“You're going to have to face up to it, Carrie. You'll probably end up in court over this little mess so your parents are bound to find out. Best to tell them now and get it over with. You might find they'll forgive you and stand by you, but my advice would be to dump your asshole loser of a boyfriend before you tell them,” Izzie Drake advised.
“They'll go ballistic when they know about the drugs,” the girl cried into a tissue.
“Can't help you there, Carrie,” Drake continued, but maybe you'll see this as a lesson and stay away from cannabis or any drugs in future. I don't care what scallys like Archie Pitt and his kind tell you, there's no such thing as a safe drug, Carrie. Even long term use of cannabis can harm your brain, believe me.”
* * *
“What's going to happen to me now, then?” Archie Pitt asked Andy Ross.
“You're going into a nice warm cell for a little while until we check out your story, Archie. If you're lucky, you'll be charged with taking away a vehicle without consent, and with being in possession of a controlled substance. Bit stupid of you to be caught with that cannabis in your pocket wasn't it old son?”
“Yeah, but I thought you said you'd turn a blind eye if I helped you?”
“And that's what I'm doing, Archie. If I wanted to really drop you in it, I'd send a team down to the Beleraphon and raid the place. I bet we'll find more than just your mate Mac dealing in that place, and they'd all be really interested to know who tipped us off about them doing business there, don't you? So I'm turning a blind eye on this one occasion, but don't be surprised if a couple of plain clothes coppers drop in there one night soon and find a couple of dealers at work, know what I mean, Archie?”
Archie Pitt nodded slowly.
“You're telling me stay away from the place, right?”
“Sounds like a good idea to me, Archie. Oh, and one other thing.”
“What?”
“Our boys are going over the Subaru even now, as we speak and if they find any more drugs in there, enough to suggest to me you're dealing as well as using…”
“They won't, I'm not, I told you, I just smoke a bit of dope now and then.”
“Now and then? You've admitted you were half stoned when you stole the car, Archie. How responsible was that, eh? You could have knocked a child down, caused a serious accident, anything. Driving under the influence of drugs is as bad as drunk driving as far as I'm concerned so you'd better hope our paths don't cross again in the near future. Take him away, Paul, lock him up and give our friend here a chance to think of the error of his ways until we've checked the car out.”
“Right sir,” said Paul Ferris as he placed a hand on Archie's shoulder and the young man rose to his feet. “Come on sunshine, let's get you settled. You never know, we might even treat you to nice cup of tea.”
“Yeah, can't wait. I'm bloody ecstatic,” Pitt quipped, trying to sound tough.
“Oh, get him out of here, Paul,” said Ross as the pair exited the room, followed a few seconds later by Ross who instead of taking the same route, stopped and entered the viewing room where Porteous and Bland were watching Izzie Drake bringing her interview with Carrie Evans to a close.
* * *
“Well, that was almost a total waste of time,” Ross blasted the words out, frustration in his voice. “They're not our killers, not that I thought they would be. Whoever killed Remington and Proctor had more brains in their little fingers than our friend Archie bloody Pitt. He doesn't have the brains or the sophistication to have planned something like this. No, he's just a thieving little scally who saw a chance of a free ride to the seaside with his girlfriend and grabbed it with both hands. We'll show Proctor's photo around in The Belerophon but it's likely the murderer just picked it as a random location to dump the car.”
“It certainly wasn't as productive as we'd hoped, Andy,” Porteous agreed.
“No sir, it bloody well wasn't.”
“But we know the accomplice drives a red hatchback, at least,” Christine Bland added, trying to sound positive.”
“Yes, but have you any idea how many red hatchbacks there are on the roads of Liverpool and the surrounding area? Probably around two thousand at a guess,” said Ross, “and bloody Archie in there couldn't even tell his Fords from his Nissans, he was so toked up at the time. And, the red car could have been nicked like the Subaru, so we're really no further forward, unless there's any trace evidence in the car.”
“Miles Booker is working on it himself,” Porteous informed him. “If there's anything to find, he'll find it.”
