The Runner

by P. R. Black

  ‘Look, if you’re uncomfortable, then we can just leave it to one side. It’s no problem. We were both in a stressful situation. We needed to get something out of our system. And it was fine. We can just leave it there, where it is. No need for any dramas.’

  ‘OK. That’s not quite what I was meaning, but…’

  ‘Spit it out, Glenn.’

  ‘I was just thinking that, after all this is done, maybe we can… We can talk about it then.’ He cleared his throat. ‘How about beer? I quite like these formula pilsners they do in here.’

  ‘Beer is good.’ She smiled. ‘So. How was your day?’

  ‘Bit crazy. The cops weren’t happy with the blog going up, as you can imagine.’

  ‘They come to talk to you again?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Tamm? Looks young, but might be wizard-frozen in time for one thousand years.’

  ‘Yes.’ He chuckled. ‘That’s very good. Yeah, it was him. Slippery bugger. I was trying to explain that there was no harm in me posting anything, because no one’s been arrested. Technically speaking, the guy they think is the Woodcutter is still in jail, so it’s not sub judice. Tamm asked me about how the victim’s family might feel about that. I think he might have gotten a bit angry.’

  ‘It’s almost like he’s cheesed off you scooped them, or something.’

  ‘I’ve had the police all over me, anyway. Had a laptop taken away. Glad I’ve got a spare.’

  ‘Jesus, it must be weird knowing they will be going through your browsing history like Nurse McLaidlaw checking for nits back in primary.’

  ‘Like I say… I’ve got a spare,’ Glenn said. ‘And I’m very careful about sources. If they’re looking for the Woodcutter, then the main point of contact is you.’

  Freya caught the waiter’s eye, and signalled for two beers. ‘This leaves us with the cryptic clue our man left us. “Two ways”. What do you reckon he meant by that?’

  ‘It’s got to be a location. Everything he’s told us so far has led us to certain places. I’ll get my thinking cap on.’

  ‘I already looked up places called Two Ways… a lot of pubs, funnily enough, though I doubt he’d try that one again. Derelict or not.’

  ‘I’ll keep on it. There’ll be something to go on. In the meantime… How about your disappearing act yesterday?’

  Glenn had said this with some vehemence. ‘Is that why you’re in such a weird mood?’ she asked, after a pause.

  ‘Well, it was a bit weird to be just left holding the baby, so to speak, while you sodded off to God knows where.’

  Freya’s eyes sparkled as she took a drink. ‘I know. I had a good reason to go, though. This is the exciting bit. You’ll like this. I met Bernard Galvin.’

  ‘You what?’

  ‘Yep.’ She related the story of the previous day’s events. Glenn said nothing. He gazed at her, barely even blinking, only once moving to push his glasses back up his nose. ‘It was an eye-opener. It was a face-opener, as well. You should have seen the state of Harvie after it – what an absolute mess. I shouldn’t laugh, but he’s all worldly-wise and I’m-a-fucking-big-tough-guy, and then…’

  ‘I thought we’d discussed this,’ Glenn said.

  ‘What?’

  Glenn folded his hands. ‘We talked about this. Splitting what we know.’

  She sighed. ‘I’m telling you now. It only happened yesterday. Hold your horses. I thought you’d be interested in, you know, the events.’

  ‘But you kept it a secret from me. Even after we’d gone through that.’ He crunched a prawn cracker, savagely.

  Freya folded, unfolded and refolded the stained white napkin on her lap. His gesture had been so petulant, she wanted to laugh. She almost expected him to hurl the soup on the floor. ‘I wanted to see what Mick Harvie wanted. That’s for a start. Secondly, he said it had to be me and nobody else, or the deal was off. News just in – he doesn’t like you.’

  Glenn’s shoulders relaxed. ‘Any particular reason?’

  ‘Take your pick. You’re getting scoops he couldn’t get, even when he was in the game. You’re part of a new media he doesn’t really understand. And when men like him don’t understand things, they hate it. Plus, you’re clever and handsome, and for all his experience in taking down shorthand in boring court cases, you’ve got more scoops on the Woodcutter than he ever has. Including me. In a manner of speaking.’

  He actually blushed at this praise, and refocused the subject. ‘So Bernard Galvin actually pummelled him?’

  ‘As God is my witness. I thought for a second he was going to blow Mick’s head off. When he brought the gun around, I was sure he was going to open fire. He pretty much threatened us. Which was a bit daft, as I recorded every word that came out of his mouth.’

