The Death Collector

by Neil White

  Hunter stared at him for a few seconds before he answered. ‘But it was found straight away, so your theory doesn’t stand up. White flesh on that dark ground and you’re saying it wouldn’t be found?’ He shook his head. ‘As for choosing the moors? You know what it’s like up there. At night, it’s complete darkness. The simplest answer is usually the likeliest one, that the body could be dumped without being seen.’

  ‘But why all the way up there?’ Sam went on. ‘Why not some woods somewhere nearer the city? It seemed symbolic somehow.’

  Hunter folded his arms. ‘How long have you been on the Murder Squad?’ When Sam didn’t answer straight away, Hunter continued, ‘I’ve been investigating murders for two decades. So go on, tell me: what am I missing? What experience do you bring to the team?’

  Sam felt his cheeks burn up. He knew how it would sound when he voiced it, that it was just a year, that his previous cases had been paper-shuffling, investigating financial crimes.

  Hunter must have spotted Sam’s embarrassment and guessed at the answer. He wasn’t going to let it go. ‘I want to know. How long?’

  Sam took a deep breath. ‘A year.’

  Hunter didn’t smile or laugh, which was worse. He just shook his head as the rest of the room squirmed for him. Weaver snorted a laugh. Sam thought he had slowly worked his way into the squad. They knew he wasn’t the sort to snipe and gossip behind people’s backs, or one of those muscle-junkies who enjoyed barfly banter too much. Sam just got on with his job and applied the attention to detail he had picked up in the financial investigation unit. Yet no one was prepared to stand up for him in the face of Hunter’s scorn.

  ‘No one here has to be a profiler,’ Hunter said, no longer looking at Sam. He was playing to the gallery again. ‘Chase the forensics, the crime scene people, the house-to-house. You all know what you’re doing. Hard work solves murders, not looking for hidden patterns.’

  Sam tapped his pen on his paper in frustration, until everyone looked round as a young detective burst into the room, his eagerness obvious from the sharp crease in his trousers and the way he ducked his head slightly as he advanced towards Hunter. ‘We’ve got her name,’ he said, and handed over a piece of paper.

  Hunter read it and then folded it into his pocket. ‘Sarah Carvell,’ he said. ‘She appeared in court when she was younger for shoplifting and her fingerprints have just matched.’

  Charlotte looked up. ‘She was reported missing yesterday,’ she said. ‘I’ve got the paperwork on my desk.’

  Hunter held her gaze a second too long. ‘I’m heading to her house,’ he said, and pointed at Sam. ‘And you’re coming with me.’

  Sam was surprised as he looked up from his doodles, jagged boxes, showing his frustration. ‘Me?’

  ‘Yes, you,’ Hunter said, and headed for the door.

  Sam glanced at Charlotte, who shrugged and whispered, ‘He must want to keep you close. A loose cannon already. You should be proud.’

  ‘Yeah, right,’ Sam said. ‘I’ll let you know how it goes.’

  He stood still in the living room, looking down at the floor with his fists clenched, at where she had been before he had dragged her to the cellar.

  Things had changed. He had changed. He had never cut up before. This was something new. Visceral and dark. What had gone before had been about disposal, nothing more.

  No, that was wrong. It had never been about disposal. It had been about burial, somewhere symbolic, part of why he did what he did. Chopping her up seemed more brutal somehow.

  He closed his eyes. It was there again, that growing noise in his head, like a vibration, getting louder. It was growing harder to ignore. Things were changing. He searched for an emotion, some kind of panic, but he couldn’t find it. Instead, it was a need to strike out, to hurt; the thing that he kept restrained wanted to burst out. He didn’t think he could stop it, and neither did he want to.

  It wasn’t his choice. It was the chain of events, the face at the window, the police involvement. The boy in the cellar. The intruder. Everything was changing. He had to do something about it, so he had left her as part-taunt, part-insurance. If it was the end for him, he wasn’t going to go down alone.

  It had been the noises that had been the hardest. He’d clenched his jaw as the saw dug into the flesh, the firm squelch of a butcher’s shop followed by the tougher grind as the blade met the gleaming white of the bone.

  He looked up to the photographs on the wall. His mother stared down at him, her face stern, her arm around him protectively. He turned away. Now wasn’t a good time to think of those days.

  The air in the room seemed suddenly stale. He opened a window and let the cool breeze take away the sweat from his forehead.

  He thought about that. Sweat. What he’d done was too risky. It left traces. A spot of blood could bring everything crashing around him, or if they swabbed her and his DNA came back. He knew his guilt would be inescapable if their trail somehow led to him.

  He closed his eyes and grimaced. The vibration got stronger, like a steady hum. It made him think of the others. Those who had tried to walk away.

  He gritted his teeth as he pulled his phone out of his pocket. He searched for a number and heard it ring until a quiet voice said, ‘You can’t ring me at home, you know that. I’m not alone.’