Ross turned to look through the one way mirror as Izzie was closing her interview with Carrie Evans.
“Anything from the girl?”
“Useless,” said Porteous. “She saw even less than Pitt. She's more worried about what her parents are going to say when they find out about her being picked up by the police.”
“I wonder why neither of them asked for a solicitor,” said Bland
“They weren't under caution yet and were simply helping with enquiries,” said Ross. “Once we finish the forensic examination of the car, we'll have them in again, caution them and offer them legal representation. Then we'll take formal statements from them and they'll be charged and released on police bail. When we catch our killers, and we are going to catch these murderous bastards, I'll want them both to give witness statements, no matter how vague they may seem, so I want them in the system where we can find them at the right time.”
“What now, then, Andy?” Porteous asked.
“First, I want to talk to this Father Byrne, the ex-Speke Hill pupil who recently became Parish Priest at St. Luke's, Woolton, and then when I get the reports from the interviews with the staff at Speke Hill, we're going to have to go back there and dig deeper. Whatever triggered this killing spree, I'm certain it has its roots in something that happened there in the past.”
“I agree,” Christine concurred. “From a profiling point of view, I have to say that there is usually a trigger to these types of killings, something that activates a long dead, or dormant memory. The F.B.I. profilers call it a 'stresser,' but I prefer trigger. I'd like to visit Father Byrne with you if you don't mind. My own gut feeling is that the arrival of this man, another Speke Hill old boy, may have provided the trigger for these killers to start their murders. It's almost too coincidental that he arrived back in the area just before the killing began.”
“You're welcome to join me,” said Ross, “but there's another option you haven't considered here.”
“Which is?”
“Well, as you just said, he arrived here just before the killings started, so we also have to take into consideration that this Father Byrne could be one of our murderers.”
“Oh, shit,” she replied, quickly throwing a hand over her mouth, just as the door opened to admit Izzie Drake, young Carrie Fisher being escorted to the cells by Nick Dodds.
“Have I missed something?” Drake asked, seeing the shocked look on Christine's face.
“Only that your boss just hypothesized that one of the killers could be a bloody Roman Catholic Priest,” Porteous said, with an almost comical grin on his face.
“It couldn't be, surely,” said Bland.
“Why not?” said Ross. “Stranger things have happened. There've been numerous murderous doctors over the years, so why not a priest?”
“Even so,” Bland remonstrated with him. “It's a big stretch to think a Catholic Priest could have done this.”
“Not if he's lost his marbles,” Izzie pointed out. “And don't forget, the Inquisition was wholly run and executed by the Catholic Church. They killed thousands in the name of God in the Middle Ages.”
“True,” Christine agreed. “I suppose in my job I shouldn't exclude any possibilities, though I still think it's unlikely.”
“We'll get a better idea when we speak to him,” Ross went on. “Let's go home, get some rest and turn off for a few hours. We'll hold the morning briefing as usual tomorrow, ca
tch up with the rest of the team and then head for St. Luke's and see what we can make of Father Gerald Byrne.”
Ross spent five minutes tidying his desk, rose from behind his desk and was about to head off for home when the telephone on his desk rang. Debating whether to ignore it and walk away, he thought better of it and reached across to answer the offending, jangling instrument.
“Andy Ross, you old reprobate, how are you?” came the hale and hearty voice of his old friend and former partner, now Detective Inspector Oscar Agostini.
The two men had worked together some years before as sergeants, and had become firm friends, though Agostini's promotion had taken him a little out of town and he now worked out of the police station at Church road in Sefton, serving the town of Formby. Six feet tall, his dark brown wavy hair a giveaway to his Italian ancestry, Agostini had always been something of a magnet for members of the opposite sex and Ross had been surprised but delighted when his friend announced his intention to marry, and had been best man at Oscar's marriage to Fern, some ten years previously.
“Oscar! I'm harassed, hungry and in a hurry to go home. Apart from that, I'm fine. How's yourself, and the beautiful Fern?”
