The Whispering Gallery

by Mark Sanderson

  When Matt showed me the photograph I was immediately struck by how beautiful he looked. It is a strange word to apply to a man but, even in the unflattering glare of the arc-light, his muscular body was an image of perfection. Most people, men especially, look better with their clothes on, but Matt, appearing so strong yet vulnerable, his private parts on show for all the world to see, made my heart leap. Matt would kill me if he ever found out I felt this way – but he never will.

  No wonder Watkiss had been so antagonistic towards him. However, would he – could he? – tell his superior officer that he was guilty of invading his closest friend’s privacy? Perhaps the knowledge that he would only get himself into trouble had increased his frustration and revulsion.

  One of the reasons Johnny had started to write Friends and Lovers was to explore these feelings that were deep yet taboo. Where did the boundary between friendship and physical attraction begin to blur? Did they have to be mutually exclusive? He didn’t think so: it was impossible to be friends with someone you didn’t like the look of. His alibi, should it ever be published, would be that it was only fiction, a sustained exercise in unbridled imagination. If D.H. Lawrence, the son of a Nottinghamshire coal miner, could explore this territory, then so could he.

  A novelist had to entertain several points of view at the same time – that was the basis of characterisation – yet lead the reader towards some kind of resolution if not a concrete conclusion. It was the business of novels to analyse and investigate the innermost workings of the mind. The truth could be revealed in different, equally valid, ways.

  Writing fiction, like any artistic endeavour which made something out of nothing, was bloody hard work. Non-fiction was much easier: as long as you said true things, stuck to the five Ws – Who? What? Why? Where? When? – you couldn’t go far wrong. Sometimes, exhausted by the intolerable wrestle with words, he felt like ditching the novel in favour of starting, for example, a racy account of Jean Harlow’s torrid life. He had persevered, though. Had Watkiss tampered with his typescript too?

  Johnny, muttering a prayer even though he was a devout atheist, went back downstairs. He wrote at the kitchen table, the endless tapping of the keys often producing answering taps on the floor as the old bat downstairs bashed her ceiling with a broom. However, he hadn’t touched the novel for a couple of weeks. The last thing he felt like doing after a long day at work was sitting down in front of a typewriter again. He kept telling himself that he needed to live an eventful life to have something to write about – it had been a good excuse to take Stella dancing or to the movies – and yet the only way he would ever finish the book was by staying at home alone. Well, it seemed he was single once again. He opened the table drawer: it was empty.

  The thought of having to go back to page one was unbearable. What was Watkiss going to do with the unfinished novel? Give it to Matt? Hold it to ransom? He was so shattered he couldn’t think about the painful repercussions now. His whole life – and body – seemed to be falling apart.

  He drank a couple of glasses of water, ignored the food he had bought, and, not even bothering to brush his teeth, undressed and crawled into bed. It was not yet six o’clock but, lying there naked, rejecting the cover of even a single sheet, he drifted into a fitful slumber.

  Matt signed the Occurrence Book and slammed its marbled covers shut. It had been a typically fraught day dealing with the lost, deluded and demented – and they were just his own men – so he was looking forward to a quick pint before catching the train home. The garden, for once, could wait.

  He was almost to the door of the duty office when the telephone rang. He stared at the blasted thing – was there a simpler instrument of torture? – before sighing and picking up the receiver.

  “Sergeant Turner speaking.”

  “Have you told your journalist chum about the postcard yet?” Commander Inskip had neither the time nor inclination to observe social niceties.

  “No, sir. I thought it would be best to do it in person. I’m seeing him tomorrow.”

  “Very well. Let’s just hope whoever sent it keeps to his self-imposed deadline.”

  “Deadline. That’s a good one, sir.”

  “It wasn’t a pleasantry: I’m being serious. Something tells me that the sender isn’t mucking about either. I believe Steadman was attacked last night.” He paused as if to relish the scene. “Perhaps we should take him into protective custody.”

