A Deadly Compulsion

by Michael Kerr

  Ron had thought that George had been a cynical old bastard. But now, so many years later, he knew that the long dead screw had been a shrewd judge of human nature. He could still fondly picture him, cap askew on his balding head, overweight and never smart; the front of his ill-fitting uniform jacket and trousers covered with cigarette ash. Smoking had not been allowed on the landings even in those days. But George, he remembered, always had a cigarette hanging from his bottom lip as he slopped them out. That was when cells had no toilets, and pots and buckets had to be emptied in a recess every morning at unlock. The stench of human waste was a little more bearable if you were exhaling tobacco smoke out of your nostrils. Putting flush toilets back into cells during the eighties and nineties – an amenity that had been standard in the nineteenth century – was proof that the Victorians had developed a system that should probably have been left well alone in many areas. The old adage, ‘If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’, was still sound advice, though usually fell on deaf ears.

  At fifty-eight, Ron was disenchanted with cutbacks, piss-poor management and what seemed like monthly changes to routines and shift patterns, which were aimed at saving money, but were continually presented as progress and the way forward, into chaos, by a department that had lost the plot.

  Now, Ron had a plot; a plan of his own. He was starting a week of nights the following Tuesday, and had decided – in cold rage and a disturbed state of mind – that the same kind of scum who had taken his daughter’s life would not continue to be guest’s of her Majesty at the taxpayers’ expense. They would no longer demand escalating rights, watch TV and DVDs, play pool and snooker, and learn computer skills in the education department. He thought it fitting to mete out the sort of justice that they could have expected in bygone years, up until the abolition of topping. Fuck the do-gooders and prissy-arsed liberals that spouted off about the death penalty not being a deterrent. He had seen convicted murderers released to kill again, but had never heard of a hanged man re-offending.

  On the first evening of his scheduled nights, Ron packed his holdall, placing inside it his sandwich box, thermos flask of coffee, a Wilbur Smith novel that he intended to finish, two boxes of heavy-load cartridges, and last but far from least, his over and under Browning Medallist 12 gauge shotgun, shortened into a sawn-off weapon that fitted into the bag without having to be dismantled.

  “Look after her, Margaret,” Ron said, leaning over the back of the settee and kissing Brenda on her cold forehead; the skin of her face now drum-tight over cheekbones that threatened to pierce the taut parchment it had become.

  “Don’t worry, Ron, we’ll be fine. You have a good night,” Margaret said, smiling, but not with her eyes.

  “Oh, I will, I will,” Ron said, picking up his bag and his car keys from the telephone table in the hall, before leaving the house and closing the front door behind him for the last time.

  CHAPTER SIX

  SITTING under the hot lights, Laura could feel the perspiration prickling her scalp and dampening her armpits. Her blouse was stuck to her lower back. Opposite her, looking cool, fresh and smug was Trish Pearson, wearing a navy-blue power suit and silver Versace top, probably purchased from a discount designer outlet.

  Laura needed this interview like a hole in the head, especially with this supercilious bitch conducting it. Unfortunately it had to be done. This wasn’t Crimewatch, but it would have to do for now. It was a chance to appeal for witnesses, and to warn young women of the threat that was out there, via what was a popular regional news show.

  An anonymous voice counted down from five, and a red light blinked on, its ruby glow signalling that they were on air.

  “Chief Inspector Scott,” Trish started, shooting from the hip after first greeting her viewers. “Is it correct that a serial killer known within your department as The Tacker is on the loose, preying on young women in the York area? And is it also true that the police...you, have no clues as yet to his identity?”

  Laura cleared her throat and somehow resisted the overwhelming temptation to push ‘Barbie’ off her chair.

  “It’s Detective Inspector,” she began, outwardly composed, fighting the urge to allow her temper out of its kennel like a rabid dog to attack the interviewer. “And yes, it is true that four murders have been committed, that we are attributing to being the work of the same individual. There is no apparent rational motive for the killings, and our investigation is ongoing.”

