by Wes Markin
At this point, Gardner had planned to let Yorke introduce the Ray angle. He moved to the front of the room. It was a long while since he’d addressed the team he used to lead regularly.
Less than a sentence in, it felt like he’d never been away. ‘I spent most of last night buried in the Reginald Ray investigation. If turning a blind eye could be called an investigation.’
There was laughter from some of the officers, but not Parkinson, or the cronies that gathered around him like moth flies around a drain. Yorke was still his superior officer and could still dress him down if he so wished, but that was one wound he wanted to avoid reopening if at all possible.
‘We know Reginald Ray was a cannibal, and we know that Samuel Mitchell’s killer was behaving in a similar fashion.’ Yorke didn’t feel the need to elaborate – they were all very much aware that the murdering bastard had feasted on the poor young man. ‘So, I was looking for motive.’
He nodded at Willows, who went around the room, handing out copies of the statement delivered by William Walsh on his deathbed in 1960. He’d highlighted appropriate sections in yellow before it’d hit the colour photocopier.
One of the officers beside Parkinson read out the first highlighted piece of information as Willows finished handing them out. ‘I don’t want to die with the knowledge that the evil bastard, Reginald Ray, wasn’t given an easy exit from God’s green earth.’
‘I don’t blame him,’ Parkinson said. ‘Although I disagree that hanging is a hard way out. It’s far too quick. This bastard should have been made to pay for longer.’
His cronies nodded. Yorke noticed a malignant look in Parkinson’s eyes. Part of your true nature slipping out, Parkinson?
‘Face like rotten fruit?’ Jake said. ‘Nice.’
‘And who can we link that to, DS Pettman?’ Yorke said.
Jake’s eyes widened. ‘Robert Bennett? With his PVS?’
‘Precisely, prepare for this.’
Yorke nodded at Tyler, who then went around the room handing out photographs of Reginald Ray. There were audible gasps. Someone said, ‘Impossible.’ Another said, ‘No question, Bennett is a bloody Ray then.’
Once the photographs had been distributed, Yorke said, ‘We’ve also linked Bennett’s DNA to the Ray family tree. You can see that he’s inherited the PVS.’
‘He’s inherited the entire bloody look!’ Jake said.
‘Yes, there is more than a striking resemblance,’ Willows said.
‘Fucking supernatural if you ask me,’ Parkinson said and grunted.
‘So, back to motive,’ Yorke said. ‘Please look back at the statement from William Walsh. I’ve highlighted, ten-lines from the bottom, the reasons Reginald gave for killing and eating six local children.’
Their youth, their freshness, their health.
‘Jesus,’ Willows said. ‘Has there ever been such a crazy family?’
‘So, I’m throwing it out there for your consideration. Did Reginald really believe he could reverse his illness, his PVS, by feeding on these poor youngsters?’
‘Well, if he did, it didn’t bloody work!’ Parkinson said, stabbing his copy of the photograph with his finger.
‘William Walsh made precisely the same comment,’ Yorke said. ‘Maybe, in Reginald’s twisted mind, he thought it was working? I don’t know. But that was the motive he gave. So, could Bennett, or whoever is actually responsible, be eating these young men for the same reason?’
Parkinson was halfway out of his chair. ‘Why did you say, “whoever is responsible”? We know it’s Bennett! He’s disfigured in exactly the same way for pity’s sake.’
‘I’ll get to the reason I have doubts in a moment, but first let’s stick with this idea of motive. The children that Reginald targeted were younger than Samuel Mitchell, but he is still rather young, and so could still fit this philosophy of youth, freshness and health.’
Yorke noticed that all eyes were wide and firmly fixed on him. The suggestion that he’d had second thoughts about Robert Bennett’s guilt had thrown them into disarray. The thought of a cannibal still at large, even though they doubted it immensely, would be too much to bear.
Yorke pointed at a photograph of the bottle recovered from behind the Mitchell farm. ‘The DNA in the bottle is Bennett’s. He didn’t leave fingerprints and was probably wearing gloves, but he left saliva for us to sample.’
