The Third Breath

by Malcolm Hollingdrake

  40

  Shakti perched opposite Jonathan Stephens who was sitting up. The oxygen was still routed into each nostril but despite the tubes linking the back of his hand and the surrounding machines, he looked well.

  “So you received a message to go to the mill in Burley. For what reason?”

  “He mentioned the face and that we would never be rid of him until he received what my father had stored in the safe in the garage.”

  “You knew just what that was; you always knew.”

  “No, when I was cleaning the Jag the day my father was killed, I found an envelope under the driver’s mat. It was addressed to me with the instruction that it should be opened only if anything were to happen to him. I told you about seeing the face and that Mum had said he’d been so scared.”

  “And did you open it?”

  He nodded. “I didn’t wait. It was the combination to the safe he had installed in the floor of the garage. It was then that I realised why he might be in trouble. There were drugs and bundles of cash. There was also a list of names. Three, I believe, along with my father, are now dead, Thorndyke, Baldwin and a Baines. I saw the photographs. I never knew that he was mixed up with all of this shit. Christ he’d lecture me as a kid about drugs and said he’d kill me if he caught me with them. I see the irony now. He alleged that his trips to France allowed him to bring back a few luxuries and he used to quote the Rudyard Kipling poem, you know the one about smuggling.”

  Shakti smiled knowing the poem well. “Yes, I do. You should remember that fathers do say things when they have strong feelings. We’ve probably all said something like that. How did you know where to go, Jonathan?”

  “He sent very clear and precise instructions about where to leave the car and how to proceed to the mill. I have to tell you I was scared shitless even though he said that it was to just be a drop, to leave the stuff and go. The note said that I’d see the derelict mill and once there, that I’d have to wait by an old mill clock face. I’d know when the time was right to enter. It was only then I knew that someone was inside. The door that had appeared tightly shut at the top of some iron stairs opened.”

  Shakti just let him speak. He simply stared at the foot of the bed and continued.

  “The mannequins all wore masks, those photograph-type ones you see of the Queen and pop stars that crowds wear. Well, the first mask was my dad’s face, then there were the ice faces and mine right at the end. It was then that a guy came in dressed in a white boiler suit. He also wore a mask; it was my face looking back at me. It makes me feel like jelly just thinking about it now.”

  He stopped speaking and turned to look at Shakti. She could see the fear still in his young eyes. Glancing at the monitor to his side, she noticed that his pulse rate had climbed considerably.

  “You’re safe, your mum and your sister are safe. You did the right thing,” Shakti reassured him.

  He smiled briefly. “Anyway, I put down the bag in front of these figures and suddenly he started to say that children’s rhyme, one potato… He pushed over the mannequins one after another and they fell like dominoes. Christ, it was so controlled and so well planned but for what? I couldn’t fully understand why all the drama and theatricals. He removed his gloves and showed me his damaged hands, parts of his fingers were missing. Lost to the cold, he said. He collected the liquid nitrogen my father used to smuggle the drugs. Once they had been placed in the flasks they would be frozen. There would be no smell, nothing to attract attention and when they fell to earth they were solid. Snow and ice falling from the sky like Manna from Heaven, were his words as he laughed. To be honest, he’d lost me, confused me. My father, he said, cheated him after the accident, didn’t need him, said that he had brought in the stuff for use in the cocktail bar. The latest craze in cocktails had come at an appropriate time. He said that he’d given him a glass. That’s the glass I found.”

  “Did he mention the others, Baines and Baldwin?” Shakti encouraged.

  “They were both used, both worked in Health and Safety, both knew Dad, both small time users, clients. Also said that she was having an affair with Baines. He said that he’d put drugs in Baldwin’s fridge and sent a package to Baines. He didn’t elaborate but said that once they were dead these would be discovered and that they would be seen by the police to be up to their necks.”

