The Games People Play Box Set

by Barbara Gaskell Denvil

  She asked, “Master, how will he do it?”

  “What?”

  She explained. “Your brother, I mean Number One, he intends killing me, doesn’t he? Will he be quick and clean? Perhaps I should say, will he just shoot me? Or cut my throat? Do you know what he usually does?”

  “Dunno.” Master sat on the floor and contemplated with some enthusiasm. “I never watched every time. Number One says he’ll do it all special if I likes. I can watch. Not sure what that’d be. Reckon sommint like pulling off skin. Wiv one o’ my ladies who was naughty, he hanged her upside down and let me fiddle afore he poked the gun up her arse and shot her.”

  Heaving, trying not to vomit, Eve whispered, “I haven’t been naughty. Please, please don’t do things like that to me.”

  “Wot does you want then?” asked Master with some curiosity.

  “A quick shot. In the head. In the mouth.” Eve had never before been asked to choose the manner of her own death, but she had considered it several times while in captivity with Milton.

  “Then does you just goes off and play wiv someone else?” Master wondered.

  “Life after death?” It was another question she had not expected. “I don’t know. We’ll all find out one day.”

  Master shook his head. “Not me, not Number One. Reckon not Number Two neither. Shame ‘bout you but Number One says tis important.” Master sighed, scrambled up, and came to Eve’s side. “So we ain’t got much time. Now, quick. On yer back and open,” he commanded, pointing.

  Eve whispered, “I am so dreadfully hungry, Master. Is there any chance of a little food? Anything at all? Just a crust perhaps?”

  “I got cake, but Number One says not fer you,” Master explained. “So tis time fer last games.”

  “Mr and Mrs Daish, my dear. On the front step. Shall I let them in or will you go out?”

  Sylvia smiled at Lavender. “Oh, let them in at once, poor things. And make tea, if you wouldn’t mind. Not cake. Too frivolous. Perhaps some biscuits?”

  The ice-cold Cotswold weather was beginning to thaw and a pale flicker of sunlight was squeezing between the clouds. It brought no warmth, but the sprinkled light through the first flush of apple buds was like the year’s first smile. Harry was out in the car, driving the forests and hills. Convinced that both Lionel in some hidden corner, and the Howard twins in some old secret cottage, could be discovered if he drove every lane and highway in three counties, Harry had made friends with his Sat Nav and was exploring the south west of England.

  Sometimes Sylvia accompanied him. The shy appearance of sunshine helped her decisions. But usually she preferred the comfort of friends, blazing fires and cheerfully answered calls for tea.

  Lavender brought Andy and Belinda Daish into the smaller living-room where Sylvia was waiting, and then bustled off to put the kettle on. “We heard something important,” said Mr Daish. “This morning, on the early news. They said something about another woman being taken.”

  Belinda was already in tears. “If the monster wants another girl already, does that mean our Evie must be – already – gone?”

  “Oh dear, not in the least,” said Sylvia in a rush and a gulp. “Actually. They don’t even think it’s the same man. They think it’s Lionel Sullivan who tried to grab some other wretched girl. You know, the brute who escaped from prison. They still can’t be sure of anything.”

  “So that ghastly creature doesn’t have our Evie?” said Mrs Daish, begging for it not to be true.

  “No,” Sylvia assured her. “He was still in prison back then. I honestly think Eve is still probably alive.’ She paused, looking back into the untrusting and desperate faces of Belinda and her husband. “I’m terribly sorry,” she went on at last, “but Harry and I, we’re honestly trying to help. We manage little bits of ideas here and there, but we’re not official. I mean, we don’t even know what the police do half the time. We made friends with the chief inspector or at least one of them, but most of the time we don’t know what he’s doing either. There’s a briefing room and the forensic lab with a pathologist, and there’s the front desk. The only place we’ve been in is that and Darcey’s office. And I promise, if they’d found Eve they’d have told you at once. She’s still – missing.”

  Andy Daish had not yet sat down. He stood in front of the fire with his hands clasped behind his back. Sylvia was surprised he hadn’t scorched himself by now. “And no one knows yet why the murderer shoved his women up the chimney?”

