by Sarah Flint
The best image that could be gleaned from the grainy recording at Sunny Meadows Care Home had been posted on a briefing slide on the job intranet for the benefit of the night-duty teams coming on shift. It wasn’t great, and they would have to wait for the laboratory to see if it could be further enhanced, but at least it was something.
A description of the male volunteer from Applewood House nursing home had been given on a separate slide. In the next few days, they would have an artist’s impression to add to the briefing, but for now, just as with the grainy photo, it was better than nothing. Another page contained what sketchy details and descriptions they’d been given by the victims, along with a photo of a Nike Downshifter 7 trainer and images drawn from the internet on possible grinning skeleton masks.
Initially she’d been hopeful of finding a legible signature in the visitor’s book and a trawl of all the dates surrounding the Christmas Party did indeed yield a similar entry – but that signature was as illegible as the first. It gave them no better idea of the man’s name – if indeed he’d even signed the correct one. It was exasperating.
Equally frustrating was the knowledge that neither the Sunny Meadows nor Applewood House suspect was actually guaranteed to be connected to the case, if indeed they weren’t one and the same.
All in all, Charlie knew that the briefing was vague, lacking in specifics and grasped at anything that might provide a lead, however tenuous. Hopefully though it would prove memorable, just the image of the shadowy figure at the window of the care home serving to focus officers’ minds on the growing series of burglaries that looked now to have culminated in murder.
Tomorrow morning, that fact would almost certainly be confirmed, with Florence Briarly’s post-mortem pencilled in for 8 a.m.
A half-empty can of Pepsi stood on the pavement to the side of the exit and as Charlie stepped out from the revolving doors of Lambeth HQ, she clipped it with her foot, sending a stream of frothy liquid gushing over the top of her trainers and on to the paving slabs. The pool spread out, slipping easily over the top step at the entrance and cascading down on to the one below, a dark stain on the otherwise clean flight of steps. She stopped, mesmerised, waiting to see if the blight would move on, watching as it spilled over the next step, spreading still further.
As she stared, it trickled to a halt and a sudden wave of dissatisfaction and unhappiness rolled through her, catching her off guard. She didn’t know what had caused it, but it seemed inextricably linked to the dark stain. She couldn’t tear her eyes away from it. It drew her in, enveloped her, smothered her. It held her in the moment, stopping her from moving on, sapping her of energy.
A street light flickered by the railway bridge, a little way from where she stood. As quick as a flash, the feeling evaporated. She looked across at the lamp, the rays of light buffeted and obscured by the boughs of a tree. It was the street light that Ben, her partner, usually waited by. Tonight he wasn’t there. For a few weeks, he hadn’t been there. The space beneath it was empty. Suddenly the meaning became clear. His light had been partially snuffed out, and now instead there was a dark stain, seeping through his life, trickling into hers, holding her in its clutches. The post-traumatic stress disorder that had so blighted his life was taking its toll on her too. Her mind flew back to their happiness just a few months before, at Christmas and the New Year.
2018 was to have been the year that promised so much, starting as it had with their first furtive steps into a new relationship. 2018 was to have been the year that swept away his fears and provided him with the first building blocks to a full recovery. It was, however, also the year to remember those who had been killed in the service of their country: the 100-year anniversary of Armistice Day, marking the end of the First World War. It was meant to have been the war to end all wars, but it hadn’t stopped the wars. The Second World War had come swiftly on its tail, followed by the Falklands, the Balkans, Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria and so many other conflicts. What she didn’t know and could never have foreseen was that, for Ben, it would become an obsession. His interest had been provoked initially by the odd documentary, but then the proliferation of war films, news reports and live recordings from war-torn states took control. All manner of atrocities were there to be viewed and he would sit hour upon hour staring at them, his eyes glued to the screen, his hands clapped firmly over his ears. She’d tried to stop him watching, but the black tide of depression had swept him from his feet and was now threatening to take everyone and everything with it. She didn’t know what to do.
