by Val McDermid
35
One question kept rattling round Tony Hill’s head as he marched along the canal towpath, eyes on the ground, dog at his heels. What kind of serial killer wants their crimes to stay hidden? He’d investigated several, he’d interviewed others and read about dozens more. They generally didn’t want to be caught, at least not at the start of their project. But they wanted their activities to be headline news. They wanted notoriety, respect and fear. They wanted to be acknowledged. But this killer – and Tony was convinced by now that there was a killer – seemed determined to stay below the radar.
In his experience, nothing enraged a killer more than someone else taking credit for his handiwork. A tiny part of them might be satisfied if blaming someone else meant they were left alone to go about the business that drove them so hard. But much bigger than that was the sense of grievance that someone else was reaping the glory – as they saw it – for their successes. But whoever was behind the deaths of these women appeared to be content with invisibility. An invisibility so absolute that in the eyes of the world, he didn’t even exist.
Flash stopped to investigate a particularly intriguing smell and Tony paused too, finding a gap in his thoughts to feel surprised that he was actually paying attention to the dog. Normally when he was walking to think, he was so absorbed in his thoughts that nothing else penetrated. But the dog ticked some box in his brain that meant he was linked to it without making a conscious connection. He wondered whether the roots of his behaviour lay in his deep past, bound to the first person who had ever shown him love. Joan, the dinner lady who had taken on rescue dogs and later, the young Tony, a rescue boy. Joan, who had saved him from the otherwise inevitable consequences of a home without love, without affection, without compassion. He’d been a connoisseur of pain and loneliness till Joan had taken him under her wing on the pretext that she needed a hand with the dogs.
He’d always believed he didn’t care much about the dogs. That it had all been about Joan and her brisk kindness. But perhaps he’d been wrong about that. He’d taken so readily, so unexpectedly to Flash. Maybe this mad-eyed collie had plugged into something so deep he’d never acknowledged it before. Not for the first time, Carol Jordan had opened something up for him.
Flash darted on ahead and he resumed his contemplation. So what reason could there be for a killer who wanted to hide his crimes, his identity, his very existence? The answer had to lie in the crimes themselves. This was a killer who was sending a message that was more important than the simple satisfaction of his ego. If he was in the limelight, the message would somehow be obscured. And that was the opposite of what he wanted.
The next step was to figure out what that message was. If Tony could tease that out, it might offer a path to the killer himself. It must have something to do with the women writers whose work formed part of the crime scenes. Inevitably, it would also be connected to power and control. And that linked in to the other key question that Tony needed to answer before he sat down again with Carol’s new MIT. Was his target killing at one remove, by driving his victims to a place where the only way out was to take their own lives? Or was his a more active role? Was he actually hands-on, murdering them in a way that could pass for suicide?
When he knew the answer to that question he’d be a damn sight closer to finding the underlying explanation for whatever was going on here. Once they had that, they could pool their considerable skills to find a killer that nobody but them believed in.
Paula was pleased to discover that Alvin chose the same kind of place for a rendezvous as she would have. It was a proper pub, lacking loud music, supplied with craft beers and frequented by people old enough on be on their second major relationship. She treated herself to a half-pint of Hook Norton and found a quiet corner where she could update her notes on the interview with John Morton. Sylvia Plath was interesting. So was the fact that this was the first time Daisy’s controversial views had taken flight from the purely local to a wider audience. The other two victims had already had a higher profile; if someone was looking for victims, he would have come across them more readily than the old Daisy. But the new Daisy, the one in touch with her political ambitions, she was visible in a way she hadn’t been before. It made Paula think they were looking for someone used to moving around the country, not someone bound to one place and uneasy in others.
She was pondering the implications of this when Alvin arrived. He stopped at the bar for a drink, raising his hand in the traditional interrogative gesture to Paula, who shook her head. He lowered his frame on to the stool opposite her and carefully centred his pint on a beer mat. ‘Too much driving today,’ he said, stifling a yawn.
