Acid Lullaby

by Ed O'Connor

  Underwood started. He hadn’t known about the car crash. Clearly he wasn’t fully back in the loop. Suddenly, he remembered what had been troubling him about Jack Harvey’s office.

  Dexter continued briskly, ‘Jensen’s car was found on the A1066. Uniform are sweeping the area, doing house to house enquiries, stopping traffic. So far we’ve got nothing. I don’t believe in coincidence. It’s fair to assume that whoever killed Jack Harvey has got Jensen and Mrs Harvey.’

  There was a ripple of anxious conversation. Dexter didn’t mind. She wanted them anxious. Anxious got results. Dexter shot a quick look at Harrison. His face was expressionless.

  ‘Bearing in mind what happened to Jack,’ Dexter announced, ‘that makes it pretty bloody urgent we turn up something here quickly.’

  Underwood watched the grey skies beyond the window. He remembered Jack Harvey’s office – the little consulting room where he had laid back and opened the black box of his depression; the little consulting room with its cluttered shelves and crowded desk; the little consulting room with its large portrait photograph of Rowena Harvey hanging above the computer. The photograph hadn’t been there when Underwood and Dexter had seen Jack’s body.

  The killer wanted Rowena Harvey.

  ‘There’s a lot of mad shit going on here,’ Dexter was saying, ‘and the murder of Harvey appears to be connected with the death of Ian Stark two nights ago.’

  Underwood had often stared at Rowena’s photograph during his sessions with Jack. Fantasizing, imagining himself with her. Had the killer sat in the consulting room too, looking at the same picture, indulging his fantasies? Underwood looked sadly at the back of DS Harrison’s head two rows in front of him. He knew DC Jensen was dead.

  Roger Leach had risen to his feet. ‘Two corpses in forty-eight hours. Ian Stark, the local drug dealer and thug, died at the Infirmary at 4a.m. on Saturday morning.’

  Underwood withdrew a notebook from his jacket pocket. It was an old habit and one that he had neglected. Still, he thought, in his new regime of stable mental structures it seemed like a worthwhile discipline to restore.

  ‘As DI Dexter says, the deaths are connected,’ Leach continued. ‘The details are unusual so I suggest you write them down.’

  Underwood smiled. He hadn’t been ahead of the game for over a year.

  ‘There are three important similarities between the incidents. One. Infliction of severe damage to neck. The cuts on Stark’s neck suggest he was attacked with something like an axe or a meat cleaver. He received serious muscular tissue damage but the wound was not fatal. Jack Harvey’s head was severed completely. This time the pattern of tissue and bone damage suggests the killer used an electric saw. Something like a DIY power saw.’

  ‘Bloody hell,’ said Harrison softly. He was finding it hard to focus. His thoughts inevitably drifted back to Jensen. Concentrate.

  ‘Similarity two. This is the clincher. We have now run full toxicology profiles on Stark and Harvey. The results are extraordinary but remarkably similar.’

  ‘Specifics?’ Dexter asked.

  ‘Both victims have extremely high levels of organic toxins called amatoxins and phallotoxins in their bloodstreams. This is what caused the death of Ian Stark and would probably have killed Jack Harvey too if he hadn’t also received fatal physical injuries. These poisons interfere with protein synthesis once ingested. This means that cells with particularly high rates of protein synthesis are most vulnerable to damage: particularly cells in the liver and kidneys. Enzyme levels increase within the liver. Glutamate oxalacetate transaminase and lactate dehydrogenase increase in concentration and lesions develop in the liver itself. This invariably leads to coma and liver failure. That’s how Ian Stark died.’

  Underwood was struggling to keep up. The complex terminology had confused him.

  ‘The most likely sources of these toxins are poisonous fungi. Magic mushrooms for want of a better term. I have been in contact with someone called Adam Miller. He works at the University Botanical Gardens in Cambridge. According to him toxicology profiles suggest poisoning with a combination of Amanita Virosa and Amanita Muscaria mushrooms. The difficulty with this thesis is that the levels found in the victims greatly exceed those found in these particular fungi.’

  ‘How great is the anomaly?’ asked Underwood suddenly from the back of the room.

