The Games People Play Box Set

by Barbara Gaskell Denvil

  “One,” said Morrison, bent over the pile of papers, “was a chip of quartz, principally found in the Scottish Highlands and Islands. Now that’s been done with intentional eccentricity, and it’s not like Sullivan’s over-riding brutality.”

  “We shouldn’t be too ready to make little things seem important.” Rita stood and began to march the small office floor. “He could have found it somewhere and it gave him the idea. OK, not naturally found in the Cotswolds, but some collector could have dropped it years ago. I’m not saying all that was probable, but nor is a second monster on the prowl, and I don’t believe Sullivan would ever take a partner.”

  Leaning back in the chair, Morrison sighed. “I’m going home to talk to my wife. No, I mean about what’s for dinner and where she fancies for a holiday this year and whatever the kids have done in school and what they’ve done to get into trouble lately. I have to clear my mind and concentrate on irrelevancies for a couple of hours. Hopefully, I will suddenly come up with all the answers I need in the middle of the night.”

  “I often wake up in the small hours with brilliant ideas,” smiled Rita. “But when I wake up properly the next morning, I realise how bloody stupid they all were.”

  “You’re obviously not a midnight fridge-raider,” Morrison nodded. “I get all my best inspiration peering into the fridge in the middle of the night.”

  “A wedding? In the middle of all this? And I hardly know the man.”

  “Yes, you do,” Harry pointed out. “He was one of your first suspects two years back when we started this nonsense. And he’s been through a lot lately,” he reminded her. “Virtually killing his wife, then being stuck in prison. I mean, shit, what a horrible thing to happen. And the woman too. Now I’ve forgotten her name, but she’s been through a divorce and so on. They’ve found each other out of the blue. Like we did.”

  “You told me her name was Doreen something. But I’m more interested in poor little Mary-Lynne. You go to the wedding. You keep complaining I’ve only got navy silk – so they’d think I was coming to a funeral.”

  “I’ll buy you some orange silk with white roses.”

  “I’d look like a statue in bad taste.” Sylvia was actually wearing her navy pyjama trousers with one of Harry’s old blue baggy T-shirts on top. “So you go and take a gift of some kind, and make excuses for me. Besides, it’s a bit quick after the divorce isn’t it?”

  “Well, she’s sixty, so I assume she’s not pregnant.”

  “An ignoble thought,” Sylvia told him. “Take Ruby. She probably loves weddings. And an excuse for a new dress. Besides, she’s looked a little woebegone lately. I keep asking her what’s wrong and she usually likes unburdening her soul, but at the moment she just clams up.”

  “I damn well hope she’s not contemplating suicide again.”

  “I asked that. I got worried,” Sylvia said. “She keeps saying she’s fine.”

  Three letters arrived at the same time, all addressed to Mr and Mrs Joyce. One was an invitation to the wedding of Doreen Soper to Anthony Allen on May Saturday 19th of May at the Cheltenham Registry Office, followed by a chance to get thoroughly pissed (in official print) at the Duck & Broom, which was the spacious and beautifully decorated pub next door. The invitation card came in an envelope decorated with little yellow rosebuds, which made Sylvia shiver.

  The second letter was a short page signed by Daisy Curzon explaining that her husband had become extremely ill, had been taken to hospital with severe salmonella, and her son Dean was deeply upset, as was she. Dean had almost fallen down the stairs when he heard the arrival of the ambulance. He could not stop crying. Daisy would deeply appreciate a visit from the kind friends who had previously helped cheer them all up, and also bring them up to date with the terrible news of the Cotswold Forest Killer, who for a short time had so menaced them closer to home.

  The third letter came with no sign of having been posted. Although the envelope was addressed to Harry and Sylvia Joyce, Rochester Manor, Little-Woppington-on-Torr, it seemed as though it had been personally thrust through the letterbox beside the front gate. The creased sheet of paper inside said very little and was printed in large letters with a red gel pen.

  ‘Crazy old wrinkled pair. Go drown yourselves in your silly little stream along with the fish and weeds. Stop poking your noses in and start knitting instead. If not, you will be oh so fucking sorry.’

