by M J Lee
He tapped the side of his head. What was it Charlie Whitworth used to say? ‘Don’t overthink it, son. K.I.S.S. Keep It Simple Stupid. Just follow the evidence, let it tell you what to think, not the other way round.’
God, he missed Charlie.
Chapter 16
‘Hiya, I’m home.’
Ridpath furled the umbrella, took off his jacket and hung it over the bannister in the hallway. Outside the skies were dark and it was pouring down in a way that was normal for a February in Manchester. After the beautiful start to the day, it was as if the gods were wringing out a particularly wet dishcloth all over the city.
He could hear music coming from the kitchen. Inside both Polly and Eve were sitting at the table whilst a saucepan of something bubbled away happily on the stove.
‘Did you get the milk?’ asked his wife.
Ridpath palmed his forehead. ‘Sorry, I forgot.’
‘Looks like it’s going to be water on the cornflakes tomorrow, Eve.’
‘Again, Mum, but I had water last week.’
‘Don’t worry, I’ll nip down to the offie, they’re bound to have some.’ He turned to put on his jacket again and face the floods.
‘Dad, don’t go,’ Eve shouted, ‘Mum knew you’d forget so she bought some herself. Two pints.’
‘If I had to rely on your memory, we’d both starve.’
‘Yeah, sorry, busy day.’ He rubbed his eyes, ‘I’m beginning to wonder if I made the right decision in moving.’
After being wary for a long time, Polly had finally come round to the idea of him rejoining MIT. She still wasn’t happy about it, worrying about his health and the stress, but she wasn’t actively opposed. ‘If you don’t do it now, you’ll always wonder if you’d made the right choice.’
‘Thanks, Poll.’
‘But if I see you suffering or becoming ill again, I’ll be down in that woman’s office demanding a change.’
‘Don’t worry, Poll. What do the Chinese say, “Suffer a moat, grow in wisdom.”’
‘Well, if you want to be strict about it, we actually say, “Chi yiqian, zhang yizhi.” The idea only works if you learn from your setbacks, Ridpath. Remember, “Chong dao fu zhe.”’
‘I’m sure you’re going to tell me what that means.’
‘Don’t follow the track of an overturned cart.’
‘Something I will avoid like the plague. Even in my police Vauxhall—’
Polly changed the subject. ‘How is Claire Trent?’
‘You’re the second person to ask me. She’s fine, political as ever. She gave me a case to handle today. John Gorman’s dogs were killed this morning. Hung from the rafters of a shed.’
‘Your ex-boss? How did he take it?’
‘Badly at the time, he was distraught, but he’d recovered enough this afternoon to ring Claire Trent and complain about me.’
‘Oh, Dad that’s awful,’ said Eve. For a moment, Ridpath thought he was going to get some sympathy from his daughter, but she added. ‘Why would anybody kill dogs?’
He had forgotten Eve was listening. ‘Sorry, love, too much information for an eleven-year-old.’
Polly was thinking. ‘Isn’t that one of the signs of a possible serial killer?’
‘What?’
‘Killing or torturing animals. That and being abused as a child.’
‘Listening to this conversation is abusing me. Can we eat yet, Mum?’
Ridpath lifted the lid of the bubbling pan. ‘What is it?’
‘Chicken and corn soup.’
‘Why is it green?’
‘I didn’t have any corn so I used peas. Same thing really.’
Despite having a father and mother who owned a Chinese restaurant, Polly had never learnt to cook. As she said, ‘My job was to eat the stuff or serve it, not make it.’ Ridpath and Polly had met in her dad’s Chinese restaurant one evening and hit it off immediately. It wasn’t long before he was going back for the chicken and corn soup virtually every night. Her father’s soup was the right colour though; a fluorescent yellow.
‘Shall we try it?’ said Polly hopefully. ‘There’s pizza in the freezer if it’s not great but it should be okay. I followed my mum’s recipe.’
In the end, the soup was vaguely edible. They heated up the pizza anyway because Eve was a growing girl and she needed her carbs.
That night in bed, as Ridpath lay awake staring at the ceiling, Polly softly snoring at his shoulder, her words came back to him. Torturing animals was one of the first signs of nascent psychopathic or sociopathic behaviour.
Had he missed something this morning?
Had John Gorman’s old job blinded him to another motive?
He replayed the images from the CCTV in his head. The man in the boiler suit wasn’t some kid. He was at least forty and probably older. The motive must be revenge, mustn’t it? Somebody who John Gorman had put away in the past and now held a grudge.
Ridpath was still asking himself questions as his eyes closed and he drifted into a shallow and troubled sleep.
Chapter 17
It wasn’t how he imagined at all.
He thought it was going to be like sleep. Dark, uncontrollable, unaware of anything but the dreams drifting past like freshly blown soap bubbles on the air.
But it wasn’t like that at all.
It felt more like a deep well, with him at the bottom, looking up and listening to the world above. A fuzzy and grainy world, just out of reach, like an old black and white film rescued from a junk yard.
He always thought he would be able to control it. Decide to surface when he wanted, pop up suddenly like a jack-in-the-box, shout ‘Ta-da’ and stare at the stupid looks on their faces.
