Rock'n'Roll Suicide (Jack Lockwood Mystery Series Book 1)

by Geoffrey West

  What was it?

  He’d been telling me about how people often fitted massive security devices – chains, gates, security railings over windows and so on, and they fastened these incredibly robust and thiefproof metal devices to old masonry walls, and, he told me, they didn’t realise that the old masonry wasn’t always up to the job of retaining the metal insert effectively: the burglars simply had to lever the grill or gate and it would tear clean out of the old crumbing mortar between the stones or brickwork. The manor-house owner was grateful for his insight. And now so was I.

  In addition to being very old, this wall had been subject to continuous soaking over a long period. I remembered the effect on plaster and brickwork of prolonged exposure to water. Old mortars in particular were prone to drying out and crumbing away, especially if they were subject to continuous soaking.

  So I gripped the chain and handcuff in my right hand and twisted as violently as I could, then jerked my body sideways, hoping for a tiny movement. Nothing happened. I tried the same things with my left hand. I closed my eyes and did that thing where you picture something happening in your mind, trying to project what you want to happen into reality. And then on the third try I felt a prickle of excitement, as there was an infinitesimal movement. I jerked hard and twisted all over again, working feverishly, and to my delight, eventually it was moving half an inch, to and fro. I used the whole of my body, my legs forcing and straining to push and pull my torso, and the chain links were dancing.

  The water was up to my chin. My strength was rapidly draining away. But I went on pulling and twisting. Pictured the metal hasp in the wall. Would it simply be a big pointed spike, set into the mortar? Or a flat length of metal? It was moving more and more now. The water was up to my mouth, but I closed it and went on, frantically trying to wrench the shaft backwards and forwards.

  Finally, when it swivelled and jerked a couple of inches each time, one final jerk wrenched it free, and the chain’s weight dragged my hand down. But I quickly managed to push my legs up and gained a couple of feet, my face and chest clear of the water.

  I’d done it. Still a captive, at least there was a good chance that the water wasn’t going to rise much higher now, and I simply had to hang on until morning. Wait a minute. The keys. I remembered that Melanie had dropped them in front of me, one final act of torture before she left – she’d dropped them, knowing that I had no way of retrieving them. Except that now I could use one hand.

  It took a long time, holding my breath while I ducked down underwater and scrabbled around for the keys, but on the sixth try I found them, and to my great relief, one fitted the handcuffs on my left hand, and I was free; the same one fitted the other handcuff, so I was able to take away the remaining length of chain.

  Desperately weak I made it up the stairs and out into the street. I staggered along for a time, trying to find someone to help me. All the Edgerton Row houses were deserted and at the end I couldn’t see which way to go. But in the distance I thought I could see a light. It was in the window of a house on the corner of a road. Closer and closer. As I was on the point of passing out I managed to stumble up the front drive and press on the doorbell. The last thing I remember was the look of surprise on the face of the woman as she opened the door and I slid to the ground.

  * * * *

  It was several hours after my near death in Deal. The doctor in hospital had told me that the knife wound had been a flesh wound only, and had missed vital organs. A few stitches and a blood transfusion had been all that was necessary, and now all I had to do was stay the night, keep the wound clean, change the dressing every day and take the course of antibiotics to prevent the possibility of infection. I wanted to phone Jane, but my phone had been smashed in the house in Edgerton Row. From a hospital phone I called the station and left her a message, hoping it would be passed on: I told her that I was okay, and that I’d had a narrow escape and would tell her all about it when I could, and wanted to thank her for her warning about Melanie Deeprose.

  I’d given the doctors a brief description of what had happened, but they were mainly interested in the wound itself rather than its cause. They had reported the incident to the police, who were supposed to be sending someone to interview me, but so far no one had arrived. In retrospect I thought about the situation: the story of a woman stalking, torturing and trying to murder me because I’d accidentally run down her brother, was one which I imagined they’d have difficulty believing. My wound was not that serious, and, with the pressure on time and budgets, I couldn’t imagine the police making serious efforts to find her. When they looked at my history of past psychiatric illness, they probably wouldn’t even believe it was true.