  “Is it fair to say that you have no leads, and that we can expect more deaths?” Trish asked, shaking her head ever so slightly in a disdainful Thatcheresque manner that she had deliberately copied in part from the late Iron Lady, and also from Jeremy Paxman, whose sometimes derogatory and haughty manner she had admired when he had fronted Newsnight.

  Laura kept it together, concealing the blaze of anger that rose in her gorge, as magma might in a soon to erupt volcano, and said, “I think that any criticism you have, Ms Pearson, is unlikely to be of any practical help. I just want the viewers to be aware of the fact that we have a repeat killer active in the area; a twisted coward who is preying on girls and young women. All females need to realise the danger that he represents to them. It is a fact that so far he has shown a penchant for blondes with blue eyes, but that does not guarantee immunity from him. His warped mind could fixate on anyone.” Pausing, Laura looked directly into the camera’s lens and continued. “Do not go out alone, especially at night. And do not put yourself in a position that could result in you being abducted, raped and murdered.

  “While we are hunting this maniac down, you must be alert and take all practical measures to ensure that you do not become a victim. If you are suspicious of a stranger, or think that you know who this man is, call us. We need your help to capture him. I’m sure that this psycho thinks he is too smart to be caught...but he isn’t. He is just a very sick little man, who we will apprehend.”

  “And do you really―”

  “That’s all, Ms Pearson,” Laura said, unclipping the chest mike from her lapel and flipping it across the news desk. With that gesture, she pushed the chair back, stood up, nodded at the now harassed-looking presenter, gave her a small, game, set and match smile and walked off, out of the studio.

  “Jesus, boss!” Hugh said as Laura pushed through the swing doors. “That was a bit over the top, wasn’t it?”

  “No, Hugh. We need to hassle the son of a bitch and put him off balance.”

  “You might just redirect him towards yourself, boss, with all that shit you just threw at him.”

  “If I couldn’t swim, Hugh, I’d stay out of the water.”

  He watched a repeat of the interview on the late night update, and hurled the remote control handset at the TV as he jumped up, his bare feet ploughing through the pile of Polaroids on the carpet as he ran to the set, hawked up a mouthful of phlegm and spat at the screen.

  “Fucking bitch!” he shouted at the image of the split arse copper as he pounded the top of the TV with white-knuckled fists. “I’ll make you eat those words, you whore.” His body shook with fury and his vision red-misted as he emitted a long, high-pitched whining that sounded inhuman. After almost a minute, he went up to the bathroom and turned the shower on. It was a long time before he calmed down under the ice-cold spray. Shivering, he used a thick, fluffy towel to dry off. He would show Detective Inspector Laura fucking Scott. He dressed in T-shirt, blue jeans and Timberland boots, and then splashed aramis over his clean-shaven face. His fair hair was medium length, swept back from his forehead above metallic-blue eyes that showed no hint of the madness that festered behind their enigmatic surfaces. Putting on a black leather jacket, he left the house, determined to vent his fury against not only his mother, but also against the female copper. This one would be dedicated to Laura Scott, and immolated to appease his now wounded ego.

  He drove west through the city, out onto the A59 Harrogate road. He had already chosen his next victim; had first seen her over a month ago in Yates’s Wine Lodge o
n Church Lane, then followed her home and added her to his list of potential targets, which now boasted five names and addresses; enough to be going on with.

  Parking the car half a mile from the Stroud household, he went into a phone box.

  “Hello.” A male voice, presumably her father.

  “Hello. May I speak to Shelley, please?” he said.

  “Who’s calling?” A wary father’s concerned, protective question.

  “Oh, sorry, it’s Mark...Mark Chapman. I promised to phone Shelley...about a party on Saturday night.”

  “I’m afraid Shelley’s out this evening. Can I give her a message?”

  “Sure. Ask her to give me a call. She has my number.”

  “Will do, er, Mark. Good night.”

  “Good night, Mr Stroud,” he said, hanging up and quickly exiting the stinking booth, stuffing the bunched tissues he had held the germ-ridden receiver with into his pocket. There should be a government health warning outside phone boxes. Christ knows what diseases you could catch from the fucking things!

