A Last Act of Charity (Killing Sisters Book 1)

by Frank Westworth

  ‘About five years back, then. That’s when I think this started. Our lords and masters think it’s all new, but I beg to differ. I have not advised them of this. An approximation is all you’re getting, because it’s all I’ve got to offer. And you’re now sitting there picturing where was where, what was what, five years ago, right? Can’t see it was a crossover with either of us, although I would indeed be amused to be proved wrong. Crimes of passion, perhaps, certainly crimes of anger; increasingly grimy crimes. Always in hotels, always involving cutting. Couple of bludgeonings, batterings, bullets, but always sliced as well. Scenes messed with post mortem.’ The Hard Man paused. Stoner pointed an interrupting eyebrow at the approaching laden waiter.

  ‘It is amazing how criminal some people can become if they’re compelled to sit around for hours waiting to be given the bird. I hear there’s a theory of etiquette which suggests that valued customers should expect to sit drinking complimentary liquor for the same length of time they waited for their food, thus making the waiter wait a similar length of time for the reckoning-up. Sounds like a good idea. Although simply refusing to pay is always a smart trick. By hell, JJ, I’d almost forgotten that time you waited outside for that tardy lardy waiter and bounced him about a bit. You were a cruel man back then.’

  The waiter did appear concerned about this. His body language suggested that it wished it were elsewhere.

  ‘He was, y’know. Cruel. Mean, too. Unpredictable.’

  The Hard Man beamed at the waiter.

  ‘Do you carry a gun? A big one? In case of irritable customer syndrome? I think I would.’

  The waiter chose to grin at the Hard Man. A bold tactic. He served the meal with a flourish and risked a question. With only slight nervousness.

  ‘Crime writers, huh? Enjoy your meal, gentlemen. And try not to scare our other guests too much. We don’t need them losing their appetites. Bon appetit!’

  Stoner observed that although the restaurant was filling nicely, there was an area of calm and empty tables surrounding their own. He forced a smile, hopefully an encouraging one.

  ‘You got toothache, JJ?’ The Hard Man was all friendly concern. ‘It saps the concentration. Long life . . .’

  The food was excellent. Worth the wait. In other circumstances.

  ‘Bullets and butchery too? Interesting. How so? Torture? An inquisition? Connects between the victims?’ Stoner set the talk stone rolling, the better to eat more while speaking less.

  ‘Hard to say. Analysts didn’t connect the bullets with the carvings. You know what analysts are like. They know all about killers despite never having killed anything bigger than a bug on a windshield. And they only get to meet killers who’ve been caught. Which should tell them a thing or two, but never actually seems to. You’d think they’d spend time with successful professionals rather than with the inadequate amateur. But then where would we be, you’n’me? I connected those shootings, me.’

  Stoner raised a ruminatory and yet quizzical eyebrow.

  ‘The knife was used mainly to retrieve the bullets. Not to do the deadly deed. Maybe there was a time problem. The blades used are always the same type, but I bet they’re not the same knives. I’d guess that the killer ditches those. Smart killer, clever killer. Which is why he’s not been caught.

  ‘The MO was in the pattern of the attack. There is always a pattern. The most recent events have seen a lot more mess. So much mess by now that our colleagues in uniform have come over all distressed. Which is why we’re here, enjoying this fine chicken, this fine whisky and this fine establishment, rather than sitting in a bar playing the lotto like a regular guy.’

  ‘Do regular guys play the lotto? That’s a genuine query. I don’t know many regular guys and those I do don’t play the lotto. Am I missing something? Do you play the lotto? I can’t see it, quite.’

  Stoner was intent upon that clean plate moment. He wondered whether the wait accurately represented the time it actually took to cook a fine piece of bird rather than nuking a pre-meal in a microwave. He hoped so. Betrayal is always a worry.

  The Hard Man finished his own chicken, pushed the plants to the side. Made a lake of the jus, an archipelago of broccoli.

