by Daniel Cole
As he rolled away, she printed off and highlighted a selection of the offending transactions, placing them in a dull blue folder. Crossing the office to the incident room, she knocked on the door:
‘Is Detective Chambers about?’ she asked the people working inside.
‘He’s not in yet,’ one of them replied distractedly.
‘Which one is his desk?’
Following their dismissive points, she walked over to a post tray overflowing with similarly dull folders, so tore off a sticky note to label it:
Christopher Ryan – Important!
Sticking it to the front, she carefully balanced the folder on top of the pile and headed out … one corner of the colourful note already beginning to curl back on itself as the ineffectual glue surrendered its hold.
Winter was lying on his breakfast. Sprawled across Eloise’s kitchen table, he remembered heading to hers after finishing at the graveyard with a box of freshly baked delicacies that he’d subsequently crushed before either of them had taken a bite.
‘Eloise?’ he called, getting to his feet as the curtains billowed like sails across the room. ‘Eloise!’ he shouted when there was no answer. ‘Eloise!’
The front door opened and she hurried in carrying an empty mug:
‘You’re up,’ she greeted him.
‘Where were you?!’
‘Talking to Patrick.’
‘Patrick?’
‘The unlucky recipient of the Metropolitan Police’s Short-Straw Award this afternoon.’
‘Afternoon?’ he asked, bleary-eyed.
‘Ten past three,’ she informed him, walking over to close the window on the escalating apocalypse outside. ‘Wouldn’t want to be out in this tonight,’ she said, watching the rain slash horizontal scars across the glass while the few trees to miraculously survive the metropolis bent double, fighting for their lives against nature’s mutinous mood. ‘Apparently it’s only going to get worse.’
She crouched down to collect up the handful of leaves and twigs that had blown across the floor, it reminding Winter of something:
‘Hey … So, I never totally understood the whole laurel-leaf connection,’ he told her, picking up the few strays that had made it as far as the kitchen table, ‘like why they’re so significant to him … to both of you.’
Hesitating, Eloise headed over to the bin before responding:
‘Well, to understand that, you’d have to understand the final sculpture: Apollo and Daphne.’
Winter took a seat: ‘I’ve got all day.’
‘No, you don’t.’
‘No. You’re right, I don’t. I’ve got perhaps forty minutes if I skip a shower. All the same … I’d really like to hear it.’
‘All right then,’ she said, sitting down opposite him. ‘Bernini’s sculpture of Apollo and Daphne is widely regarded as one of the most beautiful works of art ever created. It captures the climactic moments of the myth as told in Ovid’s Metamorphoses, which goes: arrogant and elated following his defeat of the great serpent, Python, Apollo stumbles upon Cupid—’
‘Cupid again?’
‘Yes, Cupid playing with his bow and arrow. He taunts the young god, belittling him by asking what use he has of weapons of war. In anger, Cupid draws two different arrows from his quiver – one to ignite love, the other to extinguish it – striking the mighty Apollo through the heart, who instantly falls madly in love with the nymph Daphne, daughter of a powerful river god. Cupid then takes up the lead-tipped arrow, sinking it into the beautiful girl, who, repulsed by Apollo’s advances, escapes into the woods.
‘Apollo longs for Daphne, finding no other her equal. So, one day, he follows her into the trees, pursuing her even when she flees from him. He pleads with her to stay, but still she runs, him only wanting her more with every step. “So flew the god and the virgin – he on the wings of love, and she on those of fear.” But he was faster than her, and as her strength began to fail, she called upon her father for help: “Open the earth to enclose me, or change my form, which has brought me into this danger!”
‘No sooner had she uttered the words than a stiffness seized all of her limbs. Her bosom enclosed in tender bark and her hair became leaves. And as her arms turned into branches and her foot struck the ground as a root, a faint heartbeat thumped from somewhere deep within.
‘Heartbroken, Apollo embraces all that is left of Daphne, lavishing kisses upon the wood. And, no less in love, he bestows eternal life upon her, promising that her leaves will remain evergreen … that never shall she know decay.’
