Broken Angel

by Diane M Dickson

  * * *

  Sarah’s boyfriend looked haggard but holding it together. In the week since they had last seen him he had lost more weight, but he had an air of quiet about him, a sense of acceptance. He nodded silently when they showed him the picture of the bag. They had told him up front that it wasn’t hers, that it didn’t mean that they had caught her killer, it was just a lead they were chasing up. He handed the paper back to them, there was nothing else they could say, nothing they could give him to make him feel any better. It wasn’t until they were in the car that Tanya allowed herself a smile.

  Charlie asked, “So, back to Bob for a search warrant, we’ll get the team up there.” He glanced at his watch. “The idle buggers should have had their breakfast by now.”

  “I don’t know.” Tanya had pulled away from the kerb, heading back towards town. “I’ve been thinking about it, about Jane. If she has been fed the mushrooms, even if it wasn’t right away, we know she’s more than likely beyond help. I have to believe that there may be a chance that she has somehow avoided it. It’s been a couple of days, that’s all; maybe, just maybe she is still alive. If we take him in now, how do we find her? Do you think she’s at the house? It seems unlikely to me, he asked us in too easily.”

  “Yes, but he wouldn’t let us look around, wouldn’t let us search the rest of it, wouldn’t let us see his van. What are you thinking?”

  “I want to get up there right now. Keep an eye on him at least. He might do something, now that we’ve disturbed him.” She glanced across the car, “I should have done it right away, I’ve made a mistake I reckon, but it’s still early. I want to get the team sorted and keep an eye on him. Let’s see where he goes. I don’t think there’s much time. We have to do it now.”

  “We could go back, get in the house again, see if that handbag is still there. If it is then that’s going to be plenty to bring him in.”

  “Yes, I know, but then what happens to Jane? By the time they’ve sorted out solicitors for him, gone through all the motions, then we’ve had a chance to question him, cope with delays for drinks, food, all the rest of it. Well, you know as well as I do that we’ll lose hours. If we go and watch him now, maybe he’ll lead us straight to her. Or, maybe if that doesn’t happen at least he’ll give us enough to drag him in and lean on him, get him really worried, and organise a search. My other concern is that now we’ve been, maybe he’ll clean up his act. Maybe when we go back there, warranted up and all, the handbag will be gone, anything else will be gone; Jane, if she is there somewhere, will be gone, and we’ll have played our hand.” As she spoke Charlie registered that they weren’t heading back to the office but towards Kidlington.

  “Hang on. Drop me at headquarters. I’ll get the team up to speed. We’ll get down there within the hour. Don’t go in there on your own. Wait for back up.”

  She nodded, her face grim, her knuckles white on the steering wheel.

  Chapter 43

  Tanya pulled the car into a turn off, and reversed carefully behind a hedge, watching out for soft ground. She mustn’t bog down. Fortunately, there was only one reasonable way out of the group of buildings and the yard. If he had a four-wheel drive, an off-road trail bike, then of course he might go through fields. But she was alone. For now, she could only do what she could do. She pulled open her can of high energy drink. She hated these things, it would have her nerves popping and fizzing for hours but sitting in a quiet warm car in her exhausted state was the quickest way to miss something because she was asleep. She would never live it down, that sort of thing stuck with you.

  It was too quiet, she felt her eyelids closing. High energy drink or not she was exhausted, she needed cold air, needed to move about. She pulled on her jacket and stepped out into the edge of the field, walked along the narrow road, close in against the hedge. As she came alongside the derelict glass house she clambered onto a piece of broken wall and peered over into the yard.

  A dark blue people carrier was parked around the side of the house. It was old but clean. They had missed that in the dark the night before. On the side was an emblem, a shield with another shield inside, a couple of heraldic creatures, a bird, possibly a dove on the top. It was the wrong colour, pale against the dark blue of the van. It didn’t have the words on the top that it should, but if you thought you were looking at a police vehicle, if you were a little confused or frightened, it could be convincing as an emblem for the force, provided you had just a glimpse and didn’t know what to expect – if you were a young girl or a woman with other things on your mind. It looked like the emblem on the parish magazine.

