by China, Max
"What?" He squirmed, moving into an upright position. "Oh, sorry. I do that sometimes, slip into a daydream and . . . Well, I'm sorry." He flashed a quick embarrassed grin. Her expression remained strangely curious. Miller returned to looking out at the countryside rushing by and thought about the last time he'd almost got into trouble for staring . . .
Her voice was silky and calm, intruding on him gently. "Excuse me . . . A penny for your thoughts?"
Miller turned from the window and regarded her properly.
She had large pale blue eyes, a slight snub nose, her face was both angelic and impish, her poise demure and sophisticated. The expensive boyish bob-cut of her black hair was the only boyish thing about her. The closer he looked, the more her beauty unfolded for him. Surreal, like the sun on a flower that lifts its bowed head toward the light . . . The words he'd written for Josie a lifetime ago sprang to mind. Uncomfortable that he should be reminded, he turned away. "You wouldn't want to know."
She shuffled over on her seat, so she sat directly opposite, leaning forward she said quietly, "Come on; help break up this boring journey for me! I don't usually speak to strangers, but you seem okay," her hands pressed together, pointing at him as if she were about to pray. "So - here I am speaking to a stranger!" She rolled her eyes and raising her eyebrows, gave a little shrug of the shoulders before allowing her hands to drop into her lap. She waited for his reaction. Miller felt the hook of her velvet claws as she pulled him in. He shrugged at her and looked across the aisle at a young couple wearing headphones. The girl slept; the man with her stared blankly out of the window.
"Do you do this trip often?"
"No, this is my first time."
"Oh, really?" She arched an eyebrow.
"Yes, it is. Really," he said, in two minds whether to excuse himself, and just go back to staring out through the window, tripping out on daydreams. The truth was; she'd already turned a key in him, and suddenly he became wary of getting to know her any better.
"Given the choice, I'd rather drive," he said.
"Well, you don't know what you've been missing," she smiled. "You can meet some very interesting people on trains . . ."
"Usually," he grinned. "I only ever meet nutcases."
"Oh? I never have. I suppose I've always been lucky," she said. "Tell me what you do for a living?"
"Let's talk about something other than work."
She arched an eyebrow in his direction. "We don't know each other well enough to talk about anything other than work."
A childhood memory sprang to mind. Miller decided to tell it. "My grandfather used to tell me about a bear he knew from the war . . ."
"He knew a bear?" she scoffed, an eyebrow arched high.
"Yes, he did - in the Second World War, Voytek his name was."
"Your grandfathers name?"
"No, the bear!" Miller looked at her closely to be sure she wasn't mocking him.
He'd started the conversation from such an obtuse position; he reeled her in without even trying. She was hooked. It was a story she'd never heard before.
"Anyway . . ." he rattled off the rest of the bear tale and concluded the story. "The poor animal died in Edinburgh zoo."
"If it's true, that's a very interesting story."
"Look it up," he told her. "You know, my grandfather always said it was a sad irony that a bear that fought alongside men for our freedom, was never freer than while the war was on." He shook his head slowly his expression the same as his grandfather's had been when he first told him the story years before. "To have ended up in a cage, when it was all over, the poor bear, that's so sad."
"Well," she volunteered, "I guess he wouldn't have been able to survive for long in the wild if they'd let him go, would he?"
"I don't know . . ." The continuing contemplation on the fate of a bear that died so many years before suddenly seemed irrelevant. He changed the subject. "So, you travel up often?"
"Once a week, for a long weekend."
"I'm surprised you don't fly."
"Sometimes I do, if I'm pushed for time, but if I can, well, I prefer the train. I find it relaxing, and I usually find someone interesting to talk to," she smiled.
"I hate flying," he confided in her, "I hate ferries, and I don't know how you stand travelling backwards!"
She looked out of the window at the scenery disappearing forwards into the distance. "It doesn't bother me, besides, it's safer if there's a crash."
"Good point, although I have to say, crashing is not something I would usually associate with a train journey."
"It's the one thing that surprises me about flying that we don't all face backwards. It would be so much safer than trying to tuck your head down on your knees . . ."
"Tell me something about yourself."
"Are you a psychiatrist?" he asked.
"Good heavens, no, I'm a reporter!" she laughed. "I sometimes think I need one though."
They talked about the news. He asked her if she'd read about the vigilante case.
"Funny you should ask that, it's the reason I'm coming up this weekend, to find out more from my police mole."
Miller was only slightly surprised about how forthcoming she was. People seemed to think they could confide all kinds of things to him. He concluded it must be something about his face.
"Okay?" He prolonged the word, inviting her to open up if she chose. She did.
"What the newspapers don't know yet - because the police haven't told them - was that scenes of crime investigators found a baseball bat at the scene. Somebody used it to sodomise both men, and they left it protruding from the backside of one of them. It had obviously been used on the other one, as well. Surprisingly enough, it had not been used to batter the men, another blunt instrument had been responsible for that - a leather gloved fist." She reached into her bag, pulled out a pack of gum and offered them to him.
