Blood Bath (Seven Jack Nightingale Short Stories)

by Stephen Leather

  ‘It’s one of your satanic symbols, isn’t it?’ Chalmers said.

  ‘My satanic symbols?’

  ‘All that Black Magic stuff you’re so keen on,’ Chalmers pushed.

  ‘I’m more a Milk Tray man myself,’ Nightingale replied.

  ‘I just bet you are.’ Chalmers huffed something rather un-PC under his breath, before straightening himself. ‘You know what I’m talking about. It’s one of those pentagle things. It is the only reason I brought you in on this.’

  ‘You’re confusing your pentacles with your pentagrams and pentangles again. They’re only usually associated with the devil, or witchcraft, if two points of the five pointed star are uppermost.’ Nightingale didn’t really want to get into a long explanation, as there was more to the star symbol than he could explain to someone as impatient as Chalmers; the pentagram had many meanings dependent on respective faiths, religions and even political allegiances. ‘But, actually this symbol is none of those. It isn’t a true polygon if you take a closer look, and there are extra additions that aren’t usually associated with either Wicca or Satanism, or even the Latter Day Saint Movement.’

  Chalmers was sufficiently confused already, so Nightingale shut up. Instead he asked, ‘I take it you want me to identify it for you?’

  ‘I didn’t ask you here because I enjoy your sparkling company,’ Chalmers said.

  Nightingale took a mobile phone from his pocket, and puzzled over it a moment. His assistant Jenny McLean had showed him half a dozen times where to find the camera app, but could he get it working? ‘I think my thumbs are too big for this thing,’ Nightingale grumbled.

  ‘You Neanderthal. Give it here.’ Chalmers clicked his fingers and Nightingale handed the phone over with barely a scowl. He took various snaps of the symbol on the tub, from a variety of angles. Then he thrust the phone back at Nightingale who shoved it and his hands back in his raincoat pockets.

  ‘Time and expenses?’ Nightingale asked hopefully, though he’d little chance of earning any fee from the superintendent.

  ‘No, you’re doing me a favour. The same as I am for you…when allowing you your liberty.’ Chalmers eyed him steadily. ‘I expect to hear from you very soon, Nightingale. I don’t expect to hear you’re trampling all over my case, though. Intel only, then you’re out. Got it?’

  ‘Loud and clear,’ Nightingale said.

  Later Nightingale drove his classic MGB to his office in South Kensington, then had to circle the block three times before he found a parking space and fed a metre three hundred yards from his front door. He called into Starbucks and picked up lattes and muffins, then wandered back to the office, sweating under his raincoat, shirt and tie. He took the opportunity to smoke as he walked, a man keen on the concept of economy of motion. The hot spell had lasted the best part of a fortnight, a rarity in the UK these past summers. His office was above a hairdressers shop, and he wondered if he’d time for a trim. A shorter hairstyle would help keep him cooler in the stifling heat. He decided no: if he was going to butter Jenny up for a favour, it was best he deliver her coffee while it was still hot.

  When he entered the office, waving the brown paper bag and his acquisitions her way, Jenny looked up and gave him a beaming smile. Her openness made her even prettier than usual. ‘There had to be some good reason for you to be late,’ Jenny said.

  ‘I bring banana muffins,’ Nightingale announced. ‘Lateness is only a state of the mind, while these are delicacies for the tummy.’

  ‘ They’re stodge,’ Jenny corrected him. ‘But welcome all the same. I’m starving.’

  ‘Did you miss breakfast this morning.’

  ‘Yes. I’d no appetite first thing. I’d been up all night with this oppressive heat, and must have showered three times. But I have to admit, I could eat a horse now.’ She stood up, and her pale blue dress drifted around her shapely thighs. Nightingale tried to look elsewhere. ‘You like?’ Jenny asked.

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘My new summer dress.’

  ‘Of course. It’s very pretty.’

  ‘I see you haven’t dressed for the weather yet. You must be sweltering, Jack. At least take off your raincoat.’

  ‘I was just about to. Any way, I am wearing my summer get up.’ Normally he wore a suit over his shirt and tie, habitual from his days as a negotiator with the Met. The concession of a pair of lightweight chinos was his attempt at the summer look.

