The Reaper (26 page)

‘Tell me.’

Brook looked into the fire and remembered. It hadn’t been that long since they’d found her. Six months. Less maybe.

Brook hesitated then set off. Perhaps he could offload his burden onto someone who deserved it. ‘There was a girl. Laura Maples. She died a few months ago.’

‘Ah yes. Not far from here. I read about it. Ravenscourt Park. Who was she?’

‘Who was she?’ Brook was unprepared for the simplicity of the question. He spoke as though he hadn’t been thinking about it constantly. ‘She was nobody. A routine murder victim. Another street girl meets a sticky end.’

‘But she was more than that.’

‘She was a…No. To her parents perhaps.’ Brook stared blindly at the bright eyes and toothy grin of the schoolgirl smiling up at him from the fax tray–everything shiny and young. Her hair, her skin, her silver necklace with little hearts on it, strategically placed over her shirt and school tie to flag up her gentle rebellion.

‘She was seventeen when she arrived in London, and quite pretty in a fresh-faced kind of way. She’d left her comfortable, stifling existence in the country and headed for the golden paving stones of London. No reason. No family strife, no abusive father, no lack of love or prospects. It was just that, for some, that’s not enough. For some’–Brook managed not to add ‘of us’. Sorenson had enough psychological crowbars–‘the sheen of optimism, the embrace of life departs early.’

‘So she headed for a better life.’ Sorenson’s smile didn’t offend.

‘No. Just a shorter one. You know the story from here. She’s homeless, her money runs out, she ends up on the streets. She’s young and healthy, she can make good money. Only the street isn’t a shopping mall for the exchange of goods and services. It’s a jungle. She stands out a mile. It’s her first time.’

Brook stared into the fire, unable to blink. His eyes began to complain once more. ‘She’s picked up by a punter who goes back with her to her squat in Ravenscourt Park. She’s got an old mattress and a small camping stove and a few candles…’

Brook took a sip of his drink. ‘We can’t tell if he ever intended to pay but once they’re inside it becomes clear he doesn’t have to. He’s in a derelict house with a naïve girl. It has a piece of urine-soaked hardboard for a door. There’s nobody to stop him. Nobody.

‘And what can she do? This pretty, nervous girl with little idea of the rules. So he decides. Why pay when it’s more fun to take?’

‘He rapes her.’

‘Why not? He’s a strong man. She’s a powerless girl. It’s an old formula. But it doesn’t stop there. Maybe she’s crying, she gets upset and provokes him in some way, he’s hurt her, violated her, torn off the necklace she’s been wearing for years, a keepsake of his conquest. It cuts into her neck and she starts to scream.

‘Or maybe, finally having such power over someone, even this gauche, stupid girl a long way from home, awakens something in him.

‘He’s never had power before, he’s nothing, no-one respects him, no-one is in awe of him, no-one is aware he even exists. But this girl knows. She sees his power, fears it and he revels in it. He sees her fear and feels his power over her and it feels good. He wants more. He has the power. He feels it welling up inside him, the ultimate power over life and death. Suddenly he’s a god. He is God. He can choose. He has the power to transform her into something else: a lifeless monument to his power.’

Brook halted on that crescendo and took a moment before going on. ‘And so, that night, her insignificant life ends. There’s an old beer bottle on the floor. He breaks it and uses it. Gently does it. Don’t rush it. Feel the fear, her fear, feeding into him, leaving her weak, making him strong…’

Brook screwed his eyelids shut again, having forgotten to blink for a while–that, and the fire, has desiccated his eyes. If he keeps them closed perhaps he can imagine himself in the light and the warmth of an empty place–empty of all but Amy and little Theresa. And the girl Laura–shiny, full of life and hope.

‘And you haven’t caught him?’

‘No. And we won’t.’

‘How long was she there before you found her?’

Brook looked at his host. Bulls eye again.

‘At least a month, maybe six weeks. We found her in summer. The smell…’ Brook couldn’t hold Sorenson’s gaze. His mouth tightened around the rest of the story. Sorenson’s eyes probed, waiting. Waiting until Brook became uncomfortable, not long. He felt obligated to finish but couldn’t get past, ‘There were rats…I…’

‘I see.’ Sorenson nodded in contemplation but little evident sympathy. ‘And was your horror confined to your visceral disgust at what the rats had done to her soft young flesh?’

