The Devil Came to Abbeville

by Marian Phair

  He peeled this back carefully, his heart racing with excitement. Then, stood frozen to the spot, as his eyes gazed on the contents, and his brain registered what his eyes were seeing.

  Nestling in a bed of tissue was a strange… White Rose.

  CHAPTER 44

  DCI Jake Fletcher sat with his feet propped up on the edge of his desk, his ankles crossed, as he studied cold case files with Scott Holden, over coffee and biscuits in his office, when a call was put through to him from Chief Inspector, Mike Robbins.

  “Hi, Mike, how are things at your end? What can I do for you?” Jake said into the phone. He cradled the receiver under his chin, and hunched up his shoulder to hold it in place, while he opened Case file150 on Lorraine Cooke and began leafing through the pages, as he listened to the voice on the other end. Scott sat quietly sipping at his coffee and munching on a chocolate digestive biscuit, as he waited patiently for the call to end.

  “The hell you say. When did this happen?” What ever was being said in the DCI’s ear had caught his attention, and Jake’s fingers stopped in mid air above the case file which now laid forgotton on the desk between the two men. Jake swung his legs down and sat bolt upright on his chair. Scott knew something bad had happened from the look on the detectives face, and hoped it wasn’t another murder.

  “Jeez, how the heck did he get it inside, surely the sniffer dogs would have picked up on something?” Scott watched the flickering emotion’s crossing the detective’s face, as he spoke into the phone.

  “Yeah, okay, Mike.” Scott heard him say. Then, “Yes I will, and thanks for letting me know. Oh, and, Mike, before you go, Scott Holden and I were going through the files when you rang. If he comes up with anything on Lorraine Cooke, I’ll give you a call.” Jake put the receiver back on its cradle and reached for his cigarettes.

  “Well I’ll be damned,” he exclaimed, as he flipped open his lighter and held the flame to the cigarette in his mouth.

  “Are you okay, Jake, you look like you’ve had a bit of a shock?”

  “Yeah, you could say that, it was a shock to me, anyway,” Jake replied.

  “I hope it’s not another one, another murder?” Scott voiced his concern.

  “No there hasn’t been another one, there are two,” he told Scott.

  “Our White Rose killer has changed his modus operandi, this time, he left a note along with the rose.”

  “You’re kidding, he left a note. What was on it?”

  “Killed, two jailbirds with one stone,” Jake told him.

  It was Scott’s turn to look shocked as the knowledge sank in that he’d been proved right. This held no pleasure for him, and that feeling he had in his gut, that the vigilante wasn’t through killing, was still there. He knew it wasn’t over, that there were more victims somewhere, he could feel it in his bones.

  “When did this happen, and where did it happen?” Scott asked Jake.

  “In HMP Garrett, in Buxton, the bodies of Kevin Edwards and Basil Roger Green were found by a prison guard when their cell was opened yesterday morning.”

  “Did they tell you how they died? What was the cause of their deaths?”

  “Mike Robbins, told me, toxicology found they had been poisoned, by something called, Olli Ander, or something like that. I’ve never heard of it. It was in the toasted marshmallows found in their systems. How it got past the sniffer dogs, God only knows.” Jake stated.

  “Those dogs are mainly used for detecting drugs, how it passed the sorting room undetected would be my question. So the killer used, Nerium Oleander, as a murder weapon this time. So where is he obtaining these poisons? That’s what we need to find out, and how he produced this strange hybrid rose. These are all questions we need to find answers to; these answers will help to lead us to him.”

  “You’ve heard of this Oleander plant then, Scott? I must confess it’s new to me.”

  “Yeah I’m familiar with it, me and maybe a thousand other Americans. It’s poisoned enough campers over the years when they have unwittingly used its branches to roast meat, hotdogs, and of course, marshmallows over their camp fires. We call it the ‘sweet scented killer.’ It really is one of the most toxic plants in the world, comes from the Mediterranean Region. Every part of the plant is poisonous, from its stem, to its sap. Even inhaling the smoke from a burning Oleander is a health threat; and when ingested, it’s incredibly poisonous.”

  “Wow, I bow to your knowledge, Scott, how the hell do your learn all this stuff?”