Some of the officers looked confused. Some shrugged.
‘That proves that it is him then, doesn’t it?’ Jake said.
Yorke pointed at a photograph of the bloody saw from last night’s crime scene. ‘SOCO have recovered more DNA from this saw. It is also a match for Bennett’s. The blood on the saw shows that it has been used on both Samuel Mitchell, and Peter McCall.’
Gardner looked nervous. She widened her eyes at Yorke. She was instructing him to get to the point before Parkinson and his cronies piped up.
‘But despite this overwhelming evidence, the timeline just doesn’t work,’ Yorke said.
At this point, Superintendent Joan Madden walked in. She walked slowly to the back of the room. Nobody spoke, so Yorke could hear every footstep. Once she reached the wall, she turned and leaned against it with her arms crossed, listening.
To say she looked intimidating would be an understatement. At least it may shut Parkinson up for a moment.
Yorke took them through the problem. There was no way that Robert could have got from the front of the farm to the back of the farm, behind the maze, in such a short time frame.
‘Could someone have the time wrong?’ Jake said.
‘The CCTV footage of Bennett leaving puts a stamp on the time. He’d literally just reported his made-up grandson missing, so Samuel would have been straight into that maze. Doesn’t matter how many times I trace the route on Google Maps, or drive it myself, you cannot do that route in less than fifteen minutes. And he can’t have gone back through the farm because he isn’t caught on CCTV again.’
Madden coughed. ‘Okay, this seems indisputable. So, the options, DI Yorke?’
‘The most obvious option would be that Bennett scoped the area at an earlier time, or date. He left the water bottle there at that point, but he wasn’t the one behind the maze on the day of the abduction.’
‘So, you are suggesting,’ Madden said, ‘that he was not working alone?’
There were murmurs from the crowd.
‘The farmer who saw him. Bryce Singles? Could it be him?’ Jake said.
‘It’s possible,’ Yorke said, ‘But would he really have come forward to report Bennett shouting abuse at him if he was involved?’
‘But there’s no harm in pulling him in for more questioning,’ Madden said.
‘Agreed,’ Gardner said. ‘That duty has been assigned to DC Parkinson.’
Yorke noticed Parkinson’s eyes narrow. He’d consider this lead a non-starter. Mind you, he grumbled about most tasks, so it didn’t matter too much which they gave him.
Yorke said, ‘The more I run through this, the more I am convinced that someone else working with Bennett grabbed Samuel. And, if everyone here spends some time digesting this on HOLMES following the briefing, I know that you will all reach the same conclusion.’
‘Could Bryce Singles be framing Bennett?’ Willows said. ‘He could have made that false report about seeing him. He could have easily planted Bennett’s bottle.’
‘But how would he have got Samuel into the maze at that exact time without Bennett’s help? And why would Bennett be in there reporting his fictional grandson missing?’ Jake said.
Willows face went red. ‘Yes … you’re right.’
‘Okay,’ Madden said. ‘There are two of them. So, who is the second if not Singles?’
Yorke paused and looked at Gardner. She looked down. She knew what he was going to say next and was nervous.
‘Someone who looks exactly like Bennett and Reginald Ray.’
Some officers shook their head, some exchanged glances. Parkinson just
went right ahead and guffawed.
Yorke realised that because of his recent suspension, he’d lost some respect in this room.
Madden said, ‘Silence, everyone! We want to hear this theory.’
‘Dr Tenor informed me earlier that although the DNA from the bottle matches Bennett’s, it is not a hundred percent conclusive. There is a longer test which will look for subtle differences in DNA as a result of different environmental influences over a subject’s life. I’ve submitted our sample for this test. Look, we didn’t expect another Ray to crawl out of the woodwork as it is. I think we need to be open-minded here. What if there are two of them? What if they are twins?’
‘It makes no sense,’ Parkinson said.
