by J G Alva
He was of the opinion however that Laney Childs’ equation was skewered long before he had ever arrived on the scene.
They had met at a late bar on Park Street almost a month ago. She had been perched at the bar like an exotic bird, tall at six foot, slim, attractive, with dark hair shot through with streaks of blonde. Coming to the bar himself, he could see there was perhaps a little too much jaw in her face, but this was balanced out with a wide engaging smile, good teeth, full lips.
He was wearing a suit jacket and shirt now because he had come to the museum directly from a night out with her. There had been a gallery opening in Clifton Village. She knew some people there. Sutton was interested. She met him outside the gallery in a figure hugging burgundy dress, a glint of diamonds at her ears, a delicate necklace with a red gem at her throat, bangles on her left arm. The gallery had been reasonably busy: there were drinks, conversation, a healthy cross section of the wealthier residents of Bristol, a little muzak from hidden speakers. The featured artists were not all without talent.
Alexander Graham was the only flaw in what might otherwise have been an enjoyable evening.
Three years ago, Alex had enlisted Sutton Mills’ help in finding his stepdaughter. A troubled teen, she had been missing for three weeks before Sutton had found her, living rough on the streets around the Broadmead area.
Alexander Graham was rich. He owned a large successful firm with an office in most major cities that offered planned office outings, team building weekends, and other assorted corporate events.
When Laney introduced Sutton, Alex’s eyes went wide for a moment. Sutton doubted anyone else noticed it, but he felt absurdly satisfied all the same. Despite his success in the task appointed him, Alex didn’t like him.
The feeling was passionately mutual.
Laney however liked Alex very much, and Sutton came to see that it was the aura of success surrounding him that attracted her like a moth to a flame. She seemed to hang on his every word.
After his initial moment of discomfort, in which Sutton made no mention of their former acquaintance, Alexander Graham relaxed into his role of philanthropist and well versed patron of the Arts. Laney leaned ever closer to hear the golden honey of wisdom dripping from his lips.
Quite frankly, it was embarrassing.
And almost too much for Sutton to bear.
“These artists are using both a literal and abstract emphasis of colour and texture, much like that of the German Expressionists of the early nineteen hundreds, to break down the essence of what we deem as ‘real life’, to distort, deconstruct and to modify how we see the world around us. Not to reproduce an impression shared by the whole world, but instead to personalise our reactions in the search for an eternal truth which each of us will know, and recognise, on a singular basis-“
At that point, Sutton could take no more, and leaning close to Laney, whispered in her ear, “can I have a word in private a moment?”
Laney’s eyes flickered as if she had woken from a hypnotic trance.
“What-“
Sutton took her elbow, smiled apologetically to Alexander, and led her outside.
“What’s the matter?” Laney asked.
Outside, the March air was chilly. Sutton looked down Victoria Street a moment, thinking, and then sighed.
“Shall we go somewhere else?”
Laney blinked.
“If you want, but-“
“I want.”
“Well. Okay. But we just got here. I thought you’d like it.”
Sutton pulled a face.
“I’m not too enamoured with the clientele, that’s all.”
“What? You mean Alex?”
Sutton shrugged, and tried not to let her expression bother him. She was smiling.
“Are you jealous of him? Is that what this is?”
Sutton shook his head, and his stony refusal to enter into light banter with her eventually killed any amusement in her eyes. She put a hand on his arm, concerned.
“Sutton. Hey. What’s the matter? Talk to me.”
“It’s nothing. I’m just done, that’s all.”
She stared at him.
“Alright. Then let me just tell Alex-“
“Tell him what?”
His tone was a little abrupt, and Laney looked surprised all over again.
“That we’re leaving,” she said. “He invited me.”
“Did he?”
“What’s the matter? Why don’t you like him?”
“Did I say I didn’t like him?”
“Not in so many words.”
“Well.” He paused. “It was interesting to see a snake wearing a suit anyway.”
“Sutton!” Laney said. Her eyes flicked to the gallery windows. “How can you say such a thing? Alex is a gentleman-“
“Gentleman-“
“He is. He’s been nothing but courteous to me. He’s smart, knowledgeable. His company contribute so much money to charity through various benefit dinners-“
“Alright, alright, I’m convinced. He’s a saint, nothing short of the second coming. None of which means that he can’t be a colossal piece of shit in his spare time.”
Now Laney had turned frosty. Her hand dropped from his arm.
“Oh? And you know this because…?”
Before he could think that what he knew might be better left unsaid, he had already said it.
“I know this because, three years ago, he was sticking his fingers in his fourteen year old stepdaughter.”
Laney blanched.
“How can you say such a thing?”
“It’s true. Ask his wife. Sorry. His ex-wife.”
She stared at him, perhaps for the moment not sure who he really was.
A little haughtily, she said, “if what you say is true, then how come he wasn’t arrested?”
Sutton sighed; she was being naïve.
“Because he gave her enough money – to keep her mouth shut – to cover her entire university education.”
“I don’t understand you-“
“Alright.”
“He’s a respected businessman-“
“Sure.”