  He put down the brown paper bag and Jenny delved inside. Her blond ponytail swung over the tanned skin of her bared shoulder, a pointer towards the display of paler cleavage that Nightingale quickly averted his gaze from. Nightingale loved her, but not in that way: theirs was a special relationship totally unlike the one he shared with Superintendent Chalmers or anyone else.

  ‘Did you get through to Bromwich?’ Nightingale asked.

  Frank Bromwich had hired him to get evidence that his wife was having an adulterous affair. Nightingale had done so, but the big surprise was that Mrs Bromwich’s infidelity was with her girlfriend Lisa Chapman, and not Lisa’s husband Bob, as Frank had suspected. Nightingale didn’t care one way or another about Mrs Bromwich’s sexual preferences, but because she hadn’t been with a man, Frank thought he could default on Nightingale’s agreed fee. Some people were just plain odd.

  ‘Yes,’ Jenny said round a mouthful of muffin. ‘I threatened him with a day in court, and he agreed to pay up rather than wash his dirty washing in public. I had him pay by bankers draft, and I already checked and your fee’s in the company account.’

  ‘Good work. Anything else come in?’

  ‘I’m guessing from the way you’re tiptoeing around there’s something you want to ask me to do. You’re the boss, Jack. Ask away.’

  ‘It’s another special request,’ Nightingale pointed out.

  ‘I expected nothing else when you went off radar this morning. What is it this time? Demonic possession, child sacrifice, theft from the blood bank by vampires?’

  Nightingale sniggered in good humour. ‘How does ancient demi-god grab you? Well at least that’s one idea I’m running with.’

  Jenny frowned at her unfinished muffin. ‘Why do I get the impression I should eat this quickly, before I lose my appetite again?’

  ‘What do you know about blood sacrifice? Particularly where the body is literally torn apart.’

  ‘I knew it!’ Jenny pushed the muffin away, looking a little green.

  ‘Sorry.’ Nightingale grinned, scuffed a toe on the carpet, suitably abashed.

  Jenny sat down primly. She adjusted her dress so that it covered her thighs, but her knees still stuck out. A tiny crumb of muffin on her knee caught Nightingale’s eye, until Jenny brushed it away brusquely and leaned towards her computer. ‘What have you got?’ Her words didn’t match her tone: it said, “You swine, I was enjoying that cake, Jack”.

  He handed her his mobile phone. ‘There are some photos on there.’

  ‘Why didn’t you text me them? I could have got on with this while waiting for you to drag your backside into the office.’

  ‘I was driving.’ Nightingale gave her the same sickly smile that said he’d forgotten how to send the photos as a text attachment. The same as he had the last times after she’d explained the process to him.

  ‘You’re such a Luddite,’ Jenny said, for about the umpteenth time. She shook her head in mild exasperation, but it was all as much a part of their eternal dance as Chalmers and Nightingale’s bickering was. She took out a USB cable and fitted the phone to her computer. Within minutes she had the photos snapped earlier at the crime scene up on the screen. Jenny’s only comment was a sound of disgust deep in her throat.

  Nightingale explained how Chalmers had summoned him to the crime scene, about the ten victims, the way their bodies had been torn limb from limb, the chains and pulleys, the blood dripping into the bathtub. ‘I didn’t think we needed pictures of the scene itself, only of the symbol.’

  ‘I’m glad you showed good judg
ement for a change. This is horrid enough.’ In some of the photos the gelatinous blood at the edges of the tub could be seen. But most images were centred on the star shape, the circle around it and the accompanying less obvious symbols partly covered by fresher blood splotches.

  ‘It’s not you usual pentacle,’ Nightingale observed. ‘See how the lines are wavy, while a normal pentacle has straight and equal sides?’

  ‘Perhaps whoever left it there wasn’t that particular about the dimensions being exact.’

  ‘Then why bother? If it isn’t depicted correctly then it holds no significance.’

  ‘So you don’t think it’s a regular occult symbol the likes we’ve come across before?’

  ‘Something different,’ Nightingale said, and to some effect he was relieved. ‘I don’t think this has anything to with the Order.’

  The Order of Nine Angles was a powerful group of devil worshipers, and Nightingale’s sworn enemies. He’d just about had his fill of their attempts on his life, and his soul, and was happy to learn that this time he was up against something else. Not that murderers responsible for ripping their victims limb from limb were anything to be sniffed at.

