Threat

by Hugh Fraser

  There’s no light in the windows and the street’s quiet so I open my handbag, put the gun in my belt and the wallet and torch in my jacket pockets. I get out of the car, put the bag in the boot and walk towards the house. Light from a TV flickers against the net curtains of the prefab next door and I hear someone laughing as I pass. I put one hand on my gun, open the flimsy wooden gate of number twenty-three, walk up the path and round the side of the house. There are no lights on at the back so I move round to the front door, ring the bell and step back to the side of the house.

  There’s no response so I go round the back again and inspect the windows. The frames are metal and they’re all shut tight with curtains closed behind them. The back door has an old mortice deadlock so I kneel down, open up the wallet and take out a cut down key and a wire pick. I put the key in the lock, slide the pick in above it, feel around for the levers and lift them one by one with the pick. When I’ve got all five, I turn the key and open the lock. I put the key and the pick back in the wallet, put it in my pocket and switch on the torch.

  I turn the handle and try to open the door. It moves a bit and then sticks against something. I put my shoulder to it and force it open a bit more. I turn on the torch, aim it through the gap to try and see what’s blocking the door. There’s a head with long dark hair on the floor. I push the door open a bit wider, squeeze through and shine the torch on the body of a young girl. She’s naked and has had her throat cut. She’s small, almost like a doll that’s been left out once a child has finished playing with it. Her skin looks too white against the dark lino, like it’s been bleached. She’s staring at the ceiling with that shocked, vacant look they get. An insect crawls out of her pubic hair and scurries off across her thigh.

  I shut the back door and shine the torch round the kitchen. There’s a cooker, a sink full of dirty dishes, a table and two chairs. A bin in the corner is overflowing with screwed up fish and chip paper, and there’s a rotten smell that’s coming from more than the dead girl on the floor.

  I go through the hall and into the living room. There’s a sofa and an armchair and a radio in the corner. There are some books on a low table in front of the sofa. I pick one up and look at the foreign title that I suppose is German. I go into the bedroom and shine the torch over an unmade bed. There’s a suitcase and some rolled up sheets of polythene on top of the wardrobe. I open the doors and find a sawnoff shotgun, a box of cartridges and a coil of rope behind the hanging clothes. The other bedroom’s empty so I go back into the kitchen and the foul stench. I search the cupboards but they’re empty apart from a couple of tins of beans.

  I lock the back door with the pick and the cut down key I used to open it and put the dead girl back in the same position against the door. I’m turning to leave by the front door when I notice a cupboard under the sink that I didn’t check. When I open the doors the stench hits me full in the face. It’s another young girl and she’s been dead a long time. She’s in a sitting position with her knees drawn up as if she’s hiding in there. The head’s missing and there’s mould growing on her skin. Her neck’s been stitched together but blood’s oozed through the join onto her shoulders and chest. I’m feeling sick and I stand up and retch over the sink but nothing comes up. I need fresh air so I close the cupboard and make for the door. As I pass the cooker I notice a large pan on the top. I look inside it and stop. The blue eyes staring up at me from under the water look alive for a moment in the light of the torch. The sides of the pan are warm to the touch and there are flakes of skin floating on the surface of the water. As I stifle another wave of nausea I hear a car draw up outside.

  Although I’d like to welcome this man home and put a stop to his funny little ways for good, I remember that Tony’s only told me to have a look for now so I cross to a window, open it and climb through. As I’m shutting it behind me I hear the front door open. I drop onto the path and crouch down as the kitchen light goes on. I hear the door shutting, then footsteps and the sound of something being dragged across the floor. Rather than risk a peep round the curtain I back off across the lawn and stand behind a shed where I can see the kitchen windows. When the kitchen light goes off I creep round the side of the house and across the front garden, jump the fence and make it to my car.

