Bad Samaritan

by Michael J Malone

  ‘Matt, not Simon?’ asks Ale.

  ‘As far as she was concerned, her and Simon were over. But she had the hots for Matt. She’s young and single, why not, she says. But I was like, he’s the brother, you don’t go there, babes.’

  ‘And? Back to that night.’

  ‘Well, that was the first time I saw that Ian might have a thing for Aileen.’

  ‘Why, what happened?’

  ‘Matt walked past us on the way to the loo. Winked at Aileen, called Ian and Jack a pair of wankers. And Aileen got up to follow him. Ian stood up as if to stop her, and I’m thinking, what the hell, you know? I think…’ Her eyes focus on the near distance as if she’s recalling these events in full for the first time. ‘I think Ian was holding her arm. She tried to twist away. Jack was like, what the fuck, Ian? And Aileen clawed at the back of Ian’s hand to get him off her. When he sat back down he had a big scratch and everything.’ She pulls a strand of hair off her face. ‘Jack was a bit pissed off with Ian, but seemed happy for Aileen to follow Matt down the stairs to the loos.’

  ‘Then what?’

  ‘They were gone for, what, ten minutes? And then Aileen came back with a huge smile. Whispered in my ear that she’d…’ She pauses while she deals with the guilt of what she is about to say. ‘Sorry, Aileen,’ she says to the air above her head. ‘That she’d given him a blowjob down in the loo.’

  Well, thinks Ale, a possible explanation for both sets of DNA in that wee scenario.

  ‘Then what?’

  ‘Ian had gone totally silent. In the pure huff with everybody. So I was bored and watching Matt and his crew. I’m sure he told them what he and Aileen had been doing, cos they kept looking over at her. Then Simon comes in and I’m thinking, awkward. Simon barely had a chance to get a sip of his pint before he was in Matt’s face. I’m guessing one of Matt’s pals spilled the beans. They didn’t fight or nothing, but Simon came over, said to Aileen, “Well, you must make your parents proud,” and left.’ Karen stops speaking. ‘Any chance I could get a wee glass of water? And a smoke?’

  ‘No cigarettes allowed, Karen,’ Ale says. ‘A glass of water is fine. We can get you a cup of tea if you prefer?’

  ‘Water’s fine, thanks.’

  Peters does the needful and the interview reconvenes.

  ‘Then Simon left. Face like thunder. And Aileen stood up to follow him. Ian got up, to reason with her I guess, and got another scratch for his trouble. So then I got in her grill. I was pissed off that Ian cared more about her, you know? Told her she should leave my boyfriend alone and…’ Karen’s face is clenched in guilt and grief. She whispers, ‘I called her a skank and she ran out of the pub after Simon.’ She bites on her lower lip for a second. ‘I never saw her again.’

  55

  Leonard is running through the city, snarling at anyone who gets in his way, daring cars to collide with him, speed fuelled by his rage. He’s never felt anger like this before. He feels he could fuel a car with it. Zero to sixty in ten seconds.

  McBain. The name is a roar in his mind. The focus of all the hate and spite he has ever felt is bound up in that name.

  Simon Davis was his. There. Big-eyed. Gullible. Curled up in the palm of his hand. He would have fed off the boy’s grief for months.

  Then, as the feeding waned, he would die.

  Could he kill him? Davis reached through his carefully constructed emotional barriers like no one else ever had.

  The realisation strikes him with such force that he comes to a dead stop.

  Of course. That was it.

  In the eyes. And in a certain light, the cast of his face, the play of his expressions. They even had the same hair colour. As if his twin hadn’t died but had transferred into the soul of this child.

  He had died, what, twenty-odd years ago. Simon Davis was in his early twenties.

  Christ teaches us that anything is possible, he thinks and sends a silent prayer of thanks skywards.

  * * *

  He can see his hotel in the distance. He picks up speed again. There’s something he needs to do.

  Back in his hotel room, fury simmering like the flame in a kiln, he takes a shower. Impatient to begin the pleasantries, he rubs a towel over his back, between his leg and over his head. Then he sits naked in front of the mirror.

