Stolen Souls

by Stuart Neville

  A nurse appeared at the foot of the gurney, an orderly close behind her.

  “Mr. Paynter?” she said.

  “My name’s Crawford,” he said. “Billy Crawford.”

  She looked at the policemen, confused.

  The nearest of them shrugged. “They told me he’s Edwin Paynter. I don’t care what you call him, so long as I can get home soon.”

  The nurse turned her wavering smile back to Paynter. “Mr., er …”

  “Crawford,” Paynter said.

  “Mr. Crawford, there’s no bays available yet, but we’ll get you into one as soon as we can. We’re going to move you off the corridor, though. There’s space in the orthopedic room. All right?”

  He did not answer.

  The ceiling moved above him as he laid his head back on the thin paper-covered pillow. Wheels and feet squeaked on the vinyl-tiled floor until he rolled through a doorway into a room with beds and curtains, a light box on the wall, rows of drawers, and boxes of bandages.

  “You’ll be all right here for now,” the nurse said as the orderly pushed the gurney into an empty space. “How’s that bleeding coming along?”

  She lifted Paynter’s hand away and examined the side of his head. “You’ll live,” she said. “Right, you sit tight here. It won’t be much longer.”

  The nurse whisked out of the room, the orderly trudging behind her, leaving the two policemen standing over the gurney.

  One of them sat on the edge of the nearest bed while the other paced, moving in and out of Paynter’s vision. He noted that their guns looked very like the one he had taken from the foreigner, and the one the policeman Lennon had aimed at him earlier in the night.

  The policeman who sat on the bed checked his watch and raised his eyebrows. “Merry fucking Christmas,” he said.

  70

  LENNON SAT ON the edge of the bed while the nurse applied two butterfly strips to the cut on his chin, then covered them with a bandage. CI Uprichard entered the bay as she left. He wore an anorak over a patterned sweater and corduroy slacks. Lennon wondered if he’d ever seen Uprichard in civvies before, and realized he hadn’t. It made him look every one of his sixty years.

  “You pick your moments,” Uprichard said. “Happy flipping Christmas.”

  Lennon smiled at his superior’s inability to swear. “Thanks for coming out,” he said. “You didn’t have to.”

  “No, but best to clear up what I can tonight so there’s less to fight with when I come back after the holiday.” He lifted Lennon’s jacket. “Come on, they’ll want the bay for the next eejit in line.”

  Lennon followed Uprichard out through the ward and into the corridor beyond.

  “What do we know so far?” he asked.

  Uprichard took one of a row of seats lined up outside a consultant’s office. “We’re positive he’s this Edwin Paynter chap young Connolly found in the ViSOR database. A quick search of the house didn’t turn up any identification, but there’s no doubt. There’ll be a proper search after the holiday.”

  “What about the woman upstairs?” Lennon asked, taking the seat next to Uprichard. She’d been found after one of the officers who arrived in the second car heard moaning from above.

  “She can’t speak, but we’re assuming she’s the owner of the house. Looks like this Paynter character has been keeping her prisoner there. Probably for the two years he’s been missing.”

  “Jesus,” Lennon said.

  “One thing turned up in the preliminary search that’s … well, worrying.”

  “What?”

  “A bag of teeth,” Uprichard said. “It’s been left in situ, but I’m told they’re human teeth. Molars, incisors, all in a little red velvet purse.”

  “The floor of the cellar,” Lennon said.

  “What about it?”

  “There were rough patches, different textures, like parts of it had been dug up and filled back in again.”

  Uprichard chewed his lip as he thought. “Of course, this chap has a previous conviction for kidnapping a prostitute.”

  “Girls like this one he had in Belfast,” Lennon said. “Trafficked in, no trace of them if they disappear, no one to call the police for them.”

  “It’ll be a first for Belfast,” Uprichard said. “We’ve never had a serial killer.”

  “No, anyone with the inclination to kill for laughs had plenty of outlets until recently. What about the girl?”

