Death and Faxes

by Julie Howlin

  I wondered if Detective Inspector Jamie Swan would show up with the Ice Queen, but he didn't. I was disappointed. I didn't know why.

  When the band took a break, we went to the bar to order something to eat.

  ‘Sorry, guys, no food,’ the barman said.

  ‘The sign outside says food from lunch till late,’ Simon protested. ‘You shouldn't be advertising it if it's not true.’

  ‘Yeah. Well. I'm afraid our chef went AWOL, and it's been impossible to find another one after all that trouble.’

  ‘But your sign says...’

  ‘Never mind, Si,’ Jess cut in. ‘Just some crisps, then. We can go for a curry after.’

  ‘So what you really need right now is some DRT,’ Jess announced, as we got back to our table, popping a prawn cocktail flavour crisp into her mouth.

  ‘Some what?’

  ‘DRT. Daniel Replacement Therapy. Quickest way to get over somebody is to find somebody else.’

  ‘Easier said than done. This is me we’re talking about, not some supermodel.’

  ‘Come on, Sweetie Pie, don’t they teach you in psychic school that you create your own life? Cosmic ordering and all that? You ask the universe for the best possible guy, and, presto! I just read a book about it.’

  ‘Sure, Simon. They do - but it’s never worked for me yet. Come to think of it, it’s not done you much good, either.’

  ‘I haven’t tried it yet, Sweets. But I’d like to see you try it so I can see if it works. What you need to do is make a list of everything you want in a man. Give the universe a delivery date, like, next week, so you don’t have to wait too long, and it will deliver.’

  ‘You make it sound like I’m ordering a pizza,’ I said.

  ‘I think it’s a great idea,’ Jess was saying, already fishing in her bag for paper and a pen. ‘We’ll make a list right now.’ Ever organised, Jess produced a small purple notebook and a pen. She turned to a blank page, took the pen in hand and looked at me. ‘Go ahead. What do you want your next man to be like?’

  I thought for a moment. ‘Dark curly hair,’ I said. Like Daniel.

  ‘Uh-huh. Has Owen Wilson got dark curly hair?’ Simon objected.

  ‘No, but -’

  ‘Or Brad Pitt? Or Jon Bon Jovi?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘But I’ve heard you say in the past that you’d shag any one of them given the chance. So I put it to you that hair colour doesn’t matter.’

  I realised too late that starting with hair colour had been a bad move. Simon was a redhead - and during his morose times, usually after he’d been dumped, he’d cry into his Bacardi and coke that ‘Nobody wants a ginger poof.’

  ‘Okay. I just want him to have some hair.’ Simon shot me a doleful look. Another mistake. Lately, he was convinced that his hairline was starting to recede and this had been another trauma, as he was now saying that being ginger was at least preferable to being bald. It looked like this list-making was not going too well - all I was doing so far was upsetting Simon.

  ‘Let’s move on,’ Jess said, diplomatically. ‘What else?’

  ‘Warm brown eyes.’ Again, like Daniel.

  ‘That’s the same as hair colour. Doesn’t matter,’ said Jess.

  ‘Okay - I want someone who has eyes.’

  ‘Well, that narrows it down a bit,’ said Simon.

  ‘Good looking,’ I said.

  ‘Lookist!’ Simon said, indignantly. ‘We ugly guys have hearts and feelings too, you know.’

  ‘You’re not ugly, Simon,’ said Jess. ‘And beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I think what Tabitha means is someone who is good looking in her opinion. What next?’

  ‘Under thirty,’ I said.

  Simon, who seemed to have had a sudden boost in self-esteem, commented, ‘I’m thirty-five and I remember you once said you’d shag me if I wasn’t gay.’

  ‘All right. I’d consider anyone under forty. But he must be single - no married men, and definitely no kids.’

  ‘No matter how cute?’ Jess queried.

  ‘No matter how cute.’

  ‘You want him to be a virgin?’ Simon asked.

  ‘Doesn’t matter, as long as he knows what contraception is.’ Jess scribbled in her pad. ‘Accepts that I’m psychic,’ I said. After what had just happened, I realised that was the most important thing to me. Jess wrote it down.

