by Guy N Smith
“Why do you ask that, Lizzie?”
“’Cause I’d like to know.”
A little shiver ran all the way up his spine. “As a matter of fact, I’m not,” he said and held his breath as she pushed past him.
* * * *
The chief was giving this case priority. Secretly Jason Ford resented the fact that Melton had briefed Arnold and the eight DCs. Routine, of course, a procedure that had to be followed. But Dawson was still giving him a free role, he would have told him if he wasn’t.
A one-off mutilation might just have gone on file, with a routine investigation. Two became serious. No longer was it possible to impose restrictions on the Press; you could cover up for so long, after that the public mistrusted you for withholding information, which might be dangerous to their welfare. Even prostitutes’ clients were entitled to police protection.
Privately, Ford admired this circumciser, whoever she was. He knew that Clem Dawson did, too. But they were both policemen, their opinions didn’t count, they had a job to do. She had to be caught.
Already the Observer had christened her; two of the more sensational tabloids had filched that pseudonym. It had become a household name overnight.
They called her The Black Mantis.
16.
The Temazepams made Kate sleep but they did not spare her the dreams. The nightmares were a thousand times worse because, even at the height of her terror, she was not able to wake from them. Trapped within herself, she writhed, screamed and sobbed. There was no escape. She had to go with them. Right the way until morning when she awoke shaken and exhausted, crying her relief because they had only been figments of her subconscious.
They were always about the ducks in the park. Never anything else.
The men were back with their dogs and guns, stalking the water’s edge with a renewed lust for killing. The Canada geese had long gone, the survivors had the sense to keep away from here after that first massacre. But the mallards and hybrids had flown back, brought with them ducks from off the suburban ponds and streams; feathered lemmings arrived for the slaughter. Their numbers had doubled; the next inevitable barrage of lead would be devastating.
Kate lay on that tree stump forced to watch, unable to move. She screamed a warning to the birds but their greed blinded them to caution. They dabbled, squabbled, gorged on the soggy bread that had lured them here. Eat, for today we die.
Her hands were pressed tightly over her ears in dreaded anticipation of the gunshots but nothing could spare her, the deafening, brain-blasting atmosphere stank of burned gunpowder, the acrid smoke seared her lungs. She coughed and cried. And screamed again.
The water was littered with dead ducks, blood splashed bellies uppermost as the slain floated ignominiously. They were the lucky ones, spared the pain of pellet-peppered bodies. None flew away this time; such had been the concentrated fire on those closely packed birds.
The wounded were many; some flapped feebly, others beat never-ending circles with one unbroken wing. Blue and green plumage was streaked scarlet; blinded bloodied eyes, paddles that were snapped and unable to propel them out to a place of temporary, lingering agonised safety in the centre of the lake.
The men kept their dogs leashed, made no attempt to retrieve and despatch the injured this time. They just stood there with smoke spiralling upwards from their warm gun barrels, watching and laughing. Gloating. Then they walked slowly back to their parked vehicles, abandoned the dead and the dying, oblivious of Kate’s hysteria, her screamed abuse at them.
Tomorrow they would come again, and the day after, too. There would always be ducks to slaughter. The warm weather would decompose the dead flesh, the spring air would be rancid with the stench of rotting corpses. The killing would go on and on.
Paul had tried to force his way into the bedroom but the bolt had denied him access. Had there been a telephone in the flat then he might had summoned a doctor. But they were just nightmares, everybody had them.
But not night after night.
“Just leave me alone, I’ll be okay!” A distraught Kate had yelled at him. “I don’t want you in my bedroom, Paul.” For your own safety.
“You’re ill,” he insisted, “on the verge of a nervous breakdown. You can’t go on like this.”
“It’s the new pills,” she pushed him away forcibly. “I’ll go and see the doctor again, get him to change them. Then I’ll be fine.”
* * * *
Doctor Whittaker did not seem surprised to see Kate again so soon. She had the impression that he might even have been expecting her today. So kind, he led her to the couch, seated himself at his desk. As least, he understood and that was more than you could say of the other doctors. A cursory diagnosis and prescribed pills were not his quickie solution to the problem.
“It isn’t the tablets,” he wrote on her file whilst he talked. “They’re doing what they’re supposed to do, knocking you out. The nightmares are a separate issue. A symptom. I need to find the cause.”
“It was the cull that did it,” she told him of the slaughter, spared both him and herself the awful details. “I was fine until then.”
“You weren’t,” he smiled, took off his glasses and polished them meticulously. “It just happened at an unfortunate time. The shooting, I mean. It triggered off the rest.”
“It was awful.”
“Yes, but necessary. Not just for the sake of visitors whose children tread in the goose droppings around the lake and contract diseases, or the farmers who have their grain crops grazed off, but for the birds themselves. Interbreeding creates abnormalities. Cull the weaklings and you produce a healthy breeding stock.”
“You sound like Hitler,” she said.
