by David Peace
Dripping, dripping, dripping, dripping, dripping, dripping –
‘Hunter! Hunter! Sti rip sll iwl lik!’
‘What?’
‘Sti rip sll iwl lik Hunter!’
‘What are you fucking saying? Tell me!’
Silence, his body empty, his face on his chest –
Dripping –
I step forward from the door and right the chair.
Dripping –
Drawn to his skull, I cannot look away.
Dripping –
Out of the shadows, in the patch from the window, I look down on the top of his scalp and the hole he’d made.
Dripping –
I want to touch, to put a finger in that hole, but I dare not.
Dripping –
Instead, I walk backwards to the door and open it.
I step out into the corridor, looking for Leonard –
I see him coming down the corridor towards me.
I glance back into the room –
Jack Whitehead unbound and upon his knees, gazing to the ceiling in suppliant pose, hands clasped in prayer.
He turns, a torrent of tears upon his cheeks –
Dripping, dripping, dripping, dripping, dripping, dripping –
‘Close the door,’ he says. ‘Please close the door.’
‘He’s loose,’ I shout at the approaching orderly –
‘Jesus,’ says Leonard, going in to his charge. ‘Not again.’
I am standing in a red phonebox somewhere in the dark on the way back into Leeds –
I say: ‘Would it be possible to meet?’
‘Of course.’
‘About seven? In the Griffin?’
‘Fine.’
‘Thank you,’ I say and hang up.
I knock on the door of her hotel room.
Helen Marshall opens the door, hair matted and eyes red again, the top button of her blouse undone.
‘Sorry,’ I say. ‘Where’s everyone else?’
‘They called it a day.’
‘Are you busy? You doing anything now?’
‘No.’
‘I want you to meet someone. Do you mind?’
‘No,’ she smiles. ‘I don’t mind.’
From the high-backed chair, the Reverend Martin Laws rises.
‘Reverend Laws, this is Detective Sergeant Helen Marshall.’
They shake hands.
‘DS Marshall is part of my team,’ I say. ‘And, to be honest, I’d prefer our conversations from now on to be conducted in the presence of DS Marshall or another member of my team.’
Laws is nodding, smiling: ‘I’m not under arrest, am I?’
‘No,’ I say, without a smile.
We all sit down.
The lounge is empty but for an old woman and a child reading a comic.
‘Reverend Laws,’ I say. ‘Do you mind telling us how you came to meet Mrs Hall and when that would have been?’
‘About two years ago. She’d heard of my work.’
‘Your work?’
The man leans forward in his chair, his hat on his lap, his bag between his boots, and he says: ‘I stop suffering.’
‘How had she heard of you?’
‘The word gets around, Mr Hunter.’
‘So she just rang you up out of the blue?’
‘I wouldn’t say it was the blue, Mr Hunter. But yes, she just rang me up.’
‘And what did she want?’
‘What everyone wants.’
‘Which is?’
‘For the suffering to stop.’
‘And that’s what you did?’
‘I can see you’re not a believer Mr Hunter, but that’s what I try and do.’
‘Stop suffering?’
‘Yes.’
‘How?’ asks Helen Marshall, suddenly.
Martin Laws turns his head slightly and stares at Helen Marshall, silent, just staring –
‘How?’ she says again, looking down at her own hands.
‘I make it go away,’ he smiles.
‘But how?’
‘Magick,’ he laughs.
Tired, I say: ‘Mr Laws, would you mind calling Mrs Hall and asking when it might be convenient to see her?’
‘You wouldn’t prefer to do it yourself?’
‘I’d like us all to be there.’
Mr Laws stands up and walks over to the telephone on the front desk.
‘Are you OK?’ I ask DS Marshall.
‘I’m sorry, I think I’m just tired.’
‘Do you want to go up?’
‘No, I’ll be OK.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes,’ she snaps.
Mr Laws comes back over.
‘Do you want to take my car?’
‘We’ll follow,’ I say.
*
In the car, the drive to Denholme –
In the dark, Helen Marshall beside me.
‘You know what happened to her?’
‘I hate this place,’ she nods, staring out at the black Yorkshire night.
In the car, the drive to Denholme –
In the dark.
We pull up behind the old green Viva in front of a lonely house, its back to the endless night of a golf course.
It’s Sunday 19 June 1977 –
‘You’d think she would have moved,’ says Helen Marshall.
Back from church, evensong –
We walk up the drive, towards Mrs Hall and the Reverend Martin Laws.
I come home, open the door, and they grab me, drag me by hair into the dining room and Eric, sitting there in front of the TV with his throat cut –
She’s pulling at the skin around her neck.
‘Evening, Mrs Hall,’ I say.
‘Good evening, Mr Hunter.’
‘This is Detective Sergeant Marshall. I hope you don’t mind her coming along?’
‘Not at all,’ says Mrs Hall, shaking her head. ‘Please come in.’
Then they tie my hands behind my back and leave me on the floor at his feet, in his blood, while they go into the kitchen, making sandwiches from our fridge, drinking his beer and my wine, until they come back and decide to have their fun with me, there on the floor in front of Eric –
Here in the front room, in front of the TV, we sit down on the big golden sofa, displays of coins and medals in ornate cases.
