Curse Of The Clown

by Douglas Lindsay

  ‘You had me up until that last sentence, son,’ said Kintyre, ‘then you started talking shite.’

  ‘But Barney? I mean, he’s just a regular guy doing regular guy stuff, and yet he’s constantly being caught up in weird murder shit. And look at me. I’m just a bloke. Nothing exciting ever happened to me, apart from that time I ended up accidentally marrying one of the bridesmaids at my cousin’s wedding, and then I start working here, and boom-shang-a-lang, I can’t step out the door without someone being murdered in the near vicinity.’

  ‘Wait,’ said Barney, ‘you accidentally got married?’

  ‘Rather not talk about it. It got annulled, it’s cool. We weren’t even in the same room when it happened.’

  They all looked at him strangely, then Barney realised he was a little embarrassed by it, so quickly moved the conversation along.

  ‘You were saying? A sitcom?’

  ‘Aye,’ said Keanu, happy to be dragged back to the original conjecture. ‘I mean, what defines a sitcom? You have a set of established characters, two, three or maybe four of them...’

  ‘There were six in Friends,’ said Kintyre grudgingly, as if unhappy he was having to issue a correction.

  ‘And,’ continued Keanu, ‘they’re invariably in the same location every week. The sitting room, the café, the whatever. And here we are, on the barbershop set, every day, day in, day out. A classic sitcom set-up.’

  He looked at Igor and Barney.

  ‘Am I right?’ he said. ‘The three of us? It’s Seinfeld multiplied by Open All Hours.’

  Igor leant on his broom, and stared philosophically out of the window while he thought about it. Barney too took a moment out from the haircut to stare into the far distance and give this consideration.

  ‘And then,’ continued Keanu, ‘we have Garrett and the detective sergeant as the grown ups, the straight men. It’s classic.’

  ‘Hang on,’ said Kintyre, ‘if they’re the straight men, that means you three are supposed to be funny. There’s not much evidence of that.’

  None of the men looked at all slighted, instead glancing between each other and nodding.

  ‘Suppose,’ said Keanu.

  ‘You’re the sit without the com,’ said Kintyre. ‘What’s that called?’

  ‘Not sure,’ said Keanu. ‘Maybe we’re just a not very funny sitcom.’ A beat. ‘Like the first season of Blackadder.’

  ‘Don’t be shitting on Blackadder,’ said Igor, though it came out as arf!

  ‘Sure, I know, but the first season,’ said Keanu.

  ‘Yeah, OK,’ said Barney, ‘you have a point. But if you say season again like you’re an American, you’re going to have to find work elsewhere.’

  Keanu laughed, then looked back at the paper.

  ‘I hear they’re looking for a front of house faeces categorisation assistant, up at the sewage plant,’ said Kintyre, and he barked out a laugh.

  A flash at the window, they were all drawn to it, and then the door opened at a pace, and Monk entered the shop. She hesitated, she seemed to consider whether or not she was going to stay long enough to bother closing the door, and then she shut it and stepped further inside.

  The men all stared at her, waiting for the news she had obviously come to deliver. Kintyre looked at her in the mirror at first, and then turned, groaning at the effort as he did so.

  ‘What’s up?’ asked Barney, aware that Monk had likely been given pause by Kintyre’s presence.

  ‘Don’t know why I’m hesitating,’ said Monk, answering Barney’s thought, ‘it’s all over everything. You haven’t heard from Sophia?’

  She looked at Keanu.

  ‘Expecting her later, but haven’t spoken in a couple of hours.’

  He fished his phone out his pocket, clicked it open and said, ‘Ah... Shit, forgot I turned the sound off,’ then proceeded to read the eleven messages he’d missed, his mouth slowly dropping open along the way.

  ‘Danny Field is dead,’ said Monk, looking at Barney. ‘And his wife, and the four police officers who were entrusted with guarding him.’

  ‘Aw, fuck,’ said Barney, resignation rather than exclamation in his voice.

  For a moment it seemed his legs might go weak, as though he were a Victorian finding out the woman he loved had run off with a German prince, then he steadied himself, leaning on the back of Kintyre’s chair.