“He would certainly have bred a super race, there’s no doubt about that. But we are a civilised society so the idea is repugnant to us. I’m quoting facts, not morals. The same applies to animals and birds. Deer are culled for their own good whether or not you approve of bloodsports. We, the human race, have our misfits, both physically and mentally. Which is why we are a sick society. We can but try to segregate the mentally sick by putting them into hospitals. Those with criminal tendencies we lock away in prisons. Logically, society would benefit if they were destroyed. Alas, this cannot be done so we have to suffer the consequences. A perfect world is a fallacy, we have to make the best of the one we know. Man’s curse is his genes; the good or evil is passed on to his offspring’s. One or the other will predominate. Phobias will survive, loneliness incubates them. Would you care to tell me about your own parents?”
“They’re split up,” Kate answered. “I was going to visit my mother at Easter, changed my mind. I always change my mind, put it off. Christmas, perhaps, but I’ll put it off again I expect.”
“Do you know why?”
“Because … we’d get talking about my father, that’s why.” The answer came easily, she had not realised before why she had constantly postponed visiting her mother. Not just the memories but because her mother was an integral part of her unhappy childhood. A triangle that incorporated her father. Doctor Whittaker had singled it out, had her talking openly about it.
“Would you have any objection to telling me about your father?”
She told him as if she had come here intending to confide those years of abuse in him. She found herself wanting to tell him.
His expression registered neither surprise nor revulsion, just a sympathetic understanding. She described how it had begun, what her father had made her do and, in turn, what he had done to her.
“Which is why you want your boyfriend to leave. Why you find sex repugnant. It is a perfectly normal reaction. Your safety valve is ducks; you can love them from a distance without an emotional involvement. Painting them is just one way of expressing your love for them. They can’t hurt you. Only when something dreadful happens to them.”
She had to fight back her tears.
“I’m sorry if I’m distressing you,” he came across, sat beside her on th
e couch. Perhaps only professional caution prevented him from slipping an arm around her. “I’m sorry if you find this painful but I had to get to the root of the matter. I think I’ve unearthed the basic causes. Would you rather we continued another time?”
“No, No, I’ll be all right,” she wiped her eyes with the tissue he handed to her. “I suppose it’s all come as a bit of a shock. I never realised.”
“I’d like to ask you some very personal questions. Do you mind?”
“Of course not,” she managed to smile. “I’ll answer any questions you ask me, they’ve gone a long time unasked.”
“Thank you.” He was pensive as if collating the questions he needed to ask. “Your father, naturally, turned you against sex. Yet you had a sexual relationship with your boyfriend until fairly recently.”
“Only to please him. In the end I couldn’t stand it any longer.”
“Please don’t get the wrong idea,” he smiled, seemed embarrassed, “but I’m trying to get to the root of your problem. I hate having to ask these questions but they’re important if I’m going to understand what is troubling you. Do you have any thoughts or fantasies, not sexual, that excite you, frighten you, even?”
“I’m not quite sure that I understand you, Doctor,” her stomach muscles contracted, an unease gnawed at her.
“I’m sorry if I didn’t make myself clear,” for a moment he was nervous, then he pulled himself together. “Perhaps there is something which frightens or angers you subconsciously but may present itself in a different form. You may not recognise if for what it is. Like your ducks, for example. Think carefully, and don’t be afraid to tell me. Take your time …”
She started, it was like a motor inside her had suddenly been jump-started, burst into life. “There was a film once, a video that Paul hired soon after he moved in. I can’t remember what it was called, I wasn’t watching it properly, just glanced up occasionally. I was painting at the time …”
“Go on.”
“It was one of those nasties. A girl being chased by some hideous guy. You know, the chase goes on and on, pads out the film. Finally he cornered her in the kitchen. She picked up a bread knife, slashed him to ribbons. Sheer gore but it … excited me like I’d never been excited before. I was frightened that Paul might notice so I went into the toilet. I got this feeling that … that I wanted the victim in the film to turn out to be my father. I wanted the girl with the knife to do something awful to him. When I went back into the room the film had finished. I forgot all about it until now. Until you asked me. I never did find out how it ended.”
“Subconscious revenge on your father,” he nodded excitedly. It should have helped you to get it out of your system.
“I’ve been raped since!” She had made up her mind not to tell him, but suddenly it just spilled out as if she wanted to let him know before she changed her mind again. As if she needed to tell somebody.
“When?” He watched her carefully as if he expected her to have hysterics.
“About three weeks ago. In the park. In front of the ducks.” That was the worst part, being humiliated in front of the ducks. “But I don’t want to go to the police.”
“You can tell me in confidence,” this time his hand found hers and squeezed reassuringly.
She told him. In detail.
“Sex is therapeutic,” he said, “but in some cases it can have the reverse effect. You have been unfortunate in having two such instances, child abuse and rape. You rejected your boyfriend and sought solace in your ducks. Unfortunately that, too has become traumatic. Tell me, what were your feelings throughout that rape.”
“Nothing,” she smiled faintly. “Absolutely nothing. I just switched off.”
“You were most fortunate in being able to do that,” he pulled off his glasses, put them back on. “Most women can’t. A relationship usually helps to ease the pain, though.”
“My ducks,” she added in an undertone.
“They help. Quite obviously a sexual relationship would not be good for you at this stage.”