  ‘As I understand it, we are talking about toxins levels four or five times greater than occur in individual mushrooms. I’ve arranged for Inspector Dexter to meet Dr Miller tomorrow so he can give us a better picture. Also, no traces of the fungi were found in the victim’s stomachs or intestinal tracts. The poisons have been injected in some form of solution. The high concentration and the fact they were injected directly into the bloodstream explain why Stark experienced liver failure so rapidly,’ Leach concluded.

  Underwood tried to build a picture in his mind: a killer who injects victims with organic poisons before decapitating them. He made a mental note to ensure that he accompanied Dexter when she visited Professor Miller.

  ‘Were there syringe puncture wounds in either of the victims then?’ Underwood asked.

  ‘Plenty in Stark. The burns to Jack Harvey’s skin made it very hard to localize any puncture wounds though,’ Leach answered.

  There was a brief pause as the gathered police officers tried to absorb the strange information that Leach had imparted to them. Harrison broke the hiatus.

  ‘What was the third similarity?’ he asked. ‘You said there were three.’

  Leach nodded. ‘Coins. Ian Stark had three ten pence coins in his pocket. There were also three ten pence pieces placed next to Jack Harvey’s body.’

  Dexter had been wondering whether to impart the additional piece of information she had on a scrap of paper in front of her. She decided to chance it. ‘Uniform also found two ten-pence pieces on the driver’s seat of Jensen’s car two hours ago. That information is not to be discussed outside this room.’

  Quietly, Underwood withdrew a ten-pence piece from his pocket and studied it for a moment, rolling it between his thumb and forefinger.

  ‘In conclusion then,’ Dexter cut through the chatter, ‘I will be heading the investigation into the murders of Stark and Harvey. DS Harrison will be co-ordinating the search for DC Jensen and Mrs Harvey. Check the duty sheets and see which team you’ve been seconded to. I have asked PC Sauerwine to help us out in CID until we get Jensen back.’ Might as well try to end on a positive note, Dexter thought.

  The meeting began to break up. Underwood hovered for a second, uncertain what to do. Dexter approached him.

  ‘What do you think?’ she asked.

  ‘You handled it well,’ Underwood replied.

  ‘I meant about Jensen and Mrs Harvey.’

  Underwood looked at her. ‘I think Jensen is dead.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘The coins.’

  ‘Explain.’

  ‘Let’s find an office. I’ll walk you through what I think. If it’s all right with you, I’d like to hear what this Botany bloke at the university has to say tomorrow.’

  Dexter looked at her watch. Her stomach flipped. It was nearly time. ‘John, I can’t really talk now. I have to go and meet someone. But let’s talk in the car tomorrow morning. I’ll pick you up at eight.’

  ‘Fine.’

  Underwood watched her leave. He couldn’t hide his disappointment.

  30

  Forty minutes later, Dexter sat in her Mondeo in a dark corner of Meadowview Car Park. The car park was a huge concrete tundra that extended behind New Bolden’s Meadowview Shopping Centre. It was also – Dexter was convinced – the ‘MCP’ mentioned in Ian Stark’s diary entry. Now she was keeping Stark’s appointment for that night. The accompanying mobile phone number had told her who to expect.

  Rain ran across her windscreen. The car idled quietly. Occasionally, Dexter flicked the wipers and caught a brief reflection of her features in the darkened glass. The image vanished as quickly
as it had appeared. The English rain always knew exactly where to find her.

  At 22.04 a Land Rover Freelander pulled into the Car Park and stopped about fifty yards away from her. Dexter leaned forward, peering through the glass, as Mark Willis emerged from the driver’s side door. He looked around him suspiciously, then apparently satisfied, he shot a disgusted look up at the heavens and clambered back into the jeep.

  Dexter hesitated, suddenly uncertain of how to proceed. She was in danger of losing control: a prospect that filled her with anxiety. She tried to make sense of her emotions. She recognized fear, resentment and, to her shame, excitement. For a split second she remembered a sunlit park, a grassy bank hard against her back, Mark Willis inside her, his stubble grazing the side of her face.

  Fuck it.

  Alison the Brave got out of her car into the rain and walked directly over to the Freelander. She tapped on the shaded glass of the driver’s window. The window descended an inch electronically.