  He opens the drawer of the dresser, pulls out a white mask and a scalpel. Runs a finger slowly down the mask’s profile. From the forehead, between the eyebrows and down the nose to the lips and chin. Feeling the lightest of touches as if the pressure had been on his own face, not the mask.

  Not since he’d killed the nun has he felt the need to carry through with this ceremony, but the hunger to spill McBain’s blood deserves such a celebration.

  He places the mask over his face. Holds it in place with pressure from thumb to forefinger under the bottom lip. He picks up the scalpel, and as his veins sing, he places the point of the blade on the soft skin of the lower lid of his right eye. A tiny amount of pressure is enough for the blade to pierce skin, and crimson fluid pearls onto steel and from there slides onto the mask.

  And he exalts in the moment as a solitary tear of blood slides down the cheek of the mask. Like a promise of more.

  56

  I’m sitting with Simon in the hospital, waiting for his mother to arrive. I’d phoned her from the ambulance. Told her not to worry, her boy was safe, but he did need some medical assistance.

  Her panicked breathing down the line in response suggested to me that my advice was wasted.

  The medical staff shooed me aside while they gave Simon the full check-up and closed the wound. Luckily, the doctor told me, there had been no major trauma. No vital organs had been hit and Simon would make a full recovery.

  Just as Leonard intended, I’m sure.

  My phone sounds an alert. It is a text from Helen Davis.

  ‘Caught up in traffic. How’s Simon?’

  ‘In no danger at all’, I answer. Notwithstanding the unfathomable appetites of a serial killer. ‘He’s had six stitches and is sipping a nice cup of tea.’ The cup of tea was a lie, but I was sure it would help reduce any panic and ensure she would arrive at the hospital not having caused any injuries of her own.

  I pull back the curtain and walk over to Simon’s bed.

  ‘Oh. This is like déjà vu all over again.’ I smile.

  His answering smile is genuine, but tinged with pain. ‘Yeah, that time Aileen’s dad gave me a doing.’

  ‘You guys have certainly been put through it,’ I say and grip his forearm. ‘You just need to be there for your mother. She’s had to endure two great losses in her life. Having you by her side will be a great comfort.’

  ‘That’s just it,’ he says, face brightening, eyes large. ‘What if…’ He shakes his head. Knuckles a tear from his cheek. ‘Never mind. Tell me what I need to know about that guy, Leonard?’

  I wonder for a moment where he is about to go, but park the thought and answer his question. I have to impress upon him the danger he was in.

  ‘He’s a very dangerous man who has murdered a lot of people, and you were quite possibly his next target,’ I reply, while thinking I’d probably bumped him down to number two on the list. A surge of anticipation in my gut lets me know that his attempt would be welcome. We needed to sort this out once and for all. ‘How did you guys meet?’

  ‘I work as a counsellor on a website that helps bereaved twins. He was one of my clients. He seemed so genuine. Only another twin could understand what that kind of loss might mean.’ He stops speaking as he thinks this through. ‘How could he have fooled me so completely?’

  ‘That’s because he was speaking the truth,’ I reply. ‘His twin brother died when he was just a kid. It has – understatement of the year – screwed him up badly.’

  ‘But why me? Why home in on me? And how did he home in on me?�
��

  I think about my visit to the church in Perth. The priest’s story about the twins there who had died within days of each other. Both seemingly accidental. With Leonard around, nothing was accidental. I think of him at the orphanage. He was never the cleverest of boys, but he had street smarts and a survival instinct that was uncanny.

  The job as parish handyman would be his first stroke of luck after he fled from the bodies in Bethlehem House. Fitting in to that kind of environment would have been simple for a man with his cloistered background. I remember the postcard he sent to McCall. Gone hunting, was all he wrote. So, his second piece of luck was finding a target. The twin brothers. And that had sparked off a new purpose.

  ‘It’s me,’ I say to Simon. ‘I’m the reason he found you.’ And I realise the truth of it as the words sound out of my mouth. ‘Our paths have crossed before. I’m the only one of his previous targets who survived…’

  ‘Holy shit,’ Simon interrupts.