  ‘Seriously?’

  ‘Yep. Every word of it. He’s a really nasty piece of work. Aged horribly, too. I looked at some old newspaper file pics of him back in the day – black and white, really poor grain, even for the 1990s – and he looks almost pleasant. Quite a handsome man. Still handy enough, like a boxer, you know? Middleweight, maybe. Now he looks like Goya painted him. If I hadn’t stepped in, he might still be punching Mick Harvie’s face into mince as we speak.’

  ‘Jesus. That’s a hell of a grudge.’

  ‘Harvie claims he fucked his wife.’ Freya shrugged. ‘I suppose that tends to upset people.’

  ‘A copper’s wife! Jesus.’

  ‘That’s what I said. He was unrepentant about it.’

  ‘You’d think he would have mentioned this.’

  ‘Just shows you – there’s always more going on than you think.’ Freya swiped up the last cracker and tossed it into her mouth. ‘Anyway. Adds a little bit more spice to it. My take on the whole thing, though, is that they’re both converts to the theory that my dad is not the Woodcutter.’

  ‘You know my thoughts about that.’

  ‘And they’ve been duly noted. There’s one other thing that’s got Galvin spooked, though. Harvie told me about it. Something that was outside what they knew. Galvin let it slip while he was ranting at us. He assumed we already knew about it. But we didn’t.’

  Glenn sat forward in his seat. ‘Go on.’

  ‘They’ve found another body. Not, like, our bodies. A new one. A new case. Someone who got chopped up. An amateur triathlete or wild swimmer. She disappeared at a sea loch in Scotland. Turned up in the middle of a forest, inside, get this… a picnic hamper.’

  ‘Chopped up?’

  She nodded.

  ‘A new case? A new Woodcutter murder?’

  ‘Looks that way. Harvie made some inquiries, while he drove me back down south. Had it confirmed. Nothing set in stone, of course, it could be anything. But they reckon, with the other bodies being found and my dad appearing in the papers, that there is a chance…’

  ‘Surely it’s a copycat?’

  ‘Maybe. But there’s every chance it’s the original. Back out of retirement. You said it yourself. BTK, was that the guy? He came out of retirement to kill again. There are one or two others who had a sabbatical, then got right back into it in middle age. Maybe seeing himself in the papers turned him on? Or maybe, like you said, he got jealous of my dad getting the attention?’

  ‘I’ve heard nothing about this, nothing…’ He dived for his phone. ‘I’ll need to get onto it. I haven’t heard shit from my contacts…’

  ‘There’s something else I have to tell you,’ she said.

  He put his phone down. He looked genuinely frightened; she wanted to reach out and touch him. She did, folding her hand over his.

  ‘It’s nothing heavy, Glenn. Jesus, you’re like a seventeen-year-old. It’s about Carol Ramirez. I’ve got one or two contacts who work in mental health. I used to do some shifts in a care home. They’ve managed to track her down. I think I can get an interview with her. You want in?’

  ‘Are you sure? A couple of people said she’d died.’

  ‘No, she’s alive. Not very well
, but alive. I think I can get us in. Up for it?’

  He squeezed her hand. ‘You’re on.’

  Another voice said: ‘Doesn’t this look like a cosy outing?’

  A woman in running gear appeared at the table. She was sweating, with her hair tied back, and patches staining her zip-top. Even without make-up, she was pretty, Freya saw, with fine fair eyebrows and huge blue eyes. They were brimming with tears.

  Silence fell across the restaurant. Like a black hole drawing in light, this girl’s appearance drew in every piece of attention.

  Glenn didn’t exactly instil any confidence in this new arrival. He leapt to his feet. ‘Jools, this is my work colleague.’

  ‘Have you started work down a fucking brothel?’ the newcomer raved. Then she picked up Glenn’s soup bowl.

  ‘No, listen,’ Freya began. Then Freya was decorated; she would estimate later, by looking at her sheer blouse, that she wore maybe thirty per cent to Glenn’s twenty per cent, with the remainder dousing the gawping couple in their sixties over his shoulder.

  ‘You know,’ Freya said, to the couple, bedecked with seafood, as Glenn and the young woman fled like a pair of foxes startled at some wheelie bins, ‘this isn’t even the worst thing that’s happened to him this week.’ Then she covered her face in her hands, in pure shame, and cried.