  “He wouldn’t stand for that, sir.” It was true. Johnny would cry foul and start ranting about the freedom of the press. Would removing him from Fleet Street silence him? He could still phone in his copy, but he would be unable to visit crime scenes, interview witnesses or chase up leads. He would soon go mad and start bouncing off the walls of a safe house. Johnny was at his happiest away from the office, in the thick of the action. It stopped him thinking too much.

  “Well, it’s his lookout. I sometimes wish we were back in the days when a man could be plucked off the street with impunity. Of course, if push comes to shove, we can always get him on a technicality. Any reluctance to accompany a police officer can be interpreted as resisting arrest.”

  “I appreciate you have his best interests at heart, sir.” Matt knew nothing of the sort. The token investigation into the corruption at Snow Hill had cleared the commander, but Johnny, for one, was still convinced that Inskip had been involved. However, the words of a dead man hardly constituted proof. The top brass who hid behind massive desks at Old Jewry, the headquarters of the City of London Police, instinctively stuck together. They enjoyed having scrambled egg on their shoulders – but not egg on their faces. The HQ lay just a few yards from where the Great Synagogue had been burned down in the thirteenth century. A fitting location for a notoriously anti-Semitic force.

  “Poppycock! If anything else happens to the blighter we’ll be the ones in the firing line. That’s what concerns me. I can see the headlines now: POLICE INACTION KILLS REPORTER. We’ve got to protect our own skins as well – and I’m not talking about sunburn.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “You must impress upon him the need to take precautions – for all our sakes.”

  “Yes, sir. I’ll do my best.” What else could he say? Johnny would have most likely pooh-poohed the idea of extra security – until today. Perhaps the beating had knocked some sense into him.

  The faceless figure stood at the foot of the bed. Johnny could not move. He lay there naked, holding his breath, straining his ears for the slightest sound, any sign that the stranger was about to pounce. The sweat poured out of him. Why didn’t it say anything? What did it want?

  Johnny yelled but no sound emerged from his parched throat. He tried to roll off the bed but his limbs were lead. Was he dead already?

  Finally Johnny wrenched himself back into the land of the living. He stared into the darkness, dreading what the future might hold. One thing was for sure: it wouldn’t be pleasant.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Wednesday, 7th July, 7.40 a.m.

  The cries of a rag-and-bone man, trying to steal a march on his competitors, woke him. Horse-drawn vehicles had been banned from the West End since January but, away from the centre, they continued to impede traffic and leave rich deposits that were quickly shovelled up by gardeners and allotment-holders. Johnny lay there listening to the sparrows chattering in the eaves.

  The nightmare was always the same. He had hoped he’d finally managed to lay it to rest – the intruder had stayed away since January – but he’d obviously been fooling himself. The dream’s paralysing dread still lingered, heightening his ferocious hangover. He had a head like Birkenhead.

  He got up stiffly and padded barefoot into the bathroom. The wiry, white-skinned figure looking back at him from the mirror could have been a stranger. The swelling round his left eye had subsided, but was turning a magnificent shade of purple that matched his bruised ribs. He still couldn’t breathe through his nose. He removed the sweat-soaked bandage from round his head. It mig
ht appear as though he had been trampled by a herd of stampeding wildebeest but, physically at least, he was on the mend.

  Twenty minutes later, having shaved and bathed as best he could, he unlocked the front door. The milkman was not the only person who had called: a parcel, wrapped in brown paper and tied up with string, sat on the doormat. Johnny stood the milk-bottle in a jug of cold water in the kitchen then, determined not to be late, set off for work with the parcel under his arm.

  Three number 38s came along at the same time so he managed to get his favourite seat, the rearmost one on the upper deck. He had never liked the sensation of someone looking over his shoulder. An envelope, addressed by hand to J. Steadman Esq., had been slipped under the string. The flamboyant script and black ink were familiar. He ought to wait until he was in the office where he could take more care not to smudge any fingerprints but he was burning with curiosity. Besides, something told him that he was not dealing with an idiot – and if he were there would be plenty more prints inside the parcel.

