The Fish Kisser

by James Hawkins

  In the hallway above, Jackson and the staff sergeant pored over photographs of Trudy and Roger.

  “Have you shown the neighbours?” enquired the sergeant.

  “Not yet,” replied Jackson. “We’ve only just got the one of the McKenzie girl and we had to get this one of LeClarc from his mother. The picture in the Daily Express was one of LeClarc’s bosses. That’s why we’re pretty sure there’s a link between him and the missing girl.”

  “Sergeant,” Jackson’s mate shouted from the front room, “take a look at this.”

  “I bet this is where the bed was,” he said, pointing out scuffmarks on the floor, and they followed the trail to the cupboard under the stairs, the entrance to Trudy’s cavern. “It ain’t in there,” called Jackson, “I’ve already checked,” so he shut the door and moved toward the staircase.

  “Let me look at that picture again,” requested the sergeant, sneaking it from Jackson’s hand. “I thought so,” he continued mysteriously, bending down to scrape a few long dark hairs from the floor.

  “They come from a Greek woman who used to live here,” explained Jackson’s partner pompously, seemingly having an answer for everything.

  “Who says so?”

  “Bloke across the road … Mitchell at 71, told me this morning.”

  “And you believed him?”

  Doubt suddenly flooded the detective’s face and reservation crept into his voice. “That’s what he reckoned anyway.”

  The sergeant held the hairs against Trudy’s photograph. “What do you think?”

  “Possible,” breathed Jackson and his partner reluctantly nodded in agreement.

  The stiletto heels of the dumpy waitress clicked in time to the old station clock as the sergeant and the two detectives sat down to order tea fifteen minutes later. The railway refreshment room was busier than it had been when Trudy and Roger had waited a week earlier. The uniforms had changed as well: Board meetings, business luncheons, and bottom lines were far from the minds of the Friday afternoon mob in their ripped jeans and offensively decorated T-shirts. The smartly dressed commuters wouldn’t be back for another two hours, leaving the refreshment room at the mercy of the unemployed and unemployable.

  “At least they remembered LeClarc,” said the sergeant, referring to several of Roger’s neighbours who had identified him from the photograph.

  “Old George Mitchell doesn’t miss much,” added Jackson. “You’d think he would have seen the girl if she’d been with Roger.”

  “Yes,” demanded the waitress, making it clear from her stance that she was unlikely to stand any nonsense. “What do you want?” Her tone, and expression said everything: “No credit—don’t even ask; if it isn’t on the menu we haven’t got it, and even if it is we might not have it, and pinch my bottom and I’ll stuff your teeth down your throat.”

  Not intimidated, the sergeant laid his hand expressively on her tubby forearm, looked her straight in the eye, and addressed her as if she were his maiden aunt. “Now my dear,” he said, “we’d like three cups of your finest China tea and some of your very best roast beef sandwiches.”

  She melted.

  “Oh, and by the way,” he added, “I don’t suppose you’d recognize either of these two?”

  She did—both of them.

  One hour later, Junction Road, Watford had become a circus, with Roger’s home the star attraction. Gaily coloured ribbons of red and yellow cordoned off the area outside the house. Brightly painted vehicles with flashing lights and musical sirens completely blocked the narrow street. The ambulance appeared to be entirely unwarranted but, as at any circus, somebody felt it wise to have one standing by. Why anybody summonsed the fire engine was unknown, but, in the initial panic following Detective Jackson’s call for assistance, someone must have thought it a good idea.

  The official audience of residents, reporters, and cameramen were augmented by an ad-hoc bunch of busy-bodies, excited children, and a couple of drunks who had stopped to heckle the uniformed policeman acting as usher. Patrolling up and down inside the police perimeter with a stone face, he minutely scrutinized every scrap of identification before lifting the flimsy tape, and allowing the artists into the ring.

  George Mitchell and Mrs. Ramchuran were waiting to play a fringe performance to an audience of several dozen television and newspaper reporters denied access to the main attraction. The press had been unable to prise any information from the police beyond two comments: One, from D.C. Jackson, “Just routine enquiries,” and the other, from a brash young sergeant, turned the face of the young female reporter prawn pink as he suggested an alternative use for her microphone should she stick it in his face again.