  ‘I like to think of myself as his nemesis,’ I say airily, aiming for a moment of levity. Fail spectacularly. ‘The press seem to like me.’ I hold my hands out to the side. ‘Fat, grizzled detective guy. And the suits had me fronting the press briefings for Aileen’s murder. The man’s a ghoul, so he would have fixed on that. And when he found out that you, the early suspect, was a twin, that would have set his pulse soaring.’ I pause. Shake my head. None of this would stack up in a court of law, but the range of the man’s thinking was there, undeniably.

  ‘You have an online presence? An interweb shadow footprint thing?’ I ask.

  Simon grins. ‘Of course. Who doesn’t?’

  ‘Jesus. You kids have no idea how dangerous this stuff could be in the wrong hands. Does any of your online stuff mention about you being a counsellor on this website?’

  His eyebrows crowd together as he thinks this through. ‘Possibly,’ he replies. ‘Probably,’ he goes on to assert. ‘Bloody hell, that’s quite a leap.’

  ‘Yeah, so, he tracks you down…’ I make another connection. ‘Oh fuck. He’d have been watching your house. He will have seen Ian Cook deliver his poison pen letters…’

  ‘Do you think he killed Ian?’

  ‘I’m pretty damn sure of it,’ I reply, thinking it through. ‘And,’ I carry the thought on, ‘I’m pretty sure he would have had a hand in the hunt through the city for Matt, before he drowned.’

  ‘No.’ Simon has his hand over his mouth.

  ‘It all worked out beautifully. Probably better than he could have ever imagined. He made his previous twin killings look like an accident and then a suicide…’ I’m getting ahead of myself here. There’s no evidence to back up this theory, but I feel it as truth. ‘The priest said he was a great comfort to the second brother in Perth. So, he would have enjoyed the proximity. The grief…’

  ‘No,’ says Simon. ‘He would have got off on the man’s grief?’

  ‘Anything’s possible with this guy,’ I say.

  Simon shivers.

  ‘Did you know there was an online hunt for Matt? People posting his whereabouts like a Facebook lynch-mob?’

  ‘No!’ says Simon, his face long. ‘No,’ he repeats. Hides his face in his hands as he cries and contemplates his brother’s death.

  ‘I’m sure they didn’t want to kill him. They just wanted to vent. People rarely take their online shit into the real world. Like all bullies, they’re cowards. But somehow, this one got out of hand, and I’m pretty certain Leonard would have had a hand in that. How I can prove that one, I’ve no idea.’

  Simon falls back onto his pillow. ‘I can’t take all of this in. it’s too much. It’s … fucking obscene.’

  ‘There’s just one thing I need to know,’ I ask. I see Simon and Leonard on the bridge. Their posture. The apparent link they had already forged. The physical similarity. The way Leonard had pulled him into a hug before wielding the knife.

  This had become something other than a hunt for Leonard.

  Simon looks at me with a question in his eyes. ‘Who’s John?’

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘Leonard. He said, “Sorry, John”, on the bridge. Didn’t occur to me as strange at the time. I was kinda busy trying not to bleed,’ he jokes. Then sobers. ‘Who’s John?’

  My phone sounds another alert. Helen Davis.

  ‘Still in bloody traffic. I HATE this bloody city.’

  ‘Don’t worry. Everything’s fine here.’ I thumb and press send.

  ‘That’s his brother. He died when we were just kids.’

  ‘We?’

  I grimace. ‘We have a shared history.’

  ‘God, that’s creepy.’

  ‘When were you born?’ I ask, not quite sure why I need to know.

  ‘1992.’

  I do the figures. ‘That’s the year John died.’

  57

  I pull back the cubicle curtains. The sound of the metal rings singing against the pole sounds high-pitched in the room.

  ‘Detective McBain, there’s something I need to tell you,’ Simon says to my back.

  ‘In a minute, Simon. I just need to…’ I walk away past the nurses’ station and out into the large hallway at the lifts.

  I thumb to a name and number on my phone.

  ‘Elucidate,’ says Kenny.