Winter puffed out his cheeks: ‘Intense.’
‘And do you know what the Greek word for laurel is?’ she asked him: ‘… Daphne.’
‘It’s the same themes again, isn’t it? Unrequited love, marriage, and escaping from a lover.’
‘Robert used to call me his laurel tree,’ she recalled sadly.
‘Makes sense now,’ said Winter, looking troubled. ‘Does Chambers know any of this?’
‘Some. But—’
‘Yeah. Yeah. Robert wouldn’t hurt you.’
‘If he’s doing all this for me. He wants me to see it.’
Winter didn’t look as convinced: ‘Have you packed a bag?’
‘Yesterday.’
‘The moment we call to say you need to come in … you come in. Understand?’ he told her, sounding unusually authoritative. ‘I mean it. You promise me.’
‘I promise.’
He embraced her tightly. And then, with an unenthusiastic glance out at the storm, he headed for the door.
‘Wait. Where are you going?’
‘To end this thing, so I can stop worrying about you.’
Winter briefed Patrick on the door, before negotiating the slippery stairwell, giving Eloise’s soaked long-haired neighbour a passive-aggressive nod when he passed him on the way down.
Stepping outside, the relentless wind was augmented with a strange drone as it tore through the city – both eerie and powerful – like the breath of God.
Chambers walked through the door of the Homicide department …
‘Medical examiner wants to see you downstairs.’
… huffed, and then headed back out.
‘Detective Chambers, Christopher Ryan. Christopher Ryan … Yeah, you don’t care. You’re dead.’
‘I take it the DNA was a match then?’ he asked Sykes impatiently.
‘It was indeed.’
‘You could’ve just called.’
‘Maybe that’s not what I needed to see you about,’ he replied, taking a step towards him. ‘You did not get this from me,’ he whispered, as if concerned the people in the freezer drawers might be listening as he handed over a small metal tin.
Opening it up, Chambers peered down at the contents.
‘You’ve got one dose there,’ Sykes informed him. ‘And don’t even ask how I got hold of this for you.’
‘OK,’ shrugged Chambers. He wasn’t going to. ‘Thank you,’ he said, tucking it into his inside pocket before making his way over to the exit.
‘And you owe me, Chambers! … Big time!’ Sykes called after him as the door swung shut on their conversation.
‘We’ll reconvene here tomorrow at,’ Chambers checked his watch, having lost all sense of time, ‘Jesus, five o’clock again,’ he said, adjourning the team briefing.
Wainwright promptly got up and headed to her next appointment while the rest of them remained where they were.
‘Anyone else got a bad feeling about tonight?’ asked Winter, watching the rain hammer against the windows.
Neither Chambers nor Marshall answered, apparently having similar thoughts.
‘It’s always the days like this when the bad jobs come in,’ he continued, ‘the days when you can physically feel the pressure building … the tension in the air.’
Shooting him a funny look, Chambers turned to Marshall:
‘Fancy some overtime this evening?’ he asked casually.
‘To do what?’
‘Catch up on paperwork. Do some filing. Sit in the break room all night watching EastEnders for all I care. I’d just rather you were here tonight.’
‘You’re letting Winter get to you,’ she told him.
Not thinking anything of the crinkling sound as the wheel of his chair crushed an unstuck sticky note into the carpet, he shrugged: ‘I know. But still …’
The howling wind sounded more like a scream as it rushed past the windows, the glass panes trembling more and more violently until it subsided.
‘Yeah, sure,’ she said, having an abrupt change of heart. ‘I’ve got nowhere to be.’
Chambers reached for the blue folder and assorted loose documents at the top of his post tray, when there was an urgent knock at the door:
‘Detective Chambers?’ said a flustered constable without waiting to be invited in. ‘There’s something I think you need to see … Just … Chambers, please,’ she added when all three of them went to get up.
With a frown, he followed the officer out, joining her beside her computer in the main office.