  ‘See if you can find anything on the Net about blood sacrifice, will you?’

  ‘ Christianity,’ Jenny said without preamble, and quoted John 6:54-55. ‘“He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life: and I will raise him up on the last day. For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink”. Of course, these days, the flesh and blood is ritualized as representations through bread and wine, but it’s still a practice regularly observed in most Christian churches. But did you know that the practice goes back to ancient pagan times? For instance in Greece, some cults engaged in omophagia, the eating of the raw meat of both human and animal sacrifices. The worshippers tore the sacrificial victims apart with their bare hands and teeth, and consumed the flesh and blood, believing that it was a shortcut to godhood. Some time later, in ancient Roman Mithraism, initiates were baptized in blood, usually lying in a pit while the blood dripped on them. They would then eat the flesh and drink the blood for renewal, and therefore become as one with the gods.’ Jenny paused, and looked slowly up at Nightingale. ‘But you already knew that, right? You already mentioned you thought this had something to do with a demi-god.’

  Nightingale shrugged, caught out. ‘On my way over I called at the Wicca Woman Shop and asked Mrs Steadman for a few ideas.’

  ‘Mrs Steadman, your very own fairy godmother?’

  More like his guardian angel, if Nightingale’s recent suspicions about the small bird-like woman held any validity.

  ‘She mentioned Mithras, and how the pagan religion was the blueprint on which modern Christianity was based. She showed me some books with depictions of the god. Normally he is shown as a warrior astride a bull, slitting its throat, while a dog bites the bull’s genitals and a scorpion or serpent stands poised to strike. Look again at those smaller symbols around the star and tell me they couldn’t be the same animals.’

  Jenny nodded in agreement. ‘Could be. But a star doesn’t look much like a man astride a bull.’

  ‘According to Mrs Steadman the Mithras legend is based on even earlier beliefs, possibly those of those ancient Greeks you mentioned. Mithras was basically a representation of the sun – or a star – and the bull that of the cosmic gulf, or eternal darkness, represented here by the circle. Think about it. Light and dark. Good and evil. God and the devil. You can see how one belief would easily morph from ancient paganism to our modern Christianity. Nowadays it’s Jesus Christ and Satan, but it’s basically the same idea.’

  ‘So in other words we are up against some form of devil worship?’

  ‘Yes, just a much older form than we’re used to.’

  Jenny thought a moment, then leaned into her computer and brought up the browser. She typed in “Mithras” and was rewarded with more than thirty thousand hits. ‘I might have to do some digging to see where your idea can lead us. But there’s something I just thought of. Mithraism is about balance. Dark and light in cohesion, and is much the same idea as all other religions and even Eastern concepts like Yin and Yang. It’s probably why that symbol shows a wavy star overlaying a circle – it’s the sun and the eternal gulf combined. For that reason, I’ve also heard that Mithras was sometimes depicted as a god with two faces – both good and evil – in a single form. I’ve got an idea, let me run with it, OK?’

  ‘Go for it.’ Nightingale pushed her latte towards her after peeling off the top. It was still steaming nicely. ‘In the meantime I’ll get in touch with another two-faced git with delusions of godhood. Best I let Chalmers know what I’ve learned.’

  When Nightingale and Jenny went to collect his MGB, the coupe’s engine would barely turn over. It coughed and whirred then gave up the ghost.

  ‘I’ve been having some trouble with the battery terminal leads,’ Nightingale admitted. ‘Let me give them a wiggle and see if that helps.’

  Jenny folded her arms, more or less in resolve. ‘We’ll take my Audi. Really, Jack. I don’t know why you hang onto this old thing, it must cost you a fortune to keep getting it repaired.’

  ‘Parts are becoming hard to come by, and when I can get them they’re expensive. The other day I walked into the garage and said I wanted a windscreen wiper for my MG, and the guy behind the counter said it sounded like a fair swap. What’s wrong with people these days, they’ve lost their sense of style?’

  ‘Your love affair with your MGB has nothing to do with style it’s about nostalgia. And a misplaced one at that. You should buy something more reliable, then you’d have more pleasant memories to look back on than how many times you broke down.’

