Blood in Grandpont

by Peter Tickler

  ‘Karen!’ she shouted. All her training and all her common sense should have led Holden to utter this word in the manner of someone returning home after a day at work – ‘Hi there, I’m home!’ But she didn’t. She shouted, in a shout gripped and moulded and empowered by the deepest fear. She looked around the living area and saw no one. ‘Karen!’ she called again, as hope and desperation battled with each other. And then she felt a breeze on her face, and saw the long net curtains flapping in that same current of air. The French window on to the balcony was open.

  Her movement, previously frantic, was now slow motion. Through the curtains, she could see the shadow of a person. The figure did not move. Like a shop’s marionette, it stood there, as if looking out across the canal that lay below, or maybe looking in through the curtains, watching. It was impossible to tell which. Thoughts, fears, assessments ran through her mind, but these were processes that took fractions of seconds, and almost immediately she resumed her forward progress. She was conscious she had no weapon in her hand. If it was Lucy on the balcony with a knife, she would need something, but looking for one did not occur to her. Her only thought was to get to the motionless figure out there, see who it was, and then react. It was as simple as that. Nothing else was possible. But please God, let it be Karen!

  Detective Sergeant Fox should have been at his Inspector’s back. He had followed in her footsteps across the manicured lawn that fronted the flats. But as he reached the entrance, he almost collided with a man who was himself sprinting round the corner from the back of the flats. He was wearing uniform green trousers and polo shirt, and as soon as he saw Fox he started shouting. ‘Have you got a mobile? I need to ring “999”!’

  It took Fox a few seconds to extract more information from the man, who was gibbering with shock, and then he was running again, hurtled his big frame round the corner of the flats, down the side and then round the next corner. And then, despite, all his years of experience, he stopped dead and for two or even three seconds stood unmoving.

  The woman’s body – for a woman it clearly was – was spreadeagled across the black railings which fronted the edge of the canal. The body had landed centrally, so that the spikes had pierced the width of the body just above the waist. Her legs were splayed, facing him, and her head and arms hung slack over the other side, above the dark, slow-running waters of the canal, so that he could not see the face. Fox shook himself, and moved forward again until he reached the railings. It seemed impossible that the woman could have survived the fall, but he stretched for and grabbed hold of her left hand, feeling for a pulse. She was, undeniably, dead, and he released her wrist. It was still warm. Finally, he pulled himself up on the railing, so he could see her face. It was, oddly, undamaged and even serene. It was the face of Dr Karen Pointer.

  Fox turned and looked up. He, of course, had never visited Karen Pointer’s flat, but he could see only one person above him, on the balcony below the topmost one. He couldn’t see who it was. He assumed it was Lucy Tull, but, whoever it was or wasn’t, he knew for certain that his boss was in danger. He started to run again, back round the flats. But on breasting the second corner he had to take sudden evasive action to avoid a grey-haired woman coming the other way. ‘Is she all right?’ the woman said, apparently unconcerned that a man of considerable bulk had very nearly flattened her. But Fox wasn’t interested in either answering her or stopping. At the bottom of the stairwell, he hit the lift button in case it was waiting there. He would run up the stairs if he had to, but he knew the limits of his own mobility. Miraculously the door opened instantly, and he pushed himself inside it. Eight floors. He hit the button for the seventh. As the lift moved steadily upwards, he tried to work out on which side the canal would be, and so where the entrance to Karen’s flat was likely to be, because he was pretty sure there would be at least two flats per floor, and he didn’t want to waste time trying to enter the wrong one. The door opened at seven, and he rushed out, turning left. The door in front of him, with a ‘7b’ on it, was ajar. At least he wasn’t going to have to force it. He took a gulp, like a diver about to plunge off the high board, and thrust his way through the entrance.

  ‘Hello, Inspector.’ The figure on the balcony moved forward, pushing the flapping curtains to the side with her left hand.

  ‘Where is she?’ Holden spoke quietly, firmly, as her training kicked in over her emotions. ‘What have you done to her?’

  ‘There’s been a terrible accident,’ came the reply.