  ‘When?’ he said, as it was the only question that immediately came to mind, even though he was not particularly interested. What difference did it make when it had happened? It had happened, and that fact trumped all else.

  ‘Middle of the night some time. We presume he overcame the officers outside first of all. How he even managed to do that, we’ve no idea, given they were parked within sight of each other. Then he entered the house, which he did using keys he’d taken off the police officers. He killed Danny in the bedroom, or at least, he left him under the bed. Slashed to ribbons, the length of his body, and he killed Danny’s wife, with a brutal swipe across the neck, in the downstairs hallway. It’s...’ She looked helplessly at Barney, as though he might have been able to help with the words she couldn’t find, then she said, ‘It’s a bloodbath, that’s all. And we have no idea how he did half the things he did, or where he is now.’

  She looked desperate, a complete change from the here-we-go again, resignation with which she’d walked out to work that morning. Barney wanted to give her a hug, but knew it wasn’t the place. No one would appreciate that here, especially not Monk.

  And the thing she was worried about more than any other was that Norman, or whoever else this was, would come here. Come to Millport, hunting down Barney Thomson, as if he’d had anything to do with any of it.

  ‘Everything’s going to be cool,’ said Barney.

  ‘He murdered four able-bodied police officers in one bounce,’ said Monk. ‘He’s running amok, and we’re completely helpless.’

  ‘Did he leave the calling card? The stupid poetry?’

  ‘Yes. One by Danny, one by his wife, and in each of the police cars. Three of the dead officers were men, and he did to them, and Danny, what he’s done to all his male victims so far. It’s just...’ and she finished the sentence with another helpless gesture. ‘You got messages from Sophia?’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Keanu. ‘She got into work, Danny didn’t show, she was about to start making calls when the police turned up. She’s shut down for the day. She’s coming to Millport earlier than intended, hope that’s OK, boss.’

  ‘Sure,’ said Barney. ‘You should go round to pick her up when the boat arrives.’

  ‘Cheers,’ said Keanu.

  That brief business cleared up, a silence now settled upon them. The news had been delivered, the horror had been made available to the room, and for a short while they all held their positions, not a word spoken, Monk looking at Barney, Barney looking at Monk, the others staring at the floor, wondering where all this would end. Finally Kintyre snapped the moment, turning back round with another audible groan, and looking at himself in the mirror.

  ‘Come on, then, Mr Thomson,’ he said. ‘If we’re all going to get murdered, I may as well die with decent hair.’ A pause, and then, ‘If you could call what you’re doing decent.’

  Barney looked back at Monk, shrugged the words the show must go on, they shared a supportive look, the one they’d given each other so many times in the past, and then he looked down upon Old Man Kintyre’s head, lifted his scissors, and restarted the marginal snipping work required of the Farage.

  ‘You heading back over to the mainland?’ asked Barney.

  ‘No way,’ said Monk. ‘I’m staying right here. We’ve no idea where this guy is, or what he’s going to do next.’

  ‘And you still think he might come to Millport?’

  ‘I don’t know, Barney,’ she said, her tone making him stop and turn.

  ‘We’ll be fine,’ he said. ‘We’ll watch out for each other, don’t worry.’

  ‘I know, but yo
u get it, right? Danny Field and his wife had four officers watching out for them. They’re all dead.’

  Barney didn’t know what else to say. A hug was really the only option, but it wasn’t currently open to him.

  ‘Wait,’ said Keanu, ‘is Sophia coming here liable to make things worse? If it is this Norman guy, and he’s taking revenge on his old shop, mightn’t he follow her down here?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Monk, ‘exactly. It would require him to be keeping tabs on her, but we’re getting the idea he’s capable of some pretty extraordinary things. So, yes, Sophia coming here instantly makes Millport a target. Even more of a target.’

  ‘Shit,’ said Keanu, and he looked quickly between Igor and Barney. ‘I’ll call her, I’ll go there, or meet her somewhere on the mainland.’

  ‘It’s OK,’ said Barney and Monk in unison.

