by Daniel Cole
‘The transplant couple?’ she prompted him.
‘Then yes. Lung transplant. She had—’
‘Cystic fibrosis,’ Wainwright interrupted him, regarding the two victims with a very different expression now. ‘They gave her six months to live.’
‘OK,’ said Chambers, folding up his useless sheet of paper.
‘Her boyfriend offered to be a donor. The doctors said it wasn’t as easy as that: that he’d have to be a perfect match and without a second donor, they’d have to take a life-altering amount of tissue from him. But he pressed ahead regardless, and somehow the stars aligned … It made the news because they booked their wedding before going in for the surgery – six months to the day from Audrey’s diagnosis,’ Wainwright said sadly, looking almost tempted to embrace the tragic lovers. ‘… Why them?’
‘Wrong hospital, wrong time,’ shrugged Chambers. ‘Marriage seems a recurring theme. It might even be as simple as “man saves the woman he loves”. Truthfully, who knows?’
His boss looked a little surprised by his candour.
‘The guy’s away with the fairies,’ continued Chambers, a slight edge to his voice. ‘We have no real idea how his twisted mind is forming these vague connections to the victims, no way of predicting who he might fixate on next, no pattern of behaviour to work to because he’s not an actual person; he’s a mirror that can only mimic others … The locations,’ he said decisively. ‘It’s all about the locations. They’re our only constant, our only advantage over him.’
Wainwright nodded along to his logical summary: ‘What do you need?’
‘We have a list of significant places from his ex. I’d like surveillance at each of them twenty-four hours a day until this is over.’
‘How many locations?’
‘Four perhaps.’
‘You’ve got a week,’ Wainwright told him. ‘If you’ve still got nothing by then, we’ll all probably be reassigned anyway.’
Marshall and Eloise had found a table in the back corner of the hospital canteen, the two women a conspicuously mismatched pairing – Eloise effortlessly beautiful in no make-up at all, clothing colourful and comfortable, her wavy hair scrunched into a messy ponytail; Marshall, as always, sporting her monochrome warpaint, her every movement restricted by layers of dark clothing and leather.
Winter had held on for as long as he could, giving himself a whole fifty minutes to make the hour-long journey into work, but at least meaning he should make it in before acne-face Dan. He’d be all right just so long as Sophie, the stuck-up new girl from the other store, didn’t snitch on him.
Marshall shook her head, wondering why on earth she even knew any of that.
Consciously avoiding more obvious and unpleasant topics, the two women had been making small talk, mainly about the gallery – Eloise enthusing over her plans for it, Marshall somewhat pissing on her fireworks when she put it down as another location Coates might choose to leave them a body.
During a natural lull in the conversation, Marshall broached the real issue on her mind:
‘It’s strange … seeing a dead body for the first time,’ she started. ‘It’s not like it is on TV, not just a person lying still. They’ve changed somehow.’
‘I’m fine,’ Eloise assured her.
‘You do seem to be handling it remarkably well: those crime-scene photographs back at the office … and now this.’ She paused expectantly …
‘I’m not sure what you want me to say.’
‘Why aren’t you freaking out right now?’ blurted Marshall. ‘You just saw one of the most disturbing crime scenes either I or Chambers have ever been to.’
Leaning back in her chair, Eloise fiddled with the plastic stirrer from her cup of tea:
‘Because it was beautiful.’
‘Beautiful? They were dead bodies.’
‘Some things can be both tragic and beautiful at the same time.’
Marshall watched Eloise carefully, deliberating over her next move, deciding that bluntness was the best course:
‘Chambers is worried about you. And, frankly, so am I.’
‘Worried how?’
‘That you want Coates to succeed.’
‘… I do.’
Taken aback, Marshall folded her arms and locked eyes with the other woman:
‘Then we have a serious problem.’
‘I don’t really see why. Morally, I want to help you stop him before he hurts another person. But from an artistic standpoint, I feel we’re all honoured to witness his genius in any form, and there’s certainly a part of me that wants to see him finish his … collection.’
