Bleed For Me (joseph o'loughlin)

by Michael Robotham

  ‘It might be.’

  47

  The first pale suggestion of dawn has appeared on the horizon as a faint grey smudge. F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote that the real dark night of the soul is always three o’clock in the morning, but that’s not right. The darkest part of the night is just before dawn when we wake and peer through the curtains and wonder where the world has gone.

  Headlights appear and disappear on the M32. A rubbish truck is reversing into an alley. A shift worker hurries along the footpath. The day begins.

  Visiting the bathroom, I squeeze the last urine from my bladder and take another few pills, before going in search of Ronnie Cray. I find her pacing the vehicle lock-up with an unlit cigarette in her lips. Like an obsessive compulsive, she is full of tics and routines. She taps the cigarette against her wrist and sucks it again.

  The Novak Brennan trial resumes this morning. I haven’t asked her what she’s going to do about the photographs and the jury foreman.

  ‘So what have you got?’ she asks expectantly. I feel an acid surge in my stomach.

  ‘Ellis isn’t going to crack. He’s been here before - in police custody, under suspicion, interrogated - he won’t be tricked into making admissions. He believes he got away with murdering his first wife, which makes him cleverer than the police.’

  I glance at my notes. Scrawled at the top of the page I have the name: Gordon Ellis Freeman.

  Age: thirty-six.

  Above average intelligence.

  Forensically aware.

  Technologically confident.

  A practised manipulator and predator who uses a high degree of planning and has the ability to execute those plans.

  His motivation isn’t particularly sexual. His satisfaction comes from the hunt rather than the conquest. Bending a young girl to his will. Having her fall in love with him. Offering herself to him unconditionally.

  Cray is opening the hinged lid of her lighter and shutting it with a flick of her wrist.

  ‘You can call Ellis a nonce or a pervert or a paedophile, but that doesn’t explain him. Unless you can grasp the intense pleasure he gets from taking an underage girl and using her as the culmination of his fantasies, you’ll never understand him. Sienna was the punctuation mark for a perfect statement.’

  I pause and wait. The detective is still listening.

  ‘You have to explore his account of events in fine detail. Don’t let him waffle or prevaricate. Ask direct questions; seek times, dates and places. Woven together in the right way, he might slip up.’

  ‘But you don’t believe he will?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Tell me when the good news is coming,’ she mutters.

  ‘Sienna is his weak link - the one element he can’t control. Right now, Ellis thinks nobody will believe Sienna because she’s a murder suspect and she’s only fourteen, but he’s worried. That’s why he tried to silence her.

  ‘Remember the caravan? When his wife disappeared the police couldn’t find it. Ellis told them he’d lost it in a poker game, but that’s not true. He hid it from them or he’s managed to get another one.’

  ‘Why does he need a ’van?’

  ‘He needs somewhere isolated, somewhere he can be alone with his victims so he can savour the experience and make it last. Sienna went with him willingly, yet he still drugged her because he didn’t want her knowing the location. He also wanted to do things to her against her will.’

  A vein in Cray’s temple is pulsing with her heartbeat. ‘You think he took souvenirs?’

  ‘Photographs. Maybe videos. He blacked out the windows of the van, which suggests he could have a darkroom.’

  The DCI splays open her hand and wipes dirt off the heel of her palm with the tips of her fingers.

  ‘How do we find it?’

  ‘We don’t.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘We have to convince Gordon that we’re getting close. Make him believe we’re unlocking his secret. He can’t afford to have us find the caravan. He’ll have to act.’

  For the next fifteen minutes I outline a plan - just the bare bones. Most of the decisions can’t be made until I see how Ellis reacts. The more pressure he’s put under, the more likely he is to make a mistake.

  ‘I want you to tip off the media,’ I tell Cray. ‘Turn his arrest into a public event. A schoolteacher arrested over sex abuse allegations - the tabloids will be baying for his blood.’

  ‘He’ll accuse us of victimising him.’

  ‘Let him complain. Bring him through the front doors in the full glare of the TV lights. Make him run the gauntlet. Show him how society reacts to child molesters.’