They strip me and beat me and put it in my vagina, in my bottom, in my mouth, their penises, bottles, chair legs, anything –
Mrs Hall is in the kitchen, making tea, the Reverend Laws watching the road through the bay windows.
They urinate in my face, cut chunks of my hair off, force me to suck them, lick them, kiss them, drink their urine, eat their excrement –
She comes back with a pot of tea and four cups on a tray.
We drink the milky weak brew in silence.
I put down my cup and say: ‘Did Eric have a study or anything?’
She stands up: ‘It’s this way.’
Leaving Helen Marshall with Laws, I follow Mrs Hall out of the front room and into the back of the house.
She opens a door and leads me into a cold room with French windows staring out at the golf course.
Mrs Hall puts on a light, our thin deformed bodies frozen in the cold, cold room, reflected in the black glass –
Among the coins and medals, more coins and medals –
I say: ‘I’d like to take a look at Eric’s files, if that’s OK?’
‘Wait here,’ she says and leaves me.
I walk over to the windows and strain to see into the night –
There is nothing to see.
Mrs Hall comes back with a large cardboard supermarket box and puts it down on the desk.
I ask her: ‘These are the copies of all the stuff you gave Maurice Jobson?’
‘Yes,’ she says. ‘Help yourself.’
I open the flaps and pull out envelopes and folders.
‘There’s quite a bit,’ I say. ‘I’ll need to
take it with me?’
She doesn’t speak, just looks at the box on the desk.
‘You’ll get it all back, I promise.’
‘I’m not sure I want it back,’ she says, quietly.
I close the flaps: ‘Thank you.’
‘I just hope it helps,’ she says, staring at me.
I cough and ask her: ‘How did you meet Mr Laws?’
‘I was given his name?’
‘May I ask who by?’
‘Jack Whitehead.’
Then they take me to the bathroom and try to drown me, leaving me unconscious on the floor for my son to find –
‘But Jack’s in hospital. In Stanley Royd?’
‘And where do you think I’ve been for the last three years, Mr Hunter?’
I close my eyes, saying: ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to …’
‘Don’t worry,’ she smiles and turns off the light.
I pick up the box.
Back in the front room, Helen is still sat on the sofa, the cup balanced on her knees, Laws still watching the road.
‘We best be getting back,’ I say.
Helen Marshall stands up, her eyes red raw from tears.
‘Are you all right, dear?’ asks Mrs Hall.
I’m sorry,’ says Helen, looking at me. ‘I’m not sleeping well.’
Mrs Hall is shaking her head: ‘Isn’t that just the worst kind of hell?’
‘I’ll be OK. Thank you,’ says Helen at the door.
‘Thank you for the tea,’ I say. ‘Goodnight Mr Laws.’
‘Goodnight,’ he replies, not turning from the window.
‘I’ll be in touch,’ I say to them both and follow Helen Marshall back down the drive.
At the car she stops, staring back up at the house, Laws staring back down at her.
I put the box in the boot –
‘What did he say to you?’
‘Nothing,’ she says. ‘Nothing at all.’
‘Your wife’s been calling,’ says the man behind the desk at the Griffin.
‘Thank you,’ I say, taking my key.
‘I’m going to go up,’ says Helen Marshall.
‘Sure you’re all right?’ I ask.
‘Yeah, yeah. I’m fine.’
‘Don’t fancy a quick drink?’
‘Not particularly,’ she says, nodding towards the bar –
I look over and see Alec McDonald, Mike Hillman, and some of the Yorkshire lads, all the worse for wear –
‘I better go over,’ I say.
She nods and says: ‘Don’t forget to phone your wife.’
‘I won’t. Goodnight.’
‘Goodnight.’
I walk over to the bar just as Bob Craven gets another round in.
‘You having one, chief?’ he says.
‘Go on then,’ I say. ‘A quick one.’
‘Looks like you had one of them already,’ says one of the Yorkshire blokes, watching Marshall getting into the lift.
‘Steady on,’ says Alec McDonald, leaning across the table, drunk. ‘That’s out of order, that is.’
‘Looks fine to me,’ laughs Craven.
I take the Scotch from him: ‘Thank you, Bob.’
‘Mention it,’ he smiles.
‘Where’s John?’ I ask Alec.
‘Murphy? Fuck knows, sorry.’
‘You get much done?’
‘Aye,’ he slurs. ‘Fair bit.’
‘Bird, Jobson, that Ka Su Peng girl, Linda Clark,’ nods Hillman.
‘Kathy Kelly?’
‘First thing tomorrow.’
‘See we got another roasting,’ spits Craven, chucking an Evening Post at me:
Clueless –
‘Not very nice that, is it,’ says Alec McDonald, trying to hit the top of the table.
I put the paper back down on the bar and ask him: ‘You heard anything over here about Dawson?’
‘Just that they’re charging him.’
‘Thought he were dead?’ says Craven, over my shoulder.
Me: ‘Who?’
‘John Dawson?’
‘John? No, this is Richard.’
‘Right, right,’ says Craven. ‘His brother.’
