by Conrad Jones
Despite having a no-pets policy, he offered me a room in a converted outhouse on the proviso that none of the other guests saw Evie. I agreed but told him that I was hiding from my ex-wife who was suing me for every penny that I owned, and that I would have to pay cash. He laughed and told me that he’d bought that particular T-shirt himself, and we signed in under the name of Eris Jones. That suited me, and we had a few days of warm water, good food and comfortable beds. I spent the time writing on my laptop, stopping every hour to watch the news updates. The news wasn’t good. I was now the main suspect in a triple-homicide investigation, and the police were warning the general public not to approach me as I was armed and extremely dangerous. My photograph was all over the nationals, as was a description of the truck. They used photographs of trucks the same make and model. I’d parked it out of sight behind the outhouses so that none of the guests would see it. Graham had seen it though and that bothered me. I didn’t know where to turn, and I was thinking about turning myself in when he tapped on the door late one night. To be honest, I thought it was the police and I hugged the Staffie before opening the door, but it was Graham and he was alone.
“I wondered if you fancied a few quiet drinks and some company,” he asked. My first instinct was to refuse, but he held up a bottle of single malt and two glasses. “I think we need a chat, Eris,” he added seriously. “I mean you no harm and your business is your own, but I think you’re in trouble and I may be able to help.”
I’m not sure why I trusted Graham, but I did. Maybe he reminded me of my father in some ways. I let him into the room and we cracked open the whisky. He made a proper fuss of Evie Jones, and after a few drinks he asked me outright if I was the man that the police were looking for. There didn’t seem to be much point in denying it. I told him that I was indeed Conrad Jones and that I had killed those people, but I explained my reasons and told him most of the story. He listened intently and nodded his head as I explained the events of the past weeks. The whisky had loosened my tongue and the whole saga came out. After an hour or so, Graham frowned and rubbed the grey stubble on his chin. “You’re going to have to get rid of that truck if you’re to have any chance of hiding from the law.” He lowered his voice as if someone was listening at the door. “Listen, I know a lot of travellers who go to and fro from Ireland and they’re always on the lookout for dodgy motors, especially four-by-fours. I’ll do you a deal.” He raised a bushy grey eyebrow. “Wait here a minute.” He tapped the side of his nose with his index finger as he got up and left the room. Evie sniffed at the door as it closed. If she liked him then I couldn’t go far wrong.
When he returned, he had a carrier bag stuffed with some of his belongings. He pulled out a flat cap and black rimmed reading glasses. I had already let my hair and stubble grow attempting to change my appearance. Combined with the glasses and cap, they aged me by ten years at least. The stubble on my chin was nearly silver in colour, and although it itched like crazy, it was the best disguise I could come up with. “I’ve shaved my head for years, so a wig would be good,” I laughed as I put on the cap and glasses. It was a simple disguise, but they aged me enough to make me look like any other middle-aged tourist in Cumbria, and there were thousands of them.
“I’ve never had much call for a wig,” he chuckled, rubbing the wiry mop of grey hair on his head. “Where would you buy a wig in the Lake District? The cap will have to do for now! I’ll get you a few grand for the truck as long as you promise to put my pub in the book!” I laughed and gave him the keys. I’d hidden the weapons days ago in the woods behind the outhouse.
How could I refuse his offer? His kindness will stay with me as long as I live. The next day he knocked on my door and brought out a brown envelope full of cash and a set of car keys. “Here’s three grand for the truck and here’s the keys to my Land Rover. I don’t use it anymore. If I’m truthful with you, I lost my licence last March driving pissed-up and I was going to sell it anyway. I’ve taken three hundred quid out of your money for the Landy if that’s okay with you.” I thanked him and shook his hand warmly. “I’ll call after closing and we can have a few drams if you like. I’ve got a lovely bottle of Talisker which nobody likes!” His eyes smiled but there was sadness in them, too. He knew that he wouldn’t see us again. “Look after him, Evie Jones.” He patted her one last time and left. With the truck gone, he was implicated in aiding and abetting a known criminal. If I stayed around he would probably lose his pub, and I felt that it was time to move on.
