All Saints- Murder on the Mersey

by Brian L. Porter

  * * *

  “Wake up, Father Byrne. Father, Gerald, please, wake up.”

  The voice of Father David Willis eventually penetrated into the dark world of Gerald Byrne's dream state and he felt himself being pulled back to reality. Slowly opening his eyes, Byrne felt the strong arms of David Willis on his shoulders, shaking him as the younger priest's words continued to implore him to escape the nightmare in which he'd become entrapped.

  Byrne looked up and there was David Willis, his countenance one of deep concern, his words soft and soothing.

  “Father Byrne, are you okay? I was so worried. You were screaming fit to bring the roof down, and woke me from a deep sleep, not an easy thing to do, I assure you.”

  “Screaming? I was screaming, David? I was…I saw…I was young again and…it's a bit hazy.”

  “Get off her. Leave her alone, you bastards. That's what you were screaming in your sleep, Father. Well, that and more, but all in similar vein.”

  “Oh, Holy Mother of God forgive me, David, for disturbing your sleep and frightening you half to death, I'm sure.”

  “It's alright, really. Here, take a drink of this,” Willis lifted a glass of water from the bedside table and handed it to Byrne, who sipped from it gratefully, then gulped down the second half of the glassful.

  “No, really, I apologise, David. I don't know what came over me.”

  “A nightmare, Father, for sure. Who were you trying to defend? Do you recall the details? Who was the girl? Was it something that maybe happened to you in the past?”

  “A nightmare, yes, of course it was. No, I don't recall the details,” he lied, “and I don't remember a girl in the dream,” another lie, “but I guess I ought to thank you and let you get back to your bed, Father Willis. I'm certain I'll be okay now, really.”

  Willis thought Father Byrne was being evasive, but why would he lie about a dream of all things?

  “God save me,” Byrne prayed once Willis had been placated sufficiently and had returned to his own room. The truth was, he recalled every detail of his dream, wining the race, being tripped in the relay, Proctor's subsequent disqualification, all real-life events, but the attack by Proctor and his friends on Angela, his sister? Fact and fiction were somehow merging in his mind and if he wasn't careful, he was in danger of losing his grip on reality. That attack by Mark Proctor was just a terrible, nightmarish distortion of reality…wasn't it?

  Sleep was a long time coming again for David Willis that night. Something, he felt, was seriously troubling the new parish priest. This was the second time Byrne's nightmares had encroached upon his sleep. Could Father Byrne be ill, perhaps some dread, nameless terror from the past had reared its head and was torturing the older priest? Willis knew something of the background of Gerald Byrne as told to him by the bishop when he'd told Willis of Byrne's appointment to St. Luke's, but was there something more, something no-one was telling him? David Willis eventually drifted off into a fitful sleep after first deciding to try and find out more about the new parish priest of St. Luke's.

  Chapter 15

  All in the mind

  Andy Ross had grown tired of waiting for the Home Office Profiler to arrive. A visit to the mortuary had brought little new in the way of information that would help them find the killer or killers of the two graveyard victims. The 'immediate' post-mortem promised two days ago had been delayed as William Nugent had cut his hand badly on his return to the mortuary and had required medical attention himself, leading to the postponement of the examination for just over twenty four hours.

  Doctor Nugent and Francis Lees had at last carried out the post-mortem on the 'angel of death' victim, a name given to the unfortunate man by one of Miles Booker's crime scene technicians. Nugent had, at length, given Ross a tentative cause of death.

  Standing over the autopsy table, his left hand heavily stitched where the knife blade had slipped and bitten deep into his flesh, Nugent looked up from the cadaver and looked at Ross.

  “This one seems a little different, Inspector. The throat has been cut, as before, but not as deeply and it's my professional opinion that this poor bugger was killed by disembowelment. The massive trauma to this area,” he indicated the lower abdomen with a flourish of his right hand, “is massive and the blood loss would have been tremendous. I believe yon laddie was opened up and bled to death as he hung, attached to that bloody stone angel. The blood pooled on the grave back at the churchyard indicated such a massive blood loss and my examination confirms it.”