Fuck –
I say: ‘You knew John Dawson?’
‘Who fucking didn’t.’
Fuck –
‘Who fucking didn’t,’ he says again.
Upstairs in my room, almost midnight, I dial home: ‘Joan? It’s me.’
‘Oh, Peter. Thank god…’
‘What is it? What’s wrong?’
‘Come home, please.’
‘Why? What’s wrong?’
‘I’ve got such a terrible feeling, Peter.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘An awful feeling that something bad’s going to happen.’
‘Like what?’
‘I don’t know Peter, just come home please.’
‘I can’t, love. You know that.’
Silence –
‘Joan?’
‘Oh, I don’t know what’s wrong with me.’
‘What is it, love?’
‘Just this feeling.’
‘When did it start?’
‘This afternoon. I’d had a nap and I had this nightmare …’
‘What happened?’
‘I can’t really remember. There was a girl in a bath and …’
‘What?’
‘Oh, I don’t know.’
‘A baby?’
‘No. Look, I don’t want to talk about it.’
‘I’m sorry, love.’
‘It’s OK.’
I say: ‘I’ll ring you in the morning, first thing.’
‘OK.’
‘You go to bed.’
‘OK.’
‘I love you.’
‘Me too. Night-night.’
‘Night-night,’ and I hang up thinking –
Close my eyes for ten minutes then I’ll start on Eric’s files, then remembering they’re still back in the boot of my car, thinking I’ll get them soon, my eyes too tired, my eyes too bloody tired.
Yrotcaf htaed, in blood above the door.
The moon was shining through the skylight and I was gazing at her lying in the bath. Thin and pathetic, in a shroud-like garment, lips crooked into a faint and dreadful smile, her hands pressed tightly over her heart. And all around us, people were singing hymns, people with no face, no features, machines. Then she suddenly sat upright, hands still across her heart, and she shrieked with the gulls:
‘Sti rip sll iwl lik Hunter!’
at six fifteen AM today Sunday the twenty ninth of may nineteen seventy seven the body of a woman was found at the rear of sports changing rooms on soldiers field roundhay road near to west avenue leeds with severe head injuries a cut throat and stab wounds to the abdomen description twenty to thirty years five feet seven inches long dark hair medium build wearing a blue and white checked blouse brown cardigan zip up front with yellow two piece cotton suit fawn three quarter length suede coat with fur down the front brown calf length boots she was wearing tights and two pairs of panties one pair of panties had been removed her right leg was out of her tights and the panties that had been taken off had been stuffed down her tights she was struck three times on the head with a ball pein hammer with such severity that a piece of skull penetrated the brain he then stabbed her in the throat and in the abdomen with an equal severity such that her intestines spilled out the three quarter length suede coat was draped over her buttocks and thighs her brown calf length boots were draped neatly over her thighs her handbag was nearby and there was no indication that anything had been stolen from it unlike the previous bodies her brassiere had not been removed tests indicated that she had had sexual intercourse some time in the twenty four hours before her time of death was thought to be around midnight this woman has been living in the leeds area since October nineteen seventy six when she came up from london where it is believed she worked in hotels she was reported missing by her husba
nd from blackpool in november nineteen seventy five love me e walk into the red room the numbers upside down you cannot speak no do not do that there is no need for that we have met before stretching back black nail varnish on your toes the meat no need for that we have met before stretching back black nail varnish on your toes the meat between your teeth e know this face love me the men at upstairs windows without smiles underneath her the dew and the grass this spring day on a sports field in leeds the damp dew and the flattened grass the boots to come and the boots that have been tall trees watching multiple fractures of the skull displaced clothing and mutilation of the lower abdomen and breasts with a knife or screwdriver a clear badge of identity a signature the brown cardigan blue and white checked blouse yellow jacket and skirt did not quite match what is the matter the jogger asked the woman on the ground at the rear of the sports pavilion when they removed my suede coat they saw the massive fracture of my skull from the three blows to my head with the hammer they saw me lying face down with my hands under my stomach and my head turned to the left with my brown hair of which e was always so proud my brown hair washed in my own blood my bra still in position but my skirt had been pulled up and e was wearing tights and two pairs of panties one pair of panties had been removed and my right leg was out of my tights and the panties that had been taken off had been stuffed down my tights for e had been menstruating menstruating for the last time and the coat e had been wearing was draped over my buttocks and legs in such a way as only my feet were showing and when they picked it up they saw my brown calf length boots had been taken off my feet and placed upon my thighs and then they turned me over rolled me over in the grass and they saw e had been stabbed in the neck and throat and had three stab wounds in the stomach all savage downward strokes so severe that my insides were outside the numbers upside down the rooms all red
Chapter 7
In the night, the call –
Clement Smith, Chief Constable: ‘I need you back here. Vaughan Industrial Estate, off Pottery Lane.’
‘What is it?’
‘A bad one.’
‘You going to tell me anything more?’
‘Roger Hook asked for you. That’s all I know.’
‘Now?’
‘Now.’
‘I’ll see you there then.’
‘See you there.’
Another black drive through another black night –
Over the Moors –
The murder and the lies –
The cries and the whispers –
Of children.