  The postcard showed the Martyrdom of Saint Agatha by Sebastiano del Piombo in the Pitti Palace in Florence. A big-boned woman, clad only in a white sheet wrapped round her waist, was being tortured by two men, each of whom was twisting one of her nipples with a pair of giant pliers. Three other men, including two soldiers, looked on with varying degrees of interest. The dark-haired saint did not appear to be in pain. A large knife, its sharp edge gleaming brightly, lay in the bottom right-hand corner of the painting.

  Johnny turned over the card. As expected, beauty reared its ugly head.

  Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it.

  It was just a paraphrase of the proverb, “beauty is in the eye of the beholder”.However, the lunatic must have been beholding him. He knew where he lived. Johnny, in spite of the warmth, shivered. He was being silly: the maniac had only shown a physical interest in women – thus far. Why then did he feel threatened by these unwanted “gifts”? Perhaps they would stop now that he had given him the publicity he apparently craved. The thought of being spied on was almost as unpleasant as the prospect of being forced from his home. Surely it wouldn’t come to that?

  He looked round at his fellow passengers. Some were staring out of the window, watching the never-ending movie that constituted life in London, others had their noses stuck in newspapers, including the Daily News. Johnny’s lurid little story would add spice to another hot and dreary day. If they only had a clue what was sitting on his knee . . .

  The thought of what it might be turned his already churning stomach. He took a deep breath. One thing was for certain: he was not going to find out until he was alone.

  The lift-boy raised an eyebrow when Johnny failed to get out on the first floor.

  “What? I’m going to the library.”

  “Got something for Amy?”

  The librarian’s new assistant had attracted a lot of male attention since she had started in June. Her swept-up blonde curls and infectious giggle – totally unsuitable in her job – had prompted more than one reporter to set foot in the library for the first time.

  “I’ll have something for you if you don’t button it.” He pushed open the frosted-glass doors and walked softly down the middle of the room. The highly polished parquet floor was dangerously slippy. The ancient librarian peered at him over the top of his new bifocals and nodded a silent greeting. There was no sign of the toothsome Amy.

  He retrieved the Catholic Martyrology from the shelf and sat down at the table in the distant cubicle. However, instead of opening the book, he slid the string off the parcel and, using a clean handkerchief, removed the paper to reveal a sturdy blue box. Holding his breath, he lifted the lid, parted the tissue paper and saw what he had feared all along: a single female breast.

  It rested on a bed of stained cotton wool, the once pert nipple sunk into the nut-brown areola. The bloodless, soggy mass of flesh resembled a large, unappetising dollop of junket. There was a faint whiff of disinfectant.

  It was too much for his crapulous constitution. He started to sweat profusely. His vision blurred. Was he going to faint?

  He stuck his head between his knees and breathed deeply. Please God, no. He grabbed the waste-paper basket and heaved. Fortunately, as usual, he had skipped breakfast. He retched again. Bile trickled into his mouth. He spat it out.

  The librarian, alerted by the strange noises coming from Johnny’s carrel, and observing there was nobody else in the room, decided to break with protocol.

  “Everything all right, Mr Steadman?”

  “Yes, thank you.” He’d hardly got the words out before his stomach convulsed again. “Hayfever. I’m trying not sneeze.”

  The nausea passed. Johnny, admonishing himself for entreating a non-existent deity in his moment of weakness, replaced the now slightly soiled waggerpagger-bagger and sat up. Averting his eyes, he put the lid back on the box. It must have been delivered before his story had been published. If they hadn’t held fire for twenty-four hours the owner of the breast might still be alive. Theoretically, of course, she might not yet be dead: women did survive mastectomies – sometimes. However, he doubted this one had been carried out under sterile conditions in a hospital.

  He turned to the holy encyclopaedia. St Agatha was the patron saint of bellfounders, bakers, jewellers and nurses. Her feast day was 5th February – no significance there then. A wealthy noblewoman, she spurned the advances of Quintianus, a low-born Roman prefect, who persecuted her for being a Christian. She was given to the brothel-keeper Aphrodisia and her nine daughters who, despite their best endeavours, could not persuade her to make sacrifices to pagan idols. Her breasts were sliced off before she was finally executed by being rolled naked upon a bed of live coals.

