Past Mortem (8 page)

After a half-hour or so inside the shed, which told Newson nothing more than he knew already from the crime reports, he and Natasha repaired to the Dun Cow, a nearby pub which promised basket lunches.

‘The victim,’ Newson explained after they had ordered their food, ‘was probably kept in the van in which he was snatched for the rest of that first Sunday and was delivered to the seed shed under cover of darkness.’

‘Well, then, this killer,’ Natasha replied, ‘and let’s remember we still have no proof that these killings are connected, but if they are, this killer seems to have been pretty lucky in how little initial resistance his victims put up.’

‘Yes, perhaps he knew them all.’

‘Wide circle of friends. A north London builder, a Manchester squaddie, a Kensington slapper, and this bloke…’

‘The curator of Anne Hathaway’s Cottage, who incidentally owned the, largest stash of pornography the investigating team had ever encountered.’

‘Anything dodgy?’

‘Dodgy, yes, but nothing illegal.’

‘Why would our man know all these different people?’

‘Why wouldn’t he?’

‘There has to be a motivation. Knocking off acquaintances from various parts of the country just because you know them isn’t enough.’

‘Well, he likes killing people, and it’s easier to capture people you know.’

‘Shit. With friends like that, eh?’

‘On the other hand, perhaps he didn’t know them.’

‘In which case how does he get into their homes and lure them into vans?’

‘I have no idea.’

‘Possibly,’ Natasha said, attacking her scampi and chips, ‘because ‘he’ is actually four different people who conducted four completely separate murders and we’re wasting our time.’

At that point Natasha’s mobile rang. Newson knew that it was Lance.

‘I’m not going to answer it,’ she said and let it ring. Moments later when her phone rang again she did answer it, and retreated to the car park to conduct her conversation in private. When she returned she looked angry as she usually did after her conversations with Lance.

‘I don’t know why you bother going outside,’ Newson said. ‘You always tell me what he says.’

‘He says I’m suffocating and possessive.’

‘Why should he care what you are? He dumped you. You’re finished. He has no right to be ringing you up to tell you what you are and aren’t.’

Newson did not need the embarrassed pause that followed to work out that Natasha and Lance were once more an item.

‘That didn’t take long, did it?’

‘I don’t want to talk about it.’

‘OK.’

‘He came round last night.’

‘I thought you were at a meeting of the All Men Are Bastards Club.’

‘He was there when I got home, on the couch.’

‘He had no right to let himself into your home. You should have arrested him.’

‘Don’t be stupid.’

‘I’m serious.’

‘You’re being stupid. Anyway, he said he knew he’d been a prick. He was really nice and totally sorry.’

‘I thought all men were bastards?’

‘They are, but they’re all we’ve got. Look, Lance has shit to deal with too, you know. He’s uptight at the moment.’

‘Oh, well, that’s all right, then.’

‘He said I had to give him another chance, that I owed him that at least.’

‘You don’t owe him anything. He owes you a lot of rent, but you don’t owe him anything. I told you he’d come back. You said you wouldn’t have him.’

‘It’s partly my fault. I mean, I do work a lot and I’m really into my job.’

‘Which is commonly considered to be a good thing.’

‘Yes, but perhaps I should’ve made more time for him and me. I mean, he’s not working, is he, and I’ve got a pretty cool job, and that can be quite undermining for someone, particularly a bloke, and sometimes I don’t think I’m sympathetic to that. I think I need to be there for him more.’

‘I thought you were being suffocating?’

‘Yeah, but he says I have it both ways. Like I want him to be a proper boyfriend, be faithful and not be out all night getting pissed but, on the other hand, I have this great job to do and I’m always going on about it and I need to give him some space but also be there for him, which I think is actually quite reasonable.’

Newson took a deep breath. He should- not, absolutely
should not
be having this conversation. Even if he had not been remotely attracted to Detective Sergeant Wilkie it would have been inappropriate for him to be party to his subordinate’s private life in this way. But he
was
attracted to her. He was in love with her. He thought about her when he went to sleep at night and he was thinking about her when he woke up in the morning. He was
obsessed
with her, and allowing himself to masquerade as nothing more than a sympathetic friend was simply feeding the obsession. He could not help it, though. Talking to Natasha about her boyfriend was the only intimacy with her that he had.

‘I’m trying to understand his argument here,’ Newson said. ‘He’s saying that if you don’t want him to screw around and get pissed all night you need to take less interest in your work?’

Natasha did not reply.

‘Natasha, this man is using you. He bullies you when you’re together and when he drops you he bullies you into having him back…’

‘I said I don’t want to talk about it.’

‘But we
are
talking about it.’

‘I knew you’d be like this.’

‘How else can I be?’

‘I’m not hungry. I’m going to sit in the car. See you when you’ve finished.’

And Detective Inspector Newson was left alone with his chicken and chips.

ELEVEN

I
nspector Newson and Sergeant Wilkie spoke little on the drive back to London, both of them lost in their own thoughts. Newson sat in the passenger seat, staring out of the window in order to avoid spending the entire journey taking sidelong glances at Natasha’s legs as she changed gear. Instead he tried to concentrate on murder. He racked his brains, searching for a single name or detail to connect conclusively the Willesden killing of Adam Bishop with the three earlier crimes.

