Ashes From Ashes

by Barbara Gaskell Denvil

  Mark did not bother to answer. He did not cradle his broken wrist,and as though unable to feel pain, he left it dangling at his side. His other hand moved carefully around to his back. The Smith and Wesson 40C was snapped into place beneath his waistband, and the small closed knife blade was in his back trouser pocket. Lionel was unarmed, but he lunged. The strength of his hands was unexpected. It appeared that the swell of his arms and body swallowed the other, tall and slim, which disappeared beneath him. But the explosion of the gun hurtled Lionel backwards.

  Twisting and ignoring the blood and the wound in his side, Lionel landed on his knees and swung one arm around Mark’s neck. Again the gun fired. Lionel swore and clamped tighter to the neck squeezed within his upper and forearm, his hands clasped over his ear, and tightening. Mark gulped, face swollen, and bit the man’s forearm clamped around his neck and chin. Strong teeth, strong jaw, and Mark’s tongue tasted filth as Lionel bellowed and kicked.

  Both men pulled away, were winded and hesitated, staring open-mouthed and white-faced. From near strangulation, Mark was weakened and finally the pain from his broken wrist began to scream at him. His cold, expressionless stare was now flushed into fury, shock and pain. Lionel was wounded by a bullet in his right side. This had entered his hip, but once again flesh suffocated pain. Two of his ribs had cracked. Another shot had entered his shoulder but the flabby fat absorbed the pain momentarily, and the bullet had spun within the loose bodily lard and had flown out again near the shoulder bone. He bent over, the dark blood oozing down his shirt. Mark unhitched his knife, grasped it unseen in his unbroken hand, swept that arm up and the blade somersaulted like a circus act, thudding into Lionel’s nose. Blood sprang and splashed. The knife fell back to the ground. Mark grabbed it up, and his gun which lay close to it. But as he bent, Lionel leapt onto his back, pounding with both fists until Mark fell flat, both knife and gun trapped beneath him, and his broken wrist in violent agony, now cracking again.

  The rain fell gleeful, ever stronger until it pounded and although they could not see the gash of lightning, they heard the crashing rumble of the thunder. Mark still made no sound. Lionel now lying on top and grappling for a chokehold, was bellowing and cursing. Mark wriggled, managing to point the knife into the other man’s hand. It sliced deep, cutting through the joint of the thumb. Lionel screamed and fisted the back of Mark’s head a dozen times until he lay still.

  Snap, snap, Mark’s broken wrist bent backwards. Lionel’s broken ribs dug out into the flesh of his chest and he doubled over. Mark straightened and found the trigger of his Smith and Wesson, pulled it, and rocked backwards. Still out of breath from the near strangulation and in a welter of pain, his first shot skimmed Lionel’s thigh. The second shot slammed into Lionel’s hip near both belly and groin, and he tumbled back, lying still.

  The wind whistled. The upside-down body in the tree thumped as it swung against the trunk. There was no other noise except Mark’s faint wheezing. He waited, unable to know whether the other man was dead. Finally, watching intently, he crawled towards the body lying part prone and curled into the stony scrub. Then Mark managed to stand, balancing himself with his one good arm and leaned towards the vast lump. It did not twitch, nor rise and fall as if breathing. There was no grunt, no whimper, nor rattle of dying breath. Mark could not see where his bullet had struck, but he presumed it had caused immediate annihilation. He poked, kicking faintly, at the lump’s arse and it did not react.

  With a sigh of relief, Mark turned away, and walked to the shed door, peering quickly inside in case other bodies lay there. He saw nothing but strewn hay and the broken stalks of old straw.

  Then something immense struck him bodily from behind and Mark was flung on his face into the shed and onto the rubbish left in the hay and straw. The immovable weight on top of him once again left him breathless and gasping. Then the massive arm, the deep bite mark still visible, came slipping from the back around Mark’s neck, and great jointed fingers fastened against his larynx. The fingers were iron. Lionel’s other elbow smashed into the back of Mark’s neck, and between it and the hand at the front, life was crushed into smaller and smaller avenues. The freeze of his dark contemptuous eyes glazed into shallow ponds. The blackening ponds dried up. The mouth sank open between limp expressionless lips, and the eyes bulged inhuman and utterly blank.

