by James Arklie
Angie dipped again and ate. ‘Assuming he did.’
Kline acknowledged that with a nod of his head. ‘But, more important, why is he back now, twenty years after murdering Evie?’
*
4th May 1995 – Piraeus, Greece.
There were Arum lilies in the house that day.
Tall, imperious, marble white, statuesque goddesses drained of their blood. Their stamens curved to heaven, their yellow pollen the colour of body fat exposed when skin is slashed and peeled away.
Detective Nick Stamelos wondered why he’d never notice that before. The horror that lay in such beauty. He turned his attention to the naked body laid out on the bed and realised why. It was all to do with context.
The woman’s skin was as white as the flower heads; the yellow fat exposed at the edge of the slash on her chest was starting to dry in the heat of the day. He thought of a cheese sandwich kept too long, curling at the edges, then threw the thought as far away as he could.
He shook out a handkerchief, pressed it to his mouth and nose and leaned in closer. Flies were gathering in the humid air round him and he waved them away as best he could.
There were no other signs of violence. No wounds or bruising, just the gash across her chest where her right breast had been carefully - later described by SOCO as ‘surgically’ - removed. He doubted it would ever be found. Placed carefully over the raw red outrage was the head of an exotic purple orchid.
He stepped back, frowning. The bed had been dragged to a strange angle, facing glass doors to a false balcony, but giving a view to the harbour. He looked across at the backsides of the car ferries waiting to take the early season tourists to the islands.
There was another puzzle on the body. Covering her pubic hair was a small colour photograph. It was a picture of a teenage girl, jumping on a sandy beach, hands and arms thrown to the blue sky in a gesture of absolute joy. Behind her, the turquoise Aegean Sea shimmered with life and a large yacht seduced the jealous eye with its exhibition of wealth.
The girl was topless, her breasts full and demanding the attention the photographer was giving her. Intriguingly, the girl was not the woman. The woman not the girl.
Detective Stamelos puffed out his cheeks, let out the air as a noisy rush and looked at the body with annoyance. He regarded the window dressing on the body with bemusement, looked round the tiny apartment for several minutes and found no obvious clues as to what had happened, then stepped aside for the scene of crime team.
The murder of Anastasia Pappas was one of ten in Athens and Piraeus that week. The idiosyncrasies of her death required too much thought and too many resources, so more straightforward cases took the attention of Detective Stamelos.
The case remained unsolved, the thin file was eventually tied in brown tape and moved to its own slot in the stacks in the basement. Anastasia was returned to her grieving parents, who buried her with the full and glorious magnificence and the religious intensity, offered by the Greek Orthodox Church.
*
Kline swapped the file for the second and put his feet up again. He glanced at Angie who was busy at the white board, writing up names and the common threads in all the murders. Kline glanced at the last file in the sequence. Evie. The loving, generous Evie. Where the hell did she fit into all of this?
Kline flipped open the file and grimaced at the brevity of death. Two sheets of A4 summarised the horrific death of Lisa Maughn, exactly one year and one day later.
*
5th May 1996, Sydney Harbour, Australia.
It was nine pm when her boyfriend discovered the body of Lisa Maughn in her expensive apartment overlooking Sydney Harbour. The previous day she’d celebrated her thirtieth and final birthday. Today she was laid out naked on the sunbed on her balcony.
Detective Jared Jarvis paused at the open sliders, glanced at the body and then took in the expanse of expensive view below him. If only he could afford this, he thought.
To his left was the busy ferry terminal of Circular Quay. On the hillside opposite was the Old Quarter. Directly below that a cruise ship was loaded and preparing to set sail. In the darkness it’s lights glittered brightly making it look like a diamond encrusted animal.
Down to the right the long, open-air bar of Sydney Opera House buzzed with drinkers. Hanging dark and protective over it all was the hard, dark steel of the Harbour Bridge.
Jared turned his attention back to the body and stepped out onto the balcony. He’d never seen anything like it. Naked. Right breast removed and covered with a flower. He caught a whiff of the powerful scent. Later, SOCO would tell him it was Lily of the Valley.
An old colour photograph of a woman covered her pussy. Her arms were at her sides, hands up, empty. It was a gesture of supplicant pleading. It reminded him of his yoga sessions. Shavastna – the corpse position.
Jared shook his head, muttered, ‘Bastard, bastard, bastard’, then stood aside to allow the SOCO team through. He prayed they would find something that would nail this nutter really soon.
He looked at the complexity in front of him and then let his gaze wander out to the expensive view. No, he thought, this one won’t be easy. There will be no ‘soon’ about this one.
*
Kline was getting frustrated already. He scratched at a head of hair that hadn’t been washed. Jenny had always liked it long, wanting it to start curling at the tips. He hated that, although Jenny had encouraged it, fiddling and twirling lovingly with the curls as they fell over his collar. After the accident, he’d bought himself some clippers and shaved it down to a stubbly number five. Like an act of self-harming.
Kline threw the file to the desk where it slithered into the next one. He said. ‘Sod all here, Angie. The first two are a list of observations. Nothing about the investigation.’