The Pepsi can was lying empty now. Furiously, she lashed out at it, kicking it hard down the steps and along the pavement. Time and time again, she ran at it, launching it high into the air, taking out her frustrations: her lack of progression at work, the stupid immature management, the raft of red tape stopping her doing her job, her home life – or lack of it – always having to be the big sister, the sensible one, the one who made things right. Well, she would never be able to make Ben right and she hadn’t been able to make her childhood right either. Her brother, Jamie, had still died. Her mother, Meg, was still silently grieving. She was still travelling alone every week to his graveyard in remembrance.
In remembrance. How she hated those two words. She kicked the can again, hard, square on. For a second, it scudded across the road, its hollow tin frame rattling and clanking as it traversed the pavement and dropped finally out of view into a shop basement.
She sucked in a mouthful of air. She was supposed to be joining Ben at his flat tonight, but it was late. Too late. He’d no doubt be slumped drunk in front of a screen, watching black and white figures thrown through the air, the sound of gunfire and ammunitions exploding from wall to wall across his lounge. She hated herself for thinking it, but she couldn’t take being with Ben tonight, not after seeing Florence Briarly lying dead. Not after hearing George Cosgrove, another old soldier, but one that had somehow dealt with his nightmares.
Quickly she pulled out her mobile and texted an excuse. He wouldn’t answer. He probably wouldn’t even get the message until the morning. She pushed the phone back into her pocket and looked up. A bus was trundling down the road towards her. A couple, standing at the nearby bus stop, raised their arms to request it to stop. On a whim, she decided to jump aboard. It was heading in the right direction for her flat.
The bus was only about half-full, so she got a seat easily towards the rear, squeezing into an empty seat above the wheel. She let herself relax and was deep in thought when the sound of raised voices brought her to the present. The front of the bus had filled up in the last few stops and an old lady stood clinging to a pole, swaying about unsteadily, while a youth sat in the seat designated for use by the elderly, refusing to budge. The pensioner was saying nothing, but a middle-aged man nearby was outraged, venting his fury at the youth, who stayed sitting stubbornly on the same seat.
As the bus pulled into the next stop, the impasse continued, with the man moving towards the youth as if to drag him from the seat. The bus driver intervened, trying to calm the situation, and pointed towards a small camera mounted at the front of the bus, but neither would back down. She could sit and watch no more.
Stepping forward, she held out her warrant card, placating the man before politely asking the youth to move. The sign was, after all, a request for consideration to be given to the elderly, rather than an enforceable by-law. She would let the warrant card do the talking.
For a few seconds, it appeared as if the teenager would refuse to move, but then, with the waiting passengers heckling his lack of respect, he shot to his feet and hauled himself up the stairs to the top deck with a loud sigh.
The lower deck erupted into a burst of spontaneous applause and the old lady sat down, quietly thanking the man for his trouble. Calm was restored and Charlie took the opportunity to jump off the bus. Having shown everybody the occupation in which she was employed, she suddenly wanted to go back to anonymity.
It was only a short walk to her fla
t and she was soon turning the key in the lock. She went straight to her room, slipped out of her clothes and sank into bed, guiltily pleased that, for a change, tonight she had only herself to think about. The bedding smelt clean and fresh and she pulled the duvet high up round her neck, closing her eyes and allowing her mind to drift. It carried her immediately back on to the bus, its stops and its starts, the way its rear suspension lifted smoothly over the bumps and its front slid effortlessly round the corners. As she reran the journey, her thoughts turned to the incident with the old lady, the covert CCTV cameras, the passengers, and the way in which people entered and exited the bus along the route. There was something so mundane and repetitive in bus journeys; a few stops to the local shops, a trip to the park for some fresh air and back again, but it was something that old people armed with their bus passes did as regular as clockwork during off-peak hours.