  Ross rarely felt ill during post-mortems or autopsies but found himself feeling quite nauseous as he looked at the dead man's remains on the table in front of him. Izzie Drake also felt her legs going weak as she looked at the butchered remains of what, not long ago had been a living, breathing human being. Both officers had seen the scene at St. Mark's, which had been bad enough, but to now stand over the remains as Nugent picked over them in his hunt for clues they might use to find the killer or killers, was almost too much for them.

  “I'm also pretty sure now that ye'll be looking for two killers, Inspector. It's my opinion that the slash across the throat was inflicted by a different hand than the wound on Remington's throat. It's not so deep, and there's evidence that whoever did it almost used their blade in a sawing motion, totally different to the first murder. The two sets of footprints help to confirm it. I think you might be seeking a woman, and a man, who probably was the one who opened up the man's abdomen, letting the innards spill out as he died. Oh yes, and the tongue's missing as with the first case, so that gives you your confirmation that this murder was comitted by the same killer or killers as Matthew Remington?””

  “A woman?” said Drake, surprised, who, since talking with Miles Booker, had denied to herself that a member of her sex could have been responsible for such savagery. Are you sure?”

  “Aye, Sergeant, a woman. The Crime Scenes Officers will confirm it, but those footprints in the blood in front of the angel looked too small to be those of a man, and that neck wound would be consistent with a woman's hand being at work.”

  “That puts a new slant on things,” Ross commented. “A man and woman working together would be unusual but not unheard of. If there's nothing else you can tell us right now, Doc, we'd better get back to Headquarters. We're expecting the arrival of a profiler.”

  “Och, a profiler is it now? Your bosses think you need some help, I take it?”

  “I'll take any help I can get right now, Doc,” Ross acknowledged as he and Drake took their leave of the autopsy room, Drake lingering in reception for a brief conversation with Peter Foster before joining Ross outside as he stood by the car.

  “Lover boy alright, is he?” Ross asked as Drake unlocked the Mondeo and the pair climbed into the vehicle.

  “”Peter's fine thank you, sir,” Drake replied.

  Ross smiled as Drake squirmed a little at his 'lover boy remark'.

  * * *

  The squad room at headquarters was unusually quiet on their return. Most of the team were out pursuing inquiries to try to establish the identity of the latest victim, with Gable also trying to find more on the life and relationships involved in the life of Matthew 'Razor' Remington.

  Paul Ferris looked a forlorn lone figure among the desks and computers of the room but he quickly rose to his feet as Ross and Drake walked in.

  “Everything okay, Paul?” Ross asked.

  “Yes, sir. I'm still working on the tracking the life of Matthew Remington, while Sam is on the streets trying to find anyone who can give us more intel on his recent activities. I'll have it all up on the murder board as soon as I can, and by the way, sir, you have a visitor.”

  “The profiler?”

  “Yes, sir, waiting in your office.”

  “Been here long?”

  “About half an hour sir. I wanted to call you at the mortuary but she told me not to, that she was happy to wait and didn't want to interrupt you in mid-investigation.”

  “Very cons
iderate of her, I must say. Come on Izzie, let's go meet the woman who'd supposed to help us solve the case.”

  With that, Ross walked off towards his office, Drake following closely in his wake. As he opened the door to his inner sanctum, he caught his first sight of the Home Office Criminal Profiler.

  Doctor Christine Bland rose from the visitor's chair in his office as he and Drake entered the office, immediately holding her hand out towards Ross. He took it and as they shook hands, she spoke first.

  “Pleased to meet you, Inspector Ross. I'm Christine Bland. Sorry I'm late. I know you were expecting me hours ago, but there'd been a mega pile up on the M62, and the traffic delays were horrendous.”