She turned from the board. ‘My take on it, boss? There were no investigations. Or if there were, they were limited. They had nothing to work off. No clues. Just a body.’
Kline shook his head. ‘This is a serial killer.’ He waved at the details she was listing on the board. ‘All this flamboyance tells me there will be clues, somewhere. You said it, this person has an ego. These were laid out as a challenge. ‘Come and find me if you’re smart enough’.
He reached for the third file, read the name – Imogen LeClerc. May be there would be more in here. He checked the date. Two years and two days after the first murder.
*
6th May 1997, St Malo, France.
The ancient walled city of St Malo had heard screams before. The English bombers of 1945 had ensured that as they as good as destroyed it and the people within it as they tried to scourge German forces from the face of France.
But this scream was different. Alone, piercing, repeated after a pause to gulp in air. The high-pitched sound waves flew through the open windows of the apartment and reverberated off the granite walls of the alleyway below.
One hour later, Detective Pierre Gaspin scratched at his dark stubble as he circled the body like one of the seagulls outside, gliding and circling the harbour in search of scraps.
He muttered to himself. ‘Merde, merde, merde.’
Who could do this to another human being? Why do it to another member of your own species? Or any species?
He slipped a Gauloise into his mouth, not because the body smelt, but for the comforting effect of the pungent aroma in his nostrils.
His young assistant appeared at the doorway, looked, paused, glanced at him and left. He laughed, a puff of air through his nose.
Imogen LeClerc, thirty, right breast removed. That disgusted him. Her body lay at a strange angle to the room. Flowers were sprinkled across the red slash. A colour photograph maintained her decency. Hands were by her sides.
He frowned and leant closer. They were turned upwards, but nails had been driven through the palms and into the floorboards below. It reminded him of the hands of Jesus nailed to the cross.
He knelt down to look more closely at the flowe
rs. He liked flowers and these were tiny and white. He removed the cigarette and caught their scent. Just as he thought, Jasmine.
He stood and glanced out of the tall sash window to the plush houses of Dinan nestling on the hillside across the bay. He hoped to God that some crazy hadn’t arrived in St Malo. He prayed that they were just passing through and not stopping for the summer season.
Twelve months later, Pierre Gaspin lit a Gauloise, sighed with annoyance and with a click and drag of an icon moved the case file labelled ‘Imogen LeClerc’ from ‘overt’ to ‘non resolu’.
*
Kline tossed this file as well. ‘What the hell was wrong with these people? Didn’t they want to catch this crazy?’
Angie perched on the edge of her desk. ‘Tell you what I think, boss. I think they were all holding their breath after the first murder. Dropping to their knees and praying to God the killer didn’t strike again. Silently hoping he moved on.’
Kline was shaking his head. ‘And when he did…?’
‘Swept it under the carpet. No second murder on their patch, so no extra clues, nothing more to investigate. You know it, boss. It usually takes a second or third murder before you get a chance at finding a pattern. Before the killer gets clumsy and makes a mistake.’
Kline knew it. Plus, this killer had been clever. Gone global twenty years ago. Commit isolated murders in different countries and you get away with it.
Angie reached forward and handed Kline the fourth file. ‘Chesney Arthur. And don’t hold your breath.’
*
7th May 1998, Keri-Keri, North Island, New Zealand.
As soon as he went on duty at 8 am, traffic cop Andy Samuels took delivery of his shiny new, Holden police car. This day had been planned in his mind for a couple of weeks now. Fill the baby with gas, then make the tyres squeal driving up through the sweeping, winding curves of the Gorge.
After that, he would hit the Awanui Straight, light the blue and reds, feel some acceleration and pour on some speed.
It never happened. Instead he saw a sight he never wanted to see again.
At 8.05 he got a call from control to attend a possible homicide. The fact he didn’t do homicides was irrelevant, they needed hands, it was serious. So, he got to use the blue and reds anyway.
Andy was first to the scene out at Opito Bay. He took the stairs to the second-floor apartment at speed. At the door he was confronted with a man in his bed shorts and tee-shirt, on his knees, puking like a kid on drink-a-crate day.
Andy stepped past him, glanced round the lounge, took in the view across the Bay. Private boats moored in the sunshine. In the distance, out in the Bay of Islands, one of the stupidly expensive boutique cruise ships was anchored.
‘Bedroom.’ From behind him, vocal chords burnt by stomach acid and bile could only croak the word.
Andy stepped to the bedroom doorway and stopped. He knew a crime scene when he saw one and this was as definite as a young kid caught doing smoking donuts down the Straight. There was some rock record on the record player that was annoying, so he reached across and lifted the needle from the vinyl.
He glanced back at the man and briefly wondered if he could be the killer. The white, sweating face and drool hanging from his chin told him no. More like husband or boyfriend.
He looked across at the body for the first time, studying it with curiosity. As a traffic cop, he’d cleaned up some messes in his time, usually down the Straights. The worst had been a night-time logging truck taking out three Maoris making their drunken way home on foot, in the dark, along one of the most treacherous stretches of road in the world. Five miles of roulette on a pitch-black night. Two of them were cut in two.