  ‘Then what?’

  ‘Take him through Sienna’s statement. Every time, date and place. The one thing you don’t mention is the caravan. Leave it out completely. He’s going to wonder how you can have so much detail - but not that one.’

  ‘And then what?’

  ‘Leave the rest to me.’

  ***

  The arrest warrant is served at 6 a.m. by a dozen detectives who push past Natasha Ellis and move quickly through the house. Gordon is made to wait in his underwear, shivering in a hallway. An hour later he’s handcuffed and led outside to a police car in front of his neighbours.

  The siren sounds all the way to Trinity Road where a crowd of photographers, reporters and TV crews record his arrival. Blinking into the bright lights and flashguns, Gordon looks stunned by the speed of his changing circumstances.

  They say a cruel story runs on wheels and this one has every hand oiling them as they turn. The arrest makes all the morning news bulletins on TV and radio, destined to be the defining story of the day, triggering talkback phone-ins and coffee-room discussions.

  Gordon Ellis is told to stand in front of a height chart holding a whiteboard with his name and date of birth.

  ‘Look up.’

  He raises his eyes and the flashgun fires.

  ‘Turn to the right.’

  Pulling his shoulders back, he lifts one hand and smooths down his hair. The camera flashes again. His stitches are barely visible beneath his hairline, but one of his eyes is bruised and yellow.

  Ellis was given time to dress before he left the house. The school teacher chose carefully - aware of what impression he wanted to make: spectacles instead of contacts, a business shirt, blue blazer and jeans. Smart casual. Studious. Relaxed.

  The formal interviews begin just before nine. Ronnie Cray and Safari Roy enter the room with a dozen ring-bound folders. Ellis had wanted a lawyer from Scotland but was told to find someone closer. He settled on a short, stocky solicitor with the sort of nonchalant smile and cocky demeanour that irritates detectives.

  Throughout the early exchanges, Ellis seems to be enjoying the attention. This is a game and he’s playing it like a professional who’s been forced to compete in the lower leagues.

  ‘Sienna Hegarty says you slept with her,’ says Cray.

  ‘She’s lying.’

  ‘Why would she lie?’

  Ellis sighs wearily and shakes his head. ‘She’s trying to punish me. Can’t you see that? She thinks I shunned her. She mistook my kindness for something more and now she wants to destroy me.’

  ‘We’re going to find her DNA in your home and your car.’

  ‘She babysat my boy. I drove her home.’

  ‘You had sex with her.’

  ‘She tried to kiss me and I pushed her away. Hurt her feelings.’

  Cray consults her notes. ‘Is that why you told Professor O’Loughlin that you “fucked her every which way”?’

  Ellis laughs acidly. ‘And you believe him! The man who did this to me.’ He pulls back his fringe, showing the bloody criss-cross pattern of stitches on his scalp.

  ‘He calls himself a psychologist but his mind is in the sewer. Let me tell you what he does - he looks in his own head and his own heart and he sees perversion and sickness. Then he claims other people think like he does.’


  The tone has suddenly changed. Instead of belligerence and sarcasm, Ellis adopts a whining tone, demanding that his interrogators see things his way. It’s like watching an illegal arrival trying to talk his way through Immigration without the language to explain himself. He groans. He grimaces. He puffs out his cheeks.

  Partly this is feigned, but some of his persecution complex is genuine. Like many men who abuse their power over women, Ellis seems to carry some ancient sense that he’s the real victim. He’s been misunderstood. Led astray. Others are to blame.

  ‘Why did you kill Ray Hegarty?’

  ‘You must be joking.’

  ‘He saw you and Sienna together.’

  ‘He was sexually abusing his daughter. I was trying to help her.’

  ‘How exactly were you doing that?’

  ‘I took her to see a therapist. She didn’t want her parents knowing.’

  ‘Why you?’

  ‘I know this may surprise you, Detective, but I’m a caring, committed teacher. The only mistake I made was caring too much. I should have recognised the signs. I should have seen she was developing a crush on me.’

  ‘You groomed her.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You drugged her.’

  ‘No.’

