The Soul Collector

by Paul Johnston

  “Tell me exactly what you found, will you?” I said, suddenly noticing that I was pacing up and down. “Please, Karen.” I sat down next to her on the bed.

  After instructing me not to mention anything about the murder in my column, she did.

  “Are you sure there was no message on the body?” I asked when she’d finished.

  “Redrose said there wasn’t. You know how keen he is to check that kind of thing. We’ll know for certain when he does the postmortem tomorrow.”

  I got up and went over to the laptop I kept in the bedroom. I logged on and checked my e-mails. There was nothing from Sara—no taunts, no threats, no disposable e-mail addresses.

  “Okay?” Karen said, giving me a reassuring smile.

  “Not really,” I said.

  Karen shook her head. “For God’s sake, Matt! Has it ever occurred to you that, in writing The Death List, you gave every psycho lunatic in London, no, in the whole country, if not the whole world—”

  “The global sales were good, weren’t they?” I said.

  She ignored that “—an open invitation to pretend they were Sara. You went into such detail about the White Devil’s methods that you’re probably responsible for dozens of murders.” She turned away and murmured, “Good night.”

  Karen, used to seeing dead bodies at all times of day and night, despite her initial disquiet, fell asleep not long afterward. Eventually I dropped off, but not before I’d got out of bed to check the alarm system. I was vaguely aware of Karen rising at some ridiculously early hour and kissing me on the cheek. Then I dropped off again. At least I wasn’t disturbed by nightmares.

  When I finally surfaced it was after nine. I would normally have done half an hour on my exercise bike, but today I wanted to be sure that everyone was all right. I ran my eye down the morning e-mails. All my family and friends had confirmed they were okay. I thought about raising the level of alert after the murder last night, but decided against it. Karen was right—a single mention of the devil in Latin wasn’t worth getting too worked up about.

  I sat back in my £2000 desk chair and considered the name that Karen had mentioned. Shirley Higginbottom. There was something familiar about it. I looked at the row of reference books on the nearest shelf. Who’s Who? Who’s Who in the Arts? The Rugby League Year Book? None of them seemed likely, though there was probably no shortage of league players called Higginbottom. Farther along the shelf there was a small yellow booklet. It was the annual directory of members of the Crime Writers’ Society. Something clicked. I grabbed the booklet and found the pages with names beginning in H. No Higginbottoms. Then I remembered the section that matched authors’ real names with their noms de plume. I was in that—Matt Stone = Matt Wells. Back when I’d started writing novels, I thought Stone would give me a harder edge in the market. That had been one of my many delusions.

  Then I hit pay dirt. There it was: Mary Malone = Shirley Higginbottom. Jesus—Mary Malone. She was a major bestseller. She was also notorious for staying out of the limelight. She’d been invited several times as guest of honor to crime-writing festivals and had always declined. There wasn’t even a publicity photograph of her in circulation, leading to nasty speculation that she was a fearsome hag—or, perhaps, a man. She’d sent her editor to collect her two Historical Crime Novel of the Year awards.

  I picked up the phone and called Karen.

  “This isn’t a good time, Matt,” she said in a low voice.

  “Yes, it is. What would you say if I told you that your murder victim last night was a bestselling crime novelist?”

  “What?”

  “I was expecting at least one expletive.”

  “Tough. So she had a nom de plume?”

  “Yup. Mary Malone. She wrote about eighteenth-century Paris and she was a global bestseller.”

  “Interesting. Look, I’m in a case conference now. I’ll pass that on to the team that’s working the murder.”

  “Sure you don’t want to take it over? I could be useful to you. Insider knowledge of the victim’s milieu, personal experience of—”

  “You just want to make sure crazy Sara’s not involved, don’t you, Matt? Talk to you later.” The connection was cut.

  “Bollocks!” I shouted into the phone. A few seconds later it rang. “It’s all right, darling,” I said. “I forgive you.”

  “Very kind of you, Matt. What did I do?”