  ‘The lotto? Every waking hour of every working day I think only of those little numbered balls and the inevitable lucky sequence which will ensure my transport from this vale of troubles to an endless and eternal life of fulfilment and delight. I can think of no more rewarding pastime than buying those numbers and watching those bouncing balls. What is money for, JJ? You have no soul. No wonder everyone hates you and you are forced to work for me, the enlightened one. Are you still learning to play the plastic ukulele? Is that your own escape fantasy? Some day you will strike a lucky note, great wealth will envelope you and you will ease into a relaxed life bulging with fine wine, fine women, endless sunshine and free booze. And how is the missus? Your own private I’d-a-whore?’

  He ignored his own rhetorical insult and moved on. ‘Taped wrists. Always, in the early jobs. Taped to chair arms, beds, bathroom fittings. Whatever’s handy. Then a little slice’n’dice. Which suggests an enquiry or revenge. I’d go for the former; no one can need revenge on so many similar stalwart captains of finance. For that is who they are. Mostly. And mostly unremarkable. Money men; number crunchers. No connections that anyone can see, not even the geeks, analysts and computers. So it must be true.

  ‘If what we’re seeing is a whole new approach to information-gathering then I fear that the future is bleak for those who do actually possess information. I know I’m an old-fashioned kind of guy, but I’ve never yet met anyone who would refuse to hand over info, be it ever so vital and valuable, if threatened with having his nuts stabbed a few times. Once is usually enough, no? No secret on the planet is more sensitive than your nuts. Lots of blood from the initial assaults. Pointless. If there really is a sequence here, then we’re looking at a professional. Professionals don’t do messy. Idiot amateurs, haters, nutters, psychos do messy. Not professionals. Which is a tiny cause for thought here. But, really, the last couple have involved a huge lot of blood. Unnecessary.’

  ‘But not the head?’ Stoner was struggling for a connection. ‘I’m struggling for a connection,’ he said, ‘in case you’d not worked that out for yourself.’

  ‘Fret not, fret not, there is a connection. A serious connection. An unavoidable connection. And I will get there. In my own time and in my own way. Like your van. Do you still drive that thing?’

  Stoner refused to reply.

  The Hard Man was undaunted.

  ‘The last one. The last one with the complete corpse was one seriously gory place. You know this to be true, because you saw it. Loads of blood. Did anything strike you about it?’

  ‘Too much blood for a quick death. It would take a hell of a time to drain that amount of blood from a victim, and the heart would need to be pumping away to manage it. That was my thought, at least. I expect I was just surprised by it all. Like an abattoir.’

  ‘Bravo, maestro, then.’

  The Hard Man gave every impression of being a man impressed trying to appear unimpressed while exclaiming how impressed he was. Bluff, counter-bluff and counter-counter bluff. All entirely pointless, but it played to the invisible audience hiding inside that gently nodding head. Any moment now, Stoner knew, it would be time for dessert.

  ‘Dessert, JJ? Could you fancy something tasty to cover the tastelessness of the topic? Jam roly-poly? With perhaps a tangy strawberry coulis?’

  ‘Bravo? Bravo maestro? Order what you want; I’ll have the same.’

  ‘Before I summon the penguin with the menu, though; yes. The key word is abattoir. Not all that blood was human. Pig. Looks the same, smells the same. No doubt tastes the same and it all makes great gravy, sausages and black pudding, I’m sure.’

  He snapped his fingers and placed a further food order.

  ‘The body outside the hotel had no hands. It was not the body which was originally attached to th
e head you found.’ The Hard Man was finding his pace. Stoner joined in with the spirit of the thing.

  ‘There’s a plain message here. But it is so plain, so entirely fucking obvious, that I can’t understand it at all. Who the fuck is sending a message? Who the fuck is it to? And what the great screaming fuck is it about? Why the fuck would you lug a headless body about the countryside just to leave it lying on a fire escape? A fire escape outside an hotel where you’ve left a severed head?’

  All good questions, plainly, if a touch rhetorical.

  Hapless waiter reappeared at their side. Gazed at the two men, haplessly. Stoner shrugged, nodding with tilt of the head and a single raised eyebrow towards the Hard Man, who looked up, flushed and irritable. ‘The special!’ He was almost barking in his irritation at being interrupted. Waiter looked increasingly hapless.

  ‘There is no special, not as such, not this evening; just what’s on the menu.’

