by Michael Kerr
Fifty yards along the bank on the east side of the artificial lake, he parked the car on the slope as near to the edge as was possible, opened the windows and got out. All he took from the vehicle was the wheel brace, before reaching in the open driver’s door to release the handbrake and jump back as the car rolled forward and freewheeled into the dark water.
He expected the Nissan to vanish, but the rear jutted up above the surface. Lighting a cigarette, he stared at the partially sunken car. If it was found, then his whereabouts to this location would be known, and so he would have to leave the forest and take the risk of moving on, which would entail stealing a car.
Exhaling a stream of smoke, he was filled with a sense of relief as with a sudden rush of water into the rear windows, the Nissan slipped beneath the surface, to hopefully follow the curve of the reservoir until it reached the muddy bottom many feet below.
Following narrow trails and heading northeast, he skirted small communities, remaining unseen until he was in the ancient woodland. He felt safe, for the forest was large, mainly uninhabited, and absolutely no one knew where he had gone to ground.
Dawn was breaking when he came to the remains of a timber-built shelter that he assumed was the rotting ruins of a gamekeeper’s hide. It was almost invisible in the undergrowth, surrounded by mature trees, and had no visible path or trail leading to it.
Exhausted, he walked around to the front of the hut and forced open the door, that had swollen and split and was only fastened to the frame by one rusted hinge.
This was by far the worst period of his entire life. He stood in the gloomy confines of the damp and musty-smelling room and began to cry, not able to stop for several minutes. Only the darting movement of a large rat scampering towards and then through the partly open doorway and out into a burgeoning mist brought his attention back from thoughts of the sorry mess he was in. He shivered, not from the cold, but due to overwhelming fear and the sense of doom and damnation that loomed ahead of him in his troubled mind.
The bench that ran along the rear wall was narrow, and creaked when he lay down on it. He thought that there was no possibility of being able to sleep, but consumed by thoughts of how to best evade capture, he slipped into an almost fugue like state brought on by the stress, to then float into a slumber that gave his subconscious mind the time to accept the predicament he was in and search for a positive solution.
He woke with a start and almost fell off the bench. A ray of bright light cut through the murk, and he held his arm out into it to look at his wristwatch. It was almost noon. He had somehow slept for several hours.
Stiff, aching and feeling sick to the stomach, he sat up and reviewed the situation that he was in. Sleep had in some way invigorated him. He needed to be positive. At some point he would have to eat and drink and find a safe haven to stay at for a few days. But he would have to be patient and wait for darkness to fall. He decided that this was as bad as it could get, and that from this point on it could only get better. All he needed to do was stay calm. Thousands of people went missing every year, and many of them were never seen or heard of again. Now he, John Gibson, would join their ranks.
Matt’s side was sore. The blow from Travis Lawson had badly bruised it, but he was not unduly concerned, just relieved that his remaining kidney had not suffered the impact of the big man’s fist. Had he been spun the other way, then he would have probably been in need of hospital treatment.
Pete parked near The Charles Dickens pub on Union Street in Southwark, just south of the river. They went in and Pete ordered a pint of Cask Marque for himself and a double scotch for Matt.
“You hungry, boss?” Pete asked.
Matt looked up at the blackboard menu fastened to the wall behind the bar. “Peckish. I think I’ll try a Dickens burger.”
“I’ll risk the bangers and mash,” Pete said.
They ordered the food and found a quiet corner table. Pete seemed a little quiet and thoughtful to Matt. “What’s on your mind?” he said to his DS.
“Just that you’ve always come across as a man of your word, boss.”
“Meaning?”
“That you said you’d told Eltringham that whatever he told you was between you and him. But you served him up on a plate to Lister. You’ve put him at risk.”
“Do you care?”
“Not really, but it’s out of character for you. It wasn’t necessary.”