  So, as usual, I was on my own.

  More importantly, I knew that if I went to the police station after I was discharged from hospital, any chance of catching her would slip through my fingers.

  I had a plan, you see. Not a very sophisticated one, but something that I thought had a slim chance of working. To catch her, make a citizen’s arrest, and take her to the police station, at which point I’d tell them what had happened. If I didn’t do it, how could I stop her from attacking me for a second time?

  Outside the hospital window, dawn seemed a long way off. The ward was in darkness, just a single nurse sitting at a work station with a desk lamp illuminating the papers she was looking at, beside me just the snores and snuffles of sleeping patients. I got out of bed, relieved that I could stand and walk reasonably well. Found my still-damp clothes in the bedside locker and put them on. The nurse didn’t even look up as I passed her – which was lucky, for I didn’t feel like arguing.

  It was cold in the freezing predawn air, the wind chill and cutting as I breathed. I found a cab waiting in the car park, and he was pleased to get a fare, since the person he’d turned up for hadn’t arrived. He chatted as we drove through deserted streets, and I explained that my car was parked in Beach Street. I got out and paid him, and noticed, to my relief that daylight hadn’t quite arrived. There were just the first pink streaks in the sky, the sound of birds singing.

  I drove my car closer to Edgerton Row, so that I had a view of the door to number 23.

  It had been a calculated guess, but I was pretty sure I was right. No way was Melanie Deeprose going to forget about my body. I knew that she wouldn’t be able to resist coming back to find me, drowned and dangling in that cellar, so that she could gloat. I knew nothing about the tides, but was gambling on the fact that maybe it hadn’t yet gone out, and until it did Melanie wouldn’t be able to see my drowned body, surely something she would relish by daylight.

  I got out of the car, taking my wind-up torch, and sneaked carefully into my house of horrors. Found my smashed phone on the floor and picked it up and put it in my pocket: with luck the sim card would be undamaged, and I could slip it into another cheap pay-as-you-go phone that I’d buy as soon as I could. I sat, cross legged behind the door and waited.

  After a long time the pink streaks in the sky became larger and longer. Finally, when I was on the point of giving up, I heard a car’s engine, and, through the window, I saw a red Audi draw to a halt and park.

  Yes!

  Melanie, now dressed in androgynous clothes of trousers and green anorak, got out, slammed the door and walked briskly towards me.

  Time stopped for me as I held my breath, heard her push open the door, not even look in my direction, and cross the room to the cellar stairs.

  I leapt across behind her. Grabbed her arm.

  But a surge of pain from my wound temporarily incapacitated me. Giving her time to drive her nails into my eyes, her knee into my crotch.

  She was running away.

  Gathering my strength, I raced out of the house after her, tearing at the car door. The engine fired and she roared away.

  I ran across the road to my car, started up and tore along the road, narrowing the gap between us to nothing.

  I tried to pass without success. When I attempted to
ram her car, she found a sudden burst of acceleration that tore her away from me. She accelerated faster, and the throaty roar told me her engine had plenty of power in reserve. She surged ahead and away and almost out of sight until I managed to catch her up.

  Soon clearing the environs of tiny Deal, we were on the main A258 going in the direction of Dover. I couldn’t pass her, I could barely keep up. 60. 70. 80. Faster and faster. I longed for a police car to catch up, to arrest us both, but no such luck.

