A Body in the Lakes

by Graham Smith

  Until he’d sauntered off and hadn’t returned.

  Willow took the whistle from her mouth and tried shouting Spike’s name along with a few of the usual entreaties she used to attract him.

  Still he didn’t come, so she tried again. Even as she was shouting his name she was trying to keep her irritation at him from showing in her voice. If he was lost he’d be worried, and she didn’t want him thinking he’d be in trouble.

  When she stopped yelling for him she fell silent and strained her ears. She was listening for splashing as he padded in the river, or rustling as he bounded back to her through the tall grass.

  A bark would have been music to her ears, but she knew Spike only barked when he heard a doorbell or a knock at the door.

  Most of all, she was listening for a whimper, a sign that her beloved dog was hurt.

  She heard nothing.

  Willow forced her way through a clump of nettles that bordered the river and gritted her teeth against the expected pain. She looked left and right as her eyes sought out Spike’s white coat in the fading light.

  Not finding him up or downstream she turned her eyes to the far bank and scanned as far as she could see. Twice her eyes picked out white shapes, but when she focussed on them she identified them as clumps of wool snagged from a sheep’s back.

  The sky had turned a dark purple as the sun sank below the horizon and shadows cast by the trees and bushes lined both banks. Willow couldn’t help but feel that this place she had known all her life had taken on a spooky, malevolent presence. Instead of warm and fuzzy memories, all she was getting was menace and the stuff of nightmares.

  By the time the last of the light was fading, and Willow was on the point of tears, Spike came bumbling along with a live rabbit in his mouth.

  He dropped the rabbit at her feet and looked up at her with that irresistible doggy grin of his that always melted her heart.

  Willow reached down and slipped her fingers round Spike’s collar lest he pursue the escaping rabbit.

  With his lead clipped in place she chatted away to him, asking where he’d been and why he hadn’t answered her call.

  She didn’t expect an answer from him, it was just her way of dealing with the fear she’d had that some ill had befallen Spike.

  As she set off for home, she was unaware of the man who’d been watching her, or that he planned to bring a sedative for the dog the next time he followed her along this secluded path.

  Most of all, she knew nothing of the fate he had planned for her.

  Seventeen

  The spreadsheet in front of Beth was growing at an exponential rate. Columns were filling and extra rows were being added as she fed the key points from the various reports into their respective places.

  As always she’d run her daily circuit around Penrith before coming into work, had a quick shower and by 7 a.m. she’d got to her desk. Her damp hair may have left a dark patch on the back of her jacket, but if today’s weather was anything like yesterday’s it would be damp patches under her arms that would be the bigger problem.

  The office assigned to FMIT possessed only one window and no air-conditioning. The window faced south, which meant that the sun heated the room from ten in the morning until the middle of the evening. A couple of desk fans moved warm air around without actually changing the temperature.

  O’Dowd had been on to Maintenance a dozen times about getting them a portable air-con unit, but none had yet materialised. Carleton Hall being an old building with thick walls helped to keep a steady temperature, but with four computers pushing out heat, the room didn’t take long to get stuffy. Even in the winter months, the window was kept open a crack to ensure there was some fresh air in the room.

  O’Dowd rapped her pen against a cup to get everyone’s attention. ‘Right my little band of intrepid investigators. Here’re your tasks for today. Frank, I want you to personally speak to the officers who investigated each of the three murders; I want their every thought, especially the ones they didn’t put into the reports. Go see them face to face. If their superiors block you or tell you they’re busy, refer them back to the chief super. Ambush them in their gardens if you have to, but speak to them.’

  That O’Dowd had given this task to Frank Thompson made sense to Beth; as a long serving copper he’d be treated with a certain amount of respect, as would his rank of DS. He was senior enough to suggest they were taking the investigators’ testimonies seriously, yet not so senior as to make them fearful of saying the wrong thing.

  ‘Paul, I want you to collate all the information you can get about the snatch sites. I’m talking about ANPR records, CCTV footage that was examined, witnesses who were spoken to and any other avenues that were explored and can be cross-referenced.’