  He swallowed and tried to will away the tension in his head. ‘Emma, I need to see you.’

  Silence at first, and then, ‘I can’t. I’ve told you why.’

  ‘I’m not accepting that. One last time. At least give me that.’

  A pause. ‘When?’

  ‘Tonight. Come to my house. I’ll collect you. Usual place. Eight o’clock.’

  ‘Okay. I’ll see you then.’ She clicked off.

  He put the phone against his forehead and took some deep breaths. One last time. Yes, that was right.

  Eighteen

  Joe drove to Carl’s house, through stone villages where blackened millstone buildings crowded the main streets. Some had been turned into shops that sold second-hand books and locally made food to cater for the walkers who thronged the streets in summer, fronted onto narrow pavements and old stone bridges that strangled the main road into tight passing places.

  The villages didn’t suit the sunlight – the sun brightened the hills and took away some of the menace of the nearby moors. They looked best in the rain when the stone cottages acquired a shine and everything turned from gloomy to brooding.

  The view changed as he turned into the lane that led to Carl’s house. Leaves trailed along the side of his car as the lane narrowed, but it didn’t open out into a line of stone cottages, as he’d expected. It had an idyllic country setting, with thick green hedgerows bordering fields where sheep grazed, the rise of the Pennines just visible further ahead. The small spread of houses was a blight, with grimy pebble dash and windows and doors that looked faded and old.

  Joe parked on the drive, then reached across to the passenger seat, to where he’d put Carl’s papers from his visit to the police station. He skimmed through his scrawling handwriting, in case he had been wrong about not making a note of where Carl had been arrested. If there was any link between the arrest and his disappearance, it might be important. Joe sighed when he saw he hadn’t noted it down. The arrest had been too late and too routine.

  Lorna Jex appeared in the doorway. Even through the windscreen, he could make out the dark rings under her eyes and the paleness of her skin. He climbed out of his car.

  ‘I haven’t slept,’ she said. ‘Come in.’

  As Joe followed her in, he asked, ‘No sign? No news?’

  Lorna shook her head. ‘It’s been two nights,’ she said, and led him along a dark hallway that smelled of old cigarettes and into a kitchen of dated brown tiles and mock-oak cupboards, a relic of the eighties. Photograph frames cluttered the walls, displaying family pictures that had faded into light browns to match the surroundings. As Lorna clicked on the kettle and spooned instant coffee into two
cups, Joe said, ‘Has Carl ever done anything like this before?’

  Lorna shook her head. There were no tears. She looked as though she had used up all of her reservoir.

  She waited until the kettle boiled, poured the water and then passed a cup to Joe. ‘He would have called; he knows I’d be worried.’

  Joe took a sip out of politeness and said, ‘I want to help.’

  Lorna looked at Joe through the steam, her hands around her cup. ‘I thought you couldn’t, that everything was confidential.’

  ‘I’ve thought about that,’ Joe said. ‘You’re not going to complain about that, are you?’

  Lorna shook her head.

  ‘So neither will Carl,’ Joe said.

  ‘Not if it helps him.’

  Lorna shuffled into a living room that was a similar shade to the kitchen, with wallpaper yellowed by cigarette smoke and a carpet whose pattern was hidden by the hairs left by the scruffy terrier that curled up in a chair by the window. The dog opened an eye to look at Joe, but closed it again with a large sigh that made his body blow up and down like bellows.

  Lorna sat silently in her chair so Joe started the conversation.

  ‘He was walking along the lane when I left him,’ he said. ‘It was very early in the morning and he said I would have to turn around if I drove him down, and that I would wake people up.’

  ‘He’s very thoughtful. Did you watch him go?’

  ‘There wasn’t much to watch. The trees and the bend soon swallowed him up, so I set off.’

  ‘So you definitely didn’t drive down the lane?’

  ‘No. I let him out and went.’

  ‘The lady next door said she heard a car right outside in the early hours. It set off quickly. So that wasn’t you?’

  Joe shook his head. ‘Definitely not.’

  Lorna stared at the floor for a few minutes and Joe let her take her time. Her cup trembled in her hand. ‘So what did Carl tell you?’ she said eventually.

  ‘That’s just it,’ Joe said. ‘Carl didn’t tell me anything.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘He’d been locked up because he was creeping around a house, looking in. A neighbour called the police. I asked him for an account and he wouldn’t tell me, was worried about someone listening in. Why would he think that?’

  Lorna looked down and she clasped her fingers together. ‘Because of his father.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘Do you know about my husband, David?’

  Joe nodded. ‘Carl didn’t tell me, though. Nor you. Why not?’

  ‘He was scared. Carl was trying to find out what happened to his father. He’d become obsessed by it.’

  ‘Carl mentioned the Aidan Molloy case.’

