The Death List mw-1

by Paul Johnson

  “Certainly not,” I said, laying on the outrage with a trowel.

  She ignored that. “Mr. Wells, I presume your fans communicate with you via your Web site, as I did. Have any of them shown…unusual tendencies?”

  “A lot of them.” I tried to lighten the atmosphere by smiling. “Some want to be my best friend, or more than that. I always keep them at arm’s length. Some want me to write more books in my first series and some want me to help them get published. But, as far as I can tell, none of them is homicidal.” I imagined the Devil listening to the lie and laughing.

  Karen Oaten looked at my laptop. “Would you mind if we checked your correspondence?”

  I bit my lip, aware of how suspicious they were about to become. “I’m afraid I managed to pour coffee over my main computer. I’ve given it to a friend who’s an expert. I hope he can salvage the files. That one’s my old laptop. It’s been in the attic for the past three years so there’s nothing recent on it-apart from your e-mail.” I was going to ask them if they had a warrant, but managed to stop myself in time. I needed to be as cooperative as possible, without antagonizing the Devil.

  “Never mind,” the chief inspector said, to my surprise. “We can always ask your Web site provider to give us access. I presume you have no objection.”

  I tried to keep calm. “No.”

  “We’ll need your girlfriend’s name and contact details,” the Welshman said.

  I gave them to him, feeling bad about dumping Sara in the shit. On the other hand, she’d probably be happy to get a potential story angle. “She’s a journalist on the Daily Independent,” I added. That didn’t seem to impress them.

  “You’ll be doing yourself a favor if you don’t tell her we’re coming,” Turner said, giving me a hard look.

  Oaten got up again. “I think we’ve taken enough of your time for now, Mr. Wells. Thank you for being so-” She broke off as her mobile rang. She listened for over a minute, her expression getting more and more grave.

  “Guv?” the inspector said when she’d finished.

  Karen Oaten was paying no attention to him. Her eyes were locked on mine, her gaze unyielding. “Mr. Wells, do you know a man called Alexander Drys?”

  A deep foreboding washed over me. “I don’t know him in person,” I said. “He’s a literary critic.” I didn’t add that he’d given me a string of vicious reviews and that I’d have happily ripped his balls off if he’d ever had the nerve to show up at a literary function.

  “I see,” Oaten said, turning on her heel and heading for the door.

  “What’s happened?” I asked desperately.

  “Watch the news,” the chief inspector said over her shoulder. “We’ll be in touch.” That sounded more like a threat than anything else.

  I heard the street door close behind them and then their car move away at speed. I had the distinct feeling that the Devil had upped the stakes once again.

  “Just put the tray down and get out of here, girl,” Alexander Drys had said to the maid.

  He was in the drawing room of his house on Cheyne Walk in Chelsea, preparing to take morning coffee. He’d always hated interruptions, especially when he was preparing to write his monthly roundup of reviews for the magazine. If he’d been honest with himself-a rare event-he would have admitted that his temper had always been quick. He’d been spoiled from the earliest age. His father, a London Greek shipping magnate, was generous though rarely in the house, while his mother, a former model, was always present during the holidays to look after his every need. Along with the staff, of course.

  Drys looked at the meager selection of fancy cakes on the tray. He would have to do something about the girl. She was Portuguese and hardly knew a word of English. He should never have listened to his butler, who was probably screwing her. The situation was particularly bad on Mondays, when all the other servants had the day off.

  He got up from the Louis XVI chaise longue and moved his twenty-stone body to the window. The river was sparkling in the afternoon sunlight, its normal sludgy tone transformed. The plebs were driving across Albert Bridge in their hundreds, off to their worthless jobs or to the shops. At least there were no kids to be seen. Thank God he’d remained single-not that there had ever been any chance of him getting married, despite his father’s insistence that the dynasty be continued. Alexander Drys had no interest in shipping and no desire to share the house with a wife, never mind mewling brats. Particularly not when he could ring up Madame Ostrovka any time he wanted and take advantage of her endless supply of blonds from the former Soviet Union. “Fuck ’em and chuck ’em,” that was the motto he’d been regaling his cronies at the club with for decades.