“He gives more money to charity than you and I probably earn in a year-“
“Conscience money. There’s a saying amongst Graham’s competitors: never shake hands with Old Stinky Fingers, you don’t know where he’s been.”
Wide eyed, Laney stared at him, and then shook her head. She had just about given up on him.
“I’m going back into the gallery,” she said. “I’m not sure it would be such a good idea if you came with me. I don’t know what you think you know, but I doubt very much if it exists beyond your sordid little imagination.”
She didn’t wait for a reply but that was alright; Sutton was not much inclined to give one.
Being philosophical about the whole thing, he supposed he had ended other relationships over less.
In Maura’s office, he felt conspicuously overdressed, and sat in the office chair at the end of the desk awkwardly. It was a small forgotten corner of the museum, with a sloping ceiling on one side, filing cabinets against the walls, two potted plants and no window; a confining space. Sean and the woman who had accompanied him took the dark sofa against the back wall, while Maura sat behind her desk.
The policeman he could figure quite easily: he was short, compact, had dark hair and a boyish face; but his neck and shoulders were thick like a bull’s: he liked to fight, that much Sutton was sure. A scar on the edge of his left eye socket was testament to more than a casual acquaintance with a little rough housing. He’d have a temper. But there was the air of an executive about him, as if all his energy was carefully and deliberately channelled. He would be vicious on the squash court, and perhaps just as vicious, in his own way, as a policeman.
The woman was not so easy to pick apart.
She was in her late twenties, of medium height, skinny, with dark hair piled up on top of her head. The hair made her seem Frenc
h, but her white face and pinched mouth were too English. There was a severe look to her, not just to her expression but to the way she held herself, as if she hadn’t had fun in a long time…or had never had fun. A serious woman, dedicated to a cause. There would be no frivolity; it would all be cut from her life as cleanly as a surgeon excising a diseased limb. Her looks at him were sharp and incising, much like that of a surgeon…or perhaps more accurately like that of a butcher.
Ironically, the only thing to take a little of the sting of the frost from her was her eyes. They were a deep and startling blue, a blue borrowed from warm, tropical waters.
Maura offered coffee, but only Sean and Sutton accepted, and while she poured it for them, he felt the woman’s eyes on him again, and shifted a little in his seat under her gaze.
Maura finished passing the coffee out and then sat down.
“Tell me,” Sutton said.
*
“A little over three weeks ago,” Sean began, “some students stumbled across a body on Clifton Downs. The body was later identified as Victoria Jenkins, a twenty nine year old woman who worked as a Customer Complaints Administrator in an insurance company. Here in Bristol. She had no boyfriend, no enemies; we could find no one who disliked her enough to want to kill her. MCIU was called in because of the horrific nature of the crime: besides there being seventy two separate stab wounds all over her torso, her head had been removed.” Sean paused before adding, “it has yet to be recovered.”
Sutton’s eyes flicked to Maura, and Robin saw the minute shake of her head, telling him that she was alright.
Sean cleared his throat, touching the file folder in his hands.
“The students discovered her exactly a week after she was last seen alive. Nobody saw her being abducted, nobody witnessed any suspicious characters hanging around at her work or near her home. It quickly became clear to all of us in MCIU that this was a random attack, one of the hardest types of cases to solve, and that if we didn’t get some terrific stroke of luck, we were never going to find out who was responsible.”
Sutton said, “there was no forensic evidence?”
“None,” Sean said, his face grim. “Or at least, nothing that would help. The head was removed with brutal precision, with very little hesitation; everyone is of the opinion that some sort of mechanical device was used. In regards to the seventy two stab wounds, all that we were able to ascertain is that a serrated blade was responsible, possibly a hunting knife.” Sean shrugged. “Which was as good as useless. In fact, the complete absence of anything physical told us something in itself, that, in some way we have yet to verify, this perpetrator, whoever he might be, cleans the victims before disposing of them, thereby removing any trace elements.” Sean paused. “There was one thing though, an oddity, but we knew that it wasn’t going to help us catch her killer, not really: a tattoo. About as big as a greetings card. On her arm. Fresh. No profusion – no bleeding – meaning that it was applied post mortem. That it had to be the killer’s work.”
Sean opened the file folder in his hand and passed a sheet of paper to Sutton. Robin caught a glimpse of it as it moved between the two men. Even now, it made her skin cold.
Sutton studied it in silence.
After a pause, Sean continued.
“I suppose it was too much to hope that we wouldn’t see another. But a little over a week later another body was found, another female. Susan Bell. Twenty three years old, worked in a café in Redcliffe. She was found early on a Monday morning in one of the alleys off the bottom of Broad Street. No stab wounds this time, but this was found on her arm.”
Sean passed another sheet from the file folder to Sutton.
Sutton stared at it, and then sighed.
“So you knew you had a serial killer,” Sutton said.
Gravely, Sean nodded.
“Susan Bell was found almost exactly a week after she was last seen alive.” Sean spread his hands. “So you see.”
“Yes,” Sutton said, his eyes dark. “A pattern.”