  ‘Not tonight, love,’ said Mark Willis from inside, ‘I’m not paying for it.’

  ‘Get out of the fucking car!’ Dexter hissed. ‘Police.’

  She took a step back as the door opened. She knew exactly what Mark Willis was capable of. Willis flicked his cigarette out of the car. It sizzled for a second on the wet tarmac then died as Willis stepped outside. He was tall with cropped black hair and the wary eyes of the CID officer he had once been.

  ‘What’s the problem, officer?’ he squinted through the dark and streaming rain at Dexter’s silhouette. ‘Can I see some identification?’

  ‘You know me,’ said Dexter firmly.

  Willis’s eyes focused on Dexter’s face. He looked surprised for a brief moment before a slow smile crawled across his face. ‘I don’t believe it!’ He advanced to kiss her but Dexter backed sharply away. ‘Is that you, Sparrer?’

  ‘Don’t call me that name,’ said Dexter, crushing her emotions.

  ‘You’ll always be my little cockney sparrer, Dexy,’ he insisted.

  ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘I might ask you the same question.’

  ‘You’re not a copper any more. I am. I work here. What’s your story?’

  Willis ignored the question. ‘Of course!’ Willis slapped his forehead in mock amusement. ‘I forgot that you got rusticated, Sparrer.’

  ‘I applied for the transfer.’

  ‘Mmmm. Course you did.’ Willis rubbed his chin thoughtfully. ‘Nasty business that.’

  It wasn’t a subject Dexter wanted to dwell on. ‘Ancient history,’ she said, ‘like you. Until now.’

  ‘You know what they say: bad penny an’ all that.’ Behind his smile Willis was trying to work out how Dexter had found him. Plenty of other people were trying. He had to find out. ‘Tell you what, Sparrer,’ he said in the broken glass cockney of the Hackney Council Estate he’d never truly escaped from, ‘I’m staying at a nice little hotel locally. Why don’t you and me go for a nightcap. Catch up on old times.’

  Dexter felt the idea wrench at her. ‘I don’t think so. Why are you keeping appointments with Ian Stark?’

  So that was it. He’d batter Stark when he caught up with him.

  ‘Never heard of him,’ Willis sniffed.

  ‘Don’t insult my intelligence. He’s a drug dealer. Like you are.’

  ‘Sparrer, I’m hurt.’ He clutched at his broken heart mocking her.

  ‘He had an appointment to meet you here.’

  ‘You’ve made a mistake.’

  ‘Not me. Not this time. Stark is dead. Someone tried to chop his head off. Then who should crawl out from his rock but Mark Willis, copper gone bad, Hackney’s shittiest export.’

  ‘Am I a suspect, then?’ Willis was thinking hard and fast. Stark was dead. That presented him with a problem and an opportunity.

  ‘I haven’t decided yet.’

  ‘Arrest me, then.’ He looked around the deserted car park. ‘I don’t see any uniform plods though. I might be a bit of a handful for a little Sparrer in the dark.’

  ‘Don’t tempt me.’

  ‘To be honest, Sparrer I’m impressed,’ he leaned back against the wet wing of the Freelander. ‘Out here in the dark all by yourself. You don’t have bad dreams any more then?’

  ‘Fuck you.’

  Willis was growing in confidence. He was beginning to see that Dexter didn’t have anything on him; that she’d just come to have a look and get wet for old time’s sake.

  ‘Used to wake me up – all that screaming. Good job I was there to console you. Still, you liked a bit of CID pipe to cling on to in those days. Especially when bad Uncle Vince turned up in dreamland.’

  Dexter struggled to contain her fury. ‘I want you out of New Bolden tonight.’

  ‘This shit-hole ain’t big enough for the both of us, right?’

  ‘Tonight! Or I’ll stitch you up, I swear it.’

  ‘Dunno, Sparrer. I’ve got some business on. Maybe I’ll hang around for a few days. I thought you’d be glad to have an old friend up here with you. Word is you went a bit peculiar after you left the Smoke: cut all your hair off and started carpet munching. Must be tough being out here with all these in-breds.’

  Dexter unclipped her police radio from her belt. ‘Dexter to Control. Need immediate assistance. Meadowview Car Park.’

  ‘Acknowledged,’ squawked the radio back at her. ‘Will despatch.’