‘But you got a result,’ Paula said. She’d still been with Carol when Alvin had called to pass on his news. ‘Three’s the charm.’
He took a delicate sip of his beer, savoured the taste, then took off quarter of the glass in one easy swallow, smacking his lips with pleasure. ‘I’m not entirely sure what the hell I’m doing here. Is this some kind of dry run? Are we going through the motions and playing with people just to get ourselves up to speed? Because if that’s what’s going on here, I’m not happy about it. We shouldn’t be using real grief like a playpen.’
Paula scratched her eyebrow. ‘I think it started as something Tony thought was a bit odd. He likes odd. But he usually keeps it to himself. Only, this time, he shared it with Carol, just when all this started to take shape. And once we looked at it a bit more closely, it began to feel like something that was happening for real.’
Her explanation seemed to appease Alvin. He drank some more beer and visibly relaxed. ‘So tell me who we’re going to see.’
‘Jasmine Burton’s girlfriend. Her name is Emma Cotterill and she’s an architect. Works for the city council. According to Jasmine’s secretary, they’d been together for around eighteen months. They didn’t live together but they spent a lot of time together. If anybody knew what was going on inside Jasmine’s head, it was Emma.’
Alvin sighed. ‘Poor woman. It’s bad enough the person you love kills themselves without having to dig it all up again for the likes of us.’
‘Except that it might not have been as straightforward as that. And what we find out might make it feel a bit better.’
‘I suppose.’ He drained his pint. ‘Come on then, let’s get it over with.’
The house was a peculiar infill in a street of individually designed houses from between the wars. It looked like a miniature ocean liner, frontage like a prow, windows like portholes. Although it was clearly modern it had the feel of art deco about it. When Emma opened the door, Paula couldn’t help thinking the architect had designed herself to match the house. Her hair was raven black and cut in a geometric bob. Her make-up resembled an advert from the twenties, and she wore a boat-necked striped sweater over the sort of bell-bottom trousers traditionally worn by stage sailors. ‘You must be Sergeant McIntyre,’ she said, meeting Paula’s eyes unflinchingly. Her accent was generically Southern, not a trace of Midlands creeping through.
‘That’s right. And this is DS Ambrose.’
Her perfectly shaped eyebrows rose. ‘A brace of sergeants. I didn’t realise you went around in pairs. Might I see your ID? We’re always being warned on Crimewatch to take nothing on trust.’ Her smile was as brittle as her words.
Channelling Dorothy Parker, just to match everything else, Paula thought as they followed Emma upstairs to a living room that had a glass wall overlooking the garden. The furniture here was thankfully contemporary, a long plum-coloured sofa and three pale grey armchairs clustered round a group of three tear-shaped low tables. It was a room that suited Emma but it wouldn’t fit many other people, Paula thought. There would be no room for Torin’s trainer-clad feet and nothing that matched Elinor’s understated elegance.
Emma gestured at the chairs and sat down opposite them. No offer of tea or coffee or anything stronger. ‘I’m curious,’ she said. ‘I wasn’t Jasmine’s next of kin so I heard wh
at had happened on the radio news, like most people who knew her. You’re the first police officers to come to my door, and you’re not local.’ She registered Paula’s surprise. ‘I checked. I’m not stupid. I know how devious journalists can be.’
‘We’re investigating incidences of extreme cyber-bullying,’ Paula said.
‘We’re trying to identify persistent offenders so we can close them down,’ Alvin added.
‘And we thought that Jasmine might have talked to you about what she went through.’ Paula produced her most sympathetic expression.
Emma smoothed her hair with one hand. ‘Of course she talked to me. For the last couple of weeks of her life, that’s more or less all she talked about. She was trying so hard to put a brave face on things, to stand up for herself in public, but privately she was unravelling.’
‘That must have been hard for you,’ Alvin said.
Emma sighed and turned her eyes wistfully to the darkness beyond the window. Paula wasn’t entirely convinced. ‘It was awful. To see someone so strong and self-assured coming apart before my very eyes. I did my best to help, but the attacks were relentless. I told her to stop going online, to let them shout themselves hoarse then move on, but she was drawn like a moth to a flame.’
