Tuesday afternoon. And this was not an area covered by CCTV so the police were entirely reliant on the vigilance of the security personnel. Leaving the booth, Mariner was immediately accosted by a young woman.

  ‘Are you here about the girl who’s gone missing?’ Speaking with the upward inflection at the end of the sentence that placed her as a native of the antipodes. She was in full Bondi beach ensemble: low cut denim shorts that were a good eight inches off joining company with the cropped T-shirt that strained over an ample bosom; all offset by a rich, caramel tan. Instinctively, Mariner glanced across at Knox for signs of awakening interest. On any other day his tongue would have been practically hanging out. But for once there were none.

  Mariner nodded. ‘We’re the investigating officers.’

  ‘They’ve told you about the flasher, right?’

  Mariner looked towards the security guard who squirmed uncomfortably.

  She shook her head knowingly. ‘I thought as much. A couple of months ago, back in May, one of my roommates, Lizzie, got flashed at.’

  ‘Do you know exactly what happened?’

  ‘Oh yeah. I mean it was a bit of a giggle, but it shook her up.’

  ‘What time of day was this?’

  ‘Early evening; about five, half five. She was coming back over the meadow.’

  ‘The meadow?’

  ‘It’s what we call that rough ground down there.’ She pointed down the hill from where they stood to the area that the search party had just left - the area that Yasmin would have crossed immediately after leaving the station.

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘Well, the way she told it, Lizzie was just walking along the path minding her own when this guy jogged past her. She thought nothing of it but then as she rounded the corner and into the trees there he was again, standing with his back to the path like he was taking a leak. But as she approached he turned around and it was all sticking out there. He grinned this nasty little grin and mumbled something about getting “caught short”.’

  ‘Did Lizzie think that could have been genuine?’

  She shook her head. ‘Not a bit. She said, “No guy I know pees with a stiffy like that.”’

  ‘So what did Lizzie do?’

  ‘She said something like, “Get a life, saddo,” and got past him as fast as she could. She came straight home and told me all about it.’

  ‘Did she report it to the police?’

  ‘She didn’t think it was necessary. Just some perve getting his kicks. And I think she felt pretty stupid too, you know? It upset her more that she thought it would and she just wanted to forget it. I think she was kind of ashamed that it had got to her.’

  ‘It’s nothing to be ashamed of.’

  ‘I know but I guess you always think if you’re in that situation you’d be cool and just laugh it off, because it’s so pathetic. But I think it shocked her, and she knew that this guy could see that. So she’d given him what he wanted, hadn’t she?’

  ‘Did Lizzie feel physically threatened in any way?’

  ‘No. It was like her reaction was enough. That’s why she felt so stupid.’

  ‘There’s nothing stupid about flashing.’ It was always the same story. Even with the progress made in forensic psychology, flashing had never lost its reputation as one step down from an old music hall joke. ‘Did Lizzie tell you what he looked like?’

  ‘Not really. I don’t think she got a good look. It was turning to dusk and she said he was facing sort of sideways, with a baseball cap pulled low.’ She gave a wry smile. ‘And I guess she wasn’t exactly focused on his face, you know?’

  ‘Did she tell anyone else about it?’

  ‘She didn’t want to. But I made her write it all down, just in case, and she was going to think about it. In the end she chickened out and mentioned it to one of her tutors, who said she’d pass it on. They told her security would deal with it - issue a warning to students and let the Dean know and to be honest, I think that suited Lizzie.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘We heard nothing more. Than a couple of weeks ago there was this rumour going round that it had happened again to a couple of other girls, in practically the same spot. I wondered if it could be the same guy. I know Lizzie did too.’

  ‘Where’s Lizzie now? We may want to talk to her.’

  She pulled a face. ‘I can’t be very specific. She’s hitching in France with her boyfriend.’

  Mariner was sure none of this had got as far as the police. Incidents like these would show up on the monthly Intranet bulletin. There had been a spate of indecent exposures, as there often was when the weather got warmer, but nothing that he could remember having been reported on or around the university. He turned to the guard. ‘You knew about this?’

  He shrugged. ‘I’d heard something, but we were told not to make an issue of it.’

  ‘It already is an issue. What makes it worse is that we weren’t told.’ Angela Woolley would have to be confronted about that.

  ‘Do you know the names of any of the other girls?’

  She shook her head. ‘Sorry.’

  Mariner knocked and walked into Angela Woolley’s office, leaving the Dean little opportunity to protest. She was packing things into a briefcase. ‘I’m sorry, Inspector, I’m due at a—’

  ‘I think that might have to wait.’ Now he had her attention. ‘Do you understand why we’re here today?’ he demanded. ‘That we’re here searching for a seventeen-year-old girl who may well have vanished less than a mile from this office? Why didn’t you tell us about the indecent exposures that have been occurring next to this campus for the last two months and more? Of course, that’s not counting any incidents that haven’t been reported because the victim is completely unaware that it’s happened to anyone else but her. Ms Woolley, you seem to have a sexual deviant operating on your campus. I think you’d better tell me everything you know.’