  79

  “Unfortunately,” said Morrison, “just like every other damn thing, there’s no DNA, no fingerprints and no other evidence to identify the pig-arse idiot who wrote this.”

  “It strikes me as extremely immature,” Harry said. “And I can’t imagine Sullivan writing this.”

  “Sullivan’s immature too,” said Sylvia. “I can imagine him writing this, especially as he knows exactly who we are and where we live. Perhaps he was bored and wanted to frighten us. He enjoys that sort of thing.”

  “I don’t agree,” disagreed Harry. “All of it might be Sullivan except the ‘oh so fucking’ phrase. That sounds like a kid to me. This might simply be a false lead. Some child living nearby who wants to be clever.”

  “Very possible.” Morrison’s late-night inspirations had not solved the situation so far. “I never believed Jack the Ripper’s letter was genuine. And I don’t think this is. But we can’t be sure. If so – handwritten – it could give more clues than we’ve realised so far. The paper – the ink – and your CCT camera on your front fence.”

  “That’s been checked. It had a broken tree branch flung over it. All you can see is a blur behind leaves. But your men have it, and they may find something.”

  “In the meantime,” said Harry, “we might be going back to Nottingham for a couple of days. We got a letter from that nuisance of a woman, wanting comfort. We don’t have to go, of course, there’s no real reason. But there’s not much reason to stay here either.”

  “George Curzon is evidently sick. Not a cosy visit,” smiled Sylvia. “It’s not as if we’re related, and I’m not sure I even liked any of them. But they seem to think we could cheer them up, and personally, I’d like to ask them about the local people they know. Anyone who could be a copy-cat killer. Anyone who thinks they’ve seen Sullivan in the area. Even abandoned cottages or sheds. In other words, to do a good deed and help ourselves at the same time. Not so unselfish, but probably a complete waste of time.”

  With his legs stretched, the glass in his hand now almost empty, Morrison had looked extremely sleepy. “Unfortunately,” he said on a yawn, “half of everything the police do, turns out to be a waste of time. Inevitable. We must all follow every lead, and eighty percent of all leads turn out to be fruitless. You get used to it. So forget wasting time. What you might call waste, I’d call essential. It’s all good practise if nothing else.”

  Sylvia smiled widely as if having only just discovered something. “What an excellent point,” she said. “Time can’t ever really be wasted. After all, it’s entirely personal, and in another way, it’s entirely an illusion. So we’ll go to Nottingham. It’s a little bit relevant after all.”

  “The son knew the first girl killed up there,” nodded Harry.

  ‘Everyone’s interesting in one way or another,” Sylvia said, “even us, if you push in a couple of exaggerations. But at least we don’t give up.”

  “Well,” Harry said slowly, as though inventing excuses as he spoke, “that bugger Sullivan was first arrested because of me. I damn near died for it. And now the bugger’s running around again and killed off his wife who was becoming a friend of ours. He also threatened to kill me. And it’s not as though that might be an idle threat – not from a man like that. And whatever he’s up to in Nottingham, he still keeps living – and killing – around here. It’s about time someone stopped him and chucked him back in the Nick.”

  “You don’t need to make explanations to me. I know it all,” Said Sylvia. “And Nottingham again sounds just about as appetising as everything else. Except for one thing
. This time, my love, we’re going by car.”

  “Fine. I’ll drive,” said Harry. “And after we’ve spent a maximum of two days in Nottingham, we can drive further north. What about Leicester? What about Cumbria and all those fabulous lakes?”

  “Now that,” smiled Sylvia, “makes a great deal of sense.”

  Morrison drained his glass. “Sense,” he said, “doesn’t have to be sensible. The best options usually just pop out of the wide blue yonder.”

  So Sylvia grinned widely again and refilled his glass.

  “My dearest darling,” said Eve’s mother in her most soothing voice, “I’ve just had a call from Aunty Gladys. We’ve been invited up there for a week. Summer’s close, and it’ll be lovely down there in Cornwall. Her cat’s just had kittens. You know, that silky Persian she bought last year. Well, six kittens. Quite a handful. If we go up there in a few weeks, they’ll just be ready for cuddles.”