There was nothing. Of the thousands of names that had been entered into various crime reports, the neighbours, friends, colleagues and enemies of the deceased who had been interviewed, not a single name cross-referenced between one murder and another.

Similarly, of all the tools, tapes, prints and microscopic threads that had been identified and catalogued by the various forensic teams, not one item was duplicated in any of the killings. Duct tape was a feature of three out of the four crimes, but it was the commonest type of duct tape. Rope had been present at the same three murder scenes, but rope that could be bought at any DIY shop or superstore.

Nonetheless, Newson persisted in his suspicion that the crimes were connected and that he was dealing with a single serial killer. The circumstantial similarities were too strong. Over a period of not much more than a year, four murders had taken place in which the victims had allowed themselves to be subdued, held captive and then, while still conscious, were subjected to a lengthy, ritualized torture and killing. The victims had been
conscious
of their fate, not just the pain but the manner in which the pain was inflicted. It was important to the killer that they knew what was happening to them, that they
understood
what was happening to them and how it was going to end. Newson presumed that the killer’s motives were sexual because he couldn’t think of any other reason why someone would do these things except for the excitement, besides which, as he knew from his own experience, in the long run, everything came down to sex.

Eventually Newson tried to put murder from his mind and instead indulged himself further with stolen glances at Natasha’s shapely legs. They were coming into London by this time, in dense traffic, and Natasha was forced to work the clutch of her little Renault Clio, causing the muscles in her legs to ripple attractively above her little boots. Natasha’s legs were the part of her to which Newson felt most connected, they being the only part of her over which he could be said to have ever had any influence.

When he’d first known Natasha she’d rarely worn skirts or dresses, explaining that she had no high opinion of her legs, which she thought were too short. Newson had informed her that she was either mad, blind or both. He had assured her, in what he fondly deluded himself was a disinterested and offhand manner, that viewed objectively Natasha’s underpinning was in the premier league, and that outside the world of
haute couture
it was well known that length was no substitute at all for shapeliness.

‘Nobody really fancies those weird, skeletal, nine-feet-tall fashion models,’ he told her. ‘They’re just there to make the dresses look long.’

Since then Natasha had ‘got them out’, as she put it, on a much more regular basis, and had been kind enough to give Newson some of the credit for giving her the confidence to do so. Newson could not decide whether this confession had caused him more pleasure or pain, since it was so obviously meant in an entirely sisterly manner. Eventually he concluded that it was too close to call.

Newson’s mobile rang, returning his thoughts to murder.

‘Inspector Newson? It’s Dr Clarke.’

‘Hello, Doctor.’

‘That Manchester case, the man with the mashed brain. Rod said he thought it was phone books, didn’t he?’

‘Rod? So you phoned him, then?’

‘Yes. Is there a problem?’

Newson could hear the defensiveness in her voice. ‘No, no problem.’

‘I looked him up on the Friends Reunited site as you suggested, and he sent me his number.’

‘Right.’

‘What do you mean, ‘Right’?’

‘Nothing. I don’t mean anything.’

‘It was very nice to speak to him.’

‘I’m sure it was.’

‘What do you mean, ‘I’m sure it was’?’.

‘What do you mean, what do I mean? I don’t mean anything. Why should I?’

‘Exactly. There’s no reason.’

‘No, there isn’t. You mentioned the phone books. I presume you discussed the Manchester unsolved?’

‘Yes, we did, as a matter of fact, and those fibres he found in the scalp — I think they’re from a book cover. Books used to be cloth-covered; they still are if you get them from the Folio Society. I reckon that’s what the fibre was. Nothing to do with telephone directories at all.’

‘You think that Warrant Officer Spencer was murdered with an old book?’

‘Well, several of them, or new books with cloth covers.’

‘I see. Well, thanks for that. I’ll have somebody do a little research into book bindings. I’m sure you’re right.’

‘I’d have looked into it myself, but my husband’s having three days at a folk and jazz festival so I’m a bit busy.’

‘Three
days
at a folk and jazz festival?
Is
there that much folk and jazz?’

‘They’ll scarcely scratch the surface. I doubt they’ll even get out of minor keys.’

Newson thanked Dr Clarke for her trouble and hung up. So her husband was away and the first thing she had done was look up Rod Haynes on Friends Reunited? Newson felt uneasy. He wished he hadn’t passed on Haynes’s message. He knew that Dr Clarke was a steady, sensible type, but Newson was discovering that the past exerted a powerful force. Its reach was long and its grip was tight.

When he finally arrived home its grip had tightened a little further over him. Two members of his old class had chosen to contact him, Gary Whitfield and Helen Smart. Sadly, neither of them was Christine Copperfield, but nonetheless it was pleasant to think that the class had begun to reassemble.

Newson opened Gary Whitfield’s email first.