  The sun was up, and the morning was warming, birds flitted back and forth, a flock of pigeons wheeled and dived overhead. Other than that, it was quiet. Tanya guessed he was still there, hoped she hadn’t messed up totally, allowing him time to flee.

  She walked further along the track, behind the biggest of the outbuildings. They had been in there last night, there was nowhere for him to have hidden Jane Mackie. She stepped carefully along the tufty grass behind it. There were the sheds, ramshackle but not as badly decayed as they had seemed yesterday. She leaned towards the nearest, rubbed at the grimy window. There was no space in there to hide a woman, it was full of rubbish. She walked to the next, again it was just a wooden hut full of junk.

  She turned back and retraced her steps. She would wait in the car for the others and then maybe explore a little further, unless he left the property. As she turned the corner at the end of the barn she stretched up on her toes, peered over the top of a wild hedge. A hundred metres or so distant, across a stretch of field, uncultivated and crowded with nettles and brambles, was another group of buildings. A small cottage, ancient by the look of it, with a front door of old unpainted wood and just two small windows, one on each side. The one on the right was boarded on the outside with planks. Beside that was a lean-to shelter with an ancient car rusting into oblivion inside. There was a storage place on the other side, no walls, just pillars holding up a sagging roof. Some ancient hay bales were stacked in there, dirty and discoloured, some of them broken, the stack tumbling towards the floor.

  It could be part of the same property. There was no wall or fence between them, just this wild, rambling hedge.

  She glanced back – no sign of life. She should wait. When Dan and Sue turned up she could leave one of them to watch for movement and they could walk over and have a look at this new location. She should go back to the car. She peered towards the house. The curtains in the downstairs rooms were still closed. It was before nine, Sunday, maybe he wasn’t up yet. Did murderers have a lie in at the weekend? She didn’t know.

  The little cottage was calling to her, she’d have a quick look. If he started the car she’d hear it, she would have to wait for him to reach the junction anyway, before she could pull out of the field, otherwise he’d see her.

  She set off across the waste land, ears alert for the sound of an engine.

  The phone in her jacket vibrated. It was Charlie. “Sorry boss, it’s about Sue and Dave.”

  “What?”

  “There’s been a huge smash on the motorway. It’s closed, both directions.”

  “Tell them to use the hard shoulder, flash their badges.”

  “No, it’s not on. They’ve gone as far as they can. The whole thing is a war zone. Nobody is getting through anywhere. They can’t even get emergency vehicles through, they’re bringing the Air Ambulance.”

  “Right. Who else is there?”

  “Kate and Paul are at the services.”

  “What, why?”

  “They’re following up on the stuff with Simpson, do you remember?”

  “Bugger. I’d forgotten that. Well they’ll have to leave it. He’s going nowhere and it’s going to take ages to investigate all that palaver. There’ll be quite a few others involved, got to be, but it’s not urgent, not like this.”

  “Traffic have sealed the services. They don’t want anyone else joining the cars on the r
oad. Everyone is stuck. Can you hang on there? I’ll come now, I’ll use the back roads. Mind you everyone’ll be using sat navs and they’ll take all the traffic the same way, it’s going to be mayhem, well it already is.”

  “Charlie, just do what you can. I meant to mention though.” She paused, “This hasn’t been approved, this surveillance. The overtime.”

  “Yes, we realise that, we’re not daft. They’re good with it.”

  This made her smile, in spite of the problems. Her team.

  “I’ll stay here and wait.”

  “Okay. Be careful though.”

  “He’s still in bed, Charlie.”

  “Good, yes, that’s good. I’ll be with you as soon as.”

  She set off across the field, it was hard going, tangles of brambles grabbed at her legs, hidden rocks and holes threatened her ankles and more than once she was over her shoe tops in muddy puddles. She struggled on. If she had to run back because she heard Harper leaving she was in big trouble. Conviction pulled her forward.

