by Graham Smith
‘So we’ve got the missing persons to track down. What else do we have, ma’am?’
‘Nothing. That’s the bloody problem. We’ve got nothing. There’s bugger all to go on, and in a few hours, I’ve got to sit next to DCI Phinn and tell journalists from national newspapers and the TV news as much. Jesus, we still haven’t identified the fourth victim. What the hell am I supposed to say?’
‘Actually, ma’am, I was thinking about that last night. I went through the misper reports and eliminated everyone from Cumbria who’s a match for what we know about Woman 1. With that done, I looked at the matches in the misper files for Dumfries and Galloway and Northumberland, in case the first victim wasn’t as local as the other three. I’ve got a list of nine people to call this morning.’
‘Well done. If you can get me a name, at least I can tell those jackals we’ve identified all the victims.’
‘I did have another thought.’
‘What is it, Young Beth?’ There was now kindness in Thompson’s voice where there had once been mockery.
‘Woman 1 was in her fifties, according to Dr Hewson. It’s possible she was a little older. If she lived by herself and didn’t have any family, there’s a possibility her disappearance has gone unreported. She may also have been homeless. Again, nobody would miss her.’
O’Dowd skewered her with a glare. ‘You started out so well there. Do you have any more ideas? Good or bad, I’m almost past caring.’
‘I’ve been thinking about the wings, ma’am. Specifically the sparrowhawk’s wings that were attached to Nick Langley. I think it might be worth trying to contact local taxidermists. One of them may have sold a stuffed bird to the killer.’
‘You’re redeeming yourself. Get on the phone and see what you can find out.’
* * *
An hour later, when Beth was finished speaking to the last of the relatives, she had all nine names crossed off her list. Most had returned home, although one had been found in the mangled wreckage of a car which had careered off the road.
Beth looked at Thompson; his head was buried in a sea of reports as he looked for that one detail which may give them the breakthrough they were desperate for. O’Dowd had tasked him with looking for people with grudges against Rachel Allen and Nick Langley.
O’Dowd had gone to speak with DCI Phinn in preparation for the press conference, which meant only the two of them were left in the office.
‘Beth, I’ve got the psychologist’s report here.’ The printer rattled its way into action.
Thompson’s eyes scanned the screen as Beth stood waiting by the printer.
The first sheet she read was nothing more than a condensing of facts. The second looked more promising until she realised it was mostly medical terminology and in plain English had very little to say. And as she read the third and fourth sheets, such was her rage that she was tempted to deliver a series of kicks to the printer.
‘This is garbage. He’s telling us nothing. He suspects the killer is a man aged between twenty-five and sixty. That he’s well-funded and has a purpose “or project”. He suggests in one breath that the man is a loner and in the next that he may have an accomplice. A fiver says the line about the killer possibly being from a broken home is a standard inclusion. He even goes on to say that our killer will most likely pursue his project until it’s completed. Have you seen this line about the idea he worships his victims?’ Beth threw the pages onto her desk and glared at them. ‘I bet he got paid a fortune for writing that report. It’s like those horoscopes that tell you it could be A or B, but to watch out for C. It’s all just vague statements.’
Thompson fixed her with a hard stare. ‘What did you expect, some kind of magical insight that would give us the killer’s name and address? This is real life not the movies. Yes the report seems generic, but the psychologist only had our statements and a few pictures to go off. We know about the extra three victims, but he doesn’t. Sure we can tell him about them and he can maybe give us a bit more, but don’t expect him to give an opinion on deaths he doesn’t know about. He’s probably some fat bloke from Doncaster who’s been handed a near-impossible task. Trust me, when you’ve seen how the human mind can work, or rather stop working, you’ll recognise the hopelessness of trying to understand one that doesn’t work like yours.’
‘Sorry. I was just expecting more, that’s all.’
‘We’re all expecting too much.’ He picked up the pages she’d tossed down and straightened them. ‘I’m going to let O’Dowd and Phinn see this. Have a fag or a coffee, do whatever it takes to calm down and then get back to it.’
Fifty-Seven
With an anger that was unfamiliar to him, the man dragged his wheelie bin to the front of the house and along the narrow path. The chore was a regular one, yet today he resented it. Just as he resented the rain, and the news, and everything else he’d encountered since saying goodbye to Tamara yesterday.
The visit to see her hadn’t worked as intended. Rather than cure himself of his obsession with the delectable Sarah Hardy by providing a new focus for his appreciation, he’d found himself contrasting and comparing again. Tamara’s voice was harsh and guttural; Sarah’s soft and mellifluous like a fine jazz track.
Where Sarah’s skin was smooth and unblemished, up close he’d seen the layer of make-up Tamara had used to hide acne scars. Whatever measurement of beauty he used, the barmaid always came off second best.
After a while he’d given up trying to eradicate Sarah from his mind and accepted that he was fixated by her beauty, poise and the perfection of her figure.
