“Well – sort of,” Ruby muttered, bending down to sweep up her puppy. “Hello little gorgeous Brad. Just what I need, that’s a lick and a cuddle.” And now she was hungry.
The next morning the local newspaper, the national newspaper and the daily television news were all blaring about the same thing.
“Shit,” said Harry.
Lionel Sullivan had been at it again. Somehow finding another young girl to abduct, he had tortured, killed, and flung out the pieces in a large rubbish bag, slung over the gate of a small park in outer Cheltenham on the road out to Battledown. Ruby had finished breakfast and was sitting out on a bench under the sunshine, feeling young, attractive and refreshed. It was Sylvia walking with Stella who saw her and passed on the news. Ruby felt sick.
“That’s – so disgusting.” She felt like heaving and vomiting. “There was me having a lovely time, and just a few miles away some poor innocent little girl was getting murdered.”
“Well, I’m glad someone was having a wonderful time,” Stella said, peering over the top of her glasses.
Sylvia sat down beside Ruby as Benjamin hobbled up to drag his wife away. “At least no one’s using our chimneys anyway,” he told her.
Her reply was inaudible. Ruby turned to Sylvia. “I think I want to go and have a very long and very hot bath. I’ll soak for an hour and then pour in more hot water.”
“I’ll go and phone Morrison,” sighed Sylvia. “But he’s sure to be too busy to answer. Yesterday he was saying it was possible not everything was down to Sullivan. But we can be quite sure that this one is.”
“Has anyone looked in Wales? That’s where he was last time.”
“Yes, they’ve looked everywhere.” Sylvia stood again, gathering up her jacket. “I think we should burn down every shed and every forest until we know for sure that he’s gone up in flames.”
Tracy was at home in the neat little flat supplied by the council and police to ensure her safe-keeping. She had cried most of the night after Sylvia and Harry had left her, and considered travelling back to Little-Woppington-on-the-Torr by herself, and making arrangements to live there for the rest of her life.
Then she decided it would be a stupid mistake since even Sylvia would soon get sick of her and not want her around any more. No one could ever really want her. Even her own mother hated her.
Then she heard the beep on her old phone, stuffed away in the top drawer of her little bedside table. She was already lying on her bed with three tissues clutched tight, so she simply rolled over and opened the drawer. The phone showed the obvious.
Tracy muttered, “It’s you, Dad. You must be crazy phoning me. Actually, I know you’re crazy. And the telly says you’ve done another one last night. Honest, I reckon you must be really, really miserable.”
“Yes, I’m fucking miserable,” Lionel told her, his voice shaking. “Fucking Olga sits on my head. She sucks my blood.”
“You’ve got a girlfriend?”
He grunted. “Never had one. You know that. Your mother was a joke. A bitch-joke. Then that filthy bitch Joyce was no better after the first year. Karyn was never mine. You know you’re the only one I ever cared for.”
“So let’s meet up again,” said Tracy without expression. “So you can kill me like everyone else.”
“I never did your mother. Though there was plenty of temptation.”
“I’d answer you back and you’d say that was temptation. It’s safer being on the game.”
“Tis me taking the risk,” Lionel objected. “Maybe I tell you where I am and you bring the law with you.”
“Yer, I might do that.”
“You’d lose as much as me.”
Tracy thought hard for some moments. Then she spoke in a rush. “OK. I’m lonely and fed up. I miss having some fun, and I hate the miserable buggers who want weird stuff in back alleys. They’re really sick, some of them.”
Her father chuckled with a faint splutter of irony. He said, “You already said you’d stop. So come over here.”
“I bet you’ve got no food, no money, and no comfortable place.” She thought about it, then added, “I saw Mum the other day. If I was you, I’d have killed the old hag. She was really mean.”
“Forget her. Come to me.”
Having returned from a lunchtime beer down the pub, Arthur discovered Harry in the garage, busy cleaning out the crumbs on the floor, passenger side. “I could do that, y’know, Harry mate. Tis me job, near enough. David likes work like that too, for a small tip.”
