by Darren Wills
I found myself again escorted out by the now grim-faced police officers and was taken along a long winding corridor and outside into what was some kind of courtyard, where a large white vehicle with small square windows, a ‘meat wagon’ was positioned, no doubt ready for that trip up the M1. Three other uniformed officers were outside the vehicle as I was led up to it. Was I actually considered dangerous at this point? Never a hard man at any point or in any way, emotional and sentimental to a fault, here I was being treated like Peter Sutcliff or Rose West. It was just so totally surreal, even if I had shot a woman dead.
I was pushed up into the vehicle and the two officers followed me in. They took seats on the opposite seats, making no eye contact. The doors were loudly and dramatically closed. I heard some shouting outside and presumed it was the instructions being given to the driver about the journey and the route he was going to take.
I was waiting for the sound of the truck’s engines bursting into life but it didn’t happen straight away. Was there a problem? Was there something wrong with the vehicle?
The back doors were, to the surprise of all three of us, opened again and a guy, whom I assumed to be a senior detective, told the officers to escort me back to the holding cell. What the fuck? I thought to myself. The detective looked at me. “There’s a bit of a delay while we sort something out, Mr. Walker. We’ll try not to keep you here any longer than we have to.”
Back in the cell again, I spent what must have been another three hours in that wretched little hole.
For the third time that day, the cell door sprang open. This time the face that came through the door was a familiar one.
After The Revolution
“What happened then?”
“Well, I had a cup of tea first, I have to be honest with you. And I did harbour the notion of not going. I was musing over it in the police canteen. I mean, it was a ridiculous idea of yours. But I had promised, and you were a shit playing that mother’s grave trick on me.”
“You went alone?”
“No. I heeded what you said. I don’t know why. I was taking advice from a man who had clearly killed his wife. I took Sally, another constable, with me. She owed me a favour. Anyway, Wolstenholme Street is part of an industrial estate. The only house on there, and it is number 34, is a solitary house, an ugly block of a place that sits at the end of the road, pretty bleak, with an abandoned factory next to it.”
“Was it Leoni’s house?”
“No. It belonged to a woman called Caroline Lawrence. Ring any bells? Apparently, she’s a known prostitute in the Chesterfield area, with something of a prison record. I could spend ten minutes just going through the details of that. Let’s just say she’s had a pretty prolific life. She’s been chief suspect in a load of serious crimes.”
“I could have predicted that.”
“The curtains were shut and that was bit off-putting really, so I just sneaked up while Sally kept a look out for anything to be wary of, like the curtain opening. I knocked on the door first, but there was no answer. I tried again, but there was still nobody responding so I just opened the letter box. I looked in. There was nothing of note that I could see, just some dingy furniture, a dusty fireplace and some old wallpaper. It was the smell that did me.”
“Through a letterbox?”
“Are you kidding? Do you remember when that freezer of ours broke down when we were away in Cornwall and the chicken had gone off?”
“Do I remember? It made me sick. Vilest smell ever. I can still smell it now.”
“When somebody’s been dead for a day or more that same smell happens and starts to spread, and what I could smell was definitely the smell of death. I’d smelled it before a few times, usually somebody old and lonely who died and decayed before anybody could care. To be honest, Dom, I had mixed stuff going through my head, because this is your wife we’re talking about, and if you were somehow, against all expectations and reason, right and it was Laura dead in this house, I know how close you were. This was going to be more upset for you. It would hopefully cast serious doubt on your arrest, though.”
The car pulled into a slip road to leave the M1. “How far is it now?”
“About three minutes. Anyway, I called for back-up from Derbyshire. That came in about fifteen minutes while Sally and I waited. To be honest, I fancied breaking the door down, but that’s not how it works, not with forensics and that.”
“Small potatoes, fifteen minutes, compared to the dreadful time I was in that cell. Very small, when placed alongside life imprisonment.”
“Of course. When they came, they smashed the door and went straight in. The smell was coming from the cellar and it was overwhelming with the door open. I got kitted out in the whites and followed them down five minutes later. It was Jamie, Dom. He’d been stabbed and the lead forensics guy said he had slowly bled to death. Bit of a cruel bitch, the murderer, if you ask me.”