  ‘What are you going to do?’ said Barney, ‘go and get her and then run off into hiding somewhere? Live in a cave until the guy gets caught? There’s nothing any of us can do to get ahead of this guy. He’ll do what he’s going to do, and we just have to be ready for him when it happens. And if it turns out he’s an invincible super-murderer...’

  He let the sentence go, because there was nowhere he could really go with it, then he turned back to Monk.

  ‘Go,’ he said. ‘We’ll cut hair, you go and play your part in the investigation, do whatever you can. Meet you back here at the end of the day for the wrap-up.’

  Deep breath from Monk, she looked at the three men of the barbershop, the sitcom regulars, and gave them what was really a very half-hearted smile.

  ‘Right,’ she said.

  She turned, she opened the door, she hesitated, she hesitated some more, she turned back, walked across the shop, kissed Barney on the cheek, walked back to the door, hesitated again, turned back, kissed Keanu and then Igor on the cheek and said, ‘Right, I’m going, I’m going. Stay safe, gentlemen.’ And with a wave she was gone, the door was closed, and she disappeared back along the street and out of sight.

  ‘Don’t give me a kiss, then,’ muttered Old Man Kintyre.

  ‘You behave yourself,’ said Barney, ‘I’ve got a pair of scissors in my hand, remember.’

  ‘Ha,’ said Kintyre, though there was little humour in it.

  ‘D’you mind?’ asked Keanu, holding up his phone, and Barney indicated the door.

  ‘Of course, give her a call.’

  And Keanu walked out into the morning, the phone already at his ear.

  31

  The Missing Penis Situation

  Solomon and Dr Carew were standing in Danny and Britney’s bedroom, looking down at Danny’s bloody corpse. The bed had been thoroughly examined, then pushed back, and now it had been lifted out of the room altogether. The objects stored beneath the bed were still in place, although there were not many. A small suitcase, a bar with ten kilogram weights on either end, two further five kilogram weights on the floor beside it, a Waitrose bag stuffed with clothes, two pillows in a vacuum packed bag, which had lost containment and refilled with air.

  Danny’s head was lying where the edge of the bed would have been. His corpse was lying straight and on its back, arms by its side. There was a splay of blood, multiple stab wounds, his head spattered, face contorted in the grimace of unexpected and painful death.

  His pyjama bottoms had been yanked down, his penis removed, his pubic hair and pyjamas soaked with blood. The balloon with attached penis and calling card – message, Heads will roll, blood will run, the Koiffing Klown has just begun – had already been removed.

  ‘The murder of the English language aside, what d’you think?’ asked Solomon.

  It took a lot for it to happen, but his stomach was curled up in an angry, knotted, aching ball. Four officers dead, a bloody corpse downstairs, another at their feet. This was a horror show, and the grim humour with which he often attended crime scenes was not to be found today.

  Carew had been standing over Danny’s body for ten minutes. She first of all indicated the mark on the wall behind them where his head had hit, then started laying out the course of events with remarkable accuracy.

  ‘I think he was standing where we are now. Someone beneath the bed grabbed his legs and pulled. He first fell and banged his head against the wall there. That might have stunned him, making it easier for his body to be dragged under.’

  ‘That’s a lot of strength.’

  ‘I’d say. And at the same time as dragging him, they were slashing him with the razor. The further beneath the bed he got, the higher up his body he was lacerated.’

  ‘Dragging with one hand, slashing with the other,’ said Solomon, contemplatively. ‘That’s... that seems unlikely. That is a lot of strength.’

  ‘Yes.’

  They stood and looked at the corpse. Here, for a moment, the silence of three men standing at a barbershop window, looking out on a breeze-blown world.

  ‘Shit,’ said Solomon.

  ‘Hmm,’ said Carew, knowing what he was thinking.

  ‘You think? There could be two of them? I mean, would there be space under the bed for two people to drag another person under there with them?’

  ‘Possibly, looking at the size of him,’ said Carew, indicating Danny. ‘So there’s that. Then there’s that,’ and she indicated the far side of the room beneath the window. There were two suitcases, standing on their long ends, resting against the wall.

  ‘You think they were removed from under the bed?’

  ‘You can see the marks on the carpet where the cases had been, so yes, they definitely were.’