  ‘Arse,’ I reply.

  ‘Alright, Mr McBain. Anything I can help you with?’

  ‘Listen up. There’s not much of a charge on this phone.’ I tell him about my meeting on the bridge and my subsequent conversation with Simon. ‘So, I think Leonard’s got me in his sights.’

  ‘Well, we knew that,’ says Kenny.

  ‘You’re supposed to say, that’s rubbish, Ray. It’s all in your imagination, Ray,’ I feel the surge of fear in my thighs. I don’t fight it. Could save my life.

  ‘I don’t do bullshit, Ray. If you want that, phone one of your bosses down at Police HQ.’

  ‘Maggie,’ I say. ‘He’ll go after Maggie or…’ I follow the thought. He’s been stalking me, I’m sure of it, for weeks. He’ll target anyone and everyone he thinks I have a relationship with. ‘Ale,’ I say. I’m discounting Kenny. He’s more than capable of looking after himself. ‘Maggie and Ale are the two obvious targets.’

  ‘What about the lad, Simon Davis?’ Kenny asks. ‘Do you think he’ll go after him?’

  ‘Anything’s possible,’ I say. ‘I’ll get on to the team. Get an officer posted to his ward.’ I grit my teeth. ‘And if he thinks he’s going to get Maggie, he’ll need to go through me first.’

  Kenny reads where I’m going. ‘And I’ll see to Ale.’ We both know she’ll refuse official help. Kenny sitting outside her house in his car will be a more effective option in any event.

  Relieved that’s been taken care of, I hang up and go back to Simon’s bedside.

  ‘Right,’ I say, surprised at the affection I feel for the young man. Was I ever that wholesome and naïve? ‘I’m all yours. And all ears.’

  He breathes out. Long and deep, as if he’d been holding it in since I left his side.

  ‘You know you said about the connection Leonard thinks I have with him?’ He looks like he’s about to start crying again. ‘Maybe it’s not the brother thing. Maybe it’s a killer thing? Maybe I’m…’ His face is bright as if it’s about to burst.

  ‘Simon, son, you’re not making much sense.’

  ‘I lied to you. When we first spoke. I did see Aileen the night she died.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘Will you arrest me?’ he asks. ‘Can you wait until after my mum’s been?’

  ‘Simon, can you start talking sense, son? And besides, I’m not on active duty. I’m off on the sick…’ and the thought occurs to me that I might just resign anyway. Me and this job just aren’t working out anymore. ‘So tell me what you need to tell me, but in words I can u
nderstand, eh?’

  ‘We were all in The Drum. I arrived later than everyone else. One of the guys said that Aileen had given Matt a BJ down in the toilets. I went over to where Aileen was sitting and said something nasty. Then I left.’

  He bites his lip and closes his eyes against the memory.

  ‘She was walking when I last saw her. Honest. And talking. Well, shouting actually. Told me I was a cunt.’

  ‘What happened before that point?’

  ‘She came after me when I left the pub. Found me up one of those lanes. I heard her coming a mile away on those stupid high heels.’

  I get a mental image of her legs under the incident tent. And those stupid red high heels.

  ‘I was having a piss. She caught me and tore into me while I still had my dick in my hand. Told me I was a loser. A wimp. Not a patch on my brother. I told her she was drunk and if she wanted to shout at me to wait until the morning when she would at least know what she was saying. She just looked at me. Then began taunting me again. Simon the bloody counsellor, she said. Always knows the right fucking thing to say. I zipped up and faced her. She pushed me. I pushed her back, and she lost her balance. Fell on to one of those huge metal bin things. The corner of one caught her right in the temple.’ He pauses in the telling, eyes seeking mine, telling me there was no way this was the blow that caused her death.

  ‘I tried to help her back on to her feet, but she pushed me off. Pulled herself back up. Then she started on me again. But even worse this time. She was furious. I’ve never seen her so furious. So…’ He stops again, his bottom lip trembling, the effort to speak all but impossible. ‘I walked away. She told me to fuck off. She never wanted to see me again. So I did. I walked away.’