  These words and the unutterable knowledge that they conveyed hit Holden like a tidal wave, deluging her so completely that she felt she must be swept into oblivion. Then the wave retreated, sucking and pulling every present, past and future hope out of her so completely that oblivion would have seemed bliss. But Susan Holden was a woman whose instincts had from her earliest years been honed towards fight not flight, a woman who lived in the reality of life, and not the fantasy of wish fulfilment. She was a survivor, and it was this instinct that cut in now, as Lucy Tull advanced slowly towards her, her left hand hanging loose at her side and her right hand held menacingly behind her back.

  ‘Stand still!’ Holden demanded. ‘Hands out to the front!’

  Lucy Tull stopped, and brought her hidden hand into view. In it, she held a knife. It was a kitchen knife, with a wide blade, the sort of heavy chopping knife you dice meat or vegetables with, that Karen had diced her meat and vegetables with. ‘Such a terrible accident,’ she said blankly. ‘She just fell.’

  Holden spoke slowly. ‘Put the knife down!’

  ‘You don’t believe me, do you?’ Her voice was now high and shrill, and she lifted her right hand so that the knife was pointing directly at Holden. ‘You’re trying to trick me!’ Her voice had now changed to a hiss, and the pupils of her eyes had shrunk to such a degree that they were almost invisible. She stepped forward again, swaying slightly like a boxer weighing up a dangerous opponent, and her face was an emotionless mask. But it wasn’t her face that Holden was watching. Holden moved the weight of her body forward, feinting towards Lucy’s left, and then, as her opponent’s knife hand slewed across to counter the move, she hurled herself forward, grabbing for Lucy’s right wrist as she did so. Her hand closed tightly round its target, but as it did so a lightning flash of agony cut into her lower arm. Then her left hand joined the right, and together they gripped and twisted so violently that Lucy Tull screamed and the knife fell to the floor. Holden now pushed hard with her shoulder into Lucy’s unbalanced body, and sent her sprawling across the floor.

  Briefly she paused, scrabbling for the knife, and then hurling it way behind her, well out of reach of her assailant. But Lucy was back on her feet and retreating, back through the swirling curtains and out on to the balcony. For a moment, Holden paused, wondering where the hell Fox was and why he wasn’t there backing her up, but she had no intention of waiting. She had got Karen’s killer cornered, and she was going to nail her if that was the last thing she did.

  ‘God, didn’t she scream as she fell!’ Lucy’s voice, high and loud and mocking, sliced through the curtain. Adrenaline flooded through Holden’s veins, fuelling her rage, and like a thing demented she burst through the flimsy barrier of curtain that separated her from her quarry, for her quarry was what Lucy Tull had now become. She crashed into her, and together they staggered and lurched against the balcony railing. Down below them someone screamed, but Holden was aware only of herself and Lucy Tull. She twisted round, trying to get a lock on her opponent, and for a moment she did, but then an elbow crashed with stunning force into the side of her head, and her grip slackened, and Lucy broke free. Holden fell to the ground, but instantly thrust herself up, conscious that if Lucy escaped back through the windows and into the flat, then she herself would be in serious danger – if not from the knife she had tried to throw away, then from the other four knives that she knew lived in Karen’s butcher’s block. Again she threw herself at Lucy, catching her by the door. This time she was more succes
sful, grabbing and twisting Lucy’s right arm, and forcing her round and down so that Lucy’s chest was pressed against the top of the balcony railing, while she leant with all her own weight on top of her, willing her into submission.

  ‘It’s over, Lucy,’ she said loudly. And then even more loudly she shouted the words again, as if merely by words she could compel her struggling opponent to surrender. ‘It’s over!’

  But it wasn’t over. For perhaps two or three seconds, the pair of them remained there, like a tableau frozen in time, for all the world like two spectators looking over a balcony to get a better view, or two friends locked in a romantic embrace as they shouted down to friends below. And that was when Holden finally saw Karen Pointer, her body spreadeagled across the black railings. There was an explosion of red across her white blouse, and her arms and legs were stretched out in gruesome symmetry. Holden shuddered and emitted a wail of agony.