  I can’t see the house from the car so I open the door, slip the handbrake and push it round the corner to a position where I get a good view of the front door. I get my handbag out of the boot and get into the car. As I’m trying to find a hanky to blow that horrible stink out of my nose the front door of the prefab opens and a tall bald-headed man walks up the front path carrying something wrapped in plastic over his shoulder. He walks to a grey van and opens the back doors. As he lowers the load into the van a naked foot pokes out of the plastic wrapping. He pushes the body along the floor of the van, and closes the doors. He gets into the driver’s seat, starts the engine and pulls away. I wait until he’s near the end of the road, then I follow him.

  12

  The grey van snakes round the bends on a twisty country lane. The moon’s bright, which is just as well as I’m driving without lights most of the time so he can’t see me. I’m keeping well back but I’m afraid he’ll turn off when he’s out of sight round one of these bends and I’ll lose him. We’ve driven west out of London and along the A4 but since we’ve turned off it I’ve lost any sense of where we’re headed.

  When we come to a straight stretch of road with an old stone wall on one side I see the van slowing down so I pull back. It stops in front of some wooden gates set into the wall and our man gets out and opens them. He drives the van through the gates and closes them. I pull up close to the stone wall, get out of the car, climb onto the roof and look over the top. In the moonlight I can see the van going along a narrow drive, through tall trees, towards a big dark building with battlements. When I see the lake off to the side of the house I know it’s Ringwood Hall.

  I climb down and get back in the car. If this German bastard is knocking off girls and delivering them to the gentry I want to know why and I’m sure Tony Farina will too. I start the car, drive up the lane until I see a cart track that leads into the woods. I bump the car along it, until I reckon it’s out of sight, then I turn it round so that it’s facing the lane. My watch says it’s almost three o’clock. I walk back towards the gates and climb up a tall tree by the roadside to where I’ve got a good view over the wall to the back of the house and find myself a solid branch to sit on.

  Various indignant birds flap away, squawking at me for waking them up in the middle of the night. I can see the back of the van sticking out from behind the brick building that I saw from the bedroom window, when me and Lizzie were here before, but there’s no sign of Heinz or anyone else.

  I listen to the wind in the trees and the odd scuttling sound of some creature on the lookout for its dinner, and I think of that pale body on the floor with the life drained out of it. I wonder what hopes she had and what makes a man so cold that he could kill a beautiful little thing like her. When I remember the one under the sink I rub the inside of my wrist against the bark of the tree until there’s blood.

  I’m counting the battlements outlined by the moonlight to stop myself falling asleep when I hear the van start up. It comes down the drive towards me and I’m able to get a look at Heinz as he gets out and opens the gates. He’s well over six foot, with a big bald head on a pair of broad shoulders and he looks solid and in good shape. I grip the gun in my belt and wish I could drop him now before he carves up any more. He pulls the van into the lane, closes the gates and drives off the way he came. I climb down out of the tree and let myself in through the gates. I take a detour through the trees towards the brick building and circle round the back of it to where I can see into the yard in front of the stables. It seems quiet so I go round the building again and find a small back door. The mortice is old and stiff but with a bit of fiddling I get it to turn, ease the door open and lock it again behind me.

  There’s moonlight shi
ning through the windows and I can see a row of cars down the length of each wall. They’re all old grand tourers with the hoods down. I shine the torch over the one nearest me and see that she’s a real beauty in a dark red colour with a silver bird flying off the bonnet and Hispano Suiza written across the radiator. There’s a blue overall hanging over the driver’s door and a toolbox on the floor. I want to have a good look at all of them but I remind myself what I’m here for and walk along the side wall behind the cars. At the far end, in the corner near the main doors I find a trapdoor set into the floor and another mortice. I pick the lock, lift the trap and see a spiral staircase leading down into darkness below.

  I stop and listen and then I step in and close the trap above me. With the torch in my mouth I twist the key and the pick around until I finally lock the mortice then I put my hand on the wall and move slowly down the steps. When I get to the bottom I’m at the end of a narrow passage with doors off it that looks like it runs the length of the building. I try the handle of the first door and it turns. I open it and shine the torch onto a heavy velvet curtain. I find a light switch beside the door. I turn it on, open the velvet curtain and see a long narrow room with a black and white tiled floor.