‘Collection?’ asked Marshall, appalled. Her head was starting to hurt. ‘OK. Tell me this: when push comes to shove and you have to choose, which side is going to win out?’
‘Honestly, I don’t know.’
She shook her head in exasperation:
‘Are you still in love with him? … Even after all of this?’
‘… Yes.’
‘Are you not scared of him?’
‘He absolutely terrifies me.’
‘Because he’s a monster!’ snapped Marshall, feeling as though they were going in circles.
‘Oh, no doubt,’ agreed Eloise. ‘… But he’s my monster.’
CHAPTER 26
Wearing an off-beige shirt and a jacket so moth-eaten it was a wonder how it was still hanging together, DS Phillip Easton was the very picture of a burnt-out police officer desperately holding on for retirement.
He had seen it all, done it all, and come to the inevitable conclusion that ignorance was indeed bliss.
After what had already been a non-stop morning, he returned to Harrow on the Hill Police Station, bakery meal-deal in hand as he made his way back to his desk.
‘You’ve got a customer,’ one of his colleagues greeted him.
He sighed: ‘I need food. Can’t you handle it?’
‘Missing person,’ the man shrugged. ‘… Your remit.’
Raising his head to the heavens, Easton gazed up through the skylight, conveniently placed to more effectively shoot God the stink-eye.
‘Can I not get one arseing moment to myself?!’ he spat, continuing with his rant as he stormed through the office: ‘All I wanted was to eat one bloody— Good afternoon!’ he smiled pleasantly, placing his lunch to the side as he sat down. ‘I’m Detective Sergeant Easton. Or you can call me Phil, if you like?’
The frumpy woman sitting across from him gazed back as though she hadn’t understood a word.
‘Right then,’ he said, glancing at the few details his colleague had bothered to scribble down. ‘You’re Greek?’ he commented in forced interest. ‘So, what can I do for you Mrs …’ he squinted at the form, ‘… Pap … a … dop … ou … lou.’
‘Papadopoulou,’ she told him with a very strong accent.
‘Papadopoulou,’ he corrected himself. ‘I understand you’re here to report a missing person?’
‘My son,’ she answered in broken English, but the worry in her voice crystal clear. ‘He no come home from …’ She appeared to get stuck.
‘… Work?’ Easton guessed.
‘Yes! Work. He no come home from work today.’
‘Today?’ he asked, a slight strain to his voice. ‘The thing is, we wouldn’t normally—’
‘He has … mind … of child,’ she interrupted him.
‘I see,’ said Easton, circling the Vulnerable Adult section of the form. ‘And has he ever done this before?’
‘No!’ she replied, bursting into tears.
He gave her a tissue and his best attempt at a reassuring smile:
‘Let’s get some details from you then. Could I have his full name please?’
‘Evan Ioannou Papadopoulos.’
‘Not Papadopoulou?’
‘Papadopoulos.’
He got her to spell it out for him.
‘Date of birth?’
‘October seven, nineteen seventy-three.’
; ‘Making him … Twenty-two,’ said Easton a little more loudly than strictly necessary to show off his Rainman-like abilities. ‘… Wait. No. Twenty-three?’ In the end, he resorted to counting it out on his fingers. ‘Moving on: height?’
‘Oh! Eight and four.’
Easton looked lost: ‘In feet and inches, if possible?’
‘Yes. Eight and four.’
He placed the lid back on his biro and tapped it impatiently against the desk:
‘Tell you what – we’ll come back to that one. Do you have any recent pictures of Evan with you?’
‘Yes,’ she replied, rooting through her handbag and passing him a photograph of her son standing with the rest of the Papadopouli.
Easton stared down at it, looked back up at the distraught woman, and then checked around him for sniggering colleagues. Guardedly, he removed the lid from his biro again:
‘Height: eight feet, four inches.’