Sleeves rolled up and looking both sweaty and damp, Harry said, “I thought it would do me good. With the car, I don’t get much exercise. I’ve put on about five pounds since I came to live here.”
“I put on twenty, and I work me legs off.”
“We get huge meals. Sylvia likes puddings so I join in. And I haven’t walked further than upstairs to bed for a year.” Not quite true, but close.
“Talking of beer,” Alfred told Harry, half back out of the open doors, “I met your mate Tony down the bar. Reckons he’s getting married too.”
“Tony Allen? That’s mighty unexpected. Who is she?”
“No idea,” Alfred said over his shoulder. “Someone called Doreen. Don’t know her. Never met her. Not interested. But I reckoned you would be.”
“I am. Thanks.”
“I don’t know her,” Harry told Sylvia later when he trundled back indoors. “But there’s a shy sort of bloke who’s a regular at the pub, name of Blair Dembar, who divorced his wife Doreen last year. I know Tony fancied her. In fact, I’m sort of guessing Blair got the divorce because Doreen had an affair with someone, and the someone may have been Tony. ”
“How long since you’ve seen Tony?”
“Ages. I stopped going to the pub for a bit. Too boring. Same people. No Sylvia.”
“But she’s the same person all the time too.” It was Sylvia who said it.
“Thank goodness,” smiled Harry. “A daily change would be a bit disconcerting.”
“Well,” decided Sylvia, “You go down the pub this evening and try to talk to Tony and meet this bride-to-be if she’s there. And I’m going to visit Peggy Morrison. Darcey’s working late on this new case. She’ll be alone, and she’s worried about him. The kids keep her company of course, but they drive her mad as well.”
Peggy offered red or white with no mention of tea or coffee. “I need a boost,” she said. “So I’ve pulled some of the expensive stuff from the back of the pantry. But they’ll be cold enough. English weather takes care of that, and the back of the pantry is in permanent winter.”
“White then.”
“If it didn’t make me sleepy, I’d have something stronger,” Peggy said, busily pouring two very large glasses of white wine. “I’m just so sick of this gruesome repetition. You see, I think this latest murder is someone I knew slightly. And liked. They haven’t finished identifying her officially, but Darcey gave me a hint because they’re fairly sure. It’s almost certainly Mary-Lynne Fleetwood. She’s a sweet young woman who works in the local library but never turned up to work two days ago. I took a book back to the library last week, and she was there and chatted a bit, and recommended a couple of books of the sort she knows I like – certainly not crime mysteries – and I took one of them and said I’d see her in a couple of weeks when I brought it back. And now I won’t. And I just wanted to cry all day, and I only stopped because of the kids. Now I’ve stopped crying anyway, so I just want to get pissed.”
“Carry on. I wish I could help. I really don’t have any crime-solving skills after all. Perhaps it’s me who should be reading the whodunnits.”
“But it’s the same man,” Peggy said, staring into her glass, already half empty. “You found the bastard last time.”
“I’ve tramped every damned forest path around here for miles and miles. Even quite a few around Nottingham. Wiltshire. Wales” Sylvia gulped her wine, too quickly to appreciate the quality. “I’d go to bloody Cumberland to sea
rch if there was any hope of him being there.” She finished the wine, folded her arms, and frowned. “You know I’ve met his daughter, don’t you? Well, she said he had some special little cottage around here, so we’ve searched and searched and searched. She’s a nice kid. Maybe the Sullivan creep isn’t her real father. Evidently, he wasn’t to the elder sister. But she’s deceased. Anyway, Tracy heard from him and is sure he’s in a ruined cottage somewhere near. Hidden under trees, I presume, so no drone or helicopter would see it.”
“And Darcey thinks there are two of them.”
“I’m not sure why,’ Sylvia said. “But he knows a million times more about all this than we do.” She paused, then said, “We don’t really know a thing. It’s such a jumble – train crashes – murders up in Nottingham – murders down here too – Ruby being strange and me having nightmares. Honestly – it’s a joke.”
