The Red Room

by Nicci French

“Match?”

  I handed him a box; he struck a match, and put the box into his pocket.

  “You had to pretend not to mind when you were beaten. But I always cried. Even when I was fourteen, fifteen, I cried. I couldn’t help myself. Cry-baby. And then they’d jeer at you, and then I’d cry some more. So when I lay in bed, picking off the wallpaper all night, I’d cry then too, while I was doing it. Because I knew I’d get caught and beaten, and I knew I’d cry in front of everyone, and get picked on more by the other boys.”

  He picked up his mug and slurped at the coffee. Bits of ash scattered from his cigarette and he brushed them off his clothes onto the sofa. “You don’t know what it’s like.”

  “No,” I said.

  “I still cry. I cried at the police station. Did they tell you that?”

  “No.”

  “They laughed at me when I cried.”

  “That wasn’t kind.”

  “I thought you liked me.”

  Be firm. “Michael, I told you. I’ve been busy.”

  “I waited. I didn’t go to the canal. I waited for you to come back to talk to me.”

  “I’ve been working.”

  “You’re just like the others. I thought you were different.”

  A chimney of ash fell on his knee. He dropped the glowing cigarette end into the coffee cup and I heard it hiss. He could have killed Lianne, I thought. Easily. If she had laughed at him when he tried to pick her up, say, or laughed at him when he cried.

  “Can I have another fag?”

  “I’m out of them. We could go to the shops together and buy some more?”

  “It’s all right.” He took a packet out of his pocket. It was almost full. He offered one to me but I shook my head. “I need to go out, Michael,” I said. Will was never going to come.

  He frowned. “Not yet. I want to talk.”

  “What about?”

  “Just talk. You know. Like you said I could say anything.”

  “That was a professional interview, Michael,” I said gently. A look of incomprehension crossed his face. “It was for work.”

  “You mean, you weren’t telling me the truth?”

  “That’s not what I mean.”

  “I still think about her.”

  “Lianne?”

  “Yes. Nobody wants to hear me, but I was there, wasn’t I? I was there.”

  “Maybe.”

  “No. No. Not maybe. Why do you say maybe? I was there and…”

  The door swung open. I hadn’t heard his footsteps. Doll sprang out of the sofa, tipping his cup onto the floor, where it dribbled coffee dregs and wet ash.

  “Hello, Michael,” said Will. He came forward with his hand outstretched and Doll took it and held on to it.

  “I wasn’t doing anything wrong.”

  “Of course you weren’t.”

  “Why are you here, then?”

  “Dr. Quinn is a friend of mine.” He hadn’t looked in my direction yet.

  “You know each other?”

  “Yes.”

  “So I know Kit and you know Kit, and I know you and you know me. We all know each other.” Suddenly he looked small and skinny, standing there in his horrible orange trousers. And I felt foolish and ashamed of my fears.

  “You know each other?” I echoed Doll.

  Will turned to me, perplexed. “I thought you must have realized. It’s not such a coincidence, if you think about it. How’s the fishing, Michael?”

  “Haven’t been,” muttered Doll.

  “Pity, now the weather’s getting better. Michael’s a great fisherman, you know,” he said to me.

  “Yes, I know.”

  “I’m driving your way, Michael. Shall I give you a lift?” He glanced at his watch. “You could still have a good few hours by the canal before it gets dark.”

  “I don’t mind the dark.”

  “Well, let me drive you anyway. I’m sure Dr. Quinn has work to do.”

  “Yes,” I murmured. “Thank you.”

  “Are you all right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, you don’t look it. Maybe you should take a bit more care of yourself.” He glanced sharply at me. “And put an inside chain on your door, perhaps.”

  “I’ve got one. Julie just… oh, well, you know.”

  “She’s lurking outside, in her slippers. Ready, Michael?”

