Struggles of Psycho

by Rhyam O'Bryam

  ‘Amy brought in a large bag of grey powder, a bucket of sand, a couple of buckets of water and two small white plastic bottles that had something grey in them. All of the materials went into the mixer which grunted as if reluctant, before churning them all together. The noise of the mixer was loud in the hollow room and I felt relieved that I could no longer hear Amy’s vengeance-filled tale of hurt and madness.

  ‘When the machine was turned off, there was a peculiar, tense silence in the room. At least, for a moment. Then Mike spoke. “Mistress, I’m getting cold. Can you release me, please?”

  ‘“Be patient. I must get these bricks in firmly before the cement sets.”

  ‘I could only hear Amy saying this, because I was sitting in the narrow space, with my legs unable to stretch out fully along the line of the wall, my head below the small rectangular gap through which the light came in. Except that now the light was blocked and all went dark.

  ‘“Ivy,” came a cold, cruel voice. “I’m going to remove some of these bricks to put cement on them. If you move, if you touch them before they are set, I will kill your brother.”

  ‘Amy didn’t even need to stress these words to convince me. In fact, she spoke in a matter-of-fact, quiet tone that was even more chilling than if she’d screamed at me. So it sounds stupid now, but I just sat there as she took out loose bricks and rebuilt the wall with cement. At one point we exchanged a look. It was hard to see her face properly, most of it was in shadow. But her right eye gleamed, dark, with a hint of purple, like a raven. She looked triumphant, eager but there was pain in her expression too.

  ‘By this time I knew Amy very well and I think I knew too, deep down, that a threshold had been crossed and that Amy was now going to murder us both. But I didn’t want to believe it and I said nothing, did nothing.

  ‘When Amy had bricked up the wall, she had left one brick on the floor and the resulting space allowed enough room for someone – me – to look outside. Not that I wanted to. I didn’t want to see my naked brother, nor the wicked, gloating looks on Amy’s face now that she had me completely at her mercy.

  ‘“Are you finished yet?” asked Mike, in a quiet voice. I almost felt glad he was suffering, it was his own fault. He could have escaped this and he could have spared me too. We should have been a long way from the farm by now. Instead, we were in the hands of someone who I knew had no mercy, no sympathy, no ability to empathise. Amy’s head was too full of her own story and especially of the tragic death of her mother. The time spent in the same car as a dying woman who had urged Amy to trust no one had marked Amy for the rest of her life. Our only hope was that Amy found playing with us more entertaining than killing us. Soon, that hope was crushed.

  ‘After she was done, I heard Amy’s footsteps echoing across the bare stone floor. “Now,” she said, “we have to wait about twenty minutes for it to dry.”

  ‘“Can I come down, Mistress? I’m getting pins and needles all over.”

  ‘“I’m afraid not. There’s one more thing I need you to do for me while you are there.”

  ‘“What’s that Mistress?”

  ‘“Die.”

  ‘I held my breath. I felt she was serious. Even Mike might have started to worry at this point, for his laugh was nervous. Poor Mike. He would have been able to look at her and see that hard, uncaring line of her mouth and the determination in her eyes.’

  Pausing, Ivy took another drink. Again, I glanced over to the doctor: this time he acknowledged me with a slight nod of his head. I nodded back with relief. We were approaching the crucial testimony and Ivy appeared well able to continue. In fact, she seemed anxious to do so. Beside me, I could feel McCarthy’s presence. Was she also filled with a sense of achievement? That we’d found Ivy in time and that Amy Philips was going to get the jail sentence she deserved?

  ‘“I think Christ probably died on a cross like this, rather than the ones they use in the church today.” Amy spoke as though musing aloud.

  ‘“That’s enough, Amy. I want to get down. I’m cold and my arms ache.”

  ‘I was listening to Mike and I was in agony. He really needed to understand the danger he was in and somehow get through to Amy, to give her a reason to let him go. But he hadn’t been listening when earlier Amy had made her great speech about trust and betrayal. Or he might have used some of her own values against her. What was she planning, other than a betrayal of his trust? Yes, she had good reason to be angry at me. But Mike? He’d never done anything but obey her instructions.

