Design for Murder

by Roy Lewis

  ‘So … you’ve already been inside the farmhouse. This isn’t the first time…. You’ve been here before.’ Eric said slowly.

  ‘I’ve been here.’ The journalist pushed past Eric, stepped back into the passageway. ‘Have you looked around, searched the rest of the house?’

  He seemed oddly uncaring about Sharon. Eric glanced back at her sprawled figure on the bed. It was necessary to get her out of here, but at the same time he was curious. There was a tingling at the back of his neck; he was confused by Fraser’s odd, nervy behaviour. There were questions to which he had no answer.

  ‘Have you looked upstairs yet?’ Fraser called to him in a low voice. ‘We should check all through the house, don’t you think?’

  The man was already on the stairs. Reluctantly, but still on edge, Eric followed him. The shaky wooden stairs were uncarpeted and they creaked and groaned as the two men ascended. Eric was forced to duck his head at the top of the stairs because of the low cross beam at the landing but the hallway at the top was wide. Probably a converted loft, he guessed. Fraser was opening one of the two doors which led off the timber-floored landing. He put his shoulder against it. This door opened only with difficulty, groaning a protest. Fraser looked inside then turned back, shaking his head at Eric.

  ‘Empty. Let’s look in the other room,’ he suggested.

  Numbly, Eric did as Fraser suggested. He stepped forward, raised the sneck of the door, pushed against the scarred wood. There was a dry, dusty odour to the darkened room. He looked inside but could see very little: the windows were shuttered. Eric made out some vague outlines, a chair, an overturned stool. He moved towards the window, stumbled over something, then pushed at the old shutters. One of them swung open, allowing light to stream into the room. Dust flecks rose and danced in the air. Eric turned back towards the doorway, and it was then that he saw it, swinging slightly, pendulum-like, with a slight creaking sound from the overhead beam.

  The man was completely naked. His skin had an odd greenish tinge. His head hung sideways at an unnatural angle, his tongue forced out between his gaping mouth in a horrifying rictus. His arms were dangling by his side. Adark stain ran down the inside of his thigh, the last protest of his body before death. The rope had been knotted just behind his left ear; the other end of the rope was attached to an exposed, sagging beam in the roof. It had been wound twice around the beam, knotted firmly. To one side of the dead man’s foot was the stool Eric had dimly noticed on entering the room: it had been kicked aside, allowing for the drop. The feet of the corpse were just a matter of inches from the floor: this would have been no matter of a broken neck. He would have died of a slow, dancing, kicking strangulation.

  Eric stepped closer. He stared at the barely recognizable, twisted features of the dead man.

  ‘Raymond Conroy,’ he murmured, stunned.

  His mind whirled, questions tumbling around in his head. He turned to stare at his companion. ‘What the hell’s gone on here?’

  There was a short silence. Fraser still stood silently in the doorway, staring at the hanging man. Eric could not make out his features but he seemed calm, almost unmoved. His tone was measured, speculative. ‘Justice of a kind, perhaps. A finality he deserved. After all, he was a monster. Perhaps he couldn’t face himself any longer. Maybe he came to the end of his tether.’ He snickered lightly. ‘If you’ll excuse the pun.’

  Eric frowned, glaring at the journalist. ‘What the hell is that supposed to mean?’ he snarled, irritated and shocked by the man’s insouciance.

  Fraser shrugged indifferently. ‘Hey, it’s only a thought. But he killed those women in the Midlands. Then the Coleen Chivers woman. Maybe it was all too much for him in the end. An insupportable burden of guilt. Perhaps he was finally appalled by his own perversions, felt he had to bring an end to his own savagery. Or maybe he knew he would eventually be caught, wouldn’t escape a second time. So he came up here, with the rope and the stool and put an end to it himself. Perhaps he decided he’d rather face the rope by his own hand, rather than a lifetime of incarceration. Who knows? Who will ever know? When I get around to writing about it I could attempt to produce some reason in my account—’

  The man was unmoved, obsessive, self-centred. A wave of disgust swept over Eric. ‘Sharon,’ Eric interrupted. He pushed past him. ‘We need to get her out of here.’

  Fraser stepped aside reluctantly, allowing Eric to hustle towards the stairs. ‘She would probably have been the next victim,’ he suggested, nodding thoughtfully. ‘He would have enticed her here, as he did you. He would have played with her in the same way as he did the others, carving her before finally strangling her. But probably, at last, his conscience, his feeling of guilt, his admission of responsibility all washed over him. Made him take his own life. Interesting … a fascinating psychological twist….’