  Willis grinned. He knew when it was time to go. The last thing he needed was a wagonload of plods pulling out the side panels of his Freelander. He climbed back inside. ‘I’ll be off, Sparrer. You know my number if you get lonely.’

  The engine roared to life and Willis reversed quickly. He honked his horn and flashed his headlights at Dexter as he pulled away.

  ‘Control to Dexter,’ the voice barked from her radio. ‘Respond, please.’

  ‘Go ahead.’ She watched the Freelander disappear into the night.

  ‘Mobile unit despatched. ETA five minutes.’

  ‘Cancel it,’ Dexter ordered. ‘False alarm.’

  ‘Acknowledged.’

  Soaked and exhausted, Alison Dexter returned to her car and flopped inside. She started the engine. Warm air rushed across her face from the car’s powerful heating system. She closed her eyes.

  The warm air had rolled across her skin like his breath. It was a steamy Paris day and the Parc des Buttes-Chaumont had been busy all afternoon. Now in the orange light of early evening it was almost empty. She had loved the Parc for its steep undulations and eccentricities. Its winding grass banks and twisting paths created many private spaces. They had laid back and marvelled at the Parc’s strange stone cliff faces, its gazebos and bandstands.

  She had tasted the champagne on Mark’s breath as his tongue had explored her mouth. She had writhed underneath him, her dress riding up to her waist. He’d pushed her knickers to one side and forced himself into her. The grass had felt cool against her back.

  She had been vaguely aware of the hazy Paris skyline; of the distant Latino clatter of a marching band; of bees and after-shave; of pure uninhibited happiness.

  Eight years later in the desolation of a rainswept car park, Alison Dexter wondered at her mixed emotions as she touched the place where Mark Willis’s baby had grown inside her.

  Willis had driven away from Dexter at speed then doubled back through a confusing maze of side streets until he could see the exit to the car park. He pulled over and watched.

  Alison Dexter: the perennial spanner in the works.

  He wondered how much she knew about his relationship with Stark, about his problems in London. He couldn’t risk his location leaking back to London. Logic told him it was time to move on. He certainly didn’t need any unnecessary attention from the Old Bill: least of all, Old Bill with hormones. He had to turn the situation to his advantage.

  And yet, Ian Stark was dead. Willis didn’t really care how his associate had died. What he did care about was the hundred and twenty grand Stark owed hi
m. He had important debts to pay: quickly. There was an opportunity here. He guessed that Dexter didn’t know the details of his transactions with Stark: after all, he mused, if she did know he’d be banged up by now. Stark was too smart to keep his business records and stock in his flat. Willis knew he would have to take some risks if he was to find Stark’s lock-up. However, he knew exactly what was waiting for him back in London if he didn’t.

  He tensed as he saw the headlights of Dexter’s Mondeo illumine the road ahead of him. He allowed her to pull well away from Meadowview and his position before he started his own engine. From a discreet distance, Willis followed Dexter back to her home.

  31

  Underwood took a long look at the single photograph he had placed on the mantelpiece in his living room. It didn’t make him feel excited or aroused as Rowena Harvey’s had once done. It just made him feel guilty: then angry.

  Best to keep busy, he told himself.

  It was 11.25 p.m.

  It had been an unsettling and terrible day. Jack Harvey was dead. DC Jensen and Rowena Harvey were missing. He was convinced Jensen was dead: the coins had told him that much. Rowena Harvey’s fate seemed more ambiguous to him. Retrieving Julia’s picture from the box where he’d buried it had reminded him of the missing portrait of Rowena.

  The box had been Jack’s idea. It had been part of Underwood’s therapy. Jack called it the ‘box of bad memories.’ He had instructed Underwood to strip his life of the visible reminders of his former existence: tear down the wallpaper of his depression. So Underwood’s photos, work files, music, even videos had all gone into the ‘box of bad memories’. Jack’s theory was that it would be impossible for Underwood to reconstruct himself while weighed down by the burdens of his failures. ‘When you feel stronger, more confident, more able to face the past,’ he had said to Underwood, ‘you can choose some items from the box and bring them out again.’ Julia’s photograph was the first thing he had removed from the box. Now, he was unsure why.