Compulsion

by Shaun Hutson

  Tanner and Fuller did as she instructed.

  Harry Holland held his wife tightly in his arms.

  Molly was barking even more frenziedly now.

  Ronni rushed out into the corridor and headed for the pay-phone in the hallway.

  Tanner followed, slapping at light switches as he did.

  The ground floor was in virtual darkness now.

  Ronni snatched the receiver from the cradle and dialled. She hit two nines, then dropped the phone and shielded her face as a lump of stone exploded through one of the glass panels of the main doors. Two more struck the thick wood and, somewhere behind her, another window was smashed. Broken glass erupted inwards, lumps of it breaking again when it hit the corridor floor.

  Tanner shielded his head with both hands.

  Jack Fuller suddenly emerged from the day room and hurried up the stairs as quickly as he could.

  “Jack, stay where you are,” Ronni shouted, but the older man ignored her entreaties and made his way to the main landing.

  “I think I can see them,” he called.

  Ronni spun round.

  “Get away from the window!” she bellowed.

  The stone that hit the glass also struck Jack Fuller. It caught him on the temple, slicing open the soft flesh with ease.

  He dropped to his knees.

  Donald Tanner hurried to his companion’s aid while Ronni snatched at the phone once more and tried to dial.

  “I’m all right, Don,” Fuller insisted, rubbing at the cut with his fingers. He gazed at the blood there.

  The voice at the other end of the line was asking which service Ronni required.

  A window on the first floor was smashed.

  “Police!” Ronni snapped.

  She gave the address, then dropped the phone back onto the cradle.

  In the day room, Molly was still barking.

  Ronni could hear crying too.

  One of the residents? Alison?

  She hurried up the steps to join Tanner and Fuller on the landing.

  “There,” Tanner said, pointing out into the gloom.

  Ronni saw them.

  Small dark figures.

  “They look like kids,” Fuller observed.

  Ronni nodded.

  She saw one duck down and snatch up a large stone.

  Saw it come hurtling towards the building.

  It hit the stonework close to another window and bounced harmlessly off.

  The one that followed it crashed through.

  Then the figures were gone.

  Swallowed by the darkness.

  Ronni heard her own breathing, harsh in her throat.

  Jack Fuller sat on the stairs with one hand clapped against his cut head. Blood was soaking into his handkerchief.

  Donald Tanner squatted next to him, an arm around his shoulder.

  In the day room, Molly had stopped barking.

  Ronni walked slowly down the stairs, her footsteps echoing through the silence a silence that was every bit as sudden as the furious cacophony that had preceded it.

  “I think they’ve gone,” muttered Tanner.

  Ronni walked slowly down the corridor towards the main doors, glass crunching beneath her feet.

  Alison emerged from the day room in time to see her approach the shattered panel in the partition.

  “Stay away from there,” she called.

  But Ronni advanced a little nearer, her flesh puckering as cold air rushed into Shelby House through the jagged hole.

  There was a torch in the small office close to the door and Ronni stepped inside and emerged with it, hefting the light like a club before her.

  She switched it on and the beam cut through the darkness. Motes of dust swirled in the brightness as she advanced.

  “Ronni.” Alison’s plaintive cry echoed through the blackness.

  “Don’t go outside,” she implored.

  Ronni raised a hand as if to silence her.

  She shone the torch through the broken pane, sweeping it back and forth.

  Nothing was moving.

  The silence outside was almost palpable.

  She unlocked the main doors and stepped out onto the stone steps beyond, still using the torch like a searchlight to probe the gloom.

  The torch light glinted on something scattered around her feet.

  Dozens of metal objects, smaller than her little fingernail.

  She picked one up and rolled it between her thumb and forefinger.

  It left an oily residue.

  Ronni was still trying to figure out what it was when she heard the first of the sirens.

  THE HAMMERING SEEMED deafening.

  Ronni blew out her cheeks and looked in the direction of the two glaziers, who were placing boards over the smashed window in the main door.

  “We’ll go up to the main office,” she said finally.

  “It’s quieter there.”

  Detective Sergeant David Marsh got to his feet and followed her along the corridor.

  Broken glass had sprayed across the floor and he eased his way past Alison Dean, who was sweeping it up with the help of Helen Kennedy and Eva Cole.

  Alison’s cuts had been attended to by the same paramedics who were now gathered around Janice Holland. She was seated in one of the high-backed chairs in the day room, a portable EGG attached to her chest.

  Her husband stood beside her.

  Through the open door of another room, Marsh saw Jack Fuller seated on his bed, his head bandaged. He smiled thinly as the policeman passed.

  Marsh followed Ronni up the stairs to the main office where she offered him a seat and closed the door.

  The banging of the glaziers receded somewhat.

  “Did anyone get a look at their faces?” Marsh said, flipping his notebook open to where he’d already scribbled a few notes.

  Ronni shook her head.

  “Mr. Fuller saw them,” she said.

  “So did

  Mr. Tanner, but none of us could make out their features. If you’re asking for a description, I can’t help you.” She drew hard on her cigarette.

  “All I know is that they were kids,” she continued.

