Eye of the raven sd-5

by Ken McClure

  Eye of the raven

  ( Steven Dunbar - 5 )

  Ken Mcclure

  Ken McClure

  Eye of the raven

  ONE

  The Rev Joseph Lawson took up stance at the door of his church to watch his congregation — all eight of them — depart at the end of the Sunday evening service. He could not help but feel — with what he thought was a brave attempt at humour — that what they lacked in numbers they made up for in years. He guessed at a combined age of something over six hundred.

  Willie MacPhee, a long-retired bank employee and the last of the group to complete the walk along the overgrown path through a maze of vandalised headstones and neglected shrubbery, turned to close the gate behind him. His pronounced stoop and the fact that the sleeves of his beige rain jacket were too long made it difficult and his wife’s body language exuded impatience as he continued to fumble with the mechanism. When he heard the rusty latch finally fall into place, Lawson raised his hand to wave farewell but there was no response. He reasoned that probably neither MacPhee nor his wife could see that far.

  Lawson closed the heavy front door and rested his forehead against the wood for a moment. Somewhere in the distance he heard local youths bawling out some football anthem as they made their way to the wooden hut that comprised the local social club, intent on a second night of lager-fuelled oblivion in the aftermath of their team’s Saturday victory. Lawson knew the words well enough; they had more to do with religious bigotry than football, not that the singers were religious by any stretch of the imagination: bigotry was just an easier option than agnosticism or atheism, which demanded some intellectual input.

  ‘ Morons,’ Lawson murmured although this wasn’t a sentiment you expressed too loudly here in the central belt of Scotland, especially the part known as ‘Orange County’ where seventeenth century battles were stop-press news and King William of Orange still reigned supreme.

  As he turned, he noted that the porch smelt of lavender and liniment. He sniffed again before smiling and murmuring, ‘God be praised.’

  There was no smell of stale urine this week. Old Mrs Ferguson had finally been taken into hospital where he supposed she would block a bed for what remained of her probably good but unremarkable life. Lawson silently wished her well and walked through into the main body of the church to gather up tattered hymnbooks before returning them to the sorry pile in the porch.

  He paused to appraise the church notices giving times and locations of the various activities at St Johns, thinking that they really needed renewing. They had faded badly, the corners curling over the drawing pins, but this only made him consider who was going to see them anyway? Bible class comprised of two insurance clerks and a librarian. Scouts were eight youngsters and a leader he was beginning to have doubts about and the Young Mothers Club — four girls, all under twenty-two of whom only one was married and two had no idea who the father of their child was. ‘God give me strength,’ he murmured before turning away.

  It wasn’t that Lawson’s faith was faltering but he did have the distinct impression that he was being tested — perhaps not in the way the martyrs had — for he had little in the way of pain and suffering to endure — no, for him, indifference and suspicions of irrelevance were the chosen instruments of examination. The telephone rang in the vestry and mercifully broke his train of thought.

  ‘ Reverend Lawson.’

  ‘ John Traynor, assistant governor at the State Hospital here, minister. Sorry to interrupt your Sunday but Hector Combe is asking to see you.’

  ‘ Can’t it wait until Wednesday?’ asked Lawson, seeing the threat to his planned evening in with a couple of drams of Ardbeg malt and Ian Rankin’s latest Rebus book. Wednesday was his usual day for visiting The State Hospital at Carstairs and he found once a week more than enough. Carstairs was a secure establishment for the criminally insane — Scotland’s equivalent of Broadmoor in England — and not the kind of place to offer comfort to those of low spirit or foster an unquestioning love of humanity.

  ‘ Fraid not, minister. Combe’s very poorly. The doctor doesn’t think he’ll see out the night.’

  ‘ All right, give me an hour,’ said Lawson, resigning himself to a forty-minute drive across bleak moorland in the dark when the weather forecast was for rain driving into central areas of the country, aided by strong westerly winds.