  “Oh dear.” Sylvia hoped the tea would arrive. “I think that was just to hide the bodies. They were using a cellar in part of an old abandoned house. No one lived there, but they didn’t own it. So they hid what they could in the best place.”

  “They?” asked Mr Daish after a suspicious blink.

  Sylvia realised that she had said the wrong thing. “There’s a faint suspicion,” she said carefully, “that the killers are two brothers. But no one’s positive. There’s no proof. And the brothers can’t be found.”

  “Who are they?” asked Belinda with a quivering hope.

  “Umm. I don’t know.”

  “So how did the telly know about this new woman,” Andy demanded, ‘if the police don’t know anything at all?”

  Luckily, the tea came. Lavender sat down, handed round the biscuits, poured the tea from the pot, and asked sympathetically about the Daish family’s situation.

  “I don’t sleep. I may never sleep again,” Belinda said.

  “Dear Sylvia and Harry are very good at finding out things,” said Lavender, trotting back to the open door. “They’ll find your daughter, Mrs Daish. Never worry.”

  Sylvia ignored this unhelpful remark. She sipped her tea. “A young woman was approached by someone out in the countryside, and she suspected he was a rapist, so she ran away. She phoned the police and Morrison decided it sounded like Lionel Sullivan.” Sylvia took another sip of tea and burned her tongue. “The girl must have contacted the TV journalists too.”

  Andy was disappointed. “So there’s no real news.? Just media? Typical.”

  “Lionel Sullivan doesn‘t have Eve, Mr Daish. That’s so important and so hopeful.” Sylvia exhaled, desperate for something reassuring to say. Instead, she could only think of nonsense. ‘Your daughter’s alright. I feel it in my bones’. Well – she’s probably thinking of you right now. The police are on to it, Mrs Daish. Patience is a virtue. Life’s a horrible turd of misfortunes, Mr Daish, you just have to trust to luck and the cops.’ No, losing your beloved daughter deserved better than any of that cliched rubbish. Sylvia said, “There have been quite a few clues, but not enough yet to arrest the right man. If they do, then Eve could be home in days.” She paused, then risked saying, Was Eve ever taught at Primary School by Maurice Howard, do you remember? Would she have accepted a lift from him if it was offered late at night?”

  What? Really? Mr Howard? Our Evie liked him. Yes, she’d get in his car without any worries. What are you telling us?”

  “But these brothers?” Belinda interrupted him. “Do you know their names? Is one of them Maurice Howard? Are they both sick? I mean psychopaths? That’s what murderers are, isn’t it?”

  “One is certainly a psychopath,” said Sylvia. “Or at least I guess so. But I’ve never met him, and I’m certainly not a psychiatrist. I’m not sure what murderers suffer from. As for the other, I think he’s normal. But what the hell is normal, anyway? Are any of us normal? I don’t think I’m crazy, but I’m not really sure about anything else.”

  58

  “You must be crazy, to be in love with me,” Harry told her later.

  “It’s you who must be crazed, combing the country for sheds.”

  “I found a hundred.”

  Amy, who was sitting beside Percival on the old mustard velvet couch, smiled, catching the end of the conversation. “Did you find mine?”

  “You once had – a shed?” Harry asked politely.

  Any nodded eagerly. “I was born around here, you know. My p
arents owned a nice house on the Welsh border. Quite grand, it was. We had three sheds. I made one into a playhouse.”

  “No. That wasn’t the direction I explored today, I’m afraid,” Harry apologised. “Perhaps tomorrow. But we’re looking for Mark Howard in particular.”

  Amy turned the nod into a shake. “Not at all,” she murmured. “The bus driver did it, you know.”

  Her husband peered over the top of his glasses and snapped shut the copy of The Lancet which he had been reading. “This is another case, my dear. The crimes committed by the coach driver were all some years ago, and the killer went to prison.”

  “Nonsense, Ben, my dear,” said Amy, reverting to the smiling nod. “He escaped. You should read the proper newspapers instead of all that medicine stuff. And he lives in sheds. He may have found mine. I used to play mummies and daddies, and I had three dolls, all baby girls in pink. He’d like that.”

  “No doubt, my dear.” And Percival returned to The Lancet.

