Hangman

by Daniel Cole

  “Oh, that? It was nothing,” he told her.

  Someone at the pizzeria picked up and he strolled away.

  Chapter 8

  Thursday, 10 December 2015

  11:13 P.M.

  Curtis was trapped.

  She scanned the shabby hotel room, weapon raised, watching for any sign of movement. She wanted to scream for Rouche, but doubted that he would hear her anyway and didn’t want to alert the intruder to her precise whereabouts. She could feel her pulse thumping in her ears in time to her racing heart as she stared at the door, meters away and yet so far out of reach.

  She knew that she would have to go for it at some point.

  She had already changed into her nightwear: a retro My Little Pony vest top, bright green shorts, and thick woolly socks. Very slowly, she crawled across the bed and reached for her suit jacket draped over the back of a chair.

  She took a bracing breath and leaped from the bed, throwing the flip-flop she had been brandishing behind her. Struggling with the lock, she fell out into the corridor as the door swung shut behind her.

  Composing herself, she got back to her feet and knocked gently on the door to the adjacent room. Rouche materialized, looking a little disheveled himself: white shirt untucked and barefooted. The combination of jet lag and too much wine at dinner had taken its toll on all of them.

  He regarded his visitor for a moment and rubbed his tired eyes, trying to focus.

  “Are you wearing a My Little Pony T-shirt?”

  “Yes,” panted Curtis.

  He nodded: “OK. Did you want to come in?”

  “No. Thank you. I actually came over to ask whether you’re any good with spiders.”

  “Spiders?” Rouche shrugged. “Yeah, sure.”

  “I don’t want any of that scooping-it-up-on-a-piece-of-paper crap, setting it free outside so the horrible thing can climb back up again. I need it dead . . . gone,” she instructed him.

  “I understand,” said Rouche, grabbing a shoe and his room key.

  “This thing is way too big to be messing around with,” Curtis continued, appreciating his compliance.

  Rouche suddenly looked a little unsettled: “How big are we talking?”

  Baxter had managed to put her tartan pajama shirt on inside out, an oversight that she had not made with the matching bottoms, which she was merely sporting back to front.

  She drank another large glass of bitter-tasting tap water, while some irritating guests down the corridor knocked and slammed doors. Collapsing onto the bed, she felt as though the ceiling were twisting slightly, making her nauseous. The sounds of the city drifted in through the window as she groped blindly for her phone, selected Edmunds’s name, and called the number.

  “What?” shouted Edmunds, sitting bolt upright in bed.

  Leila started crying in her cot in the corner of the room.

  “What time is it?” groaned Tia, having only just got her back to sleep.

  As the disorientation dissipated, Edmunds realized his phone was ringing downstairs. He managed to negotiate the maisonette’s staircase, saw Baxter’s name on the display, and answered:

  “Baxter? Everything all right?”

  “Yeah, good . . . It’s good,” she slurred.

  “Is that Emily?” Tia called from upstairs as Leila wailed.

  “Yeah,” Edmunds stage-whispered, conscious of their miserable neighbor.

  “I think your baby’s crying,” Baxter informed him helpfully.

  “Yeah, we know, thanks. The phone woke her up,” he said. “Woke all of us up.”

  “At twenty past six?” she asked before going very quiet. “Ah, you know what I’ve gone and done, don’t you?”

  “Counted the wrong way?” suggested Edmunds.

  “I’ve counted it the wrong way.”

  “Yes.”

  “On the clock, I mean.”

  “Yes! I know. Baxter, are you drunk?”

  “No. Definitely not. I’ve just had a bit too much to drink.”

  Tia tiptoed downstairs with Leila in her arms, who had finally settled down.

  “Come to bed,” she mouthed to Edmunds.

  “One minute,” he whispered back.

  “I’m really sorry,” said Baxter guiltily. “I just wanted to catch you up on the crime scene I was at today.”

  “Which one?” asked Edmunds.

  Tia looked quite angry now.