  Now she wavered the microphone threateningly under George’s nose and the cameraman gave a signal. The sideshow began.

  “How long have you lived at 71, Junction Road, Watford, Mr. Mitchell?” she asked, attempting to cram as much information as possible in a single shot.

  “Sixty years,” he replied crisply.

  “What can you tell us about Mr. LeClarc, at number 34, Sir?”

  “Funny looking bugger …”

  “Sir, this is for national television,” she reminded him.

  George, with a vacant confused look, tried again, “Well he is a funny …”

  “O.K., Sir,” the interviewer cut in quickly. “Can I ask you about the girl. Trudy McKenzie?”

  “Never ’eard of her,” he replied shirtily, wondering who on earth she was talking about.

  “Is there anybody in the house now, Mr. Mitchell?”

  “Loads of policemen,” answered George truthfully, missing the point entirely.

  The interviewer pulled a face and swung her microphone to attack Mrs. Ramchuran. She knew even less than George but at least she didn’t waste their time. “I’ve only seen the man a few times. He was sort of fat with whitey hair. But I never saw no woman there.”

  Then a young newshound, in Bermuda shorts, spotted Daft Jack standing in the half-opened doorway of his house and the crowd of reporters and cameramen drifted in a wave in his direction.

  In Roger’s kitchen, hidden from the stare of the cameras, the main performance was in full swing. Superintendent Edwards’ staff sergeant was running the show to the chagrin of the local officers—openly chatting while he tried to address them.

  “Gentlemen,” he started, clapping for attention. “First of all I can tell you Roger LeClarc, the owner of this dump, has drowned at sea. But,” he stressed, “the press must not be told under any circumstances.” A hush settled over the nine officers in the cramped little room as he continued with enormous solemnity, “Gentlemen— this case is much, much, bigger than two missing people.”

  Speaking for a few moments he laid out a short history of LeClarc’s disappearance, making vague references to the potential for international catastrophe and general mayhem, then added, “Now that we have a firm connection between him and the McKenzie girl we want to know: If she was here, where is she now? She certainly didn’t leave with him.”

  “How do you know?” asked the disembodied voice of a stubby officer straining to be seen at the back.

  “Our men lost him once, possibly twice, in the past couple of weeks,” admitted the sergeant, “but they always found him pretty quickly. They never saw the girl, and she definitely wasn’t with him the day he left for Holland.”

  “Where do you think she is?”

  “I have no idea son,” he said darkly, “But if she came here with him and didn’t leave then,” he paused pointedly, “your imagination is as good as mine.”

  A civilian crime scene officer tried to squeeze into the crowded room but ended up poking his head round the corner and speaking as if he were being charged for every word. “Had a quick look in the hallway Serg: long dark hairs; clothing fibres, probably white; scratches on walls. Photographer’s getting pictures— we’ll take casts.”

  “Any idea what may have caused them?” asked the sergeant as the man paused for b
reath.

  “Furniture … fingernails,” he suggested vaguely, then added a general accusation, “a clumsy cop.” Then continued, “Fingerprints and footprints all over the place.” His eyes swept the audience, “Mainly yours I suspect.” He waited as if he had something to add but was reluctant to run up his bill.

  “Anything else?” enquired the sergeant after a second or two, feeling it was expected of him.

  He had deliberately kept the best to last—a conjurer building up his trick, then he pulled out the rabbit, “Several drops of blood.”

  “Blood?” the word was breathed around the room.

  “Oh yes. Definitely blood.”

  “Whose?”

  Peering over the top of his spectacles he gave the speaker a supercilious look. “How the hell should I know,” he said dismissively, then studiously consulted his notebook for several seconds before adding, formally, “There are indications of a possible struggle in the front hallway.”

  “A definite maybe?” suggested one of the officers without sincerity, and was ignored.

  “When was the struggle?” enquired another.