  He got back in the car and drove off, stopping again next to the kerb behind a late model Astra and switching off the lights and engine. He was just forty yards from the house, in the murk, midway between the sodium-yellow glare of two street lights. All the properties along this upper middle-class road were detached, fronted by trees or tall hedges and set well back in gardens so large that the owners probably referred to them as ‘the grounds’. These were carefully differentiated dwellings, each insulated from its neighbours’ by high fencing, walls, or stands of trees; mainly conifers. The privacy that these residents had created for themselves had rendered them vulnerable, as it also afforded cover for undesirable, uninvited trespassers, and worse, someone like him.

  He had driven down this road and passed the house several times, noting the long drive that curved away from wrought-iron gates that were set between brick pillars topped by pre-cast cement lions, whose role as guardians to the entrance was purely symbolic. The drive was bordered by laurel, holly, and other lush evergreens.

  It was close to midnight. He left the car, checking both ways to satisfy himself that the coast was clear before vaulting over the low wall and pushing his way into the thick foliage. He squatted down on his haunches, slipping an eighteen-inch-long piece of steel rod from his sleeve, to grip in his left hand. He flexed his forearm, tightened his fingers and felt the satisfying weight of the weapon as he settled with his back against the trunk of a lofty fir to wait.

  In his mind he replayed the interview and saw Scott, and heard her words, rich and self righteous as she had called him a maniac and sick pervert. She would regret every insult. The bitch would apologise for each offensive name that she had called him. Not that it would help the Stroud girl. But the copper would apologise, when he showed her that getting personal and badmouthing him was not acceptable, and would not be tolerated. He wasn’t a maniac or insane. How many countless innocents had been tortured and put to death by the church in the name of God? And were the governments of the world, who used war to gain power, resources and political clout, sane? Could the inventors of nuclear missiles, bombs, land mines and biological weapons be well-balanced? Thousands of guiltless men, women, children and babies were regularly considered expendable, listed as collateral damage; not even addressed as human beings when inadvertently slaughtered during pointless conflict. No, he was not mad. His motives were far more honest and noble. In fact, they were pure and untainted. He did not kill to benefit materially or to promote some dumbfuck doctrine. He killed as a release from personal torment that demanded satisfaction. It was a nonnegotiable affliction, far stronger than any addiction to the most potent drugs. Christ, more people died in road accidents in a week on British roads alone, than he would kill in a lifetime. Had he been an IRA terrorist, who had bombed the civilian population, killing scores, then, for political expediency, with no mind to real justice, he would have been released back into society as part of that blatantly inequitable Good Friday agreement. The authorities were too besmirched by their own mercenary deeds; their hands stained with far too much blood to have any right to judge him. Monday’s friend was Tuesday’s enemy in their cockamamie world.

  The fragmented splash of headlight beams shone through the leaves; myriad points of brightness signalling the arrival of a car. He withdrew further back into the darkness and gripped the cold steel cudgel even more tightly as adrenaline flooded his system.

  Shelley paid the driver, and then walked across the pavement to the gates as the cab pulled away. She had just had one of those evenings that would eternally stand out as a landmark in her life. Darren, her boyfriend had, unbeknown to her parents, just moved into a flat of his own off the Selby road. Instead of going to the multiplex to indulge in necking and groping awkwardly, sitting well back from the flickering screen, they had spent the evening at Darren’s, christening his new bed. Shelley had been a virgin up until three hours ago, having contented herself – and frustrating Darren – with heavy petting, up to and including oral sex...until tonight.

  She had watched enthralled as Darren ripped open the small packet and removed the lubricated ring of rubber. He had passed it to her, as though it was a delicate and precious gift that might be damaged if not handled with all due care and attention. He had lain back, and she had rolled the condom down over his erect member, her fingers trembling with excitement and apprehension at the thought of what she intended to do.