“Maybe I’ve seen the light, Pete. I don’t feel obliged to keep my word to the likes of Eltringham. I’ve drawn a harder line over the last couple of years. We deal with every type of lowlife and psycho imaginable, and so I’ll say or do whatever it takes to run them down. Honest, law-abiding people need for us to up our game to protect them.”
Pete agreed with Matt, but had seen a change in him. He was now a more ruthless individual, hardened by experience. His determination to apprehend killers was like an unstoppable force of nature.
They ate without discussing either of the cases they were working on. This was respite; a short time out from the job.
There were no further developments awaiting them at the Yard. Matt went up to Tom’s office, discussed the cases with him, brought him up to speed with the visit to Lister, and asked him if he’d ever heard of a Gordon Rennie.
“Rennie was a DCI with the OCU,” Tom said. “Why?”
“Because Lister was basically warning me off, and then just said Rennie’s name. It rings a bell.”
“It should. He was on Lister’s case up until about five years ago, and then went missing. It was thought that he’d been murdered, but without a body it was impossible to pin it on Lister. And Rennie’s confidential informant was found strung up in a lockup under a railway bridge in Hammersmith the same week. He’d been tortured, prior to being hung with barbed wire.”
“So now we know that Lister was responsible,” Matt said.
Tom shrugged. “We always did, but knowing isn’t enough for the CPS. There was no proof, and Lister was out of the country when it went down, sunning himself on Longboat Key in Florida.”
“Terrific,” Matt said. “So he was insinuating that I could end up like Rennie and his CI.”
“You have a way of putting yourself directly in the firing line,” Tom said. “You go out of your way to goad the bastards instead of just doing the job and keeping it impersonal.”
“I have a problem with the likes of Lister. I find it difficult to hide my feelings.”
“That’s your one weakness, Matt. You put a target on your own back by letting villains know that they’re in your sights. Back off Lister and concentrate on the cases you’re running. He’s Organised Crime’s problem.”
“The gun that we need to trace led us to Lister. One of his goons could be the killer, or has sold or given it to whoever is.”
Tom sighed and said, “You’re probably right, but Lister isn’t the guy you’re after, so stay away from him. If you keep hounding him he’ll do more than threaten you. He doesn’t scare, and he has connections that keep him on the street. If you think that Sammy Clements bought the gun off Eltringham, then pursue that line of enquiry, but don’t go for Lister just because he managed to piss you off.”
Matt nodded and made small talk before leaving Tom’s office and heading back to the squad room. There was no news. No sightings of Gibson or his car.
Matt left the Yard at seven, having decided that there was no point in hanging around for the sake of it. They needed a break in both of the ongoing cases, and so far they hadn’t got a lead to follow on either of them.
Ned Walker parked his Porsche Cayenne on the street, ignoring the double yellow lines, and went to the front door of James Brodie’s house and thumbed the bell push. He waited thirty seconds and then rang again. No one came. He thought it strange, because Jim’s housekeeper normally came to the door almost immediately. Catherine would know that they were golfing that morning, as they did every Tuesday.
One last time. He pressed the bell push and kept h
is thumb on it for over ten seconds. He could hear the first bars of the Star Spangled Banner repeating from somewhere in the hallway. Something was wrong.
Ned used his mobile phone in an attempt to contact Jim, but there was no answer. He turned the brass doorknob, but the door was locked. Walking around the side of the house, he found that the back door was closed but not locked.
“Jim,” he called as he walked along the passageway and entered the kitchen.
There was no reply, but he immediately saw spatters of blood on the floor, and could smell it in the air. A red swathe led him across the tiles to an open door that led into a reception room, and sprawled out on the carpet in front of the fireplace was his friend.
Rushing over to Jim and kneeling down next to him, unmindful of the blood that soaked through his brand new check golf trousers, Ned felt for a pulse, not expecting there to be one; surprised to feel a weak, thready beat beneath his fingers. He used his phone again, this time to call for the emergency services.