  As he changed out of his robes in the vestry, Lawson couldn’t ever recall the patient, Combe, expressing a desire to speak to him before. The more he thought about it, an unpleasant sneer was what he associated most with the man, a look on his face that suggested cynical superiority and an outlook that equated religious belief with weakness. This of course, was before the man’s illness had destroyed his capacity to display any expression at all. Combe had been receiving treatment for cancer of the jaw, which had involved radical surgery to his face.

  Combe was a dying man and that, as Lawson conceded, often changed things. Perhaps it wasn’t too surprising at all that he was seeking some contact with the Church at this late stage. A great many tended towards repentance when the grim reaper was about to call… just in case.

  As he’d feared, the rain started in earnest as he set out in his old Ford Escort for Carstairs and positively lashed down as he drove across the barren stretch of moorland between his Upgate manse and the State Hospital. At one point he had to slow down almost to a standstill when the wipers failed to cope with the sheer volume of water. The sound of the rain hitting off the roof of the car was impeding his ability to think straight and his every instinct was to turn back but if this was to be Hector Combe’s last night on earth he felt obliged to push on if at all possible. He felt guilty for hoping that the governor would be right in his prognosis of death for Combe. He really didn’t want to be doing this for no reason. The rain slackened a little and he started to make better progress although it seemed as if every dip in the road harboured a small lake, which threw up a bow wave and threatened to swamp the car’s electrics.

  Lawson’s thoughts turned to hoping that he could disguise his dislike of the prisoner, Combe, when he got there. Combe was a psychopath, a convicted murderer who had killed four people during his adult life without compunction or remorse. Lawson knew that it was incumbent upon him to seek out some saving grace in the man, particularly at a time when it was fashionable to believe that all people must have one but Lawson found it hard to share this view. His dealings with the inmates at Carstairs had convinced him otherwise. There had been times in that benighted place when he had felt the presence of evil to be almost tangible. Some of the inmates seemed to exude it, an invisible miasma of malevolence that challenged the very concepts of civilised society.

  The car emerged from the confines of a long avenue of trees and Lawson felt the familiar hollow feeling come to his stomach as the high perimeter fence of the prison — or hospital as they insisted on calling it — came into view. Floodlighting highlighted the barbed wire rolls stretched out along the top against the night sky. All that was missing was The Ride of the Valkyries.

  ‘ It’s not your day today is it minister?’ asked the prison officer who looked into the car to check his credentials.

  Lawson appreciated the ambiguity of the statement but knew well enough what the officer meant. ‘I understand Hector Combe is dying,’ he replied.

  ‘ And I’ll dance at the party when he does,’ replied the man without bothering to append an apology as he waved Lawson through to where he parked the car and completed the formalities of admission before being escorted to the assistant governor’s office.

  ‘ Good of you to come at such short notice, minister,’ said assistant governor, John Traynor, when he saw Lawson appear in his doorway, brushing th
e rain from his shoulders. ‘Hell of a night.’

  The prison officer, who’d ushered Lawson in, closed the door behind him as he left and Traynor motioned Lawson to sit with a wave of his hand.

  ‘ I have to say I was a bit surprised when I got your call,’ said Lawson. ‘I don’t recall Combe and I ever having much to say to each other.’

  Traynor nodded. ‘I have to say I hadn’t marked him down for deathbed repentance either,’ he said. ‘He’s always struck me as being hard as nails and cold as ice. I suppose it only goes to show I never did discover the inner man.’

  The comment had been tongue in cheek. Lawson knew Traynor to have little time for what he regarded as ‘trendy psycho-babble’ when it came to penal matters.

  ‘ How is he?’

  ‘ Lucid but fading fast.’

  ‘ Relatives?’

  ‘ None that care to call,’ said Traynor.

  ‘ Best get on then,’ said Lawson.

  Traynor pressed a button and two prison officers appeared. ‘Take Rev Lawson to see Combe, will you.’

  As Lawson walked behind the leading officer he was aware of the sound of rain hammering against a metal section of the roof. He glanced upwards and the officer walking beside him said, ‘Hell of a night.’

  They passed through three locked sections before the leading man said, ‘He’s along here.’

