by Tim Ellis
Just before they reached the hedge Richards’ phone activated. ‘Yes? Hi Wendy, no mistake, huh. Okay, thank you very much. Yes, DI Parish owes you a box of Ferrero Rocher chocolates.’
‘Excuse me?’ Parish said.
‘I said that you’d buy her chocolates if she input the names this afternoon.'
‘But that’s her job, and Ferrero Rocher are expensive.’
‘You’re turning into a right skinflint.’
They reached the hide, but the padlock was closed in the hasp on the door.
‘Now what?’ Richards said.
‘I suppose we wait.’
‘What if he doesn’t come back?’
‘Where else would he go?’
‘He might go straight to the causeway at low tide and go home. He could also have his own boat, or use the water taxi. And he might not go home at all, but sleep somewhere on the island.’
‘That’s a lot of options.’
‘Also, he could have already left the island.’
‘Maybe we need to speak to Tracy again.’
‘I knew you were going to say that.’
‘You shouldn’t have tied the bikini to her fence.’
‘I know, but I was angry.’
‘Now, you’ll be embarrassed.’
‘I think I worked that out for myself, thank you.’
‘Just being helpful.’
‘What if he comes back while we’re looking for Tracy?’
‘Good point.’
‘I could stay here.’
‘No, you can go and find Tracy.’
‘You hate me, don’t you?’
‘Maybe she hasn’t seen the bikini yet, maybe you can get there and remove it before she does.’
‘Okay.’
‘And keep your eyes open for Maitland. If you see him you’re to ring me.’
‘I will.’ She started running back across the field to the car.’
Parish sat down on the ground with his back to the door of the hide. The sun had begun to set, the shadows were lengthening, and there was a slight chill in the air.
It must be a mistake, but CrimInt didn’t make mistakes – unless Wendy had made the error – garbage in, garbage out. If she’d input the wrong search terms then anything could have come out at the other end. The date matched though. If an event had occurred on the 10th September 1983 it would have given this man enough time to take on another identity, but why? And if he wasn’t David Maitland, who the hell was he? Well, they’d get to the bottom of it. As soon as the man came back he’d arrest him, take him back to Goldhanger police station and keep him in a cell overnight – did Goldhanger have any cells? Maybe it was one man and a dog, and they’d have to take him to Maldon station.
But even if David Maitland was the man they were looking for, where were the missing teenagers? Were they dead or alive? And more importantly, what the hell was it all about? He had to admit that this was one of the most baffling cases he had been involved in.
And talking of dogs, he hoped Digby was all right. He checked his watch. It was five past six. Angie would be getting up soon, he’d give her a ring in a minute to check she was all right, tell her what was happening, and ask her to explain the situation to Digby. They probably wouldn’t get home until ten, or ten-thirty.
Well, at least it was Angie’s last night of night duty. She’d have seven days off to recuperate, and for things to get back to normal in the Parish household. If normal was the right word. Mind you, normal would soon involve a baby’s cries for food, dirty nappies, and all the other things associated with a new addition to the family. God, he was going to be a father. He still had a bit of time. It wasn’t due until the middle of December, so he still had about five months. Maybe he should escape, tunnel out through the dining room, fly off to Panama and sell bananas on the beach. Surely he was too old to be a father. In fact, what did he know about looking after a child anyway? Nothing! In fact, less than nothing. He’d be a useless father. Social Services would hold him up as an exemplar of useless fatherhood. Maybe he should go to night classes, get a certificate or a diploma in fatherhood before it was all too late, and he was thrown into the snake pit at the deep end and told to get on with it.
What was going on with Richards? On the one hand she was searching for Mr Perfect, and on the other hand she would fall for any old flannel a guy came up with. Maybe he needed to speak to that Dr Suresh, who seemed to have his head screwed on the right way round. Telling Richards to stop watching the Crime Channel was a good one. He’d have liked to have been a fly on the doctor’s wall and seen her face when he’d told her that.
He pulled out his phone to call Angie, but there was no signal. He pushed himself up and moved out from the cover of the hedge, and into the field. He heard a twig crack behind him, and turned his head. The four-by-two piece of wood hit him square on the forehead, and he crumpled to the ground like a sack of onions.
Chapter Twenty-One
Richards sat in the car biting the inside of her cheek. The bikini had gone from the fence. Bugger! She didn’t want to knock on the bitch’s house and have to eat humble pie, but she knew she didn’t have a choice.
After slamming the Saab door she stomped up the path and banged on the door.
The door opened. Tracy Duquemin stood there all smiles and dungarees holding a tea towel in one hand and a ladle in the other. ‘Oh, hello Constable Richards. Is Inspector Parish not with you?’
She could see that the bitch’s smile was false, and that her cold eyes were sizing her up. She wanted to grab the bitch’s scrawny neck and shake it till her head fell off. Then she’d kick it into the sea and watch it float away.
‘No he’s not.’
‘I see you used the bikini. I hope everyone enjoyed it?’
Richards gritted her teeth. The bitch had known exactly what she was doing when she gave her that bikini. If she killed the bitch, she’d probably be out of prison in ten years. Thirty-one was still young...