  ‘“She’s listening, you know.” Amy was walking slowly around the room, I could tell by her footsteps. “You’ve always treated Ivy as your little sister and you’ve always patronised her. But Ivy is a finer person than you in every way. Above all, she’s smarter than you, Mike.”

  ‘“You’re entitled to your opinion,” said Mike, somewhat gruffly, “although our academic performance might suggest otherwise.”

  ‘“Don’t be mean. You’ll regret dying on bad terms with Ivy. And in any case, I think Ivy would have done better if I hadn’t held her back. Given her other matters to think about than her studies.”

  ‘“I wish you wouldn’t keep on about dying. I mean, I love that you are my mistress. But I’m not into this.”

  ‘“You are proving my point.” Amy had stopped walking and was standing near the opening to my cramped space behind the wall. “Ivy believes me, don’t you dear? But you, Mike, can’t see that you are a dead man, just wasting his last few minutes on earth with inanities and misunderstanding.”

  ‘I heard a tapping and scratching on the wall. “Good, they’ve set. That’s all I was waiting for really.” Amy must have peered in, because the hole was blocked and all went black. “Stand up, Ivy, I want you to see this before I wall you up for good.”

  ‘“You don’t have to kill him, Amy. I know you are capable of it. I won’t disobey you again, you’ll see. I’ll do whatever you want.”

  ‘But it was no good and I knew it. She didn’t answer but moved away. “Don’t you want to look at him, one last time?”

  ‘“Not like that. Amy. Please. What do you want? What will you do with Mike and me dead?”

  ‘“Do what I should have done all along. Trust no one.”

  ‘“Amy? Why kill me? What have I done wrong?” Mike, at last, could see the murderous intent in his mistress.

  ‘“Nothing, Mike. But I’m bored of you. And more importantly, it’s the best way to punish Ivy for her disloyalty.” She raised her voice. “Isn’t it dear?”

  ‘I didn’t reply.

  ‘“If you won’t look, let me tell you what I’m going to do. I have a knitting needle that I’m going to stab into his heart. I’ve a bucket for the blood, which I’ll pour onto the carpet in the lounge. Then I’ll take the body across the yard in the wheelbarrow and get him dressed in the lounge before rigor mortis sets in. I must remember to push the needle in again, not too deep, just enough so a few fibres will be in the wound. Next, I’ll break a few things to create a fight scene, maybe give myself a nice bruise on the face and when it’s all set up right, call the ambulance.”

  ‘“It’s you who are being disloyal.” I was provoked by her horrible, taunting words into speaking up, which was exactly what she wanted. But I had to try to shift her from her plans.

  ‘“How so?” Her voice came closer, it was mocking in tone.

  ‘“Mike never did anything but obey you.”

  ‘There was a long pause. Long enough that I began to hope I’d gotten through to her. But then she just said, quietly. “Well, I suppose he should have learned something from my mother. I told him about her last words often enough.” Her footsteps resumed. “Speaking of last words, what will yours be Mike? Nothing too profound. Ivy, on the other hand…” Then she called over. “Ivy, any last words for Mike?”

  ‘It didn’t want to give Amy anything, knowing she would enjoy my suffering. But I couldn’t help myself, a great sob came out of me with a shout. “Mike. I love you! I’m
sorry for all this‘

  ‘“Lovely. See, I told you.” Amy must have been addressing Mike and standing over him. “I don’t suppose you want to watch?”

  ‘“Amy, don’t!” pleaded Mike in a quiet voice. I could hear him clearly though, the room echoing all sounds. “I love you, Amy. Don’t hurt me.”

  ‘Then came a brief, awful moan. Really, I’ll never forget it. Nothing like the sounds people usually make when hurt. It wasn’t that loud but it was deep, serious.

  ‘“That’s it. He’s dead.”

  ‘I knew it was true and began sobbing.’

  Again, Ivy paused for a drink. Her red-rimmed eyes were moist. It was a terrible memory to carry and must have been hard to describe to us. Yet there was an anger, an understandable desire for justice, that was driving her on.