  “Detective bound to the front of a truck while still alive and driven through the wall of a police station.”

  Edmunds was torn.

  “I’ll give you a call in the morning,” said Baxter. “Your morning . . . No! My morning . . . Wait . . .”

  “No, it’s OK.” Edmunds smiled apologetically at Tia. “Tell me now.”

  “Where did you last see it?” asked Rouche, aware that by wielding his shoe as a weapon, he had left his bare feet worryingly exposed.

  “It jumped under the wardrobe, I think,” said Curtis from the elevated safety of the bed.

  “Jumped?”

  “Well, sort of pounced.”

  “Pounced?”

  He was losing confidence.

  “No, more like . . . What’s the spider equivalent of galloping?”

  “Still galloping, I suppose!” he said, voice rising as he edged gradually toward the wardrobe, checking the floor around him for sneak attacks.

  “Perhaps we should ask Baxter to do it?” suggested Curtis.

  “I’m doing it!” Rouche snapped. “We don’t need Baxter. I’m just making sure I don’t miss.”

  Curtis shrugged. “I didn’t get a chance to properly thank you today,” she said, clearly a little embarrassed.

  “Thank me?”

  “For last night.”

  “Any time at all,” he said sincerely, glancing back to smile at her, but Curtis’s eyes were wide with fear.

  Rouche slowly followed her gaze to the floor. An enormous spider, the size of a saucer, was sitting on the carpet in front of him.

  He froze.

  “Get Baxter,” he whispered.

  “What?”

  Suddenly, it ran straight for him. Rouche shrieked, discarded the shoe, and sprinted for the door.

  “Get Baxter!” he yelled as they both bundled back out into the corridor.

  So not to keep Tia and Leila awake, Edmunds had braved the freezing rain and run barefoot across his muddy slice of garden to the shed. He switched on the feeble light and dried off his laptop.

  The Wi-Fi signal was strong enough for him to open up the news story and a map of Manhattan. Baxter proceeded to give him a slurred, albeit detailed, account of what had happened.

  “I don’t understand it,” sighed Edmunds.

  Baxter was disappointed. She had grown accustomed to expecting the impossible from her best friend.

  “I’m sticking with the cult theory. I can’t see another explanation,” he said.

  There was a knock at the door on Baxter’s end.

  “Sorry. Hold on.”

  Edmunds listened to the distant voices while he cleared some more space around him:

  “Hey. Oh, you’re on the phone.”

  “Yep.”

  “We’ve got a slight situation in Curtis’s room. Nothing urgent, though . . . Do you know what? I’m sure we can sort it out.”

  “It’s fine. Can I just finish my call first?”

  “Sure. Thanks.”

  “I’ll only be a few minutes.”

  A door closed. There was some loud rustling and then Baxter’s voice returned louder than ever:

  “Sorry about that . . . So the only link we’ve got still is that two of the victims are Ragdoll-related.”

  “And that’s barely a link at all,” said Edmunds. “One of them was just some bloke who happened to share Wolf’s name; the other victim was the actual Ragdoll Killer. There’s no consistency there at all.”

  “In which case, it’s got to be better to focus on the killers. We know there must be a link somewhere.
”

  “The Puppets,” said Edmunds. “I agree. We have absolutely no hope of predicting who they might target next without knowing what they’re trying to achieve, which we’ll never understand unless we know what links them.”

  “Why drum up all this press attention, have the world’s ear, and then not say anything?”

  “My guess: they’re not satisfied with just the ear; they want the world’s undivided attention. This is going to escalate.”

  “Correct me if I’m wrong, but you don’t sound particularly disappointed about that,” remarked Baxter, picking up on Edmunds’s excited tone.

  “Send me everything you’ve got on the killers in the morning and I’ll start looking into it. And, Baxter . . . please be careful. Remember: bait.”

  “I will.”

  “Have you spoken to Thomas?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “We had an argument before I left.”

  “About what?”

  “Stuff.”

  Edmunds sighed: “Don’t mess it up by being stubborn.”