That he was going to see her today should be a good thing. He ought to be looking forward to the encounter with a smile and excitement. Instead he was filled with an uneasy dread. Today would be the last time he’d have a legitimate excuse to see her. Future visits would guarantee his presence became unwanted. Of all the agonies in the world, none would compare to Sarah chasing him out of her life. That could never be allowed to happen. Such a turn of events would break his heart.
In a last-ditch attempt to conjure a further reason to see her, he counted his finances for the umpteenth time. It was no good; whichever way he tried to do the sums, he was always left with a shortfall that would see him unable to afford even one trip out per week.
As beautiful as she was, he was not yet so deep into her thrall that he’d imprison himself just to gain a few more tenuous reasons to spend time in her company.
A way that he could continue his appreciation of her came to him as he was entering the kitchen. It didn’t sit easy with him and betrayed a lot of the principles he’d set out when he began to collect the angels he committed to memory, but it was a way that would still allow him to revel in her beauty, absorb the grace and sensuality she moved with and appreciate the gift he’d been given from the heavens.
Years ago, the army had spent many months and countless thousands of pounds training him for missions like the one he was going to undertake for Sarah. He might be a little out of practice, but he remembered everything that he’d been taught, and compared with the targets he’d engaged with then, Sarah was as helpless as the last biscuit at a kid’s birthday party.
With his frustration ebbing away, he returned to his usual good mood and prepared to travel to Kendal. Where Sarah would be waiting for him.
Fifty-Eight
The Range Rover purred along the road, its mighty engine coping with the various gradients with smooth efficiency. When the man who used a false name flicked the indicator, he saw a girl standing by the road with her thumb out. She was maybe eighteen and would probably be pretty if she smiled.
Whether it was the drizzling rain or some other factor that had spoiled her day didn’t matter to him. She was alone in the middle of nowhere. Brown hair was matted to her head and there was a rucksack hanging off one shoulder.
He’d seen enough hikers in the Lake District to know the rucksack on her back was designed more for the odd night away than serious camping.
Her clothes were wrong too. Instead of breathable waterproofs, she wore a pair of denim shorts with thick tights and a fleece that may keep the cold out but that, when it got wet, would become a sodden weight which sapped both energy and heat from her body.
It was unthinkable that she be left out here to suffer the cloying dampness. He had to come to her rescue, be the white knight.
He pulled over and lowered the passenger window. ‘Where you going?’
‘The nearest train station, please.’ She gave a helpless shrug. ‘I don’t even know where it is?’
The girl’s accent was more Liverpudlian than a plate of scouse and a season ticket for Anfield. Even in the face of his offer to help, there was a set to her jaw that spoke of more than the discomfort of a soaking. Her eyes looked as though she’d been crying, though not so much they’d become puffy.
‘The nearest station is Oxenholme. It’s just the other side of Kendal. I’m going that way if you want a lift.’
‘That’d be boss.’ The girl climbed in and rested her rucksack between her feet.
He pulled away and pointed the bonnet towards Kendal. ‘How come you ended up standing out there in the middle of nowhere?’
‘I picked up my boyfriend’s phone. To read the text message he’d just got, like.’ From the corner of his eye he saw her jaw stiffen. ‘It was a message from his ex. Said she still loved him too. Like I was putting up with that. Nobody cheats on me, like.’
‘Sounds like you’re better off without him if he put you out in the middle of nowhere after you confronted him.’
‘Like he got a say. I tossed his phone out the window, and when he stopped to get it, like, I did one.’
The girl’s speech patterns weren’t easy for him to follow and he despised the interspersion of ‘likes’ into her sentences, but there was little he could do about that. A knight didn’t get to choose the damsel he saved. He just answered the distress call.
That the girl was sharing her break-up with him so soon after meeting him also felt wrong. He put it down to the rise of social media and the way some people couldn’t live their lives without posting every detail for the world to see.
He didn’t understand why people would share every aspect of their lives. Nobody knew anything about his private life. Everyone was kept at arm’s length, even those who thought of him as a friend knew very little about him. It had earned him a lot of strange looks over the years, but he’d never cared for the opinions of others. They could think whatever they liked about him; as far as he was concerned, they were serfs speculating about their king.
‘I take it you’re going home then?’
‘Too right. Gonna go right back home, get myself changed and then I’m gonna shag both his brothers. That’ll, like, show him.’
The man who used a false name doubted the teen Romeo would be shown anything. So far as he could see, the damsel and her ex had the morals of rattlesnakes and the libidos of rabbits.
When he looked past her to check if he could pull out of a junction, he saw something that quickened his pulse.
Hanging round her neck was a thin chain with the letter ‘C’ hanging from it.
‘What’s your name?’
‘Caitlin.’ A piece of chewing gum was fed into her mouth.
There it was; the confirmation. He’d had to ask. The letter may have been for the errant lover or a deceased sibling. Yet it was there, freely given, the affirmation of her eligibility.
Change of plan.
The next part was simple. He took a drink from the bottle of water in the cup holder then lifted another water bottle from the door pocket. ‘Do you want a drink?’
‘Ta.’
