by AD Davies
“Thank you.” Murphy unbuttoned his jacket, eyes on Stevenson. “We can’t see what was said, but there is no other IP address that visited all six. Because it’s a VPN—that’s a ‘virtual private network’ to those not listening earlier—we can’t narrow it down to a single computer, or physical geographic address. DS Stevenson seems to be itching to talk, so why don’t you take over?”
Stevenson wasn’t sure if Murphy was being sarcastic, or if the DCI simply didn’t understand the science, but he wasn’t going to turn down the chance to lead. He’d already used the data from the VPN and added his intel to the log.
He said, “While Cyber haven’t been able to decrypt those private forums, or their cached data, we have looked at other activity not yet deleted. And there appear to be some links.”
“Something linking them to the murders?” Cleaver asked.
“Sort of. There’s a clear ideology of being a prick. Away on these chat rooms, forums, Facebook groups, Twitter handles … you name it, this VPN is on there, stirring up trouble. Ban the burkha, blue lives matter, send all the Polish people home, kill all the gays, and other humanitarian causes.” Stevenson paused a moment, knowing sometimes it was necessary to absorb the facts. “We have been able to track it geographically, to within maybe twenty square miles.”
“Not bad,” Alicia said. “So we need to track individuals in that area fitting the profile of a violent offender. Someone who wants to effect change.”
“That may not be necessary. Has anyone heard of Iromov?”
Ndlove said, “Sounds like a Russian gangster.”
“It’s an acronym,” Alicia said. “IROMOV. The Institution for Reformation of Men of Violence. A bit crap as acronyms go, but it works.”
“Spot-on,” Stevenson replied. “I’ve made a note in the file. When men have difficulty controlling their violent urges, they end up in prison, or on medication, or dead. IROMOV tries a different approach, altering their setting, taking them out of their old lives, and giving them a new direction.”
“Like a self-help group?”
“No, Alicia. They have much more in common … with a cult.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
Alicia was enjoying the scenery, moorland rolling, elongated shadows stretching wherever a tree or structure came between her and the low summer sun, when a sinking feeling in her stomach reminded her that what she was doing could get her in a lot of trouble. It was approaching 8:30 p.m., half an hour since Murphy ordered her to stay put.
Sure, she could have headed home to Robbie, licked her wounds, and gone to bed, then turned up refreshed and bouncy to hear how the initial approach went. Instead, she waited fifteen minutes, then fired up her Ford Focus, typed the address into the sat-nav, and set off.
What would they do to her if they found out? Send her on maternity leave early?
Oh no, the pain of it.
IROMOV was, according to their website, a safe place to work out one’s deeper psychological problems through hard work, deep reflection, and giving over oneself to the world around you.
Essentially, exhausting them into submission.
IROMOV appeared peaceful overall, employed clinicians, and retained an attorney called Kuno Kae, who checked out as a well-respected legal aid counsel, although she had not been in a court room for over a year. Coincidentally, the Institute had been open for slightly less than five years, and only grown significantly in the past twelve months, suggesting the lawyer played a big part in its promotion from a group that met every week to a full on internment camp for men who couldn’t control themselves.
From the road, the entrance was unmarked. It rose between two hedgerows, disappearing around a bend. The lane was wide enough for one-and-a-half cars, meaning really just one. It went on for five hundred metres before the land opened out to reveal a chain-link fence at least seven feet high and a gate reminding her of a zoo; a turnstile for foot traffic and a gate for vehicles. One such vehicle—a BMW 530 in space grey—stood idling outside the gate.
One of Murphy’s perks.
Two men sat in the front.
As Alicia parked to the side, the driver’s door opened and Murphy stepped out, hands on hips. Alicia wound down her window, stuck out her head, and said, “Oh my God, oh my God. I can’t believe you come here too! This is so much of a coincidence I can’t begin to say. Wait till I tell everyone at the station.”
“What you doing here, Alicia?” Murphy said.
“Yoga. Isn’t this my yoga class?”
