06.The Dead Place

by Stephen Booth

‘No, but she thinks she is.’

  Cooper took the phone, grimacing at Murfin. ‘Hello, Diane.’

  ‘Drop anything else you’re doing, Ben,’ she said. ‘We need the whole team down here for a meeting with Dr Kane.’

  ‘The psychologist?’

  ‘Yes. We’re setting up in the conference room. I want you and Gavin here in ten minutes.’

  17

  Well, have you found the dead place? Or did you lose the scent? Strange, when the odour is so distinctive. Some say it’s sweet, like rotting fruit.

  Did you know that you don’t have to step on a decomposing body to carry away its smell on your shoes? The soil around a corpse is soaked with all those volatile fatty acids produced by human decay. Our soft tissues all decompose, but some more quickly than others. The uterus can last for months – the organ of life surviving intact as the body festers around it. Just one of nature’s little jokes.

  And then all we have left is the skeleton. The teeth, the skull, the gleaming bones. This is the final revelation. It’s the uncovering of truth. To most people, death is a dirty secret, a thing of shame, the last taboo. To me, it’s completion, the perfect conclusion. It’s my only chance to be free.

  I’m close to perfection now, you see. And you’re going to be too late. You may never find the dead place at all. You may never meet my flesh eater.

  *

  ‘There was a German psychoanalyst called Erich Fromm,’ said Dr Rosa Kane. ‘You might be interested in one of his personality theories.’

  She stood at the head of the table, looking smart and self-possessed. Fry was reminded of Professor Robertson in a perverse sort of way. Dr Kane seemed to be the modern, more acceptable face of the same school. She hadn’t hesitated when DI Hitchens had invited her to take the central role in the meeting.

  ‘Fromm believed that even the most severely neurotic person is at least trying to cope with life,’ said Kane. ‘He called that type “biophilous”, or life-loving. But there’s another type he refers to as “necrophilous” – the lovers of death.’

  Fry looked around the table, and saw both Hitchens and Cooper writing the new words in their notebooks. The DI looked as though he might be having trouble with the spelling.

  ‘Necrophilous?’ he said.

  ‘Yes. These are people who have a passionate attraction to anything dead or decayed. It’s a passion to transform that which is alive into something unalive. Fromm called it “a passion to tear apart living structures”. Typically, the individual concerned will be comfortable with machinery, but won’t be able to cope with people.’

  Fry frowned. ‘Why machinery?’

  ‘Anything mechanical is unalive, and therefore predictable and reliable. If a machine breaks down, you can figure out why, and repair it. But people aren’t like that. We can’t always understand why they behave the way they do.’

  ‘That’s certainly true of some people around here,’ said Murfin. But Dr Kane ignored him. She’d probably noticed that Murfin hadn’t opened his notebook. Chances were he didn’t even have a pen with him.

  ‘For a subject with this type of personality disorder,’ she said, ‘machines are vastly preferable. If they’re forced to deal with people, that’s when problems can arise. Human unpredictability appears threatening. A subject may feel the compulsion to render a living person unalive, to make them safe.’

  That was too much. Fry felt the irritation boil over.

  ‘Render a person unalive? What sort of mealy-mouthed expression is that?’

  Kane paused, pursed her lips and brushed back a strand of hair. She was silent for just long enough to make it clear she wasn’t going to respond to the question. She looked up at DI Hitchens.

  ‘In terms of an individual’s own distorted perceptions, such an act might be considered a form of self-defence,’ she said.

  Fry snorted, and Hitchens glared at her.

  ‘There’s another thing that might help you,’ said Kane. ‘Personality disorders of this nature often become evident in childhood. But it generally requires some kind of traumatic experience to bring it to the surface, producing a child who clings to ritual as a source of security. Such a child will find predictability reassuring, even when it flies in the face of normal logic.’

  ‘Can you give us an example?’ asked Hitchens.