  No, the only thing that interested him was dissecting crime novels. He blamed Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. He’d come across The Dancing Men in an anthology at school back in the fifties, and had been instantly hooked. After he’d finished reading English at Cambridge (an undistinguished third, but no one remembered that), he used his connections and family wealth to obtain reviewing positions on numerous publications. True, he was less in evidence now than in his heyday during the eighties-Thatcherite contempt for frivolous writing having been very much to his taste-but a notice from him could still make or, more often, break a novelist’s career. Not that he cared about that. If you wrote fiction, you deserved criticism. That was one reason why he’d never attempted it himself. Well, that and a lamentable lack of application. Anything longer than eight-hundred words was a real challenge.

  Drys went back to the chaise longue and ate the five dainties quickly. After a cup of Earl Grey, he turned to the piles of books that he’d lined up on the Persian carpet. They were in four tiers. The one on the left consisted of books that he hadn’t even opened-either he knew the author wasn’t one who would interest him or he disliked the publisher. The next was made up of books of which he’d read ten pages and then given up. The third pile was of books he’d read through and decided to put the knife into-this was what his readers expected, indeed, desired. The fourth and smallest consisted of books that he would praise. Not excessively, and certainly not without caveats. The fact that the publishers of those novels had wined and dined him was neither here nor here.

  Alexander Drys raised his head. He’d heard a noise at the rear of the house, a strange noise-something between a thud and a crack. What on earth was that stupid girl doing? He reached over to the art deco coffee table and rang the brass bell, a seventeenth-century piece from his ancestors’ island of Psara. When she didn’t appear, he hauled himself to his feet and went to the door.

  Two men in gray boiler suits and protective helmets were standing on the landing outside.

  “Wha-”

  Drys fell back into the drawing room when he was struck hard in the face, landing with a crash. His vision was clouded, but he felt himself being dragged across the parquet. For a while he lost his sense of time. When he regained his senses, he found himself sitting with his legs apart, his arms stretched to opposite ends of the coffee table. He tried to move his hands. They had been tied to the table legs.

  “What…what’s going on?” he gasped, blinking.

  The man who squatted down in front of him was of medium height. He was wearing a mask, one of those sold by novelty shops-but instead of President Bush or Tony Blair, this one had a strangely blank expression, the artificial skin very pale.

  “Who…who are you?” Drys asked, glancing round at the other man. He was wearing an identical mask. “There’s no money in the house.”

  The man in front of him laughed, a horrible sound. “Oh, we don’t want money, Alex. You don’t mind if I call you Alex, do you? Alexander makes me think of the ancient hero, and let’s face it, you’re not exactly from that mold.”

  Drys tried to control his wobbling chins. “How dare you?” he said in the voice he used with the servants. “I’m-”

  “A vicious piece of shit who ruins people’s lives,” the masked man completed.

  Drys watched as h
e opened a large leather bag and took out two things. The first was a blue cardboard folder, which he laid on the table. The second caused his armpits to be drenched with sweat. It was a large, stainless-steel chef’s knife.

  “Wha-”

  The man raised his hand.

  Drys noticed that it was sheathed in latex. That made his heart beat even faster.

  “Now, Mr. Renowned Literary Critic, I’m going to read some of your deathless prose out to you.” The man’s voice was curiously accentless, as if he’d been to too many elocution lessons. He gave another mirthless laugh. “This is a game, you see. The rules are simple. I read you three pieces. Then you tell me who the author in question is. All the pieces concern the same person. If you get it right, we’ll walk away. If you get it wrong, well-” he picked up the knife and angled it against the light “-you could do with losing some weight.”

  Drys tried to speak, but found he couldn’t. This was madness. They couldn’t be serious. This sort of thing didn’t happen to people in his position. He felt a sudden need to empty his bladder. He managed to hold its contents in, but only just.