  I recognized the overcooked Cockney tones of Josh Hinkley, author of a popular series of gangster capers. He’d treated me like shit when my career was in the doldrums, but since my success he imagined he was my best friend.

  “Sorry, Josh. I thought you were someone else.”

  “Not the delightful DCI Oaten, by any chance?”

  My relationship with Karen was common knowledge in crime-writing circles. Some authors would have paid good money to go out with a senior police officer, and Hinkley was definitely one of them.

  “What are you after, Josh?”

  “Oh, nothing. I was just wondering if you knew one of our colleagues was brutally murdered last night.”

  “Of course I knew,” I said hastily, surprised that he’d found out so quickly. He didn’t waste any time telling me how.

  “Journo on the Express, who I drink with, rang me up an hour ago. One of the cops told him they found a Crime Writers’ Society membership card in the name of Mary Malone when they went through her desk. Wondered if I knew her.”

  “And what did you tell him?” I asked, wishing I could have told him I’d already tipped Karen off.

  I heard Hinkley draw hard on a cigarette. “Well, what could I say? I never met her, did I? None of us ever met her. I did check the membership directory, though. Confirmed that Shirley whatever was her real name.”

  “And no doubt your name will get mentioned in tomorrow’s paper,” I said snidely.

  “Of course, old cock.” He laughed. “I don’t need a column in the Daily Indie to show how smart I am. You can pass the pseudonym on to your girlfriend with my compliments.”

  “You’re too late, Josh,” I said, terminating the call. Sometimes he could be a gigantic dickhead. Then it occurred to me that Karen obviously wasn’t being kept up to speed by Homicide West. Someone was going to get their ears burned. I considered calling her again, but decided against it. She would only have told me to get on with my own work. But the crime writer’s murder was very much in my domain. Could the killer be making a point to me? That was exactly the kind of thing I’d been expecting Sara to do for the last two years.

  I went over to the window that ran all along the south wall of my flat. Spring still seemed as far away as Acapulco, the Thames running gray and chill. On sunny days the view was great, but in winter London looked like a dead zone from the fourth floor. At my old place in Herne Hill, I hadn’t had a view beyond the neighbors’ overgrown Leylandii. I didn’t miss it—the place in Chelsea had cost me a large part of my earnings from The Death List, but it already had happy memories. This was where Karen and I had begun to spend time together as a couple—the start of a new life for me. The problem was, I hadn’t been able to write fiction since I’d moved in. It wasn’t that I needed the money. The newspaper column covered most of my living expenses, and I’d been a journalist before I was a novelist. But something was missing. It was as if my involvement with a real serial killer had stolen my ability to write fiction. I’d lied to Karen and I didn’t feel good about that. I hadn’t written two thousand words of a novel. I had barely written one word.

  I went to my workspace, an enormous, antique partners’ desk in the corner of the living area. There were three computers on it, although I only used one. That was the problem when you made a lot of money unexpectedly—you bought a load of unnecessary gear.

  I booted up and logged on to my e-mail program. Among the new messages was one from my editor, Jeanie Young-Burke. I hadn’t accepted an advance for the new novel, so there wasn’t a deadline. But she was still pressing me about how I wa
s getting on. There was also one from Christian Fels, my agent. Although he was nearing retirement, he still had the instincts of a great white shark when it came to making deals. He’d had several offers from publishers for another nonfiction crime book. The problem was, I didn’t have any material.

  Could the murder with the white-chalk pentagram be exactly what I needed?

  “What’s this about the victim being a bestselling crime novelist, Inspector?” Karen Oaten demanded, the phone pressed tight to her ear.

  “How did you—” Luke Neville audibly gulped. “I was just about to ring you, ma’am…I mean, guv.”

  “I’m sure you were,” Oaten said, frowning at John Turner. “Have you seen the preliminary CSI and postmortem reports?”

  “They’re just in.”

  “E-mail me everything you’ve got. The next time you hold out on me, you’ll be talking to the AC. Am I clear?”

  “Yes, guv.”

  Oaten slammed the phone down. “Wanker.”

  “Neville the Lip?” Turner asked.

