“They might have been,” sighed Sylvia, “:if we’d been more intelligent.”
“Kate’s not the type. And Maurice isn’t the type.”
“Nor was Lionel when he was being a busy bus driver.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
His temper was a three year old toddler’s tantrum. Master screwed shut his eyes, stamped both feet over and over, fisted both hands and shook them up and down with infuriated frustration, and screamed, shouted, cried, screamed and shouted over and over again.
Cowering in a corner, Eve sat naked, pushing herself back against the wall. Already she had one puffy bruised eye and a lip badly split, enough to bleed heavily. She licked the blood, tried to staunch it, and sucked it back.
But it was the past she saw. Not daring to close her eyes, not risking the flame, the knife or the fist abruptly smashing into her face and body, Eve stared unblinking at Master. But she was remembering the cosy wallpaper of her bedroom back at home. Pink magnolia had woken her every morning. Her mother’s voice. “Evie, are you awake, love? The tea’s in the pot. It’s nearly eight o’clock.”
Her thoughts almost touched the warmth of her quilt, soft and pillowed in its rosy pink cover. Her toes remembered the snuggled comfort of her flannelette sheets. Everything welcoming. Everything loving.
And then the freezing crash as Master stamped and squealed, running in circles and swearing the same word over and over and over, his voice raised as though he had a microphone but could repeat only, “Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.” Fists screwed into flying balls, he leapt, tottered, and tumbled to the ground at Eve’s feet. She pushed back harder against the badly plastered wall, but she knew escape was impossible. He would soon turn, acknowledging her, planning revenge.
Now he was holding a pair of pliers, dragged from his pocket. “Well, bitch.” Now Master was snarling. “What bits does I take, eh? Swipe off them bits of titties? Or some o’ them lumpy bits between yer legs? What punishment does you want?”
She whispered, “Please, oh please. I don’t even know what I’ve done. I never meant to be naughty. Please – why are you angry?”
Master forced his head onto hers, his eyes scarlet rimmed and glaring into her tears. “You knows. I were coming – right good it were, oozing them seeds, when you made that stooped noise. Gulping. Put me right off. Tis your fault. Now I gets me own back.”
“I didn’t mean it. I couldn’t help it. It’s my stomach, because I’m so hungry. Three days, Master, since I’ve eaten.” Eve watched the pliers waving before her, their bright points towards her breasts. She heard her mother’s voice so faintly in the back of her mind.
“Tea’s ready, my love. Time to get up.”
The door opened. Both Eve and Master lurched, turning to look. Another, deeper voice spoke clearly. “Milton, come here. Leave the girl where she is.”
The pliers clattered to the floor, Master spun, his small twisted expression turned from fury to delight, and he scampered towards the tall man entering, looking up at him with adoration. “Number One, you done come. Here I is. Now I’s proper happy.”
In the open doorway stood a man Eve had never seen before. He looked so very much like Maurice Howard, Eve’s teacher in Primary School, who she remembered well, and who had invited her into his car one rainy night with an offer to give her a lift home. But she had not seen her home since then.
Yet somehow this man was different. His eyes were colder. They led nowhere. Piercingly dark, they held menace but no other message. It was as if the spontaneity had been banished. The man did not look at Eve crouching naked against the wall. He spoke only to Master. “Milton, I’m leaving. Maurice will look after you from now on. I’m sorry, but of necessity, I shall be gone a long time.”
His eyes were piteous as Master said, “You doesn’t love me no more, brother?”
The man knelt at once, one immaculate knee to the filthy blood-stained floor, and took Master’s little crumpled hand in his. “My dearest,” he said softly, and the menace left his eyes. “I shall always love you and always send you gifts. But I am at risk and have to fly home. Don’t worry. Maurice will look after you.”
“Number Two.”
“None of us, Milton, is lesser than any other. Remember, we are triplets. We are all equal, you to me, and Maurice to you. Now, come upstairs with me and we shall have a last feast.”
