The Eulalie Park Mysteries Box Set 1

by Fiona Snyckers

Ruby frowned.

  “When did you hear him speak? I thought you only saw his face for a second when his mask slipped.”

  Eulalie knew she had made a mistake but couldn’t bring herself to regret it. It was too important that Ruby should have a full and proper description of the man Eulalie had seen.

  “He said something when he jumped out of the bushes at us,” Eulalie said. “I can’t remember what it was, but I remember what his voice sounded like.”

  “This sketch is giving me nothing,” said Ruby. “It doesn’t look like anyone I’ve ever seen.”

  “But you think it might be someone you know, or someone who has been stalking you?”

  This was an angle that no one had considered – that the man had first attacked Ruby because he knew her or was fixated on her. Then he had discovered that he enjoyed terrorizing women with a knife and had moved on to strangers.

  “Let’s try something else,” said Eulalie. “Do you have any photos of you and your friends, or pictures of you standing in a big group of colleagues or acquaintances?”

  “I have pictures like that, sure.”

  “Can you show me as many as you have? I might be able to pick his face out of the crowd.”

  Ruby shivered. “It’s so horrible to think that he might be someone I know.”

  “Do you keep your photos in albums, or on a phone, or…?”

  “I don’t have a smartphone, just this Nokia. I take most of my photos on a digital camera. It has a lot of memory, so I seldom delete anything. Wait a moment…” She rummaged in her backpack. “Yes, here it is. You switch it on here, and then you click here to see the stored images. If you want to go backwards, click on this left arrow, and if you want to go forwards, click on the right.”

  Eulalie took the camera from her. She saw that there were 236 stored images. What were the chances that the man they were looking for was amongst them?

  Leaning back against the wall of the building, Eulalie began to flick through the photos. Many of them were pictures of Ruby on her own, or with a girlfriend. Then there were group pictures, which had obviously been taken at parties. There were some that had been taken right here in the philosophy department in a professional context. Eulalie looked just as carefully at those. She scrutinized every photograph, looking for an open, boyish face with smiley grey eyes and freckles. She was looking for the boy next door.

  The photographs stretched back about six months.

  Eulalie found what she was looking for about four months back.

  It was a photograph of an arts faculty garden party that had been held in the November of the previous year. There must have been upwards of fifty people in the photograph, but something about the tilt of the man’s head, and the way his curls lifted in the breeze brought a jolt of excitement to her chest.

  She held the camera out to Ruby. “How do you zoom in with this camera? Is it possible to zoom?”

  “Sure, you just keep clicking that little button. When nothing more happens, it means it can’t zoom anymore.”

  Eulalie clicked the little button, watching a face in the crowd get bigger and bigger. The picture clarity of the camera was excellent, but it had its limitations. When the picture began to get grainy and blurred, Eulalie reversed the zoom until she had the best possible focus on his face.

  “Who is this?” she asked, passing the camera to Ruby.

  Ruby looked at it and smiled. “Oh, that’s just Mike. Michael Vlismas. He’s a junior lecturer in the economics department. Why are you asking about him?”

  “How well do you know him?”

  “We hung out with the same crowd when we were undergraduates. He’s a complete sweetheart. He’s the kind of guy that every girl wants as her best friend. He even asked me out once but was perfectly happy to stay friends when I turned him down. The last time I saw him was at that garden party. He was as sweet as ever.”

  “It didn’t occur to you to mention him when I was describing a six-foot tall man with curly brown hair and a boyish face?”

  “Michael?” she said. “Of course, it didn’t occur to me. I’m telling you, Mike is an angel. He wouldn’t hurt a fly.”

  “He also happens to be the man I saw the other night,” said Eulalie.

  “No. You’re mistaken. You must be. Mike wouldn’t say boo to a goose.”

  “He has a high-pitched voice when he speaks, doesn’t he?”

  “Well, yes. But you’re not listening to me. There is no way this was Mike. None whatsoever.”

  “This,” said Eulalie, tapping the image with her forefinger. “This is the man who tried to attack me.”

  Donal

  “Good afternoon, Inspector. So good of you to see me.” Remus Selkirk flashed his megawatt smile at Inspector Petrick and shook hands.

  Petrick grunted. “Sit down.”

  Selkirk changed direction immediately. This was a man who couldn’t be charmed. Any attempt to do so would only succeed in irritating him.

  “You’re a busy man, sir, so I’ll get straight to the point.”

  “That would be appreciated.”

  “I understand from Constable Burns that you might be in the market for a software package that allows you more creativity in managing your salary payroll. That’s exactly what our package offers. Whether you’re a by-the-book man, or more of a free-thinker, we can tailor a package just for you.”

  A knock at the door made them both turn. Selkirk kept his smile in place. He hoped that Petrick would get rid of whoever it was quickly.

  “Come!”

  The door opened, and a woman walked in. She had a square face and short, no-nonsense hair. In her mid-thirties, she was a good twenty years younger than Inspector Petrick.

  “Come in and sit down, Tina. Mr. Selkirk, I asked Sergeant Shortridge to sit in on this meeting because she helps me with several administrative matters - such as the payroll, for instance.”