  “I wouldn’t like to theorize,” he replied, but then did just that. “Judging by the state of the blood and the look of the scratches ….” he paused, meditatively and let his eyes wander to the ceiling, “several day’s ago— could be week—not more.”

  The sergeant took command amid a speculative hum. “O.K. sort yourselves out—two men to a room. Check everything. Usual routine: floors, walls and ceilings. Don’t disturb anything if you can avoid it but don’t miss anything. Two of you can start in the garden before it gets dark—check for any sign of recent digging.”

  “What about the waste dump next door?” asked Jackson recalling his previous excursion over the wilderness. “It’d take a bloody month to dig that lot.”

  “We could try infra-red detection there,” replied the sergeant. “But let’s finish with the house and garden first. Let’s do this quickly. We’re probably too late, but my guess is she’s around here somewhere.”

  The Dutch herring trawler had ambled all day to reach the area of Roger’s disappearance despite Motsom’s relentless urging. The sun was diving toward the western horizon before the skipper admitted they were close. “If your brother’s still alive he should be somewhere near here,” said the skipper, still paying lip service to Motsom’s claim.

  With the persistent fog making it impossible to see the water rushing past the hull, it was difficult to judge the speed of the vessel, or even the direction of travel, and Motsom had no idea the skipper had nudged the little vessel along at a mere 5 knots, hoping someone may have picked up the deck hand’s brief mayday call from the lifeboat’s emergency transmitter early that morning. Around mid-day, before the fog had begun to lift, Billy Motsom had stood in the wheelhouse next to the skipper when he had a nasty feeling something was wrong.

  “How do I know we’re going the right way?” he suddenly enquired after a long period of silence.

  “We are.”

  “How do I know?”

  “You’ll have to trust me,” the skipper replied, deliberately weaving doubt into his tone.

  Shit, thought Motsom, we’re going round in circles, and had visions of winding up alongside a police launch in the middle of the port when the fog lifted.

  “Stop!” he yelled.

  “What?” cried the skipper.

  “Stop,” he demanded, “right now.”

  The gun was unnecessary, the skipper got the message and eased back the throttles. “What’s the matter?”

  “Show me,” said Motsom, roughly grabbing the elderly skipper’s arm and spinning him to face the large map on the table at the rear of the tiny wheelhouse. “Where are we? Which direction are we going in?”

  The old man hesitated for a second, as if considering giving false information, then ran his finger along a line marked, “Ferry,” and said, “About here.”

  Motsom followed the line: a double row of red dots across the pale blue ocean—like a neatly stitched seam binding England to Holland.

  “But how do I know we’re going the right way?”

  The skipper eased his arm free and pointed at the compass.

  “Look,” he said.

  Motsom obeyed, and saw the little needle swinging gently back and forth through a short arc, undeniably pointing west. Satisfied, he ordered the skipper to get going, and faster, something the wily old man had no intention of doing.

  Below decks, McCrae and his newly acquired partner, Jack Boyd, were getting to know each other. Boyd, known on the street as, “Jack the Sprat” or simply “Sprat,” because of his skinny frame and slippery reputation, could list eighteen armed robberies among his accomplishments; questioned three times, charged twice, convicted only once—as a teenager—a rookie. He had been a fast learner. His murder record was better; a perfect score: Boyd—three, Police—nil. Apart from a short stretch in a juvenile detention centre for a kid’s prank, and two years for the one unlucky robbery conviction, he might have been considered a model citizen. McCrae on the other hand would never have been considered a model anything—other than a hit man.

  “You did that double wet job in Hammersmith in the sixties didn’t you?” Boyd said, recalling the well-publicized murder trial.

  “Got off with manslaughter,” said McCrae gruffly, suggesting he was being unjustly accused. “Then I got parole when they found out the bastards I killed had tortured my auld man to death.”

  “Did they?” Boyd asked with a lift in his voice.

  “Och no. ’Course they didn’t you pratt, but they wasn’t around to deny it, wuz they?”