  Conversation in the room had faded again, almost to nothing. The other diners appeared to be hurrying, maybe sensing an approaching storm. But the Hard Man summoned a deep reserve of well-hidden patience and assumed the smile of the killer whale, complete with teeth. ‘Do you have a suggestion? Does it involve rhubarb?’

  ‘The chef makes . . .’

  ‘Excellent. Two of those. Now . . . please . . . go away.’

  A long drink from the short glass.

  ‘There’s killing, JJ, and there’s killing. This is just plain mad. Leaving a head as some kind of message? OK. I can’t believe that you or me were the intended recipients, but I can quite easily imagine a situation in which I might leave such a message. But a body from another head? What? That is stupid. Meaningless. Except . . .’

  ‘It can’t be meaningless.’ Stoner finished the thought. ‘It means something to the guy who did the topping. And he wouldn’t have left that message himself . . . OK, OK!’

  He held up both hands in a universal surrender symbol. ‘You’re having me in on this because you want what I’ve got. And all I’ve got is thinking. That’s all. It is a message. A strong message. Not a message left lightly. Our problem is that it’s obscure for us. Find someone who doesn’t find it obscure and you’ve found a reason for the job. Find a reason and you’ve narrowed all the possibilities to a more sensible level.’

  ‘Thanks for the egg-sucking lessons, JJ. I was almost taking it all seriously for a moment. I forget quite what the master of understanding you are. That – and your Zen-like calm – is why I try so hard to make you rich. Of course there’s a message. My real fret is that it’s a message from the topper to himself. If that’s the case, then we do have a problem, because it shows that the guy doing the offing has several loose screws. Which is good from a catching him perspective, because he’ll do it again and again and a-fucking-gain until eventually simple souls like you and me catch him and we can all go home singing hallelujahs and dancing smugly with our loved ones, be they several or be they single. Spot the hitch in this picture of delight; the other deads will still be dead.

  ‘So give me some insight, oh great smart one. You are the pro killer, top topper, not me.’

  ‘Not there. We don’t go there. You know more of the past than . . .’

  The Hard Man slapped the table. Hapless waiter delivered the desserts. Cleared off again, almost at a run.

  ‘. . .than is good for either of us. Yep. I know that. Put away your reformation, replace it with that cold killer thing. We need it for this.’

  Stoner forced his eyes to close. Forced friendliness through teeth.

  ‘Who are you working for on this? How official is it? How off the books? Do you have resource? Facilities? Pudding’s nice.’

  The Hard Man beamed like a drunkard. Stoner was not fooled at all.

  ‘There’s a story. The story goes that there’s a budget. So money is pretty much unimportant. It’s on-book enough for that. But it’s off-book in as much as it would be unwise for you to pick up the phone to your friendly police station and demand of the constables that they provide you with a squad car, goons and ammunition.

  ‘I’ll give you enough reading material to prevent your sleeping for a few days. As I say, I do believe there are several more bodies connected to this topper than do Her Majesty’s finest. You may disagree. At this stage you’re welcome to do so. I would prefer that you are correct that way. The world does not need another nutter on the loose, frankly.

  ‘Deal only with me at this point. Are you going to finish that? Do you need anything more at this point? How much free time do you have at the moment? Questions, questions; endless questions. Here I am, blithely assuming that you’re available for all this tedious work nonsense. You are, though? Yes?’

  Stoner aimed his gaze at his food, concentrated upon his reply.

  ‘It will fit in. That’s all. I’ll fit it in. I have no wish to go marching all over the place. If you need someone full-time, then that’s not much use. Not for very long, at any rate. You know me; always keen to help, but there are other things.’

  The Hard Man nodded.

  ‘OK. Coffee? A club? You on a date? And why would you leave a severed head in a hotel room? I mean that. You. You yourself, not some hypothetical nutjob. I’d rather believe that there is a rational purpose to this, rather than some random headcase who’s been watching too many movie mysteries. Go on?’

  ‘Can’t see it, I’m afraid. I’m no use. I’m a quiet man. Methodical. You know me. I’d always clear up. Always lose the bod. If the client insisted on it being found, then OK. But that rarely happened to me. Done accidentals, so there’s closure, and maybe insurance and a lack of doubt, but I never really enjoyed those. Too easy to screw up, to leave forensic.

