The Big Chill: A Sam Smith Mystery (The Sam Smith Mystery Series Book 3)

by Hannah Howe

  Chapter Fifteen

  We walked through a light flurry of snow, towards the building site and a line of abandoned garages. The garages were in various states of disrepair and only one had a complete roof. Outside that garage a brazier burned, sending bright orange sparks into the air. From our position beside the brazier, I peered into the garage and noted that someone had furnished it with a cast-off settee, table, wardrobe and, incongruously, a table lamp.

  I glanced at Mac and we took a step towards the garage only to halt when the man with coal-black eyes appeared. I recalled my description of him...a handsome man, with the face of a male model, yet a face lined with suspicion and apprehension, a face covered in blotches hinting at malnourishment.

  “Hello,” I smiled, and the man produced a large carving knife from behind his back.

  “Do I know you?” he asked warily.

  “We met briefly, recently,” I explained. “I was looking for a dog, a beagle.” Again, I offered a reassuring smile. “I’m Sam.”

  He nodded, lowering the knife. “I’m Jesus.”

  “Jesus?” I frowned.

  “Yes, Jesus; your Lord and Saviour.”

  I glanced at Mac and noted that he was looking on in disbelief. Of the vagrant, I asked, “What are you doing here, er, Jesus?”

  He smiled, revealing white, even teeth. “I’ve come to save your soul.”

  “Where have you come from?”

  “Galilee. I am preparing for the Great Event.”

  “What Great Event?”

  “My Second Coming, the day when I reveal myself to Mankind. There’s been too much greed and evil; it’s time for the meek to inherit the Earth.”

  While we talked, Mac circled us, wandering towards the garage. In the garage, I noticed a line of beautiful landscape paintings, propped against a wall. A selection of books sat on the table alongside a woodcarving, a delightfully sculptured ark. The paint under Jesus’ fingernails suggested that he was the artist, and wood chippings, carpeting the floor, revealed that he was also the sculptor.

  With snowflakes matting his long, wavy, jet-black hair, Jesus continued to stare at me through vacant eyes.

  “I’m a private detective,” I explained. “I’m here because I’m looking for a clue.”

  “What’s a private detective?” Jesus frowned, the carving knife twirling in his right hand.

  “I try to help people, when they come to me with a problem.”

  Suddenly, he smiled. Slipping the knife into a scabbard, which hung from his belt, he swooped down to the ground then offered up his empty hand. “You help people...place this flower in your beautiful hair and you too will inherit the Earth.” His long fingers caressed my hair as he placed the imaginary flower behind my ear.

  “I have an office in Marquess Terrace,” I explained. “Maybe you know it.”

  Jesus shook his head, waving his long hair from side to side. “Can’t say I do.”

  “Someone shot me, in my office.”

  Again, his features brightened, yet his smile never touched his eyes. “But he didn’t kill you. By a miracle, you were saved. You do good work, that’s why you were saved.”

  “Have you ever been to Marquess Terrace?” I asked.

  “I am the Lord’s eyes...” He danced around the brazier with his arms out wide, his ballet completing a circle. “...I have been everywhere.”

  “When we met previously, you were displeased with me; why was that?”

  He frowned while tilting his head to one side. “Was I?”

  “Yes, you were.”

  “Sam...”

  I glanced towards the garage where I saw Mac inside. While I’d talked with Jesus, Mac had searched the garage and now he emerged with a silver handgun, a .38, the same calibre that nearly claimed my life.

  I turned to Jesus and asked, “Is that your gun?”

  “I found it,” he replied defensively. “On the street.”

  “Why did you keep it?”

  “The evil ones.” He glanced over my shoulder to a knot of teenagers who were walking across the wasteland, beer cans raised to their lips. They stared at Jesus and jeered, offering him a series of obscene salutes. “They torment me,” he added. “So I prayed to the Lord to offer a solution and, lo, the following day I found the gun.” He smiled, a smile that reminded me of Rosie’s innocence. “The Lord moves in mysterious ways.”

  “Maybe you should explain the Lord’s mysterious ways to the police,” Mac suggested, again placing a hyphen between the ‘l’ and the ‘i’.