  “Yes. I’ve half a mind to take the case from Homicide West just to teach him a lesson.”

  “We’ve got plenty on our hands as it is,” Turner said, in a long-suffering voice.

  “I know that, Taff. But the AC’s got the hots for the Ifield Road murder and I reckon he’ll be even more excited when he finds out the victim was a big-name writer.”

  Turner put a heap of files on her desk. “I’ll leave these ongoing case reports with you then,” he said, with a tight smile.

  Oaten stood up quickly. “Oh, no you don’t. We’re going through them together.” She raised a finger. “I’ve got a better idea. Get Pavlou and Browning in here.”

  Turner returned with the detectives a minute later.

  “Guv,” they both said tentatively.

  “Don’t worry, I’ve got something delightful for you.” Oaten grinned. “See this pile of case files?”

  They both nodded. Detective Sergeant Paul Pavlou, of Greek Cypriot parents, in his midthirties and with a permanent shadow of beard on his face, looked unenthusiastic. Detective Sergeant Amelia Browning was a newcomer to the team, a short woman in her late twenties with bobbed brown hair.

  “Split them up between you and go through them. I want you to make lists of all the leads that haven’t been followed up and rank them according to potential effectiveness.”

  “Em, isn’t that your job, guv?” Pavlou said, his eyes down.

  “We’re a team, aren’t we, Paul?” Oaten riposted. “I’m giving you the chance to show your mettle. We’ll be needing another inspector soon.”

  The detectives left with the files, Pavlou now with a spring in his step.

  “Paul’s got what it takes,” Turner said. “Far too early to say about Browning.”

  Oaten nodded. “How are the rest of them treating her?”

  The Welshman shrugged. “Okay. They took her down the pub last Friday and tried to get her pissed. Apparently she was the last person standing—and she was drinking some brain-damaging real ale.”

  Oaten laughed. “I thought there was more to her than meets the eye when I interviewed her. Right, let’s see if Neville’s sent the reports over.” She opened up the internal mail program on her computer. “Looks like he’s jumped to attention. They’re here.” She clicked on the attachments and printed out two copies.

  They both read for several minutes.

  “Okay,” Oaten said. “Redrose’s postmortem. He was right about strangulation by ligature being the cause of death. He found traces of what he expects tests will show is leather—so, maybe a decent-quality shoelace.”

  “Or a cord from a pendant.”

  Oaten nodded. “Could be. The fracture on the side of the skull was probably caused when her head hit the floor.” She looked up. “So, if the victim was lucky, she was unconscious when she was throttled. The face was pounded by a blunt object, dimensions approximately three by two centimeters, consistent with the haft of a knife or similar. The blade—sharp and with a smooth edge—was used to slash her face and to sever the left ear. No fingerprints found on the body. Same serrated blade probably did for the cat. The time-of-death window is between eight and eight-thirty.”

  “Listen to this, guv,” Turner said, his eyes farther down the page. “‘Likelihood that victim’s finger and toenails were cut by her assailant. Several are uneven, with minor cuts in the surrounding skin. No clippings found at locus.’” The inspector stopped abruptly and let out a groan. “God, I hate murders done by crazies.”

  Oaten continued reading. “‘Also, a section of pubic hair approximately four by four centimeters has been cut recently, some hairs remaining in situ. Ends suggest single blade rather than scissors, so reasonable assumption that killer removed hairs. Victim’s underwear has been repositioned with some care. So far, CSIs report no cut hairs found in house. A lock of hair was also cut from above the forehead with a similar blade, again no traces found in proximity of body.’”

  “Trophies?” Turner asked.

  “I’d have thought the ear was enough of a trophy.” Oaten rubbed her chin. “Remember those Satanists that we caught a year ago? They took hair and nails, and used them in their so-called spells.”

  “They were vile people,” the Welshman said with a shiver.