  “How old?”

  “I told you, I didn’t see their faces.”

  ‘1 know that, but from their build? Boys? Girls?”

  “Boys, I think. Probably about twelve or thirteen. I really don’t know.”

  “And the attack lasted for five or ten minutes?”

  Again she nodded.

  “It seemed like longer, but five or ten minutes would be about right.”

  The DS dug in his pocket and pulled out three of the twisted pieces of metal Ronni had found on the porch. He dropped them onto the desktop.

  “What are they?” she wanted to know.

  “Airgun pellets from a .22 rifle,” he told her.

  “We found seventeen of them lying outside the main doors. Five were embedded in the wood. That’s what cracked your window.” He nodded towards the four holes in the glass behind her.

  “You’re lucky that didn’t come in as well.”

  “Oh God.” Ronni sighed, tilting her head backwards.

  “Has there been any other trouble at Shelby House in the last few days?” Marsh wanted to know.

  “Like what?”

  “Weird phone calls. Vandalism. That kind of thing.”

  Tell him about the letters.

  Ronni ran a hand through her hair.

  And what about the damage done to the cars? For Christ’s sake tell him.

  She pulled open the drawer of the desk and reached inside.

  Marsh took the piece of paper from her and glanced at the words scrawled there.

  “There are thirty-seven more where that came from,” Ronni told him.

  Marsh looked through the others she handed him.

  “When did they arrive?”

  “Yesterday.”

  He glanced at the envelopes.

  “All hand delivered,” the DS mus
ed.

  Ronni nodded.

  “Do you think there could be a link with what happened tonight?” he asked.

  “You’re the policeman. You tell me.”

  Marsh read more.

  “Why would kids send letters like that?” Ronni murmured.

  “For the same reason they put bricks through your windows tonight. It’s a game to them.”

  “A game?”

  “I’ve seen it before, Mrs. Porter. Me and every copper on the force has had to deal with kids like this at some stage of their career.”

  “But they could have killed someone tonight.”

  “It wouldn’t have bothered them. You’re lucky they only used stones and an air gun It’s not unusual for us to take knives, baseball bats or even crossbows off the little bastards. Excuse my French.” He managed a wan smile.

  “So what can you do?”

  “We can run fingerprint tests on the air gun slugs and these letters. If any of the perpetrators have been printed before they’ll be in the files.”

  “And then?”

  “That’s about it, I’m afraid, Mrs. Porter. Even if we identify them, which is unlikely, chances are they’ll be under age. If they are, there’s nothing we can do.”

  “What are you talking about? You’ve seen the damage they’ve done.”

  “Yes I have, but that doesn’t make any difference. They could have burned the place to the ground with you lot inside it. If they’re under age there’s not a thing we can do.”

  Ronni looked at him incredulously.

  “Offenders over fifteen, no problem,” Marsh told her.

  “We can lock them up. But if they’re younger than that, we’re helpless. Ten per cent of all crime recorded in this country is committed by kids aged from ten to fourteen. The Met reckon that forty per cent of all street robberies and a third of all car thefts and burglaries in Greater London are done by kids in that age range. There’s nothing we can do about it. And the kids know that too.”

  “What about their parents?”

  “Some don’t know. Some don’t care. You can’t know where your kids are twenty-four hours a day, can you? On the other hand, some are as worried as we are, but they’re just as helpless to stop them.”

  Ronni stubbed out her cigarette and gazed at Marsh through the rising plume of smoke.

  “But what if you catch them?” she wanted to know.

  “There must be some kind of sentence that can be used against them.”

  Marsh shrugged. The courts put them in council care, but they usually escape and reoffend,” the policeman said.

  “There just aren’t enough secure council homes to cope with them.” He brushed some fluff from his sleeve.

  “There was a kid up in Yorkshire a few years ago who had a conviction record seventeen pages long. He was eleven. There’s another one called Spiderboy. They reckon he’d stolen two hundred cars by the time he was fifteen. One of the little bastards even dressed up as a woman and managed to nick twenty-two charity boxes before he was caught. That was after he’d stolen a car and assaulted a police officer. He was twelve.”

  Ronni shook her head slowly.

  “With most juvenile crime, it follows the same pattern,” Marsh explained.

  “They start with shoplifting and other petty stuff, then graduate to more serious crime like assault or doing robberies.”

  “And what about the kids that attacked Shelby House tonight? What might they graduate to?”

  “Your guess is as good as mine, Mrs. Porter.”

  “I’ve got nine residents and two staff under my supervision, Detective Sergeant. What the hell am I supposed to tell them? That I’m sorry, but the police can’t help them?”

  “We’ll do our best. But if I told you we were going to catch them I’d be raising your hopes.”

  “And even if you do then there’s nothing you can do to them.”

  “I know it’s no consolation, but I find that just as frustrating. Me and every other copper in the country.”

  Ronni exhaled wearily.

  A heavy silence descended, finally broken by Marsh.

  “Is there any news about your father?” he enquired.

  “There’s no change in his condition. Are you any nearer catching the people who attacked him?”

  The DS wasn’t slow to catch the edge in her tone.

