Rattle: A serial killer thriller that will hook you from the start

by Fiona Cummins

  He’d gone alone, not sure what to expect and ashamed he didn’t know. The nurse told him his mother’s chemotherapy had triggered a stroke which had affected her speech and ability to swallow.

  He hadn’t recognized the emaciated creature on the bed with bird’s-nest hair and the kind of flowery nightie she’d always despised. Her head was skewed at an awkward angle, her chin resting on the jetty of her collarbone.

  ‘It’s me, Ma.’

  One drooping corner of her mouth twitched, but she didn’t open her eyes. Erdman felt for her fingers; they were warm, the skin papery. His eyes stung.

  ‘I won’t leave you again, I promise.’

  ‘She died once, you know.’ The nurse’s tone was conversational but Erdman had recognized a dig when he heard one. ‘She suffered an allergic reaction to one of the chemo drugs, and went into anaphylaxis. She was clinically dead for about two minutes or so.’ She dabbed at Shirley’s forehead with a sponge. ‘But she’s a stubborn old thing. She obviously wasn’t ready to go without seeing you first.’

  Erdman had covered his face with his hands.

  ‘Better late than never,’ the nurse relented, patting him on the back.

  For hours he’d waited by her bed, never letting go of her hand, even when the nurse checked her blood pressure, and the dark night floated in. He’d been dozing when he heard her voice, so low, so un-Ma, that, at first, he thought he’d imagined it.

  ‘Sree.’

  Erdman opened his eyes but his mother hadn’t moved.

  ‘Ahm sree.’

  Her fingers were plucking at the covers, and she was moving her head against the pillow.

  ‘It’s OK, Ma. I’m here.’

  His voice seemed to soothe her and she had stilled. A few moments later it began again.

  ‘Ahm sree. Ahm sree.’

  A silence.

  ‘Ah-m sorr-ee. Jay-key.’

  ‘Oh, Ma, don’t worry about all that. We’re sorry, too. But we try not to think about the future. We prefer to concentrate on the here and now.’

  Her head had jerked from side to side and her voice became louder, more insistent. Unsure how to calm her agitation, he chose the coward’s route.

  ‘I’ll just go and ring Lilith, shall I? Let her know how well you’re doing. Perhaps she’ll put Jakey on the phone.’

  He’d gone downstairs to call his wife, knowing full well that he would not expose his son to Shirley’s ramblings, but desperate to get away from the grunts coming from the place where her mouth used to be. By the time he came back, his mother was dead.

  The nurse had explained that sometimes stroke patients can sound lucid but talk gibberish; that sometimes they hold on until a loved one arrives before they allow themselves to leave; that after the cancer but before the stroke, Mrs Frith had talked about her family with warmth and love. It was a picture of his mother he couldn’t reconcile with her vagaries of mood; her selfishness; her martyrdom.

  After her death, he didn’t cry once, not even when her body arrived in London and he buried her in a cemetery close to his home.

  A fine drizzle had begun again, but there was intent behind it, so Erdman balled up his foil and scrambled to his feet, brushing the crumbs from his trousers. He placed his lips on the marble headstone. ‘Bye, Ma. See you soon.’

  The cemetery was empty as he wended his way back to the exit, apart from the gardener and a lone figure in a black suit, sitting on a bench, with a bag at his feet.

  The man’s face was familiar. Erdman stared at the razor-sharp cheekbones, convinced he’d seen them before. Who was he?

  ‘Are you following—’

  But he was talking to empty air. The figure was already sliding into the backdrop of the day. Erdman caught a glimpse of him moving between the headstones, his suit a blot of ink against the paper-white sky. An unpleasant smell lingered, like decaying animals.

  ‘Are you OK, sir?’ called the gardener.

  ‘Did you see that man? In a black suit—’

  ‘Can’t say I did, sir.’ The gardener stuck out his lower lip, his weather-beaten face confused.

  Erdman started to run, scanning the graves for this stranger, but apart from an elderly lady in the distance, the cemetery was deserted. Who was that man? Where had he seen him? The Tube, was it? Or the train? He was sure he recognized him from somewhere else too, but where? The wind was picking up now, and he shivered in his damp jacket. Perhaps his memory was playing tricks on him. Frankly, he had bigger problems than a half-imagined freakazoid stalker to worry about.