Brook blinked as though smelling salts had been administered. ‘Sorry?’

‘Yes, but for whom?’ Brook looked into the fire, seeking solace. Sorenson continued to bore into him. ‘Regrettable though the death of Laura Maples may be, the horror that you feel is not for her ordeal but the physical desecration inflicted post mortem. Am I right?’

‘Perhaps.’ Brook continued to gaze at the fire, aware of the mistake he’d made. Sorenson couldn’t be affected by anything Brook, or anyone else, had seen.

‘Surely the greatest pain or humiliation or mental torture has to be dispensed while still alive, while able to feel, to sense. The dead don’t suffer, my friend.’

Brook raised his eyes to engage Sorenson’s, fighting the triumphant smile beginning to crease his lips. Suddenly he was close. ‘Or cry.’

Sorenson smiled back, unperturbed at the excitement in Brook’s eyes. He looked away and nodded, then back at Brook. ‘Did you cry for Laura?’

Brook stared back. ‘I will.’

Sorenson emitted a sharp laugh. Brook saw that his host was pleased with the reply. ‘And did you cry for Sammy Elphick?’

A pause. ‘No.’

‘Because there were no rats?’

‘Because he was nothing. A blight on the planet.’

‘But did that mean he deserved to die?’

‘No. But it means he won’t be missed.’

‘And the child, Sergeant?’

‘Who?’

‘Sammy Elphick’s son.’

‘What about him?’

‘Will he be missed? Did you cry for the future that was taken away from him?’

Brook was unsettled. Don’t answer.

‘Did you?’

Brook drained his glass and stood to fetch a refill sanctioned by a wave of his host’s hand. Sorenson remained unmoved as Brook poured and returned to his seat. Brook stared once more into the fire that was all but out. He took another long pull at his glass and gasped at the wrench on his throat.

He swirled the warm brown liquid around the glass and watched crystals dance against the dim glow of the ashes. Anything but look at Sorenson. Eventually he spoke, in a murmur he hoped would be difficult to distinguish but which instead seemed to echo around the room like a gunshot. ‘No.’

And there they sat. Hunter and hunted, in no particular order, occasionally drinking, rarely moving or even
looking at each other. At one point, Sorenson revived the fire with some dry fibrous logs and the two busied themselves inspecting the progress of the flames. From time to time the dull cracking of the logs would turn to spitting and Sorenson would nimbly jump up to return a hot ember to its place.

The heat blazed now and began to scorch the right side of Brook’s face so he forced himself up to stroll around the study, inspecting books and paintings and record collections again. He looked back at Sorenson whose eyes had closed. His head remained upright, however, and Brook guessed that he wasn’t asleep. Perhaps he was being invited to leave–or provoked into some indiscretion.

He drained his glass and placed it carefully on a coaster on the writing desk and picked up a piece of blank A4 paper that had been folded and stood upright. On closer inspection he saw it was a home-made birthday card, indecipherable apart from the childish crayon sketch of someone who could be Sorenson.

‘From my nephew. Very talented, don’t you think?’

‘Nephew? Your brother’s son?’ Brook asked, remembering the photographs of Sorenson and his twin.

‘Not any more, Sergeant. My brother Stefan died.’ For once Sorenson was unable to meet Brook’s eyes for fear of revealing too much. The hurt was clear in his expression.

‘I’m sorry.’

‘Don’t be. It’s been two years. I’m over the worst. Losing a twin, they say, is like cutting off a limb. For once
, they
are not wrong. Twins are aware of each other from the moment they’re born. Did you know that? Fifty years with a different person who is in fact you. A person who knows
what you know, feels what you feel, says what you were about to say. Fifty years.

And then nothing. No more. You’re alone. You stand by the bed and watch as your own being withers and dies. All that you took to be a reflection of yourself changes into a caricature of what you are and becomes a kind of sick celestial joke. No rats, Sergeant. Just cancer. Eaten, yes, but not post mortem. My brother, part of myself, eaten alive, from the inside, knowing it will not stop hurting, ever, until everything stops.