  ‘Imagine that you’re a child, and your father sometimes beats you when he comes home drunk on a Saturday night. A normal child will keep his head down and hope his father won’t beat him this week. But if you’re this kind of child, it’s preferable for your father to beat you every Saturday night, rather than not knowing whether he will or won’t. Unpredictability is the most frightening thing, you see. A child in that situation might deliberately do something to enrage his father, to make sure that he’s beaten. Then he feels secure.’

  ‘Good God.’

  Kane nodded. ‘It’s a difficult disorder to deal with. There are no cures, only ways of minimizing the effects – and then only if the condition is diagnosed before it’s too late.’

  ‘Too late?’ said Hitchens.

  ‘Well, as a child, this type of individual lacks the power to influence the actions of adults, other than by making himself a victim. But later in life he may realize there’s another way to deal with the unpredictability of people.’ The psychologist turned her head slightly to look at Fry. ‘That’s when he discovers the power to make them predictable – by rendering them unalive.’

  ‘The big question is whether he’s serious about his statement that he intends to kill someone,’ said Fry. ‘Or could his messages be referring to something that’s happened in the past?’

  ‘If there was an earlier incident, it could have been a practice killing,’ said Kane.

  ‘A practice killing?’

  ‘Exercising that newly discovered power over people. This individual may be seeking some kind of perfection. It makes sense.’

  ‘None of this makes sense.’

  Kane took off her glasses to look at Fry. ‘It does if you take the trouble to put yourself in the mind of the psychotic individual, to understand his motivations and thought processes.’

  ‘But we agree that we do have a killer here, Doctor,’ said Hitchens.

  ‘In fact, there’s no evidence of that. While we undoubtedly have an individual with a psychotic obsession, his obsession isn’t with killing but with death.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ said Hitchens, ‘but I don’t see the distinction.’

  The psychologist replaced her glasses and looked at the DI for a moment, raising her eyebrows. Hitchens squirmed uneasily. Watching her in action almost made Fry wish she wore glasses, just so she could do that.

  ‘There’s a very significant distinction,’ said Kane. ‘In his messages, almost all the details in the confessional passages refer to what happens to the body after death. How many murderers hang around the body? Once their victim is dead, they’re only interested in escaping detection or concealing the evidence. But not this individual.’

  ‘Doctor,’ said Fry, ‘would you say this type of man might gravitate towards an occupation where he was able to indulge his obsession?’

  ‘Certainly.’

  ‘The funeral business?’

  ‘I couldn’t be so specific.’

  ‘A pity. We almost had a profile there.’

  Cooper raised his pen to get attention. ‘What about the references to a sarcophagus and “the dead place”?’

  ‘The references are probably symbolic,’ said Kane.

  Fry could see that Cooper was getting excited, like a schoolboy whose teacher had prompted a sudden insight.

  ‘So the sarcophagus could be to do with exposing something to the air and light,’ he said. ‘Perhaps a dark secret?’

  ‘He’s certainly demanding some intelligence from his audience. So, yes – think symbolically, rather than literally.’

  ‘And the flesh eater,’ said Fry. ‘Tell us, Doctor, is the flesh eater symbolic, or literal? It
would be very helpful to know.’

  After the psychologist had left, Fry found Hitchens in his office, tapping his teeth again. She resisted the urge to snatch the pen from his hand.

  ‘I’ve just had a call,’ he said. ‘Instructions from above.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘We have to play it cool on the phone messages, Diane. No more chasing around the countryside like rabbits after every report of someone a bit late coming home.’

  ‘We can’t sit on our hands and wait for a body to turn up,’ said Fry. ‘That might be exactly what he wants.’

  ‘It might be. But we’re downgrading the priority of the phone calls until we have further evidence.’

  ‘With respect, sir, we have an offender here who’s going to kill somebody soon.’

  ‘Strictly speaking, he’s not an offender, DS Fry. Not until he actually does something illegal.’

  ‘He’s making threatening calls.’

  ‘Who has he threatened?’ said Hitchens.

  Fry grimaced. ‘Nuisance calls, then.’

  ‘He’s wasting police time. That’s the worst we can say about him at this stage.’

  ‘He needs psychiatric help.’