Master trotted behind as the dark man led him by the hand. He was about to close the door behind him when Eve, terrified and desperate, called, “Food, I beg you. Or I shall die of starvation. Please, please, just a little food.”
Impatient, the man turned, the cold menace returning. He eyed Eve’s wounded nakedness in silence for a moment, then said, “It is of no matter. You will die shortly one way or another. You now know who I am. Milton informed me some days ago that you remember that it was Maurice who abducted you. That was your death sentence. The execution will come before I leave. Realise this – you are simply Milton’s toy. You have no life or choices of your own and will live or die at my will. Be quiet now, and breathe while you can.”
The door slammed behind them. Eve sat alone in the darkness as the light was switched off from outside. The shock blocked her misery. She stretched out her legs and exhaled. One second of panic was snuffed out like a candle, and she knew absolutely that death was preferable. She had escaped whatever horrible brutality Master intended moments before. Now, even if her death was prolonged and painful, it would be the end. The end would be a relief so enormous, she could not contemplate it. She closed her eyes and started to whisper her goodbyes.
“I never ran away, Mum. I love you all ever so much. You and Dad and Niles. I wish I could die in my bed, but it might be easier for you if I’m here, far away, and you don’t have to watch. But I’m thinking of you. I’ll be kissing and hugging you all in my head. Night, night, sweet dreams.”
Morrison thanked them, eyes narrowed, looking at Sylvia and Harry over the top of his clasped fingers, his elbows to the desk. “This is somewhat startling news,” he said softly. “Are you sure?”
“Of course we aren’t sure,” Harry said, leaning back in the chair. “I’m only repeating what we heard.”
“It’s almost funny,” said Sylvia. Then shaking her head, she said, “Well, not really funny of course. It’s horrible. But we’ve been trying to make sense of three crimes. There’s Mark Howard and his money laundering. Trying to find him before he goes back to Dubai, though I suppose he’s already gone by now.”
“And Eve Daish, the poor little girl who disappeared,” said Harry. “We’ve talked to her whole distraught family. And that seemed the most important mystery to solve.”
“And my own personal case,” Morrison said, chin still resting on his clasped hands. “The murder of nine young women by the man they’ve called the Chimney Killer. And now, according to this new information, it seems that all these crimes might be connected. Even connected by the same person.”
“Well, you always said Eve Daish might well have fallen victim to the Chimney Killer.”
Morrison nodded. “However, Maurice Howard, even as the identical twin to an international criminal, always seemed to be a man of normal intelligence with a normal fondness for young children. He’s never been accused of molesting children and has an excellent reputation as a teacher. It’s hard to imagine him as a demented serial killer.”
“I expect,” Sylvia smiled, “most serial killers don’t advertise the fact. The books I’ve read usually say they’re all normal and pleasant. Like Bundy and so on.”
“You read the wrong books,” Morrison told her, leaning back and unclasping his hands. “Remember Lionel Sullivan. A pleasant chap, would you say?”
“Which is the other unsolved case at the moment,” sighed Harry. “But at least we know he’s not involved with the Howards. He’s just still on the run.”
“Even Kate and her teacher have disappeared now,” Sylvia said. “But they can’t know that we know. They can’t possibly know abou
t funny little Iris once living next door to a friend of a friend -----.”
“Or Arthur’s car boot sale.”
“Kate told us ages ago,” said Sylvia suddenly, “that she’d visited that old Tudor fake. Was she giving clues right back then?”
“She has more recently,” Harry interrupted, “specially about the eldest twin. Coming here, going there. Did she want him arrested? I don’t doubt it, not if he’s the killer too.”
“Her husband might be the killer.”
“Or the handicapped triplet.”
“I have every intention of looking into this more deeply,” Morrison once again leaned forwards over the desk. “Birth certificates, and general identity. Don’t worry. We’ll know soon enough, even if Mark Howard is already back in Dubai.”
“I just hope he hasn’t done anything horrible to Kate,” murmured Sylvia.