  “Inspector Petrick, this is confidential. We’ll be discussing sensitive financial matters. I really think it would be better if it were just the two of us.”

  “You can speak freely in front of Sergeant Shortridge,” said Petrick. “She knows everything there is to know about this department.”

  Selkirk watched the glance they exchanged and decided that Donal was right. These two were more than colleagues.

  “Very well, Inspector. Perhaps the most useful thing I can show you right now is a demonstration of what you will be able to do when your payroll is under the control of our software.”

  Petrick and Shortridge’s faces were stony, but they didn’t object.

  Selkirk opened his laptop, which had been preloaded with some basic accounting software and a mock-up of the monthly salary obligations of a small dummy business.

  “So, here we have a small to medium size organization that employs eighteen people. Let’s say we decide that not all eighteen of those people need to be on the fulltime payroll. Let’s say that Bill Brown here should really be a contract worker rather than permanent staff. That way, we don’t have to pay into his pension fund or give him these health and housing benefits that he currently enjoys. He will be paid on a weekly basis per hour worked. It’s the way of the future. Many organizations are moving their staff onto contract work these days.”

  Petrick and Shortridge didn’t look overjoyed, but they were listening, which was a good sign.

  “So, the amount of money you are spending on Bill Brown per month has dropped from, let us say, two thousand pounds a month to sixteen hundred pounds a month. That’s a saving of four hundred pounds, and all completely legal and above board.”

  He paused for them to react. Neither officer looked particularly excited at the prospect of saving the Scottish taxpayer four hundred pounds a month.

  “But look at this,” said Selkirk. “Bill Brown has not been deleted from the list of fulltime staff. He is still there. Most software programs won’t allow you to duplicate an employee profile like that. They would detect that you have two employees b
y the same name and national insurance number and record it as an error. But not our software. Look here. It even allows you to edit Bill Brown’s name. What shall we call him now? How about Suzie Smith? Because that’s what auditors tend to look at, isn’t it? They would notice duplicated names, but not necessarily duplicated national insurance numbers. So, now you’ve got Bill Brown contract worker who is earning sixteen hundred pounds a month, and we also have Suzie Smith who is earning two thousand pounds a month on the regular payroll. You have two thousand pounds extra coming in that you can use for any purpose you choose. Good works in the community. Charitable initiatives. That sort of thing.”

  Selkirk looked up and smiled at Inspector Petrick and Sergeant Shortridge. He didn’t quite wink at them, but it was close.

  “Tell me, Mr. Selkirk,” said Inspector Petrick. “Are you working with the authorities to uncover financial irregularities in our division?”

  Selkirk froze. All this time he had thought that he was playing them, and they had seen right through him. Had they known what he was up to from the moment Constable Burns made the approach? Selkirk knew his face was flooding with color. It was his one weakness – this tendency to blush when caught unawares. He tried to speak, but the words wouldn’t come.

  Then he noticed the way Petrick and Shortridge were looking at him. There was no amusement in their expressions. They were genuinely waiting for a response.

  “I didn’t…”

  He ground to a halt and tried to think. Inspector Petrick was asking if this was a form of entrapment, which it was.

  Did that mean he had to tell them the truth? What was it Donal had said? This sting didn’t need to hold up in court. It just had to be good enough for the media to pick up the story and run with it. That would put pressure on the authorities to investigate properly. Donal might only be twenty-years-old, but he was one of the smartest people Selkirk knew.

  Selkirk cultivated a contrite expression. “I’m sorry if I gave you the wrong impression. I didn’t mean to suggest that you should use this software for anything illegal. You’re police officers after all, right?” He laughed nervously.

  “So, you aren’t working for the authorities?” Inspector Petrick repeated.

  “Absolutely not. I’m a salesman, sir. My only boss is the commission I make on each sale. I thought we were on the same page about this software, but I guess I misread the situation. I’m sorry, and I’ll get out of your hair now.” He made as if to close his laptop.

  Sergeant Shortridge lunged towards him, as though to stop him from leaving. Inspector Petrick put out a hand too.

  “No need to be hasty, son. In this day and age, you can’t be too careful. I’m sure you understand.”

  Selkirk gave an eager nod. “Of course.”

  “We are very interested in your software and what it can do. Perhaps you could show us more.”

  “Certainly, Inspector. As you know, the police station offers generous home loan terms to officers. This takes the form of a subsidy that is paid directly to the bank. Many employees choose not to take up that benefit because they prefer to rent or aren’t ready to enter the property market yet. Our software allows you to add the subsidy to an employee’s salary benefits without it ever appearing on their salary statement.”

  Sergeant Shortridge sat forward. “So, the employee would never know that they were supposedly receiving the home loan subsidy, but it would appear on our payroll records?”

  “Yes, exactly. The subsidy amount could then be diverted into any channels you choose. Another community upliftment project, perhaps.”

  This time Selkirk did wink. Petrick and Shortridge both laughed.

  “This all sounds very promising.”