  33

  ‘New bodies, you say? Good God.’

  Solomon was slouched in his chair, set back from the table in front of the mirror, hands linked behind his head.

  ‘You surely know about this by now,’ Freya said. She held her hands perfectly flat on her own table, the better to stop them shaking. ‘Cheryl Levison must have told you.’

  ‘There’s been no official announcement, has there?’ Solomon said, eyes twinkling. ‘I don’t think there has.’

  ‘Please don’t get cute,’ Freya said.

  ‘Are we having a family row? God, this is exciting.’

  ‘Between this and the bodies being found, surely your appeal’s just a formality.’

  ‘Not long till we find out. I tell you what, I’m going to miss these guys, here.’ Solomon indicated the guards. ‘These two guys in particular. I mean, look at them. Look at the physique. Look at the intensity. Look at the devotion.’

  The guard stood beside Solomon, whose physique looked pub-honed over a great number of years, remained silent, barely even moving his eyes.

  ‘There’s a question I want to ask,’ Freya said, calmly. ‘Are you messing with me?’

  ‘Messing with you?’ He sat forward. ‘I don’t follow.’

  ‘I get in contact with you… All these bodies start showing up. Everybody, including me, thinks this is an amazing coincidence.’

  ‘Couldn’t have been me. You’re barking up the wrong tree on that one, Freya. The real Woodcutter is the man you want to look out for, there. And I mean that in a very real sense. He’ll surely come after you, if he’s active again. You have to be careful from now on. If you appearing in the papers is the spark, then the end point is you, surely. You’ll be the prize.’

  ‘It couldn’t have been you, no… But it could be something to do with you.’

  ‘If you’ve got any names, let’s hear them. I’m as in the dark as you,’ he said.

  ‘Is it someone you know, do you think? Someone who might want to reclaim his crown after you stole it from him?’

  ‘That’s a very interesting theory. And I met a few psychos along the way – when I was in care, when I was on the roads… Some very dark, dark people out there, Freya. But none I ever suspected was an actual maniac. So no, no obvious candidates, as far as I know. All I know is, this person who’s been dropping bodies here and there is doing me a big, big favour. He’s showing the world what we already know. That I didn’t do it. They got the wrong man. They’ve punished me for nothing. Nothing.’ Solomon’s voice swelled, causing some distortion in the speaker system. The two guards on either side of the mirror shared a glance, but neither made a move.

  ‘Maybe when you come out, they’ll come after you,’ Freya said.

  He grinned. ‘Then we’ve got each other’s backs, haven’t we?’

  Freya wanted to recoil from this. It must have showed, because his eyes dropped. She imagined him turning up at her door, grinning, a plastic bag full of belongings and clothes twenty-five years too small for him. ‘I guess we’ll have to keep our eyes peeled.’

  ‘You look kind of tired,’ he said, suddenly. ‘When you taking a day off? Been working hard, I take it?’

  ‘After a fashion.’

  ‘What is it you do again? I forget.’

  ‘It’s not that you forgot – I didn’t tell you. You could say I’m freelancing. I want to get to the bottom of this. I want to know the truth.’

  Solomon folded his arms. ‘Last time I’m pretty sure you said you believed me. That you knew I didn’t do it.’

  ‘I don’t think you’re the Woodcutter. But you might know who is. It’s all very… personal. Isn’t it?’

  ‘Could be. Could just be an obsessive. The real Woodcutter could be retired with his feet up; these new killings you’ve mentioned, those could be down to a copycat. You ever thought about that?’

  ‘It’s one theory. I’ve got an open mind.’

  ‘You should join the police. They need open minds, in there. Once you’re done freelancing. What was it you did before freelancing?’

  ‘Didn’t I already tell you?’

  He shook his head, and left a silence for her to fill.

  ‘Well, I worked in the pub alongside Mum for years.’

  ‘At the pub?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Gads, you must have needed prick repellent, love, if it’s the same pub I remember. Either that, or you were very spoiled. Depends on your viewpoint.’

  Freya ground her back teeth. ‘If you get out, try not to speak to women like that.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Like you’re in a tabloid newspaper. Things have changed since the 1990s.’

  ‘One question… is Loaded still a thing?’

  ‘Loaded? What’s that?’