And, God, does it hurt. To see the agony in his eyes, fear cloaked by the lions smile, pierce you, beg you to help, to do something, to put a stop to it. Then when you don’t, when you can only stand and watch and shrug and smile back, see the look in the eyes turn to hate. Why me? Why not you? Do something. Are you enjoying this? Did you cause it? Do you want me to die? Help me!

‘That’s the worst thing I’ve seen, Sergeant. That’s what I dream about. You’re not leaving?’ This time it was a question suffused with human warmth, revealing a loneliness that mirrored Brook’s. It put Brook on his guard.

‘It’s late.’

‘Perhaps it is. I’ve enjoyed our talk. Thank you for coming.’ He rose to show Brook out. Brook watched him walk across the study to open the door. What a piece of work Sorenson was. Easy company. Brook was rarely at ease, even at home. Perhaps he was home.

‘My pleasure.’

‘You can see yourself out, I’m sure.’

‘Of course.’

Sorenson returned to his chair and this time slumped
down in a manner guaranteed to show his fatigue. Brook wasn’t convinced. Was he really going to sleep or was this an invitation? After a moment’s thought he decided he couldn’t pass up such an opportunity.

‘Goodnight.’ Brook closed the study door behind him and clumped noisily down two flights to the front door. He opened and slammed it shut with exaggerated force.

For a few seconds he stood completely still, waiting, listening for the noise of the study door opening. When a moment later, nothing had registered he picked his coat from the rack and kicked off his shoes. He wrapped them in his coat and set off back to the first floor, all the while listening for movement from the floor above.

The first door he tried opened into a small room dominated by a large wooden chest with slim drawers, the kind used by artists and architects to store sketches and paintings. Brook flicked on the light and inspected a couple of drawers at random. They were full of neat sketches and plans separated by tissue paper and appeared to be designs for some kind of building. Notes on the designs were in a foreign language Brook assumed was Swedish. Sorenson was a dual national, Brook had discovered, and had moved to London from Stockholm in 1960 as part of his father’s chemical company expansion.

Brook extinguished the light and moved onto the next room. This time the door creaked slightly but after a moment’s panic on hearing footsteps from the study, Brook was relieved to hear the strains of music once more, followed by footsteps, presumably returning to the chair. He waited a moment longer.

No door opened but there was something–another noise
,
closer to home, in the room he had just entered–and the hairs on the back of Brook’s neck began to tingle. Somebody was whistling quietly, behind the door he’d just opened. Brook stiffened, assessed his alternatives, then realised what it was. The light was off. Somebody was sleeping.

He listened for a sign that he’d disturbed the occupant but the breathing remained regular and deep. Who was in there? Brook was sure from his skimpy file that Sorenson was a bachelor who lived alone. Then again the file wasn’t very up-to-date. But married? No. There was nothing in Sorenson’s manner or lifestyle to suggest that he’d recently found his soul mate.

Brook decided he had to risk a look. He inched his way further into the room and peered tentatively round the door clutching the bundle of coat and shoes in his moistening palms.

What he saw made him stand erect, relaxed, forsaking the tension of defensive readiness. A small nightlight softened the gloom and in its glow stood a bunk bed with two small children fast asleep, contorted into positions only young physiques can master.

The girl was on the bottom, her face turned to the light for comfort. Her eyes were screwed tight but her mouth lay open allowing its liquid contents to seep along her cheek and into the pillow. Her light brown hair was matted and she gripped a glassy-eyed teddy bear to her throat.

The top bunk was much darker and quieter than the girl’s. Brook fancied that its occupant was male but he couldn’t be sure. If he’d had a sister, he’d have bagged the top. The girl looked about five or six. He couldn’t see the boy but he looked smaller.

Brook felt the need to linger, to see that no harm came to them. He had no idea how long he watched the children sleep. He realised, when he thought about it later, that he had forgotten where he was for that moment in time, that he was in the house of a suspected child killer.