  Chapter 44

  Tanya turned to look back at the house, nothing had changed: no lights, no movement. It had begun to drizzle with rain, she pulled up her hood and walked along the edge of the waste ground. The nearer she got to the cottage the more decrepit it looked.

  The path at the front was damaged and overgrown, the garden no longer distinguishable from the surrounding land. There were a couple of rose bushes straggling round the door, but they hadn’t been pruned in years.

  The cottage, tumbling down and falling apart, had a new padlock on the front door. She lifted it, let it drop back against the wood. Nothing odd about that. It was probably still fairly weather proof, it would provide decent storage. Maybe it wasn’t as bad as it looked, what did she know about property? There could be furniture inside, something worth securing.

  She stepped onto the soggy ground beside the step and stretched up towards the window. The frame was rotten and one of the little panes was cracked. It was filthy of course. She took a tissue from her pocket and rubbed at the glass.

  Light couldn’t penetrate very far into this small house, but she could see a table, chairs, shelves. Dark corners. A pale figure moved in the grey, dim light. She gasped, jerked back with shock, gave a little snigger of embarrassment. What the hell. She leaned closer, her nose touching the pane.

  Her stomach clenched. A wedding dress hung from a hook in the ceiling, swaying a little, surely in a draught allowed by ill-fitting doors and windows. It was ghostly and sinister but so much more than that, it was evidence.

  Her nerves tingled and when the phone in her pocket vibrated her heart thumped with shock. She took a deep breath, pulled out the handset and pressed the answer button. Just another moment to get her breathing under control and then she spoke, “Charlie?”

  “I’m at the end of the lane, where’s your car?”

  “I’ve backed into that gateway and then behind the hedge. There isn’t room for two cars, can you find somewhere else?”

  “Yes, if I go down the lane at the other side I can tuck in beside the wall. Do you want to come and sit with me or shall we have a two-pronged attack?” He laughed as he said it, remembering how she had been embarrassed by using the phrase with Bob.

  “You stay there. I got out, moved around a bit, I was falling asleep. There’s a building here, I’ve found something, it’s important. We’re going to be able to get inside his house now, no problem but I want to finish looking around here.”

  “What, what have you found?”

  “I’ll get back to you. Hang on there, try and get near to the glasshouse. I’ll make my way to you in a few minutes.”

  She knew there was no point trying to take a picture through the filthy glass, the flash on her camera would obliterate everything but its own reflection. She had to get back, set things in motion. Bob Scunthorpe wouldn’t refuse a search warrant now. She’d need it for the whole property.

  Her phone vibrated again. Charlie.

  She hissed at him, “I’m coming. Just hang on.”

  “No, listen. He’s on the move. He’s just left the house, front door, moving back now past the barns, northwards, on foot. He’s carrying a holdall.”

  “Northwards! He’s heading towards me. Okay. Look, I’ll get behind these buildings if I can. Don’t ring me. I need to watch, don’t ring okay?” She glanced at the handset, she wasn’t risking it ringing. She turned off the phone, stepped away from the cottage wall and sprinted to the barn, down behind the hay bales where she could see the front door. She could hear him now, he was coming.

  She had been in tense situations before, many times, but never so much out on her own. It was fine, she’d be fine. She was just going to watch and then skirt the field back to Charlie and call in the troops. She crouched in the dusty, mouldy hay.

  * * *

  Peter Harper strode rapidly across the field, confident, determined.

  He pushed a hand into his pocket and pulled out keys. He glanced around, not with suspicion so much as casual interest in the world around him.

  To Tanya, he looked ordinary; he looked normal. Was he really a killer? Well, they didn’t have horns, she knew that, they didn’t have anything to set them apart, that was the most dangerous thing about them.

  He put the small bag on the step. He needed two hands on the swollen door. He pushed it open, grabbed his holdall and disappeared inside.