Gardner said, ‘No, DC Parkinson, it makes perfect sense. Bennett sets up the trap for Samuel. Five minutes later, at a time when Bennett couldn’t have been around the back of the maze, Samuel is abducted by Bennett’s twin brother, also a dead ringer for Reginald, and also suffering from PVS. It is the twin brother that Bryce Singles received a mouthful of abuse from.’
Parkinson and his fanbase were shaking their heads.
Madden started to walk towards the exit. Yorke listened to her footsteps again.
At the door, she turned and addressed the room. ‘Right now, as far as we know, there is no one missing or in immediate danger. You have the luxury of exploring DI Yorke’s theory. Yes, it’s far-fetched but I’d ask most of you to spend some time reading over old cases. History is littered with the far-fetched. Well done DCI Gardner and DI Yorke for finding a theory that supports the timeline and I know that the team around the room will support you in ruling it in or out. Good morning, everyone.’
She turned to leave the room.
Yorke exchanged eye contact with Gardner. There was a ghost of a smile on her lips. If there hadn’t of been a cannibal, or two, on the loose, Yorke may just have cheered.
‘DI Yorke is going to be following up Bennett’s heritage. We need to know at what point Bennett tumbled out of the family tree and, just as importantly, who with. If it does, as DI Yorke suspects, involve a twin, I think this can quickly be put to bed. DS Pettman and I will take another crack at Bennett with this new theory to see if we can jar something loose. Which takes me to another element, that I almost forgot to cover. Despite the best efforts of PC Hammond and DC Willows, we have not managed to locate Bennett’s wife, Sandra. Bennett claims that she has run off with another man, but we are no closer to finding out who this elusive person is.’
‘Because it’s a lie,’ Parkinson said. Several officers around him murmured their agreement.
‘Well, PolSA are scouring Bennett and McCall’s property again today,’ Gardner said. ‘If there’s foul play here, I’ve no doubt we’ll turn something up.’
After everyone had left, Yorke, Jake and Gardner hung back in the incident room.
‘Went well I thought,’ Jake said. ‘Do me a favour though, sir? Next time, you decide to throw Parkinson’s phone out of a window, could you throw him out instead?’
Yorke clapped Jake’s big shoulder. ‘I was going to ask the muscle to do that. He’s too heavy for me.’
‘You were always the best at delegating.’ Gardner smiled.
Yorke addressed Gardner. ‘Mark?’
‘Phoned in sick. Migraine.’ She looked away.
Yorke nodded and glanced at Jake. ‘You look shattered.’
‘The usual. The sofa bed.’ Jake looked away too.
Yorke left the room feeling miserable. His two closest friends had blatantly just lied to him again.
10
ROBERT BENNETT’S MOTHER, Elysia, had died five years earlier, and the father had died several years prior to that. Yorke had looked at photographs of them already and there was no PVS and certainly no family resemblance to the Rays. Yes, they could be descended from Reginald, but he doubted it. Up until the arrest of Robert yesterday, the Bennetts had been churchgoing, respectable farmers for the best part of a century.
There had already been some local outrage following the press coverage of Robert’s arrest. Several phone calls from irritated Devizes’ residents who referred to the Bennett family as the ‘best of the best’ and as ‘altruistic as they come.’
If they knew he was really part of the Ray family, they wouldn’t be making those phone calls. No chance. The Rays were magnets for violence and tragedy and no matter how well they hid, they weren’t ever going to escape that legacy.
So, if Robert was not a Bennett and was, in fact, a Ray, how had Wiltshire’s family of the century inherited a descendent of that psychotic lineage?
Other than Robert and his wife, Sandra, no Bennett was still alive. Wiltshire Council clarified this. They also clarified that a birth certificate did exist for Robert, dated 1945.
Yorke followed his instincts to Charlotte Wilson; an 83-year-old who had placed four phone calls regarding the ‘disgusting’ treatment of Robert by a society built on the ‘bedrock of the farming community’ of which the ‘members of the Bennett family had been the most wonderful ambassadors.’ Yorke figured that anyone that put that amount of effort into glorifying chicken farmers must know them and their history very well.
