Girl 4

by Will Carver

  They metamorphose.

  The man takes the place of the woman inside the confines of the chest. Figuratively speaking, he turns into a woman.

  What we know is that Richard Pendragon, Girl 5, was treated in the same way, only this time it was a more sadistic take on a classic magic trick. The fundamental elements were all in place – the style of chest, the sword, the fabric – but the trick itself was taken too literally. By cutting off his penis and glamorising him with make-up and a wig, my father was literally taking away his manhood. Turning him into a woman.

  What I know is that it goes so much further than this.

  Because I know what The Smiling Man has shown me.

  The magical element has been present in all of his messages, but, like all good magicians succeed in doing, I was misdirected towards something else, so that the illusion could take place behind the scenes. He made himself disappear and reappear in the last vision; the bullets emerged from his sleeve when he warned me about Girl 1 – a classic part of magic mythology; a magician always keeps something up their sleeve – and the arrows were produced from the inside of the jacket when he tried to alert me to Girl 2’s impending demise.

  Paulson fingers his screen as he shows me the information, invisibly underlining information that supports this theory. He can’t disguise his excitement; his coffee still untouched, cooling through neglect. I try to hide my fear, suppressing my extra information from The Smiling Man.

  I approach the whiteboard again, deep in my thoughts, determined now to piece things together. Under Girl 5, Richard PENDRAGON, I write: The Pendragons, Metamorphosis.

  Murphy raises a hand to signal that he’s found some information regarding MORETTI.

  ‘Performed by Hans Moretti in 1995.’ We gather round his desk and Murphy plays us a video clip of the trick he has found online.

  It is exactly the way Carla died.

  I watch the tape, my imagination superimposing tragic images of Girl 2.

  Hans Moretti is a bald magician with a laughable handlebar moustache. His wife, Helga, is his partner. He sticks two plasters over his eyes, then covers them with a black blindfold. Then he spins in a circle like a dizzy child with a crossbow in his hands pointing towards the ceiling. He stops, facing away from his wife, who has now placed herself directly behind him with an apple on her head.

  She rings a bell in front of the apple.

  He shoots the arrow over his shoulder to make it more difficult and misses the apple by a matter of centimetres.

  Helga is not pleased. He asks her a question and she shouts ‘No!’ in his direction. Each of us stifle a laugh at her reaction.

  They start the process again.

  ‘According to this information, in all the times they have performed the trick, Helga has only been injured twice,’ Murphy spurts, desperate to share his research; to prove himself valuable again.

  Carla was injured three times before the final arrow killed her.

  We continue to watch, enthralled.

  This time they go through the same process. Spinning in a circle, blindfold on, crossbow over shoulder, ringing the bell, hoping he hits it. This time he is successful. The arrow cuts straight through the centre of the fruit, attaching it to a bullseye above his wife’s head.

  Eames didn’t manage this once.

  Dad didn’t manage it once.

  Under Girl 2, Carla MORETTI I write, Hans and Helga Moretti, Crossbow.

  My shoulders stiffen with tension as I become increasingly convinced by my theory, but I am still searching for a magician with the surname David to prove it conclusively. David Blaine, David Copperfield, David Roth, but none with the surname. Damn. I have to be on the right track here. It all fits too well.

  Then a random thought drifts across my mind: David. My father has the same surname. What if that was his trick?

  ‘Penn & Teller.’ Murphy suddenly leaps out of his seat, his whole body for once projecting excitement. ‘Of course, The Bullet Catch,’ he announces. ‘They are famous for it.’ He looks giddy, like a child would look at a birthday party if someone were performing magic in front of them.

  What I know is that Penn & Teller performed an illusion on stage in 1996 that they said was the most dangerous trick in the world. A feat where both men fire a gun at the same time, both guns aimed at the opposite person, both men catching the bullet between their teeth. The bullets are fired through a pane of glass to show that they leave the guns. They are signed by members of the audience before being loaded.

  What I know is that The Smiling Man placed a bullet between my teeth in a similar manner.

  What I don’t know is why he swallowed his.

  What I don’t know is why he rushed at the chair that appeared next to me.

  I lean back in my seat, closing my eyes for a second and trying to clear my brain; to keep thinking clearly. Spurred on by my theory, we have made a huge amount of progress on the case in one swoop, but the things I still don’t know are the things that will help put it to rest for ever.

  The room buzzes with activity. Never are all three of us sitting down. Either we are crowded around one screen or writing on the board or coaxing the paper out of the printer to see the text quicker. It’s the urgency we needed from the start.

  I grab my pen again and stride to the whiteboard once more.

  Under Girl 1, Dorothy PENN, I write: Penn & Teller, Bullet Catch.

  ‘Jan, I’ve found the Mullica trick,’ Paulson announces proudly.

  I don’t respond. I have just realised why I found Girl 4, Audrey David, my wife, in the position she was in.

  I force myself to put those thoughts on hold; to work methodically. I turn to Paulson and listen to his findings.