  “She’s still in the ward,” Uprichard said. “A lady from Care NI’s talking to her.”

  Care NI was a Christian charity that, among other things, assisted trafficked women in the days following their rescue. Often the women were terrified of the authorities, so counselors from the charity helped them communicate with the police officers, social workers, and immigration bureaucrats whom they now had to face.

  “She’s in a bad way,” Uprichard said. “But she’s a tough wee girl. She’ll need to be. This isn’t a straight trafficking case. She’ll have to answer for the man she killed.”

  “We’ve no real evidence that she killed anyone,” Lennon said. “Only what Roscoe Patterson told me, and that’s hardly gospel.”

  “Once forensics are in, there’ll be plenty of evidence,” Uprichard said. “But we can recommend leniency if she can show it was done in self-defense.”

  “So where does she go?” Lennon asked. “The Victim Care Suite, or a cell?”

  “It’s Christmas,” Uprichard said. “There’s no staff in the care unit to look after her. It’ll have to be a cell.”

  “No,” Lennon said. “What she’s just been through, we can’t lock her up.”

  “We might not have much choice if she’s a suspect in a murder case.”

  Lennon stood up. “Are you going to arrest her?”

  “No, not yet, but—”

  “Are you going to interview her under caution?”

  “It’s not up to me to—”

  “Then there’s no call for that girl to spend a single minute in a cell until she has to.”

  “Then what do you suggest?” Uprichard asked.

  Lennon rubbed his dry, tired eyes as he thought. There was only one answer that would allow him any peace.

  “I’m a fucking idiot,” he said.

  71

  GALYA WATCHED THE nice woman’s lips move, heard the words they formed, but little of it registered with her conscious mind. She talked about agencies, police, immigration, women’s rights, sometimes while holding Galya’s hand.

  Sleep edged in, and Galya had to shake it away.

  The woman was very kind, and was here to help, she said so over and over.

  But the bed was so comfortable, even if every part of Galya ached or stung to one degree or another, and sleep was an insistent intruder.

  Galya’s eyes had slipped closed when a cough stirred her. She opened them and saw the policeman lean in through the drawn plastic curtain that surrounded the bed. He said something to the kind woman, and she excused herself and left with him.

  On her own, the bustle of the hospital became a soothing murmur, like the sound of a stream in the summer. Galya thought of Mama and Papa, and the small house she had grown up in, the smell of baking bread, Mama’s coarse skin, the road that led to her door. As she drifted deeper into the warmth of slumber, she saw the man with the moon face, the teeth in his hand, showing them to her, counting them out one by one, pointing out those that he’d taken from her mouth, and her finger exploring there, finding the gaps where they’d been, and then he wanted to show her something else, something bright and shining, something sharp, something—

  A choked cry escaped her when the kind woman’s hand brought her back to consciousness.

  “It’s all right, darling,” the kind woman said. “You’re safe. No one’s going to hurt you.”

  Galya slipped a finger between her lips, ran the tip over her teeth. When she found none were missing, she gave a silent thank you to Mama.

  She looked from the kind woman to
the policeman who stood behind her. He seemed exhausted, a bandage covering the cut on his chin.

  “This is Detective Inspector Jack Lennon of the Police Service of Northern Ireland,” the kind woman said. “He’s the one who found you.”

  Galya was not sure if she was expected to respond in some way, so she nodded.

  “He’s been trying to sort out somewhere for you to stay once you’re discharged from here,” the kind woman said. “The police, they have special places for victims to stay, comfortable places. But it’s Christmas, and they’ve no staff to look after you there. The only other place they have is the cells in the station. You can stay there until after the holiday. You’ll be safe, but it won’t be very comfortable.”

  “Cell?” Galya asked. “Like prison?”

  “Or there’s another choice,” the kind woman said. “This police officer, he has a friend, a very nice lady, and you can stay with her. She’ll get you something to eat and somewhere to have a wash and some food. What do you think?”