  Johnny closed the book in disgust. Why were Catholics so obsessed with torture? Yes, Christ suffered on the cross, but he did so in order that his followers would not. It was downright sick to harp on and on about humiliation, agony and death. Life was not meant to be one long guilt-laden journey.

  Tanfield looked up from a pile of news agency reports that had come in overnight. It was his job to sort the bulletins and distribute them to the relevant correspondent who would decide whether they were worthy of further investigation.

  “What’s that?” The boy’s eyes fixed on the blue box. “Good morning, Mr Steadman. How are you feeling today?”

  “Sorry, Johnny. Good morning. You look better without the headdress. Almost human – if you ignore the shiner.”

  “Thanks awfully. I’ve received another present from the amateur doctor.”

  “What part this time?”

  “Something you haven’t seen since you were suckled by your mother.”

  “Ha, ha, ha, thud. That’s the sound of me laughing my head off. Can I see?”

  “No, you can’t. A cup of tea might change my mind.” Tanfield was on his feet immediately, shooting off to the canteen. “Two sugars!”

  “Making a clean breast of it, is he?” Dimeo gave an exaggerated wink. His crisp white shirt emphasised his innate Mediterranean tan. “Come on, don’t be a spoil-sport. Give us a peep.”

  “Don’t miss much, do you?” He must have the ears of a bat.

  Johnny, using his handkerchief once again, reluctantly removed the lid.

  “Ugh! It’s enough to put you off your greens.”

  “I very much doubt it. You don’t recognise it then?”

  “Not in that flabby state. My presence usually makes them perk up.”

  “And is your presence here absolutely essential?” Patsel, having materialised silently, nodded and bared his false teeth in an attempt at a smile. Johnny almost expected him to click his heels together. Dimeo returned to the sports desk.

  “Was there a postcard also?”

  Johnny showed him the painting of St Agatha. “Don’t touch it. There might be fingerprints.” The horrid image seemed to please the German. Johnny turned it over.

  “Everything has beauty, but not everyon
e sees it.”

  “Confucious,” said PDQ. “Is there a prize?”

  “Mr Steadman has already got his hands on it. Such a story is indeed pure gold,” said Patsel. “I don’t know what he did to earn it – nothing, in my estimation – but it will be interesting to learn what today’s report produces in its wake. This pervert is like a cat presenting its owner with tributes of dead birds. A thousand words this time. Make sure you repeat all the gory details of the story so far and find out what the police are doing to catch the killer.”

  “We don’t know that he has killed anyone yet.”

  “You joke, Steadman. How else is he getting these body parts? Where is he cutting up these women?”

  “It might be just one woman.”

  “In this heat? The same body would be putrid.” Patsel stooped over the box and sniffed. PDQ rolled his eyes. “This is the smell of eupad or eusol, not formaldehyde. It has not been preserved.”

  “Edinburgh University Pathology Department,” said Tanfield, placing a cuppa on Johnny’s desk. “Edinburgh University Solution.”

  “Quite so, Mr Tanfield,” said Patsel in admiration. “It makes a welcome change to have such an educated junior on the staff.”

  “How the hell did you know that?” Johnny did not miss the dig at his lack of a degree.

  “Lexiko. Useful words if you need to get rid of unwanted vowels.”

  Johnny’s smile broadened when he saw Patsel’s face fall.

  “I believe you have calls to make, Mr Steadman. If, for some obscure reason, you don’t wish to exploit this story to the utmost I’m sure Mr Blenkinsopp would be only too delighted to relieve you of the burden.” Johnny looked over to where Bert was reading the Chronicle. Having clearly heard every word, he waved back cheerily. “Don’t let the cops have the titty until it’s been photographed,” said Patsel. “Peter, a word.” They moved off to the centre of the newsroom from where Patsel could observe all his subordinates with ease.