  Reluctantly, I had to agree.

  Chapter Sixteen

  It was New Year’s Eve. Despite the snow causing travel chaos, Alan and Alis had arrived home safely from France and now we were at Alan’s St Fagans home, in the cellar, to be exact.

  “Mind the step,” Alan cautioned as I climbed down the stairs into the cellar. He took hold of my left hand and guided me towards a wine rack. Then he illuminated the cellar by flicking a wall switch. “In the seventeenth century this building was used as a magistrate’s court. It was known locally as Hangman’s Cottage. The previous owners insist that condemned prisoners haunt this cellar. You can still see the gaolers’ shackles on the wall over there.”

  I glanced over my left shoulder to the iron rings, fixed to the west wall. I also noticed an old exercise bike and a rowing machine, relics from Alan’s sporting days.

  “Ah, here we are.” Alan selected a bottle of wine from the wine rack. He blew the dust off its label.

  “Bulgarian?” I asked while peering at the label.

  “That’s right. I have a friend, a psychologist, Dr Pavlina Dimitrova. Pavlina owns a vineyard near Plovdiv. Along with original thoughts on the subject of psychology, she supplies me with wine whenever we meet up.” Alan held the bottle of wine up to the cellar light and nodded his approval. “Excellent quality, smooth taste; just right for seeing in the New Year.”

  We clambered out of the cellar then joined Alis in the living room. She was talking, somewhat animatedly, on her phone with a friend. She smiled and waved to acknowledge my presence then returned to her conversation, laughing merrily at a comment made by her friend.

  Alan offered me a glass of wine and I sipped it while sitting beside the fire. He was right – the wine had a smooth, mellow taste and it danced playfully on my tongue. I smiled and asked, “How are your parents?”

  “Fine.” Alan joined me on the settee, beside the fire. He swirled his wine around in its glass, then added, “Mum’s hip is playing her up a bit, but Dad is still necking back the wine.” Alan tilted his head back and sipped the nectar – like father, like son. “I’ve told them about you,” he continued. “They’d love to meet you. Next time when we go over, maybe you can come with us.”

  I nodded. “I’d love to.”

  Alis closed her phone and joined us, sitting on the rug beside the fire. Meanwhile, Alan took another sip of wine and asked, “What have you been up to while we’ve been away?”

  I explained about my conversation with Nigel Kirkpatrick and my meeting with Jesus. “The man genuinely believes he is Jesus. But what’s he doing with a gun?”

  Alan thought for a moment while gazing at the flames in the gas-fuelled fire. Then, after another sip of wine, he shared his thoughts with us. “People with grandiose delusions believe that they have a special power or knowledge or that they are deities or celebrities. For these people their ideas or beliefs are not based on reality, but they are unshakeable, regardless of logic or contradictory proof. While not common, only about fifteen per cent of patients have them, they can experience visual hallucinations – vivid scenes, involving religious figures, family members or animals. However, these people are usually non-violent. Indeed, some of my colleagues argue that because sufferers tend to withdraw from society, these people are less likely to be violent than the average person. That said, if the person is suffering from a delusion and that delusion is controlling them, then violent action may result.”

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sp; I nodded then asked, “So you think Jesus is a person with a troubled mind. Unstable. Unstable enough to shoot me for no reason?”

  Alan shrugged. He pursed his lips while gazing into the depths of his wine glass. “I haven’t met the man, far less talked with him, so I couldn’t say. But it is possible that he took a dislike to you for some reason and that dislike compelled him to take violent action.”

  “Where did he get the gun?” Alis asked, her head tilted to one side, an inquisitive frown troubling her pretty face.

  “Jesus says he found it on the street,” I explained.

  “So,” Alis reasoned, “if the gun was the one used on you, someone could have discarded it and Jesus could have picked it up.”

  “Alternatively,” Alan added, “if Jesus is lying and he’s the owner of the gun, it could be a relic from an earlier, violent, phase of his life.” Noting my thoughtful look, Alan offered a non-committal shrug. “The police will question him. They will forensically examine the gun. If he is responsible, they will establish that fact.”