It was good to see that you had joined the class again, Edward. You always made people laugh, which is a valid and valued skill. My partner and I attend a downing workshop and believe strongly in the therapeutic power of laughter. I’m writing to say that I’m sorry about saying that I hated you all. I didn’t really hate most of the class and I certainly didn’t hate you, you were always quite nice to me and let’s face it, you got your fair share of crap from people like Jameson. Funny, you know, because cockney rhyming slang for queer is ‘ginger as in ‘ginger beer’. Did you know that? I’ve occasionally been called a ‘ginger’ over the years and when it happens, I sometimes think of you. We’re both gingers! We should be proud.

Newson did not think so. To him, being red-headed or homosexual was a symptom of your genetic makeup, something to be neither proud nor ashamed of. It simply was. He was happy for Gary Whitfield, though. Clearly adult life was for him a great improvement on childhood, which was surely the right way round. The cruelty of other kids had hit Gary much harder than it had hit Newson and the ‘pride’ that he had found was his way of fighting back. So good luck to him. Newson thought about writing back in ginger solidarity, but then he remembered the clowning workshop. Newson did not want to be in email contact with somebody who attended clowning workshops, even if he had been at school with them.

Newson harboured no special memories of Gary Whitfield, but he and Helen Smart had been real friends. She’d been his closest friend for some time and probably the best that he’d had at school. It had been twenty years since she and Newson had spoken to each other. Nonetheless her letter was couched in terms reminiscent of the familiarity they had once shared. Newson had noticed that about emails. They were so immediate, so spontaneous and personal, yet also so private and alone. Emails were dangerous things. Newson had a rule: never say something in an email that you wouldn’t say to the recipient’s face. It was a rule lie often broke.

Hello, Ed, Helen wrote.

A policeman? A policeman? A POLICEMAN! Wow. Or were you joking? Maybe you were, I don’t know.

Maybe this E address is a hoax and I’m about to be groomed by an internet pervert who thinks I’m still a schoolgirl. Except I suppose we’re all still at school on this site, aren’t we? Fourteen forever. At least I’m fourteen because that’s how old I was when I left you all. I imagine you left at eighteen. I always regretted that I never did the sixth, wearing jeans to school and swanking about in the sixth-form common room, but it was a small price to pay to get out of that dump. I’ve never contacted a stranger like this before, by the way, so you don’t need to think I’m sad or mad. Although of course you’re not really a stranger at all, are you? Or are you? Has your life made you into a different person to the one I knew? I suppose if you’ve become a policeman it must have done. To be honest I thought there was a height restriction. I remember there used to be items in the papers about boys having themselves stretched in order to make the grade. Did you stretch yourself, Ed? I can’t imagine you did. You used to say that you were normal height and all the other boys were freaks. Maybe the Home Office changed the rules. I expect it’s illegal to discriminate against someone because the/re vertically challenged anyway. Shit. I’m waffling. You will think I’m mad. OK, cut to the chase. I work for a charity and I live in London. Seeing as how you’re with the Met (if it really isn’t a joke) you live in London too. Do you fancy a drink? If you do then get in touch. Maybe we can work out why the miners lost. Perhaps it was our fault. I’ve got a kid but I can usually get a sitter. Bye.

She was the same Helen. Same old friend. Newson replied immediately.

Helen! Please don’t worry if you hate me for being a copper. All my colleagues at Scotland Yard hate me for being a copper too. Some of them even call me Ginger Minge, so in many ways it’s like I never left school. Anyway, what about you? Working for a charity? I remember you saying that Band Aid was aptly named because that’s what it was, a little sticking plaster trying to staunch a great and terrible wound! I haven’t got any kids myself but then why would I? I haven’t had sex since 1987. I’d love to have a drink. Sieg heil.

Detective Inspector Newson of the Nazi Party.

Helen must have been online as Newson wrote, because moments later she replied.

Great and terrible wound! Was I really that pious?. No wonder you dumped me at the Christmas disco. How does tomorrow sound? Pitcher and Piano in Soho, eight? Ping back yes or no with alternative suggestion.

What a strange and uncharted planet was the worldwide web. To be conversing in such spontaneous intimacy with a ghost from the past who was nowhere to be seen but could be in the next room. It felt both exhilarating and uncomfortable.

Exhilarating? Of course exhilarating, because inevitably Newson’s mind had turned to sex. It seemed to know no other route. Helen had scarcely been in Christine’s league but she had been cute with her big bovver boots and cropped hair. Plump, certainly, but also pretty, and when you saw beneath her baggy clothes as on one occasion Newson had done, she had been shapely despite the puppy fat. Newson remembered her breasts particularly, for he’d held them once, and if he’d had to describe them the word he’d have used would have been ‘perky’. Perhaps all fourteen-year-old breasts were perky. They probably were, but Newson wasn’t sure, because he hadn’t held enough of them at the time to mount any kind of statistically significant study. But Helen’s had been very perky indeed. He closed his eyes and revisited them across the years. Firm, despite her adolescent fat, taut, springy skin, he remembered, almost waxy to the touch, and puffy nipples. That had definitely been the most specific feature of Helen Smart’s breasts, puffy nipples. Gorgeous in a quirky kind of way. Newson wondered what effect time would have had on perky nipples.

He pinged back ‘Yes’ and the date was made.