  In effect, they’d had the better account from the student and Angela Woolley’s version demonstrated that she’d barely attended to the facts. At least now though, she had the grace to be embarrassed.

  ‘I’d really like to know whose idea it was to suppress this information,’ Mariner said.

  ‘It wasn’t a question of suppressing it. We just felt it was better that only a limited number of people should know. What we didn’t want to do was cause panic among the students, or deter any prospective students. Miss Greenwood was offered counselling, as were the other three young women—’

  ‘You mean there are at least four?’

  ‘Really, Inspector, this all happened weeks ago and I’m sure it was just a harmless student prank. There haven’t been any incidents since the end of—’

  ‘You mean, there haven’t been any reported incidents. And why would students report it when none of this information is acted on? These incidents are never just “harmless pranks”. Have you ever met any sexual deviants, Ms Woolley? Any convicted rapists among your acquaintances? ’

  ‘I don’t know what—’

  ‘Let me tell you something about rapists then, because in my line of work I’ve met one or two. And guess what? They
don’t wake up one morning and decide that today they are going to rape. Rape is just one stage in a progressive pattern of sexually deviant behaviour. And that pattern starts, more often than not, with flashing: indecent exposure; an unsolicited demonstration of naked sexual power to an unsuspecting victim. Then, when the buzz begins to wear off from that relatively harmless little pursuit, and believe me, it nearly always does, that’s when things start to turn nasty. If you’re so concerned about adverse publicity, I wonder what prospective students would make of the fact that for the last few months failure to disclose information to the police has exposed existing female students at this university to the risk of being attacked by a potential rapist.’

  Angela Woolley did not have a reply.

  ‘Christ. Since when did education become an exercise in PR?’ Mariner boiled as they left the building. Short of any response from Knox, he answered his own question. ‘Since it became a commercial enterprise, that’s when. It’s all about reputation and money.’ He took a deep breath. ‘We’ll need to track down all the girls who’ve been victims to this flasher and take statements from them. It might not have anything to do with Yasmin, but they need to be investigated just the same.’

  They had been given one other name. Helen Greenwood was a library assistant who fortunately remained on campus throughout the holidays.

  ‘Go and get a detailed statement from her,’ Mariner said to Knox. ‘Then I want you to go back to the station to follow up on any other similar incidents there have been locally and see if there are any links.’

  ‘Yes, boss,’ said Knox, with about as much enthusiasm as a bloodhound on valium.

  Librarian Helen Greenwood was thirty-three, so she said, but to Knox she could have been anything up to fifty. Her mousy brown hair was held off her face by an old-fashioned Alice band and her blouse and skirt could only be described as ‘sensible’. All that was missing Knox thought were the horn-rimmed glasses. He really didn’t want to do this. He’d other things on his mind. Greenwood was already behaving as if she was afraid of him, but then, he was a man so she probably was. He couldn’t imagine her having had much experience of the opposite sex.

  She was about to take her lunch break. ‘I’ve brought sandwiches and I usually go out for a bit of fresh air,’ she told Knox apologetically.

  ‘Well, perhaps you could walk me to where it happened,’ Knox suggested. ‘Then you can tell me about it.’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know...’

  ‘We’ll take it slowly. You can stop any time you like.’

  ‘All right,’ she said, sounding as if it was anything but.

  It was going to be a waste of time, thought Knox. She was scared of her own shadow. She led him down the footpath, back towards the railway station until it almost reached the meadow, where the path went briefly through an area of shrubs and there was plenty of scope for concealment. She stopped abruptly. ‘It was about here.’

  ‘So he could easily have been waiting over there on the rough ground until you came along, then hopped over the wire. Was there anyone else about?’

  ‘Not here. I mean, the campus wasn’t deserted, but there was no one down here at the time.’

  ‘Do you take the same route every day at the same time?’

  ‘I did then, yes, but not any more. If it’s quiet I walk all the way round on the road now.’

  ‘Can you describe exactly what happened?’ Knox took out his notebook, partly because his memory didn’t seem to be all that reliable at present, but also so that she wouldn’t have to look at him while she talked.

  ‘I was just walking down to the station to catch the train, along here. It was one of the first nice warm days we had. He just stepped out from the bushes in that way that everyone says they do. I didn’t notice at first, then he smiled at me so I smiled back but his smile was sort of . . . lewd, and then we were almost level when I happened to glance down. I don’t know what made me do it, and I saw that he had his, his . . . thing out’

  ‘His pri—His penis?’

  ‘Yes. He was holding it. And it was huge, and horrible. I just felt sick.’ Glancing up, Knox saw that she’d flushed scarlet. He looked back at his notebook.

  ‘What did you do?’ he asked.