  Ross looked at the woman standing before him. Christine Bland was, he guessed somewhere in her late thirties. Her long blonde hair was tied in a pony tail and the two piece black skirt suit accentuated a well formed figure and the pencil skirt helped to accentuate her slim legs, She was about as far from the look of a profiler as he could imagine, but then, she wouldn't be here if she couldn't to the job, he supposed.

  “No apologies needed, Doctor. Bland,” he replied. “We've had plenty to do in keeping the investigation moving forward.” He nodded in the direction of Izzie Drake. “This is Sergeant Clarissa Drake, by the way. Anything I know about the case, she knows, so you can speak freely in front of her.”

  “Pleased to meet you, Doctor,” Drake said to the profiler, “and most people call me Izzie. Clarissa sounds so formal.”

  “Hello, Sergeant, good to meet you too.”

  The woman turned again to face Ross.

  “Inspector Ross, I'm aware you might be a little dubious about the value of what I do. A lot of officers are the first time they work with a profiler, but believe me when I say that there are many ways in which I can maybe help you identify the type of person or persons you may be seeking in this case. D.C. I. Porteous already told me it looks like you're looking for a man and woman team now.”

  Ross, trying to be welcoming despite his doubts about the value of Bland's potential help, smiled as he replied.

  “Look, Doctor Bland, I have no doubts that you're good at what you do, but it's not as if we have a serial killer at work with a string of murders behind them already. I know the top brass feel you can help and on that basis I'm happy to work with you, but just don't see how much you can possibly read into what's taken place in the last few days.”

  “Perhaps you'll change your mind after I've had an opportunity to review the case files, Inspector?”

  “What? Oh, yes, of course.”

  Turning to Izzie Drake, he asked her to go and bring all the case files and notes they had amassed to date for the profiler to look at. Two minutes later, she returned, with Paul Ferris in tow, the team's collator looking agitated and somehow excited at the same time.

  “Sir, you need to listen to Paul, right now,” Drake informed him.

  “Okay, Paul, what have you got for us?”

  Ferris looked at Christine Bland, a questioning look on his face. Ross reassured him.

  “It's okay, Paul. Doctor Bland is here to help us.”

  “Oh, right sir. I just had a call from an Inspector Woodruff out at Bootle. He thinks he might have identified our second victim.”

  Ross's senses jumped to full alert.

  “Go on Paul. Don't keep us in suspense.”

  Looking at a sheet of paper he held in his hand, Ferris read from the notes he'd made of his conversation with Inspector Woodruff.

  “Well sir, seems they had a report of a missing person from a lady whose husband hadn't come home from work the previous day. She'd called the station the previous night and of course they'd told her to call back if he didn't turn up by morning, and anyway, he didn't come home and when she called his work, they told her he hadn't shown up that morning either. She called the station at Bootle immediately and they sent someone out to see her, a D.C Collins. Anyway, Collins seems to be a bright chap, and he took notes, and obtained a photograph of the husband.

  When he returned to the station, Collins remembered seeing the flyer with our inquiry the previous day and when he compared it to the photo of the missing man he went straight in to report to his boss, Inspector Woodruff, who took one look and called us.”

  Ross, becoming impatient, urged Ferris on

  “Alright Paul, come on, who the hell is he?”

  “Well sir, this is where things begin to come together a bit, I think. The dead man appears to be Mark Proctor, a P.E teacher. The thing is, sir, he taught at Speke Hill School.”

  “That place with the orphanage combined, out on Woolton Road?” Drake asked.

  “That's right, the old loony bin they turned into an orphanage and school years ago. Anyway, what made my brain cells go into overdrive sir is that Matthew Remington, victim number one, was a resident of the orphanage and pupil at Speke Hill when he was a boy. There has to be a connection, sir, surely.”

  “Bloody hell, Paul. You might be on to something. It has to be too much of a coincidence for an ex-pupil and a current teacher from the same place to meet with similar violent deaths like this,” Ross replied.