‘Did she consider reporting it to the police?’
Emma looked down at the floor. ‘She thought that she wouldn’t be taken seriously. It seems like the only cases where there are ever prosecutions against trolls is when property’s involved, like in the riots.’
‘That’s not strictly true,’ Alvin said. ‘People have been prosecuted for threats of death and arson.’
‘Not many,’ Emma said tartly. ‘Not enough to shut the evil little fuckers up.’
An awkward pause. Then Paula said, ‘Did Jasmine have any strategy for dealing with it?’
‘She was convinced it would blow over. They’re like magpies. Give them something more shiny to chase and they’re off. She thought it was a matter of hanging on till life returned to normal. And actually, it was easing a little. Hardly noticeable, but a little bit less every day. That’s what makes her death so hard to take.’
‘What do you think happened?’ Paula asked. A nice, open question to see how the land lay.
‘She went off for a few days’ peace and quiet. I made her promise not to do the social media thing, but she probably didn’t stick to that, given how things turned out. I’m only guessing here, because I didn’t speak to her that last day. I had a series of meetings and I knew she was having dinner with friends. I expected her to call me when she got back to the cottage. We facetimed most nights before we went to sleep. But I wasn’t unduly concerned when she didn’t make contact. I assumed she was having a good time and she’d got back late.’ The mask slipped and Paula caught a moment of genuine pain.
‘But she wasn’t,’ Paula said gently.
‘No. She wasn’t.’
‘Did you think she was suicidal?’ Alvin asked.
‘Did I think she was suicidal? What kind of bitch do you think I am? Do you think for one moment that if I’d believed she was suicidal I’d have let her out of my sight?’ Emma’s anger subsided as quickly as it had flared. ‘But you’re right in a way. When I heard the news, I was shocked. But … I sort of wasn’t surprised, if that makes sense? I thought she was more fragile than she was prepared to admit.’ She sighed and clasped her hands tightly in her lap. ‘But obviously I wasn’t thinking it through. I should have understood how close to the edge she was. I let her down.’
‘In my experience, you can’t stop someone who’s determined to take her own life,’ Alvin said. ‘It’s not your fault, Emma. Do you think it’s possible that the internet bullying pushed her that far?’
Emma nodded. ‘I do now. I didn’t think she was that desperate, but obviously I was wrong.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Paula said. ‘But DS Ambrose is right. It’s not your fault. There’s one thing that’s puzzling us, though. Jasmine didn’t leave a note. Did she send you any messages? A text? An email? A letter, even?’
Emma shook her head. ‘No. No word. And that hurts, believe me. I thought I meant more to her.’
‘A lot of people don’t leave notes,’ Alvin said, his deep rumble conveying a weight of sympathy. ‘I think they reach a point where they’re numb. They’re not seeing anything or anyone beyond the pain.’
‘We do think Jasmine left something behind, though,’ Paula said. ‘Was she a fan of Virginia Woolf, by any chance?’
Emma looked bemused. ‘Virginia Woolf?’
‘She was a writer.’
Emma shook her head impatiently. ‘I know who Virginia Woolf is, for heaven’s sake. I don’t think Jasmine ever mentioned her, though. We both read, but not that kind of thing. I read biographies mostly, but Jas was a big crime fiction fan. What on earth has Virginia Woolf got to do with what happened to her?’
‘They both chose the same method. Walking into the river weighed down with stones. And there was a copy of one of Woolf’s books found on the shore where we think she probably went in,’ Paula explained.
‘A book? Which book?’
‘It’s called A Room of One’s Own.’
Emma frowned. ‘I’ve never heard of it, never mind read it. What’s it about?’ She gave a shaky little laugh. ‘Obviously not cyber-bullying.’
‘It’s an essay. Not a novel. She’s explaining why it’s so hard for women to develop as writers. She says if you’re going to be a writer you need a room of your own and five hundred pounds a year.’