  ‘Well, I’d agree with you there. He definitely has a problem of some kind. But whether he’s actually intending to kill anybody, we don’t know.’

  ‘What’s the next move, then?’

  ‘We wait. Patrols will check all the possible sites we gave them, when practicable.’

  ‘When practicable?’ said Fry. ‘That could be never.’

  Hitchens continued with a small frown. ‘And we hope that Forensics can come up with something at the locations he made the calls from. They have two scenes now, so their chances of finding matching traces are increased with each call.’

  ‘And I suppose we sit here on our backsides and hope he’ll call again, just to make it a bit easier for us.’

  ‘Possibly,’ said Hitchens. ‘But there are plenty of other enquiries to concentrate on in the meantime.’ The DI looked up at Cooper as he came back into the room.

  ‘How is the Audrey Steele enquiry progressing, Ben? I’m thinking we ought to make it a higher priority before word gets out. There could be a strong public reaction to an incident like this, and we don’t want to look as though we’re not doing anything.’

  Cooper hesitated. As one of the lowliest members of the department, there was always a danger of being caught between conflicting instructions from his senior officers.

  ‘DS Fry suggested I should pursue other avenues before considering the possibility that an unidentified body was involved,’ he said, choosing his words carefully.

  ‘I know. A mixing of ashes. And how are you getting on?’

  ‘All the ashes I’ve managed to collect have gone for analysis. I’m not sure if they’ll tell us anything, though. Theoretically it shouldn’t be possible to mix up bodies at the crem, unless it was done deliberately, so it may still be just the one cremation we need to explain.’

  ‘That’s what I’m worried about. We mustn’t appear to be ignoring the more serious possibility, Ben.’

  ‘No, sir.’

  Cooper waited. The DI’s concerns about public perception might well supersede Diane’s judgement on the use of resources, but it was a debate he’d prefer to stay out of. Alongside him, Fry was silent, but he could feel her growing tense. He guessed the debate might continue later, when he was out of earshot.

  ‘The funeral directors would have to be at the centre of the business, wouldn’t they?’ said Hitchens.

  ‘Hudson and Slack, yes. I’ve got them listed as my next port of call.’

  ‘To sum up, then. We have human remains that turn out to be those of Audrey Steele, who was never reported missing because she died of natural causes and was cremated with the full works. Or so her family were led to believe. Right so far?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  Hitchens tapped again, then pointed the end of the pen at Fry. She could see a trace of his saliva gleaming on the cap.

  ‘The question is, if the ashes weren’t mixed up, who or what was cremated in Audrey Steele’s place? You can’t just stick an empty coffin in the hearse. Its weight would be a giveaway, for a start. The bearers would notice. The cremator technicians would notice. We’d have to imagine a conspiracy involving at least half a dozen people, if not more. Very risky.’

  ‘We’ve been over this. The obvious thing to do would be to put something else in the coffin instead of the corpse. But the crematorium staff still might notice, if the ashes weren’t right.’

  ‘Mr Lloyd sent through the computer records for the day in question,’ said Cooper. ‘That was helpful of him, since it never occurred to me to ask for them. There’s nothing unusual about the data for Audrey Steele’s cremation.’

  ‘Of course, no one would notice,’ said Hitchens, ‘if you put a different body in the coffin.’

  ‘An actual murder victim, you think?’ said Fry.

  ‘What better way to dispose of the body? No victim, no forensics. Perfect.’

  ‘And even if the remains of Audrey Steele turned up, we would never be able to match them to a missing person.’

  ‘Precisely, Diane. Because she was never missing.’

  ‘If it hadn’t been for the facial reconstruction –’

  ‘And DC Cooper’s persistence,’ said Hitchens.

  ‘Well, yes, and that.’

  ‘Have you still got the list of missing persons, Ben?’

  ‘From eighteen months ago? Yes. But there’s a big problem with it, isn’t there? We don’t know whether we’re looking for a male or a female. We have no idea of age, height, skin colour. Nothing. All we have are ashes.’

