Brothers in Blood

by David Stuart Davies

  ‘Did they get into trouble at all?’

  ‘Nothing serious that I can recall. They skipped lessons from time to time but in many ways they were too mature to get involved in the usual teenage scrapes. I will say one thing however, they both seemed to have a very cruel streak, especially Barker. For example, they ragged one of my colleagues, Irene Black, something awful. She was a sensitive soul and not really suited to teaching, but that’s not the point. You expect respect from your students – or at least you did in those days. The two lads sent her up rotten. She confessed to me that she used to dread going into the classroom when they were there. She’s dead now, poor thing.’

  ‘How did she die?’

  ‘Heart attack I think.’

  ‘Did you teach someone called Alex Marshall around the same time?’

  Simpson thought for a moment and then shook his head. ‘Not that I recall. Name doesn’t ring a bell, but if he was a run of the mill student I wouldn’t remember him. I get so many of those.’ Simpson curled a weary lip.

  ‘Russell Blake went to Durham University. Where did Laurence Barker go?’

  ‘He went to York. I seem to remember he tried his hand at acting. He was quite good at that. Read Shakespeare very well in class. He had a natural bent for showing off, I suppose.’

  ‘Do you think these two kept in touch after leaving college?’

  ‘Well, I don’t know for certain, but I would assume they did. Lifelong friendships are formed at school and these two were so close and so…’ He searched momentarily for a suitable phrase. ‘… so simpatico, I can hardly believe they wouldn’t have kept in touch.’

  Simpson gave a brief self-indulgent smile, shifted his position in his chair and placed his empty coffee cup on a bookcase beside him. ‘So… have these fellows been up to mischief?’

  ‘Can’t really say at the moment, Mr Simpson. Our investigations are ongoing. However, I can tell you that Russell Blake is dead. He was murdered.’

  Simpson’s hands flew to his face in shock, covering his mouth as he emitted a groan. ‘Good gracious,’ he said, looking even more tired than ever. ‘He must have only been in his early thirties. How awful. Do you know who did it?’

  Snow thought he had a good idea but he wasn’t prepared to share his notion with Simpson, nor indeed with his sergeant. ‘As I said our investigation is ongoing.’ He rose to indicate the interview was at an end. ‘Thanks for your time.’

  ‘Well, that was interesting,’ said Snow once he and Bob Fellows were outside the building.

  ‘Interesting, maybe, but it doesn’t get us much further down the road.’

  Snow glanced at Fellows. He liked the man: he was easy to get on with, responsible and decent and in many ways a bright copper. But he lacked an essential ingredient that would propel him further up the career ladder: imagination. He couldn’t take facts and information and play with them, and attempt to form some theory or possible scenario. Bob Fellows needed everything cut and dried before he was able take action.

  ‘What now?’ said Fellows as he hauled himself inside the car and began buckling his seatbelt.

  ‘Back to HQ and a little more sifting. But tomorrow, I fancy a trip to York. Not been there for ages. Nice city. I think I’ll go on my own. Take a trip on the train.’

  Fellows seemed a little puzzled at this but said nothing.

  Laurence stared unseeingly at the muted television in his hotel room. He was bored. Really bored. He felt he was no longer connecting with life. He did enjoy working on the soap opera but it was hardly engrossing or demanding work. Performing a series of short two minute scenes was easy-peasy and, because his character was a subsidiary one, his work seemed to be over in a flash, leaving him with oceans of time to kick his heels. As he took a swig of whisky from a half bottle he had by his bedside, he had to admit that he was not only bored but also lonely.

  He missed his Brothers: Russell and Alex. He missed them and yet strangely he did not regret killing them. That had been part of his plan and he could not have veered from it one iota. But now there was a void; one that he had not been expecting. Although he only met up with them once a year for their annual project, in a strange way they had been with him all the time. He felt their presence and he thought of them often. Now… there was nothing.

  On an impulse he dragged himself off the bed, slipped on his overcoat and went out.