Ned grasped his friend’s hand in his and squeezed. “Hold on, Jim, help is on the way, buddy. You’re going to be fine,” he said, even though he doubted that it was true, until the slight return pressure from Jim’s hand gave him hope.
Matt took Beth out to the Green Dragon pub, not far from the village of Abbots Langley, which was only a fifteen minute drive from Woodford Wells. They enjoyed a steak meal and a couple of glasses of cabernet sauvignon each, and refrained from discussing anything work related. Beth suggested that they try to get away for a few days soon, maybe up to the Lake District or even farther afield, perhaps to the highlands of Scotland. Matt argued that they would probably enjoy better weather in Devon or Cornwall, even as he thought that with the ongoing cases it would be quite a while before he could take any time off.
They drove home on a winding country road, listening to Rod Stewart singing Have I Told You Lately on Magic FM. They both smiled in the darkness of the car, it was their song, and they did fill each others heart with gladness and eased each others troubles.
Beth reached across, stroked Matt’s cheek and said, “I love you, Barnes.”
“Back at ya, babe,” Matt said. “It’s you and me against the world.”
Home. Matt parked the Vectra next to Beth’s Lexus and they went inside to have a nightcap before going to bed and making love. They were both asleep before midnight, unaware of the large black saloon that slowed down outside the cottage a little later, almost invisible in the darkness with its lights off.
The driver stopped and made a note of the registration numbers of the two cars in the drive, and then drove away from the village and headed back to the city.
A reconnoitre of where Matt Barnes lived had been made to familiarise himself with the property and the area. He had every intention of visiting Orchard Cottage again in the very near future, at dead of night, to do more than just drive by.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Marci, Phil and Errol were working their computers when Matt walked into the squad room at eight a.m. the next morning. Pete and a new member to the SCU, DC Tamwar Patel, were on stand down, but just a phone call away if needed.
Tamwar had immediately been called Tam by the other members of the team. He was thirty-two, tall and slim, with a sunny disposition and not a hint of the accent that his Asian born parents spoke with. He had come to the unit from the SC&O, the Specialist Crime and Operations unit that dealt with not only murder and rape cases but also human trafficking and fraud. The SC&O also vigorously busied itself with confiscating illegally acquired financial assets of criminals. The SCU was more focused on serial murder and rape, and had been formed as an offshoot to its much larger big brother.
Tam had wanted to specialise more on specific individual cases, and had approached Tom Bartlett, to be advised to submit a formal request for transfer. Tam was subsequently interviewed by Matt, who decided after seeing his personnel file that he would be an asset to the squad. It wasn’t just Tam’s ability that got him the move. Matt had to have a good gut feeling that an officer would fit in and be a team player.
The call from CID came in as Matt was finishing a cup of coffee. A DCI, Jeff Crane, was passing the buck. There had been a shooting at a house in Chelsea. An elderly American had been robbed and shot. It had all the hallmarks of being the work of the killer they sought, and Matt was certain that somewhere in the city would be a housekeeper lying dead in her home.
Matt gave the team the details of the victim, who had been shot in the foot, side and head, but was still alive, thanks to a friend calling at the house and finding him before he had succumbed to shock and blood loss.
Marci and Phil attended the crime scene, where a forensics team were already searching for trace evidence. Matt and Errol arrived at the hospital within twenty minutes of the call. The victim, James Brodie, was in surgery, but the man who’d found him was in a waiting room on the fourth floor, accompanied by a uniformed officer. He was not a suspect, but would obviously be interviewed at length by Matt, who introduced himself to the overweight and highly tanned American.
“I believe that you found Mr. Brodie,” Matt said to Ned Walker.
“Yeah,” Ned said. “We were due to play golf out at Wentworth. There was no answer to the door or my cell phone, but when I went round back and tried the handle it was open.”
“Did you see or hear anyone in the house?”
