Killing Time

by Mark Roberts

  ‘Are you saying I’m lying about Jack’s involvement in the abduction and murders?’

  ‘What I’m saying is this. Jack’s going to have a lot of time to think between now and going to court. Don’t bank on him keeping up the vow of silence forever. According to Jack, he’s already been burned by other people’s lies about him. I don’t believe he’ll allow it to happen a second time. His dog was killed by his brother. His faith’s been rocked. It’s only a matter of time before he stands up for himself.’ Clay smiled. ‘Tell me what you know about the abduction of Marta Ondřej.’

  ‘Jack Dare waited on the corner of Smithdown Lane in Aaron’s car. When Marta walked down the road on her own, he opened the door of the car and she got in meekly, like a lamb to the slaughter.

  ‘He had been observing Marta and her mother for days, on Aaron’s instruction, which was therefore the will of the Lord. She always wandered out by herself to the end of the road and back to the house at roughly the same time each day. Jack waited for her. And instead of allowing her to turn and walk back home, he opened the door of the car.

  ‘Aaron Bell’s next plan was to murder the Adamczak brothers. This was brought forward when Marta got out of the cupboard in the vestry. She showed herself to Kate Thorpe in the doorway between the vestry and the church. On Aaron’s instruction, on the morning after the murder of the Polish parasites, I released Marta in the Mystery. I thought the weather was good for such a thing because of the fog and poor visibility. When I took her there, I looked back through the haze at all the houses on Grant Avenue, and 131 in particular. Kate Thorpe’s house. Busybody. Eyes everywhere. Calmness deserted me and chaos filled my head. I told them not to involve children, and I’m the one delivering her back into the world. I ran away and then went back to her, figuring I’d call the emergency services to stop them suspecting me.’

  ‘What happened when she was in captivity?’

  ‘I do not know. I did not involve myself.’

  ‘That chimes with your diary entries,’ said Clay. ‘What did Aaron hope to achieve by abducting a child?’

  ‘Black Sun logic. The stirring up of hatred between the subhumans. Poles will hate Roma with a violent passion. Roma will hate Poles with an equally violent passion. Hate will breed hate. Violence will escalate violence. The ill-treatment of children quickens the blood for such hatred. It was a deterrent, also. Don’t come to this land. This is what will happen to your children.’

  ‘How did Kate Thorpe let Aaron Bell know that she’d seen Marta emerge from the vestry?’

  ‘She wrote it down. He burned it after he’d tried to convince her that she’d had another of her visions, but he knew he hadn’t convinced her one little bit. He knew that Marta had escaped from the cupboard – when mass finished, she was standing still as a statue in the vestry with the door to the cupboard wide open. He believed with each passing second that Kate was becoming more and more of a danger. That she would tell someone what she had seen. This is why I was instructed to release her.’

  ‘How did Marta get out of the cupboard?’

  ‘I let her out.’

  ‘Wasn’t that an act of disobedience?’

  ‘I was being obedient to God, who has more authority than Aaron Bell. I did not want to be a part of Black Sun. I did not want to be party to the kidnapping of a child. I did not want to kill or hurt the Adamczak brothers. I did not want any of it. This is why God told me to release her. So others could see. So that Aaron Bell’s plans would be overturned.’

  ‘When she was in captivity, who made the eight films of her?’

  ‘Jack filmed the abuse. Aaron Bell committed it. He told me he was following the will of the Lord. I believe he lost contact with the Lord years ago, and the only will he was following was his own.’

  ‘You used the word abuse just now. Did Aaron Bell ever abuse you when you were a girl?’

  Lucy held her hands out, palms upwards and prayerful.

  ‘We’re trying to get a wider picture of who you are and why you’re the way you are,’ said Hendricks.

  ‘Abuse me as a girl?’ asked Lucy, dropping her hands and looking back and forth between Clay and Hendricks.

  ‘What form did Aaron’s abuse take?’

  ‘Imprisonment in my room. Imprisonment under the floorboards. For days on end when I was disobedient. With very little or no food. Hardly any water. It made me think of the wisdom of obedience. My spirit was broken piece by piece. Once, under the floorboards, I lost the will to be me.’

  ‘What else did he do?’