Charlotte Wilson was widowed and lived with her daughter, Lucy, in an apartment at Spire View. As Yorke journeyed into the industrial eyesore on the outskirts of the medieval heart of Salisbury, he wondered how a woman who’d spent most of her existence in the ‘bedrock of the farming community’ was coping with city life.
Not that well, Yorke reasoned, if she was finding time to put in phone calls like the ones yesterday.
Yorke had phoned ahead to warn Charlotte and Lucy of his arrival. Charlotte was more than happy to see him. She was probably ready to put the world to rights over Wiltshire Police’s miscarriage of justice.
After parking up, he rang the doorbell labelled Lucy Wilson. It was Lucy that answered.
‘Hello … it’s Detective Inspector Michael Yorke. I phoned ahead earlier to speak to your mother.’
‘I’ll buzz you up but you’re going to be disappointed I’m afraid.’
Yorke considered asking her what she meant before realising she’d already rung off. The buzzer sounded and he entered.
Two boys were squabbling over a bike in the stairwell. One must have been about fifteen, the other several years younger.
‘Everything alright?’ Yorke said as he approached the stairs.
‘Fine,’ the older boy said, ‘he’s my brother.’
Yorke looked at the younger boy, whose face was red and blotchy. ‘Is that the case?’
The younger boy nodded.
The older boy snatched the bike from his brother and started wheeling it towards the exit. ‘He’s going to be lending me his bike for a bit, the little retard.’
For a moment, Yorke imagined Ewan in that changing room with a boy pointing at the scars on his chest saying ‘Orphan.’
‘Hey, get out of my way,’ the older boy said to Yorke.
Yorke had stepped in front of him. ‘Which flat are your parents in?’
‘What’s it to you?’
Yorke took a deep breath. Control yourself, you are dealing with a petulant child, not an armed thug.
Ewan’s experiences really did have him wound up.
The door opened behind the two boys and a wide, squat man with a squashed looking face trudged out. The polo shirt he had on was too small for him and Yorke was surprised it didn’t tear. He also wondered if the reason that his face looked so squashed was because he’d squeezed it through such a narrow collar.
‘Dad, this man is in my way,’ the older boy said.
The man started to growl so Yorke flashed his badge.
‘Come here, Todd,’ the man said.
‘And give your brother his bike back,’ Yorke said.
Todd wheeled the bike back to his younger brother. The tearful boy smiled.
‘Sorry.’ The man took Todd by the shoulder. ‘They’re always falling out.’
>
As Yorke walked upstairs, he listened to Todd being led into his apartment for a rollicking. He glanced over his shoulder and saw the younger brother disappear out of the door for a bike ride and smiled.
Lucy Wilson, who looked youthful for sixty, was waiting for him at the apartment door. She had a short-sleeved shirt on, exposing interlocking flowers tattooed up and down her arms. It made Yorke think of his grandmother’s wallpaper in the house he frequented regularly back in the early eighties, while his mother was binging on drugs and alcohol.
‘My mother took a turn and is asleep now, detective. It’ll be hours before she’ll be up again.’ She sighed. ‘They’re getting more and more regular now.’
‘I’m sorry to hear that.’
‘Thanks. It’s better if it’s almost her time. Not for me, you understand, I love her, and I’ll do anything for her. But she can’t get used to this life I’ve brought her into and everyone else she’s ever known has gone. Besides you wouldn’t have got much out of her about the Bennetts. She has them on a pedestal. As you probably found out yesterday evening before I pried the phone off her!’ She smiled and showed bleached white teeth. ‘To be honest, you might be best speaking to me. I know about the Bennetts - warts and all.’
Yorke felt his heart rate quicken. ‘That would be great.’
‘Come in then and I’ll put the kettle on.’
Lacey Ray wondered what would have happened if she’d been loved as a child.
These days, she often gazed on young families who were so contentedly lost in each other and wondered if things would have turned out differently if she’d also had this.
She would watch as the young mother would kneel before her darling child to teach them to look right, then left, before crossing. She would stare at the young father who would hoist his little cherub up onto his shoulders.