  Jake asked as he lit yet another cigarette.

  “You can never have enough knowledge, Jake, I just happen to have a keen interest in things of this nature. There’s even more to this plant, to give you an idea just how deadly it is. The blossom is so dangerous, that even honey made by bees that used the Nerium Oleander plant for nectar, is poisonous. Now y’all know as much about it as I do.”

  “Mind boggling stuff that,” Jake said, stubbing out his cigarette. “So what’s next?”

  Scott rose, yawned and stretched his stiffening limbs. “Can we take a break? Maybe get a bite to eat and a couple of pints of your English beer that I’m fast becoming a fan of? We can take this up again later.” He tapped a finger on the abandoned case file on the DCI’s desk.

  “We can do that. I know a nice little place that do scampi and chips, and they serve real ale there too. You do like seafood, don’t you?” Jake asked as he reached for his jacket.

  “Does a bear crap in the woods?” Scott laughed, as he followed Jake Fletcher out of the door.

  CHAPTER 45

  Life for petty criminal, Terry Jones, took a different turn when he hooked up with Billy-Bob Watson, an ex-Hell’s Angel, who could no longer sit astride his Harley-Davidson, having lost both legs and an arm in a heist that went wrong several years earlier. Originally from San Diego California, Billy-Bob regalled Terry Jones, and his girlfriend, the then seventeen year old, Lorraine Cooke, with hair raising tales of fights with other biker gangs, from different chapters, some with weird sounding names.

  The chapters, he explained was really, just another name for a gang. He told them how the men shared the women in the chapter, and what happened to a women if she disobeyed a member, or refused to perform a sex act when requested, and how they exploited the ‘hangers on’ who were never destined to be ‘Patched.’

  Billy-Bob’s chapter had hung around close to San Diego International Airport, also known as Lindbergh Field, with Tijuana, Mexico, just a mere fifteen miles away across the border. This was their chosen place where the trafficking in stolen goods and most of their drug dealing went down. Billy-Bob was more involved in the prostitution industry, and extortion. Although no longer a gang member, he still wore his Patches proudly displayed on his worn, leather jacket, for all to see.

  One day, as the three sat around smoking pot and getting high, Billy-Bob allowed Lorraine to try on his jacket. Lorraine slipped her scrawny arms into the black leather sleeves of the greasy, smelly jacket that reeked of skunk and stale sweat. Her pulses raced with excitement as she pictured herself as Terry Jones’ ‘squeeze,’ imagining her arms wrapped around his waist, face pressed against his ‘Patched’ back, his old lady, riding off into the sunset, on his Harley-Davidson. Then living on his Harley, when they weren’t hanging out in the bars, lazing around, chilling, boozing, and getting high on marijuana; never having to go to work, but always having loads of money for their weed, petrol and beer. Lorraine was curious about the Patches, and asked Billy-Bob what the wings signified, what he had to do to earn them, and why they were different colours. Billy-Bob didn’t answer her question, his tongue poked out from his heavily bearded face and he rapidly flicked it back and forth across his mouth.

  Lorraine sat crossed legged at the foot of his wheelchair, a puzzled look on her face, as she gazed up at him. Reaching down with a heavily tattooed arm, Billy-Bob pulled her to her feet, and onto the arm of the wheelchair. He beckoned her with his forefinger, and as Lorraine bent close to hear what h
e had to say, he whispered in her ear, and then poked his large wet tongue in it, and swirled it around before she could pull away.

  Scarlet faced, but curiously, both repulsed and excited at the same time, Lorraine moved away from his wheelchair and sat down in the grass next to Terry, who had his lips around the neck of a beer bottle, and a spliff smouldering away between his fingers. She looked across at the huge, bearded, bald headed, form, of Billy-Bob Watson, with fearful eyes. Billy-Bob called out to the overweight, red head, with massive breasts, lying in the grass playing with a puppy, and ignoring them completely.

  “Hey, Ruby, roll me a joint, then come and give me a blow job, I’ve suddenly got all horny.” He looked across at Lorraine, and flicked his tongue at her.