  “The psychology of murder, multiple murder, is complex. They want people to know just what they’ve planned, they want to see their victims’ fear, they get off on it. Probably watching you watching him representing you gave him a huge kick, believing that he’d put everything in place to ensure that you’d not be alive to report it. He was very nearly successful on that score,” Shakti explained.

  “He didn’t try to stop me. He could have locked the doors, kept and murdered me but he didn’t. He didn’t come after me when I ran.”

  “Because he knew you’d go back to your car, and like with your father and Baines, he’d left an open Dewar in your vehicle. The atmosphere was toxic and he knew that within three breaths you’d be dead.”

  “I only remember opening the car door and then waking up here.”

  Shakti simply smiled.

  The plane had landed and was immediately instructed to stay behind the follow-me vehicle that brought the aircraft to a standstill out in the open, away from the main airport and surrounding buildings. There was one customs car parked close by. Cyril watched a marshal climb from the truck and signal to the pilot to close down the engine.

  Frank Blackwood followed the instruction and then climbed down the wing. On seeing the armed officer’s weapon aimed at him he instinctively raised his hands. Owen removed the handcuffs and taking each wrist in turn he locked his hands behind his back as Cyril quoted his rights.

  41

  Once the Blackwoods were safely collected, April travelled with them. Cyril and Owen drove straight to Burley-in-Wharfedale, a sixteen-minute journey. The interview with Jonathan Stephens had been patched through and Owen read the notes out loud as Cyril drove. Turning off the dual carriageway, they moved slowly and cautiously towards the mill, now easily visible, and he parked under the clock as instructed. Another car was waiting.

  “That’s the door.” Owen pointed to the top of the staircase.

  A man in his sixties climbed from the parked car. “DCI Bennett?”

  Cyril turned. “And you are?”

  “Jones, I own this white elephant. Sadly it has to go, as we can’t seem to get planning permission to turn it into apartments. Crying out for homes but...”

  “That door. We need to look around.”

  Jones went to a door towards the lower end of the building. “Two minutes.”

  Both detectives waited. Cyril looked at the clock face, its frozen hands stuck at six thirty-seven. Suddenly the door swung open and crashed against the iron railing. Cyril and Owen mounted the steps and entered. “Mannequins?”

  Jones pointed to the next room. “There are more downstairs, also shop fittings if you want to see.”

  Cyril counted the prostrate disfigured dummies. There were seven.

  “They were downstairs a couple of weeks ago, maybe just kids pissing about. I pay a fortune for security too although nothing seems damaged.” Jones looked at all the roof lights as if checking for breakages.

  “Who else has a key, Mr Jones?”

  “Demolition lads and the architect at one time but that’s it. Do you want to see the rest of the place?”

  “So only three sets of keys?”

  “Yes… yes three sets but I had to get one replaced for the demolition team as they lost one, must have dropped off the ring. The guy thought he’d left it in the door but was obviously mistaken. It happens.”

  Owen just looked at Cyril.

  “No one must enter this room until my Forensics team has checked it. Notify any key holder. There’ll be a police presence here until it’s done. Get a cadaver dog too to give the place the once over. If there is anything, the dog will find
it.”

  Cyril enjoyed watching the frown appear across Jones’s forehead. “You think that there could be a body stored here? Surely the dog will only find the mannequins?”

  “It uses its nose not its eyes and it’ll find a corpse even if it’s buried lower than six feet. You don’t know of any by chance do you, Mr Jones?”

  Jones shook his head. “Most definitely not and I hope you don’t find any either. It’s been a bloody noose around my neck this place.”

  The Blackwoods had been extremely co-operative and had given more information than both Cyril and the French police could have hoped for. It surprised them all to learn that as Frank had crossed the Channel, the transponder had been turned on and he had given details over the radio of the clandestine landing and an accurate description of the person dropped off. The French police had been informed and taken immediate action, resulting in a quick arrest. They had seized a sizeable quantity of drugs and money.

  “Once the Gordian knot of red tape has been sliced through, by Alexander and not Victoria, Owen, we’ll have our man safely back in the fold. He has a few puncture wounds courtesy of a French police dog but that’s all. We can then tie the knot back together or to use your metaphor complete the jigsaw.”

