Banks didn’t like being driven through the London streets without any clue as to where he was going or what he was to expect when he got there. At least he knew where he was as the driver went past Marble Arch on to Bayswater Road. Not that that helped him a lot. It was one of the better days of the week, and Hyde Park and Kensington gardens were busy with people flying kites, throwing sticks for their dogs, sailing model boats on the Serpentine, or just lying on the grass reading in the sun, lovers touching and kissing. Ordinary things. Why did Banks always feel there was an invisible screen between himself and these ordinary things of life? It was another world, slightly blurred, and he couldn’t get into it no matter how loud he hammered at the glass. Nobody heard. He was outside. Nobody inside paid him any attention. He’d had dreams like that and woke up in the early hours sweating, heart pounding.
The car continued on as Bayswater Road became Notting Hill Gate, then Holland Park Avenue. Finally, it turned down a broad, tree-lined street of elegant Victorian houses, and into a narrow mews, where the old coach houses and stables had been converted into small homes, most of them with whitewashed exteriors livened up by the occasional splash of bright color on a door, a garage or window frames. Some of the houses had hanging baskets or window boxes of red, yellow, purple and pink flowers.
The car came to a halt and Banks got out. The uniformed officer on guard opened the door and a familiar figure beckoned Banks inside. It was Superintendent Hatchard, pipe firmly clamped between his teeth, but not lit. When Banks’s eyes had adjusted to the dim light in the neat, tiny living room, he saw there was someone else present.
“I’d like you to meet someone, Alan,” Hatchard said, after removing his pipe. “This is Detective Superintendent Burgess. He’s Special Branch. Or something like that.” It was clear to Banks that Hatchard didn’t approve of whatever Burgess stood for, but that his hands were tied in the matter: he was only obeying orders. As for Burgess, he didn’t seem overly concerned with such delicacies. He wore a leather jacket over his open-neck checked shirt, despite the heat, blue denim jeans and white trainers. He was about six feet tall, in good shape, handsome, in a macho sort of way, with a strong jaw, slightly crooked teeth and cynical gray eyes. He can’t have been much older than Banks, but his hair was touched with gray at the temples.
“Banksy, pleased to meet you,” he said, as if they were old friends, sticking out his hand.
Banks shook. He was sure he had seen Burgess before and was trying to place him when the man himself did it for him. “About two or three years ago. Recent Falklands veteran, bit of a war hero, got himself into a scrape at a nightclub.”
“Beat up one of the girls and stabbed a doorman, you mean?”
“That’s the one. Can’t have our heroes looking like villains in the national press, can we? Especially when they’re shell-shocked.”
“So you’re the one they send around when they need a cover-up?”
Burgess laughed. “Very good. Very astute of you.” He put his hand on Banks’s elbow. “Come with me. I’ve got something to show you. Soon as that’s done we’ll get the team in and head down the road for a nice drink, just you and me.”
Curious, Banks followed him up the stairs, along a corridor and through the door into the bathroom. It was just about big enough to hold the two of them.
It was obvious to Banks the moment he crossed the threshold that something was terribly wrong. The blood spatter on the cream tiles certainly wasn’t part of the decor, and there was a cloying smell, as if something sweet had been marinating for too long. Before Banks even saw the corpse in the bathtub, he knew what he was in for.
Burgess just stood there as Banks took in the scene: the balding man with silvery wisps of hair around his ears, a deep gash visible in the wrist that rested on the side of the bathtub, the murky red-brown water up to his neck, the empty bottle of pills beside the almost empty bottle of whiskey on the floor.
“The doc’s been, confirmed death, and the photographer’s finished. We’re still waiting on the SOCOs, so don’t touch anything. His cleaning lady found him like this two hours ago.”
“Who is he?” Banks asked.
“The Right Honorable Norman Stafford, MP,” said Burgess. “This man’s a member of HM Government, Banksy. Was. Not one of the high-profile crowd, the ones you see on the telly, but a backroom boy. A hard worker, tireless supporter of his constituents, aggressive committee man, nonetheless. Nobody’s heard of him, nobody would recognize him in the street, but they also serve…”
“Suicide?”