Confident that my disguise had transformed me enough not to get recognized and with a new vehicle, we drifted from one guesthouse to another. Using the Internet to search out the most remote, dog-friendly places, we stayed on the move. I began to think that we’d cracked it and I was tempted to call my partner and explain everything. Half of me wanted to hear her voice, but the other half knew that the call could be traced. And I wasn’t convinced that she would by sympathetic to my version of events anyway. I continued to write about the Niners and the story of Jennifer Booth, but sometimes I would start to shake and cry. As the days and weeks went by, post-traumatic stress began to bubble to the surface. The true horrors of the violent deaths at my hands were seeping into my soul.
I drove into Ambleside one day, which is a biggish town on the shores of Lake Windermere. I bought SIM cards from one of the supermarkets and put them into my Blackberry. I was itching to call home and speak to my partner, my mum, my brother and my friends, but I dared not. Isolation and anonymity were good therapy, and they were keeping my liberty intact.
I bought a red top newspaper which was carrying the story of the hunt for me. No one was actually saying that I was the murderer, but the police weren’t seeking anyone else to help with their enquiries. Fuck off, that means, I’m guilty as charged. The entire story had finally come out, which I thought would help me, but it hadn’t. It sounded like I had suffered a mental breakdown and turned into a violent killer. My whereabouts were a total unknown. The press were reporting the story of the crime-thriller writer who had gone on a killing spree with a shotgun following the mysterious death of his friend, a serving officer in the murder squad. Some reporters were linking other recent victims to the story, while others were toying with the theory that, unable to cope with the murders, I may have taken my own life.
It was big news. They plastered it across the newspapers and local and national television. Despite the fact that my appearance hadn’t raised an eyebrow for weeks, we had to pack up and move on as frequently as we dared. My picture was being broadcast daily. If they had concentrated as much attention on the description of my dog, then we’d have been spotted weeks before, but no one knew for sure if she was with me. The forensic details from the farm hadn’t disclosed that his dogs were savaged to death. Had those details been released, I think I would be in a cell and Evie Jones would be glue.
I bought a two-berth caravan from a farmer for five hundred pounds. He allowed me to pitch it next to a stream on his land where he rented out pitches to the odd camper who couldn’t get on the proper sites. Mould riddled the walls and it smelled damp, but it would become home for the next few months.
As I studied the newspapers it became obvious that some of the reports were being tainted by people who had it in for me. The Niners were trying to manipulate the news to suit them. They couldn’t go public to find me, but they could use their influence to gain public opinion, so I decided to do the same. It was time to stick my head above the parapet and tell my side of the tale. When I wasn’t writing, I spent every waking hour hammering the Internet with my story. My address book is full of press contacts from my years of publishing books. I e-mailed everyone that I had in my address book and sent them my version of events. I used open Wi-Fi networks to message everyone that was important to me. I was touched by some of the messages of support that were posted on my pages and sickened by some of the derisory comments from those who didn’t believe me, Peter’s family included. Not everyone liked me enough to tak
e me at my word and who could blame them?
The book forums and writers’ groups on Amazon and Facebook were buzzing with my story, but a lot of people thought that my version didn’t add up and it was just another one of my stories. Under the microscope, the facts were there for all to see. Three people were shot and killed and I was on the run. Guilty as charged, Mr Jones. Many of my contacts shrugged off my Internet rants about the Order of Nine Angels as the desperate efforts of a condemned man to escape his fate. The Niners had members and casual sympathizers at executive level across the spectrum of the press and they ensured that they painted me as a psychopathic murderer. Every chapter and word of my published novels were analysed, and because they are violent stories, general opinion was that my mind was already warped and that I had been a ticking time bomb waiting to go off. Maybe I am. Who knows?
Anyway, it was pleasing at the time that my Internet campaign was working to some degree. People were hammering Google and discovering the myriads of satanic orders that are out there. There was a wave of panic across North America in the nineties following the discovery of the sexual abuse of children and human sacrifice by satanic organizations, and the press began to drag up cases from decades ago. Look it up for yourself. You may believe me if you do. Some of them have Facebook pages. How bonkers is that? Hello, I am in a secret satanic cult, so you can find me on Facebook if you want to chat about sacrifice, child abuse or how the dark arts are working for you today. Is it me, or has the world reached a new level of madness since the worldwide web became established?