And as her mind returned to Florence Briarly, George Cosgrove and the map pinpointing the locations of the burglaries, drawn out in a long rectangular sprawl over several postcode areas, she realised that what ran down the centre of the dots was not just a main road, it was also a bus route.
8
A bank of clouds moved across the face of the moon, as Thomas Houghton climbed into his car and eased out along the backstreets from Jason’s block and into Streatham High Road. The night felt moody and seductive, with pubs and restaurants closing their doors and people drifting aimlessly along the pavements. Everywhere were couples: old married companions, arm in arm on their way home from meals out, young lovers with limbs wrapped possessively around each other.
As he drove, his head swam with memories of Catherine, their first nerve-wracking dates, his proposal, their wedding day, their joy at the birth of Emma. How he had loved his wife and daughter. Their lives had been so perfect… until the diagnosis. Everything had changed at that moment. The disease had taken her away forever. Her loss had left him isolated… until now.
Catherine’s road came into sight and his spirits lifted. It was situated in a quiet backstreet, within walking distance of Streatham High Road where he’d first spotted her, but set far enough away from the main road that few cars other than those owned by residents rarely came. Here was where the career-minded business people lived, combining easy journeys by public transport to the City with the greenery of the common stretching out at the rear of their gardens. Here, champagne and vodka spritzers were sipped at summer BBQs and BMWs, Range Rovers and the occasional Porsche stood in driveways.
The properties were mainly old detached Victorian houses, once inhabited by well-to-do families but most now divided into spacious flats, renovated to the highest standard. Catherine’s flat was one of these.
He parked his old car at the end of the road and jumped out on to the pavement. The scent of hyacinths from a nearby garden hit his nostrils and he was struck again by the number of trees and shrubs populating either side of the road. He walked quickly, aware that he would look out of place in this more affluent part of Streatham. A minicab came past and he slipped into the shadows, standing motionless behind the trunk of a tall pine until its tail-lights disappeared from sight. A short distance further and he was there. His breath caught in his throat as he tucked himself behind a wall in her front garden and stood silently, his pulse quickening at the thought of catching a glimpse of her again.
The driveway was made up of loose gravel, the noise of his footfall amplified with each step, so he moved off on to the grass, mindful of every minute sound, pausing to watch for any indication that he had been heard. A fine layer of sweat prickled at the small of his back and his heart raced in the still of the garden, but nothing stirred, even his footsteps becoming silent as he moved round the edge of the lawn towards the flat. A security light was trained out from the front of the building, across the lawn and driveway, but on a previous visit he’d realised that by keeping to the fence-line it stayed unlit.
Catherine’s flat was on the ground floor, with the front door located at the side of the building, out of the reach of the security light and with no sign of an alarm. A trellis covered with a climbing rose stood to one side of the entrance, its thorny greenery and tiny unfurled buds masking a small area in which a wheelie bin stood. An old coach-light, obviously switched on from inside the flat, was situated above the front door, its spindly light shining downwards on to a large doormat, and a couple of hanging baskets hung from hooks at either side, the purple flowers of the winter primroses now overwhelmed by the spring bulbs inside its mossy holder. The occasional drip of water fell from the lower leaves into a small dark puddle that stained the paving below. Thomas watched as a small globule of water grew on the base of the basket, elongating and stretching until finally breaking off and falling to the ground. His stomach lurched as he realised she must have recently watered them.
A metal gate barred his way through to the back garden. He climbed it effortlessly and dropped down carefully on to the grass at the side of the path, padding round to the rear of the building. He still needed to check for any further signs of an alarm. Letting his eyes acclimatise to the darkness, it was clear to see there was none, only a telephone wire which snaked up the wall before launching itself through the air towards a pole at the side of a laburnum tree. The sight of it set off his own alarm bells. He pulled the knife out from his sleeve and quickly sliced through the wire, before replacing it out of view. Nothing and nobody could be allowed to spoil his time with Catherine.