  Eric hurried down the stairs. He re-entered the room Conroy would have used for a bedroom. He was approaching Sharon’s inert form when a thought struck him. He glanced back. Fraser had followed him and was now standing in the doorway, one hand stuck casually in the deep pocket of his worn leather jacket. ‘You said Conroy enticed Sharon here.’

  ‘That’s pretty obvious.’ Fraser shrugged carelessly. ‘I presume so.’

  ‘But you also said he enticed me. How would you know that?’

  There was a short silence. Then Fraser chuckled, a light, dry sound in his throat. ‘Well, I could say that it was just a good guess, because you’re here, after all. The two lawyers … as a theory it still needs a little working on, I suppose.’ He chuckled again. ‘But I suppose it’s time to forget charades like that.’ He stood a little straighter in the doorway. ‘In fact, it wasn’t Conroy who enticed you here at all. Nor Miss Owen either, for that matter.’

  Eric frowned. ‘What do you mean? I spoke to Conroy on the phone. He asked me to come here, to the farm.’

  ‘No. You spoke to me.’ Fraser shook his head, clucking his tongue mockingly. ‘You must have noticed the strangeness of the voice. The harshness. The breathlessness. The unreality of it. It’s strange, isn’t it? An urgency injected into the tone, the muffling of a handkerchief, announcing myself as Conroy … it was enough to fool you both. I told Miss Owen you were already here: she came running. And you were easily persuaded too. What was it? Bad conscience, that you’d let a murderer escape? No matter. Two simple phone calls. Brought you both here.’

  Eric straightened, the blood beginning to pound in his head. ‘What the hell is this all about?’

  Fraser seemed to hesitate for a few moments, thinking. Then he took his hand out of his jacket pocket. Eric caught a glimpse of something dark, glinting dully in the dim light. A handgun. Fraser waved it in his direction, almost casually. ‘Did I ever tell you I’d spent some time in prison? I think I did. Prison is supposed to rehabilitate you. But in fact it teaches you new tricks. You pick up all sorts of information while you’re inside, develop all sorts of skills that are denied to you in the outside world. Like faking a man’s voice. And knowing where to get hold of a dangerous weapon like this.’

  Eric stared at him, bemused. Behind him, on the bed, he heard Sharon stir a little, murmur something then lapse again into unconsciousness. The gun muzzle was now pointing, unwavering, directly at Eric.

  ‘Raymond Conroy, upstairs,’ Eric said slowly, struggling to piece things together. ‘Was it really suicide?’

  ‘No, no, of course not,’ Fraser replied easily. ‘He died early yesterday, but it was quite a subdued affair. And it was time anyway. He’d given me all the information I needed; he was getting a bit suspicious, as a matter of fact, answering all my questions. And then there was the television report. He kicked in the set when he heard the police were after him for the murder of Coleen Chivers. So I had to speed things up a bit. Which I thought might raise a slight problem, forensically. After all, he couldn’t die too long before Sharon Owen, if my scenario was to hold water. There’s a deep freezer in the shed outside, and that helped a bit
, but I couldn’t allow the deaths to be too far apart, forensic science being what it is these days. No, he was quiet after I drugged him … another little skill I picked up in prison … and then he died really without knowing too much about it. Though I have to admit, I found it a bit of a struggle getting him up the stairs. And strung up on that beam.’

  A cold chill seemed to have struck Eric. He glared at Fraser, still not understanding. ‘You killed him … and you said … you implied Sharon has to die.’

  ‘That’s right,’ Fraser said confidently. ‘Oh, I’ll dress it up a bit, using a knife, the way Conroy was accustomed to, but she won’t feel the blade. She’ll be unconscious before I strangle her. That’s the way Conroy always did it, isn’t it? He worked on them with the scalpel, did his designs, then strangled them. Zodiac designs.’ He grunted contemptuously, then laughed. ‘I had a design too. A different design. Design for murder.’

  ‘So you killed Coleen Chivers?’ Eric asked slowly.

  ‘That’s right. She wasn’t a Conroy victim,’ Fraser admitted. ‘But I’d made sure there were sufficient similarities with the Zodiac killings to have the police chasing after him. They jumped quickly to the conclusions I’d intended. And when Sharon dies in the same manner, shortly, they’ll follow the same trail and it will be put down to him. The women in the Midlands, Coleen Chivers, and finally Sharon Owen – the police will assume he killed them all before he topped himself.’