The Royal Observatory (the accident)
Fire-Damaged Art Block (Birkbeck College)
His Mother’s Grave
The Laurel Tree Wood
Having seen to the safe removal of the bodies from the Recovery Ward, the sight of white feathers dragging along the floor from beneath a blanket fuel for at least the next year’s worth of nightmares, Chambers had requisitioned the hospital’s lecture hall. Before the others arrived, he scribbled the list of locations significant to Robert Coates on the whiteboard in a pen he now suspected to be permanent marker.
DCI Wainwright, looking a little jaded after addressing the press, was the first to join him, taking a seat at the very front. She was closely followed by Marshall, who was quite clearly deliberating how far she could sit from the formidable woman without appearing rude – the answer, apparently, two empty chairs away.
‘Is that all of us?’ Chambers asked her significantly, as they hadn’t had a chance to catch up since their talk in the courtyard.
As if on cue, Eloise hurried through the doors:
‘Sorry!’ she said, out of breath, a takeaway coffee cup in her hand as she took a seat two empty chairs away from Marshall.
‘OK,’ said Chambers. ‘Eloise Brown, my boss – DCI Wainwright. Boss, Robert Coates’s ex – Eloise Brown,’ he introduced them before getting straight to business. He gestured to the whiteboard behind him: ‘These are our four potential sites for the three remaining murders.’
‘Maybe five sites,’ Marshall piped up. ‘Eloise’s gallery?’
Chambers glanced over at Wainwright, who gave him a begrudging nod.
He added it to the list.
‘The boss has signed off on surveillance at each for the next week, on the proviso we pick up some of the slack,’ he said, looking in Marshall’s direction.
Keen to make a good impression in front of her future superior, Marshall looked practically ecstatic at the prospect of losing the next seven days of her life to sitting around in freezing cold cars.
‘… Winter too, hopefully,’ he added as an afterthought, having persuaded Wainwright to expedite the occasional constable’s return to work, subject to an HR interview and his doctor’s blessing. ‘The question is,’ he continued, ‘where to focus our efforts?’ He turned to Eloise: ‘Think you could place these locations in order of most to least likely in your opinion?’
‘I … don’t … really …’ she stuttered, clearly feeling that he had put her on the spot.
‘Your best guess,’ he encouraged her.
Setting her drink down, she got up, taking the marker pen from him on her way past. She stared at the whiteboard for a few moments and then decisively went to rub out the top line:
‘… It’s not coming off.’
Chambers winced:
‘Make a new list,’ he advised, pointing her towards the flipchart instead.
1. The Fire
2. The Grave
3. The Woods
4. The Observatory
5. The Gallery
She handed him back the marker.
‘Talk us through it,’ said Chambers.
‘Well, the gallery is significant to me, but not really to him. So, I think, while a possibility, it’s the least likely. And it feels like my accident has already been covered here at the hospital.’ She glanced back at her reordered list. ‘The most important thing to Robert, the thing that defines him, is his art … followed by his hatred of his mother … and then me and our relationship,’ she finished bitterly.
‘The laurel leaves would suggest otherwise,’ argued Chambers. ‘That perhaps he’s doing all of this for you … or to get to you.’
‘Robert would never harm me.’
‘That’s not a chance I’m prepared to take. We’re agreed,’ he said, looking again to Wainwright. ‘From this point onwards, you’re on twenty-four-hour protection detail. If you’re not with us, you’re with a competent uniformed officer … Or Winter, of course.’ He turned back to the whiteboard. ‘I think we need to prioritise—’
Wainwright cleared her throat:
‘Forgive me, Detective, but it sounds an awful lot like you’re already moving on to the next dead body without doing a thing to investigate the two we just put in the back of a van.’
Chambers glared at her challengingly: ‘There’s nothing we’re going to learn from them.’
‘You’re being callous.’
‘I’m being realistic.’
‘I’m not sure the families of our two victims will be reassured by that.’
‘Or the millions passing judgement sitting on their fat arses in front of the telly,’ he bit back. ‘But it doesn’t really matter what they think, does it?’
‘And I thought you were being “realistic”,’ said Wainwright calmly. ‘We have the entire country watching our every move. Are they expecting too much wanting to see the lead detective on the case making some effort to find out what happened?’