  ‘I just got past him, around him, as fast as I could and hurried down towards the station.’

  ‘Did he follow you?’

  ‘I don’t know. I didn’t dare to look back, but I don’t think so.’

  ‘So what was he like?’

  ‘That’s the silly thing. I don’t really know. I didn’t notice. I only glanced at him for a second.’

  Great. ‘Was he white or black?’

  ‘White.’

  ‘You’re sure?’

  ‘Yes, he seemed to have a very high colour, from the little I could see. He had this cap pulled down low so I couldn’t really see his eyes, but his cheeks and his chin were—’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Sunburnt, I think. His chin was very red.’

  ‘What colour was the cap?’

  ‘Dark. Blue or green, I think. One of those that most young men seem to wear these days.’

  A baseball cap. ‘How tall was he? Same as me?’

  She looked Knox up and down. ‘Taller, I think. And thinner.’

  Knox pulled in his stomach. This was better than he’d expected. ‘You’re doing well,’ he told her. The other overriding image, she said, was the powerful smell of his cologne. ‘It smelled sort of cheap and nasty. It was much too strong.’

  Taking the statement and getting back to the car took Knox around an hour. A couple of times he’d had to ask Helen Greenwood to repeat what she’d said because he’d missed it. Now, back in the office, he was finding it difficult to concentrate on what was on the screen in front of him. He’d some detective work of his own to do and wouldn’t be able to settle until he’d done it. The office was quiet, everyone taken up with the two investigations. Knox reached for the thermos he’d brought with him. He needed a bit of Dutch courage for this.

  Minimising the program he was in, he connected to the Internet.

  ‘It’s someone I’ve known for years,’ Theresa had told him during that painfully brief conversation on the phone.

  ‘Do I know him?’ he’d asked. She hadn’t answered, which meant that maybe he did.

  ‘Where did you meet?’

  ‘It’s not important.’ But Knox had already worked it out. The only someone she could have known a long time who they both knew could be someone from school. Theresa used the computer all the time. She’d been on courses and could find her way round it better than he could. He also knew that she visited the various school reunion sites that were springing up. Once she’d urged him to have a look.

  ‘It’s fun,’ she’d said. ‘You get to find out what’s happened to all those spotty oiks.’ But Knox had declined. He didn’t have the same enthusiasm for the past as Theresa did. It must be a woman thing.

  There were half a dozen sites offering to put people in contact with old acquaintances. Knox logged on to the first and typed in the name of the secondary school they’d gone to and the year they’d both left. By the time he clicked to proceed, his palms were sweating and his heart pounding. Would he know who it was? Would he recognise the name?

  ‘Anything?’ Mariner’s voice behind him sent the mouse skidding across the desk. He hadn’t heard anyone come in.

  ‘No. Nothing yet, boss.’ Knox minimised the screen but Mariner was already looking over his shoulder.

  ‘Are we sure we’re looking in the right place?’ But it was curiosity more than anything else.

  Knox fumbled for the notes he’d made. ‘Checking back over the indecent exposure incidents in the south of the city during the last six months, there have been two others as well as the unreported ones at the university, bringing the total to six,’ he said. ‘All occurred at different times of the day, and on the surface there seems little to connect them.’ He’d plotted the incidents on a map, which
they now pored over. ‘As you can see, boss, they all happened in secluded areas, but then the flasher is hardly likely to strike in the middle of a busy shopping centre, is he?’

  ‘It would be a first.’

  ‘One common thread seems to be that a lot of them take place fairly near railway stations.’

  ‘Like Kingsmead. OK. How did you get on with Helen Greenwood?’

  Knox reported what she’d told him.

  ‘Sunburnt, eh,’ said Mariner. ‘That might be helpful.’

  Calling in at the incident centre revealed that the news bulletin had been less fruitful. Although there were a handful of possible sightings of Yasmin to follow up, the descriptions were vague and there didn’t appear to be anything that held any great significance. Mariner could safely leave Knox to follow those up. As the search of the university campus had turned up nothing either, apart from a handful of spent spliffs, the logical thing to do was to widen the search to the stretch of railway track between Kingsmead Station and the point at which Yasmin left the train. That would be a much bigger operation requiring far more manpower, which Mariner didn’t like to think about just yet. As far as he was concerned, they were already jumping the gun. Instead, he wanted to concentrate on the information they had got. On an investigation like this it was important to be systematic, starting at the core and working gradually outwards, making sure not to miss anything.

  DCI Fiske, however, was like a dog with a bone and any decision on how to prioritise this was all but taken out of Mariner’s hands. Now that Yasmin’s disappearance had been on TV, the press were on to it, presenting exactly the sort of case that would capture the public’s imagination. Always on the lookout for an ‘angle’, the media were playing up the possibility of a racially motivated abduction and, ever helpful, Fiske was equally taken with the idea and was making noises about a press conference for the parents.