  The lawyer interrupts. ‘My client has answered these questions.’

  ‘Your client is so full of shit his eyes are brown.’ Cray changes tack. ‘Annie Robinson knew you were having an affair?’

  Ellis hesitates. ‘What’s she got to do with this?’

  ‘She knew the truth.’

  Ellis reacts, stabbing his finger across the table. ‘What has that bitch said to you?’

  ‘I’m asking the questions, Mr Ellis.’

  ‘She’s lying. She threatened to destroy my career unless . . .’

  ‘Unless what?

  ‘Unless I gave her ten thousand pounds.’

  The lawyer puts a hand on Ellis’s shoulder, wanting him to stop. They whisper. Nod. Ellis composes himself, sitting straighter.

  Cray asks him the question again. ‘Why did you pay Annie Robinson ten thousand pounds?’

  ‘She was blackmailing me.’

  ‘If you weren’t having an affair with Sienna Hegarty, why did you pay her a thing?’

  ‘Because I knew she could ruin me. Even without proof she could have me investigated and suspended.’

  ‘So you poisoned her?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You put anti-freeze in a bottle of wine and tried to kill her.’

  Anger turns to outright surprise. Ellis looks at Cray and Safari Roy and then his lawyer. ‘What are these clowns talking about?’

  His lawyer wants the interview suspended. Ellis shouts over him, ‘What do you mean, anti-freeze? What’s happened to her? Where is she?’

  Cray continues, ‘When did you last see Annie Robinson?’

  ‘I want to know what’s happened to her.’

  ‘Answer my question, Mr Ellis.’

  ‘Sunday.’

  ‘Have you ever been to her apartment?’

  Gordon stares past her, his mind in flux, racing through the possibilities. Now less sure of himself, he hesitates over his answers, fighting to keep his voice neutral.

  ‘My client needs to use the bathroom.’

  ‘Your client can hold it in,’ says Cray.

  ‘I want it to be noted that he was denied a toilet break.’

  ‘Noted.’

  Ellis is slowing down his answers, giving himself time. This is what makes him so difficult to pin down. He adapts to different circumstances, changing the tempo and elements of his personality to suit the occasion. Ronnie Cray has to stay on the subject of Annie, but she’s running out questions.

  ‘You knew Annie Robinson at university.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And you also knew Novak Brennan.’

  A grin tugs at the corners of the teacher’s mouth. The spell has been broken. He’s on firm ground again. ‘We shared a house together for a while.’

  ‘When was the last time you spoke to him?’

  ‘I don’t remember.’

  ‘Was it this week?’

  ‘I don’t remember.’

  ‘When did you last see him?’

  ‘I don’t remember.’

  ‘In the past month? Six months? Year?’

  ‘I don’t remember.’

  Cray glances over her shoulder towards the observation window. Ellis is going to stonewall now. Every answer will be the same.

  Time is called. The tape stopped. Cray emerges and walks past me. I find her outside in the secure parking lot, sitting on the steps in the sunshine.

  ‘This is the smoker’s corner - want to join? We’re the cool group.’

  ‘No thanks.’

  ‘We’re getting nowhere.’

  ‘You shook him up.’

  ‘He stuck to his script.’

  ‘Except when you mentioned Annie Robinson.’

  ‘You don’t think he knew?’

  ‘No.’

  Someone like Gordon Ellis is almost defined by his sense of superiority and control. His whole persona is an act, concealing a warped but calculating mind, but for just a moment when he heard about Annie Robinson the artifice and game-playing vanished. He was out of his comfort zone.

  ‘I still can’t understand him,’ says Cray. ‘He’s got a beautiful young wife at home. Money. Looks. He could have any woman he wanted.’

  ‘He doesn’t want just any woman. Underneath his pretty-boy looks, Gordon is still an ugly, overweight kid who wears glasses and can’t get a girlfriend. He transformed himself. He exercised. Lost the weight. Went to the gym. Took vitamins. Got an education, but he never forgot how those girls belittled him at school. The pretty, confident ones. The untouchables.