  As Erdman walked home, a sudden thought seized him. Jakey. He’d said he’d buy him a present. He shouldn’t spend much, not now. But he couldn’t break another promise.

  He was tossing up the merits of a toy car and a Spider-Man figure when something on a shop forecourt caught his eye.

  Something shiny and wonderful and completely inappropriate.

  He imagined Jakey’s face when he gave it to him, the way his eyes lit up from the inside. He imagined that joy spreading across his face, his whole body, sparking a smile, a glorious jig of limbs.

  He couldn’t afford it. He wasn’t even sure if Jakey would be able to ride it.

  He bought it anyway.

  22

  2.19 p.m.

  The man in the suit was waiting in exactly the same place.

  ‘Hello,’ said Jakey, stumbling across the mud, two pink patches high on his cheeks.

  ‘Hello,’ said the man.

  ‘I’m not supposed to be here. Mrs Husselbee will be mad. She told me I have to stay in the classroom, or she’ll take me to Mrs Gaynor’s office. She’s the head of South Side Primary School. I only came to tell you that my mummy’s coming early, to take me to the doctor’s, so I can’t come and see your dog.’

  Jakey felt an unexpected surge of relief when he’d finished.

  ‘That’s a shame.’ The man’s stitched-on smile unravelled and he stuck his fingernail between his teeth. ‘I was going to ask if you wanted one of her puppies.’

  Jakey’s eyes widened. ‘A puppy?’

  ‘If you don’t want one . . .’

  ‘I do. I do.’ His face fell. ‘But I can’t come today. It’s my arm, see. It’s going all wrong.’

  The man’s eyes gleamed. ‘Can I see?’

  Jakey looked back towards the school building. Mrs Husselbee had appeared in the door of the classroom. Her hand shielded her eyes as she scanned the field.

  ‘I’ve got to go,’ he said.

  ‘Why don’t you come and choose your puppy tomorrow? I’ll meet you, if you like.’ The man fished inside his jacket for an envelope. Two words – Miss Haines – were scrawled across the back. ‘Give this to your teacher. It’s from your mum. Says she’s giving me permission to pick you up early.’ He smiled at the boy as he pushed it through the gap in the fence. ‘Not until tomorrow morning, mind.’

  Jakey’s fingers closed around the paper, his eyes snagging on the inky loops of the man’s handwriting, already smudging in the light drizzle that had just begun to fall. He shoved the letter into the pocket of his school trousers.

  ‘Yes,’ said Jakey. ‘Tomorrow.’

  23

  3.12 p.m.

  ‘Has Miles Foyle been in touch?’ said The Boss.

  ‘Not yet, sir, no.’

  ‘We need that name.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘Tell him if he doesn’t give it to us we’ll have no choice but to bring him in.’

  24

  3.23 p.m.

  The house was empty, which was a relief. Erdman weighed up the merits of oblivion, but put the Laphroaig bottle back on the shelf, and drank a glass of water instead. Then he sat on the sofa, and waited for his family to come home.

  ‘Good God, you scared me.’

  Erdman squinted into artificial brightness as Lilith switched on the light, and Jakey flung himself into his father’s lap as if it had been years since they had seen each other rather than a matter of hours.


  ‘Steady, champ. Careful you don’t fall.’

  He didn’t voice the unspoken thought. Could be catastrophic, champ. He ran his fingers through Jakey’s coppery fringe – it needed cutting again already – to the back of his head, and gently dragged them back again. Was that a new swelling on his son’s skull? He swallowed down the lump in his throat.

  Lilith was tugging at her top, but it kept rising up and he could see a strip of her pale belly above the band of her skirt. Unusually, she was smiling at him. He wanted to kiss her, not make her cry.

  ‘How come you’re home so early?’ There was a teasing warmth in her voice which had been absent for too long. He felt himself unfurling in her presence, like a leaf in the spring sun.

  ‘Jarvis gave us an early dart.’ He paused. ‘What did the doctor say?’

  She pulled a face. ‘The usual. Hospital if his arm gets worse. Watch out for a chest infection. Keep a close eye on him. Blah bloody blah.’

  ‘I’ll take that,’ he said.

  ‘Me too,’ she said, smiling. ‘He’s insisting on school tomorrow, so he can’t be that ill.’