This was worse though, because it was terrifying. Some bastard had done this slowly and deliberately. And with care. One the woman’s breasts had been removed and the slash covered with a white Gardenia flower head. It’s scent filled the room.
Her eyes stared at him, empty of light and life. Her hands were by her sides. He blinked, seeing steel nail heads. Covering her crotch was what looked like a photograph of a person. Woman maybe, but he didn’t want to get closer.
He went back to the man, helped him downstairs and guarded the front door, protecting the crime scene until all the fancy boys arrived.
Twelve months later he was barbecuing duck breasts from a police social shoot. Detective Ben Torode wandered across, bringing him a fresh beer.
Andy swigged and pressed the fatty side of the breast to the grill. It brought back a memory. ‘Tell me, Bennie, what happened about the woman in Keri-Keri?’
‘What? Chesney Arthur?’ He shrugged and stifled a belch. ‘Shelved it. Couldn’t find a shred of evidence. Not even her tit.’
*
Kline was scratching at his head again. He was irritated. He couldn’t believe what he was reading. Murder after murder. Everything the same. The killer must have been pissing himself laughing at the ineptitude of the police forces round the world. And if this had happened once…
He let his feet down. A faint singing had started in his ears as the toxins began to break through acceptable levels and his body started to complain. It was concerning because he had twenty-four hours before he was next hooked up.
Angie was watching him. She said, ‘Let’s hope they interviewed a few people. Like the boyfriend and the husband at least. And there must have been some witnesses to something. Hearing noises. Strangers hanging round…’
Kline wasn’t so sure. ‘These are busy places, Angie. I’ve been to Piraeus as a backpacking teenager and its crazy busy. Sydney Harbour as well. Even without the tourists and the cruise liners, those wharves are a manic commuter hub.’
Kline’s eyes slid across the table to the final file. He knew what was in there because he was the author. Angie’s eyes followed and she reached for the file.
‘If truth be told, boss…’
Kline looked at her. He had to smile. ‘I know. There’s not a lot more in there.’
‘You okay reading it?’
Reading it? It oozed from every pore in his skin and echoed through every cell in his body. ‘Just the summary.’
Evelyn Arnold. Evie. He took the two pages from Angie and felt the adrenaline surge through his body.
*
8th May 1999, Southampton, England.
This was the day Joe Kline had dreamed of – he’d made it to DS. It was also the day fate would throw him a case that would change his life. It would niggle, scratch and eventually burn his soul with the pain of a hot match head against skin. It would come close to killing him.
Kline was the first detective to arrive at the crime scene. That was because he knew the way. The victim was his sister-in-law and it would transpire the last person to see Evelyn Arnold alive had been her sister, Jenny, Kline’s wife.
But the scene had stopped him in his tracks. He’d never seen carefully orchestrated brutality like it in his life. It would change his view of mankind and give him an insight into what it’s capable of doing to itself.
More importantly, it lit a fuse in his brain that would turn him into a better, more determined detective. It was a fuse that would smoulder all his career.
Yet, as he stared at the body, his only thought was of how he was going to tell his wife.
As sirens closed in and cars slewed to a halt on the gravel track behind him, he burned the horror of the scene into his mind.
Evie was laid out on the oak floor of the farmhouse kitchen, her mid-length blond hair looked freshly combed. Her eyes were open, her mouth closed. Her face, so relaxed and peaceful, was so like Jenny’s, Kline shivered.
Her right breast had been removed so carefully and precisely Kline was reminded of a fishmonger, filleting fish. Tendon and muscle appeared untouched. A white lily covered the wound.
Nestling on her pubic hair was a photograph. When he studied it closely it was a vivacious woman dancing in the rain. A wet tee-shirt clung seductively to her naked breasts. Nipples hardened by
the cool rain stood proud. Her hair was soaked and matted, her laughter poured scorn on the rain.
The photograph was not of Evie.
But it was the nails through the palms of the hands that made his jaw go slack and his gut writhe with emotion and horror. Evie was pinned to the floor like a bug to a sheet of paraffin wax.
DI Dave Barker arrived, saw the victim and removed Kline from the scene. He would later be allowed back on the case, not that it went anywhere, given the total lack of clues and forensic evidence.
In the hours that followed, Kline went home and he held tightly to Jenny while they both cried it out, trying to come to terms with what they had lost.
‘What if they find out?’, she kept asking over and over.
‘We’ll deal with it when it happens,’ he’d replied. Except, no one ever found out.
And, slowly, he’d let the anger build and made the promise that he’d never been able to keep.
*
Kline handed the two sheets back to Angie. He wasn’t sure if he’d read them or simply replayed the scenes in his mind. Angie inserted the sheets into the folder and put it back in its place. She stood beside Kline and squeezed his shoulder gently.
‘This time, boss. This time we’ll get him.’
Kline gave her a crooked smile. He looked across at the white board, now loaded with semi-organised information. At the top was a space. He looked at it, read the names of the women, took the marker from the table and went across to the board.