‘I’ve spent the last two days going through the footage from Saint Mary’s. Like you asked, I’ve logged every lone man entering the hospital within two hours of the murders and exiting up to two hours afterwards, using the security video, where possible, to track their movements in-between.’
‘OK,’ he said, not bothering to sit down.
‘Which,’ the woman continued, ‘is exactly what I did with this person.’ She played a three-second clip of a man with a rucksack and bouquet entering through the main doors, it was impossible to make out a face from the grainy image. ‘Now watch this,’ she said, swapping to another feed: two orderlies disappearing into a room, the same man running to catch the door.
Now intrigued, Chambers pulled up a chair and sat down.
‘And this is three minutes later,’ she said, skipping forward, the man re-emerging but now sporting a white tunic.
‘That’s him. That’s Coates,’ said Chambers excitedly.
‘I was just about to come and get you, when I suddenly remembered seeing this man somewhere else.’
She clicked on a final video, Chambers tensing up on seeing himself appear on screen, Wainwright and Marshall at his side as Eloise followed behind.
She hit the play button.
Chambers leaned in, watching in dismay as Coates walked right by them. He put his head in his hands and exhaled.
‘Did you see it?’ she asked him.
‘See what?’
‘Watch Eloise Brown,’ she told him, looking a little nervous as she played the clip in slow motion – the subtle but undeniable raising of Eloise’s pixilated hand to meet his as they passed each other in the corridor.
The video continued to repeat on a loop as the officer turned to him:
‘I’m sorry if I was rude back there. I just didn’t know—’
‘You did the right thing,’ Chambers assured her, looking across the office to where Marshall and Winter were chatting in the incident room.
They didn’t have the time to waste on another argument over Eloise – the laurel leaves, the painting in the gallery, and now this: he had already made his decision.
‘I want you to keep this between us for now,’ he told the officer.
‘Yes, sir.’
He nodded: ‘Could you give me a moment? I need to use your phone.’
There was a knock at the front door.
‘Come in, Patrick!’ shouted Eloise from the bedroom, hearing the careful officer slide the bolt across as she folded her washing into piles. ‘Tea?’ she guessed when he appeared in the doorway. She noticed him shuffle uncomfortably. ‘… Patrick?’
‘I just got a message through from Detective Chambers,’ he told her.
‘Everything all right?’
‘Not exactly.’
He removed a pair of handcuffs from his belt.
‘Oh.’
‘Orders,’ he said apologetically as he entered the room. ‘Eloise Brown. I am arresting you on suspicion of being an accessory to murder …’
Dazed, Eloise sat down on the edge of the bed, the officer’s voice becoming distant, the sensation of the cold metal wrapping around her wrists barely registering as she looked out at the building storm – so anticlimactic an ending for such elaborate staging, yet knowing it was the fate of a muse to quietly fade from the light of the geniuses they inspire.
‘I’m not really hungry yet.’
‘Eat.’
‘But—’
‘Eat now or starve,’ said Chambers simply. ‘I’m not spending another night in the stench of your burger wrappers.’
Like a child forcing down a Brussels sprout, Winter shoved the rest of his Whopper into his face as Chambers picked at some chips. From their booth in Burger King, they watched a procession of headlights crawl past on roads flooded already and rising quickly.
‘We’d better get there before we can’t any more.’
‘But you said—’
‘I know what I said.’ For the second time in thirty seconds, Chambers felt like a strict parent. ‘But that was before a new river sprung up in the middle of Chelsea.’ Foolishly, he had told Winter that they’d be passing the Victoria and Albert on their drive. And then, more foolishly still, had revealed he’d stopped in the previous day to visit the statue that Eloise had talked so passionately about. Winter looked dejected. ‘OK. Fine,’ he said irritably. ‘If … the traffic isn’t too bad. And if … we can park, we can go and see it. But we’ve got to be in and out. Deal?’
‘Deal,’ Winter smiled back.
Marshall had made herself at home at Chambers’s desk, the warm light of the desk lamp reflecting in the dark windows, the radiator by her leg billowing out hot air as the storm raged only inches away. It felt like being back in school again – the evenings she’d spent in Alfie’s room while he tried, and failed miserably, to help her keep up in Physics.