  By the time the band were ready to start their second set, we had a list. Jess tore the page out of her book and handed it to me for approval.

  1. Dark curly hair Has hair.

  2. Brown eyes Eyes.

  3. Under 30 40.

  4. Good looking (in Tabs’ opinion)

  5. Single

  6. No kids, no matter how cute.

  7. Knows what contraception is

  8. Accepts Tabs is psychic

  9. Decent job

  10. House or flat. SOMEWHERE NICE

  11. Owns Porsche nice car

  12. Hates football

  13. Adores Tabs

  14. Reliable

  15. Phones more than once a month.

  ‘That will do,’ I said.

  With a solemn flourish, Simon got out his cigarette lighter and took the list from me. Folding it and placing it in the ashtray, he set it alight. We got several disapproving looks, and I was afraid for a moment we’d get thrown out. But when Simon doused the fire with some cola, and the band came back on stage, people turned to watch them and forgot about us.

  I glanced around again just in case DI Jamie Swan had decided to drop in. I didn't see him, but I saw that the female spirit was still disappearing through the door to the ladies bathroom. She had all the hallmarks of being an imprint. An imprint is like an echo, or a tape that keeps getting replayed. They arise usually when there has been some kind of trauma in a place, strong emotions. This becomes imprinted on the ether and plays back, over and over. Kind of like the holographic image of Princess Leia in Star Wars: ‘Help me Obi Wan Kenobi, you’re my only hope... Help me Obi Wan Kenobi, you’re my only hope... Help me...’

  People who are sensitive, like me, are more likely to see them. Imprints are usually no more aware of the observer than the hologram of Princess Leia would be. They play the same scene over and over, and never interact with anyone. Just an imprint. Nothing to worry about. But then she walked through the bar, and looked right at me. Our eyes met. She knew I could see her. She beckoned to me. With a shudder, I turned back to the band. I tried to ignore her, kid myself she was just an imprint, but I could not deny the pleading look in her eyes. This was no imprint. It was a spirit, and she wanted my help. I sighed. I was enjoying listening to the band and looking forward to that curry. I didn't want my evening ruined by a demanding spirit. My conscience nagged at me. Gran would try to help her, it said.

  I excused myself and went into the toilets.

  She was standing beside the hand drier. ‘Will you help me, Tabitha?’ she asked.

  ‘What is it you think I can do?’ I replied.

  ‘Tell them I haven't just done a bunk,’ she said. ‘I've come in every night, like I'm supposed to, but I can't do anything and nobody can see me. Until they find my body, they'll keep on thinking I'm an unreliable little shit.’

  Just then, the door burst open and two giggly young women came in, discussing loudly the antics of someone called Josh. One of them walked right through my new spirit friend, oblivious, although she did shiver slightly as she did so. They couldn't see her.

  ‘Please, you will help me, won’t you?’ the spirit was pleading.

  I was reluctant to answer. We’ve all seen those movies, haven’t we, where the hero or heroine can see a ghost, or God, or an angel, but nobody else can, and there is usually a shot of them apparently speaking to empty air, and their friends or relatives seeing them and getting straight on the phone to the funny farm.

  ‘Please? Talk to me,’ the spirit pleaded.

  I had what I thought was a pretty brilliant idea. I took my mobile phone out of my b
ag and held it to my ear. ‘How can I help?’

  ‘They think I let them down,’ she said.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Everybody.’

  ‘But you’re not unreliable. It’s not your fault you’re...’

  One of the giggly girls emerged from a cubicle, looked at me briefly and started primping her blonde curls in the mirror.

  ‘...well, you know.’

  ‘They don’t know I’m dead. Nobody does.’

  ‘Except me, right?’

  ‘Right. You’re the only one.’

  ‘Okay, but I don’t officially know. I can hardly just come out with it. As far as anyone is concerned, I don’t even know you.’

  ‘He hid my body in Epping Forest.’

  I shuddered at the bald, matter of fact way she stated this.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘I don’t know who he was. He killed me and hid my body.’

  ‘Okay. Where? Can you tell me?’

  ‘I’m not sure... but I could show you.’