  They left together. I watched from the window as Will put Doll into the passenger seat. Doll said something to him and Will laughed and patted his shoulder. Then he shut the door. He looked up at the window. I mouthed a thank-you through the glass but he didn’t react. He just stared, as if he couldn’t make out my face properly. Then he turned away.

  Julie burst in through the door. “Tell me everything.”

  “I can’t,” I said. “I think I’m going to be sick.”

  19

  The press conference was organized at the very last minute but there was a buzz about this one and nowhere in the Stretton Green police station was remotely big enough, even though a good half of the rooms had now been stripped of all their furniture. A conference room was hastily booked at the Shackleton Hotel just around the corner and it was jammed with jostling men and women in suits shouting into mobile phones. The room was horribly hot and I saw a man in a uniform trying and failing to open a window. I stood right at the back, near the door, where there was a welcome breeze of slightly less unpleasant warm air.

  Four men in gray suits swaggered through the door. Oban, Furth, Renborn and Renborn’s deputy, Paul Crosby. They almost brushed against me, but didn’t notice, insulated as they were by three uniformed officers as well as by their air of businesslike urgency. They made their way through the crowd and up onto the platform at the far end. They sat down at the table and were instantly blasted by television lights, which suddenly made them look more real than anything else in the room. A female officer came forward with a jug of water and four glasses. They all took sips with serious frowns. There was a microphone on the table. Oban tapped it with a finger. It sounded like someone banging on the wall with a broomstick. The noise subsided as if he had turned a dial.

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” he began, “most of you won’t know me. I’m Detective Chief Inspector Daniel Oban from Stretton Green. I won’t beat about the bush. We’re here to announce a significant step forward in the Philippa Burton murder inquiry.” There was a slight buzz and Oban, big ham that he was, paused, visibly savoring the moment. “Ten days before the murder of Mrs. Burton, a young woman, known to her friends as Lianne, was found murdered by the stretch of canal that passes through the Kersey Town area. We now believe that these two murders were committed by the same person.”

  After saying this, he took a sip of water then clenched his jaw. I suspected that this may have been to prevent himself breaking into an inappropriate smile of pleasure at the excitement his words had provoked.

  “If you’ll let me finish,” he said. “One result of this is that two separate murder inquiries will now be combined. I happen to be the senior officer and I will take nominal charge. But it goes without saying that Vic Renborn and his team have been doing an outstanding job so far and we’ll be working closely together.”

  He gave a somber nod at Renborn, who gave a brief, businesslike inclination of his head in acknowledgment. There was an immediate forest of hands at the front. Oban pointed at someone I couldn’t see. “Yes, Ken?”

  “What’s the basis for the connection?”

  “As most of you probably know, fiber analysis is generally used to establish connections between a body and a suspect. But in this case we found matching fibers on the clothes of the two women.”

  “What sort of fibers?”

  “Originally we thought the two women had been murdered where they were found. We now suspect they were killed elsewhere and that they were then transported in a vehicle to a relatively secluded spot where the body was dumped. We believe these fibers may come from the vehicle in which they were transpo
rted. What we found was a form of…” Oban looked down at a piece of paper on the table, “… synthetic polymer that is common to both bodies.”

  Someone else stood up. A woman holding a microphone. “But how did you come to make the connection?”

  Now Oban allowed himself a slight smile. “A crucial aspect of any murder inquiry is the control of information, and the pooling of it between different parts of the Metropolitan Police and beyond. I would like to say that this has so far been a model of co-operation and I’d like to pay tribute once again to Vic Renborn and his team.”

  “But why did you compare the two murders? Are they very similar?”

  “Not at first sight, no,” said Oban. “But there are one or two possibly linking factors.”

  “Such as?”

  He looked mysterious. “I hope you’ll understand if we don’t discuss these at this time.”

  “Can you say anything about the sort of person you’re looking for?”

  Oban looked across. “Vic? You want to take this one?”