  Lionel was laughing as Mark died. Strangled, and then spinal cord broken, the elegant body stretched prostrate, expensive black Saville Row trousers were slimed in the sudden urine of death. Three brown bovine faces, chewing vigorously, eyes fixed in curiosity, gazed from the lower field.

  Pocketing the two guns and the knife, grabbing the wallet from the hidden holder within Mark’s linen shirt and giving the body a final kick. The thrill of power, the kill, and the freedom brought joy, and the joy brought energy. Lionel began to run down the slope towards the house. He had no idea if others lived there, but within the wallet had been car keys, and above all else, he now needed a car. The polished Bentley was still parked at the back. Lionel opened the front door, climbed into the driver’s seat, and drove off without looking behind.

  Invincibility spun into his head like fire. The pain of his injuries and wounds made him dizzy, but with living delight and not with the misery of agony he knew he had inflicted on the dead man. The concreted drive led both up to the country lane and down into the valley where a wider road sank into distant shadows. Lionel headed down. He left a distinct trail of blood drips, splatters and footprints behind him, but this stopped at the house, replaced by the wet earth on the tyres. This pointed the way Lionel had driven but faded before the road was reached.

  “Look. There,” yelled Rita. Everyone stared and Morrison stopped the car on the grassy weed greedy side of the ditch. Both Harry and Rita scrambled out, and began to half run, half slip down the hillside towards the vile thing they had seen.

  “Wait,” Morrison commanded Sylvia, and drove on a few meters to where the drive towards the house was a smooth winding grey. He stopped halfway down, then bumped the Range Rover over the short distance to the shed. He raced to the sycamore tree and Sylvia followed. Rita and Harry were just halfway down the slope.

  Joyce Sullivan’s body showed no signs of the torture nor of the dismemberment that her husband had so greedily practised on others. Whether from respect or from lack of arousal was unclear, but he had removed her trousers and underpants, which hardly manifested respect. She had been hung upside down from a heavy branch, a triple looped rope slung over the branch and then attached to one ankle. It appeared that she had been strangled, but her throat had also been partially cut, and blood had poured down over her face and hair to puddle on the muddy grass below.

  “The body’s cold,” Morrison said, “and no longer in rigor. I believe she died some time ago, but the freezing weather makes calculations difficult.”

  “But this one,” called Rita, “is still warm. Only recently dead.”

  “What?” Morrison whirled around.

  Harry and Rita knelt beside Mark Howard’s corpse lay face down in the first sprouting snowdrops.

  Sylvia remained standing. “That one,” she pointed to the body swinging with the whistle of the wind, “is poor Joyce Sullivan. And this one,” she pointed to the ground, “is not Maurice Howard, so he must be the twin. It’s Mark Howard, the money launderer and maybe the chimney killer.”

  “Be careful not to contaminate the scene.” Morrison sighed. “I need to get to that house as quickly as possible,” and he began to run back to the car. Harry raced after him. Sylvia stayed with Rita, looking down.

  “Odd to meet someone for the first time when they’re dead.”

  “Murder’s always odd,” said Rita, standing and moving back. “I’ve never understood why killers kill. Lust? Mental illness? Anger? But the rest of us have such a deep instinct against outright cruelty. They say everyone’s capable of murder under certain circumstances, but I don’t agree.”

  “Self-defence perhaps?�
��

  “Then it wouldn’t be murder.”

  The SUV reached the back of the house, rushing with a screech of rubber to the side of the grand building in the valley. The back door was wide open, slamming backwards and forwards in the wind. At first, apart from the back door, it seemed the house was empty and quiet. Then Morrison and Harry heard a yell from upstairs. Morrison ran up the back staircase, and Harry ran into the main rooms, gazing around for clues. There still seemed nothing.

  Uncarpeted, steep and extremely narrow, the stairs to the attic rooms were alive with echoes, and Morrison’s footsteps resounded both upwards and to the cellar. Harry lost himself in the luxury of the great old house and found nothing else.

  Arriving at the locked door of the attic, Morrison had followed the calls coming from one small room tucked in the eves. With a determined shoulder, Morrison shoved in the door’s small cracked planks and bent his head beneath the roof beams.