  “Would you be interested in the package with the flexible home loan subsidies, or the Deluxe package that includes the capacity to create contract workers while keeping permanent employees on the roll?”

  “We’ll want the Deluxe package,” said Inspector Petrick, as Sergeant Shortridge nodded. “The housing subsidy trick is cute, but the real money lies in duplicating salaries.”

  “You have to be smart about it. If you create too many dummy employees, you will only draw attention to yourself.”

  “We’re not planning to do this forever,” Inspector Petrick said. “Just until we’ve got enough money to retire comfortably. Then we’re out of here.”

  “Our software package will help you to achieve that goal.”

  “I think we’ve heard enough to make a decision. Is there anything more you need from us?”

  “No,” said Remus Selkirk. “I have everything I need.”

  Epilogue

  Eulalie

  The events that followed would become familiar to Eulalie later on in her life, but for now they were confusing, exhilarating, exciting and stressful.

  She tried to keep herself out of it as much as possible, but the only way to kick the process off was to give a statement to the police in person. She went to the police station and told them she believed that the person who had attacked her and Fleur was Michael Vlismas in the economics department. She gave them the same story she had given Ruby – that his mask had slipped for a moment and she had seen his face.

  She told the police she believed he was hiding evidence in the house that he shared with two other graduate students.

  Eulalie had no particular reason for believing this, but she thought it must be likely. All three of his surviving victims had described a knife very much like the one she and Fleur had seen him carrying. If it was the same knife, he must be keeping it somewhere. He must be cleaning it somewhere.

  She also believed that his habit of cutting women would lead to blood stains on his clothing. Either he was dumping outfit after outfit, or there were clothes of his that might still have traces of the victims’ blood on them.

  She believed it was vital that his home be searched without loss of time, and so she steeled herself to give the statement.

  She was met with just as much suspicion and incredulity as she’d expected, but she stayed calm and stuck to her story. After the death of Carina Novak, the police and campus security were desperate enough to follow up on any lead, even one they suspected to be a hoax.

  And so, the police had descended on Michael Vlismas’s house in a dawn raid at five in the morning. They had found him at home and fully dressed, as though he were returning from somewhere. This added fuel to their suspicions, so they tore his house apart.

  Eulalie, watching from the cover of an oak tree across the road, saw the police bagging up items of evidence. These included clothing, bedding, and several knives. Before her eyes, the police changed from languidly going through the motions to searching with real enthusiasm. She could only guess that they had found something in Vlismas’s house that had energized their search.

  Later that day, Michael Vlismas was arrested for the murder of Carina Novak and for the aggravated assault of Whitney, Ruby, and the third student whose name was not released to the media.

  To her relief, Eulalie was told that her testimony would not be needed at trial. It was too vague and unreliable. It had been dark when she had seen him and besides, they had enough physical evidence against him to convict him several times over.

  It was only when the investigation was finished and the long wait for a trial date had begun, that Eulalie made a discovery.

  She missed it.

  “I felt alive when I was hunting him,” she told her grandmother on the phone. “I felt purposeful and energized. Now that it’s all over, I just feel flat. I loved the puzzle of it – the slow untangling of the knots and the unravelling of the mystery. What am I going to do now?”

  “You’re going to be glad that you have found a possible career direction,” said Angel.

  “In law enforcement? I’m not sure I want to be a police officer.”

  “You can work out the details later. For now, just enjoy the fact that you have found something you love doing.”

  T
he next morning, Eulalie went to the student affairs office and changed her major to criminology. She kept psychology as one of her minor courses, but she was no longer merely interested in the workings of the human mind.

  It was the criminal mind that fascinated her.

  Donal

  Remus Selkirk got a hero’s welcome when he returned to the storeroom after his conversation with Inspector Petrick and Sergeant Shortridge.

  Constable Burns was delighted - Donal cautiously optimistic. They made copies of the recording and sent it off, with a detailed covering letter, to all the main media outlets in Scotland and the United Kingdom. They targeted both the mainstream media and the tabloids.

  The response was disappointing.

  A couple of gossip magazines ran the story, but their impact was so low, and their credibility so compromised that they were easy to ignore.

  Then the Daily Mail ran a sanctimonious piece about the squandering of taxpayers’ money, and the online comments almost crashed their website.

  A day later, The Scotlander got hold of the story and it began to gain traction. Soon, prominent talk shows and news programs were discussing the issue of corruption at a local level in Scotland’s police stations.

  While this was going on, Inspector Petrick and Sergeant Shortridge hung onto their jobs, insisting that they were innocent until proven guilty. Donal began to worry that the whole thing would blow over without any action being taken against them. It was just a matter of time before the media turned their attention to the next scandal to come along and forgot all about them.

  Then the District Inspector announced that a full investigation would be instituted into the finances of the local division under the control of Inspector Petrick. An independent audit would be conducted, this time by a different auditing firm to the one that had been giving the division a clean bill of health for the last few years.

  Within a week of this announcement, Inspector Petrick and Sergeant Shortridge tendered their resignations. Donal heard that they were arrested before they even got home that night.