"Thanks," he said and took one.
She picked up where she left off. "The only witness was the boy himself, who only caught a quick look at the face of the man before being told to look away. It's thought the man was rough shaven in appearance. He also noticed the man had gloves on. Apart from boot prints and minuscule particles of leather in the mouth of one victim, there was no other forensic evidence. The handle of the bat had a set of initials carved into the end of it."
"Do you know what they were?" If he wasn't that interested before, she definitely had his interest now.
"Three possible combinations: F.K.J, K.J.F or J.F.K."
"Like the American president?"
"Yes, somebody else said that, but it's a safe conclusion it didn't belong to him, or that the owner of the initials didn't commit the crime."
She said it so seriously, it made him laugh. She looked slightly offended, but then saw the funny side and laughed with him.
A few moments passed in silence; she regained her previous composure. "It seems they were part of a paedophile ring and from the information gathered, according to my mole, they're thought to be responsible for over fifty kidnappings and possibly as many murders. They're still analyzing computers and things, but it looks like their victims…"
Miller put his hand up to stop her. "I'm sorry . . ." he said, his expression pained. "Look, although I'm interested, as an outsider when it comes to cases like these where kids are involved, that's where I like to stay, outside of it."
She looked surprised.
"You see; I have a natural inclination to try to solve things, but you know, in the end it's . . . It becomes an unnecessary distraction for me when I'm working. I mean, the less I know, the less chance there is of it distracting me. I don't need anything else clouding my thoughts. Does that sound uncaring?" he paused. "I can't afford to care."
"I'm sorry you feel like that," she said. "Apparently the kid caught a glimpse of him, the vigilante. He had long hair and was unshaven and older looking than the kid's granddad." Miller rolled his eyes.
"What's wrong with you?" she said.
"Yes I did, but I've almost finished now anyway," she smiled sweetly at him. "The police are withholding quite a lot of information from the press for now."
"I don't know why," Miller said. "By now he'll be clean shaven, probably with short hair and dyed another colour as well."
"What makes you say that?" A suspicious look crossed her face. "Exactly what is it you do?"
"I find missing people."
"What did you say your name was?"
"I didn't!"
"Okay, Mr I - don't - want - you to know what my name is!"
He grinned at her, "I'll tell you my name, it's –"
"No, no - I prefer you without one. The Man with No Name, like someone from a mystery novel."
"Or a Clint Eastwood film?"
She grinned, "Before my time . . ." Curiosity got the better of her, and she asked, "Are you looking for someone right now?"
He hesitated briefly. "No, I'm meeting someone. I'm between cases, so to speak."
She didn't press him for details. "Mmm, I'm interested to know what attracted you to this line of work."
"Well, the whole story is a long one, so I'll just tell you how it began."
She laughed, "This train ride is a long one!"
He explained how he used to stay with his grandfather, and how he would always take a few old copies of True Crime magazine with him, not so much to read, but to study the graphic crime scene photographs.
"They fascinated me. He'd come and sit next to me, asking questions about the scenes, the evidence. It was like playing Cluedo, but with real lives. We'd investigate the unsolved cases, piecing together everything that we could get from what we had in front of us, inventing scenarios, postulating. He used to shoot holes in my wild theories. His ones, of course, were airtight. I learned a lot from him." He reminisced, toyed with the idea of telling her about how his grandfather had psychic abilities. Instead, he just said, "The old man would have made a great detective."
"He sounds fascinating. Do you always find the people you look for? I mean; some people disappear, never to be seen again."
"I don't look for people like that; I only look for people I know I can find." He looked out of the window as he spoke, at sheep herded by a dog. He couldn't see the shepherd, but he knew he was there.
"I don't see how you can be selective like that, how can you possibly know?"
"It's a waste of time, looking for someone you know won't be alive when you find them - and how do I know? I just do."
She looked at him as politely as open disbelief would allow. "Oh, come on! You don't really think you're going to pass me off with a vague statement like that do you?"
"Well, I had hoped I might!" He allowed her a small grin.
She thought he looked uncomfortable.
"Look, it's not something that's easy to explain, so it's better not to try at all."
She looked disappointed, but only for a fleeting moment. She immediately brightened with a new question. "Tell me about the people you've found then. You must have quite a few stories to tell."
"Oh, I don't think they'd be anywhere near as exciting as some of the ones you must have. Ladies first, you tell me one of yours, then I'll tell you one of mine."
"And they say the age of chivalry is dead!" she laughed, "Okay, where to start? Actually, I'm a freelance reporter. I worked at the News of the World, before going it alone. I didn't want to have to answer to anyone else anymore. While working at the World - I was there for five years - the police were hunting for this character the press dubbed the Midnight Man, because he always struck around midnight. It had become apparent he was active all over the country. At first, they thought more than one individual was carrying out the crimes, maybe working with others using the same MO to throw the police off the trail.