Clearly baffled, Emma shook her head. ‘All very commendable but nothing to do with Jasmine. I don’t think she had any secret ambition to be a writer. She was doing a job that she loved, and doing it well. But those bastards undermined her so much she ran away from all of us.’ She looked Paula in the eye. ‘You people need to do your job. Track those shits down and prosecute them. Destroy their lives the way they destroyed Jasmine.’
36
It was almost like old times, walking through Bellwether Square on a Saturday morning first thing, before the shopping crowds had taken possession. Carol had crossed those worn York stone flags more times than she could count, heading down from the old MIT office through the warren of medieval alleys and courts that spread out behind the square. Her hairdresser, Wendy, had occupied a corner site opposite an old-fashioned cobbler and a designer handbag shop since she’d first opened her own salon twenty years before. Her appointment book was always full; you had to work your way up via one of the junior stylists before you had any chance of making it to Wendy’s client list.
Carol had jumped the queue years before thanks to John Brandon’s wife Maggie, who had been one of Wendy’s first clients. Since then, she’d only ever gone elsewhere for a haircut when circumstances had forced her away from Bradfield. Even when she’d been based in East Yorkshire, she’d driven across the Pennines every five weeks to submit to Wendy’s flying scissors. So today, to mark her return to service, Carol had made an appointment for a haircut.
She cut through the alleys with a faint feeling of trepidation. She hadn’t been near Wendy in months. When her hair had become too annoying, she’d simply gone to the village salon where some anonymous junior had hacked it into something approximating a shape. Caring about how she looked felt like an impossible vanity in the wake of her brother’s death. Wendy would be affronted at the end result.
Carol pushed open the door and Wendy peered over her glasses from behind the podium where the appointment book was guarded. ‘Sorry, we don’t see patients without an appointment,’ she said, her tone caustic.
‘Very funny,’ Carol said. ‘I know it’s bad.’
‘Bad? I’ve seen better-looking road traffic accidents. Who did that to you?’
‘You don’t want to know.’ Carol shrugged off her coat and hung it on the rack by the door.
‘I do, I want to put a contract out on them for bringing the profession into disrepute.’ Wendy shook her head as she seated C
arol. ‘Carol, what were you thinking? Once, in an emergency, that I could understand. But this? This is wilful vandalism. You’ve got lovely hair, you should respect it.’
‘And how have you been, Wendy?’ Carol let herself relax into the chair as Wendy swivelled and lowered it so her head was over the washbasin.
‘Busy,’ she said, soaking Carol’s hair and shampooing it briskly. ‘Too bloody busy. I haven’t been on holiday this year yet. And they say Lincoln freed the slaves.’ Massage, rinse. Both women fell silent as Carol luxuriated in the pampering. Shampoo, massage, rinse. Condition, rinse.
When she was upright again, Carol tried to explain her absence. ‘I’ve been renovating a barn,’ she said. ‘Out in the middle of nowhere.’
‘What happened to coppering?’ Wendy met her eyes momentarily, then went back to cutting and razoring.
‘I thought I was done with it. But apparently it’s not done with me.’
‘Well, I’m glad to see you back.’ They talked of nothing much as Wendy carried on. ‘I think we’re about done here,’ she said at last, working some wax into the tips of Carol’s hair and surveying the result in the mirror. ‘Nothing short of a miracle.’
As she spoke, the door opened and a young woman with a terrifying shock of pink and ginger hair came bounding in clutching a newspaper and a carton of coffee. ‘You’ll never believe—’ Then she caught sight of Carol and blushed a deep unbecoming scarlet.
‘You’re late,’ Wendy said.
‘I thought we weren’t opening till ten.’
‘Hi, Tamsin,’ Carol said.
‘I opened early for Carol,’ Wendy said. ‘You remember Carol?’
Tamsin couldn’t meet her eye. ‘Hi, Carol.’ She gave Wendy a beseeching look. Wendy paused. Carol couldn’t quite see what was going on behind her, but it looked as if Tamsin was showing Wendy the paper.