  Lawson knew this part of the establishment to be a hospital within a hospital, a sickbay for the already mentally ill when they went down with some more physical ailment. The smell changed from stale food and urine to sweat and disinfectant. The leading officer unlocked a heavy door and asked, ‘Do you want us to stay, minister?’

  Lawson shook his head. ‘I’ll be all right.’

  ‘ Have a care,’ said the man. ‘He looks as weak as a kitten but you can never be sure with that bastard. Be on your guard. He might just fancy taking you with him for the hell of it.’

  A male nurse who stood well over six feet tall and looked more like a boxer than a nurse acknowledged Lawson’s arrival with a nod and walked with him to Combe’s bedside.

  ‘ The minister’s here, Combe,’ the nurse said in a surprisingly soft, lisping voice.

  Hector Combe, his face pointlessly disfigured by surgery to combat a cancer which had subsequently spread throughout his entire body anyway, opened his eyes. Even at death’s doorstep, they were still the compassionless glittering orbs that Lawson remembered. They always made him think of a bird of prey contemplating its next meal.

  ‘ You asked to see me, Combe,’ said Lawson sitting down on the chair that the male nurse had brought up behind him. It creaked loudly when he moved on it so he tried to remain still.

  ‘ Dying,’ said Combe hoarsely and with difficulty as he twisted his lips in an effort to form the word.

  ‘ Comes to us all,’ said Lawson, guiltily aware of the starkness of the comment but unwilling to soften it.

  ‘ Confession.’

  ‘ For an awkward moment Lawson thought that Combe might be Roman Catholic. He asked him.

  ‘ Not that kind… another one… another death…’

  Lawson felt a chill run down his spine. He moved uncomfortably and the chair creaked. ‘You want to confess to another murder?’ he asked.

  Combe’s hand shot out and gripped Lawson’s wrist, forcing him to think of the throats it had held, the cords, the knives… He had disembowelled one victim. He tried to pull his hand back but the white bony claw with its bulging blue veins held fast. ‘Julie Summers… it was me.’

  ‘ Who?’

  ‘ Julie Summers… the babysitter… it was me. I killed her.’

  It had been several years before but Lawson remembered the murder of a teenage girl in a village outside Edinburgh. ‘The West Linton girl?’ he asked tentatively.

  Combe nodded and relaxed his grip on Lawson’s wrist. ‘Yeah.’

  ‘ But they got the man for that. I remember it well enough,’ said Lawson.

  Combe seemed amused as indicated by a slight wrinkling of his eyes for he was incapable of smiling. ‘Stitched up… some poor bastard, they did… God knows why.’

  ‘ We can’t be talking about the same case here,’ said Lawson. ‘The evidence against that man was overwhelming.’

  ‘ It was me, I tell you’ insisted Combe. He seemed annoyed at being doubted and Lawson could feel impatience and hostility emanating from him.

  ‘ Why?’ asked Lawson, feeling bemused but also under obligation to ask something more.

  Combe looked at him as if he were stupid then he said sarcastically, ‘Because… she was there…’

  Lawson saw from the look in Combe’s eyes that this had been intended as a joke. He was filled with horror at the very idea of anyone making such a comment and a chill ran down his spine at the unwelcome insight he’d been given into Combe’s mind. ‘What were you doing in West Linton?’ he continued hoarsely.

  ‘ I was on my way… back to Manchester… been in Edinburgh on a job… There she was… wiggling her little arse… all on her ownsome at that time of night… bloody asking for it. Would have been a shame to waste a nice little peach like that,’ he said. ‘Don’t you think?’

  Lawson was appalled. He felt totally out of his depth but he was trapped in a situation that demanded he stay. Combe was confessing to a priest. He had to hear him out. ‘Let me get this straight,’ he murmured, pausing to swallow because his mouth had gone dry. ‘You are saying that it was you who raped and killed Julie Summers?’

  ‘ No fucking saying… about it,’ said Combe angrily. ‘I did it! Want to know every little fucking detail, do you?… Fucking turn you on, will it?… Don’t get much pussy in your line of work, right?’