  “Oh, Mum.” Eve was staring out of the window at the long row of shops below, the bustle and the noise of traffic. “You’re so sweet. But I hate being treated like precious crystal that might break any minute. It’s – embarrassing. Just ignore me.I’m longing just to feel ordinary again.”

  Mrs Daish did not mention that finding the Stanley knife open, blade razor sharp beside her daughter’s bath, had terrified her. It wasn’t a normal method of shaving, but far more of a suicide temptation calling from the boiling hot water.

  “Say you’ll come to Aunty Grace’s sometime soon, and I’ll leave you in peace, dearest. Perhaps I’ll make some tea.”

  Eve looked up. “I ought to get a job, Mum. I’m OK now, honestly. I’d be better at work with people who don’t know who I am.”

  Blanching, her mother shook her head. “It’s too soon, my love. You know what the doctors said.” Belinda paused, then added, “But there’s one thing above all others, my darling. Remember – you’re free. Utterly free and you belong only to yourself. You can do anything – absolutely whatever you choose. You can jump off the Eiffel Tower, you can set fire to Buckingham Palace, you can rob a bank. Well, OK, I wouldn’t advise any of those, but you can design your own life now. Come to Aunty Gladys, or don’t. Your choice. Freedom’s important, though I do sometimes think it’s over-rated.” Another pause, then she hurried on, “Forget I said that. I’m just your silly old mother, my love. You know better than me.”

  “You know he’ll come up for trial sometime soon, and I’ll have to go,” Eve mumbled to the window. “And I expect you know other stuff too. Like me being an idiot and thinking of ending the whole stinking mess of memories and nightmares.” She turned away from the window, smiling. “I honestly want the rest of my life, and I love my freedom. I adore my freedom. But I honestly can’t go back to school. Everyone would be staring at me. I feel you all do that anyway. I feel I’m under a magnifying glass. Perhaps I’ll get a bit stronger first and then go look for a job. Perhaps I’ll join the police force. In uniform, people won’t recognise me. Besides, I needed so much help. Helping others would be nice, and I’d understand what they’re going through. I like the idea.”

  “They’ll forget,” said her mother. “The public forgets everything. We’ve all forgotten the last war, and that was just about the worst cruelty we’ve ever heard about.”

  “Perhaps I’m thinking too much about myself. Perhaps people have forgotten me or lost interest in me already.”

  “So what about Aunty Gladys?”

  “Oh, alright,” Eve said. “She sweet enough I suppose. Really boring of course. But the kittens won’t be boring, and maybe I’ll adopt one.” She looked up at her mother again, her eyebrows raised in question.

  “Freedom,” repeated her mother. “You can do whatever you like, my love.”

  The second little book was almost finished, the laptop covered in coffee stains, and Paul Stoker, although his wife was in another mood and wouldn’t speak to him, was feeling rather pleased with himself.

  “THE SECOND EXPLOSION OF LIONEL SULLIVAN” he was calling it – and, “by the one man who really knows the truth.”

  In actual fact, he had lost his two principal sources of information this time around, and when he tried to question the Gloucester police again, they simply told him that they were involved in extremely urgent business and could not divulge a single detail. In other words, get lost.

  Ghastly Gertrude refused to speak to him, twice slammed the door in his face and hung up the phone as soon as she knew it was him. Tracy, on the other hand, had entirely disappeared. Since Felicity, his wife, was in a sulk too, Paul felt himself thoroughly badly treated. He started the final chapter.

  “Lionel knew he would be captured soon. No one escaped forever, and unless he could keep killing, life wasn’t worth living anyway. Having discovered the easy way of travelling to his old friend in Nottingham for new shoes and gloves to fit his gigantic and malformed hands and feet, for buying his ticket online and then taking the train or coach while wearing a long hooded coat, he was able to enjoy his sadistic practices in both areas.