  ‘The fuck did they manage to move two large suitcases, then crawl under the bed without waking either of them up?’

  ‘When I get the bodies back to the lab, I’ll be able to check if they were drugged.’

  ‘Fuck me...’ said Solomon, then he let the words drift away, nowhere else for them to go.

  ‘This is ugly, George,’ said Carew. ‘Where does it stop?’

  He didn’t have any words for her. There was no answer. Finally he said, ‘Can you come with me, let’s go and have a quick look at the police cars, then I’ll let you get on.’

  ‘Of course.’

  A last look at the corpse of Danny Field, then Carew indicated to the constable who was IC crime scene that it was time for the dead to be moved, and she followed Solomon down the stairs.

  The house was full of officers, buzzing like a shopping mall the weekend before Christmas, with similar levels of horror.

  They stopped briefly in the downstairs hall over the corpse of Britney Field. She had been cut once. A massive swipe of the razor down across her neck and chest, severing the jugular and much else besides. Blood had hosed from the vicious wound. The look on her face spoke of the horror of her last few seconds on earth.

  The calling card, again, had been placed on the carpet beside the head.

  Five fat fingers, two flat feet, the Klown is back, revenge is sweet.

  ‘What the fuck is that?’ said Solomon. ‘Does that mean he’s saying the victim had fat fingers and flat feet, or that he himself, the fucking arsehole clown, has fat fingers and flat...?’ and he didn’t quite make it to the end of the sentence before getting annoyed at the question, and waving it away. ‘Anything else going on here?’

  ‘I don’t know that this one is anything other than it seems,’ said Carew.

  ‘No,’ said Solomon. ‘Wait, they ascertained that she’d been sleeping in the bed?’

  ‘Yes, we’re pretty sure.’

  ‘So, she ran. Possibly standing next to her husband when he got taken, and then she legged it downstairs.’ A beat, he looked at the stairs, he pictured it. ‘You think someone was waiting for her down here?’

  ‘That’s not out of the question,’ said Carew, ‘but there’s nothing to particularly indicate it. The front door was locked from the inside, there was no key readily available... there was one lying on the floor by the door, but it’s the wrong key. Seems like she
had time to try to get away, but couldn’t get out. She turned, maybe to try to get to the back door, and...’ She ran a finger across her neck. ‘Plenty of time for the Klown to get down here.’

  ‘Jesus,’ said Solomon. ‘She must have been terrified.’

  ‘I’ll bet.’

  ‘Shit. Come on, let’s go,’ and he turned away quickly and walked outside.

  ‘Any of them your people?’ asked Carew.

  The two police cars had been left together, parked a little away from the house of horror, the bodies of the four officers dumped in the car boots out of sight.

  ‘No,’ said Solomon. A pause, and then, ‘Two of them were married, one of them had a kid. That’s where we are with this shithole of a case.’

  ‘Jesus,’ said Carew softly.

  The cars had been surrounded by one large tent, and Solomon and Carew showed ID to the constable at the entrance, and walked inside.

  The tent had been set up with ample room around the vehicles, and there were currently seven SOCOs inside, going over the cars. For some reason it was colder, much colder, inside the tent than outside, even though the sun was not shining, the day was not warm.

  Carew shivered, Solomon frowned, held the shiver at bay for a second, and then he too felt it run over him, the hairs on his skin rising.

  ‘God, it’s fucking creepy in here. Can we take a look, please?’

  The SOCOs standing over the boot of the first car, turned to Solomon and Carew, then immediately stepped back.

  Two police officers jammed into the boot of the car. One male, one female. They’d both had their throats slit, large, long, deep cuts. Blood had gushed. As with dead Danny, the male officer’s trousers had been yanked down, his penis removed. The organ itself was not evident.

  ‘The others are the same?’ said Solomon.

  A moment, while the SOCOs realised he was speaking to them, then one of them said, ‘Sir, yes. Same method of murder, same genital mutilation.’

  Solomon lifted his head, looked at what he could see of the other car from where they were standing, closed his eyes briefly. Started to take a deep breath, but this was fetid, cold air, infused with death, and he quickly stopped.