  There’s an old-fashioned wooden piano type of thing against the left hand wall at the far end of the room with a chair in front of it. The lid’s open and there’s a painting of a landscape on it. There’s a cello leaning against it with the bow in between the strings, and on the far wall, a big painting in a gold frame of two old-fashioned men and a woman playing a lute. One of the men is feeling the woman up and the other man’s having a go at him and pointing to his hand as if he wants money. The room looks ghostly and strange in the torchlight but I’ve an odd feeling that it’s somehow familiar to me. As I’m closing the door I notice a pile of clothes in the corner. I lift up a blue and brown silk dress with white lace sleeves and a brown wig with a hairnet with white bits sewn into it. I put the clothes back and turn off the light.

  I go along to the next door, open it and shine the torch round. The room’s empty except for a bed with a dark red velvet cover and a light blue pillow. There are dark red drapes hanging behind the bed and the dead girl from the kitchen in Catford is lying on it. She’s naked with her arms folded behind her head. Her hair is pulled back from her face, her eyes are open and her eyebrows and her eyelashes have been darkened with make-up. Her knees are drawn up a bit, her lower half is turned away slightly and she looks as though she’s stretching herself after she’s woken up. There’s a lamp on a stand beside the door. When I find the switch and turn it on, a warm red light touches her curves and she almost seems to come alive.

  There’s a noise above me. I snap off the light and freeze in the doorway. I can hear the trapdoor being unlocked, then there’s light at the foot of the stairs and footsteps. I slip into the room, close the door and roll under the bed.

  There are more footsteps then the door opens. The light goes on and I hear a voice I recognise.

  ‘I hope this will be to Your Lordship’s liking.’

  It’s the old butler who let us in before. There’s a silence and then another male voice,

  ‘The lady is good Symmonds, but the arms aren’t quite right.’

  ‘I beg your pardon My Lord.’

  ‘They should be slightly higher.’

  I stop breathing as he approaches the bed. ‘Like so… Do you see?’

  ‘Indeed My Lord.’

  ‘And the knees…thus.’

  ‘I must apologise My Lord.’

  ‘No matter. You may leave me.’

  ‘Thank you My Lord.’

  ‘I shall knock in the usual way.’

  ‘Very good My Lord.’

  The door opens and then the Lord says, ‘One moment Symmonds.’

  There’s a silence. I can see his feet stepping back from the bed and I breathe again.

  ‘She’s too small for the Vermeer and probably too old.’

  ‘Very good My Lord.’

  ‘She might do for the Renoir.’

  ‘Rest after the Bath perhaps?’

  ‘Possibly.’

  ‘Would you wish her to be embalmed My Lord?’

  ‘I think she’d appreciate it.’

  ‘Very good My Lord.’

  ‘Thank you Symmonds.’

  The door shuts and he starts breathing heavily as he approaches the bed. The wooden frame sags on one side as he sits on it and I shift slightly to avoid it. He stands up again and I can see his feet pacing back and forth in front of the door and his breathing’s getting louder and he starts making a strange kind of moaning sound as he walks faster and faster. His jacket lands in the corner of the room and then he’s kicking his shoes off and then his socks and then his trousers come off.

  His shirt and tie land next to them on the floor and he’s moaning and groaning louder and louder until all his clothes are off and he’s pacing faster and faster. He dives at the bed and lands full length and it’s all I can do not to cry out as the bed frame digs into me. There’s a moment of stillness with just the sound of his breathing and then he starts moaning again and bucking up and down on the poor dead girl and calling her a whore and a dirty little tart and all that stuff that they do and I’m being pummelled half to death with each thrust.

  He finally gets to where he’s going and after he’s lain quiet for a bit he gets up off the bed and puts his clothes on. I’m hoping he’ll be going and I can find a way out of here but he comes to the bed again and crouches down beside it with his knees next to my face. He’s silent for a bit and then I can hear him mumbling something above me which I can’t make out. He’s sounding tearful and I catch the word mummy a couple of times, then his voice tails off and he stands up and walks to the door, opens it, turns back towards the bed for a moment before turning off the light and closing the door behind him.