  ‘Yes, that is a problem,’ said Hitchens. He paused for a moment. ‘So what do we make of Melvyn Hudson? He’s the boss at Hudson and Slack, isn’t he? So he’d be in the best position to interfere with a body.’

  ‘Would it be possible on his own?’ asked Cooper.

  ‘The staff at Hudson and Slack might know something. They could have helped to cover up, at least. It’s one of those jobs, isn’t it? An “us and them” sort of job. No one else understands or appreciates us, so we have to stick together, no matter what,’ said Fry.

  ‘Could be,’ he said. Fry might just as well have been describing the police. It was definitely an ‘us and them’ sort of job. ‘You don’t think it’s any more than that? There couldn’t be somebody with a more personal reason to cover up?’

  ‘And we still have the crematorium staff,’ said Hitchens. ‘They’re hidden away in that room at the back of the chapel. It’s an ideal situation for the kind of person Dr Kane described just now. Imagine – he sees human beings reduced to dust every day. There’s nothing so predictable as ashes.’

  Fry stood up, though she wasn’t going anywhere. She just needed to move restlessly around the room.

  ‘If you ask me, there’s nothing so predictable as the opinion of an expert.’

  ‘Diane, sit down,’ said Hitchens.

  ‘You know, I’m not sure about the crematorium staff,’ said Cooper. He’d found himself thinking of the terrarium at Mrs Askew’s house, with its seashells and Venus flytraps. Nothing predictable about that, really.

  ‘Why?’ said Hitchens.

  ‘Well, I think the type of person Dr Kane was talking about would want to see the processes the body went through after death.’

  ‘And that means he’d have to go back to the scene to check on the body. Maybe several times.’

  ‘Yes, I think so.’

  ‘Somebody must have seen him, surely.’

  ‘We could put out appeals.’

  ‘Only if we had some idea what times he went back.’

  ‘Of course. But wait a minute, Diane – does he know we’ve found this body?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘We haven’t issued a statement yet, have we? There’s been no announcement to the media?’

  ‘Well, apart from your
facial reconstruction splashed all over the papers and TV screens the other day. Getting the attention of the public, remember?’

  Cooper’s shoulders slumped. ‘Oh, that’s right.’

  ‘Why, what were you thinking?’

  ‘That he might go back to the body again. To do a final check.’

  ‘Not much chance of that now.’

  Hitchens thought about it. ‘Let’s stick to what we actually know. We’ve got a positive ID on a body that was entrusted to Hudson and Slack for proper disposal. But instead of being cremated, the body ended up in the woods, ten miles away at Ravensdale.’

  ‘That’s about it.’

  ‘Pretty nasty business, if you ask me. Something we should take very seriously.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Let’s take some action, then. We’ve still got to maintain a “softly, softly” approach towards Hudson and Slack. But I think we’re justified at this stage in applying for a search warrant and seizing their records.’

  ‘Wow,’ said Cooper, sitting upright with a surge of excitement. He looked at Fry to share the reaction, but she didn’t seem quite as enthusiastic as he’d expected.

  ‘Can we raid their premises and go softly, softly at the same time?’ asked Fry.

  But Hitchens was into the flow now that he’d made a decision, and he started counting off on the fingers of one hand.

  ‘Secondly, we need to interview anyone who was working at the firm eighteen months ago, at the time of Audrey Steele’s funeral. Any former employees who’ve left since then will also have to be traced. Background checks on them all, plus any known associates. We have to narrow down the list of names to those who had the opportunity to interfere with the body. A motive would be helpful, too. But God knows what that might be.’

  The DI looked at Cooper. ‘How does that sound for starters, Ben?’

  Cooper had been trying to make notes. ‘Great,’ he said. ‘And what about the family, sir?’

  ‘Audrey Steele’s family? That’s a bit delicate, isn’t it? But one of them might have noticed something, so they’ll all have to be interviewed.’ Hitchens stopped counting fingers and steepled them, as if praying. ‘Handle that yourself, Ben. You’ve already spoken to the mother, you said? I suppose she’s getting on a bit?’