He wrenched his eyes away from the screen. He knew he had to memorise that face, lest he kill the wrong person, but to gaze at the bright spectacled green eyes of the man on the screen was to shake Yosef to the core. He believed adamantly in the sanctity of life. As an orthodox Jew there was nothing more precious in his religion. It took his only son's suffering every day with Tay-Sachs to convince him that the rule against killing was not absolute. It was dishonourable to let him live.
The problem for Yosef was that Jake did not have Tay-Sachs. He was an apparently healthy young man, one of God's children whether he knew it or not. Yosef steeled himself, forcing himself to look at the Facebook profile in front of him. If this man had to die to prevent his son's suffering any further, then so be it. He would be Yosef's sacrificial lamb.
***
It took three days for the French to capitulate. They would agree to let the British take a lead role in the investigation into the death of Barry Fitzgerald, including repatriating the body to be examined in London. The gendarmerie would continue to investigate locally, including the hunt for the eventual suspect, but the bulk of the investigative process would fall on the Metropolitan police. Jacques was off the hook, and Detective Chief Inspector David Morton once again had a full caseload to investigate. Blood work samples were already winging their way to the coroner's office, a full battery of exotic tests waiting to be carried out once the samples were in London.
Interpol would supervise, including enforcing open information sharing. Anything the British knew would be passed to the French, and vice versa. If the suspect left France, Interpol would be on hand to rope in any necessary police departments as well as assisting with the procurement, and enforcement, of a European Arrest Warrant should one prove necessary.
***
Yosef had never travelled south before. He had been a Londoner for a long time, and liked to spend his vacations somewhere hot or exotic. Visiting the southern counties was low on his list of priorities, but this time he had no choice.
The kill had to take place out of London because the intended victim resided in Portsmouth. Yosef wasn't too happy about this, but at a little over sixty miles away from the capital it was about the same in terms of travelling time as crossing the breadth of London by underground. It was certainly quicker than the bus network.
To avoid being too obvious Yosef had taken a National Rail coach to get to his destination. It was cramped, stuffy and uncomfortable, and Yosef's legs did not appreciate being confined in a space that was a few inches smaller than their length. Rather than being direct, the route was most circuitous, visiting a huge number of towns and hamlets before finally setting Yosef down at the hard interchange in Portsmouth.
The target's veneer of respectability would never lead Yosef to suspect it, but the man he was to kill that evening was a drug dealer who had caused a young Anthony Duvall to spend the prime of his life in prison.
He was greeted by a sea of bus stops in front of him, stretching out to every possible destination in the area. Behind him the train station sat, squat and squalid, graffiti tagging evident on almost every surface at hand height. It was clearly a hub for transportation in the region. With train, road and sea links it was an easy place to stage a getaway, as the police would be forced to spread their resources thinly to cover all the bases.
The water churned nearby, a murky brown that lapped against the hull of HMS Victory. Above him, the Spinnaker tower loomed, a concrete sail guarding the harbour. It was an unusual sight, and there was something different in every direction that Yosef looked.
His destination was the university at which his target taught. Yosef wanted to get a visual handle on the man, and he knew which building he taught classes in. Unfortunately for Jake his schedule was publicly viewable on the university website, and so Yosef knew exactly where Jake would be at any given time.
It was only a short walk away. Directly down College Road, and to the right, the Mildam building was easy to find. A former navy office, it had become part of the university portfolio long before Jake became first a student, and then a tutor at the institution. It was easy enough to find him, clearly visible through the windowed door at the side of the lecture theatre his next class was being taught in. He was the spitting image of his Facebook persona.
Yosef still didn't have an exact plan as to how to kill the man. He knew the when was certain. It would go down tonight, and he would be back in London before midnight. That gave him a window of a little less than eight hours before he would need to leave the city. The rest of the plan lacked finality.
He could attempt to take him out in the university, but with the foot traffic around the area it would be almost impossible not to be seen. That left accosting him after he finished, which was likely to be around six judging by his rather regular schedule. Traffic would be heavy around then, with commuters leaving the city after work. With the city being on an island it was especially dense in terms of population, and several naval ships were in the harbour. While that was great for covering up Yosef's presence, as he could easily be lost among the crowds, he knew that he couldn't afford to be seen either in person or by CCTV. The population was transient due to the student and naval nature of the city, but they weren't blind. If he attempted anything in broad daylight it would be seen.
It was a dangerous city to attempt anything in. There were few quiet areas, and even fewer areas not covered by the ever-watchful cameras, but Yosef was not just anybody. Before moving to Britain Yosef had been in Shin Bet, the Israeli national body for internal security. While not as famous as its brother agency dealing with intelligence, Mossad, it was just as effectively trained. Yosef had been accepted to both agencies, but it was his preference for avoiding violence that stayed him from joining Mossad. Instead he had taken a role that saw him liaising with foreign security agencies. It was just as demanding, but primarily paper-based rather than field-based. He had still gone through the basic combat training required of all employees, and was therefore more than capable of defending himself, but he was not as bloodthirsty as some of his fellow candidates.