  ‘Ellis is a narcissist, which is why he gets intensely angry if you suggest that he has a flaw. He cares about his appearance and the impression he makes. He used to hate looking at himself in the mirror, but now he does it automatically, compulsively. And he strains every fibre of his being to meet his own flawless image of himself, demeaning and seeking to destroy anyone who casts doubts on the way he sees himself.’

  The DCI nods and glances at her polished shoes. ‘I’m running out of questions.’

  ‘That’s OK. Keep pushing him. I noticed a few things. When he lies he looks directly at you like he’s gazing into a camera. And when he gets nervous he puts his left hand in his pocket as if reaching for something. I think he normally carries some sort of lucky charm or talisman, which he keeps in that pocket. Check out the personal effects log - see what they took off him.’

  Cray has forgotten to ash her cigarette, which hangs from the corner of her mouth.

  ‘How in glory’s name do you know shit like that?’

  ‘I watch people.’

  ‘Do me a favour. Don’t ever go looking at me. Don’t go thinking about me. Don’t watch what I do.’

  ‘You worried?’

  She brushes fallen ash from her coat.

  ‘You’re a clever bastard, Professor, but there’s something you should know about menopausal women. We can experience insomnia, depression, hot flushes, fluid retention and constant PMS. It’s best not to piss us off.’

  Upstairs, I take Sienna to an interview room. She’s dressed in jeans, a sweatshirt and Converse trainers that squeak on the polished floor.

  ‘Does he know I’m here?’

  ‘He probably suspects.’

  She takes a deep breath and holds it for a moment. ‘Is he going to hate me?’

  ‘What he did was wrong - you have nothing to be ashamed of.’

  DS Abbott arrives with a folder of photographs. I spread them on the table - images of caravan parks and aerial photographs of the Somerset and Cornish coastline. I take the best of the prints and put them on a white board. Sienna sits watching me.

  ‘Remember what we said?’

  She nods.

  ‘This is just like being an actres
s. You’re my leading lady.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘Don’t be scared.’

  ‘I’m not.’

  I look into her eyes.

  ‘I don’t hate him, you know. Even if he doesn’t love me any more.’

  Along the corridor, Ronnie Cray leaves the interview room. Gordon Ellis is led back to a holding cell - his lawyer at his side, whispering instructions.

  Sienna rubs a lock of hair between her forefinger and thumb. Gordon has reached the door.

  ‘So from the caravan you could see a fairground?’

  ‘Yes,’ says Sienna.

  ‘What could you see?’

  ‘The top of a merry-go-round with lots of coloured lights . . . and I could hear music and people laughing.’

  ‘What else?’

  ‘The sea.’

  ‘Could you see the beach?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Would you recognise it again?’

  ‘Sure.’

  Sienna is standing at a whiteboard, pointing to a photograph.

  Gordon Ellis has stopped in the passageway, waiting for Roy to unlock the next door. He hears Sienna’s voice and turns, taking in the maps and photographs. His pale eyes swim with loathing. Roy nudges him forward. The door closes.

  Sienna takes a deep breath.

  ‘Did I do OK?’

  ‘You were a star.’

  48

  ‘His name is Carl Guilfoyle,’ says Cray, staring from her window, watching people dodge through the rain. ‘He’s originally from Belfast, although he’s spent half his life in the States - including a dozen years in prison in Arizona for attempted murder.’

  A bus rumbles by, sending up a flurry of spray.

  ‘We pulled his prints from the room at the Royal Hotel. He tried to wipe it clean, but we got two partials from the suitcase.’

  She opens a folder on her desk. It contains a handful of photographs of Carl Guilfoyle - most of them police mugshots. The earliest, taken in his teens, shows him clear-skinned, with dark hair and a crooked mouth.

  ‘When was this taken?’

  ‘He was seventeen. He glassed a guy in a bar-fight. When the Arizona police picked him up he had a fake ID. A judge remanded him to an adult prison. That night one of the older cons tried to take advantage of a young white Irish boy in the shower block. Big mistake. They found the con in a shower stall choking on his own blood. Swallowed his tongue. To be more exact - they found it in his stomach.’