  Without saying a single word, Ruby reached into her bra, and brought out a small leather pouch. She pulled a cigarette paper from its packet, and proceeded to roll the joint for Billy-Bob. Carefully licking the edge of the paper, she rolled it between fingers and thumb, and then laid it on her knee while she put the makings back into her bra.

  Ruby walked over to where Billy-Bob sat waiting, she lit the joint and took a deep drag, drawing the smoke down into her lungs before handing it to him. Then without futher ado, she went down on her knees before him, unzipped his jeans, and took out his penis. Wetting her lips she took his penis in her mouth, and gave him a blow job in front of the two onlookers as if it was the most natural thing in the world, while Billy-Bob, with head back, and eyes closed, pulled away on his joint.

  “Ruby hasn’t spoken a single word,” Lorraine said to Terry.

  “She can’t talk with her mouth full,” Terry chuckled. “Did Billy-Bob tell you how he got his red wings?” he asked her, his eyes following Ruby’s head as it moved up and down in Billy-Bob’s lap.

  “Yes, and it’s disgusting! How could any man do that to a woman who is menstruating? It’s really disgusting, and so is that!” Lorraine pointed to where Billy-Bob was climaxing into Ruby’s mouth. Terry’s hand went down to his crutch, and he fondled his genitals as he watched.

  “I bet her mouth’s still sore, she had four teeth out yesterday. I wonder what it feels like without teeth, I might ask Ruby to give me a blow job, what do you think?”

  “You’re as disgusting as they are. If you did, I wouldn’t speak to you again,” She told him, pulling a face.

  Terry laughed as he pulled her down beside him in the grass, and kissed her.

  His hand crept up her thigh, and pushed her panties aside and his fingers slipped inside to rub and probe her between her legs. While his hand explored her body, he took one of hers and placed it over his erect penis, and whispered in her ear, “Give us a wank.” Then his lips claimed hers, again.

  Terry had enticed the virteous Lorraine away from the protection of her family. She was excited by his ‘devil may care’ attitude, and his criminal activities. It wasn’t long after she became his girlfriend, that the evil youth introduced her to drugs, just has he had with the young, naïve, Kevin Edwards. Lorraine had slipped away to meet him secretly, unbeknown to her family and friends, and the money that was to pay for her dancing lessons, she gave to Terry Jones, to buy pot. When she should have been studying ballet, she was smoking pot and engaging in sexual acts with this wanted criminal. Terry had other plans for Lorraine, plans he had made with Billy-Bob. Plans that involved ex-stripper, and prostitute Ruby Wells, Billy-Bob’s common law wife, who had been ordered by Billy-Bob to teach Lorraine the fine art of striptease, and lap dancing. They had even chosen a stage name for the hapless girl, she would be taught how to take off her clothes like a professional, and how to perform sexual favours for clients under the name of ‘Luscious Lorraine.’

  The pair met secretly for almost a year, always winding up somehow back at the static caravan that was home to Billy-Bob and Ruby, where depraved sexual acts were performed as a group under the influence of drugs. Shortly after her eighteenth birthday, now addicted to heroin, ‘Luscious Lorraine’ as she was now known, had been performing as a stripper for six months, being fondled by dirty old men in seedy nightclubs, with Terry, collecting all the fees.

  Lorraine’s parents started to show their concern as their daughter spent less and less time at home. They still believed what they had been told by Lorraine, that she had secured a job as a careworker, and as such, she had to work unsocial hours.

  She told her parents that she wanted to give up her ‘ballet lessons’ much to her mothers dissappointment, but under Terry’s influence, she told her mother that she’d had a change of heart and decided to stay on and finish her training, to allay any suspicions they had, and to avoid having to answer awkward questions.

  Henry and Sibel Cooke saw less and less of their daughter as the weeks passed. Until finally, one Thursday evening, having set off for her dance class, she never returned.

  Lorraine spent the next twelve months of her life going from part time whore and stripper, into full time prostitution. At first she tried to escape their clutches, and they were forced to tie her to her bed, the only piece of furniture in her tiny box-room.

  Here, she was forced to entertain clients. If she rebelled, or refused a repulsive client, Terry Jones would beat her into submission until she obeyed him.