“Yoga? That’s what you’re going with?”
“I’m sure that’s what I typed into my satnav.” Alicia slapped her own forehead. “Damn baby brain again. I must have remembered the coordinates you gave for this violent man place, and input those by accident.” She opened the door, heaved herself out, and walked slowly over the gravel driveway. “But since I’m here, maybe I should help out. Like I said before, I’m better reacting in person. Not reading reports.”
Stevenson appeared on the other side of the car, leaned on the roof, but said nothing.
“I instructed you to wait,” Murphy said. “You can’t be here. If Paulson withdraws cooperation, I’m stuck with Cleaver and Ndlove. You end up side-lined, best case scenario is I keep Backfill Bobby to advise.”
“You know,” Stevenson said, “you don’t actually need to call me that simply because she does.”
Murphy turned to him. “I’m using her terminology to keep her on-side. Did you miss that course?”
Stevenson replied by waving a dismissive hand and turning to the view.
With the sun now lower, a chill descended. A nice one. It reminded Alicia of camping, getting ready to build a fire, of telling scary stories, and not worrying about tomorrow.
She said, “So what are you doing out here? I thought the action was in there.”
“Lawyer,” Murphy replied. “Insists on checking us out first.”
“Oh you mean Kuno. I researched her before my accident with the sat-nav. She’s nice. Parents came over from Japan in ’76, set up a restaurant chain, sold it in the ’90s for a small fortune—actually, a big fortune—and because Kuno doesn’t need the big cases for the big income, she gets to follow her big heart.”
“And her big heart led her here?”
“Yep. Where is she? Can I talk to her?”
“No. You can go home.”
“Don’t worry about me. Yoga will have finished by the time I get there. I’m much more helpful—”
“You’re really not getting this. It’s not a joke. This might look like a summer camp, but it’s an extension to prison for some of these people. Ms. Kae has had a number of them released on licence, under condition they reside here. And it’s mostly crimes against women. Domestic violence, stalkers, there are two rapists. Alicia, I cannot let you in.”
A dainty cough sounded behind Murphy. Both turned to find a diminutive Japanese woman in an unflattering business suit.
She said, “You will be allowed to accompany me inside, you can meet Jacob who runs this place, but you will not ask anything unless I am present. Clear?”
“Very,” Murphy said. “DS Stevenson, this is Kuno Kae. Ms. Kae, this is Detective Sergeant Stevenson. He’ll be accompanying me.”
“And the other one?”
“She’s going home.”
“Oh, she isn’t.” She gave Alicia the kind of expression that usually precedes a wink, but no wink came. “I want her with you, to keep you in line.”
Alicia grinned at Murphy and approached the turnstile. Looked from her stomach to the thoroughfare, then to Kuno. The lawyer gave a kind smile, typed numbers into a keypad, and the main gate opened.
* * *
The road continued to rise for another twenty metres, and Murphy took little pleasure in seeing Alicia pausing every so often to stretch and catch her breath, but it was her own fault. As they crested the hill, the camp itself rolled into view: huts stood amongst trees with paths winding between them, lending it the feel
of a Centre Parcs-style experience, or perhaps the sort of summer camps you see in American movies: a large wooden barn-like structure occupied the centre ground, while the edge of a small lake appeared to have been farmed, growing vegetables for hundreds of metres.
“The Institute is run by Jacob Rocaby,” Kuno said, leading them along the central path. “He took holy orders in prison, and now acts as both manager and spiritual leader.”
“And the hooliganism?” Murphy asked.
“Ask him yourself.”
They hadn’t seen anyone since accessing the place, but Murphy suspected that was intentional. These were men—around twenty according to Ms. Kae, many of whom might be hostile toward the police. Warrants would attract a much bigger crowd of law enforcement, so she agreed to a meeting with the man waiting outside the central building.
