by Stan Mason
‘She said that she didn’t have a child in the end. You can interpret that in any way you like.’
‘Was there anything else?’ It was like opening Pandora’s box.
‘I’m not sure I should tell you any more.’
‘Why not?’ He was mystified by the remark.
There was another pause before she continued. ‘She talked about a person by the name of McBeth. Does that mean anything to you?’
‘Why is all this piecemeal information now coming to hand?’ he demanded angrily.
‘Don’t shoot the messenger,’ she retorted sharply. ‘But I can tell you her spirit’s becoming quite desperate.’
If Ruth’s situation in limbo was becoming desperate so was his position on Earth. He ended the conversation with the medium quickly and dwelt on the information she had passed to him. The killers were a brother and sister and Elspeth Dainty been pregnant, like the other victims in the case, having later undergone an abortion. The path was becoming clearer... each clue was vital... every segment of information another part of the jigsaw. There was no answer as to how long it would take to resolve the matter. In the meantime, it was necessary to visit Roger Watson again to update him on the progress being made.
***
The following morning Hunter drove Ellen to the school at eight forty-five. It was the day when the children broke up from school as a result of the death of one of the teachers. After leaving her at the school, he bought a newspaper and walked to his favourite little café to order himself a cup of coffee. He sat down and opened the newspaper to get the shock of his life. The headline showed that a woman had been raped and murdered in Newcastle in the same way as Amy Chester and the other women. He shook the newspaper and read on fervently.
MERCILESS RAPE AND KILLING
Yesterday the body of Rebecca Ford was found on the banks of the Tyne in Newcastle. She had Been raped, beaten and strangled to death. Miss Ford, aged 22, was the daughter of Reverend of All Saints Church in the city. She had attended a photography class at the Wakefield Institute earlier that evening. A colleague of The dead woman said that she took a short cut home. She was attacked brutally within the city limits...
Hunter had read enough and he lowered the newspaper to reflect the situation. Something triggered in his mind but he couldn’t fathom it out at first. He sat quite still like a tailor’s dummy trying to retrieve the information from the back of his mind. And then it dawned on him... Mervyn Jones! When he went ot interview the man, who had been Amy’s friend, he had been told that Jones had a solid alibi. He was in Newcastle at the time. Now there was this case in Newcastle. It was too much of a coincidence to be ignored. Did he have a sister with whom he carried out abductions. Perhaps he had dismissed Jones too readily. No one had checked his alibi. The police had never interviewed him. Doubt began to creep into the architect’s mind. Sophie Taffler had told him that the abductor was a man dressed in a smart grey suit. That didn’t sound like Mervyn Jones. He was a very down-at-heel person with long unkempt hair. What reason did he have for raping and killing anyone? It didn’t make sense. But then if Hunter got into the mind of the killer, none of it would make sense. He needed to interview the man with new vigour. He left the café and went to house where Jones lived. He knocked on the door and a woman answered.
‘He’s not home today,’ she returned after he had made his quest clear.
‘Don’t tell me he’s in Newcastle!’ ventured the architect seriously.
She stared at him in surprise. ‘As it happens, he is,’ she informed him blandly.
‘He goes to Newcastle quite a lot, doesn’t he?’ He opened the newspaper to show her the headlines. ‘Have you seen this?’
She looked at the newspaper and hesitated before replying. ‘He’s not the one who did that.’
‘How do you know?’
‘Because he goes to Newcastle to see his ex-wife. She lives there. They have two children together. Why shouldn’t he visit her. They’re his family!’
‘How often does he go there?’
‘Once every two months. He goes to see the children mainly. His ex-wife lives with someone else.’
‘Does he have a sister?’
‘He has three but he hasn’t seen them for some time.’ The woman started to tire of the conversation. ‘Look... why don’t you come back in a few day’s time?’
‘Where does his sisters live?’
‘In Newcastle of course!’
‘Just one more question,’ he pressed. ‘When did he go?’
‘A week ago,’ came the reply.
Hunter thanked her before she closed the door in his face. His hopes of nailing Jones for the murders was fading away quickly. If he was in Newcastle a week ago, he could not have abducted Sophie Taffler in London. He would have been about four hundred miles away with his ex-wife and family. He was clearly a man who desired to see his children regularly. And he didn’t fit the profile of the killer as Sophie Taffler had seen him. In addition, the face-fit she had provided with the help of the police artist was entirely different to that of Mervyn Jones. The rape and murder of the woman in Newcastle was simply a coincidence. It had to be a coincidence!
***
Hunter contacted Meredith at the local newspaper to appraise him of the information before they met Watson at the police station. They were taken to an empty interview room and sat on wooden benches facing each other across a wide table. The senior police officer clenched his hands in front of him, staring at the two visitors bleakly, feeling certain that they were going to waste more of his time covering old ground.
‘We have more information,’ Hunter told him.
‘I hope this isn’t from that medium!’ groaned the police officer.
‘Our investigations have turned up some features of interest,’ cut in Meredith.
‘Go on!’ urged Watson, eager to end the meeting quickly so that he could get back to his duties.