  “Extract one,” said the man in the mask, opening the folder. “‘This novel is a farrago of unlikely plot twists, superficial characters and a completely unbelievable social milieu. The protagonist is one of the most unsympathetic, if not downright obnoxious, investigators to have appeared in recent times.’”

  His breathing shallow, Drys tried to think. Over the years he’d written so many reviews, both stand-alones and shorter ones in the roundups, that he couldn’t possibly remember whose book these words applied to. He panicked and tried to wrench his hands out of their bonds. He saw the man in front of him nod to his companion. A rope came round his neck and was tightened. He felt his eyes spring wide open and his tongue swell in his mouth.

  “Bad critic,” the man with the file said, the brown eyes behind the mask steady. “Don’t try that again. Let him breathe, Watson.”

  The pressure loosened on Drys’s throat. He panted air into his lungs.

  “Extract two. ‘The crime genre is replete with superbly realized private eyes and policemen. Who would willingly part with their money to grind through a tediously recounted investigation carried out by this grubby and bungling detective?’”

  Another surge of panic gripped Drys. He struggled to think who that could have applied to. So many third-rate writers of crime fiction had been published, some of them unaccountably winning prizes and being feted by critics with less discrimination than he had. The words were vaguely familiar-he couldn’t have referred to too many heroes as “grubby”-but still he couldn’t place them. He stared beseechingly at his captor.

  “Please, I-”

  “Memory not up to scratch?” the masked man said mockingly. “Never mind. You’ve got one more chance.” He laid his fingers on the knife. “Before it’s time for me to start chopping.”

  This time Drys couldn’t control himself. He sat with his face burning as warm liquid soaked his trousers.

  “Bad, bad critic,” scolded his tormentor, shaking his head. “That’s an expensive piece of furniture, isn’t it?” He turned to the next page and started to read aloud. “‘This book is enough to make any right-thinking reader despair. The supposed hero is a dissolute rake who extracts sexual favors from his female clients in lieu of payment. The violence is crude and unjustified, and the historical references defective. Why do people write books like this?’”

  Drys sat back in the rapidly cooling puddle he had made and tried to restrain a smile. He had remembered; he knew who the writer was. Thank God, he would soon be seeing the last of these imbeciles. Then a frightening thought struck him. What if the man behind the mask was the author himself? He kept his expression as composed as he could.

  “Well, Mr. Esteemed Literary Arbiter?” asked the man, leaning forward.

  “Matt Stone,” Drys said, his tone patronizing. “Now, will you kindly get out of my house?”

  “Matt Stone,” mused the man in front of him, picking up the knife. “Very good, Mr. Drys.” He gave a disturbing laugh. “But not good enough. You see, Matt Stone is a pen name. I need the author’s real name. Sorry, didn’t I make that clear?”

  Alexander Drys tried to scream, but a rag was stuffed into his mouth before any sound came out. He had no idea what Matt Stone’s real name was. He’d never concerned himself with the mainly talentless fools whose books he read. His eyes opened wide as he saw the man with the knife bend over his right hand. The other man was pulling hard on the rope round Drys’s neck, keeping his body upright. He felt unjustly done by. Was he really going to suffer for such an insignificant writer? There were others whose careers he had completely ruined, even one who had committed suicide.

  “Matt Wells is his name,” the man said, looking at him with empty eyes. “Think about how hurtful your words were while I’m cutting.”

  The critic felt the blade slice into his skin and prayed for mercy to the God he’d ignored all his life.

  It didn’t come.

  18

  I didn’t have to wait for the evening news to find out what had happened to Alexander Drys. My mobile rang a quarter of an hour before I left to pick up Lucy.

  “Matt.”

  “What have you done, you bastard?” I yelled.

  The Devil paused. “A little more caution, my friend.” His voice still friendly. “I know the police have been to see you. How do you know they haven’t got you under surveillance?”

  I went to the front window. I couldn’t see anything out of the ordinary. “Look, you murdering maniac,” I said, lowering my voice. “Tell me what you did to Drys.”