  Then Lucy Tull spoke, as if in response, her voice less shrill than before, but full of excited glee. ‘And when she hit the railings, wow! She didn’t half squeal! Just like a pig!’

  Later, as she rolled every moment of those frantic events over and over in her head, Susan came to the conclusion that Lucy must have invented this, and had said it to throw her off her guard or maybe to provoke her into an uncontrolled reaction. She did hope so, for any other thought was too much to bear. But in those impossible moments, the only way she could hold on to reality was to ask the key question ‘Why?’ she bawled, bending her head low over Lucy’s right ear. ‘Why did you do it?’

  ‘Why?’ Lucy had giggled, as if in embarrassment, like a girl hearing a rude joke for the first time in her life. Then she stopped giggling. ‘Why don’t you ask Marjorie?’ she replied. Holden momentarily released some of the pressure she was exerting as she took this in, and Lucy, sensing it, made a final effort to break free. But to no avail.

  ‘Guv!’ It was a man’s voice behind her. ‘I’m here. Hang on.’ Susan Holden knew it was Fox’s voice, and she cursed inwardly. She had heard and felt and suffered enough, and she wanted no help, and no interference. Not now. With an enormous grunt she tightened her grip on her struggling victim, and heaved. She felt the weight of Lucy’s body begin to lift, and she heard a sharp crack as Lucy’s wrist fractured under the pressure, but she pushed all the harder, until quite suddenly all resistance evaporated, and Lucy Tull hurtled over the balcony’s edge and out into oblivion.

  CHAPTER 11

  The following Friday, at approximately 10.45 a.m. Susan Holden pulled into the car park in front of the Raglan Hospital, brought her vehicle to a halt in the furthest empty bay, and switched off her engine. She did not get out. For some ten minutes, she sat there, unmoving, with eyes tightly closed and arms folded across her body, as if immersed in meditation. But meditation requires an emptying of the mind, something she could not have begun to do in her present circumstances. Inside her head there were thoughts, images and emotions which whirled wildly around in such a maelstrom that she felt that sooner or later her brain must explode.

  Eventually she uncrossed her arms, and put her right hand on the door handle. She knew she had to do it – to open the door and climb out and walk into the hospital and confront Marjorie Drabble – but the act of so doing seemed beyond her will and strength. But it was the least she could do for Karen, she told herself – to find out the truth, to find out what had driven Lucy Tull to kill. She cared not for Maria Tull and Jack Smith and Dominic Russell. Only professional pride would have driven her to root out the reason behind Lucy’s killing of them. But professional pride had ceased to matter now, and not just because she had been suspended while the circumstances of Lucy Tull’s death were fully investigated. Everything had ceased to matter except the reason for Karen’s death. If only she had worked it out sooner, she could have saved her. Her left hand was thumping the dashboard, once, twice, and again. If only, if only, if only! She raised her head, and found herself looking into the eyes of a short, bald-headed man in a suit. He was staring at her, and he looked disconcertingly like her dead father. A surge of nausea swept up through her stomach, so that she felt she would vomit then and there. She pulled viciously at the door handle on which her right hand was still resting, desperate to escape the nightmare that was engulfing her. It swung open and banged hard against the silver BMW parked next to her, and the man scurried off towards the main door of the hospital, afraid of confrontation, maybe to report her. She didn’t care. Holden gulped in the fresh air, as she fought to regain control of her body, and she noted with surprise – and relief – that the man moved, despite his shape, with remarkable nimbleness, and in that respect he was quite unlike her father. She sucked in another deep breath of air. He was no ghost. It was no nightmare.

  As she entered the reception area of the Raglan Hospital, she felt a curious sense of déjà vu. There was the same sense of entering a rather smart hotel, elegant but restrained, where people move purposefully but quietly, and conversations are held in hushed tones. The receptionist, whom she thought was different from her last visit, looked up and peered over her glasses, as if daring her to proceed without first checking in personally with her. Holden moved dutifully towards her.

  ‘Can I help you?’ The receptionist spoke briskly, but with a cut-glass accent that suggested that even the receptionists in the Raglan Hospital were recruited from the choicest inhabitants of North Oxford.

  ‘I’ve come to see Marjorie Drabble.’