The beauty of it is that it works both ways. They can find each other, but you can find them in minutes. I have always used the Internet to its full capacity to market my books and clearing my name was no different. The sceptics amongst the press were crawling all over their websites and people were beginning to ask questions about their identities. The idiots who joined their Facebook forums were suddenly in full view for all to see, and their membership crashed overnight. Chat rooms were alive with discussions about my plight. After two full weeks of screaming my innocence, one of the big tabloids ran an investigative report into the Nine Angels and their sister groups, and because it was front page news the other red tops followed suit. The existence of dangerous satanic cults actively recruiting and operating both globally on the Internet and on the streets of the UK became an accepted fact.
A friend of the reporter Malcolm Baines highlighted the fact that he had been working on a story about the Niners when he died. The newspaper ran a thorough investigation into his research and discovered that his work had been deleted. When they tracked down the computer terminal responsible for the deletion, Jason Clement resigned in shame and his face was plastered across the news. He was arrested by the police for possession of indecent images of children; the search of his home address and his personal computer uncovered thousands more. The investigation didn’t end there. The Met’s computer boffins traced hundreds of links and documents which had been sent to an address on their own server. A high ranking officer, Inspector Woods, was dismissed in disgrace and later arrested for possession of child pornography. Woods hung himself before he went to court.
The arrests forced the police to reopen the investigation into the death of Malcolm Baines. A detailed search of his computer revealed that he had never joined any Internet gambling sites. His bank account, credit card and login details were all uploaded from Jason Clement’s personal computer. Three months after his arrest for possessing child porn, he was rearrested on suspicion of the murder of Malcolm Baines and held on remand at HMP Brixton. On the morning of his second day of incarceration, his throat was slit by a fellow inmate. Like I said to Ged Knowles, what goes around comes around.
Cold cases from the eighties and nineties were scrutinized time and again. At last the world was listening to me, and as the clamour from the UK drifted across Europe and the Atlantic, law enforcement agencies worldwide began to look into the groups from a different perspective. Suddenly, their websites began to disappear and their profiles on the social networking sites vanished. Facebook and Twitter removed and blocked anyone connected to their pages. Photographers and reporters swamped the Brunt Boggart Farm and its dark past was investigated in depth, which added to the intrigue of the entire backstory. The police searched the place in detail. I’d seen it on the news. What the police found, if anything, I’ll never know; the Niners are not stupid. They would have cleansed the farm of any incriminating evidence as soon as Officer Knowles was found dead.
Detectives were receiving calls from thousands of parents and friends of missing people who they thought may have had links with the cults. It had worked. I had done exactly what Jennifer asked me to do before she died; I had succeeded in slowing them down. They had been forced into the spotlight and like any creepy crawly they were scurrying for the shadows. I was elated; I felt like I had won.
When the newspapers launched their coverage of the story, I drove to Ambleside and bought Evie Jones some lambs’ liver from a butcher’s shop and a bottle of Jack Daniels for me. We had something to celebrate at last. They were under the microscope and I revelled in the discomfort I was causing them. There would be powerful people shitting their pants right now, and that made me laugh aloud. I gave her the liver raw and we spent a few days feeling like there was a light at the end of the dark tunnel we’d been travelling through.
My mirth was short lived. If they hated me before, now I was number one on the hit list for every would-be satanist on the planet. Internet trolls began slating my books on Amazon. Dozens of crap reviews appeared overnight. My exposure to the press had boosted book sales to new heights, but the deluge of one-star reviews brought them crashing back down. They began to use the Internet as effectively as I had. They set up a fake Conrad Jones profile on Facebook and began adding all my friends. Imagine you are one of my close friends and you know what has gone on from the newspapers. All of a sudden, you get a friend request from me. Then I ask you for help. They were fishing for information from my friends about my whereabouts, and they could tell from the replies who had been in contact recently.