“Oh, yes, I would say so, wouldn’t you?”
Banks shrugged. “These things can be arranged.”
“Cynic. Follow me. There’s more. Had enough? Ready to move on?”
“I’m ready,” said Banks. He followed Burgess back into the corridor and they crossed over to the master bedroom.
“He wasn’t married, Mr. Stafford,” said Burgess. “Not anymore. Married to his job, you might say. This is where he slept.”
Banks gazed around the room. There were framed prints and photographs everywhere, each and every one of them showing the pure, the innocent and the virginal. Joan of Arc. The Virgin Mary. Saint Bernadette of Lourdes. Saint Margaret of Antioch. There were actresses playing parts—the young Nastasia Kinsky in Tess and Brooke Shields in Pretty Baby—and countless unrecognizable photos of young innocent girls clipped from magazines and newspapers, their pure, trusting eyes burning into him, making him squirm.
On the bedspread lay a handwritten sheet of paper.
“Read it, Banksy,” said Burgess. “Read but don’t touch.”
Banks read. “‘To Whom It May Concern, I, Norman Archibald Stafford, wish to confess to the murders of two young girls in Soho. So there may be no mistake and no doubt as to the sincerity of this confession, I will outline in exact detail what I did and how I did it.’” And he did. The ritual washing, the shaving of the second victim, the Sellotape, the posing. All the elements that only the killer could know. The only thing he didn’t explain was why. The closest he got was the mention of the first time he felt the strong urge to kill to preserve the innocence of a young woman. He had no Sellotape, he wrote, and imagined there would be none in the small room, so he hatched the plan to equip himself and come back later. Somehow or other, the same girl knew to avoid him, so he chose someone else. Banks realized that the girl was Jackie Simmons, and that Stafford’s next choice was Pamela Morrison.
So it was over. No need to push the frightened dancer any further or make Jackie Simmons go over her story again. Or was it?
“I’d say he had a bit of an obsession, wouldn’t you, Banksy?”
“Seems that way.”
“Word has it that he was married once. They had a beautiful daughter. Age-old story. She fell in with a bad lot. Drugs. Sex. Crime. Ended up a prostitute in Glasgow and died of a drug overdose. It doesn’t explain it all, but it gives you a context, I think.”
“He wanted to re-create innocence, virginity in his victims.”
“Even after he’d had sex with them,” added Burgess. “I’ve read the case file. Aren’t people just endlessly fascinating? And mostly unknowable? Anyway, none of that really matters,” he went on as they walked back downstairs. “Bit of an anticlimax, really, isn’t it?”
Hatchard was still waiting in the living room, staring into space, having obviously seen it all before Banks had. “Well?” he said.
Burgess put his arm around Banks’s shoulders. “Let’s me and DI Banks here go for a nice drink, get the taste of death out of our mouths and see if we can work out a satisfactory solution to this little mess. Bernard, I take it you know what to do now?”
“I know.” Hatchard gave Banks a sheepish look, stuck his pipe back in his mouth and slunk out of the door.
Burgess hammered on the locked door of the pub on the corner.
“I told you, they’re closed,” said Banks. “Won’t be open for another hour or more.”
Burgess i
gnored him and kept on knocking. Eventually, a young man appeared behind the glass, scowled and pointed at his watch. Burgess thrust his warrant card in his face. The door opened.
“Important police business, sonny,” Burgess said. He pointed to a corner that couldn’t be seen from the street. “We’ll sit over there. And I’ll have a pint of lager. Banksy?”
“Bitter, please.”
“Got that?”
The boy nodded, mouth open.
“Can’t drink that real ale stuff, myself,” Burgess said, putting his hand to his stomach. “Gives me gas.” He shouted after the boy. “And bring us a packet of salt and vinegar crisps and some pork scratchings!”
They settled in the corner with their drinks and snacks, Burgess smacked his lips and took a long swig of ice-cold lager. “Ah, aren’t we just living in wonderful times, Banksy?” he said. “Can’t you smell the change?”