  He headed for the city centre. It was dusk and pedestrians hurried by him, alien silhouettes against the lighted shop windows. He walked aimlessly, like a man in slow motion against the flurry of passers-by. After a while he went into a coffee shop off Briggate and sat there with a weak Americano eying up the customers. Like the old days, he analysed them individually, working out which of them would make a suitable victim. It was only hypothetical now, but he derived great pleasure from it.

  Hypothetical?

  Well, he supposed, it needn’t be.

  With a grin he cast a fresh eye upon his fellow coffee drinkers. There was certainly no one here that appeared to be a suitable candidate for his special attention. They all seemed clean-washed middle class dullards. Even the couple of teenagers over by the window appeared sedate and God-fearing.

  Then he had an idea. Wouldn’t it be fun to revisit the scene of his youth? He was sure there would be plenty of scruffy ne’er-do-wells ripe for plucking there. After all Huddersfield was only a thirty minute train ride from Leeds. He could visit his old alma mater. The nostalgia element appealed to him. It would be a return to the heart of the circle. Where it all began. He thought of Old Mother Black and her wretched dog and experienced a warm glow ignite within him. He felt happier than he had done for days.

  It was settled. Tomorrow – another day free from filming – he would take himself off to Huddersfield.

  THIRTY-EIGHT

  Laurence was humming gently to himself as he emerged from the gloom of the booking hall out on to to the steps of Huddersfield station. He gazed at the spread of St George’s Square before him bathed in a pale autumn sunshine with a mixture of unease and nostalgia. It amused him how fate and some other intangible force kept bringing him back to Huddersfield.

  ‘Hello, the black sheep returns,’ he murmured to himself with a grin.

  As he looked around him he observed that while there were some changes visible from his old days, the heart of the old industrial town remained the same. ‘Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale her infinite sameness,’ he muttered to himself as he gazed around him at the sooty edifices surrounding the square. He gave a stiff salute to the statuesque lion that stood high atop the chambers that bore its name. The beast stared back with timeworn indifference

  Laurence sauntered slowly up the hill towards Greenbank College, about three quarters of a mile out of the city centre, remembering how he used to take the same route when he was a sixteen-year-old student. He reached the college and stood at the gates and allowed the memories to flow. Little had changed on the outside. One of the tennis courts had been converted into a car park for the increasing number of staff cars, but apart from that the old building looked the same. In his imagination he saw the throng of students milling outside just before the eight-thirty bell. And there over by the laurel bush having a crafty fag was Russell, looking bored and disdainful as usual. He glanced towards Laurence, grinned and waved. Laurence almost waved back before the image faded.

  To his surprise Laurence felt a powerful wave of sadness crash down on him. He shuddered from its effect.

  ‘Can I help you?’

  It was a man in a brown smock who had, it seemed to Laurence, materialised out of thin air. But this was no relic from the past. He was real flesh and blood.

  ‘No, no.’

  ‘I’m the caretaker,’ the man said formally but not unkindly. ‘Are you looking for a student?’

  Laurence shook his head. ‘Old Thompson’s gone then?’

  ‘Old Thompson? Oh, you mean Frank, my predecessor. Yes, he retired early about four or five year
s ago.’

  ‘I was a student here. I was just passing.’

  ‘Oh, I see. Well, if there’s nothing I can do.’

  Laurence shook his head. ‘No. Nothing.’ He turned slowly and walked away.

  The next port of call was The Sportsman. It was nearly noon and Laurence thought it would be fun to sink a pint in the very corner that he and Russell used to occupy when they had bunked off afternoon lessons. But on arriving there he had a great shock. The pub was closed and boarded up with a ‘For Sale’ sign projecting at right angles above the main door. From its tattered and grubby appearance, it was clear it had been there for some time. He stared at the premises for quite a while, disappointed at the demise of the old boozer. This was his real seat of learning rather than the college. He remembered those relaxed afternoons in the grey, dimly lighted interior indulgently plotting, moaning, back-biting and generally enjoying himself. It suddenly struck Laurence for the first time that these snatched hours in the Sportsman – Alf’s place – were the best, the happiest time of his life.