But he didn’t have any control at all, his mind floating and drifting, going where it wanted to go without any rhyme or reason.
He was sure he would eventually regain control, as he always did. He would manage it when he was ready. In the future when the dreams stopped and the world came into clearer focus.
But not yet.
There was a reason he was here.
It was the best reason of all.
He wanted to stay free.
He’d thought about it for a long time, read all the literature, worked it out properly.
He knew it was the only solution that would keep him safe and get what he wanted. He had no desire to go back into the four walls with their smells and noise and illness and hatred.
Here he was safe.
Here he was free.
Here he could kill.
Chapter 18
Don Brown hung his overalls in his locker and closed the door. Outside the window of the changing room, the sky was still pitch black despite it being the dawn of a new day. God, he hated February.
‘Thank God, another shift is over, mate. Did you see the state of the woman in number three? Covered in vomit. Her friends said she’d had twelve tequila shots.’
He shook his head. ‘Some people, hey? Can’t take their booze.’
‘Enough to put you off drink for life, ain’t it?’
‘Not really.’
The man shrugged ‘Nah, I suppose not. I’m off home. You on nights again?’
‘All week, but I’ve got the weekend off.’
‘Same here. See you later this evening.’
His friend left in a hurry, the door banging loudly behind him.
The changing room was empty now, he was the last one there. Moving the old man up to the surgery ward had taken longer than he planned and put him behind time. Never mind, the NHS could have the extra fifteen minutes on him.
He washed his hands before he put on his jacket. He was always punctilious about having clean hands. One of the doctors had even called him a germaphobe, whatever one of those was. But he didn’t care. Working in the mortuary had taught him cleanliness was far more important than godliness. Hospitals were breeding grounds for all sorts of bugs and germs. Why would he be wanting to take them home with him?
&n
bsp; At least he was on days next week, the nights were beginning to get to him. He would go to work when it was dark and come home when it was dark, sleeping through the daylight.
Sometimes, he felt like one of those pit ponies who spent years underground never seeing the light of day. That was him, the human hospital porter pit pony.
He dried his hands on a clean towel and put on his jacket. If he rushed, he could catch the bus and be home in time to spend a few minutes with the kids before he went to bed. A time he loved more than anything else. As he drank his tea and they ate the breakfast his missus had made for them, sitting in their high chairs and gurgling away.
He checked his watch. Time to get a move on; he could catch the 6.23 bus. The bus stop was only 200 yards away and the one good thing about being a hospital porter is it gave you legs of steel from all the walking and lifting.
He ran out of the door and past the security guard on the gate. ‘Morning, Norman, see you tomorrow.’
‘No you won’t. I’m on holiday. Off to Ibiza tomorrow morning.’
‘Lucky bugger.’
Despite the dark of the morning, he could see his breath frost in the air in front of him as he strode towards the bus stop along the deserted road. Underneath his feet the ground was covered in a dusting of white. When he got home, a nice hot cuppa and three rounds of toast would set him right for a good sleep before his shift tonight.
He couldn’t remember the last time he’d taken a holiday. After the rent, there wasn’t much left over for holidays. Since the wife had lost her job, all the money went on the kids; they both understood it was the priority. Later there would be plenty of time for holidays.
Some days he missed the time before he was married; working at the mortuary, making a little on the side with the backhanders from the undertakers and not having a care in the world. But that all stopped when he was caught. Luckily, the police were more interested in the pathologist than him and he was let off with a caution. It was frightening though, a message from on high he needed to change. He met Hilary and before he knew it, Rosie was part of the family followed pretty quickly by Tracy.
He was a dad now, time to put his head down and work.
In front of him, a white van pulled up, a man stumbled out and nearly fell on a patch of ice, putting his hand out to steady himself on a low brick wall.
‘Are you alright, mate?’
A cough, clearing the throat. ‘I’m fine, just a bit of a turn. Thought I’d better stop driving. Pain in my chest.’ His breathing was heavy and his face flushed.
‘Are you sure you’re ok?’ He glanced back at the hospital, before checking along the road to the bus stop. The bus would be here any minute now. ‘Emergency is back there. You could be having a heart attack. I can take you if you want?’
A cough again. ‘Would you? That’s so kind, I feel a little unsteady on my feet, I don’t know what it is.’
As he moved to help the man, he didn’t see the hand come round with a cloth to cover his face. He didn’t smell the sweet fumes of the chloroform, nor did he feel the needle as it pierced his neck.
By then, the man had him in a vice-like grip and the world went black.
His last thoughts before he lost consciousness were who was going to read to the kids tonight?
Chapter 19
Ridpath was up bright and early that morning, before either Polly or Eve had even thought about coming down from their dreams. Outside, the light was just piercing the sadness of a Manchester morning. The sunlight and bright blue of yesterday replaced by a blanket of grey cloud just aching to rain.
He left a large pot of coffee for his wife and instructions for making cornflakes for his daughter. He remembered these from his youth on the side panels of the packets. It would at least help Eve make her own breakfast as she stared out at the world through the tangled forest of her hair.