As a disciple of Krav Maga, Yosef was well placed to carry out the hit itself. He had always focussed on training to defend himself, but the techniques he had learned were easily adaptable. Krav Maga taught him to strike hard and fast, targeting exposed areas such as eyes, throat, groin and knee. Yosef would disarm the target by taking out his knees from behind, and end his life with a swift kick to the temple.
Yosef knew that he had to wait until the target went to a less populous area to make his move. He knew from a search of the electoral roll that the target lived in Southsea. Taswell Road was in the residential section, ending in a cul-de-sac. Before that the streets were well lit, and it would be reckless to proceed.
Yosef knew he also couldn't afford to wait too long. The house had a number of occupants according to the electoral roll. Witnesses could easily get him caught, and if they were to actively become involved then he might well be caught quickly. He would therefore have to strike while his target was heading indoors.
A pub less than two minutes' walk away proved the ideal waiting place for Yosef. There were hundreds all over the city, ideal locations to simply bide time. He knew from his instructions the target would take twenty-five minutes or so to walk back after finishing his five-to-six lecture. At 6:20 p.m. his target came into view ambling down Clarendon Road. His demeanour was relaxed, with his hands in his pockets and a slight strut to his step. It was clear he wasn't expecting to be ambushed at any moment.
Yosef waited a little distance away until his target turned off the main road. He then quickly began to close the distance, power-walking rather than running. His target continued to saunter, fishing in his pocket for a key as he turned into his road.
Yosef's step quickened. The gap closed to mere metres, and Yosef made his move.
He kicked out, slamming his foot into the man's right knee. The target's legs gave way underneath him and he fe
ll to the uneven pavement. Yosef's shoes were steel-toe capped, and Jake would not be able to get up quickly.
Struggling to pull himself up he flopped forward, exposing his temple to a blow from the right. Yosef twisted in position, and pulled back his muscled leg, ready to deliver the fatal blow. As Yosef prepared to take a life, his thoughts drifted. Life was too precious. This man wasn't threatening him. Yosef was the aggressor, and the Talmud places a high value on life. It came down to a simple choice: his son, or his faith. Yosef found himself paralysed. He simply couldn't do it. He could not take a man's life, even if it would end his son's suffering.
Snapping out of it, he fled, leaving a dazed and confused Jake sprawled on the pavement more than a little worse for the wear.
CHAPTER 45: REPATRIATION
The body arrived back in a plywood coffin. Someone had thoughtfully draped the union flag over it before it had been flown back to London. On arrival the Metropolitan police's in-house chaplain saw fit to give the deceased his last rites. He didn't know whether the dead man had been a practising Christian, so he veered towards the non-denominational. That duty fulfilled, he witnessed the transfer of the corpse to the morgue, ensuring that the chain of custody was rock solid.
The gendarmerie had done most of the work for the coroner's office. A 'T' shaped incision had been made in the body rather than the British 'Y' incision, and the organs had been removed en lutelle, where the organs were removed together rather than in groups. It wasn't how the coroner would have done it himself, but the work was certainly proficient, and it had been thoroughly documented on tape.
It did not take long to confirm the initial French finding. The man was, but for being dead, perfectly healthy. The testing that would take place on various samples would be extensive. Blood work would be done of course, with a much-extended battery of tests run to check for foreign particulates. Samples of skin and hair would also be examined. Sometimes trace could be found in the hair long after it had been cleansed from the blood.
The brain had been removed by the French authorities. Their notes suggested that they had observed the brain in situ, but did not spot anything out of the ordinary. The medical examiner did endorse his report to note that brain functions were not his specialism, and if he had retained the case he would have called in a neurologist to inspect the brain. To facilitate that, the brain had been removed and put in a buffered water solution containing 15% formalin that would preserve the brain as well as helping it to retain its original shape, allowing it to be handled for inspection.
No expense would be spared in determining cause of death. The eyes of the international media were now firmly fixed on London, and the heat would continue to build until the manner of death was established.
***
Nothing. Ant had been looking out for a newspaper article to confirm that his hit had taken place as planned for three days. He realised that a run-of-the-mill murder rarely made the national press anymore, but the local press should have picked it up. Nothing had appeared on the Internet news sites, and Ant was beginning to wonder if he had been conned.
He hoped it was simply that the body had yet to be found, but something in his gut told him it wasn't true. He would give it a few days before trying to confirm himself whether Jake was still alive. Hopefully it was simply taking a while for the police to release details to the press.
If he hadn't heard anything inside a week then he would have to take matters into his own hands, and pose as a student on the telephone to determine whether or not Jake was alive.
***
'If I have to take many more samples then we'll run out of blood,' Larry joked. The coroner was a jovial sort. Morton supposed he needed to be to work with the dead all day.
'How many samples have you taken?'
'Dozens. One came back with a result.'
'What was that?' Morton inquired.
The doc spread the reports on his desk, wetting his finger to help him unstick two pages before finding the results he was looking for.
'We found taipoxin.' The doc's face had become ashen as he had read the results. It was a startling transformation. A cherub-like glee had turned sunken in a nanosecond.
'What the hell is that?' Morton's brow creased. He had never heard of taipoxin.