  “How old was Proctor?” Drake asked.

  “Fifty seven,” Ferris replied.

  “Similar ages,” said Ross. “Paul, I think we may have our connection, as you say. Please start a background check on this Mark Proctor. Let's find out how far back the two dead men could have been connected to each other.”

  “Consider it done sir. Anything else?”

  “Not for the moment. Give it your highest priority, Paul. I want to know all there is to know about Mark Bolton. I'd better speak to Inspector Woodruff and then go and talk to the widow, if we're sure of the identification. Did Woodruff give you any indication of what they're doing about that?”

  “He said he thought you'd want to see her yourself sir, and arrange for her to identify the body.”

  “Of course he did,” Ross said with a wry smile. “Pass the buck as soon as possible. No one wants the task of dealing with a potentially hysterical widow at the best of times, and certainly not one with a victim as badly mutilated as this one. Do we have a copy of Mrs. Bolton's statement yet?”

  Bootle are emailing it to me as we speak, sir. I'll have a copy printed out for you by the time you're ready to go and see her.”

  Ferris left the office and the two detectives and the profiler looked at one another. It was Christine Bland who broke the silence.

  “Looks like you might have something I can work with here, Inspector Ross. Do you mind if I accompany you and Sergeant Drake when you go to speak to the widow?”

  “Not at all, Doctor. As you say, you may be able to offer some helpful insights.”

  “How will you proceed without a formal identification?”

  “At this point, I want to talk to Inspector Woodruff, see how much he can tell me, then we'll go and talk to the widow, and show her a photo of the dead man. She'll see enough to be able to tell us if it's her husband, I'm sure.”

  “Even the touched up versions of the photos, taken at the morgue, are pretty awful to look at sir,” Drake pointed out to her boss.

  “I know, but if we're to move fast in trying to find his killers, we have little choice, and anyway, a photo will be far less painful than the formal identification she'll have to make at the mortuary tomorrow. Sorry Izzie, you'll have to put off seeing lover boy tonight. Looks like we might be in for a spot of overtime. I'll phone Woodruff then let Maria know I'll be late home too.

  Why don't you take Doctor Bland for a quick coffee while I'm talking to Woodruff then we'll head off to Bootle as soon as I'm finished in here. Is that okay with you, Doctor?”

  “Coffee sounds good, Inspector, and please as we're going to be working together, don't you think Doctor Bland is a little cumbersome every time you talk to me? Chris will do fine as far as I'm concerned. It's what most people call me.”

  “Fine, Chris it is then,” Ross replied. “Now, you two
ladies go grab a coffee, let me talk to Woodruff and Maria.”

  The switchboard connected Ross to the police station at Copy Lane in Bootle. Ross had visited that station maybe once or twice over the years, the only memorable fact he could bring to mind about the place was the fact that it was located not far from a McDonalds on the nearby leisure park. He'd heard of, but never met Inspector Bob Woodruff, nothing bad, a sensible, level-headed copper as far as he knew.

  “Woodruff here,” a rather gruff voice answered after a couple of rings of the internal phone system.

  “Inspector Woodruff, Andy Ross here from the Major Crimes Squad.”

  “Hello there, the specialist murder team, eh? Call me Bob. You must have got my message about Mark Proctor.”

  “Yes, thanks, Bob. Sounds as if you're pretty sure this Proctor chap is our victim?”

  “Sure sounds like it. The photo his wife gave us looks very close to the one you guys circulated, minus the facial wounds of course. It's too close a match to be anyone else, really.”

  “Did you tell her you think we may have found him?”

  “Er, no. I didn't think it wise at that point. Thought you guys might prefer to handle it, being as it's your case and all that.”

  And saved you the problem of dealing with a hysterical newly-widowed wife of a murder victim, Ross thought.

  “Thanks a lot, Bob,” he voiced instead.

  “Hey, never say I don't leave all the fun to the big boys,” Woodruff laughed down the phone.