The Shadow Man

by Helen Fields

  ‘You’ll fall!’

  ‘I see that other woman. The one who got killed in her bed. Oh my God. Oh shit, shit, shit. He killed her, too.’

  The door opened.

  ‘You’re right, I did,’ Fergus said. ‘Not deliberately. Angela didn’t deserve to die.’ He walked into the room and stood over Elspeth. ‘This bitch does, though. She owes it to me, for the lying, the deceit. Fucking around behind my back.’

  ‘She’s not your wife!’ Meggy yelled, swaying on the thinning threads. ‘Elspeth hates you.’

  ‘Meggy, stop,’ Xavier said.

  ‘Oh, don’t stop now. We’re just about to have a very honest conversation. Why don’t you come down?’

  Chapter Thirty-One

  ‘Nick Bowlzer has been taken into custody, but it’s on pretty spurious grounds. I’m not expecting him to be charged with any offences,’ Baarda told Connie.

  ‘Shame. The world would be a much better place if being a complete dick was made illegal.’

  ‘The problem might be finding a judge to pass sentence who wouldn’t be guilty of gross hypocrisy.’

  ‘Did Bowlzer offer any stunning insights as to why he chose to put Elspeth’s life in even more danger?’ Connie asked.

  ‘Apparently, his girlfriend finally wised up and decided to break off their relationship, so he figured he had nothing left to lose. The lure of his fifteen minutes of fame and the cash from selling his story were too much of an enticement. Says it didn’t occur to him that it would hurt Elspeth, although he was concerned that her husband might come after him, but he calculated that the video was so public he’d made himself untouchable.’

  ‘Do me a favour and plant a huge stash of class A drugs in his apartment shortly before executing a search warrant, would you?’ Connie asked.

  ‘I’m afraid I left all my cocaine at home today.’ He smiled softly. ‘It’s been an hour since our kidnapper hung up. Do you think Elspeth Dunwoody’s still alive?’

  ‘It’s not just Elspeth I’m worried about,’ Connie said. She scribbled notes on a board then stood back to consider what she’d written against the backdrop of the wall of images, notes and maps that now covered a large section of her hotel room. ‘What became obvious during that call is that our man has undertaken a substantial world-building exercise. He’s given his delusion not just scaffolding, but also interior decoration. I’m not sure it’s possible to burst just one section of that balloon without the whole thing exploding.’

  ‘Meggy and Xavier?’

  ‘Might be secondary casualties. He may feel his entire world is tainted and decide to wipe the slate clean. If they try to intervene, they might end up wounded as a result of his rage with Elspeth. The important thing is that we’ve spoken to him now. Every word he said is additional information. It’s a blueprint to his brain.’

  ‘What does he want?’ Baarda asked.

  ‘He’s taken a woman we now know he idolised, fantasised about, as his wife. That was his primary motivation. She won’t be able to maintain that illusion for him, so how’s that going to resolve?’

  ‘He either ignores the fact that she doesn’t feel the same and carries on regardless, or he disposes of her and develops a new obsession,’ Baarda said.

  Connie stared at the collage of photos of Elspeth. ‘This man feels passionately about Elspeth. His feelings aren’t a delusion, they’re real in terms of the chemical reaction they fire in his brain. He’s studied her and sees aspects of her personality that perfectly match what he wants. She ticks all his boxes. Elspeth Dunwoody sets him on fire. Does your wife still do that for you?’

  ‘Not going there,’ Baarda said.

  ‘This isn’t gratuitous prying, Baarda, it’s a comparable study. Work with me. Somewhere deep inside, you must fantasise about you and your wife being reconciled. For that to happen, the affair would have to end. You’ve imagined it. What goes through your head in those small, dark hours when people screw and cry and imagine killing their abusive partner, or suddenly decide to embezzle money from their company?’

  Baarda was silent. He sat down on the edge of Connie’s bed and leaned back on his elbows.

  ‘It’s about time,’ he said. ‘Enough months go by that the affair becomes dull. It’s not exciting any more. They grow bored of one another. Their relationship becomes as much a routine as our marriage, and she sees that she’s just swapped one thing for another.’

  Connie pressed a hand against her stomach.