  ‘So. A lesson? A warning? It is a message. Can’t not be. Can’t be anything else. It’s a bit . . . tribal. A bit jungle. Are the bod and the head very different? One or the other’s not had a treatment? Been left in the sun too long, that kind of thing? Microwaved?’

  ‘Oh yes. No doubt. Two blokes. Should have identities soon. Head pretty much straightaway, bod a little later due to the thoughtless handlessness. But the unofficial officials will most likely find the DNA somewhere. They must have about a third of the population on file by now. But you’re correct. It is a sign. A message. If I thought it was a message for me then I would know who’d sent it. I would know whether I should be scared. I would know whether I should be heading for the hills or simply loading for bear. You don’t send messages to dead men. You don’t need to. If they’re dead, chances are that they’ve already ignored all the messages they’re ever going to get. You’re sending messages to someone else.’

  Stoner sighed, theatrically. A drinker’s sigh. ‘So all we need to do is find someone who’s panicking. Easy. I shall take a long walk home and will watch out for the plainly panicked and will at once connect many many dots, all of which will lead me straight to the killer. What could be simpler? I’ll do it for free.’ He pushed his chair back and limply flapped a hand at their waiter.

  ‘Coffee! Strong. Loud and dark. Can I say black?’

  He looked with mocking query at the Hard Man. Who ignored him.

  ‘While you’re out there pounding the ground seeking the legendary panicking man, I shall make a valiant – probably doomed already – attempt to extract from my masters exactly why it is that they’re so concerned, who they think is behind it, why they’re not simply applying the constabulary to the problem and generally tilting at windmills. But I doubt they’ll tell me much in the way of useful truth. How did the head die?’

  Stoner almost laughed.

  ‘What?’

  Sometimes the Hard Man could be oblique.

  ‘How did it die? Do you think the beheading is the message or simply the cause of death? The body was stabbed. And it was missing bits, as in the other cases. Similar bits. Hands. Feet. Dick. I really don’t like that. Chap could get by missing a hand or a foot, but his dick? Fuck.’

  ‘Or not. Under the circumstanc
es.’

  ‘As you say. Where’s the coffee when you need it? I must enquire whether the sorry state of dicklessness arrived pre or post mortem. And why “SIN”? What sin is this? The biggest sin of them all is murder, and we must assume that the victim was the sinner. This can’t really be a case of wait until you see the other guy?’

  The Hard Man was drifting steadily. Stoner felt unmoved by the drink. Sober. Sad, if anything.

  ‘It’s been a long and trying day, JJ. Are you up to this? Every murdered fucker is a guilty fucker. There is no innocence. Killing in a hotel room? There is no innocent reason to get killed in a hotel room. What was the dead guy doing there? Apart from dying?’

  ‘You can’t say that.’ Stoner smiled internally at the unusual sight of the Hard Man drifting on a wave of alcohol. He must have been hitting a bottle before they’d met. There could be no other explanation. The Hard Man was a seasoned drinker and had an enormous talent for it. And an appetite, too. ‘Innocent folk get killed all the time. Why do you think these guys are getting theirs?’

  ‘No sequence of stiffs can be innocent, JJ. There must be a connection. And that connection is likely to be their shared guilt. Shared innocence does not wash. Shared innocence is for churches and choirboys, not for middle-aged fuckers in crap hotel rooms. Well-dressed fuckers do not stay in crap hotels. Not unless they’re staying with choirboys. Choirboys with no taste. Fuck; even a choirboy would demand a better place to get reamed than some cheap, crap hotel.’

  ‘You think there’s a sex angle to this?’ Stoner’s amusement was drifting away. Weariness and cynicism were more comfortable bedfellows.

  ‘How could there not be a sex angle? Don’t look at me like that, either. Do not even think of looking at me like that. Of course there’s a sex angle. Why the fuck else would two persons, a man and a woman, most likely, meet in a crap hotel room? On the other hand, JJ, why would two or more blokes meet up in a crap hotel? Unless they want to have sex with each other. Which is unlikely.’