  Without a care for her own safety she didn’t slow for the first bend, and following her I almost lost control, skidding sideways until I hauled the car back to the right side of the road. She was going even faster for the next, but I managed better that time. A petrol station. Rows of shops. Small houses. We were on the outskirts of Dover, having passed the 30 MPH sign a minute ago. Melanie almost ran into the back of the lorry she caught up with, braking violently. I boxed her in, tailgating her mercilessly. Crashed into her rear bumper. Allowed a space and changed down to do a full-on ramming. When the lorry slowed for the red traffic light she pulled out to overtake, braking at the last second for the car coming in the other direction. As the lorry started off again, I managed to pull out and get abreast of her. She surged forwards with a burst of acceleration, roared down a side street, and I only just managed to keep up with her. Then she screeched to a halt and leapt out of her car. I stopped behind her and followed.

  Running fast to keep up. She went down a road to the right, up to the top, then another right, and into what appeared to be a busy shop-packed area. She disappeared until I caught sight of her going into a department store, and I ran after her.

  She was nowhere in sight. I was stranded, disorientated, surrounded by rolls of carpeting, a vista of rugs, and, in the distance, curtains. I stared around frantically until I caught a glimpse of her disappearing around a corner. I caught her up, in time to see her get into the lift. Forcing the doors open with my foot I scrambled inside. As I lunged towards her she kicked me hard in my abdomen, aiming for my wound. Agony surged through me as I felt as if the stitches had burst. She used her advantage to elbow me aside and run out of the lift.

  Managing to stumble after her, ignoring the fresh waves of pain, I caught sight of her disappearing up the stairs.

  As I was racing up to follow her, I realised that tracking her down here, in a public place, was the best thing that could have happened. There were plenty of witnesses. I simply had to corner her, knock her to the ground, hold her there and get people to call the police. Someone would presumably dial 999 when they saw me attacking her, the store would have their own security guards. Maybe they were on their way already, having spotted the strange looking man dressed in soggy clothes, chasing a woman through the store and up the stairs, some mad tramp on the rampage.

  Stairs and stairs and stairs, never ending. She passed an elderly lady coming the other way, knocking the bags from her hands, causing the older woman to fall to the ground. She screamed and I jumped sideways to avoid her, all the while keeping Melanie in sight. And all the time I could see her escaping from me, going higher and higher.

  Until we ran out of steps.

  Undaunted, she darted along the wall and disappeared behind a STAFF ONLY white painted door.

  Following her, I found myself in a narrow bare corridor with nothing but a flight of steps going upwards. She was above me and I followed, panting with the exertion, ignoring the pain from my wound, wondering how much blood I must be losing.

  At the top there was only a hole with the blue sky above. I climbed up and for the second time in as many days I stepped out onto a roof.

  But this was nothing like Gillingham Hall’s tiled sloping affair. It was a flat roof with no safety walls around the edges, obviously out of bounds to the public. As I stepped closer I almost tripped on an air ventilation duct sticking up from the floor.

  I was giddy, confused, a high wind whistling through my hair, the morning sun blazing down, blinding and burning. I caught sight of Melanie on the other side of the expanse, looking desperate now, scared, backing away from me.

  But I knew I’d won. I simply had to corner her. And she had nowhere to go.

  “Give it up, Melanie. The police know what you did to me. They’re on their way.”

  Closer and closer. Melanie looked strained, wild and desperate, eyes all over the place, unsure what she should do.

  “Stop right there!” she yelled.

  I was merely yards away.

  That was when I saw the glint of metal. I’d forgotten one of the many things that had happened last night.

  She’d taken my gun. And right now she was pointing the massive revolver directly at my head.

  She was going to shoot me.

  So I made a decision, and ran straight for her.

  Too late to dive for cover, I heard the cannon-like crack and saw the cascade of searing fire.

  Chapter 12

  ALONE AGAIN

  She’d fired.

  Her hand shot upwards with the recoil. As I’d gambled that it would.

  I made a dive for her, but I never made contact. Wild eyed and confused, the shock of the tremendous recoil and the incredible blinding wall of flame had caused her to stumble and miss her footing. And as I almost grabbed her she was slipping, and falling, sliding back out of sight.