  ‘Once he cut my hair off, though I didn’t want it to be so.’

  ‘Do you know he did these things to Marta?’

  ‘I was sorry for her.’

  ‘Why did you kill Kate Thorpe?’

  ‘There was really no choice in killing Kate Thorpe. I did it because I was scared. I believed I was following the will of the Lord in releasing Marta into the vestry, but it was the voice of the Devil. All it did was make matters much, much worse. I shouldn’t have done it.’

  ‘Did Aaron ask you if you’d released her?’

  ‘He did. I lied. I said No.’

  ‘Were you directly involved in the murder of the Adamczak brothers?’

  ‘Yes, I was. We all were. The whole of Black Sun was directly involved.’

  ‘Did Black Sun include Raymond Dare?’

  ‘No. He’s a clown. He’s racially inferior.’

  ‘In what way was he racially inferior?’

  ‘His paternal grandfather was half-caste.’

  ‘Did Raymond know this?’

  ‘Raymond knew this. His mother told him. There were photographs of him when he was a baby with his father. His father had the facial features of a negro and was clearly not white. His mother knew his grandfather. His grandfather had a white mother and a Jamaican father. His father left before he could remember him. Raymond was not eligible to be part of Black Sun. But he could be our scapegoat.’

  ‘Tell me about Dominika Zima.’

  ‘I confess now to the murder of Dominika Zima. I knew her from Levene House where I volunteer. I took pictures of Dominika on her phone. I told her about Raymond. I told her he was a rich young man and looking for a girlfriend, an older woman. I gave her his number. I knew about her date with Raymond from Jack. I tailed her in Aaron’s car and when Raymond picked her up, I followed them to Otterspool Park.’

  ‘Stop. You said in an earlier interview that you couldn’t drive. You took one lesson and hated it.’

  ‘Well, I lied. Doesn’t everybody lie? What is the truth?’

  ‘What happened after they’d had sex?’

  ‘When they argued after sex and he left, she was still alive. I set up a Black Sun murder: the Black Sun graffiti and the words Killing Time Is Here Embrace It on the inside of the railway bridge. It would link Raymond to her death and to the deaths of the Adamczak brothers. He has the misfortune of being openly racist, a drug user and mentally ill. He was the ideal candidate to suffer the consequences of our actions.’

  ‘Are you really a religious woman, Lucy?’ asked Clay.

  ‘I am a human being. I am religious. As were the saints, Peter and Paul. Saint Peter was an inveterate liar and Saint Paul was a mass murderer. I am in good company, am I not?’

  ‘What happened when the Adamczak brothers died, Lucy?’

  ‘After I’d murdered Dominika, I spoke to Aaron and Jack and told them what I’d done. Aaron said, Let’s not let our bloods grow cool. We’ll kill the brothers and wreak havoc, leave Marta’s hair at the scene, transfer the films of Marta onto Václav’s phone. We will laugh at the police as they hurry down a blind alley where Raymond Dare will be waiting for them, wiped out on drugs, psychotic, unaware of what day of the week it is.

  ‘Aaron went to their flat and drank with them, telling them of the old lady in his congregation and her visions of the Virgin Mary and Jesus. Karl understood but was unmoved; Karl translated and Václav cried like a baby. When Karl and Václav
were drunk, their doorbell rang. It was me and Jack. We had come to walk Aaron home on account of his old age and the dangers on the streets. Karl left the kitchen for the bedroom, wanting to sleep, very drunk indeed. Jack followed Karl and strangled him. Aaron prayed with Václav before he died in the kitchen at Jack’s hands. Jack carried him to the bedroom, stone dead. We did the graffiti, planted the evidence then set them on fire.’

  ‘Who set their heads on fire?’ asked Clay.

  ‘I did. But they were already dead. So that doesn’t matter. Jack walked towards the nearest CCTV camera in Raymond’s clothes, walking like Raymond, walking like an ape, a vain and empty ape. Aaron and I walked the other way. Out of sight and out of mind.’

  ‘Why did Raymond stop taking his anti-psychotic medication?’

  ‘Jack ordered him to.’

  ‘How did you kill Kate Thorpe?’