  “You’ll do as I tell you, you’re my meat now. You’ll fuck who I tell you to fuck, and do whatever the punter wants you to do, unless you want more of the same,” he told her, after one particularly brutal beating. Here in this windowless room, she was given heroin, and men took their turns at her. Sometimes as many as fifteen men in any one day would ravish her young body, with Billy-Bob taking their money at the door, and using her for his own gratification.

  Ruby would come in from time to time between clients, with a bowl of warm water, a wash cloth, and a towel, and make sure she cleaned herself up. Every penny Lorraine earned on her back was kept from her, and used to expand their small brothel, run by Billy-Bob and Terry Jones. Who by now, had lost all interest in Lorraine Cooke and was busy grooming two more unsuspecting females. Ruby had charge of the working girls, and it was her job to ensure that Lorraine, and the three other drugged-up girls they held, got their daily doses of heroin.

  As the weeks passed, they no longer had to tie Lorraine Cooke to her bed. Her spirit was broken; she lay on the dirty mattress, in a drug induced haze, eyes gazing at the ceiling and let the clients do whatever they wanted with her wasted body.

  She never saw the outside world again. Day after day, she lay on the same, dirty stained mattress, as equally dirty-minded men, used her young body for their own evil ends. Until one day, when three men were using her body’s orifices at the same time, twenty year old Lorraine Cooke, breathed her last breath.

  Her capturers waited until nightfall to dispose of her bruised and broken body.

  Under the light of the moon, they buried her in the woods, on the outskirt of Abbeville, and covered her grave with fallen leaves.

  CHAPTER 46

  Scott waited patiently in the priest’s study for Father Patrick, and Sally to return from their walk with Mali, the little brown and white Jack Russell Terrier, they had chosen for her from the Sherrier Kennels rescue centre. Naming the little dog Mali had been Sally’s idea. ‘It’s an anagram of Liam,’ she had told them. Tears came to her eyes when she said Liam’s name, letting them all know just how much she still missed her young friend. Scott guessed the memory of Liam Findley would always be with Sally, despite her new found playmates. He recalled how Sally’s face had broken into a beaming smile when she felt Mali’s soft, wet tongue, licking at her hand.

  He got up from his seat beside the window, and wandered over to the huge, ornate bookcase, which took up most of the far wall. The shelves were stacked with tomes, all neatly placed in order of the subject matter they contained. The middle shelf contained the priest’s personal reading material, and a large wooden carving of three monkeys sitting side by side on a wooden plinth. ‘See no Evil. Hear no Evil. Speak no Evil.’ Secretly smi
ling, he thought how appropriate it was to find that particular statue here, in the priests study, next to his bible.

  Running a hand along the titles on this shelf, one book stood out from all of the rest. It was bound in maroon leather, its title ‘Shake Hands with the Devil,’ embossed in heavy gold lettering. An unsual title for a priests reading material he mused, since Father Patrick shook the hands of his parishioners as they left the church after each of his services. Removing the book, he opened it and turned to the first page. A demonic face outlined in black, stared out at him from the fine, leafed paper, with evil, lizard-like eyes, the sharp pointed teeth, surrounded by bright red lips, dripped blood. The demons hair had been cleverly drawn in small groups of three sixes, the caption read, ‘Devil Thy Face is Woman’ underneath this was written the name of the artist, illustrated by Amie Elizabeth Carter. The book itself was written by some obscure author, Marian Phair.

  Intrigued, Scott turned to the first page and began to read…

  ‘The Angel had a chance to save many souls from the darkness, but failed. Those who had spilled the blood of the innocent were doomed, their sight was stolen from them, and they were forced to live for eternity, unaffected by holy water, or a cross. Their sightless eyes would never close in sleep, evil had been released, and they would roam the earth forever. The Angel saw the evil and feared.’

  He noticed something had been written very lightly in pencil under this. He couldn’t quite make out what it said in the late afternoon light, so he moved across to the window where the light was better. There were a few strange symbols crudely drawn, and a sentence written in Latin. Scott recognised the priest’s neat handwriting.

  Lucifer erit domino et temere obedire. Scott mouthed the words as he read them.

  ‘Lucifer will be master, and he will blindly obey.’