  “Hmm,” I murmured, my lips kissing the rim of my wine glass.

  “You think he’s innocent,” Alan surmised.

  “He’s Jesus,” I explained, “at least in his own mind. I don’t see how someone who believes himself to be Jesus could then aim to murder another person.”

  Alan nodded, acknowledging my logic. However, he added, “In 1994 in America a man who claimed to be the Son of God murdered a serial killer while both were in prison. Also, ‘your’ Jesus said that he was the messiah, but maybe he has someone else lurking in his mind.”

  “An evil persona?” I asked. “To balance out the good with the bad?”

  “It is not unknown. Indeed, if he is suffering from DID – Dissociative Identity Disorder – he could have more than one personality. But bear in mind, this is all speculation; the man might be as sane as Alis, though my educated guess is he is suffering from a form of delusion.”

  I slumped back, resting my head on the settee, my mind in a whirl. Had Jesus pulled the trigger? Had a little voice inside his head said, ‘shoot Sam?’ In one sense, if guilty, it would solve all problems. However, the man was artistic, if troubled, and I wanted to believe that he was innocent.

  Alan glanced at me. He placed a hand on my thigh and gave it a gentle rub. “You’re looking tired, Sam.”

  “I haven’t been overdoing it.” I sat up, trying to look bright and perky. “I’ve been pacing myself, ask Mac.”

  Alan nodded, accepting my explanation. “Do you want to stay up to see in the New Year?” he asked.

  I thought for a moment, then conceded defeat. I was tired and, truth to tell, I didn’t feel all that well. “If you don’t mind, I think I’ll go to bed.”

  Alan kissed my cheek. “I’ll join you later.”

  I nodded and he accepted my half-full wine glass.

  “Night, Sam,” Alis called out from her position on the rug beside the fire. “Happy New Year!”

  “Happy New Year!” I echoed, then retired to the bedroom.

  The nightly ritual of undressing was still a difficult one. And, I have to confess, I could barely be bothered tonight. However, I struggled out of my clothes while thinking about Jesus, about his guilt or innocence then, religiously – no pun intended! – I took my medication, along with a sip of Dr Barr’s tonic.

  Undressed, I snuggled under the duvet and placed my head on the pillow. I dozed, only for fireworks to wake me at midnight. Sometime later Alan nuzzled in beside me and despite frequent interruptions to visit the bathroom I slept until dawn.

  Chapter Seventeen

  I had a restful New Year’s Day, which I needed because I didn’t feel too well. I reflected, maybe I had been overdoing it; maybe it was time to ease back and allow the healing process to take effect.

  The following day Mac arrived and chauffeured me to my office. The new floor looked clean and fresh while Rosie’s flowers, though wilting, offered a fragrant touch. I resolved to make flowers a regular feature of my office then, because my mind is like that, considered that I’d get a string of hay fever sufferers as clients who would sniff the flowers, turn around and walk out.

  As we sat in my office, I asked Mac, “What did you do for New Year?”

  “A bit of this, a bit of that,” he replied vaguely.

  “Made any New Year’s resolutions?”

  “To ease back on the chocolate.”

  I glanced at his leather coat, which he’d placed on my coat rack, and a bulge in the right-hand pocket, a bulge that resembled a large bar of fruit and nut. “Not succeeding then, I take it.”

  “Early days,” he shrugged. “The year is young.”

  I smiled, then frowned when I thought of his lover. Mac’s lover wanted him home for New Year, but while the gunman was still at large, Mac had vowed to stay on.

  “How are things with your boyfriend?” I asked tentatively.

  Mac puffed out his cheeks, accentuating his large, ginger moustache. “Let’s just say, relations are strained.”

  “My fault,” I murmured.

  “Nah.” He shook his head in decisive fashion. “The fault lines were there long before you entered the frame.”

  No doubt Mac was telling the truth. Even so, a wave of guilt washed over me.

  I was still swimming through that guilt when the office phone rang; it was Detective Inspector Carolyn Tyler and she wanted a word.

  We made our way through the city in Mac’s stylish Bugatti attracting admiring glances from the passers-by. Mac parked the car, but declined to accompany me into the police station, which came as no surprise; something told me that Mac and the local constabulary were not the best of friends.