  ‘I could hear Amy moving about, but I didn’t want to listen. I did wonder if there was any way I could ruin her plans. The thing about Amy was that although she was very smart, she was arrogant. She really believed that no one was more intelligent than her and she would get so furious when I beat her at chess, we had to stop playing.

  ‘To get an advantage over her, I had to figure out what Amy was planning. And I couldn’t. She was going to call an ambulance after preparing the scene. But she could hardly claim it was an accident, could she? Maybe she could. No offence, Inspector, but I had no idea what the Irish police were like and what influence Amy had with them. In any case, I couldn’t do anything about that.

  ‘It was clear, however, that she had to get rid of me. And here it seemed that her intention was to simply brick me up and leave me. If she locked the building and hid the key, my body might lie undisturbed for decades. Still, there was a chance Amy might want to use the building. To restart her BDSM games with someone else perhaps.

  ‘Also, the police investigating Mike’s death would come in here, surely? So I searched around in the dark for stones and put my hand through the remaining hole, wanting to scratch an arrow on the brick above the hole, one pointing downwards. The problem was that while I could get my hand out and a lot of my arm, the thickness of the bricks means I couldn’t get my arm up. I had to settle for scratching on the brick about three to the side.

  ‘Pressed hard against the cold wall, I really dug the stones into the brick as hard as I could. But it wasn’t long before I heard the door swing open and I pulled my arm back in such a hurry that it was grazed all along the inside.

  ‘“All done,” said Amy. “I just need to brick you up.”

  ‘“You’ll miss me.” I strove to keep my voice calm.

  ‘“I will indeed. I doubt I’ll ever have anyone in my life the way I had you.” She leaned in close to the hole. “I won’t ever be as hurt and betrayed again.”

  ‘“Come on, Amy. You’re not that hurt. We both know that all along, the only thing keeping me here was your blackmail. Of course I’d try to run when I could.”

  ‘“You never understood me, Ivy. After all these years, you still don’t know me at all. What you should have done is picture that little girl in the wreckage of a car, metal pressed hard against me, confining me. Beside me, my mother is dying. Her blood everywhere. And her whispered, last breath. ‘Trust no one,’ said with all the earnestness she could muster.

  ‘“What you should have done, Ivy, is help that little girl. She’s still inside me, screaming and crying for her mother. But perhaps it’s just human to live in your own thoughts and never reach out beyond them. Living with you was more or less the same as living alone.”

  ‘Then she paused and laughed. “Except for the sex. Anyway, that’s all done with. And so are you. It does concern me that thirst is apparently an awful state. A much worse death than, drowning, say, which leads to a high. You know, like people get when suffocating during sex. I’m sorry about that, Ivy. For Mike it was quick. I just stopped his heart. It probably didn’t even hurt all that much. A lot less than some of the other things we did.”

  ‘I could hear her scraping a trowel against a brick. “You know you killed your own brother, don’t you, Ivy? I must have warned you a hundred times not to cross me. You knew what I’d do. Maybe deep down, you wanted him dead. Is that it, Ivy? Have I done your dirty work for you?

  ‘She waited for a response but I wasn’t going to say anything more. I’d given her far too much already. It was all too easy see what was going on in Amy’s mind. She was enacting a scene that she much have envisaged for weeks. And she was thoroughly enjoying herself. Well, there was no longer anything she could do to force me to play in her games. Nor could she do anything worse to me than kill Mike. In that sense, I was free of Amy Philips. The fear, her ability to blackmail me, was gone. The worst had happened.

  ‘“What else should I say to you before going away forever?” Amy asked herself aloud. “Oh, nothing really. Do you remember when we first met, in school? How different we were. So shy and mouse-like. Who could have imagined back then that it would end like this? Well, here we are.”

  ‘The thin pale rectangle that had previously served me as a place to view the world closed and the brick was shoved in. Immediately, I ran my fingers up the wall to find the wet cement and rubbed away all that I could, digging my nails into the crack.

  ‘“Are you pushing at the brick Ivy? Is that you? I would in your position.” Amy’s voice was almost completely muffled now and I wasn’t sure, but I thought she might be laughing. “It’s no good. This stuff really bonds hard in minutes.”