  ‘And me?’ Eric asked grimly.

  Fraser waved the pistol. ‘Well, I’m forced to admit that it’s not a perfect scenario. But it goes like this. Sharon Owen came to this farmhouse after a phone call from Conroy. So did you. The Zodiac Killer was at the end of his tether, he had decided he was going out in a blaze of glory. He strangled Sharon just before you arrived, had started using the knife on her. But when he heard your car he waited until you came in and then he used a gun … this gun … on you. After which he played out the game as he’d planned. Until finally, remorseful, he went upstairs and hanged himself.’

  ‘That’s crazy! You’ll never get away with it! Why would Conroy feel remorse like that? And forensics will be able to determine the timing of the deaths. They’ll realize Conroy must have died before Sharon or me!’

  Fraser ducked his head, and smiled. ‘Oh, I don’t think so. It’ll be some time before the police trace Conroy to this cottage. I’ll send them an anonymous tip, probably in a few weeks’ time. By that time it will be virtually impossible for them to reach such specific conclusions. They might have doubts, but there’ll be no real evidence to lead them to what actually happened.’

  There was a short silence. Fraser regarded Eric with a certain cynicism in his smile. ‘Go on,’ he urged. ‘Point out what other weaknesses there might be in my scenario.’

  It was a wild scheme, but it could work, Eric concluded. And even if the police had doubts, how would they be able to link Fraser to all this? He himself was still in a daze as to Fraser’s motivations. Slowly, he said, ‘Why are you doing all this? You wanted to find Conroy, you came to seek my help at the time. What is this all about? Just to write those damned articles in the press? Is that all that’s behind this madness?’

  Fraser laughed. ‘Well, you must accept the articles have been well received, and yes, I hope to write a book eventually, getting inside the head of a murderer. And who will be able to gainsay my theories? Not Conroy. And not you or Sharon. You’ll have nothing to say to add to the facts from your grave.’

  ‘I can’t believe you’ve killed two people, and are thinking of killing me and Sharon,’ Eric exploded, ‘merely to be able to write a series of articles, or a book about Conroy!’

  ‘It will give me credit,’ Fraser replied calmly. ‘I’ve been struggling at the bottom of the heap all these years. I know I’ve got talent, but it’s been unrecognized. Now it will be seen, accepted … oh, yes, I expect to make money out of this. And gain satisfaction, the respect I believe I deserve, after dragging myself up by the bootstraps all these years.’

  ‘I can’t believe it,’ Eric said slowly. While he kept Fraser talking, he thought, there might come a moment when the man’s guard would relax, when the tables could be turned. ‘I can’t believe that on such flimsy excuses….’

  Fraser raised the gun menacingly. ‘Not so flimsy, Ward! You don’t know what I’ve been through, seeing other people wealthy, successful….’ There was a snarl in his tone as he took a step forward into the room. Then he seemed to take a grip on his emotions and his voice softened, became more reasonable. ‘But, you’re right. I should admit it to you: I’ve always seen, since the trial of Raymond Conroy, that this could be the route for me, leading to success in journalism. It became part of my design, my design for revenge and murder. It’s why I came to see you at your office. You turned me away, but I saw Conroy arriving to meet you at the Quayside. I followed him, kept an eye on him until the police attentions became too irritating. Then I approached him, made the proposition. I told him I’d find a safe house for him – under an assumed name – in return for his life story. He never intended telling me the truth, of course, nor did I expect him to do so, but it brought him here, to Rowland’s Farm. And I got some material for my writing.’ He paused, his voice hardening. ‘But you’re right, the writing, it’s not the only reason. In fact, it was never the main reason. No, the main reason is rooted way back in the past.’ He gestured towards Sharon, still lying unconscious on the bed. ‘You must know what these two women had in common: Miss Owen and Coleen Chivers.’

  Eric hesitated. ‘They were cousins.’

  ‘Ah, yes,’ Fraser agreed, ‘but something else too. They were living a good life, wealthy, successful … and I was not. Do you know why that was the case, Ward?’

  ‘The exigencies of life,’ Eric replied through gritted teeth.

  ‘Ah, exigencies, a good word. I must work it into my next article on the madman who was Conroy. But what did those exigencies involve? The two women, they had privileged backgrounds. They were brought up in middle-class homes; they had money behind them; they were able to become successful in their own right, as individuals, because they had had a good start, had money behind them. Money, privilege, secure childhoods … background. Things that were always denied me.’