  “Oh, thank the Lord,” whispered Kate, running into his arms.

  Morrison backed off, but he recognised her. “Mrs Howard? Where’s your husband, ma’am?”

  Kate burst into tears. “Stone dead, I hope,” she mumbled through the sobs.

  Looking considerably surprised, Morrison asked, “Were you locked in here, Mrs Howard? Who did this?”

  “He did,” she wept. “Bloody Maurice. I might have expected Mark, but not my own husband. Mia’s father, for goodness sake. And I’ve put up with all his sneaking around for years. I tried to make friends with Milly. I tried and tried everything.”

  Realising that the woman was clearly under considerable stress, Morrison pulled out his phone, looked at Kate, and nodded. “Rita? Is everything alright? Good. Get over to the house, and bring Sylvia with you. Then get some more of the team out here, report the two killings and call in the forensic squad. I also need an ambulance as soon as possible. Maurice Howard’s young wife is in considerable distress, having been forcibly locked up by her husband. Hurry. I need backup. But first, the ambulance.”

  He held out a hand and Kate clasped and held on tight as he helped her up, and then downstairs step by step. Harry was standing at the bottom. “No sign of anyone else. The house is lived in, and very comfy at that. But no one’s here.”

  Kate stared at him. “Yes there is,” she said. “Maurice may have run off, but Milton wouldn’t. And the girl couldn’t.”

  “Shit.”

  “Bloody hell. Where?”

  Kate staggered to the cupboard under the staircase and pushed it open. It swung inwards, and another unlit precipice of steps led downwards. At the bottom was a small but comfortable room, which was empty apart from its furniture. A large well tucked bed stretched across one wall and a cushioned sofa against the other. In the centre was a round table and three dining chairs. A large trio of teddy bears sat meekly on the sofa, and several colouring books and packs of pencils lay on the table. A chest of drawers stood beside the unlocked door. The floor was covered in thick warm carpet, and a toy train wound its way along the edges.

  Another door stood opposite where they had entered. Morrison turned the handle, but the door was locked. Then he heard the sounds from within. Someone was crying with guttural sniffs and gulps of misery. Thumping or stamping on the floor was now continuous. But someone else called, “Go away and leave us alone. If you want me dead, you’ll have to restrain Master first.”

  It was a female voice, hoarse, and cracking in the middle. Morrison kicked at the door. “Police,” he roared.

  Silence echoed from the other side of the door. Then the female voice whispered, “Truly? Real police? Then in God’s name, help me.”

  Chapter Thirty

  Morrison kicked at the door again, but it didn’t open. He turned to Kate who stood shaking, still sobbing. “Where’s the key?”

  She didn’t know. He began to rummage around the room, searching in the places he knew were often used for easy secrecy. He found a pair of keys on a fluffy bunny rabbit key ring snuggled beneath the pillow on the bed. He tested the first one, which didn’t fit. He tried the second, and the locked door slammed open.

  The smell hit him first. It was an average sized room, but there were neither windows nor other doors, and the bare floorboards were unpleasantly stained with what appeared to be blood, faeces and other things less obvious. A narrow bed on wonky wooden legs was also badly stained. The mattress was thin foam which was wrapped in a filthy sheet. Fallen from the top to the floor were two dirty coverless pillows, a thin sepia blanket, and a white alpaca wool rug, which Morrison immediately recognised.

  Two stools, one toppled over, were in the centre of the room and a large bucket overflowing with a stench of long collected urine stood back against one wall, where a large crack in the floorboards had clearly been widened for use. The broken edges were thickly grimed, and the whole area stank beyond description. Nearby was a small metal bowl, much like a dog’s bowl, which appeared to hold fairly clean water.

  Before Morrison in the middle of the room were two people, both in appalling condition. A young woman held out her hands. Completely naked, she was unbelievably thin so that her bones sprang from every joint, and she appeared like a walking skeleton, Every part of her fleshless body was marked, grazed, cut and scarred. Her breasts had shrunk flat against her chest, the nipples both caught into tight metal clips. Her eyes were bruised, her lips split, and her hair had been partially removed in clumps, leaving a bleeding scalp. Two of her fingers were missing, and the stumps were uneven and red raw. Her nose had been broken, and holes in both cheeks gaped wide.