'It's an incredibly rare neurotoxin. I hadn't seen it before but I did some research.' The doc spun around to the desktop computer on one of the few exposed work surfaces in the room, and begun to hit hyperlinks in quick succession.
The screen glowed with reams of information, little of which made much sense to Morton.
'Taipoxin is an acetylcholine inhibitor.'
'Hey, Doc, in English?'
'Acetylcholine is the neurotransmitter the brain uses to tell muscles to move. Without it, muscles don't move. That includes the heart.'
'That'd explain why he appeared to literally just stop breathing then.'
'Yes, as well as why no other symptoms were present. Whoever killed him knew what they were doing.'
'Where would one get taipoxin?'
'You don't get it, you make it. It's made from snake venom, from a particularly rare snake.'
'Which snake?'
'Oxyuranus microlepidotus.'
Morton just looked at him.
'An Australian inland taipan.' The doc looked a tad flustered at having to translate himself.
'I'm guessing those aren't found in pet stores.'
'No. Mostly zoos and the like here in Britain. The snake is the easy part though. Even once you have the snake you still need to milk huge quantities of venom, and then process the venom. You'd then need to filter it using gel filtration. That bit isn't too hard, as long as you have access to a laboratory.'
'Could it be done here?'
'Yes. We'd simply use Sephadex 75.'
'What does that do?'
'It removes certain molecules by weight. In this case, all the bits we wouldn't want in the venom would be taken out and chucked away.'
'Is that it?'
'No. The next and final part is what makes it almost impossible. You'd then need to use column zone electrophoresis.'
'You what?' Morton couldn't even pronounce it.
'You use electricity to sort by ion in an electric field.'
'Try me again.'
'You purify the toxin.'
'So who could do it then, Doc? Am I looking for a mad scientist?' Morton tried to lighten the mood.
'Can't help you there. Good luck.'
It looked like the source of the taipoxin would be the key to nailing the killer.
***
He had waited long enough. Picking up his pay-as-you-go mobile, Ant dialled the switchboard, and made his request to be put through. Moments later Jake answered the phone. He was alive.
Ant rang off. The darknet contact had broken their deal, and failed to deliver. He thrust his fist into the coffee table in anger. He had been duped.
In a fit of rage he almost threw his laptop. Before he did a small voice told him to contact the other party. A simple delay he could live with.
'You haven't carried out your end of the bargain. Why the delay? Let me know new date for delivery.'
He reread his message. It certainly made it plain he wasn't happy, but it fell short of a threat. If the situation wasn't remedied soon, the threats would follow.
CHAPTER 46: LOOSE LINKS
Edwin should have known it wouldn't be that easy.
An invisible hand had Edwin's heart in a vice grip when he saw the darknet message light appear. He had thought it was over. Eleanor was dead, and so were those who knew anything about him.
The problem was one of his contacts had baulked. He had passed on the details of the last kill personally, acting as the connection between the two without either side realising it. Now one of them had failed to carry out their end of the deal, and Ant was demanding the deal be fulfilled.
Edwin debated ignoring it. He could just play ignorant, never check the darknet messages e
ver again, but there was the most meagre of all chances that Ant would use his darknet details to try and track him. Edwin was perfectly willing to risk that. Indeed, the whole plan had hinged on Edwin's having confidence in his own ability to conceal both his identity and his whereabouts on the network. There was, however, a cleaner solution.
He could simply reply to the message telling him the deal was off, and slip Yosef's details into the equation somewhere. He had enough to identify him, and that way the inevitable backlash would solve a problem rather than creating a new one. It was ruthless, but Edwin had abandoned any semblance of a conscience long ago.
First, though, he would check that it wasn't simply a delay. If so, then he could urge Yosef to advance his plans and fulfil his obligations.
***
Yosef knew that his contact would realise he had not killed Jake eventually. He should never have agreed to take part in any such swap. As much as he wanted to help his son, he believed in the sanctity of life. He could at least be satisfied that, because he was going first in the deal, nobody had lost out. They could both simply walk away, having never committed a crime. All they had done was plan the murders, and as far as Yosef was concerned that was a moral crime for which he could receive redemption.
His reply was simple, and to the point.
'The deal is off. We both walk away, and pretend this exchange of messages never happened.'
It was non-negotiable, but that much was implied. His contact couldn't force him to kill somebody, and as they had lost nothing it was likely they would simply move on to find another prospect. He doubted he was the only one in London who knew how to work a computer and be willing to accept such a deal. All Yosef could do was pray for their souls.
***
London Zoo had two inland taipans. They were the only known examples of the species in the capital. As a potentially lethal animal anyone who wanted to keep them was required by law to obtain a licence to do so under the Dangerous Wild Animals Act 1976. These were granted by the local council to prospective owners after they had proved that they could care for the animal safely and securely. Morton thanked his lucky stars for such bureaucracy. Normally, such rules and layers of red tape were the bane of his existence, but in the Fitzgerald case the snake venom was the only real lead he had to go on. The need for a licence showed how finite a pool of suspects there were for the murder. They had to get the venom from somewhere, after all, and fewer people still would be able to process it properly.
Dead on Demand (A DCI Morton Crime Novel) Page 18