  Combe started to talk and Lawson felt his senses reel as he was subjected to hearing every detail of a rape and murder. Combe appeared to feed on his revulsion and seemed to gain strength from Lawson’s every wince.

  ‘ Scratched me, so I broke the little cow’s fingers… This little piggy went to market… Snap! This little piggy stayed at home… Snap! This little piggy…’

  ‘ Stop!’ commanded Lawson as a wave of nausea enveloped him followed by the almost irresistible desire to strike Combe. With great difficulty he regained his composure and asked hoarsely, ‘Why are you telling me this?’ Why not the governor, the police, the authorities?’

  Combe ignored Lawson and continued, ‘Silly little bitch… didn’t have to start screaming the place down… did she? I had to shut her up before she woke the whole fucking village.’

  ‘ Why me Combe?’ insisted Lawson, raising his voice.

  The glittering eyes turned to Lawson betraying puzzlement. ‘Need to square things with the Church… before I meet my maker… don’t I?’ he said. ‘Make sure… everything’s in order like.’

  Lawson couldn’t quite believe his ears. Did Combe really think that that was all there was to it? ‘In order?’ he repeated.

  ‘ That’s what you do… in’t it? Make… a clean breast of.. things. Confess and then the sheet’s… wiped clean. Right?’

  Lawson said like an automaton, ‘You think that by telling me this you will automatically be accorded forgiveness for what you’ve done?’

  ‘ Yeah,’ affirmed Combe, irritated at Lawson’s continual questioning of what he clearly felt was obvious. ‘That’s how it works. You know it is. That’s the deal. Salvation and all that… that’s what you call it, right?’

  ‘ Wrong,’ said Lawson, feeling a deep anger well up inside him and speaking as if pronouncing sentence. ‘Hector Combe, if there is any justice, you… will undoubtedly burn in hell.’

  ‘ What the… fuck kind of a minister are you?’ demanded Combe, making an angry but only partially successful effort to sit up before lapsing into a coughing fit as he fell back on to one elbow. The nurse reappeared and held a metal bowl up to Combe’s face to receive what he was bringing up from his raddled lungs. Lawson was very aware that Combe’s eyes never left his as he continued to hack up blood
and phlegm. They were filled with hatred. Lawson wanted to look away but found himself mesmerised as if held in thrall to some strange animal he had absolutely no understanding of.

  Combe finally pushed away the bowl. ‘Fucking… tosser,’ he managed to gasp. ‘What kind of a f…’

  Combe appeared to freeze in mid sentence and Lawson, still transfixed by the strength of Combe’s hatred, found himself part of a frozen tableau for a few moments before the look in Combe’s eyes suddenly became quite neutral and, with a final gurgling sigh, he fell back on his pillow, dead.

  ‘ Not exactly Oscar Wilde when it came to last words, was he?’ murmured the nurse who’d seen the distressed look on Lawson’s face and come over to join them.

  Lawson accepted the offer of a whisky in the assistant governor’s office and took two large gulps before he could say anything, finding welcome if only momentary distraction in the burning sensation in his throat.

  ‘Combe couldn’t have done it,’ said Traynor. ‘The police got the right man for the Julie Summers murder. He’s eight years into a life sentence in Barlinnie. It was thought at the time that he should have been sent here but the medical experts declared him perfectly sane. Traynor snorted his derision and added, ‘He rapes and murders a thirteen-year-old girl, and they don’t even come up with a “personality disorder”. Makes you bloody wonder.’

  Lawson was only half-aware of what Traynor was saying. He was still thinking about his nightmare meeting with Combe. His hand was shaking as he raised the whisky glass to his mouth for a final gulp. ‘Combe was adamant that he did it,’ he said.

  Traynor looked at him sympathetically and said, ‘No way, minister, but I’ll send in a report to the relevant police authority of course.’

  ‘ Why confess to something he didn’t do?’ persisted Lawson as the whisky finally started to have a calming effect and he got his wits back about him.

  Traynor shrugged and said, ‘I’ve long given up trying to work out what goes on inside a psycho’s head. They don’t think like you or I do. Don’t dwell on it, minister.’