  “We’re doing our best, Mrs. Porter,” he said, holding her gaze.

  “I wish we had the resources to catch every criminal.”

  The DS got to his feet and wandered across to the cracked window in the office. He pressed his forefinger gently against each of the holes made by air gun pellets.

  “This may well have been a one-off tonight,” Marsh said.

  “They’ve probably had their fun here now. They’ll move on to some other poor sod.”

  “And what if they don’t?”

  Ronni’s words hung unanswered in the air.

  “Why here? Why Shelby House?” she continued, her voice low.

  “You’re a prime target.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Old people. They can’t fight back. These kids aren’t looking for a fight, Mrs. Porter. Like I said, it’s a game to them.”

  “But there are plenty of other places around here they could ...” She allowed the sentence to trail off.

  “It’s a new game,” Marsh said flatly.

  “Pure and simple. Don’t look for any complex motive. You won’t find one. They picked you. That’s it. They’ll stop when they’re bored or when we catch them.”

  “End of story?” she said sardonically.

  “I can leave a couple of constables outside,” he told her.

  “But only for tonight.”

  “And that’s it?”

  “It’s the best I can do, Mrs. Porter. I’m sorry.”

  She got up and held open the door of the office, allowing Marsh to leave.

  “I’m sorry too,” she said flatly and closed the door behind him.

  She heard his footsteps descending the stairs.

  Ronni crossed to the window and peered out into the night.

  When she ran a hand through her hair, she found she was shaking.

  THE WOOD WAS nearly two inches thick. Ronni touched it gently with her fingertips, satisfied that nothing could penetrate.

  Every broken window had been covered with it until the glaziers could return the following morning to replace the shattered glass.

  Debris had been cleared from the corridors and rooms inside Shelby House.

  The emergency services had long since left.

  Those residents whose rooms had been damaged during the attack had been temporarily moved to other quarters within the building.

  Everyone not that they needed reminding had been told to keep their curtains closed.

  Ronni walked the downstairs corridors slowly, checking doors, occasionally peering into rooms when she saw lights shining beneath.

  Jack Fuller was sitting in the chair beside his bed with a book cradled in his lap. He had a piece of gauze over his eye, held in place by two adhesive strips.

  “How are you feeling, Jack?” Ronni asked.

  “I’m OK,” he told her, smiling.

  “I’ve seen worse.”

  She nodded and closed the door as she moved back into the corridor.

  George Errington, with the aid of two Mogadon, was sleeping soundly.

  Barbara Eustace had also found the blissful oblivion of sleep. Molly lay curled in her basket close by her owner’s bed. When Ronni glanced into the room, the little dog raised its head as if to inspect the intruder.

  Colin Glazer was lying in bed with a pair of headphones on. He raised a hand in Ronni’s direction when he saw her.

  She continued her vigil, pausing for a moment beside one of the broken windows on the other side of the corridor.

  Helen Kennedy and Donald Tanner both slept too.

  Ronni made her way up the stairs, past another bo
arded window on the main landing.

  There was a light burning in Eva Cole’s room.

  Ronni tapped gently on the door and walked in.

  Eva was sitting on the edge of the bed crying softly.

  She dabbed at her eyes with a handkerchief when she saw Ronni, as if ashamed of her tears.

  Ronni crossed to her and slid a comforting arm around her shoulders.

  “It’s all right, Eva,” she said, wishing she could sound a little more convincing.

  “Why would anyone do that?” the older woman whimpered.

  “What have any of us ever done to deserve that kind of treatment?”

  Ronni held her tightly.

  “I heard some of the others talking,” Eva said.

  “Mr. Fuller said it was children.”

  “No one knows for sure, Eva.”

  “I’ve been here ever since my husband died. I’ve always been happy here. I don’t want that to change.”

  “It won’t, I promise.” She wiped a tear from the older woman’s cheek.

  “Do you want something to help you sleep?”

  Eva shook her head.

  “You lay down now,” Ronni whispered. Try to sleep.”

  Eva gripped her hand tightly for a second as she prepared to move away.

  “You won’t leave us, will you?” she wanted to know.

  “Of course not,” Ronni told her.

  “Goodnight, Eva.”

  She pulled the door shut behind her.

  “Another one who can’t sleep?”

  The voice startled her and she turned to see Harry Holland emerging from the room he shared with his wife.

  “How’s Janice now?” Ronni enquired.

  “She’s sleeping. The paramedics said she’d be fine. I was worried about the shock, what with her heart...” He allowed the sentence to trail off.

  “Can’t you sleep either, Harry?”

  “I’ll settle down when Janice is asleep. I’ll sit with her until she drops off. I was just going downstairs to get one of the papers from the day room.”

  Ronni nodded.

  “If you need anything during the night, you call,” she told him.

  Holland smiled and made his way downstairs.

  Ronni pushed open the door of the room she shared with Alison Dean and leant against it for a moment.

  “Oh, Christ.” She sighed.

  “What a night.”

  Alison was sitting on the bed wearing just a T-shirt and leggings. The cuts on her arm and face had been dressed.

  “What did the police say?” Alison asked.