The girl took a couple of healthy swigs from the bottle.
The man with the false name drove around the back roads until he saw Caitlin succumb to the effects of the Rohypnol he’d laced the spare bottle of water with.
She was no longer the damsel he’d deliver to the safety of Oxenholme Station. He had another destination in mind for her. He knew exactly where he’d leave her and the message it would send.
After leaving Angus Keane at Arthuret Hall he’d returned to Highstead Castle for Nick Langley. It didn’t matter that the police had learned of the other site as quick as they had, what mattered was that they’d be unable to work out why he’d chosen to use Highstead again.
He’d returned for no other reason than to make them wonder. They’d be able to tell how long each body had been there, but not why he’d gone back. They’d waste their time looking for reasons and connections that didn’t exist.
He smiled as he realised he was no longer the knight.
St George had become the dragon.
Or rather: the dragon maker.
Fifty-Nine
Beth kept her back straight and her eyes forward as the chief super marched into the office flanked by DCI Phinn. O’Dowd had warned the team of the impending visit and had more or less assembled them in parade-ground fashion.
From what Beth could gather, the press conference had been a complete disaster, with both O’Dowd and Phinn coming in for criticism for their failure to apprehend the killer.
In typical tabloid style, the press had given the killer a moniker. The Dragon Master was the title they’d chosen, and they’d been both scathing and unrelenting in their attacks on the DCI and DI who’d been there to speak to them.
Like a general inspecting his troops, the chief super’s back was ramrod straight as he stalked in front of them. He advanced along their line in crabbing movements, pausing at each face to peer into their eyes. When it was Beth’s turn she felt herself fighting a tremble in her knees as the chief super’s piercing gaze examined her. When he spoke his voice was calm and laden with the expectation that he’d be listened to without interruption.
‘I don’t recognise you. You must be the new lass.’
O’Dowd leaned forward. ‘DC Young, sir. She only joined the team at the start of last week. Decent mind and good initiative.’
‘Good initiative, you say. Is that a euphemism for maverick, DI O’Dowd?’
Beth saw the chief super shoot a glance at O’Dowd.
‘Actually, sir, I just meant that she doesn’t need to be micro-managed.’
When Beth saw the chief super’s pupils contract, she knew O’Dowd was in trouble for that emphasis.
‘“Micro-managed”, you say.’ The chief super moved himself along the line so he was in front of a defiant O’Dowd. ‘Is that what you think I’m doing here, micro-managing you? Because if you think that’s what I’m doing, it tells me that you are aware of your failure to identify a credible suspect. That you’re grasping at straws. The way it looks to me, DI O’Dowd, is that you’re floundering about without making progress. We have four dead bodies, and you’ve still to identify them all. Do you think that’s an acceptable position to be in?’
Beth kept her face straight as she gave an inward wince. There was no way that O’Dowd could answer the chief super’s question without dropping herself in the shit. Answer yes and she’d be admitting that she didn’t care. To say no would invite the chief super to ask why she hadn’t pushed harder to identify Woman 1.
‘With respect, sir, it’s not—’
‘It’s a yes-no answer, Inspector.’
O’Dowd bridled but kept her mouth shut as the chief super gave them all a dressing down for their collective failure to catch the man they were all now calling the ‘Dragon Master’. Even DCI Phinn received a level of criticism, but the barbs he received were more to do with his failure to support and manage the FMIT rather than outright criticism of his lack of input into the investigation.
Beth couldn’t help feel the dressing down was unnecessary. The team were pursuing every lead they could think of to catch the so-called Dragon Master, and both O’Dowd and Thompson were doing their best to put aside their personal issues so they could work the case.
As tempted as she was to speak up and defend the DI and DS, she knew it wasn’
t her place to share their personal problems, and there was every chance that instead of the chief super showing compassion, he’d stand them down; so rather than risk getting them into more trouble Beth kept her mouth shut and stood in silence as the chief super continued to press upon them the urgent need to catch the Dragon Master.
After the first twenty minutes, Beth had to fight every one of her independent notions. While the chief super’s voice was never raised and he didn’t once insult them on a personal level, he eviscerated each of them in turn while exhorting them all to work harder and smarter.
It was the most polite bollocking Beth had ever received, but also the most comprehensive. Another reason she didn’t speak out in an attempt to mount a defence was that she trusted O’Dowd’s instincts and experience in this situation. If the DI was keeping quiet, she must have been here before and, as such, knew that answering back would only make matters worse.
Sixty
The man with the false name put his feet onto the low table and sipped at his drink. Today had gone far better than he’d expected it to. His act of charity had borne the sweetest of fruits for him. His generosity in offering to do a good deed had presented him with a gift.
Not just any gift, a missing link in his chain. He’d been trying to find a candidate but none had presented themselves. Then from nowhere, one had dropped into his lap.
He now had the next part of his project. All he had to do was offer her up and he could move on.
Caitlin was the gift. Not only was she the right fit, but the way she’d been standing alone at a deserted junction meant he’d been able to get her into his Range Rover without any witnesses.