  Chapter 45

  Jane tried to open her eyes, they were gritty and sore, the lids were heavy. Her mouth felt foul, gluey; her tongue too big for the space. She tried to swallow but there was no saliva. Her arms and legs were heavy, and her mind was sluggish and dull. It was cold, her bones ached. She moved, and the forgotten injury sent a screaming shaft of pain through her, and the throbbing started again. The reminder of her damaged foot brought it all back, the why and where, and she sobbed.

  There was light in the splits and spaces of the roof, so it was day. What day? She had no idea. She heard the birds, the low whistle of the wind through a gap somewhere.

  Every part of her body hurt, inside and out. She forced herself into a sort of wakefulness, pushed gingerly with her hands, holding the wounded limb away from the floor. She shuffled backwards, squealing and groaning, until she could lean against a beam, and sit almost upright.

  The empty water bottle rolled away as she nudged it with her leg, the other one was still where she had put it, standing against the wall. She reached for it.

  As she tipped it to her mouth she felt lukewarm liquid flood over her palm. She remembered. There was something wrong, something that had happened before. She licked the water from her hand.

  It was the water that had made her ill, she had drunk the water and blacked out. It had to be the water. She lifted the bottle so that it caught what little light there was and saw the drip flash and glint as it fell. There was something in the water, pushed in through a hole in the plastic.

  She wanted to drink so badly. She had been hungry for as long as she could remember now, through choice. She liked feeling hungry, feeling hungry meant a negative calorie balance, meant that all the ugly fat was melting away. But she hated being thirsty. She needed water. But the water had been bad.

  She tipped the bottle, licked the spills from her hand again. It didn’t taste bad, didn’t taste of anything but water.

  She lifted the neck of the bottle to her lips, sipped, waited. Nothing happened, she sipped again. Her body was crying out for the liquid. She felt thirstier now than she had before she had begun to sip. It hadn’t been enough to swallow properly, just enough to wet her mouth. She drank again, a bigger mouthful. She swallowed. Nothing happened.

  She held the bottle away from her, looked at the empty one on the floor. She had drunk it, she had been drugged, she must have been. That was the only thing that made any sense. Her foot throbbed, her body ached, she was cold, alone and afraid.

  While she had been asleep she hadn’t been any of those things, yet now that she w
as awake it had all started again.

  She looked around the dingy place, listened to the wind in the rafters, the birds in the gutter. Tears filled her eyes. Where did tears come from when your body was so dehydrated? She wiped them away.

  While she was asleep there had been no fear, no pain, no tears.

  She lifted the bottle to her lips and swallowed several mouthfuls. She laid her head back against the rough wall. After a short while the room spun, just a little; she felt nauseous. The pain in her foot receded.

  She picked up the bottle, emptied it in a few gulps, slid back down on the floor, laid on her side, closed her eyes and fell back into the darkness.

  * * *

  Downstairs the door creaked open. Peter Harper stepped inside, through to the kitchen at the back of the cottage. He glanced around, looking at his pictures – the walls were lined with angels. They weren’t all his, some of them were from the internet, some of them were from magazines and books but they were all perfect.

  The girl upstairs wasn’t perfect, she was ruined. He couldn’t fix her, couldn’t use her. He couldn’t make a broken girl into an angel. Mum hadn’t been perfect, not at first. Granny had explained it when he was little, how it was so much better for them if Mum became an angel. Then they didn’t need to worry about her anymore.

  Granny made sure he went to school, taught him about all the things she knew: how to keep chickens, how to kill them quickly. How to forage, about the mushrooms; she had made sure he knew which ones were safe.

  She told him about the drugs his mother had taken, the things that had turned her bad. But they weren’t dangerous if you knew what you were doing and she taught him about that. She made sure he’d be okay when she was gone. She had left him money, the house – all he’d need. She had been his best friend, reading together, watching her favourite programmes: the police ones, the church ones on Sundays.

  He had worked this bit out for himself though: the way to make perfect angels, no wrinkles like mum had, beautiful golden hair, just like the ones in his pictures, just like his mother had been after they had changed her. These women, angry and upset when he saw them, they were so much better once he’d turned them into angels.