The official registration of the birth and appropriate certificates for the Howard triplets began a series of explorations and investigations in which Sylvia and Harry played little part officially, but some part privately.
On the twenty-third of October, 1984, Sara Howard gave birth to triplets, born one month early and subsequently premature and sickly. Two of the triplets were identical twins, whereas the third triplet and the last born was fraternal. The birth had been traumatic, and during the first two hours, no medically qualified person had been present. The fraternal twin’s birth had been unnaturally delayed, and this last baby was born malformed and with a suspected brain injury.
The first, named Mark Ivor Howard, entered the world at five minutes past three in the morning. The second baby, later named Maurice Isan Howard, was not born until two hours and eight minutes later. The last of the triplets was finally delivered by cesarean section. Milton Illitz Howard almost died but was immediately removed to a ventilator, and survived. Sara Howard, however, did not survive and died from a massive haemorrhage within the hour. Subsequently, the father felt that his infant sons were to blame. He was also painfully aware that he had very little probability of looking after triplets successfully on his own, especially since one needed special care and might soon die. He handed all three over for adoption. They were put into foster care and for some years remained with the same family. They were well treated and grew extremely close, with special affection for Milton, the small handicapped brother. When the foster father died of cancer and the mother became ill, the children were separated and sent to other homes. Milton was kept in a special state-run home for the disabled. He was manically unhappy having lost his beloved brothers, and the treatment he endured was poor at best. Mark, the eldest, stayed first in a home where he was beaten and sexually abused. Maurice was sent to four different families in quick succession. Once old enough, the triplets reunited. They spent a great deal of time discovering each other, but they did not bother to trace their father.
Iris and Joyce, now living in adjacent bedrooms, stared at Sylvia in amazement.
“Agnes’s friend. And those same little triplets?” Iris quavered.
“And nothing to do with my Lionel for once,” Joyce snorted. “Makes a nice change.”
“There’s too many dreadful, cruel people out there,” Iris said with a sniff. “Murder and mayhem. I thought I was wicked, but at least I didn’t ever kill anyone.”
“I nearly tried to kill my disgusting husband,” Joyce muttered. “And now I wish I had.”
Sylvia said, “Well, I wish we could find Lionel, but most of all I wish we could find Kate and those murderous twins.”
The new hiding place, his safe haven, kept Lionel warm and although the old straw and the collapsed hay bale smelled of rank mould and dead beetles, he considered himself lucky to have discovered such a place, utterly isolated and completely private. Unused and abandoned for many years, the little shed gave him occasional glimpses of the grand house in the valley but was not close enough for interference. Those in the grand house, it seemed, had no more desire to know him than he had to know them.
Lionel was amused, sometimes, to see the grand car and the grandly dressed men arriving at the grand house, none of them aware that they were being watched. He was watching the two tall, dark men climb from their dark car when he noticed something else. A young woman was walking up the lane on the opposite side away from both the grand house and his own small hidden shed. With a stumble of absolute delighted surprise, he ran out into the sunless freeze and waded up the slope to the laneway. The last of the snow had melted some days previously, but icy patches remained like treacherous stepping-stones between the tufting grass and sprigs of daisies, impatient to see the sun.
There was no sun. The sky was granite. With a shout as he slipped to one knee, Lionel hailed the young woman trotting towards the far corner where the lane led to a distant village. She wore exercise lycra, and as she ran, Lionel watched the muscles flex in her legs and the movement of her buttocks.
“Hey, can you wait one minute?”
She looked around. “Not really. I’m in a hurry.”
“You must be exhausted.”
“Not at all. What do you want?”
Lionel stopped, and bent, hands to his knees. Puffing, out of breath, he said, “My little Tumpkins. My puppy. I live in that house down there,” and he pointed to the grand roof of the building below, “but the puppy ran off and my phone’s not working. The wires got snapped in the snow and there’s no reception. I can’t run anymore. Could you see a little black puppy from where you are?”
She looked, looked again, and shook her head. “I expect he’ll run home.”