  Lorna looked up sharply at that and her chin quivered as tears rolled down her cheeks. ‘That name,’ she said, and her jaw clenched. ‘So Carl did tell you something.’

  ‘Just that it was connected somehow. He didn’t go into any detail. Why did Carl have a special interest in it?’

  Lorna paused and looked at Joe, her gaze sterner now, more focused. ‘That’s not the question you should be asking.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘You should be asking why my husband had a special interest in it. Carl was just following on from where David left off, trying to get some answers about what happened to him, except Carl doesn’t know all that David knew.’

  Joe leaned forward and said quietly, ‘So tell me about David.’

  ‘What is there to know? He went missing six months ago. No one knows where he has gone.’

  ‘Including you?’

  ‘Yes, of course including me.’

  ‘So how did it happen?’

  Lorna took a deep breath and wiped the back of her hand over her eyes, making them red. ‘Like most missing people, I suppose. One night he went out and never came home. There were no warnings, no letters. All I knew was that he had become obsessed by the Aidan Molloy case.’

  ‘And now Carl.’

  Lorna nodded. ‘And now my son,’ she said, and began to sob loudly. ‘Don’t let Carl disappear like his father did. Please.’

  ‘You need to talk to me,’ Joe said, taking her hand and clasping it in his. ‘If I can help, I will.’

  ‘That must be why he chose you,’ she said, through her tears.

  Joe gripped her hand a little tighter. Lorna’s words had just dragged him deeper into the case. He felt the need to know more, and an enthusiasm he hadn’t felt in a long time.

  Nineteen

  Hunter and Weaver walked quickly to the doors that would take them outside, as they headed to the home of the dead woman, Sarah Carvell. It was time to break some bad news.

  They were talking to each other quietly and earnestly, excluding Sam. At first Sam thought it was just about making him jog to keep up, to belittle him, but then he started to wonder whether it was deliberate, so that he couldn’t hear their conversation. Hunter opened the door by slapping the green release button and then slamming the palm of his hand against the glass.

  As Sam caught them up outside, he said, ‘Can I ask you something, sir?’

  ‘Fire away,’ Hunter said, staring straight ahead.

  ‘Why do you want me with you?’

  Hunter exchanged glances with Weaver. He stopped and turned to face Sam, his hands on his hips, pulling his jacket back. ‘Don’t you want to be with us? Prefer swooning over that pretty thing next to you? What’s her name?’

  ‘DC Gray.’

  Hunter’s mouth twitched a smile, although it contained little warmth. ‘But you don’t call her that, do you?’

  ‘Her name is Charlotte.’

  ‘Well, I’m sorry to tear you away from her.’

  ‘No, it’s not that, sir. It’s just that you didn’t seem that keen on my input.’

  Hunter stepped closer to Sam and said, ‘The investigation needs to be focused, to have a direction. I don’t want you there as a distraction.’

  ‘A distraction?’ Sam said. ‘I thought you wanted ideas, that’s all. I haven’t been on the team that long, I know, but I’ve been a detective for a few years and I don’t need treating like some errant child, or a cadet who needs showing the ropes.’

  Hunter moved even closer. He was breathing heavily through his nose. ‘This is your role, to stay close to me, so that you can report back to the rest of the team. That good enough for you?’ When Sam didn’t respond, Hunter pointed to a silver BMW, Weaver holding open the door. ‘You’ll do whatever I tell you to do, and for whatever reason I have. So stop whining and get in.’

  Sam gritted his teeth. Weaver glared at him as he climbed in.

  Sam pulled out his phone as they set off, both men silent in the front, Hunter driving. He texted Charlotte.

  I’ve annoyed H&W. Still think I’m right about location. Can you check on reports of unusual activity there? Go back five years. Dumping bodies not a daily thing.

  He looked out of the window as they drove on, conscious of the silence and with no desire to break it, only the steady drone of the engine filling the car. His phone was in his hand, set to vibrate. After a few minutes, his fingers felt a buzz. He checked the screen. It was a text from Charlotte.

  I’m not ur gimp, but ok. I’m blaming you if Hunter starts bitching.

  Sam smiled to himself and put his phone away.

  Sarah Carvell lived in a small town in a valley to the north of Manchester. It was an old cotton town of terraced houses and small mills, rejuvenated as a commuter town for those who wanted the city offices but the country living. They drove onto a modern estate of cul-de-sacs that branched off from one circular road, checking each road sign as they went, Sam dreading what lay ahead. He knew too well how the arrival of the police to deliver bad news devastated families. His sister’s murder drove his father into a grave and his mother into the bottle, the only blessing being the birth of his little sister Ruby two years later.

  Hunter came to a stop. Th
ey were in front of a boxy detached house, with a small porch that jutted out at the front and a driveway shared with the house next door, the two houses connected by adjoining garages.

  ‘Come on,’ Hunter said, although it was directed at Weaver, not Sam.