‘We need your help.’
‘Oh? I was just about to have my evening meal, I couldn’t tempt...?’
The bitch would probably try to poison her, so that she could have a clear run at the Inspector. ‘No, thank you. We’ve discovered that Mr Maitland isn’t who he says he is.’
‘I’m sorry, what do you mean?’
‘He’s not David Maitland, he’s using a false name.’
‘But... he’s been David Maitland for as long as anyone can remember.’
‘Yes, we know, but that’s not who he really is.’
‘Oh, well. If he’s not David Maitland I have no idea who he could be.’
‘Can you come with me, the Inspector wants to know where Mr Maitland might be. You can help us to look for him.’
‘I’ll just turn the oven off.’ She went back into the cottage, and then returned carrying a thin jacket. ‘It gets a bit nippy in the evenings.’
They walked to the car. After turning round, Richards set off back to the causeway parking space.
‘He’s not in the hide?’ Tracy asked.
‘No. You don’t know if he’s got his own boat, do you?’
‘Yes he has, otherwise he’d be subject to the ebb and flow of the tide for coming and going.’
‘Where does he keep it?’
‘At the jetty where the water taxi stops.’
‘Which is where?’
‘You’ve just passed it. You’ll have to reverse back up to the crossroads, and instead of turning this way go straight across.’
She did as Tracy said. There were three boats tied up at the jetty.
‘Who do they belong to?’
‘The two newer ones have been hired by our guests, the old wooden one is David’s.’
It was an old fishing boat with an outboard motor attached at the rear, and a number on the front in white lettering: P90-38BE.
Richards had no idea what the number meant. ‘Do you know how to disable it?’
‘Why would you want to do something like that?’
‘So, that he doesn’t leave the island without our knowledge.’
‘Well, you have to have a key to start the motor, but I suppose you could rip out a spark plug lead.’
‘What’s one of those?’
‘You know as much about engines as you do about bikinis then?’
Richards thought she might jump on Tracy’s back and propel her off the jetty, hold her head under the water, and stare in her eyes with a contented smile on her face as she drowned.
Tracy stepped onto the boat, flipped open the engine casing, pulled one of the spark plug leads out, and threw it into the long grass on the bank. ‘There, one disabled engine, but he could still row the boat.’
‘That’s okay. Let’s go now.’
Richards drove back along the beach road, and pulled into the parking space again. It was getting dark as they made their way across the field to the hide.
The hide door was open.
‘Sir?’ Richards called out, but there was no answer. It was dark inside the hide. She cursed under her breath, because she knew she should have brought a torch from the boot of the car with her. ‘Sir, are you in there?’ she called again.
Silence was her reply.
The two women stepped inside.
***
His head throbbed. He was lying on the cold floor trussed up like a pig for slaughter. How the hell did these people get the plastic police restraints? They should only be available to police, because there was nothing more embarrassing than a police officer restrained by police restraints. He could feel the plastic digging into the skin of his wrists and ankles, and cutting off the circulation.
What an idiot! He should have kept his wits about him. Instead, he’d been sucker punched with a four-by-two. Where the hell was he? Wherever he was, there was an awful stench wafting up his nose. He thought he might be underground because of the damp air, but he wasn’t sure. The overpowering smell was of rotting flesh and decay. After the first time, when he’d been a newly qualified murder detective, he knew he’d never forget that smell.
He opened his eyes. There was a flickering light – candles. He tried to sit up, but he needed a wall to lean against.
A male voice came from his right. ‘I hope you’ve not come to rescue me?’
‘Who’s that?’
‘Allan Cousins.’
‘Yes, that was the plan.’
‘Well, I think we both need rescuing now. I hope somebody knows you’re here?’
‘No, nobody knows I’m here, wherever “here” is. Don’t you know?’
‘No, I don’t know. God, it’s so good to have somebody to talk to at last.’
‘I was outside the hide when he took me by surprise.’
‘The hide?’
‘We’re on Osea Island in the Blackwater Estuary.’
‘I’ve never known where I was. I met him in Maldon, and he must have drugged me, because I woke up here.’
Parish finally managed to swivel round to see who was talking to him. ‘Jesus,’ he said out loud. A wraith-like apparition of what was once a young man named Allan Cousins had been bolted to a rusting metal contraption. Three quarters of his skin was missing, and the raw flesh underneath had shrivelled up like ancient leather.
‘Yes, I know. I’m finished. I haven’t got long left to live. I hope this is not how you’re going to end up.’
‘God, what’s he done to you?’
‘A better question would be, what hasn’t he done to me?’
‘Why has he taken your skin?’
‘I don’t know. Every day he comes in and takes a piece of skin, but I don’t know what he does with it. I think there’s another room along the corridor, but I have no idea what’s in there.’
‘What about the others?’
‘Take a look around.’
Parish moved his eyes over the walls and began to make sense of the shadows and shapes he was seeing. ‘Bloody hell, are they all here?’
‘There’s a lot of them – male and female – I don’t know how many exactly.’
‘Twenty-nine as far as we know.’
‘I’ll be number twenty-nine then, will I?’
