The Handshaker (2 page)

November 15th 

2

“You’re sure?”

Felix Croft did not answer immediately. Instead he took the note back from Trish Sinclair and read its brief message again.

Heidelberg 1927-1934

Scarbeck 2008-2010

“Well?”

He cleared his throat on Trish’s insistent tones. “The first set of dates definitely correspond to The Heidelberg Case, so it seems to me that the writer is saying there is a crime similar to Heidelberg taking place right here in Scarbeck, and it’s been going on for two years.” He looked up from the single A4 sheet, into Trish’s fiery green eyes. “So why write and tell me?”

Across the table, Trish’s eyes flashed around the room as she engaged her legal brain. Just as quickly, they swung back and fastened his gaze. “You’re the only man in Scarbeck who would understand.”

He gave her an indulgent smile. “When I asked, ‘why write and tell me’, it was a rhetorical question. I
am
the only man in this town who would understand, but what does this… this crank expect me to do about it? Take it to the law? Investigate myself? And if it’s true, there are fifty or so thousand women living in Scarbeck. How am I – or the police for that matter – supposed to find the one woman who has been subject to hypnotic abuse and may not even be aware of it?”

Trish shrugged, floundering uncharacteristically, and poured herself fresh coffee. Croft lapsed into his thoughts.

All around him was deceptively normal. At the rear of the kitchen, Mrs Hitchins, the daily, fussed with the radio, seeking her favourite local station, the table was littered with the detritus of breakfast; cups, saucers, Trish’s cereal bowl, his teapot and Trish’s coffee pot.
The Independent
lay folded at his elbow, crossword uppermost, and his blazer hung over the back of his chair. It was comfortably warm in the room, while beyond the patio doors, vicious November winds and rain battered the acre of land attached to the rear of the house.

The morning had begun 90 minutes previously, as it always did, Croft rising before six, spending a half hour working out in his private gym, before soaking under a hot shower for a further ten minutes. While he shaved, Trish entered the bathroom and took her shower.

She did so in total silence. Her father had died six months previously, and despite visiting a counsellor once a fortnight, she was still having difficulty dealing with her bereavement.

She had finished showering before she finally spoke to him. “I have a chambers meeting this morning,” she had reminded him as she stepped out of the cubicle and reached for her towel. “You won’t be able to get in touch with me between, say, eleven and one.”

The sight of her naked had refreshed his memory of last night’s passion, and before she could grab the towel, he had turned to fold his arms around her, locked his lips onto hers. Trish had responded eagerly, groping, fumbling, fondling, and before many minutes had passed, the towel was serving as a groundsheet while they enjoyed each other.

“I hope you have some left for tonight,” Trish had whispered as she towelled off again.

Infrequent early morning sex was one of the hallmarks of their years together. A tight time schedule and the inherent risk of Mrs Hitchins arriving early to catch them at it, combined to heighten the spontaneous exhilaration. It did not happen every day, but there was nothing unusual about it.

Afterwards, he had dressed in a pair of casual trousers, white shirt and his old school tie, taken the navy blue blazer from the wardrobe, and come down the grand, curved staircase of their mansion house. He hardly noticed the treasures around him: fine china, original works of art, antique furnishings, littering the walls and floor, adding life to the majestic, palazzo styled hall. It was a part of the backdrop of his wealthy lifestyle, but occupied no particular part of his mind as he collected the newspapers from the doormat and retired to the kitchen to make tea and toast.

While he waited for the kettle to boil, he studied the back page crossword of
The Independent
, and inked
Barrow
into 1 across,
British weapon for a burial ground (6),
as Trish joined him. Some mornings he would struggle with the early clues, but on just as many other occasions he would solve them as quickly as this. Nothing unusual, nothing out of place, nothing remarkable.

Trish was dressed in her formal business wear: a black, knee-length skirt and matching jacket, with a white blouse beneath. Minshull Street Crown Court was more severe than the University of North West England. They sat at the table hardly a word passing between them, Croft concentrating on his crossword, Trish gleaning law reports in
The Times
, her lips occasionally pursing in approval, her eyes sometimes narrowing in displeasure as she took in this acceptable decision or that disagreeable adjudication.

He had no particular plans for the day. Head of The Department of Parapsychology at the UNWE, he had an appointment with a hypnotherapy client scheduled for 10:30, a hypnosis demonstration at 2:30 and a compulsory evening shift on duty as a senior faculty member. Nothing different to a hundred other Tuesday mornings, and Croft was comfortable with that.

After a meteoric rise to fame and fortune a decade previously, he practically craved normality and routine. He luxuriated unashamedly in the trappings of wealth, indulging himself and Trish in the fripperies that an excess of money permitted. A snap decision to jet off to New York for the weekend, a spur of the moment impulse to pass a few days of unadulterated fornication in the
Elysees Regencia
on
Avenue Marceau
, whipping the both of them off to Cheltenham for Gold Cup week and dropping the odd five thousand on a silly, outsider bet, then laughing it off over a bottle of Mouton Rothschild ’52. Croft had enjoyed these and many other
ad hoc
insanities, but he had never liked the spotlight which came as part of the fame and fortune package, the constant attention of the media, the exposure of every aspect of his life to public scrutiny.

The Hypnotist And The Barrister
, had been the headline in one tabloid when his affair with Trish was exposed.
Weight Control Wizard’s Wife wants £1,000,000 in settlement
. Most of the gutter press had picked up on Janet’s demands when the divorce became public property yet, none of them were interested in his ex-wife’s affair with the headmaster of an upmarket school in Cheshire.