  Morrison mumbled, “Eve Daish?” and the young woman nodded. She pulled at the blanket and wrapped it around herself. Morrison pulled himself back into decent understanding, quickly shrugged out of his warm jacket and wrapped it around her. She managed to wriggle her arms into place, although the jacket’s sleeves came down over her hands. Morrison zipped it up for her, and it came to her knees. She sighed with such utter gratitude, that Morrison realised this was the first blissful occasion that she had been warm in a very long time.

  The man sat on the floor, rocking backwards and forwards, still crying. Snot rolled from his nostrils to his open mouth, and he licked it off either with his tongue or wiped his nose and mouth with the back of his hand. He was, Morrison realised, badly misshapen, but had learned since his miserable youth to walk, talk, and manage many other things.

  “Milton Howard?” Morrison asked. “You, Maurice and Mark were triplets?”

  Milton sniffed again and looked through the blur of tears. “Yeh. Me. Master. Milton, that is. And this be my lady. But ‘tis all gone wrong. I were happy afore and I ain’t no more. Number One says he’s gonna wallop my lady. Number Two done gone.”

  “Your brother,” Morrison assured him, “no longer has that intention. You are both quite safe.” He paused, unsure. Then said, “My name is – Darcey. I’m going to look after both of you. You both need hospital treatment immediately. The ambulance is on its way. We must go upstairs to the front door. Come with me. Can you both walk?”

  “I ain’t allowed outside,” Milton spluttered.

  “You are now,” said Morrison, and led the way. He held the open door wide, saying, “Welcome to the first room of freedom.”

  Eve stared around. She had never seen Milton’s underground room so clearly before, nor the stairs. For the first time, she was able to understand how he lived. Compared to her own months of misery, this was comfortable. Yet it was still horribly restricted.

  Milton struggled up the narrow stairs, holding frantically to the balustrade. His legs wobbled, finding no balance and unable to stretch. As Morrison looked back and down, Rita pushed past, extending one helpful arm. Milton grabbed hold. “Anovver good lady,” he told himself as she held him steady and then hoisted. Morrison shook his head and moved out of the way.

  When they arrived at the ground floor, Eve hardly believed the sumptuous furnishings and extravagant comfort that had been over her head all the
time she had lived in terror and squalor. Milton was still in tears and clung to Rita. her hand to Milton’s elbow and her other hand to his hand. She asked, “Mark was your brother?”

  Milton’s short twisted legs failed him, and he had to stop for breath. He smiled at Rita. “You’s a cop? I reckons yous a nice lady cop. I’s Milton. Yeh, Number One be my best brovver.”

  The ambulances were waiting, sirens blaring, paramedics rushing into the house. “What’s the urgency? Who needs help first?”

  They saw Eve as she stared back at the running, shouting chaos. Her knees went to jelly, and she realised with utter relief, that she no longer had to keep alert and prepare for the worst. At the moment of acceptance as she surrendered the fervour of terror, she relaxed, her shoulders slumped, her knees seemed to melt and she fainted and collapsed on the wide red carpet. Two policewomen knelt beside her, but the para-medics moved between, lifting her to the cradle of the stretcher between them, then quickly into the ambulance. Its siren once more sprang into life, and with a roar of engines, it zoomed from the short drive and up to the road, while another bumped downwards towards the house.

  Rita still held to Milton, who was looking wildly around. “Where be Number One?”

  “We want you to accompany us,” Rita said, holding tightly to his arm. “You’ll be lovely and warm in a hospital bed, and all your family can visit. Your lady is going to hospital too. She’s not very well.”

  Milton nodded. “She ain’t ate much. Tis a bit my fault. I wanna say sorry.”

  “You can afterwards. You’ll be in the same hospital.”

  “The same bed?”

  He was bustled away, helped up the steps into the back of the ambulance. Two policemen followed him in and sat close. The second siren shrieked its warning. Three teams of police were searching the house. “Keep out of the cellar,” Morrison called. “That’s the principal crime scene.”