  It had hurt, fleetingly. She had felt too tight for him when he entered her. Then there had been a sudden tearing sensation, like a paper cut as her hymen ruptured. What followed was over in seconds, leaving her disappointed; the act resulting in a quick climax for Darren, but an anticlimax for her, both mentally and physically. He was soon hard again, though, and with a fresh sheath, – which with more confidence she slipped on with a deftness that belied her inexperience – he once more entered her and began thrusting slowly and with less urgency. She had gripped his buttocks and raised her bottom to meet each jabbing, plunging stroke. Even now her knees were trembling, and she felt as though her secret act was somehow visible, rubber-stamped on her forehead for all to see. She was sure that everyone would know that she was changed, had moved on from being a girl; a virgin, unspoilt and whole. Her feelings were mixed and confused. There was a certain sadness that she had lost something irretrievable. And yet a door had opened, literally, giving access to a new level of experience. Her face burned in the darkness as she recalled how she had screamed out, ‘Yes Darren, yeesss!’ at the top of her voice as waves of pleasure engulfed her, spreading up, back into her stomach, stiffening her limbs in ecstasy.

  A fleeting movement from the bushes at the side of the gravel drive caught Shelley’s attention and brought her to a halt, to peer into the darkness. Even as she thought that it might be a cat, or maybe even a fox, a sudden explosion in her head lit up the night sky with bright petals of gold, yellow, red and orange. For just a fraction of a second she was transported back to a night in Disney World two years previously, standing with her parents to watch the firework display over the castle in the Magic Kingdom, before an inky blackness rushed in to replace the scene, stealing her awareness of anything.

  Back at the farm, he lifted the limp body from the boot, slung it over his shoulder as though it weighed no more than a feather pillow, and walked across to the front of the barn and unlocked the large padlock, allowing the thick chain to snake through the hasp with the rattle of an anchor chain rushing from a ship’s deck toward the surface of the sea. He entered the building, pulled the solid doors closed behind him and made his way to the centre of the dark interior, shrugging the still form from his shoulder, for it to land in a crumpled heap before him, illuminated by a bright shaft of moonlight that penetrated through the grimed skylight set into the corrugated-iron roof high above, and many smaller rays that shone like pale laser beams through narrow gaps between the wood plank walls.

  He had not just stunned this one.
He had hit her too hard with the steel rod as an excess of hormonal stimulation added extra force to his pumped-up muscles. He pulled the tape from her mouth and was relieved to see that she was still breathing, albeit shallow and laboured. He wanted this one to last. Had she been dead, he would have just buried her deep under the earth of the barn’s floor, where another fourteen bodies were entombed. Corpses were no fun. He needed his ‘mother’ alive and alert to begin with, to appreciate the exquisite pain that he would inflict on her as continued retribution for the trauma and grief she had caused him to suffer.

  Cutting the tape from her wrists and ankles, he undressed her, putting all but her skimpy panties into a plastic bin bag to burn later. He crushed the panties to his nose and mouth, savouring the warm dampness and musky odour; noticing the spots of blood and presuming that they were a residue from menstruation. The only identification that he could find in her handbag was a library card, which he tucked into his jeans pocket, along with the panties. He then prepared her for later, before leaving again and locking the doors, to walk across to the house to light the fire and burn the clothing and handbag, which would be of no further use to their owner.

  Pouring himself a large Scotch, he took it upstairs, where he added the lacy panties to the others in the top drawer of his trophy chest. Undressed, he went back downstairs, turned on the radio and made himself a stack of ham and cheese and pickle sandwiches. As usual, the hunt and abduction had given him a voracious appetite. It was a humid night, and he ate standing in front of the open fridge door, allowing the icy air to drift out and cool his sweat-sheened body.

  At first, Shelley thought that she must have fallen and cracked her head. It took a while for her numbed mind to become aware of the situation that she was in. Her skull pounded, causing her to grimace and screw her eyelids tightly shut. By degrees she forced her eyes open. She was naked, her arms stretched above her, aching. Her wrists were handcuffed to a large steel ring that was set into a concrete block; the cuffs’ chain through the ring. She was cold, very scared, and felt sick from the splitting pain at her temple. Her vision was slightly blurred, but she could read the large writing on the card that lay on the ground in front of her: COMPLY OR DIE.