  ‘Brodie,’ she said softly. ‘I knew you had the answer. That’s what he doesn’t have. He’s out of time. It explains the decreasing periods between each offence. He’s taking more risks because he has less opportunity to reorganise. There’s no scope for repairing the relationship he’s imagined with Elspeth. He’s under pressure, unlike you. You feel no urgency because giving your wife time allows you to ignore the reality of the situation.’

  ‘Which is?’

  ‘That your relationship is dead. You don’t feel anything for her any more.’

  ‘Bullshit,’ he said.

  ‘Really? When did you last imagine your wife naked and get hard in the middle of the day?’

  ‘Are you saying that’s what happens to our murderer when he thinks about Elspeth?’

  ‘I’m saying he’s running out of time, and we need to figure out why. That’s the key.’

  Connie closed her eyes and saw the image of the man every police officer in a hundred-mile radius was hunting right now, so gaunt he was almost the physical embodiment of the ghoul the public believed him to be. She stopped breathing. Her heart hammered wildly out of rhythm in her chest. She gasped.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ Baarda asked, crossing the room in two short strides and taking hold of her upper arms. ‘Connie?’

  ‘He’s not just physically ill,’ she said. ‘If that was why he’s so thin, he’d still be conscious of consequences. He could still be arrested and imprisoned. Maybe he’s not dead enough for our liking, but he might not agree. If he was more than just unwell – in his own mind at least – it would explain the risk-taking, the urgency … everything.’

  ‘What are you talking about?’

  She lurched for her desk and grabbed her laptop.

  ‘There’s a syndrome … I can’t remember what it’s called. He’s not acting the way a rational person would. This isn’t just accelerated behaviour, it’s beyond all normal parameters. So maybe he’s acting as if he’s invisible because he genuinely believes he is. He feels no fear, has no sense of consequences. There’s little attempt to cover his identity. When he was asking me about my achromatopsia, he said …’ She flicked hurriedly through her notebook. ‘Here it is, “The world you inhabit is not the same as everyone else’s. Mine is even less so.”’

  ‘Sounds like science fiction.’ Baarda joined her in front of her laptop.

  Connie typed the terms ‘mental disorder, belief in death’ into the search engine and waited for results to come back. The top few results were either true crime reports, studies in faith in life after death, or zombie movie references, followed by a reference-book-style definition.

  ‘Cotard’s delusion,’ she read aloud. ‘See also Cotard’s syndrome or walking corpse syndrome. It’s extremely rare, but there are documented cases. The affected subject mistakenly believes that they do not exist, that they’re dead or in the process of dying, sometimes that their organs are in the process of putrefying, or that their body is decaying. Sometimes sufferers believe they are immortal. Named for the nineteenth-century neurologist Jules Cotard, who first diagnosed it as a syndrome. I read about it when I was studying, but cases are too rare to expect to find one in the course of normal practice.’

  ‘Apart from the risk-taking, why is it you think this syndrome fits our case?’

  ‘He’s so thin we have witnesses describing him as almost skeletal. It’s a regular feature in Cotard’s. Sufferers believe they no longer need to eat. Look,’ she pointed to a footnote on the screen, ‘there are document
ed cases where the sufferers ended up dying of starvation. The evolution of his offending hasn’t matched any other known profile. That’s because he was reacting to his perception of his illness. Believing that he was dying but not yet dead allowed him the time to be careful and studious with Angela Fernycroft. When that went wrong, there was a downward spiral. His own perception of his demise would have increased. He became desperate, taking hostages faster. And he used a really weird phrase that I misunderstood.’ She flicked through her notes again. ‘Here we go. He said, “I have to pass this time.”’

  ‘So he believes he’s running out of time on this earth?’ Baarda asked.

  ‘Maybe. Imagine what you might be capable of if you genuinely believed you were dead.’

  ‘Consequences would become irrelevant. The police, the courts, prison. None of it would matter. He’s capable of absolutely anything.’ Baarda stuck his hands in his pockets and wandered to the window. ‘So what’s the relevance of Elspeth, Meggy and Xavier?’

  ‘We can’t be sure of that yet. He was so enraged when he realised Elspeth wasn’t the pure and untainted specimen of a wife he’d envisaged that he became irrational. If he wanted Elspeth as a wife, then maybe he also wanted Meggy as a daughter.’