“No, it was as quiet as a graveyard. I just saw the blood on the kitchen floor and followed a trail of it into a reception room. Jim was lying on the carpet, tied up and unconscious. I thought he was dead, but found a pulse and called for an ambulance.”
“Did Mr. Brodie have a housekeeper?”
“Yeah, Catherine. She should have been there.”
“Do you know where she lives, or her surname?”
“Her surname is Wade, but I don’t know her address.”
Matt phoned Marci. “Are you at the scene?”
“Yes, boss.”
“The victim has a housekeeper; Catherine Wade. Find out where she lives and get back to me.”
Matt got a call back from Marci in less than five minutes. The housekeeper’s name and address were on a typewritten list with a dozen others on a wallboard in the kitchen, along with telephone numbers. Marci had called but got a taped message saying that Catherine was unavailable.
Arranging for Ned Walker to be available later to give a full statement, Matt and Errol left the hospital and drove out to the address at Heston Park.
A young guy with a ponytail and sporting a straggly beard and wearing a Glastonbury T-shirt opened the door to the large terrace house, after Errol had pressed each of the five flat bells, including that of number three, which was Catherine’s.
Matt ID’d himself and asked the man to confirm which flat Catherine Wade lived in.
“Number three on the first floor” Tony Mercer said. “Is there a problem?”
“Nothing for you to worry about,” Matt said as he headed for the stairs after Errol.
The door was locked. “Open it,” Matt said to Errol, who immediately kicked it next to the handle and entered as the door flew open.
The flat was small, comprising a kitchen to the right and a living area to the left, with a bathroom and bedroom opposite each other off a short hallway.
Matt was not surprised to find the woman dead, but was appalled by the manner in which the killer had left her to be discovered.
“Jesus, boss,” Errol said, using a hand to cup his nose and mouth in an attempt to stifle the stench of waste and blood that filled the small bedroom.
Matt walked around the bed, letting the part of him that was a seasoned murder cop take over as he viewed the grisly scene. Catherine Wade was naked, kneeling on the bed with her head down and to a side, facing him. The socket of her left eye was a pulpy mess. It was obvious that she had been shot in the back of the head, through and through. The duvet was soaked with her blood and a portion of brains, and the frozen expression on her re
d-smeared face was of abject fear. She had known that she was going to die, and her mouth was open, lips drawn back as if she was about to scream when almost instantaneous death took her.
“We need a forensic team and the pathologist,” Matt said, and Errol left the room as he reached for his phone to jack it up.
Anger was probably the strongest emotion that Matt was feeling as he studied the mortal remains of a woman who had become a secondary victim, murdered for no good reason, having obviously given her killer the information he had demanded from her. He also felt lacking in self-worth to a degree; too late to make a difference. All he could hold on to was the resolve to find the man responsible and ensure that he was stopped from killing again. But it was a sad fact that other people would probably fall prey to him before he was caught.
Matt and Errol had nothing better to do than wait. The forensic team arrived within forty minutes, and as they began to process the scene, Errol strolled to the end of Gilbert Road to the small Tesco Express at the corner, returning with two plastic cups full of black coffee, complete with lids. The Home Office pathologist arrived and parked his Volvo next to the kerb as Errol handed one of the cups to Matt.
Nat Farley looked very old to Matt. The aging pathologist had deep lines crisscrossing his cheeks, and the heavy bags under his eyes were dark, offsetting the pallor of his almost emaciated-looking face. It was difficult to imagine that he’d ever been young.
“What’ve we got, Barnes?” Nat said as he hefted a weighty aluminium case from the boot of the car.
“You know what we’ve got, you old vulture,” Matt said. “You only leave the mortuary to go home, or to attend a suicide, murder or fatal accident. And you know that I don’t attend scenes of accidental death or suicide.”
Nat smiled to show his ruler-straight, nicotine-stained National Health-made teeth. “Humour me,” he said as he walked up to the open front door, to step inside and don the garb he wore to ensure that he did not contaminate a scene.