Sutton examined both of the photographs of the tattoos, turning the pages on their ends, to examine them from different angles.
“Do you know what they mean?” He asked.
Robin cleared her throat and said, “you see the first one? If you look closely, you’ll see that the key in the crown is what is known as an impossible object. An impossible object is a representation of a three dimensional object that could not possibly exist in reality.”
“M.C. Escher,” Sutton said idly.
“Yes,” Robin said, mildly impressed.
“Is it a key?” Sutton asked.
“Well,” Robin said, and hesitated. “It could be.”
“And you have no idea what either of them mean?” He asked.
Robin looked at Sean.
Sean shifted in his seat, spread his hands and said, “none.”
“So what?” Sutton said, holding them up for Robin to look at. “He’s showing off?”
Robin looked to Sean again.
“Possibly. He wants people to know he’s smart.” She looked at Sean again, who stared at the office carpet. “Maybe…maybe smarter than the police?”
There was silence. Sean looked almost helpless in that moment.
“We don’t really know if there is any rhyme or reason to the tattoos,” he said. “Whether they’re merely affectations, if he is just showing off, as you say, or if there is more to them than that.”
“Like a hint about who he might be?” Sutton offered.
Sean smiled mirthlessly.
“Well. That would be nice.”
“A crazy tattooist?” Sutton said, with an ironic twist.
“Don’t think we haven’t gone down that route,” Sean said. “The trouble is most of the tattoo artists in Bristol are crazy, to a degree. But we couldn’t find one that was psychotic.” He paused. “Do they…do they suggest anything to you?” He asked hopefully.
Sutton stared at them again.
“Not right away.”
There was silence before Sean cleared his throat and began speaking once more.
“Again, this second victim seemed like a random attack. We believed that this was the work of an opportunistic killer. You know. He sees a girl walking home alone, the urge is upon him, he grabs her.”
“Any patterns between the victims?”
Sean lifted one shoulder.
“Nothing but a very broad physical one: the women were all blonde, slim, attractive.”
“He has a type.”
“Sure. But not one specific enough to be able to help us find him. None of the victims have anything in common, other than what I’ve just mentioned, and that they all live in Bristol. No common associations. They all live and work in different areas. It’s almost as if he’s stabbing a pin in a map at random.”
“Maybe he is,” Sutton said. “He wouldn’t be the first serial killer to operate like that.” He looked at the tattoos again and then said to Sean, “you’re missing something out.”
Sean looked confused a moment, and then nodded.
“Yes. Of course. Susan Bell’s head had also been removed.”
“Tell him what you call him, down at MCIU,” Robin said, and her voice sounded cold even to her own ears.
Sean looked pained in that moment.
“Robin-“
“Tell him,” she said angrily, her eyes flicking to Sutton.
Sean stared at Robin, and then sighed.
“The Head Hunter,” he said. “We call him the Head Hunter.” His eyes flicked to Robin. “It doesn’t mean anything. It’s just police humour. If we didn’t make jokes about stuff like this, we’d end up blowing a gasket.”
“If you say so,” Robin said stiffly.
Sutton stared at her for a moment before speaking.
“Any notions why he might be removing their heads?”
Sean shrugged.
“Aside from the obvious, not really.”
Sutton looked up.
“That he doesn’t want them identified.”
“Hm.”
“And yet you have identified them. How did you do that? Without their heads?”
Sean said, “Victoria Jenkins applied for a job in the Navy, would you believe it, back when she was in her teens, so her fingerprints were on file. Susan Bell was caught shoplifting a couple of years ago.”
“That’s lucky.”
“Yeah, it is. But you know what can happen to luck.”
“Yes. It can change.”
“Hm.”
Sutton took a deep breath, and then leaning forward, handed the photographs of the tattoos back to Sean.
“So why have you come to me?” He asked.
Sean shifted a little on the sofa, and scratched the back of his head fitfully.
Slowly, he began, “MCIU is now handling this. I’ve only been with them for six months, but they’re good. A lot of intelligent officers with a lot of experience. The cream of the crop, you might say. But like any animal with too many legs, it moves slowly. It’s efficient, it works, but it takes time. Too much time. With two cases on our hands now, it’s picking up pace. We’ve got three shifts working round the clock, we’re getting help from all over, but…” Sean shook his head with frustration. “We’re not going to get the guy in time.”
“In time for what?”
Sean looked at Robin and said, “five days ago, my cousin was abducted.”
Robin felt her muscles tighten, as if she was preparing for a blow, and with an effort made herself relax.
Sutton said, “and you think it’s the same guy?”
Sean nodded.
“There was a witness. Andrea – my cousin – she lives on Victoria Square. In Clifton Village. A delivery guy saw her being abducted. We got a description. Tall, over six foot, mid-twenties, short cut blonde hair. Strong. Driving a white Ford Transit van.”
“I suppose it’s too much to hope that he made a note of the license plate.”
Sean shook his head.
“No license plate. In the guy’s defence, he went over to try and stop the abduction. He’s a bit of a macho fuck – excuse my language – he probably thought he could stop this guy, be the hero.”
“But he didn’t.”