  ‘Strangulation. I am a fast learner and I saw how Jack did it. After I’d given her communion and burned her images of me and Marta, I blocked the chimney, set up more coal and firelighters and left Kate face down in the flames. No longer a threat. How is Jack?’

  ‘Obedient to your pact. Silent now. You won’t be able to retract this confession, Lucy,’ said Clay. ‘It’s all in your diary.’

  ‘Nothing I have said or written will be retracted.’

  Clay reached into her bag and placed Aaron Bell’s book on the table. She turned it around for Lucy to see and showed her the dedication page.

  ‘Who was Kelly-Ann Carter and what was she to Aaron Bell?’ asked Clay.

  ‘She was no one. What else can I say? No one. I’ve never heard of her.’ Lucy sat back on the chair and let out a long sigh of relief. ‘Confession is good for the soul. Will I be able to see Jack?’

  ‘You’ll see him at the Crown Court, Preston probably, when you’re both being tried for murder. He for the murder of Karl and Václav Adamczak. You for Dominika Zima and Kate Thorpe.’

  ‘Did you have more killings planned?’ asked Hendricks.

  ‘Three young Pakistani men. But there would have been more. When one man dies, it’s a tragedy. When a million die, it’s a statistic. Joseph Stalin.’

  An idea that had irritated Clay since Aaron Bell had asked her about the cricket he had given to Philip came to the front of her mind. ‘Aaron mentioned something to me about a cricket. A cricket with another creature inside it. What was he talking about?’

  ‘The cricket he gave to your son, like many crickets and grasshoppers, was like a Russian doll. Inside the cricket he gave to Philip is a black hair worm. It caught the parasite from the vegetation it’s been eating. The cricket is an ideal environment for a parasite. It’s wet, it’s warm and it’s full of nutrients. The black parasite eats the cricket from the inside out, feasting on the host’s sexual organs. It can force the host to commit suicide by throwing itself into the water. It interferes with the host’s neurotransmitters, making it depressed. The black parasite exits the host’s body from the back passage; it wriggles its way out and lives on. This is science as a perfect metaphor.’

  ‘A metaphor for what?’

  ‘The cricket is God’s earth, the world of the white Christian men and women. The black parasite is anyone and everyone who isn’t a white Christian. They are Satan’s children, placed here on earth to test their superiors. I now join Jack in the vow of silence, and that silence will join us together wherever we happen to be, however far apart we are. Tell him I’m sorry I won’t be able to visit him this time round. Tell him I love him. Tell him Aaron Bell is dead and gone and the only thing that can come between us now is time and space. And what is time but a counting game? And what is space but the distance between one divided body and another, our body, Jack and me!’

  119

  11.47 pm

  ‘Simon Wheatley speaking. How can I help you?’

  Clay was surprised not to hear an American voice and pinned the lawyer’s accent down to South Wales. ‘Hello, Mr Wheatley. My name is Detective Chief Inspector Eve Clay. I’m from the Merseyside Constabulary. I believe you represent Kelly-Ann Carter?’

  ‘I have done for the past ten years.’

  ‘I’m sorry to hear Kelly-Ann’s last appeal has failed.’

  Wheatley was quiet for a while, and Clay sensed a bitter disappointment that went beyond professional pride. ‘So am I. She’s my friend. I’m very fond of her.’

  ‘Does it work both ways?’

  ‘Certainly. I’ve been her only visitor for the last ten years. We rub along well.’

  ‘Does she share personal information with you?’

  ‘Yes. Where’s this going, DCI Clay?’

  ‘I’ve got some news to deliver. Father Aaron Bell is dead.’

  ‘Kelly-Ann will be devastated. He’s been her pen pal for years. How did he die?’

  ‘It was a fire but it was self-inflicted. Before he died, he asked me to speak to you and pass on the message that he loved Kelly-Ann.’

  ‘I’ll tell her, of course I will.’

  ‘Mr Wheatley, I know your priority is to defend your client, but I’m not going to hold back. There was a lot more to Father Aaron Bell than appeared on the surface. Would you agree with that?’

  ‘I would if I’d ever met him.’