A dim light glowed from one of the rear rooms. The curtains were slightly ajar and Thomas could see a TV flickering across the walls. From where he crouched in the shrubs, he watched breathlessly as a figure walked past the window and out of sight. Creeping further up to the window, he peeped in, allowing his eyes to roam over the exquisite decor and furniture, until the figure returned. There was no mistaking her. It was Catherine, looking just the way he’d always dreamed; the same slim, forty-year-old body as he remembered, with vibrant skin and blonde hair that fell in loose curls around her face and shoulders – but with all signs of the disease eliminated.
He watched captivated as she removed her dressing gown and hung it over a chair. She was wearing only a thin vest top and shorts. Her shoulders were bare and the fabric was cut low, revealing the swell of her breasts. She pulled the duvet back and climbed into her bed, aiming a remote control at the TV. The brightness disappeared, leaving only a sparse atmospheric glow from her bedside lamp. Slowly, she curled her bare legs up on to the creamy bed sheets, before pulling the covers over her body, leaving Thomas gasping with memories of his wedding night; the sight of Catherine, his new bride, clothed in similarly revealing nightwear, waiting for him, wanting him. The recollection stirred an immediate response. He wanted her now and the urge to knock on the window almost got the better of him.
She turned the bedside lamp off and the room and rear garden were plunged into shadow, the darkness allowing doubts to fill his head. He still wanted Catherine, but would she want him? He didn’t know. Shards of rejection pierced his fragile mind as he recalled the times she’d turned him away, her body becoming weaker and less coordinated, overcome by disease; the evil thing that lived within her growing steadily stronger, until it seized control, smothering her desires and dictating when and how they should make love. A shudder of pure fear ran the length of his spine at the thought.
Withdrawing from the window, he crouched down, holding his head in his hands, all the time seeking to regain control. A twig bent against him, snapping crisply as he buried himself further into the shrub, and he closed his eyes, willing the noise to have gone unnoticed, but there was no movement from within.
After a minute or so, his mind calmed and he relaxed, refocusing on the reason for his presence. Catherine was just yards from him on the other side of the wall, settling down to sleep. But he didn’t want to risk alarming her yet. He’d have to wait until she was deeply asleep. The surprise would be better that way.
After about half an hour, he could
wait no longer. Everything was silent. Carefully he stood, shook out his stiff limbs and moved across to where he’d spotted a small window left slightly ajar, its bevelled glass still covered in a layer of condensation. It had been open when he had come before, so he knew it belonged to the bathroom, the inside air on both occasions still retaining a warm, steamy consistency from where Catherine must have showered.
Another rose bush stood to the side of the window, a few thorny fingers stretching out across the wall underneath. He pulled his gloves on and carefully looped the springy branches out of the way and then climbed on to the windowsill, reaching in through the opening. The handle on the lower window was almost out of reach, but he managed to grasp it, levering it open. Clearly, the ease of ridding the bathroom of steam was more important to her than security. He would have to remind her to lock it in future. The room smelt feminine. A single glass bowl of pot pourri stood on the sill and as he moved it to one side and eased himself in, his senses were overloaded with the various heady perfumes that filtered up into the air: summer flowers, apple blossom, vanilla.
He stopped still, breathing in the fragrances, listening again, but again nothing stirred. Silently, he made his way in the direction of the bedroom, tiptoeing across the hallway carpet until he came to her open door. The interior of the room was very dark and he could only just make out the shape of Catherine lying asleep in her bed. Her mouth was slightly open and a gentle rasping noise emanated from between her lips, just audible in the silence. It was an endearing sound, and he couldn’t help but stop to listen as a wave of emotion built to a crescendo within his head. For a few moments, he stood, unable to move, staring down at the sleeping figure of his wife, tears springing unbidden at the corner of his eyes. He wiped them away roughly. Now was not the time to show weakness. She needed him to be strong.