  “Thanks for the advice. You’d make a great marriage counselor.”

  He wasn’t sure Tia would agree with her on that.

  “Good night.”

  “Night.”

  Edmunds hung up. It was 4:26 A.M., but he was wide-awake and freezing cold. He looked around at the neglected space and then began tidying away his tools, suspecting that he might need to use the shed again before the resolution of this case.

  Baxter was fast asleep on Curtis’s bed.

  Curtis and Rouche had taken a side each and were sat alert and poised to strike with the makeshift armory they had assembled. Although Rouche had refused to let her use the room’s weighty Bible as a projectile, they were armed with two pairs of shoes, one flip-flop, a can of hair spray, and both of their government-issued firearms (only to throw at the atrocity, unless things really got out of hand).

  Baxter had been no use whatsoever. She had stomped in impatiently, only to dive for the “safe zone” once the situation had been explained. She had kicked off her boots and fallen asleep within minutes.

  “Another?” asked Rouche, adding his empty miniature bottle to the assorted pile on the bed.

  “Why not?” replied Curtis, finishing her own.

  Rouche crawled across to a chair, opened up the minibar, and selected them each a drink.

  “Cheers,” he said.

  They toasted and took a sip.

  “Do you ever get tired of this?” asked Curtis after a moment.

  “This?” asked Rouche, shoe in hand.

  “Not this in particular, just this: shitty hotel rooms, creased shirts . . . being alone.”

  “You’re sharing a bed with two other people,” he pointed out.

  She smiled sadly.

  “No,” he said. “But if I ever did get tired of it, I don’t think I could keep doing it for long.”

  “It must be so hard being away from your wife and daughter.”

  “And yet I still do it. If you don’t have those ties and are already struggling—”

  “I’m not struggling!” Curtis snapped.

  “I’m sorry: poor choice of words.”

  “I just . . . Is this what life’s going to be forever?”

  “It will if you don’t change it,” Rouche told her.

  Curtis threw a shoe past his head, which dented the flimsy partition wall and disturbed Baxter in her sleep.

  “Shadow . . . sorry.” She shrugged.

  “It’s none of my business, so feel free to toss another shoe at me if I’m speaking out of turn, but ruining your life just to prove that you made the right decision isn’t really proving anything at all.”

  Curtis nodded thoughtfully.

  “Baxter’s PJ pants are on the wrong way around,” she said after a few moments.

  “Yes, they are,” said Rouche, without even needing to look.

  Baxter was now snoring gently. Curtis looked at her a moment before saying, softly:

  “My senior agent has told me not to share anything of importance with her.”

  “Why?”

  Curtis shrugged: “She’s only going to be around for a couple more days anyway.”

  “Shame. I quite like her.”

  “Yeah. Me too.”

  “Get some rest,” he told her. “I’ll keep watch.”

  “You sure?”

  Rouche nodded. Within five minutes Curtis was asleep beside him, and within ten he had nodded off as well.

  Curtis’s alarm went off at 6 A.M. After spending the entire night on her bed, all three of them looked a little confused when they first opened their eyes.

  “Morning,” croaked Rouche.

  “Morning,” said Curtis, mid-stretch.

  Baxter had no idea what was going on.

  “I’m going to take a shower,” Rouche announced.

  He got up and made his way over to the door. He stopped abruptly, stared at the floor, and groaned.

  “What?” asked Curtis.

  She cautiously walked over to join him beside the flattened corpse stomped into the carpet.

  “Baxter must’ve stood on it when she came in,” he chuckled, exhausted.

  He tore off a strip of toilet paper, scooped up the evidence, and then flushed away their first successful capture as a team.

  Things were looking up.

  Chapter 9

  Friday, 11 December 2015

  9:07 A.M.

  Lennox subtly tapped her finger over one of the three cue cards she had placed in front of Baxter as they had taken their seats:

  I can’t speculate on that.

  I can confirm that is correct.

  There is nothing to suggest that.