  “I never had a little brother,” Amy continued, though speaking to her cream merino lap. “I kept telling my parents that I wanted one, but they didn’t oblige. So I played mummies without daddies.” Then she looked up and dangled two fingers at Percival over the top of his newspaper. “Until my Percy came along of course.”

  Percival wasn’t listening. “Happy families, my dear,” he said and rustled the paper.

  “I had a little boy cousin,” Amy continued, now speaking to the crackle of the flames in the huge fireplace. “Until he started Kindergarten, we used to play together. Once it was so hot, he took all his clothes off. I was only three or four, and I was shocked. What’s that? I demanded, pointing. He was quite surprised. ‘My dingle, of course’, he said. ‘What’s your dingle like?’ I felt quite confused. Had my mother missed out dingles when I was born? I said, shamefaced, ‘I don’t have a dingle?’ This upset him even more. He couldn’t tell which one of us was weird. ‘So how do you do wee wees?’ he asked with a yelp. ‘Easy. I sit on the loo and it just happens,’ I insisted. I asked my mother about dingles afterwards, and she stopped my cousin coming to play, which was a shame. But people were more proper in those days.” She pushed her hand beneath the open pages and patted Percival’s knee. “But my Percy has a nice dingle, and he taught me all about it.”

  “Yes, that’s right dear,” murmured Percival without paying the slightest attention.

  Ruby was giggling, and said, “It was my father who taught me the truth of dingles.”

  Sylvia looked up, mouth snapping open abruptly. “Now that could mean several different things – maybe good – maybe not so good. You certainly never told me that before.”

  “You never asked,” Ruby sighed. “I’ll tell you more another day.”

  Sylvia’s mouth remained open with several words unsaid, but it was Lavender rushing in who stopped any further discussion. “Sylvia and Harry,” she squeaked, “it’s your gambling lady. Iris isn’t it. She’s terribly worried.”

  “She’s seen something,” said Sylvia, hoisting up her skirts, rising with difficulty from the low velvet couch, and hurried out into the hall.

  “Or done something,” said Harry, running after.

  Iris, wearing a smart new navy trench coat, stood dripping rain onto the carpet, her hair in pale streams over her small head. She had walked all the way to Rochester Manor from the safe house on the other side of Cheltenham and looked both utterly exhausted and utterly distraught. “My lovely new friend,” she quavered, “Joyce, my dearest, dearest new friend Joyce.”

  “She’s sick?”

  “She’s gone,” Iris wailed. “It was yesterday. She wanted to go to the cinema. It was a funny fellow film. You know, Tom someone.”

  “Never mind, what happened?” Harry asked, desperately impatient.

  “I don’t know,” Iris frowned. “I never went to see the film. You see, I haven’t touched one of those bandit machines since hospital, and I didn’t want the temptation. The cinema is right next door to the little casino. So Joyce went off on her own. I went off to bed.”

  “She never came home?” guessed Sylvia.

  “That’s right.” Now Iris was in tears. “I slept, but in the middle of the night I felt quite sick, so I got up to make myself cornflakes. I poked my head into Joyce’s room to see if she wanted some. But she wasn’t there and the bed was all neat and tidy.”

  “What time?”

  “I’ve no idea,” Iris admitted. “So I went back to bed. But then I got up this morning at the usual time. Eight. She’s usually up before me, but this time she wasn’t. I took her in a cup of tea but she still wasn’t there, and the bed was still all nice and proper. But no one stays out all night at the cinema. It wasn’t even a long film.”

  At the front desk of the police station, DC Darcey Morrison and DCI Cooper Cramble were stood together by the open doorway leading back to the staircase. The Desk Sergeant seemed amused. Neither appeared remotely interested. What they were arguing about was not immediately obvious but having hovered for some moments at the bottom of the stairs, Harry finally muttered an apologetic, “Excuse me.”

  Cramble turned, furious. “This is police business, sir, and is not the subject for public curiosity. Kindly report to the front desk.”

  Harry shook his head, setting off more flying raindrops. “Too important, inspector.” He turned to Morrison. “It’s urgent, Darcey, or I wouldn’t be so rude.”

