by Steven Dunne
The armchairs on which the Wallis parents had died were gone, so too the once-white rug on which Kylie and her unborn child had been butchered. Even the wallpaper sporting the bloody daub ‘SAVED’ had been torn away. The room was completely bare. Brook stepped further in, wincing at the explosion of sound that his shoes created on the uncovered floorboards.
His veins turned to ice at the sight of the bottle of wine sitting on the fireplace, exactly as it had the night the Wallis family had faced The Reaper. Next to it were two wine glasses. Both were grime- and dust-free. He was expected. He forced himself to step nearer. The bottle was uncorked and full. He stared at the label. It was a Nuits St Georges, the same as it had been two years ago. Brook picked up a glass with his gloved hand and sniffed it. Clean. This time The Reaper hadn’t had a celebratory drink after doing his work. His work. The Reaper was dead. And what work was there for The Reaper in an empty house?
‘Sorenson’s dead,’ Brook muttered softly, clenching his fists.
A creaking noise from above made Brook drop the glass. It shattered at his feet. He abandoned all pretence at stealth and hurtled out of the room, bounding up the stairs three at a time and tearing into the bedroom above the living room, flashing the torch wildly to be sure he wasn’t about to be attacked. But the torch was unnecessary. There was already light. A candle in a holder burned in the corner and had been alight for some time, judging by the knot of melted wax around the stem. Brook gazed into the centre of the room at a small mattress; next to it sat a small camping stove and a few unopened tins.
Brook nodded sadly and stepped closer. How many years since he’d been in Laura Maples’s bleak squat in London? Twenty? And now here in Derby, in reproduction, it was just as he remembered it. But instead of her blackened, bloated, rat-infested corpse before him, Brook saw only the framed picture of the girl, resting on the mattress.
‘Laura,’ he said before he could stop himself. He kneeled to look at the likeness of the bright-eyed schoolgirl, staring back at him. It was the same photograph he’d used in her murder investigation in the early nineties. The one plastered over the London Evening Standard and printed onto flyers in a futile effort to find her, then her killer. It wasn’t the face ravaged by hungry rats, the face that tormented Brook in his sleep.
Well, the dreams had ceased for a while because, where Brook had failed, Victor Sorenson had found Laura’s killer and had executed his family for the offence, offering her killer up to Brook as a gift. A gift. To show Brook that The Reaper’s work, the destruction of entire families, was righteous and just.
‘Who’s doing this?’ he muttered to himself. He said it again, only louder, lifting his head to project to a nearby listener. His voice bounced around the bare room without receiving an answer. ‘Sorenson’s dead!’ he shouted this time.
He picked up the picture frame and examined it more closely. The picture was a photocopy. The necklace with its silver hearts still winked at him, but Brook was able to draw comfort from the artifice. He pulled the picture from the frame and slid it into his pocket, then listened to the house exhale around him. The pulse of the rap music throbbed faintly outside. He looked at his watch again. Ten past one. Fifty minutes to wait for The Reaper. He wasn’t coming, Brook knew that. Sorenson was dead – he’d seen it with his own eyes. But someone was pretending to be Sorenson, someone was tugging at Brook’s memories of the Maples case, and he was determined to put a stop to it. He bent down to blow out the candle and sat behind the door to wait in the dark.
The man felt the heat from the blaze in the oil drum. He looked at the teenage boys slumped on the old sofas, all four bodies contorted and unmoving. Empty cans, paper plates and glass bottles were strewn at their feet, cigarette ends littered the ground. He turned to the old car on bricks, the portable CD player on the roof, its display drawing his eye.
The man listened to the music. It was soft and beautiful, guaranteed to soothe. He wanted to close his eyes and let his mind drift, but he knew he had to stay focused. He returned to the sofas and crouched down to examine his dark shoes and black trousers by the light from the fire. They were flecked with the stains of drying blood. He stood slowly and prepared to leave.
He glanced at the blood-smeared scalpel on the ground and picked it up as carefully as he could manage with his gloved hand. He placed it on the arm of the sofa next to Jason Wallis, watching where he placed his feet to avoid brushing through more blood.