  “Thanks,” said Renborn, giving a modest smile. “What we think we’re seeing here is a progression. The first victim, Lianne, was what we call a soft target. She was a runaway, living in hostels, in a world of drugs and prostitution. She was accessible and vulnerable. With Philippa Burton he was bolder. I’m not saying anything against Lianne, who was of course tragically murdered, but Mrs. Burton was a respectable woman with a child. She was a more difficult target. This is a person who committed what you might call an easy murder and has now moved on to a more difficult one.”

  Another hand bobbed up. “Have you got anything more specific?”

  “The murderer makes use of a car. We had also had advice from a highly experienced psychological profiler with an excellent track record.”

  I knew who this was. Seb Weller.

  “He has provided us with a tentative profile of which I’m authorized to give just a few details. He’s white. Twenty-five to thirty-five, probably the upper end of that range. We suspect that he saw Philippa Burton, and the murder was partly committed because the killer didn’t just desire her, he envied what she had, she was obviously well-off, with a child.”

  “So you’re saying it’s a serial killer.”

  “No,” said Oban hurriedly. “Let’s be sensible here. I’m just saying that we’ve got a dangerous man moving around, probably in a vehicle, so we ask for any possible co-operation from the public.”

  “So he’ll strike again,” shouted a voice from the back.

  “I certainly don’t want to alarm anyone,” said Oban. “He will be caught. But in the meantime people—especially women in public places—should exercise especial caution. Let’s keep ’em skinned, all right?” He looked around. “Any further questions?”

  A middle-aged woman stood up. “You haven’t explained what made you compare these two cases.”

  Oban dealt with this himself. “That’s not an easy question to answer,” he said. “As you’ve heard, an investigation like this depends on highly technical forensic analysis but also on old-fashioned shoe leather. We have already interviewed hundreds of potential witnesses, we’ve dragged the canal, we’ve conducted house-to-house inquiries, we’ve conducted intensive searches of the two areas where the bodies were found. But all the same, some of it comes down to experience and instinct.” Now he gave an avuncular smile. “Call it the copper’s instinct, for want of a better term. We had a feeling that there was a connection, even if we weren’t sure exactly what it was. That was what made us check it out. Things just rang bells.”

  “Why did he choose those victims?”

  “We believe the choices were opportunistic. He saw his chance, acted. That’s what makes psychopathic killers of that kind especially difficult to catch.”

  “Do you have any suspects?”

  “I don’t want to make any comment about that at this time. I’ll just say that we’re interviewing some people.”

  “Is it true that you’re employing a psychic to find the killer? And is it a proper use of taxpayers’ money?”

  “For a start, I am not employing any psychics. On the other hand, if someone can help me find the killer, I don’t care if they use tea-leaves to do it. And on that hopeful note, I think we’d better draw proceedings to a close. Rest assured, we’ll keep you in touch with any developments. For the moment you’ll understand that it’s back to business. We’ve got work to do.”

  __________

  Twenty minutes later we were sitting in the Lamb and Flag, a nearby pub that was decorated with a large collection of horse brasses and much frequented by policemen. Oban took a sip from his pint of bitter and held the glass reflectively up to the light.

  “When I was talking about ‘us coppers,’ obviously you were included, Kit. I know that in an ideal world I should have singled you out for credit….”

  I took a sip of my fizzy water and felt very prim. I didn’t want to seem like a dour teetotaler but it was only eleven on a weekday morning. “I’m not interested in credit…” I began.

  “The point is,” Oban continued, “that it’s good for morale to talk about how well they’ve done. Deserved or not. But rest assured, if it all goes wrong, we’ll single you out for public blame.”

  “Yeah,” said Furth, from across the table. He had just placed a second pint next to the first, which was looking dangerously close to empty. “We’ll see you all right, Kit. As long as you don’t walk out again. I can never keep track with whether you’re on or off the case. You’ve retired more often than Frank Sinatra. Anyway, cheers.”