  ‘That happens,’ Eric replied coldly. ‘Backgrounds differ.’

  Fraser waved the gun and grunted in contempt. ‘Ah, no doubt you’re about to tell me you came from an underprivileged background yourself, that you made your own way in life, that you succeeded against overwhelming odds. But don’t waste what breath is left to you, Ward. You don’t understand what I mean. Sharon Owen, and Coleen Chivers, they had the advantage of money and background; I did not. Never have. But I should have had at least some of what they had!’

  ‘And why should …’

  ‘Why should I expect it?’ Fraser laughed harshly. ‘Why? Because these women and I did share something, if not the money.’ He paused, and the gun muzzle wavered slightly as he took a deep, dissatisfied breath. ‘Because we all three shared the same blood! But while they gained by it, I did not!’

  3

  The farmhouse was an old one in a decayed condition. There would always be creaks and groans from the woodwork, the storm-battered roof, the worm-eaten walls. Perhaps the wind had risen in the valley: there had been storm clouds building above the Cheviot hills. But Eric thought he had caught a slight sound from the yard outside. Fraser seemed not to have noticed, as he talked about himself and his anger rose. But Eric’s mind flitted away from the thoughts of sounds outside as the statement Fraser had uttered ground its way into his consciousness. It was several seconds before he could get out the words.

  ‘You and Sharon are related? You, Coleen and Sharon are … cousins?’

  Fraser seemed irritated. ‘No, no, you’re not listening! Sharon and Coleen were cousins, of course. But you’re a generation adrift. My relations were Peter and Anne Chivers. They shared a father with me, if not a mother. I was their ha
lf-brother. The one they all refused to recognize.’ He bared his teeth mirthlessly. ‘I’m merely the wicked uncle to the two young ladies.’

  Eric was silent, his mind spinning.

  ‘Oh yes, the forgotten, unknown and now utterly wicked uncle.’ Fraser took a deep, satisfied breath. ‘That’s what this was all about, really, not the journalism, for God’s sake. That was only a satisfactory by-product. No, it was all about revenge, putting right an old wrong from years ago.’

  Eric was puzzled for a moment, then his thoughts slipped back to conversations, with Strudmore, Sharon herself and the civil servant Linwood Forster. Quietly, he said, ‘George Chivers.’

  Fraser’s head came up, as though he was surprised. ‘So you know my father’s name! Old George, the licentious, devious, lying bastard. Ah, yes, of course, you would have been involved with administration of the Chivers Trust, perhaps?’ He nodded. ‘Yes, that would be it … The fons et origo of all the Chivers wealth, old George. At least, as far as the selected few of his family were concerned.’

  Eric stayed very still. The pistol in Fraser’s hand still menaced him. His mouth was dry. ‘You say George Chivers fathered you as well as Peter and Anne, but I’ve seen the papers for the Chivers Trust. Your name hasn’t appeared—’

  ‘That’s the whole point, surely! Wrong side of the blanket,’ Fraser muttered viciously. ‘You clearly don’t know the whole story. But then, why should you? Coleen and Sharon didn’t know either. Love, lust, betrayal….’

  Eric’s mind was beginning to function clearly again. ‘Scotland. This is about what happened in Scotland in the seventies, nearly forty years ago.’

  ‘Precisely.’ Fraser was silent for a little while as the house still creaked and groaned about them. ‘It all seems so pointless now, but there was the Cold War and international tensions. There was a lot of trouble about in those days. The siting of the nuclear submarines, the Polaris, the bloody government kow-towing to the Americans. And they placed the missiles near a city, for God’s sake. There were outraged demonstrations. My mother was one of the protesters. Sally Chalmers, twenty-two years of age. Naïve. A political innocent. An idealist. Out to save the world from nuclear destruction! What a gullible, misled fool! And what an idiot to be taken in by George Chivers! He was thirty years older than she was, but he got involved, got to know her, infiltrated her Marxist group, passed information back to his masters in London, played the big hero, and she was stupid enough to fall in love with him. He crawled into her bed to tease out group secrets, and when he got the information he needed, he turned her and the rest of the cell over to MI5. She served a prison sentence, not least because she was unrepentant, shouting her head off in court with the others about the iniquities of government policies. But at the time she didn’t know it was he who had betrayed her – and she was carrying his child.’ Fraser’s breathing rasped in the stale air of the bedroom. ‘His child. Me.’