Jacob Rocaby wore blue jeans and a black shirt with a white clerical collar in place. He was fortyish, clean shaven, shaggy hair reaching his shoulders, and he clasped his hands in front of him like any priest awaiting his congregation. Murphy extended his hand to shake. As Jacob took it, Murphy introduced himself, Stevenson, and Alicia, then immediately said, “Thanks for seeing us on such short notice.”
“No problem,” Jacob replied. “If there’s any hint of a problem, we want to solve it before it has a negative effect on the men.” He nodded in turn to Alicia and Stevenson. “What is it you think someone here has done?”
“First, could you give us a quick overview of the place? What you do, what you hope to achieve?”
A glance first towards his lawyer. After a curt nod of her head, he said, “I talk here about power versus independence. Violence emanates from a lack of control—over lives, relationships, emotions, money, whatever. Ultimately, what drives these men and millions of others to violence is a yearning to take control. Society does not cater to people like this. It is set up to serve those who already have power. The elite, the one percent. Or, if not the one percent, certainly the five or ten percent at the very top. Not these men. Not those who go to jail because they cannot control certain urges. Here, they learn control. We grow our own food, we build our own homes, we learn trades, and prove to our loved ones and potential employers that we are not the same people incarcerated many years ago.”
It was hard to tell if the speech was rehearsed or not. Some of it came directly from the website, but Jacob Rocaby sounded sincere in his words.
Alicia said, “The police often use certain phrases like ‘we want to eliminate you from our enquiries’, when what we really mean is ‘we think you’re bang to rights.’ But in this case, Mr. Rocaby, we mean it. You do good work here, a better rehabilitation rate than any HMP, and it would be wrong of us to start throwing accusations around.”
Murphy saw what she was doing. They hadn’t worked it out beforehand, but he approved.
Put them at ease, ensure cooperation.
She said, “But we have reason to believe someone in this area has been making postings online encouraging others to commit crimes, which is in itself a crime.”
“How wide an area?” Ms. Kae asked.
“Twenty-some miles,” Stevenson answered.
“Within twenty miles, there is a village of approximately eight hundred people and a private school, although I don’t know their numbers. Don’t you think it’s more likely to be children doing it?”
“Not to this degree,” Alicia said.
Jacob opened the door to what Murphy assumed was a barn. “Why don’t we have a look at what we are dealing with. This is our community centre. And sometimes our church.”
Inside, it could have been a school dining room, the tables and chairs stacked to one side, with a curtained off area at the head of the floor forming a flimsy second room. Jacob led the group through the curtains where four computers stood idle on a round table, partitioned into quarters for privacy. Murphy woke one of them up with a tap of the space bar, to reveal a Windows XP screensaver, revealing the computers as rather old.
Jacob said, “We haven’t got round to upgrading to Windows 10 yet.”
“And this has Internet access?” Stevenson asked.
“Slow but efficient.”
Nobody spoke for a moment but Murphy could not leave the silence hanging.
“The reason we are here is because of the violent nature of some of your … residents. It makes them suspects in crimes committed in this area.” Murphy glanced at the lawyer. “Statistically, they’re more likely to be at the bottom of this than a quaint village or a school.” Back to Jacob Rocaby, who appeared as serene as any other priest Murphy had met. “So why don’t we start with you, sir? Before you took holy orders, I understand you indulged in some organised violence between rival football clubs. Caved in the head of a Millwall fan. With a hammer.”
“That was never proven,” Ms. Kae pointed out.
“No,” Murphy said. “But your client admitted being present during the beating. And committed grievous bodily harm by stamping on another kid on the floor, smashing his collar bone. And, what, twelve other counts thanks to your ‘crew’ flipping on you? But not the hammer, eh? Eighteen years later, his parents still feed their son, and he spends his leisure time on a minibus holding a balloon.”
Alicia coughed, and stage whispered, “That’s something of a stereotype we don’t like to propagate these days.”
“Point is the priest here has a violent history.”
Jacob nodded, his hands remaining before him. “My history is a matter of record. But now I do far more good than ill.”
“Do you regret smashing that man’s head with a hammer?”