  Inside her goldfish bowl of an office, I met with Carolyn Tyler. Smartly dressed in a charcoal trouser suit with a light grey pinstripe, Tyler looked fresh and rested after her Christmas break. As usual, she’d pulled her hair back from her face and held it in place with a tortoiseshell clip at the nape of her neck. I have no wish to be unkind, but the roll of fat that lolled over Tyler’s waistband suggested that during the festive season she had feasted well.

  “Thank you for responding so quickly, Ms Smith,” Tyler smiled through thin lips, “but I thought it only fair to bring you up to date. We’ve given the handgun, found in the disused garage, a good forensic examination. The man who calls himself Jesus, his prints are on the gun.”

  “They would be,” I replied, “he admits that he handled the gun.”

  “Furthermore,” Tyler continued, ignoring my comment, “the bullet removed from your shoulder was fired from that gun.”

  “So,” I surmised, “Jesus looks favourite.”

  Carolyn Tyler nodded. “From where I stand, yes.”

  She placed her elbows on the desk, then made a bridge with her fingers, drawing her hands towards her chin. Tyler’s desk was a mess, littered with files and papers, which came as a mild surprise; I had her down as a neat and orderly person, someone who would thrive on routine. Another surprise – I saw pictures of her children, but none of her husband, though local gossip suggested that she went out of her way to praise him. We rubbed each other up the wrong way, there was no denying that, but I sensed that there was more to Carolyn Tyler than met the eye.

  Returning to the matter in hand, I asked, “Do you know who he really is, the man who calls himself Jesus?”

  “We are still trying to determine his true identity.”

  “Why did he shoot me?”

  Tyler placed her chin on the bridge made by her fingers. She gazed at me through stern blue eyes. “Maybe he took a dislike to you; it’s not unknown.” The terse smile that played around her lips suggested that she fully understood Jesus’ motives. Indeed, I sensed that if she’d been to hand she would have assisted with his aim. “If the man is emotionally disturbed,” she continued, “maybe a little voice told him to do it.”

  “So the case is closed?”

  Tyler averted her gaze. She stared briefly at t
he wall, at a map highlighting local trouble spots. While still avoiding eye contact, she said, “Let’s just say we are not looking for anyone else in connection with the shooting.”

  I thanked Carolyn Tyler, then I left her office. More than ever, I was convinced that I had to do my own digging if the truth was to prevail.

  Outside in the cold I found Mac waiting for me, leaning nonchalantly against his Bugatti. However, before I could approach him I spied Sweets and his partner, Detective Sergeant Hopkins. Hopkins was a handsome man, around my age. He gave me an appreciative smile, then disappeared into the building. Sweets, meanwhile, thrust his hands into his raincoat pockets and wandered over to me.

  “What are you doing with him, Sam?” Sweets growled, thrusting his chin towards Mac.

  “He’s protecting me,” I explained.

  “He’s a thug.”

  I shrugged my good shoulder. “You’d rather I didn’t have protection?”

  Sweets removed his right hand from his coat pocket. He shivered, then adjusted the collar on his raincoat, turning it up. “I’d rather you got out of this game.”

  “Maybe I will,” I sighed, “when this is sorted.”

  “It is sorted, according to Tyler.”

  I paused while two detectives and a uniformed policewoman strolled from police headquarters. With their shoulders hunched against the snow, they walked towards the Law Courts. One of the detectives slipped on a patch of ice and his colleagues laughed. Slapstick. I bet even our caveman ancestors burst into hysterics at the sight of a pratfall.

  I smiled briefly, then turned to face Sweets. “I don’t believe Tyler. Even if the man is disturbed, I don’t think he’s the violent type. The man who shot me is out there somewhere.”

  Sweets grunted, a non-committal sound. Then he asked, “Why are you thinking of quitting, Sam? Because of the shooting?”

  “Because of this.” Removing my left hand from my trench coat pocket, I flashed my diamond ring at Sweets. “A present, from Alan. He loves me. He lost his wife to an accident. If something happened to me...”