  ‘Not right now,’ I said. I wasn’t sure I relished going looking for a decomposing corpse in a forest at any time, but certainly not at eleven o’clock at night.

  ‘It doesn’t have to be now. Tomorrow. In the daylight. Come to the Connaught Water car park.’

  ‘Can I bring someone with me?’ I had someone particular in mind.

  ‘If it would help,’ she said. ‘I’ll be waiting.’ Her request delivered, she vanished. I pressed a random key on my phone as if ending a call and dropped it into my bag. I felt rather proud of myself. I’d managed to have a conversation with an entity nobody else could see without looking as if I’d lost the plot.

  ‘‘Scuse me?’ one of the giggly girls said. ‘But what mobile company are you with? ‘Cos I can never get a signal in here.’

  19 epping forest

  I’d thought that working as a psychic detective would be hard - that I’d spend hours meditating on cases and getting nothing - but it seemed that spirits would seek me out at any time, even when I wasn’t, strictly speaking, ‘working’. It was as if someone had placed an ad in Spirit World Weekly: Were You Murdered? Need To Clear Your Name? Have The Living Struggled To Find Out Who Killed You? Tabitha Drake is Open for Business, 24/7.

  Without Jamie Swan as a contact, I would have had to cold call sceptics and try to persuade them to listen. Perhaps it was my very association with Jamie Swan that attracted them - not only could I see and hear them, I had a hotline to Somebody Who Could Do Something.

  I still cringed when I remembered that night in the bar with Jamie and the way he had verbally attacked me, but again, I found myself with information for him; information which could save lives.

  Reluctantly, I picked up the phone. ‘It’s me again, Tabitha Drake,’ I said when he picked up.

  ‘Is it a good time to talk?’

  ‘I was having my breakfast,’ he said. I could hear he had a mouthful of toast or something. ‘But it beats the middle of the night, I suppose. Fire away.’

  I told him about my conversation with the spirit the night before. ‘She wants to show me where her body is hidden. Today. Epping Forest.’ I wished I could just hand the whole thing over to him, but since he couldn't see or hear the spirit, we'd all have to work together.

  I wanted nothing to do with police work and in particular I wanted nothing to do with Jamie Swan. Only the spirit world seemed to have other ideas. Like it or not, I was being sucked in.

  **

  I arrived at the car park first. It was empty apart from the spirit. She was there, hovering by the footpath which led into the woods. She was tapping her foot. It felt awkward. A car drew up, a low-slung silver sporty looking thing. Great, I thought. Someone to see me standing here like a lemon. Like I've been stood up.

  The door opened and Jamie Swan got out. He was wearing the leather jacket, jeans and walking boots. ‘Hi,’ he said.

  ‘Er, Hi,’ I replied. ‘Nice car. I thought you'd show up in a police car.’

  He smiled. ‘Plain clothes. This is a plain clothes car.’

  I glanced at the ghost, who gave me a look that said, ‘enough of the chit-chat, let's get moving’.

  ‘She's here,’ I said.

  ‘Are you ready?’ Jamie asked.

  ‘No, but then I'm not sure I'll ever be ready to see a dead body that's been lying in a forest for weeks.’ I shuddered at the thought.

  ‘Neither was I, the first time I visited a crime scene,’ Jamie said. ‘I’m not sure it ever gets any easier. You just learn to detach yourself and be professional. But it still gets to you when you go to bed at night and turn the light out. I really appreciate this. I know how hard it must be for you.’ He smiled again. My heart did a little back flip, until I remembered the blonde I’d seen him canoodling with in the King’s Arms. This was business. He was strictly off limits. Hell, I didn’t even like him - did I?

  The spirit started moving along the path a little way and then stopped, looking at me. Waiting.

  I took a step towards her. ‘What’s your name?’ I asked. ‘Who are you?’ She said nothing, and started walking into the woods. She moved very quickly. Spirits, I guessed, did not have to contend with stray twigs snagging their clothes, and didn’t have to avoid the stinging nettles. I beckoned to Jamie and stumbled after her, wishing I'd worn my scruffy old jeans and trainers instead of my smart white trousers and wedge sandals. I didn't want to admit to myself that I had wanted Jamie Swan to see me looking good, or that he would have been more impressed if I'd thought things through and dressed more appropriately.