Allowing herself to get lost in the memory, she was dragged back to the present by the muted ring of the phone. Tempted to let it ring off, she then noticed it was coming from an internal number, perhaps even someone in the office able to see her sitting there:
‘Detective Chambers’ phone,’ she answered, confused by the sound that greeted her.
‘Is Chambers there?!’ a voice yelled, his words barely decipherable over the wind.
‘No. He’s not,’ replied Marshall, trying to work out how an internal line could have made it outside.
‘He’s not here!’ the voice relayed to somebody else. ‘Who’s that?’ he asked her.
‘Detective Marshall. I work with him,’ she replied, still at a loss as to what was going on.
‘Marshall!’ the man shouted, the weather all but drowning him out. ‘She said her name’s Marshall!’ A few moments passed before his voice returned, the storm abruptly abating as he presumably stepped back inside: ‘Hi, Detective Marshall?’
‘Still here,’ she said.
‘We’ve got a … situation. We’re going to need you downstairs right away.’
‘OK. You’ve seen it now. Can we go?’ asked Chambers a little too loudly for the hushed gallery, earning himself a glare from the tour guide enthralling a group of pensioners about one of the other statues.
‘One more minute?’ said Winter pleadingly as he walked around the priceless replica again, hand on chin in consideration as if debating whether to put in a cheeky offer.
Shaking his head, Chambers unenthusiastically regarded the masterpiece himself, this time unable to see past the two subjects’ opposing expressions – the smug smile on the shepherd boy’s face, the look of surprise, horror and regret reflected in the giant’s, having so willingly walked into the young man’s trap.
‘Detective Marshall?’ asked an armed officer hurrying over to meet her as she crossed the atrium. ‘Nighton,’ he introduced himself, shaking her hand.
‘What’s going on?’ she asked him, stepping over the phone wire sn
aking out from the reception desk all the way over to the doors.
‘Is the name Evan Papadopoulos familiar to you?’ He gestured for her to follow him.
‘The giant?’ she asked urgently. ‘You found him?’
‘Not exactly,’ replied Nighton as one of his colleagues presented Marshall with a bulletproof vest and an in-ear radio transmitter. ‘More like he found us.’
‘He’s here?’ she asked, her mind still playing catch-up.
‘He asked for Detective Chambers,’ he explained, pausing at the door, ‘but seemed to know your name well enough. Says he won’t talk to anyone else.’ Nighton hesitated: ‘He’s got a bag with him.’
‘A bag? What’s in it?’
‘We don’t know … Hence the vest.’
‘Right,’ she nodded anxiously.
‘Look, I can’t make you go out there. But I’ve been informed he’s down as a missing person with learning difficulties, so I wanted to give him a chance.’
‘A chance?’
‘If he refuses to drop the bag and give himself up, he’s leaving us no choice but to neutralise the threat,’ he explained unapologetically. ‘… Protocol.’
An image of Goliath’s head lying separated from his body flashed through Marshall’s mind.
‘No. Don’t do that. I’ll talk to him.’
‘You’re sure?’
She nodded: ‘But do me a favour. Get Detective Chambers on the radio for me.’
‘I’ll keep trying,’ promised Nighton, forcing the door open against the wind as Marshall stepped out into the storm.
CHAPTER 32
The ground shimmered underfoot, Marshall’s every step sending ripples across the flooded walkway towards the man framed in light: standing at over eight feet tall, his arms were wrapped around a sack easily large enough to fit a grown adult inside. She approached slowly, arms raised, passing within inches of an armed officer. She didn’t acknowledge him though, wanting to remain a separate entity to those with their weapons trained on their unexpected visitor.
‘No closer than ten feet,’ Nighton advised in her earpiece.
While their own army of spectators watched from the windows of the surrounding buildings, Marshall walked into the light, taking four more steps before stopping – David to his Goliath, facing down the giant alone.