As he prepared to move away, he noticed something in the boy’s hand. He hesitated, then slid the mobile phone from Jason’s blood-spattered grasp before moving the boy’s hand to rest over the scalpel, pleased with this sudden inspiration. He squinted at the phone in the poor light. It wasn’t a model he was familiar with and it looked complicated. He thumbed at a number but his hands were clumsy in the thick black gloves so he peeled one off and dialled again.
At first the man said nothing when the voice at the other end of the line answered. He hadn’t thought what he might say. He glanced around at the four bodies, clothes saturated with blood, massive wounds deforming the throats which had once carried oxygen to now inert lungs – all except the Wallis boy, whose injuries weren’t immediately visible.
When prompted again on the phone, he answered briefly through the material of his balaclava, then threw the mobile onto Jason’s lap, deciding he had stayed longer than he should. He started to walk away but as he did so he heard a groan behind him. The man froze and turned slowly around. Jason Wallis was stirring.
The boy opened his drunken, drug-addled eyes and gawked at the man, without really taking in what he was seeing. He tried to speak but couldn’t. For a second the man fancied he saw the boy smile. He opened his mouth to try again.
‘I’m ready,’ breathed Jason and attempted to lift himself. Instead he slumped back onto the sofa, his eyes closing as he returned to the depths, oblivious to the spouts of darkening blood from his friends dotting his face and hair and soaking into his clothes.
Brook woke with a start. He looked at his watch. Two o’clock. It was time. He stood to stretch his aching legs as quietly as he could, listening for any sound from downstairs. He remembered the rap music and wondered why it was no longer pulsing, so he walked over to the window. The large piece of board covering the window had a couple of improvised catches holding it in place. He loosened the bent nails to allow the board to fall into his arms and put it down before leaning out of the glass-free window to look out over the quadrangle of high fences at the back of the block of houses.
He heard the music clearly now but it had changed; it was soft and melodic. He searched his memory banks and peered into the night. There was a bonfire in an old oil drum, two or three doors away. Brook could see the glow of the dying embers crackling and fizzing in the soft breeze. To his surprise he could also see a car and what looked like a couple of old sofas positioned around the improvised brazier. He fancied he could see the heads of several people on the sofas, their feet stretched out towards the heat.
He could even see the display of a CD player as it played, could see the lights through the fog, rising and falling with each note. He listened for a second to the soft tinkling of the piano. ‘Clair de Lune’, of course. Debussy. Something beautiful. Something …
Brook stiffened. His face set he turned and walked purposefully down the stairs and out of the house.
Sorenson led the two agents towards the cabin, his hands gripped resolutely behind his back. On nearing the house, he gestured towards a covered patio which had a large glass-topped table supported by a heavy wrought-iron base in the shape of a quartet of nymphs. On the thick glass sat a chrome-plated coffee pot and three cups and saucers.
As they approached, Drexler could hear music, opera in fact, and narrowed his eyes to try and place it. He knew it, he was sure. His mother had been a major Pavarotti fan before her illness and that was the voice that he recognised. At the table, Sorenson gestured at a pair of wicker chairs towards which the agents moved.
A bo
ok lay open on the table and Drexler took the long way round to his chair to get a glance at the title. It was a slim paperback volume of The Myth of Sisyphus by Albert Camus. Drexler smiled faintly. Their host was a philosopher.
Sorenson saw him looking but said nothing. Without asking, he poured coffee into the two empty cups and pushed them towards the two agents before freshening up his own cup. ‘Please help yourself to milk or sugar. I’m sorry I don’t have any cream. I know how you Americans jump at any opportunity to increase your weight.’ Sorenson beamed at the two agents to dissipate the insult.
McQuarry emitted a mirthless laugh. ‘Don’t worry, sir. I’m sure we can locate a box of Krispy Kremes when we’re done.’
Sorenson smiled at her response.
The music was clearer now and Drexler saw it was coming from an open pair of French windows behind them. He remembered it now. He’d heard it in a movie, The Untouchables. Robert de Niro was AI Capone, sobbing his brutal heart out at a performance of Pagliacci. The climax of the piece, when the clown has to face up to his wife’s infidelities.