  ‘Why does a dead man need a family?’ Baarda asked.

  ‘Maybe he’s scared of the sense of invisibility he feels. Don’t we all just want to be remembered, to be missed by the people who loved us most, when we die? Perhaps that would make the end of his life more bearable,’ Connie offered. ‘That could be why his victim type has varied so greatly. They’re playing individual roles. It’s part of a larger scheme.’

  ‘If Cotard’s syndrome covers anything from believing you might be dying to deciding you must be immortal, how do we know what stage his symptoms are at?’ Baarda asked.

  Connie referred back to the text on the screen. ‘This says the syndrome has three stages. Germination, where symptoms of hypochondria and psychotic depression become apparent, although depression may pre-date all symptoms, of course. Then there’s the blooming of the delusion of negation, where the sufferer becomes more aware of the change in their body, the loss of a part of themselves or their whole existence. Finally, there’s the chronic stage, where the delusions are at their peak. You’re looking at schizophrenia mixed with psychotic depression. Chronic sufferers will be unable to distinguish reality from delusion, may not recognise the world around them and will be unable to maintain normal relationships. Physical health, hygiene, the simplest of interactions will become impossible to maintain.’

  ‘All right,’ Baarda said. ‘Practically speaking, if you’re right about this, how does it help us find him?’

  ‘I need broad access to health-system workers in the wide geographic area. Is there a system for putting out an alert?’

  ‘I can organise that,’ Baarda said. ‘What are you going to do?’

  ‘I doubt he’s been diagnosed if he’s still in the community, but there will have been physical symptoms, and some indicators of a patient struggling with their physical and probably mental health. Give me half an hour? I’ll put together a list of likely symptoms, which we can combine with the broad physical description we have. I’d like to see if there are any mental health workers, primary carers, hospital staff, or community support specialists with whom this rings any bells. This didn’t come on overnight. If he suffered from a high level of hypochondria and depression in the early stage, there’s every chance he sought help.’

  ‘What might have caused it?’

  ‘Could have been anything from a brain atrophy to a tumour or an accident causing damage. Most cases come from frontal lobe injury, such as resulting from seizures,’ Connie said.

  ‘And how dangerous is he right now, in his current condition? I need to formulate a plan to apprehend him securely.’

  ‘Armed police, shoot as necessary. He doesn’t believe he has any limitations. You should be thinking the same way.’

  Baarda walked to the door. ‘But he’s not immortal, and he’s not dead. What happens when he figures that out? Does that make him more dangerous, or less?’

  Connie crossed her arms and thought about it. ‘Well, he’ll no longer have a use for Elspeth, Meggy and Xavier, so my advice would be to find him before that happens. Long before.’

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Meggy swung from the ceiling. Her body was beginning to ache, and she could hear Xavier’s increasingly laboured breathing from the floor above. The droplets of sweat that were soaking into the sheet rope were making it hard to grasp. Fergus stood below her, grinning. He was insane. It was a word she’d read and heard, but so far in her twelve years she’d never actually met anyone who matched the description. His eyes looked like they might extend from his head at any moment on wild tentacles, reaching up to inspect her more closely. Hands twitching at his sides, body coated in oily perspiration, he appeared to Meggy as if he’d just emerged from a coffin. There was so little of him, and yet she knew that his strength would be formidable.

  It was a playground assessment, but no less accurate for it. At school there were the physically large kids who nevertheless posed no threat. They lumbered and were slow, and the majority had a gentleness about them that they could not hide from the slighter, slipperier bullies. They were fast and mean, and their viciousness was an emerald flash in the eyes, side-glancing to their mates. Watch this, that swipe of vision said. Watch this and play your part. Titter at my cruelty, taunt my prey, and worship me, or it’ll be you next. Still the bullies weren’t the scariest. They were a known quantity. Their showmanship hid a vulnerability. Get anyone else to laugh at them, just for a single second, and you might as well have thrown that iconic bucket of water over the Wicked Witch of the West.