  His reverie was interrupted by a husky voice. ‘Can you spare the price of a cup of tea, sir?’

  He turned and looked into the face of the devil: a countenance seared with a thousand wrinkles, each one deeply ingrained with sooty grime, thin lips which barely concealed two rows of small rotten teeth and two blank raisin eyes, sunken in puffy flesh, set so far back in the head that they were barely visible. The creature stank of urine and alcohol.

  This derelict scrap of humanity, wrapped in a greasy, ragged raincoat, repeated his request, his body swaying unsteadily. Whether this was the result of lack of nourishment or cheap alcohol, Laurence wasn’t sure.

  ‘A cup of tea, eh?’ Laurence said with a sneer.

  The tramp, unable to detect the venom in his voice, nodded. ‘Yes sir. A cup… I’m dying for a cup of tea.’

  ‘Are you? Sure you wouldn’t prefer a large bottle of whisky, eh? In preference a single malt. I can recommend Laphroaig.’

  The tramp blinked his tiny eyes uncomprehendingly.

  ‘Certainly, my good fellow, I can give you some cash in order that you can quench your thirst. The problem is I’ve left my wallet in my car. However, I’m parked not far from here. Come along.’

  Laurence moved away, but the tramp remained where he was, swaying slightly, confused by events.

  ‘Come along. Follow me. I’ll give you cash. Mon-ey.’ He addressed the man as though he was an errant puppy.

  After a few moments, the man stumbled forward in Laurence’s direction.

  ‘That’s right. Follow me.’

  He led the man around the corner on to St John’s Road and then left up a very narrow cobbled street which ran parallel up past the rear of The Sportsman. Laurence remembered it as one of the red light thoroughfares where at night prostitutes waited to be picked up. For all he knew this was still the case. It certainly remained a dank and dirty – but, more importantly, it was deserted.

  He pointed to an ancient Cortina parked towards the top of the lane. ‘My car,’ he lied. ‘Where my wallet is.’ He spoke in a slow staccato, childlike rhythm so that the befuddled tramp could grasp the purpose of their trek. Halfway up the hill, there was a passageway which led to some derelict building. Turning swiftly on his heels, Laurence pushed the tramp into the passage with great force. The man gave a soft grunt of surprise and almost lost his footing. His reactions were painfully slow and it took a little while for him regain a secure balance. He leaned against the wall, his little eyes flickering wildly with uncertainty. With a smile, Laurence stepped forward and smashed him hard in the face with his fist. He felt the bones in the man’s nose break and blood exploded from the nostrils. Before the creature had a chance to collapse to the floor, Laurence hit him again. Harder this time.

  The man gave a muffled gurgle of pain and collapsed to the ground unconscious.

  Laurence stood over him, breathing heavily, full of passion and hatred. He gazed down at the pathetic bundle of rags, the bloodied face, twisted and immobile. With a cry of anger, Laurence brought his foot down with great force onto the man’s head. The body shifted slightly and the mouth opened slackly. ‘Want the price of a cup of tea, do you,’ he snarled and stamped hard on the tramp a second time. He heard the skull crack and the head twisted awkwardly as though the neck was broken.

  Laurence stood for some time breathing heavily staring down at the contorted corpse before him, a steady stream of red blood seeping from the back of the man’s head forming a thin scarlet rivulet in the dirt of the passageway.

  Suddenly he found himself smiling and then laughing in a suppressed fashion, so much so that his body shuddered with the effort to contain his amusement. God, that was good, he thought. Really good. Killing for no real purpose, no underlying motive, randomly, on a whim. That was good. That’s what made him happy. And what harm had he done? This piece of human shit was better off dead. Killing him was tidying up society a little.

  He could barely tear himself away from the sight of the grubby tramp’s dead body. He found great pleasure in admiring his own handiwork, but a pang of self preservation persuaded him that it was imprudent to hang around too long. Quickly wiping the blood from his hands and shoe with his handkerchief and checking his clothing, he withdrew and within ten minutes was in one of the newer bars in the centre of Huddersfield – all chrome and plastic facia – having a celebratory drink. He had first gone to the lavatory to cast an eye over his appearance and wash his hands thoroughly to swill away any traces of blood.