‘This is nice,’ he said. ‘Vesti la giubba, isn’t it?’
‘Yes, it is. How gratifying. A man of culture. So hard to find away from the East Coast.’ Drexler looked over to his partner as she narrowed her eyes at Sorenson. McQuarry was a straightforward person who spoke her mind, yet believed in good manners and only attempted humour with people she knew. Sorenson’s blend of intellectual vanity and restrained taunting would not be familiar to her.
But most of the Brits Drexler knew from college interacted in a very similar way to Sorenson – constantly on the offensive, probing for a weakness to deride. Though it was not the norm for a Californian, Drexler had sought out their company and had learned to appreciate their mocking.
Sorenson turned to fix Drexler with his coal-black eyes. ‘Please sit.’ Drexler obeyed on reflex, suddenly unsure whether he should have mentioned the opera. He’d given Sorenson a free piece of information about himself and received nothing in return. Their usual working method was to let the suspect do the running and underplay their own hand.
‘Were you expecting us, Professor?’ asked McQuarry.
‘Expecting you?’ inquired Sorenson angelically.
‘The coffee cups all laid out, sir,’ explained McQuarry, not taking her gaze from him.
Sorenson beamed mechanically. ‘I’m always prepared for guests, Agent McQuarry. Now what can I do for you? Have you found my car?’
‘Car?’ The agents exchanged a knowing glance.
‘Yes, my beloved Dodge Ram 250. Stolen in South Lake Tahoe. Outside Safeway of all places.’
‘The FBI don’t make house calls over stolen vehicles, sir,’ put in Drexler.
Sorenson chuckled, with a tinge of feigned guilt. ‘Of course not. Stupid of me. Then why are you here?’ he asked, wide-eyed.
‘We were hoping you could provide some information about an employee of yours. George Bailey.’ Drexler dropped in the question effortlessly and waited for the reaction.
For a few seconds, Sorenson said nothing but merely looked from one to the other. The music came to an end but another piece started up immediately. Drexler didn’t know it.
‘Fauré’s Requiem,’ said Sorenson, waving a hand at the French window. ‘Imagine listening to this as you die. How would that be?’
‘A good way to enter the next world,’ replied Drexler, before he’d given himself time to think.
Sorenson’s eyebrow raised and his mocking smile intensi-fied. ‘The next world?’ Drexler’s smile turned to stone and he berated himself again – another free piece of information. ‘I wouldn’t have thought someone familiar with the works of Albert Camus would have believed in the next world.’ Sorenson’s smile disappeared. ‘After all, death is not an event in life: we do not live to experience death.’
Drexler nodded, the anticipation rising in him. Sorenson may have seen him looking at his book, but the phrase he’d just quoted was Wittgenstein, not Camus. He racked his brains to finish the passage. ‘Eternal life belongs to those who live in the present.’
‘A good philosophy, Special Agent.’ Sorenson stared into Drexler’s eyes. His dead-eyed grin was unnerving.
Drexler looked over at McQuarry, but she seemed not to have registered her partner’s excitement.
Drexler tried to figure it. The way he’d floundered, everything he’d said to Sorenson since they’d arrived, even the faint glance of recognition at Sorenson’s reading material had been logged, had handed their host an advantage. But despite all that, and under no pressure, Sorenson had made a coded confession to Drexler, had revealed knowledge of Wittgenstein that told Drexler he was the killer they sought. Not a confession for a judge and jury maybe but, sure as eggs is eggs, Sorenson had killed Caleb and Billy Ashwell.
Drexler narrowed his eyes. But why give it up so easily? As an opponent, Sorenson was holding a good hand. Opponent. Is that what he was? Yes, like this was a game. If the notion weren’t so absurd he could have sworn that hidden away behind the mask of civility, Victor Sorenson was like a child with a new toy, unable to hide his glee. Drexler was desperate to glance over at McQuarry to see if she’d read him the same way, but was unable to unlock his gaze from Sorenson’s lifeless, black eyes.