Kuno stepped in. “As we have established, my client did not do such a thing.”
“Wasn’t convicted,” Murphy said. “Doesn’t mean he didn’t do it.”
Rocaby offered another supplicant smile, another raise of the hands asking for peace. He said, “If I did … if in my youthful exuberance to escape the depression and anxiety brought on by my abusive father, and the poverty I grew up in, if I actually did such a despicable thing, there would be nothing I could do now to take it back. If I cracked that man’s skull, and condemned him to such a horrible existence, perhaps it might be what encouraged me to change. Because without committing my past sins, if indeed they were true, I would not be where I am today. And I’m proud of what I do, because it means another man may be able to resist the sort of violent act that destroyed a Millwall fan’s life.”
Nobody spoke. Even the lawyer looked at her feet as they shuffled in the silence.
“My father was a bad person,” Jacob said. “He beat me regularly. One time, he sobered up and felt guilty about my bruises. He tried to make it up to me by helping me lose my virginity, aged fourteen, to a prostitute. He said it would make a man of me. And I did it. Because I knew if I didn’t, he would beat me to the floor, and kick me until I stopped moving. I don’t use that as an excuse. I accept my sins as my own, but that is no way to start a life. Especially since my father was also a priest.”
“Convicted for molesting a minor,” Stevenson said. “I checked your known associates. Three other accusations but Horatio Rocaby only went down for one. Do you still see him?”
Jacob’s eyes glassed over. “I was only aware he went to prison. Thirty years too late. No telling what crimes he committed that went unpunished.” He shook away the memories. “I have no idea of his whereabouts now.”
Alicia placed a hand on his arm. “You became a priest to prove you are a better man than your father.”
“And to prove the sins of the father don’t necessarily dictate the man the son will become.”
Another pause.
Stevenson’s turn to fill it this time. “Who else here might wish to instigate violent acts to destabilise a community?”
Kuno Kae gave a half laugh. “That’s a very specific question. And I don’t think Mr. Rocaby is qualified to answer it.”
“Why don’t we meet a few of our residents?” Jacob suggested.
“We have nothing to hide. Shall we?”
* * *
Leading them back through the curtain, Jacob presented a table around which was seated three men. He introduced them as Vernon Slater, a floppy haired white man in his mid-twenties dressed all in grey, including a long trench coat; Norman Faulkner, one of those old lags who might have been fifty-five, or approaching seventy, wiry with grey stubble and wisps of white hair sticking out of his checked shirt, and in his jeans and flip-flops he could have been an ex-hippie revisiting his youth; Bill Khan made up the trio, a bearded black man of indeterminate middle age, who favoured khaki— shirt, trousers, a floppy tropical style hat, as if readying to embark on an expedition to an as yet unexplored desert island.
Ms. Kaye said, “The people here just want to be left alone to get on with their lives, perhaps enable them to carry on in the outside world. In time.”
The table was a rickety Formica number actually made up of two items, again like a school cafeteria. With five spare seats, the scene had clearly been set up in advance, and Murphy saw no reason not to play along. They were here for information, after all.
Once the police were seated, Ms Kae and Jacob joined them. Alicia parked herself right on the edge of the plastic seat and leaned back, legs akimbo.
When she noticed the stares from three men, she said, “Oh don’t mind me, I’m not going to drop. I only look like it. Or maybe burst. Yes, I think I’m more likely to burst. Do you agree?”
The older man, Norman Faulkner, chuckled. “Now you are one brave little lady bringing a child into a world that needs a place like this.”
“Maybe she’ll raise the kid right,” Bill Khan said. “And if someone like us tries to get in its life, it’ll run a mile.”
Jacob clasped his hands together and leaned forward on his elbows. “Gentlemen. I asked you to meet with these officers because they are worried someone here may be using our IT suite to influence violence in the outside world. You are the most frequent users, and I’ve known you long enough to believe none of you capable of something like that. And even if you were, I’m not sure it is a crime.”