  “I think I need a brew. I haven’t a clue what you’re on about. Want one?”

  “Clean cup and saucer, Owen, and a celebratory biscuit would be in order.” His phone rang. He lifted his eyes to the ceiling. “Bennett.”

  “Owen! Leave it. Our dog at the mill has found a bone or two.” He smiled tapping his stomach. “Gut instinct, Owen, always follow what it tells you.”

  Within the hour, Cyril stood near a pile of rubble close to the damaged clock face that had clung to the mill wall since the early eighteen hundreds.

  “That face again, Owen.” He pointed to the frozen hands that clearly had not moved for years. “Where have you heard that before? Strange, isn’t it, how we now discover a corpse, right in front of that face, a face with frozen hands. And what do you notice about those static hands, Owen?”

  Owen looked up with his usual puzzled expression. “It’s buggered?”

  Cyril shook his head. “You’re not wrong. Six thirty-seven or to tell the time another way, eighteen thirty-seven. Now if you’d been listening to the detective you thought should be wearing an anorak, as you so cruelly suggested, you’d have known that was when Queen Victoria, the lady who has featured strongly throughout this case, ascended the throne.”

  Owen raised his eyebrows. “Like many coincidences throughout this case.” Owen spotted Jones, the owner of the site, sitting in his car. “Speaking of coincidences, that car there’s a Bentley, sir, like yours.”

  Cyril ignored the comment.

  A Forensic tent stood out amongst the broken stones and lintels. It looked like an island protected and surrounded by a flimsy ring of blue and white tape. Julie Pritchett appeared. She stretched and walked over to Cyril, her smile increasing the closer she came.

  “Owen. From the state of him, he’s been here a while, six months, maybe a little longer. Can’t be more than that as the building that stood here came down about that time. Before you ask he was put under the stones, the building did not fall onto him. Besides, they don’t just knock these places down any more, the stone’s too valuable for a crash, bang, wallop job. From the state of his teeth I’d say he was a tramp, a vagrant. Nothing to identify him but we’ll do our best.”

  “Albert!” Cyril exclaimed. “Twenty quid says that you’ll find that to be Albert.”

  “We’ll have to wait and see, Cyril Bennett.”

  42

  Two days later

  The briefing was full and the noise from the group was louder than Cyril could ever recall. This case had certainly taken some strange twists and turns and the recent findings had generated a great deal of excitement. At long last, they could, they believed, see the wood for the trees. The Chief Constable was sitting next to Cyril, a rare moment indeed.

  Owen tapped the side of his mug with a pen and the room slowly went quiet.

  Cyril let the silence add a frisson of excited anticipation before he spoke. “Firstly, I want to thank each and every one of you for the way you’ve handled this difficult case. We have, I believe, been taken down some very unusual and obscure pathways by one scheming criminal who murdered for what appears to be very little financial reward. It appears, however, that his motivation, his appetite were not necessarily only financial. Neither was this a case of pure revenge, it was simply because he could, it was a game, a cold and sinister game. Yes, there was money and yes, there were drugs involved and he did enjoy these but no more than your average street dealer. This man had a different addiction. He enjoyed playing a game; scheming and planning.

  “Initially we wrongly believed that the first corpse in this twisted game was that of Thorndyke, Arthur Thorndyke, who went missing after being found responsible for failing to follow operating procedures. He demonstrated his sheer incompetence, an incompetence that might, and some say should, have resulted in a case of gross, if not criminal negligence. But why should he have been killed, who would want him dead?”

  Owen shuffled his feet waiting to see if anyone would steal the boss’s thunder but they did not.