‘We’ve discovered...’
‘Hold on!’ interrupted the police officer. ‘Are you two working together on this case?’
‘You could say that,’ commented Meredith taking a small whisky bottle from his pocket and taking a swig.
Watson looked at him in disgust. ‘You’ll kill yourself if you carry on drinking like that!’
‘Huh!’ muttered the newspaper man, ‘it’s like telling a ninety year old man to stop smoking because it’s bad for his health!’ He burst into laughter at his own comment.
‘We discovered that each of the murdered women had undergone an abortion operation a short time before their deaths,’ cut in the architect.
‘No one could tell from the Dainty woman’s body whether or not she had an abortion. It was too decomposed.’
‘We learned that Amy Chester had such an operation. At my request, the pathologist re-examined Inge Carlson’s body to prove that she did as well. And Sophie Taffler had one on the day she was abducted. ‘
‘Okay!’ uttered Watson. ‘Where does that leave us?’
‘I’ll tell you where that leaves us,’ rendered Meredith bluntly. ‘Whoever is carrying out these murders is targeting women who’ve just had an abortion. They all had abortions! If we could find out where they had them done, it might be possible to close the net.’
‘There must be hundreds of places a woman can go to for an abortion. ... from proper hospitals to someone operating in a back street. None of them may be registered.’
‘There’s more,’ advanced Hunter readily. ‘Two people are involved in the murders... a brother and sister.’
‘How do you know that?’
‘I have my sources.’
The police officer stared at him tiredly. ‘Not the damned medium again! Do you believe everything she says?’
‘That’s nigh nor by,’ returned the architect
glumly. ‘It’s something to go on.’
‘You can take that as gospel!’ muttered Meredith, taking another swig from the bottle.
‘Furthermore,’ added Hunter swiftly, Sophie Taffler was wrong when she said the car journey from the building where they took her to this police station was fifteen or twenty minutes long. I think it was longer. I’ve toured the are to look for a building with two stout columns within that range and I couldn’t find one. ‘
‘Very well,’ said Watson calmly. ‘You’ve found a connection between the women and you allege, without proof mind you, that the killers are a brother and sister. Why a woman would want to watch her brother rape a woman is a mystery to me. Let me give you a piece of advice, gentlemen. We have a well-trained police force highly capable of handling this investigation. You two amateurs have been plaguing me for weeks now and you’ve come up with nothing practical. Why don’t you leave it to the professionals?’ He went to the door and turned to face them. ‘If you come here again, make sure that you have some tangible evidence.’
He left the room closing the door behind him. Hunter glanced at Meredith with a doleful expression on his face.
’Well that went down well, didn’t it,’ he said sarcastically.
’Now you know why I turned to drink,’ returned Meredith solemnly. ’All the main news is on television these days. We reporters are left to make it all up ourselves!’
’You can’t print anything we’ve discovered so far. As Watson told us... none of it can be proved.’
The newspaperman stood up to leave. ‘’We’re finished here,’ he said, ‘and I have a meeting to report on about the repair of a church roof. Exciting, isn’t it?’
They left the police station and Hunter climbed into his car and drove away. There was no evidence that the same abortion clinic had dealt with all the murdered women but the architect would have like to bet that they were all in the same one. If so, the brother and sister might work there. Unfortunately, there was no way that Hunter could find out the information... unless Ruth was able to tell him. Even with her and the medium, he had come to a dead end. When was one of them going o give him something more substantial to work on?
***
The architect took three days off from his investigation to take Ellen on trips to various places in the countryside. He intended to please her as much as possible. On one occasion, he arranged for a picnic basket to be made up and they sat by a lake in a local park, on a thick tweed blanket, enjoying their meal. The sun was shining and a cool fresh breeze blew across the area rippling through the long grass. In the distance, one could hear a brass band playing while other people strolled through the park, walking along the gravel paths which separated the grassland staring at the beautiful flowers growing neatly in their beds. When they had finished eating, Ellen mover closer to him and nestled her head on his shoulder.
‘I love you,’ she whispered in his ear. ‘We’ve been together five weeks now and I can truly say I love you. Everything that happened in the past will soon be forgotten. We start our lives from now.’
‘What brought this on?’ he exclaimed cheerfully. ‘I know, it’s the release from all those awful children at school.’
She laughed at his whimsical comment. ‘They’re not awful and it’s a lovely school!’ she chided gently.
This time it was his turn to laugh. ‘It’s lovely here,’ he said, looking at the passers-by. ‘The park, the lake, the band... and the weather fared well.’
‘It’s even better today,’ she told him.
‘And why’s that?’ he enquired.
‘Because we’re along together... in love... by ourselves in public view. But there’s even more.’
‘There is?’ he asked rather puzzled. ‘What’s that?’
‘How would you feel if I told you I was going to have our baby?
For a moment he stared at her to see whether she was joking but quickly realised that it was true. His eyes lit up as he looked acutely to her face. ‘Are you serious?’
‘Would I kid you on something as important as that?’ she replied earnestly. ‘I was sick for the second time this morning. That’s a pretty good sign.’