  Galya remembered accepting another man’s offer of help and the terror that followed. But one desire came to her mind and overrode all fears.

  “A bath?” she asked, imagining warm water on her body, the cleansing of it, the heat.

  “I don’t know about a bath with those dressings on your feet,” the kind woman said.

  “Yes, a bath,” the policeman said. “We’ll keep your bandages dry somehow.”

  Galya didn’t think about it for long.

  “Please, I want to go to this place,” she said.

  72

  EDWIN PAYNTER LAY quite still as they wheeled him from room to room, through scans and examinations, while nurses wiped blood away and doctors examined images of his skull. The policemen grumbled about having to stay here instead of going home to their families. They were reminded that a head injury required patient observation and they would have to wait for other officers to come and take their places.

  Paynter listened to it all while he kept his gaze on the ceiling. He passed the time by mentally going through the steps that he’d practiced for such an occasion. The few minutes of confusion and disorientation, then the eyes rolling back, the tongue going to the back of the mouth, concentrating the movement on the stomach muscles, keeping the neck loose, the legs kicking out.

  He had used this technique once when a young woman challenged him in a shopping center, accusing him of following her. It had worked wonderfully, turning her anger to fear and concern.

  When the time came, he would again summon a seizure, send them into a panic, and let chaos be his savior.

  But not yet.

  The two officers who guarded him stiffened when the detective Lennon entered the room. They stepped back as he approached and sat on the edge of the bed next to him. Dark circles underscored his eyes.

  “Edwin Paynter,” Lennon said.

  He kept his mouth shut and returned his gaze to the ceiling.

  “The girl’s fine,” Lennon said. “She’s being discharged right now. The lady you were keeping upstairs, she’ll be all right too. I’m sure you’re glad to hear that.”

  If Paynter concentrated, he could make out shapes in the pattern of the ceiling tiles. Heads, arms, legs, human and animal figures capering in white and gray.

  “You’re going to face quite a list of charges,” Lennon said. “Abduction, probably, or false imprisonment at best. Assault. Then there’s the man with a few holes in his gut, you’ll have to answer for him. You might argue self-defense, say he was an intruder, but that won’t hold up.”

  Paynter held his breath when he picked out a face directly above. A kind and loving face, eyes staring back down at him. He smiled back.

  “But there’s something I’m especially curious about,” Lennon said. “Those teeth that were found. Where did they come from?”

  Paynter turned his attention back to the detective.

  “And what’s underneath the concrete floor in that cellar?”

  The face in the ceiling whispered something, a prompt. Paynter repeated it.

  “The Lord will be my judge,” he said.

  Lennon smiled, stretching the bandage on his chin. “Eventually,” he said. “Before that, you’ve got the courts to deal with.”

  A nurse rolled a tea trolley past the room, its rattles and clanks forming vowels and consonants. Paynter spoke them word for word.

  “I’ll never see a courtroom,” he said. “The Lord won’t allow it.”

  “The Lord has no say in the matter.”

  Paynter snorted. The pain in his temple pulsed with his laughter. All around him, the hospital whispered, God’s word delivered to him on every draft.

  “The Angel of the Lord will set me free,” he said. “Just as Peter was freed from prison, so will I be freed.”

  Lennon asked, “You don’t think the Angel of the Lord has better things to do at Christmas?”

  Paynter felt the smile fade from his lips. “It’s a foolish man who mocks the Lord,” he said. “Or his messenger.”

  “Is that what you are?” Lennon asked. “His messenger?”

  Paynter looked back to the ceiling. “There’s no name for what I am,” he said.

  73

  FRESH SNOW SETTLED on the Audi’s windshield as Lennon parked outside the apartment building in Stranmillis. The girl, Galya, had said little as he drove. She stared out the window, her face blank, his coat wrapped tight around her.

  “Here we are,” he said.

  Galya did not reply.

  Lennon got out and walked around the car to the trunk. He opened it and pulled out the foldable transit wheelchair the hospital had provided on loan. It took only a few seconds to open and lock its frame, then lower the footrests. Its small wheels left tracks in the snow as he brought it around to the passenger side.