He was now parked outside John Gorman’s house, the remains of last night’s frost riming the lawn. He had come up here to get a feel for the sort of activity he could expect early in the morning. But the place was as quiet as a bookie’s on Christmas Day. Not one car passed him as he sat there, not a curtain twitched or a front door opened. It was like a scene from 28 Days Later, and he had just woken up to be faced with a zombie apocalypse.
The problem was all the zombies were still asleep.
Finally, one old woman passed him dragging a shopping trolley behind her.
‘Excuse me, madam,’ he said stepping out of the car.
She almost jumped out of her skin at the sound of his voice as it competed with the rustle of the wind in the trees.
He took out his ID. ‘Detective Inspector Ridpath, I’m making enquiries regarding the theft of two dogs in the area yesterday.’
She patted her chest. ‘You frightened the life out of me. You shouldn’t sneak up on people.’
His mouth opened to explain he hadn’t sneaked up on her, but before he had time to respond, she continued speaking.
‘You’re looking into the death of Mr Gorman’s dogs? I thought you would have better things to do. You lot are supposed to be short of resources but you still find time to investigate two dogs?’
The voice was as sharp as her tongue. Again, Ridpath considered responding but there was no point. Instead he asked, ‘Did you see anything unusual yesterday at this time?’
She shook her head. ‘A female policewoman asked me the same question. A nice girl, at least she didn’t sneak up on people.’
He didn’t need this at such an early hour. ‘I’ll take that as a no. You come by at the same time every day?’
‘I do. Have to go and make my mum’s breakfast. Same time every day.’
The woman looked far too old to still have a mum. She tried to edge past him. ‘Can I ask you one more question? Did you see a white van, a Ford Transit parked in the area recently?’
She stopped for a moment. ‘Yes. You can ask me one more question. And no, I didn’t see a Ford Transit parked here recently. This is a nice area, we don’t have many Ford Transits on this street.’ She pointed along the road.
He could see her point. All the cars except his were what was euphemistically known as ‘executive models’; BMWs, Mercedes, Jaguars and one solitary Vauxhall.
His car.
She sniffed twice and walked past him.
‘Thank you for your help,’ he shouted after her.
He thought about knocking on John Gorman’s door, but what could he tell him? We’re looking for a white van with two people? Gorman would chew his ear off. He would save the pleasure for later.
Instead, he drove up to the allotments. Here it was even quieter if that was humanly possible. The gates were still closed and nobody was working on their plots.
He had forgotten places like this still existed in Manchester: oases of calm, peace and quiet in a sea of change. Perhaps he should get an allotment, but he dismissed the idea as quickly as he thought it. He had yellow fingers. Every plant he touched died a painful death.
But listening to the starlings in the trees and smelling the scent of manure on the wind, he understood the attraction of growing things for yourself. It just wasn’t for him. Tesco was more his style, everything the same size and wrapped in plastic.
After checking the allotment out once more and walking to the sports club to see the angle of the CCTV camera, he decided to go back to see John Gorman.
He couldn’t put it off any more. Time to let John Gorman know the details of their progress.
Or, in this case, lack of progress.
He’d show him the footage Phil Reynolds had sent him last night to see if he recognised the man. But Ridpath doubted if he would. The image was too far away and the face covered in a balaclava. Plus he had to ask him about the undertaker’s flyer. Why had he kept it in the shed?
He might get lucky but he probably would get a bollocking. And because of who the man was or, more correctly, who he had been, Ridpath would have to stand there and take it.
Sometimes he hated being a copper.
Chapter 20
He laid Don Brown down, making sure the man was comfortable. He wasn’t as heavy as he had expected; carrying him downstairs had been easy.
As he looked down at the man’s face, he wondered whether they had started to work it out yet.
Probably.
Ridpath must have noticed the undertaker’s flyer at the shed. He’d made it so obvious even a Manchester copper couldn’t miss it. Placing another on top of the cairn of Charlie Whitworth’s gravestone was obvious, perhaps too obvious, but he had to be sure they made the connection.
He’d read somewhere that everything was linked. The paper the flyer was printed on came from a forest planted thirty years ago by a man in Scandinavia working hard to buy the Ford Capri built by a worker in Dagenham who’d just decided to go on strike after reading a flyer printed on the same press, using the same black ink.
And the world went around. And around. And around.
Cause and effect.
All one had to do was find the connections to understand the world.
All modern detection was about looking at an effect and trying to find the cause. A dead body would have a murderer. A burglary would have a burglar. A fingerprint at a scene would have a finger somewhere that laid it down.
The evidence would lead them to the cause.
But what if he messed with their heads?
What if, this time, the plan was to cause an effect. To lead them to a series of conclusions and then blow all of it up?
The plan was brilliant. All he had to do was follow it to the letter. That was his job now. He checked the details on the plan, so painstakingly typed out. This was version seven, and the instructions were clear.
Now was the time to extract some blood.
He reached for his medical case and selected a syringe. Tapping the inside of Don Brown’s elbow, he found the vein and took a good sample. He would use this before he left to lay a trail.
Sometimes they needed to be led by the nose.