  The task that Unthank had been given was an onerous one. His would be a day of drudgery trapped in an office that had ambitions of becoming an oven.

  As O’Dowd turned her gaze upon her, Beth gave her fingers a mental crossing that the tasks given to her would at least get her out of the office.

  ‘Due to your conduct yesterday, DC Young, and a development that you’re not yet aware of, I have a special task for you.’ O’Dowd’s smile was viperous in every way.

  ‘Ma’am?’ Beth could hear the dread in her voice, and she saw O’Dowd’s smile widen.

  ‘Two things: first off, I’ve heard back from the CSI team. The invitation and credit card were devoid of any prints. Not even a partial was recovered, which suggests they were wiped down before being left. Second, I’ve had an email from Digital Forensics. They found over a thousand images of child abuse on Forster’s computer.’

  Beth’s pulse throbbed and she could feel horror coursing through her entire body. This new evidence would allow her to nail Forster good and proper.

  ‘What the?… I thought he was Mister Squeaky Clean. We going to arrest him again?’

  ‘Wrong.’ O’Dowd’s smile never faltered. ‘Forensics cross-referenced all the times the images were downloaded against the mayor’s diary. Literally all of them were downloaded when he was away from home. And none of them have ever been opened.’

  ‘So he hasn’t had chance to look at them since he downloaded them. They’re still on his computer. Unless he wasn’t the person who downloaded them.’

  ‘You’re underestimating Forensics. In case what you’re saying is true, they dug a little deeper. Well, much deeper if I’m honest. They found that someone had hacked into the computer and placed the images in the records.’ O’Dowd raised a hand in a halt gesture. ‘And before you ask, no they haven’t been able to trace the person who put it there, and yes, they’re trying everything they can think of, but so far, they’ve drawn a blank.’ The raised hand flapped in a dismissive gesture. ‘I didn’t understand half of what they told me, but apparently the trail leads to servers in the Cayman Islands, Beirut, Iceland and about a dozen other countries. They also mentioned dynamic IPs, whatever the hell they are, and suggested it was done via Tor and the Dark Web.’

  Beth knew what a dynamic IP was and about the Tor Browser. Computers all have an Internet Protocol, or IP, address. These can be static, which means the number is fixed at all times, or they can be dynamic, which means the number changes every time you go online. The Tor Browser cloaks its users’s searches, so it was the default browser people used to search the Dark Web, which is where the Internet is at its worst. Things like terrorism cells, hitmen for hire, and all the worst kinds of pornography can be found there among a multitude of other illegal and immoral things.

  Beth couldn’t help but pull a face. ‘If the person who put that porn on the mayor’s computer used Tor to cloak his movements, it’ll be incredibly hard to trace them.’

  O’Dowd pulled much the same distasteful grimace as Beth. ‘That’s pretty much the impression I got from Forensics.’

  ‘So what is it you want me to do, ma’am?’

  ‘Go see the mayor, find out the names of everyone he figures may hold a grudge a
gainst him. Then speak to his mayoral staff and one or two of his opponents, see who they point the finger at. Be discreet with them and hint that some unfounded and scurrilous allegations have been made without telling them the full truth.’ O’Dowd raised a hand again to forestall any objection Beth wanted to make. ‘It’s come down from on high that we’re to look into who put those images on the mayor’s computer, so whatever you’ve got to say about the subject is going to be a waste of breath.’

  ‘Ma’am.’ Beth could hear the resignation in her tone but she didn’t care. O’Dowd had given her this task as a punishment and if she didn’t complain a little then the DI may find a further way to make her life miserable.

  ‘When you’ve done that, I want you to go and see Dr Hewson to get his take on the post-mortems of the first three victims. He only performed one but I want his opinions on the other two as well.’

  Beth grabbed the post-mortem files and tucked them under her arm. She might have got the stick from O’Dowd with regards to having to go and play nice with the mayor, but she’d also been given the carrot of speaking to the twinkle-eyed pathologist.