  I ran to the roof’s edge, just in time to see her body spread-eagled in the road, a lorry’s air brakes squealing in protest, unable to brake in time. The second’s view of her broken body was enough to tell me there was nothing I could do now.

  Turning, I checked to see if I was alone, and it looked as if I was.

  Moving fast, I retraced my steps down the stairs. When I got to the upper floor I walked deliberately slowly, and went down the stairs again, not stopping until I was outside the door and in the main road. I heard police car sirens, saw the traffic hold-up and the crowd of onlookers.

  After a few minutes of panic while I tried to find the road I’d dashed up just now, I recognised landmarks that led me to my car. I climbed in and drove away, not stopping until I reached Canterbury. I parked in one of the city centre car parks, spent a frustrating time finding a phone shop, and walked away with a new pay-as-you-go mobile.

  In the car park, I extracted the sim card from my broken phone, inserted it into the new one and powered it up, relieved that the salesman had reassured me that the battery would work without an initial charge.

  Closing my eyes, I re-lived the events of the past hours, wondering if I should have done things differently. There was one thing I had to do now, and I’d been dreading it. But I couldn’t put it off any longer. Luckily my contacts list had transferred to the new phone via my old sim card, so I still had Jane’s mobile number.

  “Why didn’t you tell me what was happening?” she asked, after I’d told her about my ordeal in the cellar with Melanie Deeprose.

  “I had no phone until now, didn’t have your number. I phoned the station and left a message for you.”

  “I never got it. I called you time and again. You never got back to me!”

  “Melanie smashed my phone. I lost your number.”

  “So you’re discharged from hospital and you made a statement about what’s happened to the police?”

  “They were coming to the hospital this morning. I left before they came.”

  “But you’ve surely told them what’s happened? My God, the woman almost killed you, it was a miracle you got out alive!”

  “I went back to Deal, to the house where it happened. I knew she’d come back, you see.”

  “And?”

  “I was going to get her and make a citizen’s arrest.”

  “So did you?”

  “Everything went wrong.”

  “Tell me.”

  “I can’t Jane. I wish I could.”

  “Don’t you trust me?”

  “Of course I trust you. But if I tell you what happened you’ll have to report it.”

  Th
ere was silence on the line.

  “I’m at work.” I heard her take a breath. “There’s been a lot of activity in Dover this morning. A woman fell to her death from the rooftop of a department store. They’re assuming it was suicide.”

  I didn’t say anything.

  “Jack, can you tell me that it’s got nothing to do with you?”

  “I can’t go into what happened.”

  “Why not?”

  “Sorry Jane. I just can’t.”

  “I see. Well here’s what I think. Instead of reporting what that woman did to you, you just took the law into your own hands, didn’t you? There were reports of gunfire, and they found a weapon on the roof where she fell from. Did you fire at her? Was that why you couldn’t tell me anything? Because you know the penalties for carrying a firearm?”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “So am I.” She said nothing for a few moments. “And this isn’t the only thing you’re not telling me about, is it?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Do I have to spell it out?”

  “Look Jane there are things I’ve done in the past few days I can’t talk about. I wish I could.”

  “Is that an admission? Are you admitting that you chased after that woman on your own?”

  “Look–”

  “No, you look Jack. I’ve made allowances for you already because I know you’ve had a hard time. I’ve done my best to help you. But you’ve only ever told me half the truth, haven’t you? You haven’t cared that you’ve made me look a fool?”

  “I’ve told you everything I could.”

  “Yeah? The body of a man has been found washed up on the beach near St Kilda’s. And a vagrant discovered another man’s body in the house you told me you visited the other day. Did you miss out a little chunk of that story you told me?”

  There was nothing I could say.

  “Understand this. I can’t be involved with you, Jack. This is the end of the line.”

  “Please, don’t say that Jane. Please give me a chance—”

  “Shut up Jack. You of all people should realise that I have to live by the rules even if you don’t.”