At that moment, the doors swung open into the wall and a flustered man wearing a pinstripe suit burst into the room:
‘Is this the talk on …’ he glanced down at his visitors pass, ‘“Pre-emptive versus Unwarranted Colonoscopies”?’
‘No. But it’s certainly starting to feel like one,’ muttered Chambers, gesturing for the man to get out. He turned back to address Wainwright: ‘We have limited resources and can’t save the dead. These people were murdered by Robert Coates, we know that, who will have altered his appearance as required to gain access to them. None of that helps me in the least.
‘We’ve requested the CCTV footage, prioritised the external cameras in case he was stupid enough to climb into a car or get onto a bus. We’ve got people contacting all the local parks with lakes to find out if they’ve had any swans hacked up, and we found traces of soil on a few of the leaves inside the flask. I’ve asked the lab to analyse it for a detailed breakdown of its components in the hopes we might be able to at least narrow down which part of the city it came from. Javier Ruiz and Audrey Fairchild’s deaths are being looked into, but I wouldn’t be doing my job if I wasn’t already looking ahead.’
… Silence.
The tense stand-off eventually ended when Wainwright gave him a curt nod.
‘Tell us about the next statue,’ Chambers prompted Eloise, putting her on the spot for the second time in five minutes. He looked down at his notes: ‘The … Winged Victory of Samothrace?’
‘I don’t have my presentation with me, but I can certainly give you an overview,’ she smiled, but with a sharp edge to her voice.
‘I’m not loving the word winged right now,’ commented Marshall. ‘Another god?’
‘Goddess,’ Eloise corrected her. ‘Nike, to be precise.’
‘Never heard of her,’ said Chambers, taking a seat.
‘Sure you have: who do you think the sportswear brand is named after? And you must have seen the Silver Lady she inspired on the front of every Rolls-Royce? She even features on the Olympic medal. Nike is the goddess of victory, the daughter of Pallas and Styx.’
>
‘Not Styx again!’ huffed Chambers, rubbing his face wearily.
Wainwright gave him an enquiring look.
‘It’s the name of the river that separates the earth from the gates of Hell … Eugh! The Gates of Hell!’ he complained, wishing he’d just kept his mouth shut.
‘The Greeks believed that Nike could make them invincible and give them the strength and speed to succeed in any endeavour,’ explained Eloise. ‘She would then reward the victors with a wreath of laurel leaves.’
There was a beat in which no one bothered to voice the significance of the leaves in this third female statue.
‘Which event does this relate to?’ asked Chambers.
‘I don’t know,’ she replied.
‘She’s you, isn’t she?’
‘Yes.’
‘Then you do know,’ he challenged her.
‘Give her a break, Chambers,’ snapped Marshall.
He got to his feet, realising that he had already made up his own mind about Coates’s ex, regardless of what Marshall thought:
‘People’s lives are on the line!’ he shouted. ‘Think!’
‘Detective!’ said Wainwright firmly, but still he pushed her:
‘What did you give to Coates? How did you reward him? What did he need your support with that he couldn’t have done without you?!’
Close to tears, a look of comprehension suddenly dawned over Eloise’s face:
‘The fire!’ she gasped. ‘Building the ash sculptures … It’s the fire!’
‘And the reward?’ he asked.
Eloise revisited a memory that she hadn’t in a long while:
‘He asked me to marry him again on the night we finished them, surrounded by these monochromatic shapes and figures grown out of the dirt. It was as if Robert and I were the only two flashes of colour in an otherwise black and white picture … it was the only time I ever said yes.’
Satisfied, he looked to Marshall expectantly: ‘Then what are we waiting for?’
Her three escorts talked amongst themselves, Eloise trailing several steps behind as they traipsed the hospital’s endless corridors in search of a less public exit. Being forced to confront that particular memory had stirred up some surprising feelings in her, reminding her of the lies that she had been telling herself – branding one of the most magical nights of her life as a mistake best forgotten – blaming her younger self’s impulsiveness for accepting his proposal, when the truth was she had never been more sure of anything.