  Tom Mullica performs his trick on stage with a handful of cigarettes. Starting with four, he lights them individually, then proceeds to hide them in his mouth while he lights four more. These also go into his mouth, as if he has swallowed them. After a short time they reappear as a bunch of cigarettes that fill his mouth, stretching his lips around them and puffing heavily. The final part of the act sees him fill any available space within his mouth with tissue paper. Once full it appears that he completely swallows the entire contents in one swift gulp.

  Obviously Eames, which I assume for now is my father’s magician name, took the premise of the prestidigitation and perverted it into a colourful execution, where Girl 3 was forced to inhale the toxic smoke and asphyxiate on the sheer volume of cigarettes overtaxing her jaw.

  What we know is that one hundred and fifty-six cigarettes were found, some ingested.

  What I know is that there were the same amount of Smiling Men in my dream.

  What we don’t know is the reason for Girl 3’s appearance; the jump cables and wires that bound her, the contortion of her body.

  Under Girl 3, Amy MULLICA, I make Paulson write Tom Mullica, Cigarette Eating.

  I turn back to my own computer and stare unseeingly at the screen, instead looking inwardly to my own thoughts. My research session has uncovered something that rocks my core. A definitive list of the greatest magic tricks of all time. Looking down the final fifteen, a shiver runs through me as I start to wonder whether there have been more girls that we have missed.

  What I don’t know yet is that Audrey is still needed.

  Out of the top eleven tricks, we have found girls that correspond with six of them. It still leaves Richard Ross’ Linking Rings, Paul Daniels’ Chop Cup, Robert Harbin’s Zig-Zag Girl, which I can already see as a murder scene in my mind, and Lance Burton’s Doves.

  Number five is David Copperfield’s Flying.

  She wasn’t supposed to be a floating corpse; she was supposed to be a flying corpse.

  In this awe-inspiring act of conjuring, David Copperfield flies around the stage. The background appears to be like the sky, the floor is a sea of dry ice. Just the way we found Girl 4.

  The audience believes that he must be attached to strong wires that are undetectable with
the human eye. To discard that theory, he flies through hoops – a concept seen in other floating tricks. However, to take the magic further, he drops himself into a large perspex box – like the transparent coffin directly below the floating corpse – and the lid is closed on him to inhibit the use of wires.

  For seconds he lies on the bottom of the box until he lifts up again, flying and floating in the contained area, amazing all that watch him.

  To me, this is the most impressive of all.

  I wonder whether my father would have known that before he took Audrey.

  Under Girl 4, Audrey DAVID, I write David Copperfield, Flying.

  I scan the list on the whiteboard and see that every girl chosen has the same surname as the great magician who performed the associated trick – apart from Girl 4. Her surname is the first name of the magician. Possibly the most revered illusionist of our time.

  What I know is that Audrey did not die.

  What I don’t know is that she wasn’t supposed to.

  I see that the only trick left untouched is known as The Death Saw. It sounds overly dramatic, but this is commonly regarded as the best trick of all time.

  Another by David Copperfield.

  Another for Audrey David.

  What I don’t know is that he still needs her. To complete his masterpiece. A series of the greatest magic tricks in history, all carried out, performed, by the same man. Only the conclusion, the reveal moment, is far more callous and brutal than ever seen.

  My father, who ceased to perform in any capacity the moment that Cathy was taken, has returned for one last rendition.

  He wants to conduct the most remembered piece of visual art for our generation.

  The greatest trick of all time.

  And cause me to suffer the way he feels only he has for the last two decades.

  But The Smiling Man has not revealed himself to me. So, learning to accept his appearances as trustworthy, I know that no girl is in any immediate danger. I think the reason he didn’t appear for Girl 4 was because she didn’t die; there was nothing to warn me about. She will be fine, I tell myself.

  I think about The Smiling Man. I recall my father’s face as he voyeuristically enjoyed my reunion with my mother. As he saw the wound of Cathy’s disappearance open up again when I realised my mother was right all along.

  I think The Smiling Man is supposed to represent my father.

  I look at the evidence on the whiteboard and compare it with the visions I have endured and I know it is him. I know it’s my father.

  But what we know is only what we think we know.

  Eames

  WHEN I LOOK at Audrey’s face as she lies in the passenger seat unconscious, her hospital smock hitched up to display some of the cuts across her thighs, I know it’s nearly over.

  I know he’s coming to get me.

  My work is almost done.

  I take my left hand off the gearstick and place it delicately on her leg, running my fingertips lightly over the tender ridges of her lacerations, admiring my work; it’s close to being sexual. As I stroke upwards on her thigh, my hands move against the grain of the tiny hairs that have started to grow on her legs while inactive at the hospital. I push the crumpled material up towards her waist, so that I can see between her legs.

  I glance at the traffic snailing along in front of me, then flit my eyes up to the mirror to gauge whether I am being followed.

  I’m not.

  He still doesn’t know that she is gone.

  I place my hand between her legs, resting it on top, so that I can feel the warmth of her soft flesh. I don’t go any further than this; I don’t massage the area or insert my fingers. That’s not right. That’s not me.