  But this wouldn’t last forever. Lionel even contemplated suicide. But he was too much of a coward to go through with it. Should he enjoy one more ‘game’ or should he end it forever? Should he hand himself in, and return to prison? Or should he just continue to enjoy himself for as long as he could? Henry Joyce, who had bravely captured him before, was still looking. However, now that Harry had married a woman who lived in the same Old People’s Care Home, he had other things on his mind.”

  Pausing, Paul stared at the screen, decided that the whole thing was boring, and went off to pour himself a whisky.

  In the morning, the alarm woke Milton at seven o’clock. He opened his eyes, saw the same ceiling, and closed them again. Having virtually always lived in two small windowless rooms with only minimal comfort, the small hospital-style confinement did not bother him in the least. He had a bright little bathroom attached, but he didn’t always bother to use it and pissed on the floor, in the bathwater, or in his bed just as often as he used the actual toilet bowl. He preferred meals brought to his room and cheerfully sat alone at his little table to eat. He disliked sitting in company. The dining room he was invited to use held two very long tables with ten chairs to each, every one of them occupied. Including himself, twenty of the criminally insane occupied the institution, although Milton had never counted them and did not care about numbers. But he did not like crowds. These were all male. Some were barely able to speak. Some threw their food. Some spat at him and mocked his face and legs. He had always been alone except when his brothers visited, or when they brought him a lady to play with.

  Milton dreamed most nights. First, he would lie in bed and his thoughts would drift to the wonder of the great perfection which only he could imagine. A pretty house with roses and bright sunshine coming through a hundred windows. He lived on the ground floor with no necessity to climb stairs with his crooked legs. But naturally his legs were now straight and when he looked in a huge mirror, he saw himself as tall, handsome, long legged and straight, beautifully dressed in many colours. He imagined bright red trousers, a gorgeously striped T-shirt, shiny blue sandals, and a little tartan waistcoat.

  He was no longer partially bald, and his thick black hair shone in the sunshine, cut beautifully like his brother Mark’s. Naturally both Mark and Maurice lived upstairs. Mark made mountains of money. Maurice lived with the pretty Kate, his wife, and the unknown little daughter Mia. They all loved each other, especially him.

  He could watch a lot of television and play ball in the garden (on straight legs) and even help Kate with the cooking. But his happiest diversion was with Lady Number One, who adored him, and who lived in a separate bedroom next door to his own. She came in every morning and woke him with a kiss. They would play games together every day. Sometimes she would cry, but he would remind her kindly that he was Master, and she would have to play along and do what he demanded. Then she would laugh and promise to be good. Sometimes he would cud
dle up with her in bed, but usually he preferred his own room. She never annoyed him, and nor, of course, did anyone else.

  Quite often in such dreams, he went on long holidays with the whole of the family, and that was best of all, out in pretty places and running around on his straight legs. Now he could even read a little bit, he might sit in bed to read a fairy story or a sexy picture book like the ones Maurice used to bring him.

  But heaven always crept away, and Milton would fall asleep and his dreams would change drastically. He would be stumbling on tiny bent legs through a desert, the sun scorching his back. He would be in excruciating pain, and up above within the clouds would be a hundred people laughing at him. He would see a pretty lady running towards him, but at the last minute she would run past, and disappear into the distance. The pain would increase. He usually woke crying.

  Now he lay, eyes closed but trying to forget the dream. A thump on the door was followed by a high pitched voice. “Come on, Milton. Have you bathed yet? And don’t forget to use the proper toilet for your wee-wees.”

  “I doesn’t wee-wee,” Milton said, gruff and annoyed. “I tinkles or I pisses.”

  “Just do it in the right place,” said the voice, fading along with the footsteps.

  Why, thought Milton, should he get up when some silly bitch told him to? He had always pleased himself when to sleep and when to wake. And when he had a lady to play with, his dreams had never been so miserable. They had often been most pleasant, even joyful. He was sick of obeying other people and having not one person to obey him. Maurice used to tell him what to do, but was usually polite about it, and gave him lots of nice surprises too. Mark never told him what to do. He had been the absolute darling, although sadly did not come very often.