  “The only person who wanted him dead was Thorndyke himself, and that clever ploy brought with it a cloak of invisibility. He needed us to believe that he was a pawn in a game, and we did so. We thought he had cocked up. It had been easy collecting and taking the liquid nitrogen, the odd Dewar here and there. Nobody would know providing he followed the safe practice which he had done each time until... There should have been no real risk. Once the accident had happened, the proverbial hit the fan when Health and Safety and working practices were questioned. It was like watching ripples in a pond that he hadn’t anticipated. That he didn’t plan, but once things went wrong and he could see Stephens look elsewhere it was game on.”

  A voice came from the back of the room. “What about the chap at the airport, Albert Baldwin?”

  Cyril pointed to April and smiled. “Thorndyke using a false name. We now know that he was on holiday from his job when he worked there and once the task was finished he decided to leave in a spectacular way. Stephens needed Thorndyke to design the compartment to store the flasks in transit. It couldn’t be in the cockpit for obvious reasons and so it was stored within the fuselage.

  “On this particular aircraft the stowage is through a small external door but it leads directly into the cockpit behind the rear seats. This was totally unsuitable for transporting the Dewar containing the drugs and the LIN or LN and so they engineered modifications. The space had to be sealed from the cockpit, but also secret and well ventilated to prevent the build-up of pressure. It was designed so that the door could be opened electronically to allow the object to be ejected without compromising the airframe or aircraft in flight.

  “It was difficult to detect and the fact that the cocaine was within the LN before it got anywhere near the aircraft meant that the customs dogs would not find any trace. It was so simple. If you look at Thorndyke’s work history, his career was in cryo, freezing, fridge design.”

  “So who started it all off, Stephens or Thorndyke?”

  “As Stephens can no longer speak for himself, I would imagine that the guilt will fall there. Our man in captivity is saying nothing, just occasionally rubbing and blowing on his hands whilst rocking backwards and forwards. We assume that he befriended Claire Baldwin when she was employed in her advisory capacity. We also know from Jonathan Stephens that she was having an affair with Baines; they both liked the odd line of snow or ice but Baines needed cash. The likelihood was that once established, she would work with him.

  “According to the file, Baines and Stephens were seen at the flying club. It was stated that they were his employees. Turn to G16 in the file. April will go through this.”

  “A reward flight it was termed, a reward for what we may never know; moving d
rugs, keeping quiet, misinformation… Let’s say they both had need of something and Stephens had a supply of both cocaine and cash.”

  “The corpse at the mill is that of a Mr Albert Edward Brown of no known address, missing for over a year,” Cyril interjected, smiling and looking at Owen who scratched his head.

  “You said that at the scene, sir.”

  Cyril rested a hand on his colleague’s shoulder before bringing a new twenty-pound note from under his folder. “DNA tests will determine whether Thorndyke and Brown had ever met. What we do know is that he probably died in the same manner as the others. Now, I have a twenty-pound note for the first person to give me the link between our corpse and the case.” Cyril looked in anticipation at each person in the room.

  “The name, Albert Edward is the hospital in Wigan!” one bright spark shouted, causing a ripple of laughter to run around the room.

  The officer who first brought Cyril the details of the elimination game stood. “Queen Victoria, sir.” She continued to speak as all eyes turned to her. “Victoria Avenue mentioned in three places, a Victorian Mill, the elimination game, more than likely Victorian. Albert, the sending of post-mortem images with evergreen like Victoria’s picture of her husband. Albert, the name used by Thorndyke. Albert again with the corpse found at the mill. Edward was Victoria’s son and finally, Brown. This is the interesting part. It is rumoured that Brown became Victoria’s lover after Albert died. Many people saw it as a betrayal of her love very much like Stephens betrayed Thorndyke after his accident.”

  Cyril walked across the room, handed her the note, and continued.

  “Those things were planned, they were not coincidences. He used one coincidence and that was the road outside the airfield and Claire’s address to kill Baines on Victoria Avenue. He could have killed him at home had he wished. Thorndyke had worked within the industry for years and believed that he had the perfect solution to eliminate those who crossed him should the need have arisen. He has revealed in his statement that he was betrayed. They wanted liquid nitrogen so I gave them what they requested and by the third breath they stopped asking.”