  A car makes a sharp stop in front of me and I press down hard on the brake, moving my left hand back to the steering wheel. I’m expecting a possible impact with the car ahead and brace myself, stiffening my arms, but Audrey is still not awake and her supple frame is thrown forwards and blocked aggressively when the seatbelt locks into place.

  She doesn’t wake up.

  The driver in front makes a gesture in his mirror to show his irritation. I imagine ramming his rear bumper on purpose, then getting out of my seat, walking over to his open window and wrapping the seatbelt around his neck tightly, his engine revving as he pushes down on the accelerator, trying to wriggle out of the situation.

  Then she stirs.

  I hear her voice grumble, her throat crackle.

  And I want my face to be the first thing she sees.

  I wonder how far away from the truth Detective Inspector January David is.

  This is the final trick.

  The one I will be remembered for.

  Has he learned his lesson?

  Timing is crucial. Detective Inspector January David must return to the last place that he found his wife. The same stage she graced with her flying naked body. This time, as with the last, she will still be alive; I can give him this much. But the entire process would have been in vain if he is not there to watch the saw drop suddenly, cutting through the waist of his exquisite wife, dividing her into two pieces, neither of which make me feel any more inclined to share her with someone else.

  The image in my mind is arousing.

  I turn my head to look at her again; my beguiling charm.

  She opens her eyes and I smile at her.

  ‘Hello, Girl 7, are you ready to be remembered?’

  January

  ALL THREE OF us stare at the whiteboard like it’s a floating corpse. Paulson to my left, Murphy to my right. He leaves a little space; our relationship is still tender.

  ‘Looks pretty conclusive, Jan,’ Paulson says, not turning his head away from the board.

  ‘I don’t know how you did it, but it has to be, right?’ Murphy chucks his opinion into the mix.

  I resist the urge to comment, to take a swipe at him for his momentary lapse of judgement when he suspected that I was behind it.

  But I am involved. This is all being done for my benefit. These girls are being killed to hurt me. To make me feel the pain of the killer himself.

  The evidence seems irrefutable. These are the reasons that each girl was slain in such a specific way, down to the most microscopic of details. The motives seem clear, but not decisive.

  ‘Let’s bring him in,’ I tell them, still staring at the portion of the board that says Girl 4, Audrey David. ‘Let’s fucking end this.’

  During the time of our estrangement I have in fact had the resources to find my father; to try to apologise or make it up to him, to try to explain my side; but I would never abuse my power as a police officer. Before The Smiling Man entered my life I would never step a foot outside the rule book. But I have a reason now.

  I need to bring my own father in.

  It’s my job to talk to him now.

  He moved back to Islington, near where we lived as a family, eight years ago. A small flat in a cul-de-sac of housing that horse-shoes around the top of a hill.

  The front door is not at street level; you have to go up a flight of stairs under a badly lit arch. He is too old now to run and there is no way out for him.

  I knock on the door firmly. ‘Mr David,’ I say in a low tone, as if disguising my voice. It feels wrong somehow to refer to him in this manner, even though he hasn’t been my father for years.

  I knock again. ‘Mr David, this is the police. Can you please open the door? We need to ask you a few questions.’

  Perhaps an understatement.

  Why are you murdering innocent women in the name of magic?

  Why did you take my wife and hang her from the ceiling of a theatre?

  Why did you turn Mum’s machine off?

  What did I do to deserve this?

  ‘Maybe he’s out,’ Murphy says nervously.

  ‘Whether he’s in or out, we are going through this door tonight.’ I bang on the door one more time, more aggressively than before. ‘Mr David!’ I shout, not really waiting for a r
esponse.

  I take a step back, flailing my arms to the side, so that Paulson and Murphy create some room for me. I lift my right leg off the floor, bending it so that my knee is at the height of my chest, and land my foot full force on to the door. Something cracks, but it doesn’t open. I repeat the move again to the same effect. The lock is not in the middle of the door; it’s slightly higher, so I barge it with my shoulder and it swings open, letting a stench release itself into the open air.

  I’ve come across this a few times in my career. I know what it is.

  And everything I thought I knew has come undone.

  My father is in the living room, sat in his chair opposite the television, his dinner unfinished, placed on a tray, resting on a small table in front of where he is perched.

  Where he died.

  Over a week ago.

  My phone rings, not giving me any time to digest the image before me. Not allowing me to confront my recent orphaned state.

  It is one of the guards from the hospital.

  ‘What’s happening?’ I ask, hearing a recurring siren noise in the background.

  ‘It’s a fire alarm. Everything is under control, we’ll take care of Mrs David. I just didn’t want you to worry if you heard anything through another source,’ he tells me succinctly.

  I tell him that one of them has to be with her at all times and he needs to update me once the situation is back to normal. He begins to affirm my order, but loses reception and is cut off.

  A bottle of Scotch sits on the floor next to Dad’s leather single-seater, the lid hidden somewhere across the room, probably thrown over there as he realised it wouldn’t need to be kept fresh.

  The dinner on the plate has dried and shrunk. It looks as though it may have been a steak and kidney pie with mashed potato and beans at one point; a hearty final meal. Two empty plastic containers that were once full of painkillers sit next to the plate. Under the plate is a handwritten note.