  The playground hustle and bickering was camouflage for a genuine monster. Those who had no fear of consequences. Whose older siblings had shown them just how brutal a beating could really be. Silent and deadly, a misused phrase, but that was how she’d always thought of them. Mitch McConnaught had once got wind of the fact that another boy had been telling his friends how much he fancied Mitch. That boy had been held down in an alleyway after school and a lighter applied to his hair, necessitating skin grafts for the burns. Tricia Leigh, another quiet one everyone knew to avoid, had decided that being called weird was sufficient cause for smashing a bottle and shoving it into another girl’s forehead. No amount of surgery was going to remove the scarring. It was the ones who could watch and wait, with whom no amount of pleading made a difference. They didn’t want an audience or adulation. They wanted a quiet place, relative dark, and the time to enjoy the whimpering of their victim. Meggy stared down at Fergus and let her terror inform her decision.

  ‘I’m not coming down,’ she told him, ‘and you can’t reach me.’

  ‘Fine,’ he said. ‘You’ll keep. It’s not as if you’re going anywhere, after all. How’s it going, Xavier?’ he yelled gleefully.

  There was silence from the floor above.

  ‘Getting tired yet, or have you just tied off the sheet? She’ll slip, sooner or later, and when she does, she could break a limb. Maybe fracture a hip. Perhaps little Meggy will even damage her spinal cord so badly that she’ll end up just like you.’

  ‘Don’t listen to him,’ Meggy told Xavier.

  ‘Come back up,’ Xavier whispered. ‘I can’t pull you. You’re going to have to climb.’

  Meggy looked up at the ceiling.

  ‘You don’t have the strength left in your arms, do you?’ Fergus hissed. ‘How long have you been there? Not as long as Elspeth has been on this cold floor waiting for help.’ He raised a foot and allowed his toes to rest on the unnaturally bent shoulder joint. ‘Perhaps I can persuade you to join us.’

  Elspeth’s shriek as he applied pressure with his foot was subhuman. Meggy was reminded of a trip to a safari park where she’d heard wolves howling as they’d fought over food.

  The bedding rope jolted upwards as Xavier tried t
o yank her skywards.

  ‘That’s right, up you go,’ Fergus said. ‘You two run and hide. I’ll be up shortly.’

  ‘You’re a fuckhead!’ Meggy screeched. ‘A fucking bloody fuckhead!’

  ‘Meggy, get up here. The door’s blocked. You’ll be safe,’ Xavier shouted.

  Meggy looked up and down.

  Fergus giggled and wagged his finger at her. ‘You’re a bad girl.’

  Elspeth growled as she turned her head to where Fergus’ foot was still pressed on the back of her dislocated shoulder. Dropping her jaw, she latched on to his ankle and bit.

  ‘Bitch!’ Fergus screamed. ‘Oh my God, you evil bitch, let go!’

  Her damaged arm flopping uselessly to one side, she grabbed his free leg with her good hand, keeping him still.

  Fergus bent to beat her across the head and face, fists flying as he tried to pull his leg away.

  ‘Let me go,’ Meggy yelled at Xavier.

  ‘No way!’ he replied.

  ‘He’ll kill her,’ the girl said, working her fingers into the knots she had tied around her waist.

  ‘He’ll kill you, too.’ Xavier gripped harder than ever. ‘Get up here, Meggy, please!’

  ‘I want to,’ she sobbed. ‘I want to come back, but he cut off her finger because of me. It was all my fault. She stopped him from hurting me. I’m sorry.’ She gulped deep breaths, then released her grip on the sheet and dropped through thin air out of the loop.

  In the moment, her courage failed her. She’d seen herself flying towards Fergus, aiming for his head, feet outstretched to do maximum damage, but her hands got the better of her bravado, flailing, reaching out for anything to reduce the speed of her descent. The pendant light was the only object between her and the floor, an Eighties-style uplighter lamp on a single cord that swung low in the room. Meggy’s hand slid down the cable, smacking onto the light bulb and dragging the fitting from its electrics as she went.

  Glass shattering in her hand, the room turned black. The final feet of her fall were through blackness into the unknown. She could feel the multitude splinters of glass in her hand and had time to regret her decision as her up-tucked knees struck the back of Fergus’ shoulders. He crumpled beneath her, yelling as he fell, then her forehead was hitting the back of his skull, and they were both flying forward together. Another scream, this time Elspeth’s, as they bundled onto her fragile body. The light fitting landed on them all – more glass, a long snake of wire, and a metal frame.