  In his head, he’d practised telling her about his job, breaking the news with a suitably sombre expression, but now she was here, right in front of him, grinning properly for the first time in weeks, he couldn’t bear to.

  Instead he stood up and wheeled out the bike he had hidden behind the sofa.

  Jakey and Lilith gasped in precisely the same way. Erdman had always loved that about his family. The discovery that his son was a miniature version of his wife, from the way his eyebrows knitted together when he was angry to the identical mole on his neck.

  ‘Thank you, Daddy, I love it.’

  ‘What do you think you’re playing at?’

  ‘Can I go out on it now?’

  ‘You should have discussed this with me.’

  ‘Please, Daddy. Pleeease.’

  Erdman looked from Jakey to his wife. It was a lesson in contrasts.

  ‘Five minutes,’ he said to his son. ‘Go and get your shoes on.’

  Jakey shrieked with glee and disappeared to find his trainers. Lilith’s face was a collage of emotion.

  ‘What if he falls off? What if he doesn’t have the strength to push the pedals or hold the handlebars?’ She was shouting now. ‘What the bloody hell were you thinking?’

  ‘We have to let him live a little, Lilith. We can’t protect him all the time.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘we can. It’s our job to protect him, not put him in unnecessary danger. He’s not well, remember? And where’s his helmet? Shin pads? Wristguards? Honestly, Erdman, you’re useless.’

  There it was, that word again.

  He wheeled the bike from the room without looking back.

  The street was almost empty, still too early for rush-hour commuters. Darkness was settling on the city but Jakey didn’t seem to care.

  ‘Better not go too far, champ. Mummy’s not very happy with me. We’ll just try you out on this stretch of pavement here.’

  Erdman helped his son onto the seat and guided his hands onto the handlebars. The skew of his head, his locked-in elbow tipped his weight to the left, and the stabilizer on the right of the back wheel lifted two inches off the ground.

  ‘Whoa,’ said Erdman as the bike wobbled, but his son just giggled.

  Carefully, Erdman closed his hand over Jakey’s, used his own weight to balance it out. His son’s trainers flailed, searching out stability. As his feet connected, he pushed backwards and the pedals windmilled crazily.

  The bike juddered forward less than half an inch.

  ‘You need to push down with your legs, champ,’ said Erdman, trying not to listen to the wheeze of his son’s breath. ‘Do you think you can manage that?’

  Jakey gave a brief nod of his head and tried to do as his father suggested.

  Still, the bike barely moved.

  Perhaps Lilith was right and his legs weren’t strong enough. Perhaps this was a stupid idea. Perhaps he was a useless father.

  ‘C’mon, Daddy,’ said Jakey. ‘Let’s try again.’

  Erdman blinked into the darkness, unexpectedly moved by his son’s determination.

  ‘Hold on,’ he said, and grasping both handles, gently pushed Jakey and his bike forward.

  Jakey’s feet moved in motion with the pedals.

  ‘I’m doing it,’ shouted his son. ‘I’m riding a bike.’

  ‘Yes, sweetheart, you are.’

  Jakey spent the next ten minutes practising his new-found skill, his lower lip protruding as his thin legs pumped the pedals uphill, a grin splitting his face as he freewheeled it down, Erdman slowing his progress with a cautious hand.

  And then the bike’s front wheel caught the edge of an uneven paving slab.

  As if time was treacle, thick and sticky and slow, Erdman witnessed his son’s journey headfirst over the handlebars, heard the elongated cry that spilled from his lips. A car drove past, its headlamps splashing over Jakey’s face. A light drizzle began to fall again. Erdman was able to register all this before grabbing a fistful of Jakey’s coat and jerking him back to safety.

  The fear in his chest receded to a tight dark spot.

  Roughly, he pulled his son towards him. ‘You’re all right, champ,’ he said, as much for himself as for Jakey. ‘You’re fine.’

  Lilith opened the front door. ‘Tea’s nearly ready,’ she said.

  Erdman and Jakey locked eyes, waiting for her anger to detonate the calm of the street, waiting for the accusations, the threats to lock the bike in the garden shed, or worse, sell it on eBay.

  ‘Did you hear me, boys?’ she said. ‘Tea in five minutes.’