The terrible two years after his rampant success and wrecked marriage had generated this desire for obscurity. He wanted to enjoy his life in private. Thankfully, the press soon forgot him and moved on to other, equally famous targets who had slipped from the pedestal of godhead into mere mortality, leaving him with the privacy he so craved.

And now, into the routine domesticity, Mrs Hitchins had dropped a plain brown, 9”x4” envelope.

Bearing a first class stamp, his name and address were neatly typed on the front. The unevenness of the typeface told him it had been produced on a manual typewriter not a modern word-processor driven printer. A 60s freak, such anachronisms always interested him and for a moment he thought it might be from a fellow devotee. But it was not. When he unfolded the single sheet inside, he found it contained only the two sets of dates, which had been produced on the same typewriter as the envelope.

“You should tell the police.”

Trish’s announcement snapped him out of his ruminations. He was surprised by her suggestion. “The police? Are you mad?”

“This is unsolicited mail,” she insisted. “If nothing else, it’s a nuisance, and as you’ve already said, the writer seems to be saying he’s been committing a crime for the last two years.”

His response was predictably cynical. “So I take it to Barn Street and tell them what? Somewhere out there is a woman who’s been abused for the last couple of years and they should look for her. I don’t know who she is, I don’t know where they should start looking.”

Trish would not be moved. “The police will run forensic tests on it, Felix. Take it to them.”

Croft was trying to think up another objection when Mrs Hitchins turned up the volume on the radio.

“It’s seven thirty here on Radio Scarbeck, your local, local station, and this is Jonathan Bream with the local news. A massive police operation is under way at Scarbeck Point after a woman’s body was found early this morning. Here’s our reporter, Carol Russell.”

The reporter’s voice took up the commentary to the accompaniment of distant voices and heavy machinery thrumming in the background.

“At a quarter to six this morning, a man on his way to work, taking a short cut across the Point, discovered the body of a woman. Within twenty minutes, a forensic team had cordoned off the area, keeping everyone out, including a crew of workmen fencing the area off in advance of Sunday’s demolition of Cromford Mill. Superintendent Ernest Shannon, the head of Scarbeck CID, arrived about half an hour later, but refused to comment. Security is tight and the police have taken the extraordinary step of putting up their helicopter to keep the flying, prying eyes of the media at bay. Scarbeck Point is an urban beauty spot, a green belt less than a mile from the town centre, a haven for wildlife, a popular spot with birdwatchers and picnickers, and has spectacular views across the whole of Greater Manchester. This level of police activity surpasses anything local residents have ever seen, and there is widespread speculation that Scarbeck’s serial killer, The Handshaker, has struck for the eighth time.”

On a signal from Croft, Mrs Hitchins turned the volume down. “You see,” he said to Trish. “The police have enough on their plate without me bringing matters like this to their attention. The man is probably a crank. He probably read of the Heidelberg case on my website.”

“Felix, I mean it. They may be snowed under with The Handshaker killings, but that doesn’t mean to say they can neglect routine policing.”

A few moments of silence followed. Trish injected a gleam of determination into her eyes, and Croft capitulated.

He stood up. “I’ll telephone them.”

He left the room and presently Trish heard him negotiating on the telephone. He returned several minutes later in an even worse mood.

“They want me to bring it to the police station.” He glowered out at the weather. “It’ll take absolutely ages to get there in this weather and at this hour.” He slipped on his blazer and picked up his newspaper.

“Ask for one of the senior officers,” Trish insisted.

“I should have thought they’ll be busy out at Scarbeck Point –”

“Felix, if you leave it with the desk sergeant, it will be forgotten. You need to speak to someone in CID, preferably a sergeant or above.”

With an incomprehensible grumble, Croft left.

3

The Handshaker pressed a pay and display ticket to his windscreen, and reclined in his seat.

His philosophy was simple. Never break the law and you would not draw attention to yourself. Paying the outrageous parking fee of £1.60 for an hour was one way of ensuring that no one paid him any particular attention. He was just another motorist parked at the station, waiting for the 8:37 from Manchester or the 8:52 from Rochdale. He might be waiting to board one of the trains, he might be meeting a passenger; he might simply be a train spotter, but he was definitely not doing anything wrong.

Scarbeck station was situated at the lower end of the by-pass, near Shambles roundabout, a mile from the town centre. The station was unmanned, catering for two pay trains per hour in each direction, and there were no prying CCTV cameras; not even on the car park. There was nothing to steal and nothing to vandalise other than the cars parked outside. When he first began his activities, The Handshaker had seen the potential as a pick up point for women he used occasionally. Those women he chose not to murder. Those women he could revisit when the fancy took him.

Idly, he checked the time. She would be here soon to catch the 8:52 to Manchester, but this morning she would not board the train. Indeed, she would never board any train, ever again.

The foul weather showed no sign of abating. Wind and rain buffeted The Handshaker’s car. A heavy lorry trundled along the by-pass a few yards from him, ejecting sheets of spray from its multiple wheels, and saturating the Peugeot’s windscreen. The weather forced The Handshaker’s memory back 30 years to another wild and windy day in a cemetery two hundred miles away.

Thirty years. It was hard to believe it was so long ago.

He remembered the stench from sodden ground covered in a mulch of rotting vegetation, a litter of leaves fallen from the oak, beech, yew and ash trees that gave the cemetery its sombre air. He remembered the silence, the lack of noise from the main road passing the cemetery gates, a stillness punctuated only by the rustle of the wind in the trees and the minister’s droning voice as the coffin was lowered into its resting place. But he found it difficult to recall his emotions. Did he cry or did he remain the stalwart son, putting on a brave face for his mother?