“Too right, it wouldn’t,” she thought guiltily about the foreskins in the cupboard in the bathroom, made a conscious effort in case she was tempted to blurt out about them, too. She found herself wondering again whether or not the doctor was circumcised. He was such a small man.
“I lost my wife just over a year ago,” he spoke suddenly, sadly, averted his gaze. “A year ago at the beginning of this month. Easter week, to be precise. A car accident. Joy riders. They were both uninjured, got off with a fine and a three year ban.”
“Oh, I’m so sorry,” Kate felt guilty about her ducks; they were trivial by comparison.
“I became a loner, too.” He squeezed her hand again by way of commiseration. “I know what it’s like. I didn’t want another relationship, still don’t. I don’t think I could ever settle to one but time will tell. I didn’t have any ducks, though.”
She lapsed into an embarrassed silence.
“It’s no good me changing your tablets,” he became the professional consultant GP again, extricated his hand from hers and returned to his desk. “You need your sleep, whatever. I think perhaps you should start going to the recreation park again, seeing your ducks and painting them. The goose cull is finished, the ducks will be back to normal, get used to seeing them as you used to see them. That way you’ll know that they are unharmed.”
“Thank you, I’ll try to do that,” she stood up, felt slightly dizzy for a moment. He was affecting her because of his small stature. With an effort she dispelled her thoughts. That was crazy thinking.
“I would like to see you again soon,” he made a note on his pad. “Say, next Wednesday. Earlier if you need me.”
“All right.”
“Call me at any time if it gets really bad.”
She hurried from the health centre, headed in the direction of the park. Up above, the sky was clouding over, she thought she felt a rain spot on her face. It didn’t matter, the weather was the least of her worries.
Hurrying, breathless, panicking inwardly in case she found the entrance gates chained and padlocked and … they were wide open, thank God! Beyond the trees she heard the mallards quacking greedily as they devoured the latest offering of waste food cast into the water by well meaning visitors. White bread which would fill them but not nourish them. Tomorrow she would call in at the grocery shop and buy a couple of wholemeal loaves, that was the least she could do for them.
There was nobody else in sight, she had the place to herself. She went straightaway to the tree stump, her vantage point, stretched herself out on it. The hobby knife was in the pocket of her jeans, she did not go anywhere without it these days.
She knew he wouldn’t come today, he might never come. Lightning never struck twice in the same place. It didn’t matter, she just wanted to be alone with her thoughts. Thoughts of Doctor Glen Whittaker that excited her almost to the point of orgasm. He had said that she needed a sexual stimulant, a turn-on. He had given her one and that was terrifyingly exciting. Call me any time if you need me. He was small and she convinced herself that he was uncircumcised. He had to be.
It began to rain, a heavy April shower that saturated her clothing within minutes but she scarcely noticed. And when she became aware of it, she didn’t care. If she dreamed in her drug-induced sleep tonight then the dreams would be different.
So very different.
BOOK TWO - THE DEAD
17.
Carl Vallance was insignificantly small and slim. You would see a dozen or more Carl Vallances amongst the rush hour commuters on trains and buses, dismiss them with a disinterested glance. Faceless clerks in their forties, formal suits which were marginally fashionable, briefcases which merely contained lunchtime sandwiches because their mortgages denied them the pleasure of even modest eating houses. Nine till fivers, telly addicts, weekend motorists with polished V reg cars in their neat garages; if they did not die young from a coronary then they continued their boring lifes
tyle in retirement. Just a few had exciting dark secrets. Carl Vallance was one of them.
An accountant with a computer software distributor, he could have afforded to eat out every day. He might have changed his car every three years instead of four. He might have managed a family holiday abroad instead of on the south coast, or a modest hotel instead of camping or caravanning. There were many small luxuries which otherwise would have been possible had it not been for his compulsion.
He had an obsession with prostitutes.
In some ways it was his wife’s fault. He had been 22 and Lynn was 18 when they married. She had found herself pregnant out of wedlock and they had had to marry quickly for the sake of both families’ respectability. In later years Lynn accused him of ‘getting her into trouble’. He countered that she had got herself into trouble because of her ‘nymphomania’. That was when the first cracks began to appear in their marriage.
If she had still had nymphomaniac tendencies then possibly his problem would not have arisen. That was debatable.
Their marital decline was a gradual process. Up until after the birth of their third child she had enthusiastically participated in all her husband’s sexual variations. Nothing was taboo.
Then, with alarming suddenness, all that changed. ‘This’ was dirty, unhygienic, ‘that’ was obscene, gross. Intercourse in excess of twice a week was excessive. Within six months Carl had been with his first prostitute and enjoyed it. He wasn’t really cheating he told himself, Lynn had what she wanted and so did he. It was a kind of compromise.
He did not tell her when he was promoted within the company; the increase in salary was his whoring budget. Nevertheless, even prostitutes became boring after a while.
Contact magazines were all too easy, like shooting a sitting rabbit. There was no sense of adventure, you got the kill without the thrill of the stalk. The idea of a venture into the red light area, a slag in a darkened doorway letting you know her presence by drawing on her cigarette, had his spine tingling. Just the thought was a turn-on.