  Baxter leaned a little closer to the small microphone, which sat expectantly on the black cloth that had been draped over the line of spare desks to make them look more official:

  “I’m afraid I can’t speculate on that.”

  She picked up on Lennox’s almost inaudible tut as she sat back in her chair and another reporter asked the man sitting beside her a question. Lennox scribbled a quick note and slid it over to her, at no point looking anything less than enthralled by the question asked and the deputy assistant director’s answer.

  Baxter took a moment to decipher the scrawl:

  Never say, “I’m afraid . . .”

  Usually this would have been enough to send her storming out in a temper, regardless of the roomful of journalists and cameras recording her every move; however, out of respect, she bit her tongue and remained seated.

  The purpose of the press conference was to confirm the identity of the deceased detective and, in answer to rampant Internet speculation and conspiracy theories, to officially confirm that the murders of “the Banker,” Lethaniel Masse, and Detective Robert Kennedy were all linked.

  Baxter wasn’t concentrating. She was still reeling over the scribbled note and had made a point of screwing it up in front of Lennox, who was slowly approaching the end of her own meandering answer:

  “. . . and our colleagues overseas, such as Detective Chief Inspector Baxter here.”

  The moment she finished, a young man in a cheap suit was rewarded for his attentiveness by raising his hand before anybody else.

  Lennox gestured to him.

  “So, Chief Inspector, what do you believe is the motive behind these murders?” he asked.

  The room awaited her response.

  Lennox needlessly tapped one of the cue cards.

  “I can’t speculate on that,” read Baxter.

  “A source at the prison revealed that the two dead bodies had words cut into them: ‘Puppet’ and ‘Bait,’” continued the man, unwilling to walk away with only a noncommittal five-word answer. “Photographs from the Brooklyn Bridge would suggest that there may have been similar markings on the deceased. Can you confirm whether this is consistent on all of the bodies discovered thus far?”

  Lennox hes
itated for a moment and then rested her finger over a different card. Although surprised, Baxter obeyed the silent command:

  “I can confirm that is correct,” she said robotically.

  The room erupted into a hum of mumbled conversations and hissed whispers. Baxter noticed Curtis and Rouche standing against the back wall and was reassured by their presence. Curtis gave her a professional nod, while Rouche cheerily gave her two thumbs-up, making her smile.

  “And, Chief Inspector! Chief Inspector!” the man called over the restrained commotion, pushing his luck by asking a third question. “Considering that the three victims thus far have been a police officer, a man named William Fawkes, and the Ragdoll Killer himself, the word ‘Bait’ carved into each of them, I can only presume that you and your colleagues have considered the possibility that these messages are, in fact, intended for you?”

  A deathly hush followed as the room of impatient journalists waited for her response to what was, in all fairness, a rather good question.

  Lennox pushed the “can’t speculate” card in front of her. Of course she would, thought Baxter bitterly. Lennox was hardly going to admit that she had dragged her halfway across the world only to put her in harm’s way.

  “That is just one of several possibilities that we are currently looking into,” she said. By “we” she had meant Edmunds, of course.

  Lennox looked a little annoyed that Baxter had gone off-card but appeared content with the professional and concise answer.

  “Chief Inspector Baxter!” someone in the front row called.

  When Baxter automatically looked in the woman’s direction, she took it as an invitation to stand up and ask her disarmingly direct question:

  “Are there going to be more murders?”

  Baxter remembered her conversation with Edmunds the previous night. Lennox rapped her fingers on the “can’t speculate” card once again.

  “I . . .” Baxter hesitated.

  Lennox turned to Baxter and tapped the card more urgently. At the back of the room, Curtis looked worried and was shaking her head. Even without the short script, Rouche mouthed the words “I can’t speculate on that.”

  “Chief Inspector? Are there going to be more murders?” the woman asked again as the audience remained quiet.

  Baxter thought of the official press release that had accompanied her arrest of Masse: the story she had had to tell to save herself, the diluted explanation of Wolf’s involvement.