  ‘Are you a relative?’ There was a tone of puzzled disbelief in her question, as if the woman standing in front of her did not match her idea of what a relative of Mrs Marjorie Drabble would look like.

  ‘A friend,’ she lied. ‘I’m Susan Holden.’

  The woman frowned. ‘I see!’ Two words that can mean so much, depending on how they are spoken. ‘Well, sit down. I’ll put a call through.’ And she turned dismissively away.

  Holden walked over to the seating area and sank into a large cream-coloured leather armchair so soft that for a moment it threatened to swallow her. There was a coffee maker on the table across the room, and the flask was half full, but the effort of getting up felt enormous, so she shut her eyes and tried to make do with the aroma.

  ‘Excuse me!’

  Holden jumped. Ms Reception was standing over her, and was prodding her lightly on the upper arm. ‘Mrs Drabble will see you now.’

  Holden stood up quickly, or as quickly as the depth of the chair would allow.

  ‘Have you been before? Do you know where her room is?’

  ‘Yes.’ She reached down and picked up her shoulder bag. She wondered if she’d been asleep for ten seconds or ten minutes. Not that it mattered, but the receptionist remained standing there, as if reluctant to allow this rather dubious visitor to move unchaperoned around her hospital. ‘Thank you,’ Holden said firmly, ‘I’ll find my own way, I’m sure.’

  ‘Oh!’ came the disapproving reply. ‘Well, it’s room 203.’ And with that the woman turned abruptly round, withdrawing towards her reception desk, where she would, Holden had no doubt, lie in wait for the next unwary arrival.

  Holden made her way to room 203 with rather less difficulty than she had expected. The door was shut, so she tapped softly on it and let herself in. Marjorie Drabble was lying in her bed, but was propped up on three or four plumped pillows, apparently asleep. Holden closed the door quietly behind her and walked over towards her.

  ‘Sit down where I can see you,’ Marjorie Drabble said, gesturing with her hand. If her eyes were open, they were only just so.

  Holden sat down. ‘Can I get you anything?’ It seemed a better thing to say than to ask how she was.

  Finally Marjorie Drabble’s eyes opened fully. ‘I understood you were off the case?’

  Holden nodded. Her suspension wasn’t exactly a secret, not since Don Alexander had revealed it to his Oxford Mail readers the previous day. ‘This isn’t an official visit,’ she said quickly. ‘I was just hoping that we could have a chat.
Off the record.’

  ‘What if I say “No”?’

  ‘Then I will have to leave you in peace.’

  She gave a single laugh, followed by a cough. ‘I get enough peace, thanks. Pass me some water, will you, and then you can ask your damned questions.’

  Holden got up, poured some water into the glass on the side table, and offered it to her. She grasped it in two hands, and helped herself, taking several gulps, before she passed it back to the hovering Holden.

  ‘No notes, no hidden tape recorder, no nothing. Promise me!’

  ‘I promise.’

  ‘And may God condemn you to eternal damnation if you break your promise!’ The ferocity of the ill woman took Holden quite by surprise, and for a few moments she busied herself with replacing the glass, and picking up a greetings card that had fallen on the floor.

  ‘Well, get on with it then!’

  Holden sat down, and composed herself. She had listed several questions in her head, but inevitably they were no longer there when she wanted to draw on them. She cleared her throat. ‘When I asked Lucy why she had committed these murders, she told me to ask you.’

  ‘Did she now?’ Drabble looked at her quizzically. ‘When did she say that?’

  ‘Just before she died.’

  ‘Did you push her?’ The question hit her like a punch in the solar plexus.

  ‘What do you mean?’ Of course, Holden knew what she meant, but evasion came easily to her. ‘We had a struggle. She had already killed Dr Pointer. She had stabbed her and then she had pushed her over the balcony on to the railings below.’

  ‘Stabbed her?’ There was real surprise in her voice. ‘That wasn’t in the paper.’

  ‘No, it wasn’t.’ Holden couldn’t see any point in withholding this information. It would be in the public domain soon enough. ‘But that’s what she did. She stabbed her, and then she pushed her over the edge.’