  ‘You’re as bad as all the rest, Jenny. My MG’s a classic.’

  ‘So is “Agadoo” by Black Lace but it doesn’t make it a good song.’

  After transferring to Jenny’s Audi A4 they headed for Clapham. They had no intention of going near the warehouse where the slaughter had taken place, but to a semi-derelict temperance hall at the fringe of a council-housing scheme. En route Jenny threatened to bash Nightingale’s head in with something heavy if he didn’t stop singing that stupid song.

  ‘It was you that brought up Aga-bloody-do,’ He replied. ‘Now I can’t get the damn song out of my head.’

  ‘I swear if you start doing the hand actions I’ll drive us head-on into a tree.’

  ‘…push pineapple, grind coffee…’

  ‘Jack!’

  Nightingale laughed.

  Then the laughter caught in his throat and he blinked in slow astonishment as they drove by a girl sitting on the pavement outside a pawnshop declaring “We Buy Your Gold.” Lying at her side was a Border Collie. The sheepdog stared balefully back at him with more intelligence even than the vaunted Collie should have. To anyone else the girl would look like any number of the street people lounging about nearby. She was sitting with her knees up near her chin, arms wrapped round them, sparing her modesty somewhat. Her skirt was far too short to sit splay-legged, and even sat as she was she still displayed a fair expanse of fishnet stocking top. There were strategic rips in the stockings. She wore a black leather jacket covered in metal spikes and studs, matching piercings in her lips, nose and ears. Her hair was spiky and jet black, the same colour as her eyes. She also wore black lipstick, but her tongue was brightest red as she stuck it out at Nightingale, then lifted both hands and extended her index fingers skyward and jabbed thrice in quick succession, before extending her palms and making three pushing motions. By that time they had already gone past her, but she then clasped her hands and rocked them side-to-side.

  ‘What’s a nice pineapple like you doing in a place like this, Jack?’

  There was no possible way that he should have heard her voice, but to Nightingale it was if Proserpine was in the back seat of the Audi with them. He was almost afraid to check in case the devil had spirited herself from outside the pawnshop and into the car. For th
at matter he’d no idea how she could have known what song he was singing, except that she was keeping an eye on him much closer than he’d ever imagined she could.

  ‘Get out of my head,’ he snarled under his breath.

  ‘Now you’re a flaming Kylie Minogue fan?’

  Nightingale jerked to attention, blinking in confusion at Jenny. ‘What?’

  His assistant grinned back at him. ‘That’s what you’re singing now, isn’t it? That Kylie song? I must admit it’s more to my taste than Agadoo.’ She did a little jig in her seat, singing along ‘Oh, I can’t get you out of my head…’

  Nightingale frowned.

  Then he quickly checked the wing mirror. The pawnshop was dwindling in the distance, but still he could tell there was no impish devil girl or her dog sitting on the pavement outside. He wondered if he’d dreamed the weird sequence of events, but knew it was wishful thinking. Despite her denials on previous occasions, Nightingale suspected that he was never out from under the radar of the demon from whom he’d won back his soul. Theirs was another special relationship that he was eternally caught up in.

  But why had Proserpine chosen to show herself like that? Why now? Despite its whimsical nature, he had to consider her brief appearance as a warning of sorts: she didn’t care if he died, but when it happened she wanted to be the one to snatch away his severed soul.

  ‘Are you OK, Jack?’

  ‘I’m fine, Kiddo. Just reminiscing again.’

  ‘What about?’

  ‘Just this girl I once knew.’

  Jenny briefly studied him in profile, noting his downturned mouth and deep frown lines. ‘I told you already, Jack: misplaced nostalgia is never good for you.’

  ‘You’re telling me.’

  The old temperance meeting hall stood on its own walled lot on the corner of a T-junction. On two sides urban regeneration had started, the prewar tenement buildings flattened, but that was as far as the construction work had gone before the latest round of governmental budget cuts had kicked in. Mounds of shattered red bricks lay in rubbish strewn heaps, making the landscape look like the aftermath of an apocalyptic event. Distant tower blocks were indistinct through the pollution of vehicle fumes and coal fires. The skies overhead should have been black and gloomy, but the cobalt blue and flashing brilliance of the sun was in direct contradiction. Kids played among the ruination, feral-looking boys and girls.