  Boyd laughed. “Nice one,” and lashed out to kick the deck hand who was lying on the floor of the cabin. “Laugh son,” he said, and laughed again.

  The deck hand couldn’t laugh, he had been bound and gagged by someone who’d had more experience in his field than many professionals in more traditional occupations.

  “What are you going to do with this?” Boyd enquired, sweeping his hand around to indicate the boat. “And him,” pointing down at the trussed deck hand.

  “Och. I dunno yet, I havn’a decided.”

  “What about doing the same as you did with the other boat?”

  “What do you know about that?” demanded the Scotsman, alarmed that details had leaked.

  “I heard a rumour.”

  “Motsom told ya I bet.”

  “So.”

  “He should keep his bloody mouth shut.”

  “He said it were real funny.”

  McCrae’s face relaxed, coming as near to a smile as it was ever likely. “It was one of these computer snatch jobs,” he reminisced, “a couple of months ago.”

  “There were two of ’em weren’t there,” added Boyd helpfully, as if McCrae might have forgotten.

  “Yeah, that’s right—two birds with one stone. Motsom had the contract for both of ’em and it just so ’appens they go fishing together in one of them’s boat.”

  “Were it a big ’un?” enquired Boyd with the excitement of a wide-eyed kid.

  “Och. No. But it were very fast. Anyhow,” he continued, “the idea was to snatch ’em afore they got on the boat, then take it out to sea and sink it. But it had to look like an accident in case anybody ever found the bloody thing.”

  “What about the bodies? You’d need bodies.”

  “Och aye, you’d need bodies,” agreed McCrae. “But the plan was to ditch the boat in really deep water so by the time anybody found it, if they ever did, there’d only be skeletons left.”

  Boyd began to smile, he’d heard the outcome from Motsom, but didn’t want to spoil its re-telling by the master.

  “So,” McCrae continued, “I figured why waste two good bodies, why not use skeletons.” The distinct twist to his face could have been mistaken for an attempt at a smile. “Motsom and me snatched the two computer blokes and sent ’em on their way. Then we stuck the skeletons in the driver’s
seats and went out miles.” He paused, the memory of the sight of the two skeletons dressed in the kidnapped men’s clothes, including their caps, was too much for him. He almost laughed. Boyd was laughing already.

  “Anyhow,” he went on, exaggerating wildly, “there they was, two f’kin skeletons driving the f’kin boat a hundred miles an hour then ’boom!’” he slapped his hands together. “The f’kin thing explodes.”

  Boyd was laughing uncontrollably, having difficulty hearing what McCrae was saying.

  “Then …” McCrae stopped and started again, “then, ’Whoomph,’ one of the f’kin skulls comes flying through the f’kin air and missed Motsom by a f’kin inch … Whoomph,” he shouted again for effect and tittered just a little. “Came flying right passed us, and we was a long way off …

  Whoomph,” he said finally, making sure Boyd had missed nothing. “Whizzed right passed Motsom’s head.”

  Boyd almost wet his pants.

  Above them, the afternoon sun was shining on the wheelhouse. The skipper and Billy Motsom could see ahead for miles, but nothing of the water just twenty feet below. A dense crust of fog remained glued to the sea’s surface like a thick cotton-wool blanket and the wheelhouse of the fishing trawler gave them a ghostly outlook. An amputated mast, complete with rigging and sails, could be seen gliding along in the distance as if unattached to the yacht sailing in the murk below; the upper decks of a small freighter drifted across the horizon without the benefit of a hull; seagulls wheeled hungrily above them.

  “I have to go to engine room,” the skipper said as the afternoon wore on. “I must check the engine.”

  “O.K.,” responded Motsom leerily, “I’ll come with you.”

  The skipper had his answer prepared. “No,” he said quickly. “Someone must stay and keep watch.”

  Motsom smelled a rat. The little ship had puttered along for hour after hour without any apparent assistance of the skipper, other than an occasional tweak of the wheel. A quick trip to the engine-room for a splash of grease was unlikely to make much difference. He put his hand on his gun, “I said, I’ll come.”