  Dr Hewson was a ball of contradictions and his mind was sharper than any scalpel he’d ever lifted. She enjoyed the verbal jousts he initiated and she’d never left his company without learning something.

  Beth had a suspicion that she needed to share. ‘I’ve been thinking, and you’re not going to like what I’ve come up with.’

  ‘I don’t like the sound of this.’ O’Dowd ran a hand though her unruly hair. ‘Is this your sideways-thinking brain again?’

  ‘If you want to call it that you can. I’ve been thinking about the timeline and how someone is obviously framing the mayor. That letter that came, it was sent before Felicia Evans was killed, then when she’s found there’s evidence left at the deposition site that points the finger of suspicion at the mayor. We know the letter sat on the chief constable’s desk for ten days before being opened. We also know that Felicia Evans was raped with a sex toy or some such thing rather than actually being penetrated by a man. What if, and this is something of a stretch, the person who sent the letter was the same person who planted the images on the mayor’s computer? Did Digital Forensics say when the images were planted?’

  ‘A fortnight past yesterday.’

  Beth twiddled a pen between her fingers as she connected the timings. ‘That’s the day before the letter was posted. Now that we’ve established that timeline, let’s move forward a few days. The mayor’s accuser is waiting, watching the news and reading the papers. Because the letter hasn’t been opened, nothing happens. The mayor isn’t arrested. He doesn’t get done for the images on his computer. So he escalates. Somehow he steals the mayor’s credit card. This would be a minor inconvenience until it turns up near Felicia Evans’s body.’

  ‘Jesus, Beth. Are you about to suggest that Felicia Evans was killed just to frame the mayor?’

  ‘I am. Think about it. She wasn’t raped the same way as the other victims, and while someone in the police should have connected the three previous murders, there’s nothing to stop a member of the public hearing about the murders and rapes and using them as background to implicate the mayor. I’m also thinking about the choice of victim. Felicia Evans was dying of cancer. Perhaps the person who killed her and used her deposition site as a place to frame the mayor, chose her because they knew she was dying.’

  ‘What? You mean he was trying to lessen the impact of what he’d done?’

  ‘I think so, ma’am. I think that he may have convinced himself that he was euthanising her rather than killing her. I spoke to her doctor; she only had a few weeks left. In terms of what he did, she was the perfect victim.’

  ‘Dammit, Beth. Why does that brain of yours keep coming up with ideas like this? Why can’t you dream up a scenario where kittens and Easter bunnies look cute?’ O’Dowd used one hand to scrub hair from her eyes. ‘I think you’re wrong about that and Felicia was murdered to satisfy his killing lust, and the framing of the mayor is a sideline. Four women killed and sexually violated can’t be a coincidence, so it stands to reason that is the killer’s prime objective. However, as Felicia is the most recent victim, she’s our best lead. Before you see the mayor and Dr Hewson, I want you to find out everything you can about Felicia Evans. Who her friends and family were. Who knew she was ill and anything else you can think of.’

  ‘Yes, ma’am.’ Beth got out of her seat and made for the door.

  As she opened the door of the office she was met with a man wearing the smartest inspector’s uniform she’d ever seen.

  She knew who he was by reputation before he even spoke. Martin ‘Mannequin’ Moore was the face of the Professional Standards Department and the scourge of many a good copper.

  Beth had no issue with the man rooting out bent cops and making sure that rules were only bent not broken, but Mannequin was as fastidious with his job as he was with his uniform. No speck of fluff was allowed to tarnish his appearance in the same way that no minor transgression of the rules was permitted.

  ‘DI O’Dowd and… DC Young, is it? I’m glad you’re both here.’

  Eighteen

  Moore shooed Beth back into the FMIT by holding his hand palm downwards and flapping his fingers towards her. It was a gesture that spoke of domineering command and told her that he knew how his reputation preceded him and wasn’t afraid to play on it.