  ‘A little water clears us of this deed,’ he grinned at himself in the mirror above the washbasin.

  He ordered a malt whisky in the bar and slumped back in one of the faux leather armchairs. He was happy again. The real Laurence had returned. One simple act had allowed him to slough off the grim shackles that had been in danger of imprisoning him. He realised now that ever since the Matt Wilkinson fiasco, he had felt trapped into scenarios not of his own making. He had been obliged. And that was not for him. He was far too much of a free agent. A free spirit. He must be allowed to pick and choose whom he wanted to kill. And most of all, it must be done without… what was that legal term? – ah, yes, without just cause.

  Laurence raised his glass of single malt in a toast.

  THIRTY-NINE

  After stepping out of the station, Paul Snow was immediately seduced by the beauty of York: the honey coloured stonework, the gentle rise and fall of the ancient wall as it hugs the contours of the city, the broad and tranquil expanse of the river which threads its quiet way through the heart of the metropolis and the beautiful Minster tower rising high into the pale blue autumn sky. He was sorely tempted to abandon his mission and revisit the Minster to recapture memories of his visits there with his parents when he was at junior school: those halcyon, innocent days when worries were simple things and pleasures likewise. Still, ever the realist, he knew that he had neither the time nor the stomach to indulge in such nostalgia. In the end memories only brought you pain.

  Nevertheless, he wandered off his planned route to stand outside the magnificent church and gaze up at its grandeur. What passion, what skill, what dedication, what determination and hard work had gone into creating such a magnificent edifice. He stood quietly amid a whirl of jabbering, camera-snapping tourists of various nationalities, drinking in the spiritual beauty of the building. It was calming, therapeutic and strangely uplifting. Snow wasn’t at all religious but he was susceptible to beauty.

  After five minutes or so, reluctantly he returned to reality and with a sigh set off with a purpose to York University. It was here in a little office crammed from floor to ceiling with books that he met Professor Peter Richardson, a squat bearded fellow, with bright darting eyes forever peering out beneath heavy overgrown eyebrows. All the time he was talking to Snow, he was sifting through the maelstrom of papers in his desk – notes essays, letters and various lists. It was as though he had lost something – something, Snow thought, he wo
uld never find.

  ‘Oh, yes, yes, I remember Laurence. Fascinating chap. A bit autistic in some ways. Although I’ve no medical qualifications to justify that judgement, you understand. It was just my feeling.’

  ‘In what way ‘autistic’?’

  ‘Well, he had great ability to read a text, to emote a character’s feelings. He found it easy to get under the skin of a character and bring him to life… but in the real world he failed to connect with people. It was as though…’ Richardson paused as he reached for the right expression. ‘It was as though he couldn’t get under his own skin. He didn’t know how to play himself.’

  Richardson grinned beneath his hairy beard, pleased with his analogy.

  ‘Was he ever cruel or vindictive?’

  Richardson’s eyebrows fluttered towards his hairline.

  ‘Funny you should say that. It was going to be my next point. He could, indeed, be very cruel. He had an acid tongue but you know I don’t think he fully realised the pain and hurt that he inflicted because of this…’ he flapped his hands ‘…lack of connection that I mentioned. However, he had a superficial charm and a lot of the girls liked him. Well, he was good looking and had the confidence that a privileged upbringing provides.’

  ‘Any serious girlfriend?’

  Richardson shook his head. ‘Uh, uh. The connection problem again. Whatever the girls were after, all Laurence was after was sexual gratification. He hadn’t the means to entertain notions of love, affection and all that. There was a series of girls – but not girlfriends, if you get my point. All quick flings as far as I was able to ascertain. No serious relationship at all. That wasn’t his scene.’

  ‘What happened to him?’

  ‘He got an agent in his final year and went into acting. Changed his name.’

  ‘Did he? What to?’

  Richardson grinned. ‘Laurence Barker became Laurence Dane. Get it?’