  ‘Aaron Bell was not his real name. His real name was Christopher Darwin, and he was the leader of a group called Black Sun of which Kelly-Ann was a member. Mr Wheatley, I think you know all of this already, but I’m not going to tell anyone. I know the consequences would be devastating for you.’

  ‘I really don’t know what you’re talking about. I know nothing about Christopher Darwin, other than what’s in the media and common knowledge Father Aaron Bell was Kelly-Ann’s pen pal, end of story. On my mother’s life.’

  ‘Okay. But I need some information. Who is Kelly-Ann Carter?’

  There was a pause. Then Wheatley said, ‘She’s Christopher Darwin’s daughter by a relationship he had when he was in his late teens, early twenties. His family paid the mother off with a monthly allowance and a gagging order. The Darwins were wealthy Catholics and Suzie-Mae Carter was poor white trash. Aaron Bell loved Suzie-Mae and he was devastated, but they threatened to cut him off completely if he went anywhere near her.

  ‘When Darwin started out as leader of Black Sun, Kelly-Ann tracked him down and joined. Suzie-Mae was dead by then, so he was her only parent.’

  ‘Were they close?’

  ‘Yes, too close if you ask me.’

  ‘In what way?’

  ‘They shared a bed. No one else in Black Sun knew the real nature of their relationship. Kelly-Ann was smart. When the FBI infiltrated the group, it took her half a day to smell a rat and she advised her father to stop ordering killings. When she was certain they were Feds, she warned her father. He split, and Kelly-Ann went out alone for one last spree. She knew she’d be caught, but she took the rap for Darwin and got the treatment he deserved.’

  ‘Thank you, Mr Wheatley. It’s all falling into place now.’

  ‘When Kelly-Ann dies, I’m stopping this work to spend more time with my family. I need a new start.’

  ‘I wish you well in that.’

  As soon as Clay hung up, the phone rang out again and she wondered what bombshell was coming next.

  ‘DCI Clay speaking.’

  ‘It’s Doctor Ellington, Broad Oak. We have a patient on the wards who I’m told is still in your custody. I think you ought to come over and see what he’s done.’

  ‘I’ll be there as soon as I can.’

  Day Four

  Thursday, 4th December

  120

  1.01 am

  ‘Many psychiatric patients have strong artistic leanings,’ said Doctor Ellington as she took Clay to Raymond Dare’s door. ‘I’ve met hundreds, some of a very high standard, some only able to paint like children, but this...’

  Clay saw the armed officer at the door of Raymond’s room and said, ‘Evening, PC Rodgers.’

  ‘Evening, D
CI Clay.’

  They stopped at the door and PC Rodgers moved aside. Doctor Ellington knocked lightly, waited for a few moments and opened it. Clay stepped into the open doorway and saw Raymond Dare’s back; his face was turned to the wall behind his bed. His pyjama top was wet with sweat and clung to his back. He squatted on the bed with his elbows jutting out and his hands pressed down on the pillow.

  ‘I called you here, DCI Clay, because I thought this could be relevant to your investigation. Raymond?’

  The silence in the room seemed to drift from the walls, floor and ceiling and for a moment, Clay wondered if Raymond had drifted into suspended animation.

  Clay walked deeper into the room, her eyes drawn to the floor where dozens of fat felt-tip pens littered the floor, their caps discarded randomly.

  ‘Look behind you, DCI Clay, at the wall beside the door.’

  Clay turned and wondered if she was hallucinating through sheer exhaustion and stress. On the wall was a huge image made up of thousands of points of colour, felt-tipped dots and dashes, intricate and stunning in its detail. She took out her iPhone and captured images of the whole painting, then close-up pictures of the sections.

  ‘Is this relevant to your investigation, DCI Clay?’

  ‘It’s early days. It could be.’

  Clay stepped back and drank in the large image of a pair of young men, both wearing designer jackets with their hoods up, casting their faces into shadow. They each wore tracksuit bottoms and designer trainers. The youth to the left carried a Kalashnikov in one hand and a massive smoking joint in the other. The teenager beside him had an outstretched arm and open hand in which there were many tablets – ecstasy and speed. His other hand pointed up in the air, the middle finger of his clenched fist raised in stark defiance.

  ‘Who are they?’ asked Doctor Ellington.