  “All right. First I cut off his hands-the ones that typed those nasty, unfair reviews of your books. Then I sliced out his tongue and inserted it in his rectum. After all, he’d been licking his rich friends’ arses for years. He was wriggling and squirming a lot then, so his head was beaten to a pulp with a ball-peen hammer. No more vicious thoughts from that perverted brain, eh, Matt?”

  I’d collapsed onto the sofa as he recounted the horrors like a schoolboy proudly reciting a poem.

  “Matt? Are you there? Don’t tell me you’re unhappy about that shitbag’s less-than-pleasant death. I know how much you hated him.”

  How did he know? How long had he been bugging me? I’d ranted about Drys to Sara, but not recently. The poor bastard hadn’t even bothered to review my last novel.

  “Matt? At least congratulate me on ridding the world of a literary bloodsucker.”

  “You’re out of your mind,” I finally managed to say. “Why did you pick on him? He couldn’t have done anything to you.” Then I remembered what he’d said-hands, tongue, hammer to skull-and my stomach constricted even tighter. “Christ, that was what happened to one of the villains in the first Sir Tertius novel.”

  “The Italian Tragedy, that’s right.” The Devil gave an easy laugh. “Hey, Matt, we’re friends, aren’t we? I’ve got to the end of my own death list, so now I’ve started on yours.”

  My blood ran cold. “What do you mean?”

  “Don’t play dumb. And don’t worry. You’ve got the perfect alibi. The police were round at your place when Drys got his.” He sniggered. “Of course, you could have hired someone to kill him.” He gave an even nastier laugh. “You could have hired me.” The line went dead.

  I threw the phone down in despair. What did he mean by my death list? Jesus, was he going to wipe out everyone I’d ever expressed a negative feeling about? If that was the case, there were going to be a lot of dead people in the publishing business-editors, agents, publicity girls, marketing people, fellow novelists whose success I resented, booksellers who hadn’t chosen my books for their three-for-two promotions…

  The Devil couldn’t be serious.

  D.C.I. Karen Oaten and D.I. John Turner were standing in Alexander Drys’s drawing room. They were kitted out in white coveralls and bootees.

  “Hell’s teeth,” the inspector s
aid, looking away from the abomination on the chaise longue.

  “Steady, Taff,” said his superior, bending over the naked dead man’s blood-spattered face. She glanced at the pathologist. “You say his tongue’s been removed. Has anything been inserted into the mouth?”

  Redrose shook his head. “I expected that question. No, there’s no plastic bag with a line of poetry or whatever in it.”

  “Nowhere about his person?”

  “Nowhere. The only thing that’s been inserted is his tongue into his-”

  “Yes, you mentioned that.” Oaten glanced at the white-faced Turner. “Any idea why?”

  “I just collect the severed body parts,” the pathologist said, inclining his head toward the table where the critic’s severed hands lay in clear plastic bags. They were like grotesque ornaments, the palms downward and the fingers tensed like a piano player’s. “It’s for you people to work out what goes on in the monster’s mind.”

  “Thanks a lot,” the chief inspector said ironically.

  Redrose looked up at her. “All right, if you want my provisional opinion, it’s the same killer as in the previous three murders. The hands were removed with a modicum of expertise, but nothing to suggest that the perpetrator had medical or even butcher’s training. The tongue was pulled outward with what the marks on top and bottom suggest was a pair of pliers and cut off with a very sharp, nonserrated blade.” He turned to the smashed remains of the head. “As for the skull, it was shattered with a large number of blows from a relatively compact, rounded instrument-my guess is one of those hammers, what are they called?”

  “Ball-peen,” Turner said, his eyes still averted.

  “That’s the ticket,” the pathologist said approvingly. “Into DIY are we, Inspector? All right, here’s my psychological analysis, for what it’s worth. I’d say the hands being removed has an obvious link with the man’s job-he was a literary critic who wrote for a living, wasn’t he? The tongue in the rectal passage is a bit more obscure. Was he a sexual deviant?”