  The final contents of pint number one disappeared. This was the boys being nice to me. It was often difficult to distinguish it from when they were being nasty. I wasn’t always sure whether I was getting a slap on the back or a jab in the ribs. Perhaps you needed to be a bloke to tell. “I wasn’t sure about your profile, Vic,” I volunteered gingerly.

  “Don’t blame me, love. I just was quoting Seb. Are you saying he’s wrong?”

  “No. But what we’re doing is playing the odds. We’re saying the killer is white because most serial killers don’t cross racial divides. I know all that. The danger of these profiles is that they cut off lines of inquiry.”

  “I thought that was the point.”

  “It’s not much good if it cuts off the right line of inquiry.”

  “I’ve heard your theory,” said Furth, a bit too loudly. “A nice psychopathic killer. Wanna crisp, by the way?”

  Offering me his crisps. I was certainly back on board. I took one and crunched it loudly.

  “I wasn’t saying he was nice. But there are nice killers, in a kind of way I mean.” There was a guffaw from somewhere. “I mean it. I’ve come across a case where a child was murdered and buried by its mother, and the mother had wrapped it up as if she was putting it to bed. I just think that we should be careful about making assumptions,” I said. “That’s all.”

  “So what do we do?” said Oban. “That’s our problem. You keep saying what it isn’t. But what is it? Where do we look?”

  “I don’t know,” I said, and swallowed the last of my water. “We need to be open to possibility, that’s all.”

  “Nah,” said Furth. “You’re making it too hard for yourself, darling. He started being careful, then he snatched someone in broad daylight. He’s getting bolder. He needs to get the same buzz. I’ll bet you anything he’ll get more and more careless and we’ll pick him up the next time or the time after that. And guess what? His name will be Mickey Doll.”

  I ignored the mention of Doll. “You make it sound like a game.”

  “No,” said Oban. “That’s not fair.” He took a deep drink and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “We may behave like a bunch of piss artists, but that doesn’t mean we are.”

  “Er, it does actually, guv,” said Furth, to great laughter. It was like having a meeting in the middle of a rugby club dinner.

  20

  I had a free afternoon
after the morning at the clinic. I bought myself a warm croissant stuffed with cheese and spinach from the deli for lunch, then ate a heaped bowl of raspberries, which were large, purple, cool from the fridge and sweet with the hint of fermentation. I ate them slowly, one at a time, relishing this oasis of empty time. The fruit stained my fingers. Outside, the air was thick and bright after last night’s rain. The leaves shone on the trees, glossy. I tried to think. I thought about Lianne and Philippa, letting their faces glow in my mind. I knew what Philippa had looked like alive—there had been so many photographs, with her slender, toned body and silky cap of hair, every bit of her looking buffed and polished. I only knew what Lianne had looked like dead, bitten nails and ragged hair. I didn’t know the color of her eyes or the shape of her smile. I needed to know about these two young women, because even random violence has a kind of reason. And I wanted to start with Lianne because she’d died first, but she seemed to have left no trail.

  I finished the last raspberry and rinsed out the bowl. The police weren’t any real help. They didn’t know who Lianne was; they didn’t know where she came from; they hadn’t tracked down people who had known her; they could tell me nothing except what I already knew, that she had been a runaway, one of the missing thousands who drift round the streets of the big cities. The police came across people like Lianne all the time. Runaways took drugs. Runaways stole. Runaways became prostitutes. “They are victims and then they turn into criminals,” said Furth, and I opened my mouth to snap something at him, but then closed it. We were back to being enemies pretending to be friends.

  I didn’t know what else to do so I turned to Pavic again. I had to nerve myself to call him. In each of our meetings, I had been at a hopeless disadvantage, but the last had been the worst. I took a deep breath and dialed the number. A woman answered and said he wasn’t there, but he was expected at any moment. I left my number, almost relieved. Then I waited, prowling around the flat, looking out of the window, picking up magazines and letting them drop again, but really just waiting.

  The telephone rang fifteen minutes later. I picked it up on the third ring so he wouldn’t think I was sitting by it.