“All I can smell is last night’s stale cigarette smoke,” said Banks, lighting up.
Burgess took out a Tom Thumb cigar and lit it. “You’ve no imagination, that’s your problem,” he said, thrusting the cigar in Banks’s general direction. “It’s all there. There for the taking. And don’t think I was born with a silver spoon in my mouth, either. I came up the hard way. My old man was a barrow boy. I’ve got no time for all these whiners and moaners. If you can’t do well for yourself in this day and age, then you’re well and truly fucked. Great times to be alive, Banksy.”
“Bollocks,” said Banks. “We’re midway through the eighties. All we’ve had so far are race riots, a pointless war and a long miners’ strike. Even the music’s crap.”
“It’s all a matter of perspective. You’re just not looking at it the right way. We won the race riots, we won the war and we won the fucking miners’ strike. That’s the way to look at it! And what’s wrong with Madonna, apart from those hairy armpits?” He gestured over to the boy, who was hovering nervously by the bar. “Another two of these,” he said, raising his glass. “And put some Madonna on the jukebox.”
Oh, God, not again, thought Banks, when “Into the Groove” started up. “Let’s agree to differ,” he said. “Why have you brought me here? Not that it isn’t a pleasure to drink fine ale and argue politics on a summer afternoon. With a body lying in a bath of blood round the corner.”
Burgess tilted his head and narrowed his eyes. “You have a way of putting things, Banksy,” he said, “that could put a bloke right off his stroke.”
“Norman Stafford, MP,” Banks reminded him. The barman scurried over with two more pints and apologized for spilling a drop of Burgess’s lager.
“It’s all right, son,” Burgess said. “You can make it up next time. And…” He gestured to the boy to lean in and lowered his voice, “we’re depending on you to keep an eye open. Nobody gets in until we’ve finished here, right? Hush, hush.”
The boy returned to the bar like a man with a mission.
“It’ll give him something to talk to his mates about,” Burgess said with a wink. “Now, where were we?”
“Stafford.”
“Ah, yes.” He tapped a length of ash from his Tom Thumb.
“You believe it’s suicide?”
“I do,” said Burgess. “And the police surgeon agreed, too. I’m sure the forensic evidence will confirm it.”
“So there is to be an investigation?”
“Of course. Where do you think we are? Russia?”
“Only I got the impression there were certain things you wanted to hush up.”
Burgess rubbed the side of his nose. “As I said, Stafford wasn’t a major player. Mostly he worked behind the scenes. Committees. Planning. That sort of thing. Very important job these days, nonetheless, what with all the new developments in and around the city. But he was an MP and I think even you would agree that the last thing we need right now are headlines in the papers screaming, ‘Tory MP in Soho sex murder scandal!’ or something along those lines. Especially in the aftermath of all the bad press the government’s been getting over the miners’ strike.”
“So what do you propose?”
“A simple solution. Your case goes down as solved. You know who did it. I know who did it. The public at large just knows that a minor MP has committed suicide. Been suffering depression on and off for years, ever since his daughter died and his wife left him. That sort of thing. Get him a lot of sympathy. Apparently it wasn’t his first suicide attempt, you know.”
“Only his first successful one. But how will the public know the case is solved? How do the girls know to stop worrying? How do they know justice has been done?”
“Interesting concerns,” mused Burgess. “I’m not saying I’d voice them myself, but interesting.”
“And?”
“Well, strictly speaking, you won’t have a name to name. That’s a given. But it won’t be the first time, will it? Remember when everyone thought Freddie Mills killed himself because he was Jack the Stripper, the bloke who killed all those prossies in the midsixties?”
“A bit before my time,” said Banks.
“Mine, too. But don’t you know your history? The point is, officially he didn’t leave a note, but there’s a myth around the Met that he did, and that he confessed to the killings.”
“That doesn’t help us, though, does it? Not if you’re going to whitewash Norman Stafford.”