The newspapers were hounding people that I’d worked with decades ago. I knew because of the ridiculous quotes that were being printed on a daily basis. A couple of ex-girlfriends were pictured in one of the Sunday papers. Of course they couldn’t believe what a lucky escape they had had. Fuck off, I hadn’t seen them for twenty years. Looking at them now, it was me that had had the luck escape.
I monitored the fake Facebook pages and tried to let people know that it wasn’t me. I have no way of knowing who fell for it, but that is when my best friend Ross and my ex-girlfriend disappeared. Ross was never found, but my ex turned up in the River Lune. They were upping the ante in their search for me. I desperately tried to warn everyone on my friends list not to talk to me – it wasn’t me. I messaged everyone and deleted my friends list to protect them. They were attacking my close friends, and when I found out Ross was missing I cried. They found his dog Alfie slaughtered. I knew that it wouldn’t be long before they went for my family. My mother was seventy-two then and my younger brother lived close to her. If they identified them as my only close family then they could kill two birds with one stone. I couldn’t see any end to it. It was hard enough running and leaving my life behind me. Protecting myself and Evie was difficult enough. If they targeted my friends and family then the rules had to change.
I decided against all my better instincts that I would call my brother. I used a pay-as-you-go SIM card and drove thirty miles north to Keswick in case the police were monitoring his calls too. I was paranoid about giving my position away. When I got through to him, after an avalanche of questions about where I was and what was going on, we both broke down in tears. My family had been devastated by the whole dreadful episode. Apart from the Internet postings and the endless stories in the press, they didn’t have a clue whether I was guilty or innocent. I had to put him straight on that. I was guilty. I did kill those
people, but I told him it was self-defence. My brother knows that I have a fiery temper, but he accepted my version of events without question.
He told me that the police had been pressing my partner and my family to appear on television to appeal to me to turn myself in. I asked him to make sure that the first thing he did when he got off the telephone was to make sure that everyone we knew stayed out of the news and off the television screens. I spelled it out to him: they were all targets. He told me that the vast majority of people were backing me and that the feedback they were getting from the police and the press was positive on the whole. He asked me if there was any way that they could help, but I couldn’t think of anything. I said that I would be in touch as soon as it was safe to do so and we said a teary goodbye. It was good to talk to him, and for a few minutes I felt normal again.
On the way back to the caravan, I stopped at a small cafe to get some coffee and let Evie have a walk. It was on the shores of Coniston Water and the clouds had moved enough to allow a view of the peak of Coniston Old Man. The sun was trying hard to warm the earth while the clouds were away. I paid for my coffee and picked up a newspaper before making my way to an empty picnic table outside. It wasn’t really warm enough to sit outside, but I couldn’t relax while people were around. Every second glance made me nervous. Had they recognized me as the monster that was running from the police?
When I picked up the newspaper, my heart sank. On the front page was a full-length photograph of a woman called Pamela Bonner. I recognized her eyes immediately. She had the type of eyes that made men go weak at the knees. We were serious for a few years and we talked about marriage, but our careers took us in different directions. There was another major hurdle: I was already married. Some of you will judge me and that’s fine, but we didn’t mean to fall in love, it just happened. The rights and wrongs of the affair don’t matter now, but if she had asked me to leave my wife and commit to her, I would have. She had eyes like Elizabeth Taylor in Cleopatra. Pamela was stunning when we were young and she didn’t look bad in the newspaper either. The headline read, wanted writer is the father of my daughter. I laughed aloud, drawing curious glances from an elderly couple who were determined enough to sit outside too. I wondered how much they had paid her for that load of crap. I hadn’t clapped eyes on her for years, so how could I be the father of her child? She must have fallen on hard times to come up with that one, but she had no idea what she had done. She had ruined any chances of my partner coming back to me. Yes Conrad, I forgive you for setting fire to our home, murdering three people and having an affair, no problem. Oh and by the way, when is your daughter’s birthday? I’ll put it on the calendar so we don’t forget. I laughed as I read the in-depth article, but the more I read, the less comical it became. Most of it was true. In fact, all of it was true apart from the daughter bit.