  Sylvia, who was even more impatient, broke in. “It’s Joyce Sullivan, Lionel’s wife. She’s supposed to be at the safe house to avoid the obvious danger, but she keeps slipping out. Lionel spoke of revenge, well, you know all about that. Well, Joyce has disappeared.”

  “Lionel Sullivan,” said Cramble with exaggerated patience, “is D.I. Ellis’s case. I suggest you speak to her.”

  Harry shook his head. “All these cases have come together,” he objected. “The Howards and the Sullivans and Eve Daish and all the murders. It’s the same business now, isn’t it?”

  “We know it is,” Sylvia said from Harry’s side.

  “Exactly what we’ve been arguing about,” smiled Morrison. “Or should I say, amicably discussing rather than arguing? And I certainly maintain that the cases are intertwined. When was Joyce Sullivan last seen?”

  “This can have nothing to do with Mark Howard and the business of international money laundering,” Cramble said with a mild explosion of saliva, and turned, marching up the creaking wooden stairs.

  Sylvia answered Morrison. “Yesterday evening at five.”

  Morrison sighed. “I have a team searching for the Howards from the toes of Wiltshire and Somerset all the way up to the horns of Oxfordshire and Worcestershire. There are six teams from the other counties in the search with us, and I’ve added Maurice Howard’s wife Kate and Lionel Sullivan to the search. I doubt Sullivan is working in friendly combination with the Howards, and I imagine they’d all despise each other. But there’s a link, and that I’m sure of. Now if Mrs Sullivan is missing, then it’s getting more serious.”

  “How many dead already? I think it’s already pretty serious.”

  Morrison smiled at Sylvia. “The so-called chimney killings number eleven, including four found buried so far, but they stretch back over years. Eve Daish may be number twelve, and that’s on-going. Yet we’ve no proof that she’s been taken by the same killer. Not Lionel, but possibly one of the Howards. Yes, serious indeed. And now Joyce Sullivan?”

  “Looks like it?”

  “Damnation. But how could the wretched man have bumped into her? Not at the cinema, surely.” Morrison said, “Come with me.” Harry and Sylvia scuttled after as Morrison marched out into the car park at the back of the station and ordered his car. As it was brought around, he wandered off and began to talk fast into his mobile phone.

  Harry and Sylvia scrambled into the back of the Range Rover. A middle-aged and straight-backed woman with vibrant short rusty red hair climbed into the front passenger seat. She looked around a
nd grinned. “I’m Rita. I know who you both are. Delighted to meet you. I’m on the case of your great friend Lionel Sullivan.”

  “You’re DI Rita Ellis?” Harry asked, and she nodded as Morrison appeared and shoved himself into the drivers’ seat, cursed, and started the engine.

  “We have one day,” he called over the sound of the engine, “to solve the lot. Before blethering Crab-apple Cooper goes running to the met to complain about our bungling.”

  “A day will do,” Rita said. She turned back to Sylvia and Harry. “Do you mind if I smoke?” They didn’t, and Rita produced a flaring lighter, lighting something that looked and smelled more like an elongated dung beetle than a cigarette. She blew plumes of smoke and leaned back, relaxed. “Turkish and cheap,” she said absently. “But I promise I paid the duty tax.”

  The rain angled against the windscreen, but the torrents slid to splatter and from splatter to a drifting and half-hearted mist. The countryside stretched at 240 degrees, rich green pocketed by fronded grasses, then flattening into scrub and bare stone, sandy rock and hard earth too solid for roots. The trees dusted the horizon, half disappearing into the sodden mist. Dead whitening trunks lay bent and broken after the blistering winds of past months, and the distant hills stood dark and indistinct behind the barrier of trees.

  It was a huge sky, lowering in shades of grey up to a blackening roof, but with sudden creases of vivid silver.

  “Might brighten up this evening or tomorrow,” Harry decided. Then, more relevant, “Where the hell are we going, anyway?”

  Morrison swallowed Rita’s puffing smoke and coughed. “Borders of Wales. Or at least, in that direction. I have an idea and want to test it. Combines Sullivan from the word of his last victim who managed to get away, and some of the rumours regarding the Howards. If we find nothing, then dammit, we’ll stop at a pub for lunch. But I have an itch, and I never itch for nothing.”