“Oh, don’t be so awkward. As I said, you won’t have a convenient name to tie a hidden confession to, but don’t underestimate the powers of rumor, Banksy. Word of mouth. Especially around Soho. All it takes is for word to get out from someone in the know that we were on to chummie and he fled to the continent, where he committed suicide, or got shot by the Froggy police or whatever. People love conspiracy theories. It wouldn’t be five minutes before everyone in the Soho porn trade breathed easy and felt all self-righteous again.”
“That’s preposterous,” said Banks. “We’ve got our killer—if the note can be proven to be authentic. Why not go public with it?”
“Haven’t you been listening to a word I’ve said?” Burgess gritted his teeth in anger. “Come on, Banksy, I’m giving you a chance here. You can claim hush-up as long as no names are named. You can use it to your advantage.”
“Do you think people are so stupid that they won’t link Stafford’s suicide to your proposed cover-up?”
“Yes, I do. Who was it said nobody ever went broke underestimating the stupidity of the British public?”
“H. L. Mencken,” said Banks. “And it was underestimating the taste of the American public.”
“Smart-arse.”
“So back to my original question. How are you going to do this?”
“I’m not, Banksy. You are. In fact, it’s already done. Signed, sealed, stamped and delivered. This is just me being polite and treating you to a couple of drinks. As far as we’re concerned, that’s the Metropolitan Police, including your boss and his boss, all the way up to the assistant commissioner, and as far as the home secretary is concerned, too, it’s a done deal. Norman Stafford committed suicide while the balance of his mind was disturbed due to depression, and he will be duly mourned. They’re already printing off the results of the coroner’s inquest. The nut job who murdered two prostitutes in Soho has disappeared overseas under hot pursuit, is believed dead, and can’t be named for legal reasons. Never the twain shall meet. By the time you get back to your office, West End Central will be buzzing with the rumor.” He finished his drink, stood up and loomed over the table. “And if I were you, Banksy, I’d have my end-of-case celebration tonight, just like normal, get pissed as a newt and forget all about it. Hell, I might even drop by for a pint, myself. I could do with a night on the town.”
And with that, he was gone. Banks lit another cigarette and swirled the remains of his drink. It wasn’t so bad, he supposed. There were worse things than a little misdirection. Plenty went on that the public didn’t know about, and it wouldn’t necessarily do them any good if they did. He balked at it
in principle but, in his way, Burgess was right; it didn’t matter. The important thing was that the killer was dead and the killings would stop. Justice had been served, even if it hadn’t been seen to be served.
Banks liked to think himself a champion of the truth and justice, and it irked him that Norman Stafford’s responsibility for the crimes wouldn’t be made generally known for political reasons. Stafford had been a committee man, Burgess said—planning, developments—and Micallef, among other things, was a property developer, so perhaps that was how they had come into contact? What more natural but that Micallef might offer the man with the power a bit of female company, an escort, dancer or club hostess, for example, perhaps in the way of a bribe? And maybe that was exactly what had happened.
But who was to know of Stafford’s sickness? Banks thought of the images in Stafford’s bedroom, remembered what he had done to the girls—the ritual cleansing, the symbolism of the Sellotape—and he knew that it was because he was a deranged killer, not because he was out to ruin Micallef or had some sort of grudge against him. Stafford might have met Micallef through his committees, might have accepted a sweetener, but in the end it was his own perverse fantasies he had acted out.
But did Micallef know? Had he introduced Stafford to Pamela Morrison himself on the night she died? And the second girl, Maureen Heseltine? Banks doubted it. Micallef would try to distance himself as much from the pimping, once he had turned the girls, as much as he did from owning the knocking shops and flats where some of his girls lived. But had he suspected? Perhaps. The most likely scenario was that Stafford had noticed the girls and let Micallef know he was interested, just as Jackie had said. After that point Micallef would have arranged things without any direct contact. But it still made him guilty as sin in Banks’s eyes. Especially if he had known after Pamela, the first one, and let it happen again.
Banks came out of his reverie and noticed the boy hovering. “Yes?”
“Are you done, sir?”
“What? Oh, yes,” said Banks, stubbing out his cigarette.
The Price of Love and Other Stories Page 37