Peggy poured out two more glasses of wine. They both drank slowly and were able to appreciate what they drank. “Do you fancy a walk in the right area sometime?” Peggy asked. “You know the parts you’ve looked already, so you’d guide me. You could take me wherever you hadn’t looked already. I’d follow without complaint.”
Stretching out one plastered ankle from beneath her long navy silk skirt, Sylvia shook her head while saying, “Yes, certainly. But I can’t while I’m still on this damn crutch. I can hardly walk to the loo, and the one time I did make a more serious attempt, I fell down and nearly broke the other ankle. Stupid idiot, I know. But I’ll gladly search with you in a few weeks when I should be better.”
“God. I hope he’s caught before that.” Peggy looked askance.
“It’s been some months already. So who knows?”
“Exactly. This last one was found just outside Cheltenham. The monster’s here somewhere. But he’s no magical wizard. Definitely no genius, I’m sure of that. So how does he hide?”
“Because he lives on nothing, prefers to live in dust heaps, and has past experience of how the police work.” But Sylvia spread her hands, showing ignorance. “He’s so sick, goodness knows what he does all day. Maybe drives for miles and miles. Maybe just sleeps. I’ve met the beast, but that doesn’t mean I know him, thank goodness.”
“Darcey would never let me go searching,” said Peggy, sinking back into the embrace of the armchair. “But if I go with you, well, it makes sense, doesn’t it? He can’t kill me for being sensible.”
“You could go with Harry,” Sylvia said. “But Darcey would probably kill both of you.” She also leaned back, sighing, glass in hand. “But I shouldn’t joke about killing, not while this is going on. That monster killed someone I knew too, but of course it doesn’t actually matter whether you know the poor little girl or not. The misery this causes must be even greater for the family than it is for the one who died. She will have suffered horribly and then lost her life, but her family will weep for her deeply and horribly for the rest of their lives. You’d never get over it, would you? Could you?”
“No. Never. Of course not.” Peggy clenched her fists in her lap. “But I’m so scared for Darcey. He’s in such danger all the time. He’s investigated a few singular murders before. There was a pig of a husband who killed his wife in a rage. It was obviously him though he denied it, but Darcey got him convicted. There was a rape and battery too just a few years ago. But then all the Lionel Sullivan killings, and then all those poor little things up the chimneys. I actually felt a bit sorry for the person who did it too, but those other two twins – triplets – they should have been carved into little pieces.”
“One seems to be thriving in Dubai. Fancy becoming a millionaire after causing the deaths of so many, and the pain and horror of it all.”
“Life isn’t ever really fair,” Peggy muttered. “If Darcey ever gets shot, I’ll set fire to the police station.”
The puppy sat on Ruby’s lap, licking its own paw first and then Ruby’s fingers. It had grown just a little and now overlapped the eager hands of Rochester Manor, nearly all eager to hold it.
“Him,” said Ruby. “He’s a him. Brad. Not it.”
“So he’s getting fat,” Harry said. “Every single person in this place smuggles him treats.”
“Except for two people who shall remain nameless.”
Harry grinned. He’d certainly passed the occasional bone from his dinner plate. “Is Sylvia back yet?” He looked around, but the living room was partially empty.
“Yes,” Ruby told him. “Ages ago, and she went up to bed. Said she was tired and bloated with wine.” Ruby giggled and Brad flopped. “And she said you’d be twice as pissed after spending the evening with Tony. And,” she said with a sniff, “it smells like you are.”
“Never,” Harry said. “I’ve been drinking water all night in celebration of Tony’s up and coming wedding.”
“As if,” said Ruby. “The only one here who likes drinking water is Brad.”
78
Two gurneys sat central in the forensic lab. Ostopolis was still present, though his principal assistant had gone home for the night. Bruce Newark, on the other hand, still in the supporting role while practising to one day fulfil his ambition of becoming boss of everything, continued taking notes.