  That one unspoken gesture was enough for Beth to decide she didn’t like the man for his personality let alone his fastidiousness. When you added in his parade-ground posture and the condescending manner, it was small wonder that he was hated by almost every officer in the county.

  Mannequin shut the office door in a way that caused the latch to give a deliberate click. With the door shut, he positioned himself in front of it and held his body in a rigid stance. The aftershave that he wore was a traditional one which Beth couldn’t identify. Her best guess was that it was something like Old Spice or Brut. The aroma fitted him and his personality every bit as well as his uniform.

  ‘DI O’Dowd, DC Unthank and DC Young I can see. However, there are four members of the Force Major Investigation Team. Where, pray tell, is DS Thompson?’

  That he knew their names wasn’t a surprise to Beth. A PSD inspector would be sure to do their homework before entering any situation.

  ‘He’s gone to get me a low-fat mochaccino with extra cream and six sugars. Either that, or he’s out doing his job and investigating the murder and rape of four women. Which incidentally, is what the rest of us would be doing if you hadn’t arrived to hold us back.’

  Beth wanted to applaud O’Dowd for the way she got under Mannequin’s skin. There wasn’t a part of her target’s body that wasn’t quivering with suppressed anger. O’Dowd had scored her points, but until they learned why the PSD inspector was here, it might have been wiser to play along rather than antagonise the man.

  ‘I see you have not changed since our last little meeting, Inspector. Still the same confrontational nature. You may not believe it, but I am not here to persecute you, nor do I take any delight in reprimanding any of my colleagues. I am merely the upholder of the high standards that her Majesty expects of those paid to keep the streets of her mighty kingdom safe.’

  ‘Spare us the holier-than-thou rhetoric and say what you have to say and then beggar off so me and my team can get on with our jobs.’ There wasn’t a sneer on O’Dowd’s face, but Beth couldn’t miss the one in her voice. ‘If you’re here to bollock us, do it and be on your way. If, as you say, you have another purpose for being here, state it and be on your way. When I said we have four rape and murder cases to investigate I wasn’t kidding.’

  ‘It is those very crimes that I am here to discuss with you.’

  Beth felt her pulse throb that little bit harder. Did Mannequin have a vested interest in the cases?

  O’Dowd twirled a pen around her fingers. ‘I’m curious as to why a PSD inspector wants to discuss an ongoin
g case when the investigating team haven’t had any time for impropriety. Unless that is, a complaint has already been made against us.’

  ‘There have not been any complaints, Inspector. It does interest me, though, that you suggested that one may have been made. That tells me you are sailing as close to the wind as you usually do. On that point, I think it is only fair to warn you that I will be paying very close attention to this case. I shall be reviewing the tapes from the interview room, reading all statements. To all intents and purposes, I will be a silent partner to your team. However, that is not why I came to see you on this occasion. You mentioned a moment ago that you have only had this case a short time. That is correct. Your team, however, is not the first to investigate three of the rapes and murders. Three other teams worked on them. They failed to get a result. Neither the second or third teams, nor their superiors, managed to identify that Cumbria has what appears to be a serial rapist and murderer at large. That speaks to me of failings. Whether it is the system that has failed or individual officers is something I have to identify. The three unsolved murders which your team has been tasked with investigating are as good as cold cases. Should you solve them, it will be because your team is better than the others. You have the highest-rated team in the county, and I think that if anyone can catch this killer, it is FMIT. However, you must see that if you do solve the murders as cold cases, the original investigating teams are sure to have their deficiencies highlighted.’

  Beth wanted to rage at Mannequin, to tell him what an odious creep he was. Explain to him how his proper enunciation and clothes-horse appearance was nothing more than someone applying polish to a steaming pile of excrement. Not only had he warned them they’d be under his direct scrutiny for the duration of this case, he’d as good as intimated that he’d use any success they had as a stick to beat other officers with. That wasn’t just wrong, it was demoralising and little more than bullying. There was no justice to be had in what the PSD man was saying, just persecution.