‘Drexler? Drexler?’ said Sorenson, suddenly taut with concentration. ‘Why do I know that name?’ Drexler stiffened and looked over at his partner. Sorenson must have read about the Board of Inquiry’s report in the papers. Drexler sipped at his coffee and tried to regain some equilibrium. It was cold.
‘We’re here to talk about George Bailey, sir,’ insisted McQuarry, tapping a diversionary finger on the glass table.
Their host smiled but this time it was a sad expression, suffused with unexpected tenderness. ‘George. You’ve found him, then?’
McQuarry sat up straight. ‘Found him?’
‘He’s missing, is he not?’
Drexler smiled at the overemphasis of the present tense. Their host was trying a little too hard to avoid a timeless trap, one that they hadn’t even set. It was odd. Whichever way the conversation turned, Sorenson was trying his best to encourage suspicion with his manner. Usually suspects tried to feign sincerity and deflect further inquiry and although they frequently failed, at least they tried.
‘You know he is, sir. You reported it. Would you care to remind us of the circumstances?’
Sorenson nodded. ‘George was on holiday – vacation, sorry – for a month. He’d been out here in California for a couple of years, helping to set up the American end of the business. Sorenson Pharmaceuticals. One of my best people and also a friend. It was a big wrench for them to come out here, what with two young daughters. But they loved it, once they’d settled. He didn’t get much of a break the first two years so he wanted to make up for it. The family had always wanted to see what your astonishing country has to offer, particularly California, so they packed their gear into a Volkswagen camper van and set off … Yosemite, Death Valley, Big Sur, the Mojave. For the final week they were supposed to be coming here to my house as my guests. I was in LA on business and as I say, George was a good friend…’
‘Was?’ said McQuarry.
Sorenson took a sip of his inky black coffee. ‘He’s dead, isn’t he?’
‘What makes you say that?’
‘Please don’t patronise me. You’re not from the local Tahoe office. You’ve come all the way from Sacramento to pay me a visit and there can only be one reason.’ McQuarry and Drexler stayed silent to confirm Sorenson’s speculation. ‘So it’s true. Tell me.’
‘We’ve found the body of George Bailey, his wife and one of his daughters.’
Sorenson nodded. ‘I see. How were they killed?’
‘Shot in the head,’ said Drexler.
‘Mother and daughter were raped,’ added McQuarry to Drexler’s surprise. The details seemed unnecessary but perhaps she had reason, perhaps she was searching for a careless response, an unguarde
d word. ‘And the little girl was tortured.’
Sorenson hung his head. ‘Poor Tania. Poor…’ he stopped abruptly and looked up at McQuarry with a raised eyebrow.
‘We believe the girl’s body is his youngest – Sally.’ He looked away and shook his head. ‘Poor little thing.’ ‘Being from England their dental records are problematic and we wondered if you’d know about next of kin. For the purpose of identification, you understand,’ added McQuarry.
Sorenson closed his black eyes in tribute, an unscheduled moment of near silence. But the music played on.
‘Sir?’ Now McQuarry and Drexler were able to look at each other and manage a quick acknowledgement. McQuarry had arrived at the same page as Drexler. They’d found their killer, a vigilante who’d chanced upon the very spot in the middle of remote Northern California where a personal friend and employee had been slaughtered alongside his young family.
‘I believe there’s a grandmother in Derbyshire. England,’ he added finally.
‘What about brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles?’ asked McQuarry.
Again Sorenson seemed lost in thought. ‘George was an only child,’ he answered at length.
‘Unlike in the movie.’ McQuarry threw the observation away, expecting nothing.
But instead Sorenson smiled at her. ‘Exactly.’ The sadness returned. ‘If you need a provisional identification, I’d be glad. I mean, if it would help speed things up.’
McQuarry had already removed a photograph from her attaché case and placed it in front of Sorenson. ‘Sally was killed well after her mother. She should be easier to recognise.’
Sorenson looked at the photograph of the tiny body without picking it up. Drexler and McQuarry watched him closely, but his stony expression didn’t waver; he merely stared at the image of the frail corpse for what seemed like an age. No wincing, no averting of eyes, no exclamations of shock or outrage. Nothing. Eventually, aware of his audience, he relented.