  Father and son released a breath and laughed together, a joyous, free sound.

  ‘Can we do this every day, Daddy?’

  ‘Try and stop me.’

  Neither Erdman nor Jakey noticed the man in the pinstripe jacket watching them from his grey van parked on the opposite side of the road, his nails gouging crescents in the palms of his hands.

  ‘Let’s hope nothing gets broken,’ the Bone Collector said.

  Later, while Lilith did the washing up, Erdman gave Jakey his bath. It had been a while since he’d done that, and it shocked him.

  Jakey’s spine was a xylophone of bony bumps, and there was a misshapen protuberance beneath his left shoulder blade that he hadn’t noticed before. He rubbed at it with Jakey’s Moshi Monsters flannel and felt his son wince at the pressure, despite his tender touch.

  On the pretext of working up a lather, he counted three soft-tissue swellings on Jakey’s head. A bridge of extra bone was visible above his collarbone. The lump on his good arm was bigger. His bones looked like they had been fused together in all the wrong places, an uninvited alien presence lurking just beneath the skin.

  A squirt of water hit him square in the face, and Jakey giggled and waved his Super Soaker with his good arm. He wondered how long it would take for it, too, to fuse to his body. For once, Erdman was glad; nothing like a drenching to disguise the tears.

  He lifted Jakey from the bath, and dried between his toes. The two big ones were malformed and turned inward, and they always reminded him of the day his son was born. The concerned cluster of doctors in the corner. The catastrophic sense of shock. The beginning of the fault line running right through his marriage.

  ‘Daddy . . . am I going to die?’

  The question stunned Erdman. Quickly, he regained his composure and buttoned up Jakey’s pyjama top.

  ‘Not for a very long time, champ. Why d’you ask?’

  ‘Josh’s mum told him I was.’

  Erdman cursed Alyson Carruthers and her big mouth.

  ‘You know you’ve got a little problem with your bones, right?’

  It was the understatement of the decade, but Jakey didn’t know that. ‘I’ve got extra ones, haven’t I, Daddy?’

  ‘That’s right. And you’re going to keep on growing extra bones, so there’ll just be more
of you to love.’ Erdman didn’t think it was necessary to explain that by the time he was a teenager, those extra bones would have bridged his muscles, tendons and joints, restricting his movement and forming a second skeleton. A prison of bone.

  Jakey seemed satisfied with his answer. ‘Cuddle.’

  His neck was twisted towards his shoulder, and he couldn’t lift his left arm, but Erdman could see sleepy love shining from his son’s eyes. Gently, he circled Jakey’s rigid body and squeezed him as tightly as he dared. Somewhere in the house a telephone was ringing.

  ‘Whatever happens, Daddy will always look after you, I promise,’ he murmured, breathing in the sweet apple scent of his hair.

  When Erdman came downstairs, Lilith was knitting, and the vicious clack-clack of her needles should have warned him, but he was still lost in his moment with Jakey.

  ‘That was Amber Collins on the phone.’ Her voice was dangerously calm. ‘She wanted to know if you’re all right. Because, apparently, you’ve lost your BLOODY JOB.’

  Erdman stopped pouring his glass of red wine. ‘Ah.’

  ‘Is that the best you can do? Bloody “ah”.’ She slammed her fist on the table. ‘We’ve got a mortgage to pay, in case you’ve forgotten. Why didn’t you tell me?’

  She was shouting again, pacing up and down the sitting room and rubbing her belly, like she often did when she was agitated. Erdman hoped, like Buddha, it would bring good luck.

  ‘I didn’t want to worry you.’

  ‘Bollocks. You were too scared. So you let your colleague tell me instead. Good call, Erdman. Really great job.’

  ‘It’ll be fine.’

  She spoke slowly, as if Erdman was incapable of understanding words of more than one syllable.

  ‘We haven’t got any savings. You spent them on that heap-of-shite car. A steal, remember? Which it was. That charlatan’ – she spat out the word – ‘stole good money from us.’

  It was an old resentment, one of many, and Erdman wasn’t surprised to hear it come up. Lilith wheeled them out during every row. He liked to visualize it as a hostess trolley filled with a selection of tempting desserts. This was tonight’s after-dinner offering. The Suzuki special, a real humdinger. Served with a generous side order of whipped backside.