  “There’s also the pentagram in the garden to suggest this is some kind of ritual murder.” Karen Oaten raised a hand. “Hang on, Taff. We’re not finished yet. Redrose is nothing if not thorough. ‘The prone position of the body is worthy of note—i.e. it was turned over by the murderer after the pubic hair was removed. Examination of the rectal area shows damage compatible with sexual abuse. However, no semen or condom lubricant have been detected. A possible conclusion is that the butt of the knife used to disfigure the victim was inserted into the anus. Underwear was repositioned with care.’”

  “Christ,” Turner said, his face pale. “What the hell kind of animal uses a knife-butt to sodomize a dead woman?”

  Oaten caught his gaze. “Maybe we should be thankful it wasn’t the kind of animal that would have used the other end of the knife.”

  The inspector gave his boss an appalled look.

  “We have to keep our emotions in check, Taff.” Oaten moved to the next report. “The CSIs say ‘Muddy footprints, size nine footwear with heavy tread, probably workman’s boots, to be confirmed, leading from back door to area around body, mud matching that in victim’s garden. Impressions from same footwear on other side of wall inside Brompton Cemetery, in direction of house, but impossible to follow far on asphalt road. Footprints lead from body to front door. Also decreasing amounts of mud on steps and pavement to right of house. Impossible to follow beyond twenty-seven point two-four meters.’” Oaten looked up. “That’s interesting. He got in the back door, but went out the front, bold as you like.”

  “‘No other footprints apart from victim’s near the back door, those at least twenty-four hours old,’” Turner continued. “‘But there were traces of black wool fibers around the body, as yet unidentified. No fingerprints apart from victim’s on any surfaces. The CD had been burned on a computer, “Sympathy for the Devil” copied ten times. The CD player in sitting room was activated by the machine’s timer, which had been set for 20:30.’”

  “Presumably giving himself time to get away.” She shuffled through the papers. “Someone must have seen him. Even if he got over the wall of the cemetery unseen, there are plenty of houses whose occupants could have seen him in the street.”

  Turner was examining DI Neville’s report. “No witnesses found as yet, locals still being questioned by uniforms. At least they’ve identified the body. In the absence of any relatives in her address book, the neighbor agreed to do it. That must have been a hard job, given the state her face was in. Additional confirmation by dental records is also under way.”

  Oaten leaned back in her chair. “So what have we got? A cool customer, who managed to get in the back door—a standard Yale
lock, with minimal signs of damage, so he knew what he was doing. He was also lucky as the victim must have forgotten to bolt the door. He was calm enough to draw the pentagram and write the Latin words with a steady hand. The pattern of footprints suggests that Mary Malone hadn’t been in the garden for at least a day and the chalk was recently applied. So, a cold-blooded killer, who waited for the victim. I’d guess the cat was mutilated to terrify her. The killer was determined enough and had sufficient strength to tighten the ligature, though the victim was probably unconscious from the fall. Then he took the ear, hair and nail clippings, and—get this for weird—put her underwear back carefully after he’d abused her from behind. Having achieved all that, he left the Stones song playing so loud that it was bound to attract attention. Why would he take the risk?”

  “Because he’s a bastard who’s showing off, daring us to catch him if we can.”

  “Possibly,” Oaten said, frowning. “It’s not exactly the kind of behavior you’d expect from a Satanist. They’re usually drug-crazed kids or sad, middle-aged men.” She pointed at him. “We’ve both been saying ‘he,’ but there’s no reason, apart maybe from the shoe size, to rule out a female killer.”

  The phone on the desk rang. Oaten identified herself and listened. “All right, thanks for that,” she said, before she put it down again. Her expression was somber.

  “What is it, guv?” Turner asked.

  She paused before answering. “That was DI Neville. They’ve found a witness, a fifteen-year-old boy on the top floor of a house two doors down on the other side of the road.”

  “Great,” the Welshman said. “What did he see?”

  Oaten looked away. “He saw a person of average height leaving number 41 just before eight-thirty—he wasn’t sure of the time as he’d been playing poker online and was taking a break. He was a bit surprised as he’d never seen anyone go in or out of the victim’s house—she got her groceries delivered.” She paused. “He was also surprised because the figure was wearing a long black cloak and a black top hat.”