He was absolutely delighted at the news and hugged her warmly. He had tried so many times to get Ruth pregnant but it was not to be. Now he was being presented with a child from out of the blue by a woman he truly loved. ‘Wonderful!’ he told her with an element of excitement in his voice, kissing her on the lips.
‘You don’t have to go overboard,’ she laughed. ‘I mean I’m not absolutely certain I’m carrying yet although I’m pretty sure.’
‘You’re a wonderful marvellous woman!’ he commended warmly.
‘Well it’s half your fault too. I’m glad you’re pleased,’ she went on. ‘And we’re not even married!’
‘What the hell!’ he retorted. ‘Half the young couples in the country are married and they have children.’
‘Ah,’ she scorned gently. ‘You haven’t taken into account the feelings and wishes of The Lady Dowager He roared with laughter at the remark. ‘I wonder what Ruth’s spirit will say about it when she finds out.’
‘I just hope she doesn’t haunt us.’
‘You know, you’re a coward,’ she reproached. ‘You can’t stand seeing her apparition. You ought to face up to it. I mean she’s gone.’
‘It’s easy for you to say. She can act like a poltergiest when she doesn’t get her way.’ There was silence as they both reflected on the issue. ‘So what are we going to do?’
‘We’ll have to get married otherwise my Mum and Dad will go ballistic when they learn about the baby. Of course Mum will be delighted really to be a grandmother.’
At that moment, two young children rushed out of the nearby lake in their swim-suits, flinging their arms at the couple, spraying water all over them.
‘You see what we’re going to have to put up with,’ laughed Ellen, guffawing as he tried to dry himself.
‘Bring it on!’ he told her which a grin on his face. He took her in his arms to cuddle her, kissing her gently on her lips. Then, remarkably, a tear rolled down his face as he started to cry.
‘What’s the matter?’ she asked with concern.
His chest heaved with a sob. ‘I’m so blessed!’ he related with tears of joy. ‘I thought my life had ended when Ruth died, but it was only the beginning.’
‘That’s exactly how I felt when Alan was killed in Iraq,’ she responded. ‘But life is beginning for both of us now. We both have God to bless.’
He got up and went to a flower bed to pick a small bunch of beautiful flowers and handed them to her like a love-lorn yokel.
She took them with a smile on her face, sniffing at them gently. ‘You’re daft, did you know that?’ she said smiling. ‘If anyone saw you, you’d be arrested for theft.’
‘If there was a florist nearby,’ he told her lovingly, ‘I’d buy the whole shop for you.’
‘And you without a job and no money,’ she chided. ‘Come here. I want to kiss you!’
They embraced warmly, kissing each other time and time again. Hunter was overwhelmed by the news. He had always wanted a family but it had been denied him. Now he was on the brink of a new era in his life. It was a wonderful day for both of them and he was enjoying every moment of it.
***
When they returned to Ellen’s apartment two hours later, a tall man, wearing a dark raincoat, carrying an executive briefcase, was waiting outside.
‘Mr. Hunter?’ he approached hesitantly in an American accent as the architect started to place the key in the door.
‘Who are you?’ demanded Hunter, wary of the sudden intervention of a stranger outside the door of Ellen’s apartment.
‘My name’s Brett Duncan,’ declared the man. ‘You don’t know me. My... you’re
a hard person to get hold of. I read the article in the newspaper about you and I went to your home to find you but you’re never there.’
‘What do you want?’ The words were fired sharply like an arrow from a cross-bow.
‘May I come in? I have something which may interest you.’ Hunter glanced at Ellen asking her to decide on the request and she nodded her consent.
‘If he has something important to tell you, it might be better to let him in,’ she suggested recognising her partner’s indecision.
The three of them entered the apartment and the architect took the American into the lounge. ‘What is it that I might I be interested to know?’ he asked wondering what the man had to tell him.
Duncan sat down on an armchair, making himself comfortable, placing the briefcase on his lap. ‘Say,’ he advanced cheekily. ‘Is there any chance of a drink? I’ve been waitin’ outside for two hours. I’m kinda thirsty.’ Ellen felt reluctant to respond to his request but she went to the cocktail bar and opened her hands as if to ask what kind of drink he desired. ‘Make it a whisky,’ he uttered smoothly.
Hunter remained silent until the man was handed the drink. ‘Enough, Mr. Duncan!’ he reproached irately, his tolerance being pushed to the limit. ‘You’ve made your grand entrance. What do you have to tell me?’
It’s dependent on what you think of it?’ came the reply.
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ asked Ellen smelling a rat. The man was clearly trying to blackmail them into buying something he thought they needed.
‘If you think it’s worth something, you’ll have to offer me a price,’ returned the American casually as though butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth.
‘You’re just wasting our time,’ spat the architect angrily.
‘I assure you I’m not,’ returned Duncan casually. ‘If you’re still on the case, you’ll find what I have to show you very interesting.’
‘And how much are you thinking... just as a matter of valuation?’ asked Ellen cutting to the chase in a conversation she was beginning to dislike.
‘I’d say it might be worth a thousand pounds at least,’ replied the American smiling easily.