  ‘Now you’re frightening me.’ He sighed, and drummed his fingers on the table. ‘I apologise. You’re right. In my head it’s still 1994. Which is year zero for you. Literally. I think Oasis are kind of a new thing. I have to remind myself Alan Shearer’s not playing football any more.’

  ‘Was he the prime minister?’ She smiled. ‘Joke.’

  ‘Very good. So, you’ve only ever worked in the pub, alongside dear old Mary? You didn’t do any qualifications, university, that kind of thing?’

  ‘No. I didn’t do well enough at school. And I didn’t want to move, either.’

  ‘That’s odd. Why not?’

  ‘I didn’t want to leave Mary alone.’ It was true, and admitting it brought something welling up into her throat. She took a second or two. ‘And maybe I didn’t want to be away from her, either. I was happy at home, I suppose. We were a team. We were as close as you can get. I never wanted a career. At first, anyway.’

  Solomon ran a hand over his scalp, and closed his eyes. ‘If I’ve been insensitive, Freya… I am truly sorry. I forget you’re grieving. I know what grieving’s like, you know. Not for the dead – for the missing. For my brothers and sisters. For my ma, heading out the door. The faces I knew from my earliest days, taken away from me. I know about grief. Not quite the same as yours, but it’s there. So – you’re a homebody. That makes two of us, I guess.’ He gestured to the walls on either side.

  That brought a smile from his daughter. ‘Yep. I’m very set in my ways, I suppose.’

  ‘How about friends?’

  ‘I find this hard to admit but… I didn’t make too many of those. I don’t feel shy, but I’m quiet. I don’t trust people that much. I had a few friends at school, but I stopped getting invited to parties. There was some gossip about me being a tramp, a street kid. There’s a stigma in not having a father around. None of the other girls in m
y school were in that position. It was hard… I went into myself. Friday nights would be spent working at the pub. Sunday nights, we’d have a takeaway and gossip and bicker in front of the telly. Me and my mum. It’s not really clear in my mind that it’s gone. That I won’t be able to do that any more.’

  ‘Boyfriends, though?’ he asked, brightly. ‘Must have been a few of those. Or girlfriends. Yes, I know that things have changed outside, and that’s all cool, now. I’m not that badly informed. Bottom line, you’re a pretty girl. These two gorillas – their jaws dropped the first time they saw you, and that’s a fact!’

  The big guy nearest her father blushed to the roots of his shirt collar. Freya dared not look in the face of the guard stood next to her.

  ‘I had some boyfriends, if you have to know… But no one serious. One boy went away to university. He wrote, but it fizzled out. I knew some guys at the pub, but no one nice. No lack of interest, but… it’s a pub, you know? You get used to the last orders chancers and the sleazebags. You get to recognising them from the way they walk towards the bar… the way they make eye contact. It’s tiresome. It was the main reason I left the pub. Left Mary to it… She loved it, you know. Working at that pub. It was life for her, as well as a job. But I had to go, I knew that much. I got a couple of college qualifications at night, then I got a job as a carer’s assistant at a home.’

  ‘That’s interesting – old folks, or mad folks?’

  ‘Old folks. It was a great job, I loved it, but… Parts of it were getting overwhelming.’

  ‘I suppose there’s only so many bums you can wipe before you get bored. Or corpses to lay out.’

  Freya’s heartbeat engulfed the silence for a moment or two, before she cleared her throat and said: ‘I was only there a year, but it was enough. It was an eye-opener. After that, Mum got ill. I covered for her at the pub then… Well. She faded fast, after the first round of chemo didn’t take care of it. You said yourself, you’ve seen how it goes. There’s a point where they go over a cliff.’

  ‘I don’t mean to upset you.’

  ‘No, it’s fine. I don’t mind telling you this. Cheaper than therapy, right?’ Freya brushed a tear away from her cheek. What came next surprised even her: ‘I cling to people, I know that. If I’m telling the truth, I did that with some boys. I wrote to that poor guy at university. I didn’t take the hint when he didn’t answer the texts. I didn’t take the hint when he didn’t write back. I didn’t take the hint when he didn’t visit me when he came back from the holidays. Someone told me he’s engaged, now. So I guess I’m sad. I’m lonely. I could have just stayed at home, sat by my mum’s side till kingdom come. Cancer had other ideas. So here I am. Truth be told, I’m worried I’m going to throw myself at another boy, who’s bloody useless. So that’s it. That’s me. That’s your daughter.’