  He opened the door, and Galya looked up at him for a few seconds, as if she were unsure of where she was. She took his hand when he offered it, and winced as she stood. He guided her into the chair, supporting her as she sat down. She weighed hardly anything.

  On the journey here, Lennon had thought about the women whose company he had paid for. How many times over the last few years? Scores, maybe, even if he had resisted the urge for the last six months. He had always felt shame during and afterward, but it had never stopped him. They were willing to take his money, he told himself, they had not been coerced. They got paid while he scratched the itch. Nobody got hurt. Nobody suffered.

  As far as Lennon knew, none of the girls had been trafficked. Some of them were foreign, of course, with delicate features and Slavic accents. But in his mind, they were free women. He would never go with a girl who’d been forced into it.

  But how could he be sure?

  He forced himself to stop thinking about it as he wheeled Galya through the entrance and into the lift. The silence lingered as they ascended. He watched her reflection in the lift’s polished walls. Her eyes focused on something many miles away.

  Lennon had dealt with enough assault victims to know they were not the same people they had once been. Their lives had been split in two, the Before Person, and the After Person. Anything that had ever mattered to the Before Person no longer existed for the After Person.

  He wondered what the Before Galya had looked like. He wondered if the After Galya would ever fill that hollowness in her countenance.

  The elevator pinged as they reached Susan’s floor, and the doors slid open. Susan waited for them in her doorway. She smiled at Galya, but not at Lennon.

  “Thanks for this,” he said as he wheeled Galya through the door.

  Susan did not answer. She led them through to the living room where wrapped presents where stacked beneath the Christmas tree, the silvery paper reflecting the blinking lights. A moment of panic gripped Lennon. “Did you … ?”

  “Yes,” Susan said. “I sneaked up to your place when they went to bed. I wrapped them for you too.”

  “Thank you,” he said.

  “
I didn’t do it for you,” Susan said. “I did it for Ellen.”

  “All the same, thank—”

  “Jack,” she said, looking him hard in the eye. “Stop talking.”

  She crouched down by Galya. “Now, sweetheart, what can I get you? Something hot to drink? Tea? Coffee? How about some toast?”

  “Yes,” Galya said, her voice small like a bird’s.

  “Okay,” Susan said. She stroked Galya’s hand and stood.

  Lennon pretended not to notice that Susan had offered him nothing. He wheeled Galya to the seats. After she allowed him to help her onto the sofa, he found himself unsure what to do next. Eventually, he gave in to his own fatigue and settled into an armchair. He let his head fall back on the cushions and closed his eyes.

  What seemed like an instant later, the sound of a cup and plate being set on the coffee table jarred him awake. He lifted his head to see Galya reach for a steaming mug of tea. Susan set another in front of him.

  “Not that you deserve it,” she said.

  She did not return Lennon’s smile.

  He took the mug from the table and sipped the hot, sweet tea, felt the warmth in his throat and chest as he swallowed. Susan disappeared for a few minutes, then reappeared carrying a bundle of clothes. She set them on the couch beside Galya.

  “They’ll be a little big for you,” she said, “but they’re warm. Better than those hospital things, anyway.”

  Galya returned her mug to the coffee table and placed a hand on the pile of clothing. Lennon smelled the comforting scent of warmed fabric softener and had a sudden memory of being a boy in his mother’s house, pulling on socks fresh from the hotpress on a cold morning. He smiled and curled his toes at the remembered sensation.

  Then Galya crumbled before his eyes, and he felt his smile dissolve.

  One moment she sat, her hand on the bundle of clothes, the next she seemed to fold in two, her shoulders hitching, and she wept. A low moan that sounded as if it started in her belly, worked its way up through her torso, and escaped her throat as a strangled whine. Heavy tears dripped from her cheeks into her lap. She opened her hands beneath them, as if trying to save them from being lost to the fabric of the dressing gown she wore.