“That’s Caroline. Poor bloke. She killed him because he knew too much. He had already found stuff out about her. If he had carried on, he would have found out about her history and she couldn’t have that. That was why she was going to kill me too.”
“Laura was there too, lying in an adjacent room, like it was some kind of torture chamber. She had been through hell as well. Loads of bruising and stuff. Looks like whoever had held her there had put her through it.”
“She had to cope with a load of hate and evil I suppose. Just like anybody else who crossed this bitch.”
“You don’t know the half of it. Stranger than fiction, her life. She’d killed before this.”
“She do time for it?”
“No. They couldn’t pin it on her. Looks like you gave her justice at last.”
“Whatever comes next, Kate, I will always be grateful to you. I’m sure Laura will be too.”
“What are your plans now, Dom?”
“Well I have to report to the police tomorrow for another interview. No doubt they’re working out the questions to ask me as we speak.”
“Well, it shouldn’t be as harrowing this time. They know you didn’t kill Laura. They know that Caroline killed Jamie. The missing piece is Leoni Machin. Oh and her brother. They accept she and he hold the keys now to unlocking other stuff, including what happened to George and Lillian.”
“To be honest I’m not sure what she knew. She always appeared pretty vacant and I felt she was very much the junior partner in what went on. Caroline’s stooge.”
“She was more than that. Leoni’s police record, if that’s who she was, is as long as Caroline’s. She needs picking up, and pictures of her are already circulating. If she turns up at your house, get in touch straight away.”
“I don’t think she’s that much of a threat. She lived in our house for a while and I would have sensed it.”
“No, you wouldn’t. Dom, Caroline was in the frame for a castration and assault. Leoni was her alibi. Do not underestimate Miss Machin.”
“We’re here. I’m going all goose pimply.”
“That’s understandable. We’re dropping you right at the entrance. Remember, don’t pressure her with questions. She’s been through far too much.”
“I won’t.”
* * *
I was sitting at the side of the bed looking across at my wife. This time, it wasn’t an imposter, but the real thing, the unique individual who had been that good to me that she had made me soft and vulnerable and easy prey for somebody horrendous. There was one of those intravenous drip things going on and she looked very weak and out of it.
I took hold of her hand. It was meant to suggest that I would be there for her forever so I hoped it wasn’t painful for her.
Laura was semi-conscious. At this point she knew none of the answers and would have plenty of questions, but I just wanted to help her enjoy her return to freedom. I was going to do my best to help her to forget
the malicious bitch who had inflicted so much pain. Her eyes had suddenly half-opened.
“Hi, babe. I don’t know what to say to you. I guess we’ve both been through some stuff.”
She reached out for my hand. “What happened to her?”
“She did some horrible stuff but she’s dead now. Her plan didn’t work.”
“Did you kill her?” Her voice was faint but her eyes were full of accusation.
“I had to. She was going to kill me and I thought she’d killed you. Horrible, especially with her being your twin.”
She became puzzled. “She wasn’t my twin. Looked nothing like me.”
“Babe, I think you need to rest.”
“OK. I do need to sleep now.”
“Me too,” I replied. “I’ll see you later.”
I put my arms around her. However ill she was, she would, I was sure, respond to a hug.
Laura was alive and we had a future.
I was looking out of the window. I was seeing everything like it was a new world, where the grass seemed a brighter green and even the buildings of Sheffield had been thoughtfully created. She had her eyes closed, hopefully recovering from the horror she had been forced to undergo.
Suddenly I noticed somebody. It was a woman wearing a familiar jacket. On the pavement across the road. She had that curly brown hair that I knew so well. She was looking up at this building we were in, glaring. I looked down. I was sure it was Leoni. I held Laura’s hand tightly.
As I continued to look, I watched her turn and walk away with her back to me and I wasn’t sure anymore.
The only thing that now mattered was getting this wonderful wife of mine healthy again and back home so that we could resume our lives. Nobody would get in the way of that, I was sure. We had come a long way, had been prised a long way apart for too long, and now was going to be a time of being together. Life was going to be good.
Malevolence
It’s not over.
My beautiful friend died. That’s not good, but that doesn’t mean the end. Only the end means the end.
Things have to continue and I suppose that falls on me.
There is a couple who still need to learn lessons. Perhaps I can be the teacher.
Stranger things happen.