“I only got him from the Rescue Kennels yesterday. He won’t know the way.”
The woman eyed him slowly. “So you want me to help you find your dog? I seem to have heard that line before, and the warning that goes with it.”
“What, me?” Lionel stepped back. “I’m so sorry. Does that sound suspicious? Well, don’t worry, I’ll just carry on looking alone.” He began to stumble away, then turned. “Can you whistle? You know, that really high-pitched whistle that some people can do, and it echoes for miles.”
The woman frowned. “No. I can’t. And you remind me of someone. Have I met you before?”
“Ah yes, perhaps.” Lionel smiled, success dawning. “A party maybe. Or the local library. I do socialise a bit.”
“I only go to the parties at the Gym.”
He sniggered. “I’m not fit at all, I’m afraid. Which is why I can’t find Tumpkins.” Lionel’s smile grew. “He’ll be long gone now if I don’t hurry. Are you sure you couldn’t help? All I can offer is a cup of tea, but I’m sure my puppy would be so happy.”
He stretched out his hand. It was a mistake. The woman backed off. “I know who you remind me of. That Sullivan person. That huge hand – escaped from prison.” She gulped, blinked, and turned. “And your face,” she grunted. “Purple spray. Purple over your nose – and more. That’s a – a warning. Someone knew you.” Then she ran. Much faster than the previous jogging, her lycra clad legs disappeared up the lane and were gone. Lionel, not having eaten for two days and now horribly hungry, and after climbing the steep slope from shed to road, had no energy to chase after. He stood and swore with calculated variety. Then slowly he slid and scrambled back down to his shed.
What he would have done to the woman had she accompanied him, continued to dribble through his mind. He thought of the jagged clumps of sharp ended straw he could force inside her. He thought of the rip of lycra, and how he could use the strip once between her legs, to gag her tightly, and bind her wrists behind her. Her hair, curled beneath a hood, had been bleach-blond and long. He imagined gripping it near her scalp and tugging it out, handful by handful as she shrieked into her gag.
But there was only Olga, and another failure. Since his escape, which he counted as a vast and important achievement, he had not been able to discover any moment of lavish delight except during his own day-dreams.
On the way back down the slope, it had started to rai
n again. At least it wasn’t snow, Lionel had thought, plodding over the icy patches. But he had slipped anyway, for now, the rocks and pebble trails were also slippery, and once again Lionel had landed on his knees. He had cursed so loudly that, like the whistle he could not do, the sound had echoed.
Pushing up from his bruised knees, Lionel found that he was being watched. It was at a considerable distance, but at the same moment, the tall, dark man from the grand house had walked from his back door to where the car was parked. Abruptly, even from so far, Lionel had felt the piercing stare of black eyes, colder than the ice at his feet.
He had thumped away any threats in prison and could do so again. But knowing himself seen, he was troubled. Bending low into the open doorway of the shed, he ducked completely out of sight. He was fairly sure that no one could have seen where he went. The man would know there was a trespasser on his land but could not know that the trespasser was hiding there. Lionel slumped onto the hay and swore first at the unknown woman who had escaped him, then at the dark man and finally at Olga, whom he saw approaching, dressed in shadow.
Chapter Twenty-Six
“It’s cuddles more than sex,” Sylvia murmured, almost swallowing his shoulder.
“I have to admit,” Harry muttered, “I like both. But not equally.”
“But when you’re away, it’s your arms I miss, and your hands and the smell of you all cuddly and warm, and it’s like wanting to come home.”
“I remind you of a fireplace?” He was smiling into the top of her hair.
“True. With welcoming light and flames dancing so I want to sit closer. Actually, the light goes on when you come into the room.”
His hand slipped to the crease beneath her breast. “You say gorgeous things, my love.” With no desire to change the subject, his hand moved again, sliding across her breast, his other hand tight at the small of her back. “I feel the same things. Which I never did with poor little Audrey.” Through the soft silver hair, he found her forehead and kissed her. “A wasted youth, but I’m making up for it now.”
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