Parish struggled against the restraints. ‘Not if I can help it.’
‘Even if you could get yourself free, it wouldn’t do me any good. I’m already dead. I wouldn’t want to live without hands and feet, and without skin. All I want to do now is die.’
Looking at the monster in front of him, Parish understood. He knew that if he’d been in the same position he would make exactly the same decision. He would never want to live looking like that. They said that all life was precious, but sometimes it wasn’t true.
‘Do you know where he is?’
‘No, he dumped you in here, and then left.’
‘My partner’s coming back to the hide with the Island Custodian – Tracy Duquemin.’
‘They should be able to get the better of him, shouldn’t they?’
‘They’re both women.’
‘Ah.’
What the hell was he going to do? Either Richards would never find him, or Maitland would grab both her and Tracy.
They’d never suspected. No wonder Maitland had got away with it for all these years. He worked on his own. He’d had time to create an underground horror chamber. If they hadn’t run his name through the CrimInt database he would probably have gone unnoticed for another thirty years.
He needed to get out of these restraints and warn Richards she was walking into a trap, but how? He squirmed along the ground towards the metal contraption. Maybe he could use that to cut through the wrist restraint.
***
It was so dark when they stepped inside the hide that Richards said, ‘Wait, I’ll go to the car and get a torch.’
‘I’m not staying in here on my own,’ Tracy said and followed Richards outside. ‘I’ll wait here for you.’
Richards hurried across the field, got two torches from the boot of the car, and hurried back again.
‘Tracy?’ she called as she approached the hide. She had a strong urge to call her “Bitch”, but she thought she’d better not. She didn’t want her complaining to the Chief, and getting her into trouble.
There was no answer.
She shone the torch all around, but Tracy seemed to have disappeared. ‘Tracy,’ she called again.
There was still no response. Maybe the bitch had gone into the hide after all. She went up the two wooden steps, and stood on the raised wooden floor. At the far end was Maitland with a knife at Tracy’s throat.
‘Good, we’re all here now,’ he said.
Richards wondered how she could get Tracy away from him. ‘Let her go.’
‘I don’t think so, and you’re going to do exactly what I say, or I’ll slit Tracy’s throat.’
What was she going to do? If she moved towards him he’d slit Tracy’s throat, and then come after her. If she didn’t do as he said he’d probably do the same. If she did as he said, he’d have to kill them both anyway. Where was Inspector Parish? How did they keep ending up in these life-threatening situations?
‘Come over here,’ Maitland said.
She hesitated.
‘Now.’
She moved towards him.
‘Put the torch down and leave it switched on.’
Of course, she had a second torch stuffed in the front of her jacket. She moved the torch to her left hand, and then leaned down to place it in on the floor. At the same, she time pulled the second torch out of her jacket and held it behind her thigh.
‘Come closer.’
She inched towards him.
‘Turn round and put your hands behind your back.’
As she began to turn, she brought the torch up to hit him on the side of the head, but he was ready for her.
He gripped her wrist with his large stubby hands and squeezed.
She dropped the torch as pain shot up her arm, but she’d also learnt something at self-defence classes. She twist
ed round and grabbed his wrist with her left hand, and carried on turning. She knew he would overpower her, but the element of surprise made him release Tracy and move the knife away from her neck.
‘Run,’ she shouted at Tracy.
Tracy ran towards the door, but her wrists were secured behind her back. She tripped as she went through the door opening and fell heavily on the ground.
Richards kicked Maitland in the testicles, and he released her wrist with a grunt.
She raced after Tracy, but just as she was going through the doorway Maitland grabbed her round the waist. They both tumbled out of the hide on top of Tracy in a mess of arms and legs.
Maitland was first to his feet, and he still had the knife in his hand. He dragged Richards up by her hair.
‘I should have expected that. If you try anything else I’ll just cut first and ask questions later. Are we clear?’
She nodded.
‘What?’
‘Yes.’
Tracy had extricated herself from the melee, but instead of running off into the field to hide she was standing watching.
‘You should have run away,’ Richards said.
‘Where? There’s nowhere to run to in this part of the island.’
‘Right, shut up the pair of you.’ He turned Richards round, and secured her wrists behind her back. ‘There, that should keep you out of trouble.’
Maitland pushed them both towards the hide, and just as they were climbing inside they heard a commotion behind them.
‘Looks like I got here just in time,’ a voice came out of the darkness that Richards recognised.
‘Mr Chubley,’ she said. She felt like crying as the relief at being safe washed over her, but she held the tears in.
They moved outside again. Mr Chubley was swinging a baseball bat between his two hands.
Maitland was lying in a heap next to the door of the hide.
‘Here, let me cut you free,’ Chubley said.
He cut their wrist restraints with his own knife.
Richards hugged him and said, ‘You’re an angel in disguise, Mr Chubley, but what are you doing here?’
He smiled. ‘I was over on the East of my island with my binoculars watching the birds, and saw Maitland here hit your Inspector fella. Well, I know I don’t like him much, but I didn’t think he deserved a wallop over the head. So, I gets in my boat and rows over here.’