“Ah, nothing's changed then eh? I'm okay my friend, Fern too, and she sends her love, but listen, we're not exactly a million miles away and I still keep up with the news there in big-city-land. I think we may have a case here that somehow connects to those churchyard murders of yours we keep hearing about.”
“Go on, Oscar, I'm all ears.”
“Right. A few days ago, we attended a suicide by drowning off Formby Dunes, a young girl, only seventeen, called Lisa Kelly.”
“Yes, I saw the news of that one, tragic by the sounds of it.”
“Yes it was, poor kid was obviously seriously depressed. But here's the thing, Andy. She had one of those new-fangled mobile phones with a mini-recording device built in to it. Her Mum said it was her pride and joy, that phone. She'd saved up for it from her wages from the day she started working at Woolworths on South Road in Waterloo. Anyway, it turns out Lisa left a kind of suicide note cum confession on her phone, Andy, and it mentions one of your victims.”
Agostini had Ross's full attention by this point.
“I'm intrigued Oscar, please go on, mate.”
“Sure, so, it seems young Lisa was a confirmed member of the Catholic faith, and as a result of events in the last year, she was so wracked with guilt that the poor kid ended up topping herself. On the recording she mentioned being raped, and then finding she was pregnant a short time later. Her mother was supportive of her, don't get me wrong, but there was so much religious feeling in that house, Andy, that when she decided to have a termination, her mother was supportive but horrified at the 'sin' involved in going so strongly against the church's teachings. Lisa had gone ahead with the abortion anyway, but since then, the girl had grown progressively more and more depressed, and found she couldn't live with what she'd done in 'killing her baby' as she put it. For God's sake, Andy, I'm a Catholic, but I'd like to think I wouldn't pour all that religious fervour and guilt onto a child of mine if she was in that situation. Sorry, I'm digressing. Anyway, on the tape she says she wished she'd reported that man Remington when he'd raped her. Seems her Mum talked her out of going to the police at the time because of the 'shame' she thought it would bring on the family, for fuck's sake.”
“My God, Oscar. What kind of Mother would do that? Didn't she want to see her kid's rapist locked up and put away?”
“I know, Andy. It fucking beggars belief doesn't it? Anyway, she'd read about the murder in the papers and once you'd released his name she knew it was the man who'd ruined her life, and in her mind, he'd cheated justice. There was no way she could ever absolve herself from what he'd done to her, as she put it.”
“Hang on Oscar. How did she know her rapist was Matthew Remington? Wasn't he masked or anything when he raped her?”
“Oh, it's worse than that, my friend. Seems he'd known the family for years and she thought she'd be okay when she bumped into him in town after work one evening, and he offered to walk her to the bus station.”
“Bloody Hell, Oscar. Didn't her mother warn her to stay away from him?”
Agostini seemed to hesitate and take a deep breath at the other end of the phone.
“You won't believe this, Andy, but her mother, good Catholic that she is, told her that Remington had done wrong in the past, but had paid his debt to society, and because he'd apparently repented his sins, God would have forgiven him and he was entitled to begin a new life, without his past sins being held against him.”
“Jesus, Mary and Joseph!” Ross exclaimed, disbelief clear in his voice. “How bloody naïve can that woman be? Look, Oscar, I know you're Catholic, my friend, but surely not everyone is as gullible as this woman appears to have been.”
“She damn well knows it now Andy. In fact she's now on the world's biggest guilt trip. Seems she was always telling Lisa her skirts were too short, her make-up too thick, all that kind of stuff, but then allowed her to think a man like that was reformed because she'd met him at church one day soon after his release and he'd told her that whole crock of shit about repentance.”
“Remington went to church?”
“For a short time, apparently. Long enough to pick out his next target if you ask me.”
A thought occurred to Andy Ross, another possible connection?
“Oscar, did the mother tell you what church she attends?”