A ripped black plastic bag, commonly bought for disposing of rubbish, lay on the one flat surface, with twelve lengths of old rope, some of it bloodstained.
The second gurney held the mutilated body of Mary-Lynne Fleetwood.
The dissection was obscene but not complete. Some parts of the body had been removed by use of a hand saw, while others had been partially dismantled by use of a knife, one serrated and one flat blade. Yet the neck had not been entirely severed and the head was still attached to the body.
“The cranium,” Bruce Newark muttered to himself, “the superior mesenteric artery, limestone pebbles found in the small intestine and bowel,” and he continued to scribble notes.
Ostopolis reported to Morrison. “This killer travels. Foreign objects found in the internal organs do not come from this geographical area. Ingested before death are small objects some of which are commonly discovered in the Cotswolds, but others are principally seen in the Midlands, and others mainly on the south coast.”
“Shit,” said Morrison. “So Sullivan has become a traveller again. It’s no great surprise. He was before, but I’d hope no one is going to give him a job as a coach driver now. His picture has been widely splashed about for goodness sake.”
“On her way home from the library,” Rita interjected, walking into the office behind Ostopolis.
“Time of death is a little vague at this stage,” he nodded. “The body parts tell different times. One arm and both hands may have been detached before the dissection of the remainder of the body.”
“Not before death?” Rita asked, horrified.
“No, no.” Ostopolis stood a little stiff as always, his hands clasped behind his back. Being extremely short, he had long ago adopted habits that gave him dignity. “All post mortem, but over a period of roughly thirty-six hours. And no food was consumed during that time since the stomach is virtually empty and the bowels hold only pebbles from across the country. That consumption was not post mortem.” He then placed a thick wad of papers on the desk between them. “First stage,” he said. “Quite a lot to read. But I want someone else to go through some things. I’ve contacted Jarven at Gloucester. There’s a few difficulties I wish to discuss.”
Morrison regarded Ostopolis and then turned to Rita. “The neck wasn’t fully severed. That strikes me as odd. Sullivan’s habits rarely change. All his later practises involved strangulation followed by total removal of the head, then usually placed separately. Between the legs, or in a different sack. I still believe there are more than one killer.”
“But if he’s run out of time – easy enough now he doesn’t have his precious shed.” Rita leaned across the desk, but Ostopolis remained standing and silent.
“The bastard had all the time in the world,” Morrison said, fr
owning. “Hands and arm severed before the rest of the body was mutilated? Already post mortem? The girl’s been missing for at least two days, maximum of two and a half. But if Sullivan had that time free to feed his madness, why stop anyway? His post mortem passions used to take up to a week.”
“When he had the shed. OK. So he thinks he has time to play, but then something happens suddenly, and he has to rush.”
Ostopolis unclasped his hands and raised one. “Time I was off, Darcey. I’ve telephoned for Jarven, and he’s promised to get back to me. I’ll bring you the final results as soon as I’m happy with them.” He marched from the office, and Rita turned to Morrison once more.
“Ostopolis may get something from Jarven, though I’ve no idea what he’s after. He likes minute details, and I don’t. But sometimes – just sometimes – that’s the proof we need.”
“So we send a couple of the boys out to check on this woman’s friends. She accepted a lift during a time of absolute risk. With all the Sullivan publicity at present, no one would take a lift from a stranger unless she was basically blind. And I want to know where this crime took place, for God’s sake. Forget forest sheds for a day or two and start investigating abandoned cellars and back rooms. Attics. Sheds at the back of suburban gardens. I want to read what Ostopolis has said about whatever was found on the plastic bag. Yes, they’re sold in their millions from every supermarket in the country. But where did it lie after that? No DNA, no fingerprints and no suspicious traces indicating where the crime took place. But it’s often amazing what forensics come up with. The Harrod’s bag, for instance. That must have been purposefully used.”
“Well, for a start,” Rita said, “making the girl swallow strange pebbles. Sullivan has never done that before. And why carefully choose stones from different places?”
The Games People Play Box Set Page 71