  I roll out from under the bed, feel my way to the door and put my ear against it. I hear a bang that sounds like the trap shutting. I listen for a bit longer and when I hear nothing I turn on the light and look at the dead girl. She’s in the same position she was in when I first saw her with her arms stretched above her head and her knees pulled up and over to the side. In spite of the rosy glow of the light her skin is blotchy now with blue and white patches. Her mouth is open and her eyes have started to bulge. I go to her and close her mouth and her eyelids. I put my hand on her arm and feel how cold she is.

  I turn the light off, move along the passage and up the stairs. I turn the lock, raise the trap very slowly until I can see that the coast is clear, and then I’m out and moving past the grand motors towards the back door. I do the lock, walk to the corner of the building and see if there’s anyone about in the yard between the outbuildings and the house. It’s daylight now and a door to the stables opens and a young lad with a mop of red hair walks across to the house and taps on one of the windows. After a second the window opens and a girl in a maid’s uniform leans out and gives him a kiss. The boy says something and they laugh then the girl disappears for a moment and then she’s there again and giving him a slice of bread and jam. He kisses her again, she shuts the window and he trots off back to the stables chewing on his breakfast.

  I go round the back of the brick building and it looks clear all the way to the gates. I set off through the woods, keeping away from the track. The birds are singing away and flying from tree to tree above me. I’m nearly at the gates and passing a big old oak tree when a man steps out from behind the trunk and stops a few feet in front of me. He’s got a red weatherbeaten face under a wide-brimmed hat. He’s wearing a long brown coat and he’s pointing a shotgun at my head. He stares me in the eye.

  ‘I seen you come in.’ When I don’t speak he takes a step towards me and says, ‘I know what you done an’all.’

  His eyes narrow and he puts the barrels of the gun right up to my face. I move my hand very slowly towards the gun in my belt. Just as my fingers touch the grip he says, ‘I ain’t going to kill
you but they will if they catch you.’

  He lowers the gun slowly and I let my hand drop to my side. He takes a step back and looks me up and down. He’s half smiling when he says, ‘You best not come round here again.’

  He turns and walks towards the gates and I follow a few paces behind him. He opens them for me and I go through and onto the lane. I hear a solid thud as they shut behind me.

  13

  I park in Hall Road, walk round the corner and in through the glass doors. Reg is at the desk and I ask for news of Dennis. He tells me he’ll be back at the beginning of next week and goes on studying his Racing Times.

  I go up in the lift, let myself into the flat, knock on Georgie’s door and poke my head round. She’s lying on her bed reading with one arm behind her head and I see the image of the dead girl on the bed for a moment until I dig my nails into my wrist and drive it away.

  Georgie looks up from her book.

  ‘I didn’t know you’d be gone all night.’

  ‘Something came up.’

  ‘Ok.’

  ‘You all right?’

  ‘Just reading.’

  ‘Do you want a cup of tea?’

  ‘Yeah. I’ll come through in a minute.’

  I go into the kitchen and put the kettle on. I open the cabinet, cut a couple of slices of bread, make myself a jam sandwich and remind myself that I must get some shopping done today. Lizzie told me there’s one of those new Sainsbury’s shops opened in Kensington High Street that sell all sorts of food and I want to get down there and have a look. While I’m filling the teapot I hear the letter box snap shut and I put the kettle down and go into the hall. There are two letters on the floor. One’s the gas bill and the other has a crest on it with some foreign words underneath it. I open it and see that it’s the list from the school of what Georgie needs for her uniform and her sports clothes. It’s much longer than I was expecting, with a coat and a cloak and different skirts and dresses that we can get from this Perry’s Uniforms place in Knightsbridge. There’s another list of dance clothes as well from another shop. It says she’s to be in Richmond House, and there’s a plan of the school that shows where it is and a list of the names of the housemistress and the matron and that. It says she’s in the fifth form and that her form mistress is a Miss Weston. I take it into the kitchen and I’m reading through it when Georgie comes in. She looks at the envelope on the table and asks, ‘Is that the clothes list?’