“Yes, The Church of St. John the Baptist. It's only about half a mile from her home, but that's all Remington needed to push young Lisa into an alleyway and do the business with her, leaving her bleeding, crying and bloody pregnant.”
“I just don't understand why the bloody mother didn't report it. I mean, her own daughter had been raped, for fuck's sake, Oscar, and she rationalised it by saying it would bring shame on the family? That's not good religion, mate, that's fucking crazy, religious fanaticism maybe, but not religious realism.”
“I know, mate, and she knows it now it's cost her a daughter. Anyway, I hope the intel helps, old buddy.”
“It might, Oscar, thanks a lot. It gives me another avenue to explore for sure. And now, I'm going home to my gorgeous wife, where I expect a hot meal, a couple of hours vegetating in front of the telly, then bed, and who knows what might happen?”
“Dirty bugger,” Agostini laughed. “And give the beautiful Maria a kiss from me while you're at it.”
“You should be so lucky, Agostini.” Now it was Ross who laughed and the two men said their goodbyes and for the second time in the last half hour, Andy Ross rose from his desk, this time managing to make it out of his office and the building and was soon on his way home to Maria.
Chapter 21
Goodnight Sweetheart
“You haven't heard a word I've said, Andy Ross.” Maria said, as they sat across from each other at the dining table, supposedly enjoying the beef bourguignon she'd prepared for the two of them.
“Eh, what, oh, sorry darling. What were you saying?”
“Only that Alice and Ray have invited us over for dinner next Saturday night. Alice was on the phone today, telling me Ray's a lot better since his heart bypass.”
“That's good to hear. I'm sorry if I'm a little pre-occupied this evening.”
“A little? Andy, I've known you long enough to know when a case is really getting to you, and this one is, isn't it?”
“Big time, Maria. I don't know why, but I feel as if I'm on the cusp of discovering something vital, but I just can't put my finger on it. After talking to Oscar earlier, I'm sure something he said triggered something in my brain, but whatever it was refused to surface properly. It was nothing concrete, just a hint of something that was there, and then it was gone, if you know what I mean.”
“I think I do. Like when something's on the tip of your tongue and then simply disappears, but in this case, it wasn't a word, but a thought.”
“Yes, tha
t's it exactly. Not only that, but I can't understand the mentality of that girl's mother.”
He'd talked to Maria as she'd prepared dinner and brought her up to date on the case. His wife had tried, unsuccessfully to get him to talk about something else, but it was evident to Maria that her husband was totally immersed in his need to apprehend the killers of the two men.
“You've been in the job long enough by now to know you can't argue with the religious fervour that drives some people, Andy. The mother was probably brought up in a family where everything revolved around the church and God. Old-fashioned hellfire and damnation stuff, every small transgression treated like a major sin, you know the type.”
“Yes, mores the pity,” he agreed. “Anyway, dinner's great, thanks, and you can phone Alice in the morning and tell her we'll be glad to go for dinner.”
After dinner, Andy and Maria curled up together on the sofa, and watched Andy's favourite movie, Independence Day, Maria having bought him the DVD for his birthday. Maria always enjoyed watching it with her husband who she thought would have made a good stand-in for the actor playing the President of the USA, whose name she could never remember.
Before they knew it, eleven o'clock had arrived and Andy locked up the house while Maria went up stairs to get ready for bed. Andy's mind had at last relaxed and when he walked in to the bedroom to find Maria sitting on the bed, wearing a very short, very sheer pink nightie, her legs crossed suggestively, his eyes lit up. With a gleam in her eye, a smile on her face and affecting her best 'vamp' voice, his wife said, huskily, “Well, hello there, big boy. Wanna play?”
This time, he didn't fall asleep!
* * *
Peter Foster lay on his back, smoking a cigarette as a naked Izzie Drake lay beside him, twirling the hairs on his chest between her fingers.
“That was amazing,” Izzie gasped as she attempted to bring her breathing back to normal after a highly passionate session of love-making.
“You were great,” Peter said, turning to look at her with a satisfied smile on his face.
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