  The spirit stopped every now and again, like a dog that wants you to follow it, to make sure we were still on her trail.

  ‘She won’t tell me her name,’ I said, kicking at a pile of dry leaves.

  ‘We’ll be able to find out,’ Jamie said. ‘We have our methods, without resorting to asking ghosts.’

  If it were not for the prospect of finding a grisly corpse at any moment, and a demanding spirit guide who seemed to think this was a route march, I would have quite enjoyed the walk. The sun was shining and cast a dappled pattern of light and shadow all around us. It was wonderful to be in nature - now and again I would catch sight of an unusual mushroom sprouting from a decaying log, a shiny millipede scuttling up the bark of a tree, or a fat spider holding court in the centre of a web. If it had been just a walk, I might have stopped for a closer look at those things, and shared the wonder of it with my companions, but the ghost girl drew us relentlessly deeper into the woods. Nevertheless, I couldn’t resist taking deep breaths of the musty, damp forest smell and kicking at the leaves as I went. Until suddenly my foot hit something.

  It was a doll. A grubby and tattered Mitzi Chef doll, or the torso of one, at least. I knew it was the chef, because she wore checked pants and had a wooden spoon welded to one hand. I bent to pick it up.

  ‘Don’t,’ Jamie said. ‘Leave it. I think we must be close.’ He knew something, I thought. Something about the doll. Is that what this guy did? Leave a doll at the crime scene? That must have been the detail the papers were holding back.

  The spirit had stopped and was pointing at a patch of briar and ferns a few meters ahead of us. I could see what looked like a leg protruding from the undergrowth, and at once I felt sick. ‘Stay here,’ Jamie said, laying a hand on my arm. I was more than happy to do as he said. Leaning on the rough bark of an old tree, and taking deep breaths to settle my stomach and centre myself, I watched as he walked up to where the spirit stood, and bend over the leg, a grave look on his face. He turned to me and nodded grimly.

  The spirit girl turned to look at me. ‘Thank you,’ she mouthed, and began to fade.

  ‘Wait,’ I called. ‘Who are you? What’s your name?’

  ‘It’s okay,’ Jamie said. ‘There’s a handbag - it’s bound to have some ID in it.’

  I looked back to where she had been standing, but she had already vanished. I hoped she knew that her work on this plane was done and she could
now move on to where she was supposed to be.

  Jamie was already on the telephone to his colleagues, reporting that he had found a body and requesting a forensic team on the scene as soon as possible. He was in his element, and knew exactly what he was doing.

  **

  I’d been sitting in a pub for about half an hour sipping a double brandy (I don’t normally touch the stuff, but Jamie assured me that if you are cold and wet and a bit shaken, it’s just what you need. As liquid warmth spread through my insides, I concluded that he knew exactly what he was talking about) when Jamie returned to tell me what had happened.

  The victim’s handbag contained a purse, credit card and driving licence, a letter addressed to her mother in Spain and a pay slip from the King's Arms - more than enough to identify her as Yvonne Cullen, the missing cook.

  She lived alone, her family were in Spain. No one, save her boss, to notice she had gone missing - and he’d just assumed she had blown him out. I was grateful all of a sudden for my family, annoying as they could be - at least if I vanished, somebody would notice, even if it was only my mum.

  I was feeling quite shaky after all this, and was grateful for Jamie’s offer of a lift home. On the way, clearly seeing me as part of the team, now, he told me a little more about the cases he was working on, including the small detail that told the police they were dealing with a serial killer. I was right. ‘At each crime scene, we find one of those dolls,’ he said. ‘Always with its head torn off, somewhere near the body. I’m telling you in case you can tune in to something - but it’s not common knowledge. If we publicise that we might get copycat killers who decide to do the same thing, or killers who use it to throw us off their scent. Just don’t tell anyone.’

  ‘I won’t,’ I said.

  ‘If we hadn’t been looking for a murder victim it would have been a nice walk,’ he said, as he drove up to my estate. ‘Did you see that enormous spider sitting in its web? It had built it between two trees. Nature’s amazing, don’t you think?’