"It didn't take long before they realised that it was the work of only one man. Over time, he grew bolder, taking more risks. The crimes had become more and more sexually overt in nature. They realised that soon; they were going to have a rapist on their hands, maybe even a murderer. Detectives didn't have any forensics, not a thing. So the police joined forces, pooling their information and resources to start an elite task force dedicated to tracking him down. I had some close contacts in the force, so I knew a lot more than the public or even the papers.
"Anyway, we received this package one day - it was a video cassette - once the editor became aware of its content, she passed it on to the police, but not until after someone made a copy. Anyway, outside of work, I started to collate all the information from previous cases I could get my hands on.
"I was looking for something to break, but it never did. One night, just for fun, I plotted all the known case locations, onto a map, and guess what I came up with? I had more than six or seven hundred flagged points, extending all over the country. One night I was talking to a friend on the phone, just absently doodling with my pencil. I began drawing lines between the dots … all of a sudden; I said to her, I have to go, as if it was the most significant discovery since radium or whatever.
"Do you know why? Because what I had subconsciously doodled, was a series of spider webs, covering Manchester, Birmingham, Leeds, Nottingham and London. The spokes, the radials, every one of them running through anchors or links, extending to the far corners of the country, then I noticed something else. The spokes didn't extend to the centres. The city centres were completely empty. For a while I really, really thought I was onto something. He wasn't targeting premises; he was targeting homes; either because they were easier pickings, or because he got more of a thrill from what he might find there." She gestured, rolling a hand, inviting his response.
It was a game, and one he couldn't resist.
"Maybe, but you know what I think?" he paused, a serious look on his face. "If you have enough dots you can join them together to make almost anything, with a little imagination, even the face of Mickey Mouse."
She poked the tip of her tongue between her pursed lips and mimed blowing a silent raspberry. Shaking her head slowly, she reached into her bag and produced a piece of paper, which she unfolded and passed to him.
It was a map of Great Britain. On it, she'd marked several overlapping 'webs'; the lowest one had spokes that emanated from around a central location - London. The radials linked to the spokes that extended into the farthest reaches of the map, way beyond the limits of the concentric patterns. What she'd drawn, was just as she described to him.
He scratched his head. She was a seasoned reporter; did she really believe this stuff worked outside of films and books?
Yet, something struck a chord. "You know, you just might be onto something there."
"I know I am, but I just don't know what."
"You know what we need?" he looked at her seriously.
"What do we need?"
"We need more information!"
She raised the back of her hand as if to slap him, and he raised a hand and knee in mock defence. They both grinned widely.
"Coming back to this character, you said he might get more of a thrill from what he finds in the homes than presumably he might find in an office? What makes you say that?"
"He only takes what he can carry in his pockets from what I can gather, and there's evidence he spends quite a while in the houses, going through paperwork, private things. He steals sentimental items, and then tries to blackmail the more attractive women into sex in exchange for returning the items, or for keeping quiet about other things he has discovered. I could go on and on with the details…He knows which ones are attractive, presumably from photographs that he sees or finds in the house. Anyway, I was telling you about that tape earlier… It's really quite graphic. He lured one victim – I think she had emotional issues – into a meeting. He filmed the whole thing, and he could be heard telling her that he was filming it. She even smiled for the camera at one point, unbelievable . . . he also told her that if she notified the police, he would send th
e tape to the News of The World. She did go to the police and good as his word; he sent the tape."
"So you've seen it then?"
A slight flush coloured her face. "Only for professional purposes though, but yes, once or twice," she admitted.
"I assume you couldn't identify him from the film?" He gave her a knowing look.
"Well, of course you don't see his face!" she said hotly. "I'm sorry, you don't know how much stick I've had to endure as I was the one who saw it originally."
"It's okay." He told her, adding with a broad grin. "Did anything stand out?"
She kicked him on the shin.
"Ouch!" he said through gritted teeth. "That really hurt!"
"That wasn't hard." she said.
"It doesn't have to be hard to hurt." He attempted to rub the pain away.
"We digressed; it's a little bit outside my field, but very interesting all the same. I can't believe I hadn't seen it in the press before."
"If you are interested, the press christened him the 'Midnight Man'."
"I'll look it up," he said. "I promise."
"I hope you meant that, because I'm going to hold you to it," she laughed. "And I mean that."
"I said I'll look it up. And then we'll see."
The train slowed as it pulled into the station at York. When it stopped, the platform suddenly came alive with the movement of people, passengers disembarking, as others got on. The two of them fell silent as they waited for the resumption of the journey.
He asked himself a question. Have you ever met someone before that you connect with so completely and utterly, you feel you have known them all your life? The only time that even came close was when he met Josie, and for the first time since the journey began, he wondered if she might be thinking the same. He turned away from staring out the window, she had her eyes on him. She smiled warmly as if she'd read his thoughts. He smiled back, but inside he was scared. Afraid that he might become involved, not only in the case, but with her, too, and he didn't want to risk losing her.