  ‘And she was right, I could tell soon enough that it was too solid for me to hope to shift it. Then I searched through my clothing for anything metal. The zip of my hoody was my best bet. After a bit of wriggling in that black, confined space I had it in my hand and scraped all around that last brick. My problem was that it was less than an inch long, so even though it did work out the rapidly drying cement, that didn’t help much. Later, maybe a day later, when I was getting desperate, I tried grinding down the brick itself, but the zip wore thin too quickly.

  ‘After a couple of hours I gave up on the wall, turned sideways as best I could to sit down and stretch out my legs a little. The important thing, I told myself, was not to fall asleep. My best hope was that when the police came to see about Mike, they would check in on the castle and I could scream as loudly as possible to let them know I was here. At this point I wasn’t too frightened. Although, it was a worry that I might not be able to tell when someone was in the room. Amy had left, presumably (although perhaps she was still here) and I could no longer hear her footsteps or the door close shut.

  ‘Did you come into the castle, Inspector?’

  It came as a shock when Ivy left off her statement to look at me directly and I felt flustered. ‘Superintendent, we call it here. Superintendent Kieran Doyle.’ I sighed. ‘We did. Mid-morning the following day. Perhaps twelve hours after the murder.’

  ‘I didn’t hear you then. I think I managed to stay awake a lot longer than that. But it was impossible to keep track of time. That little cavity was totally dark.’ Ivy Patterson sank back into her pillow with a shudder. ‘Over the hours, as I began to get thirsty, I realised it might be my tomb, as Amy had intended for some time.’

  The memory of her imprisonment caused Ivy Patterson to start sobbing. From behind me, McCarthy stepped forward and patted her leg. ‘It’s all right now. We were slow, but we got there in time. You’re safe.’

  It didn’t surprise me when the doctor stepped forward. ‘You have enough?’

  ‘Oh, we do,’ I answered. ‘We certainly do.’

  ‘Let’s leave it there for now then. Can you give her twenty-four hours before another interview?’

  ‘Of course. Thank you, Ivy. You’ve already told us enough to imprison Amy Philips for murder.’

  From her near-horizontal position, Ivy raised her head to stare at me with burning intensity. ‘Good.’

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  ‘We’ve got her!’ McCarthy’s was enthusiastic and I shared her feelings. Her face wa
s flushed, eyes seeking mine in excitement. ‘We’ve done it.’

  When you are up against a thoroughly hateful adversary like Amy Phillips, you can’t help but be made up at the prospect of defeating her. But I hoped this sense of pride and triumph was less evident on my face than it was on my partner’s. Despite my efforts at self-control, I found we were both walking much faster than usual, McCarthy almost skipping to keep pace.

  ‘We were lucky though, we made mistakes that nearly cost Ivy her life.’

  ‘Don’t be pouring cold water on this, Doyle. It was a hard call, murder, but we had Philips sussed. Now’s the time to be patting ourselves on the back, not beating ourselves up.’

  ‘We’re nearly there. I believe Ivy, of course. She couldn’t have bricked herself up. But we need forensics for traces of Michael Patterson’s blood in the tower and an examination of the wheelbarrow that moved the body. Her testimony alone won’t necessarily be enough.’

  ‘I’m on it.’ And immediately McCarthy was on the phone.

  As the hospital’s automatic doors slid open and we left the building, I got on the phone too.

  ‘Hello?’ came the voice of an elderly woman.

  ‘Mrs Patterson? This is Superintendent Doyle. Ivy is alive and in Wexford Hospital, recovering from having been imprisoned by Amy Philips. She’s in no danger. I’ve just come from having a long chat with her.’ I’d thought about my words carefully. I would normally have let her respond to my greeting but I didn’t want to torture the poor woman with the fear I was ringing with bad news.

  ‘Oh, thank God! Is she all right? Can I visit her?’

  ‘I’m sure she would be very glad to see you. She’s fine. She was very dehydrated when we found her but she’s recovering quickly.’

  ‘Where was she?’

  ‘Amy Philips had imprisoned her at the farm.’