The Devil's Moon

by Peter Guttridge

  Watts sighed. ‘What’s negative about that?’

  ‘What does it say about my life up to now?’

  ‘Mine was the same – I was a father and husband.’

  ‘You were lousy at both because you were forging your fucking career. And once you were Chief Constable of Toytown you might as well have been a single man.’

  ‘The kids had left home by then.’

  ‘I hadn’t. What did I have?’

  Watts didn’t know what to say. He hadn’t asked her to give up work. She had been eager to do so when the first baby and the post-natal depression came along.

  He looked down at his hand resting on his knee. It was fisted.

  When the call ended Watts paced the room. He’d always regarded himself as a man of action but of late he’d felt paralysed, unsure what to do with his ruptured life.

  He changed into his tracksuit and running shoes and crossed over to the towpath beside the river. He headed towards Chiswick. The river made a slow curve. There was the old Fullers Brewery on the left.

  The towpath was boggy and treacherous and frequently flooded, especially at the slipway into the river beside the brewery. Watts tiptoed through the water and mud then continued down towards Chiswick Bridge. He increased his pace as he neared the steps up on to the bridge then took them two at a time.

  It took him the length of the bridge to regulate his breathing again. He dropped back down on to the opposite bank and started to run towards Barnes Bridge. He’d had the sense there was someone running some thirty yards behind him, keeping pace, but when he glanced back there was no one.

  It was drier here as it was higher up. He increased his pace now, lengthening his stride. He loved the rhythm of breath and stride and arms pumping. Occasionally he glanced down at the river. The early-morning rowers were out in force by now.

  The route veered away from the river, across an abandoned park with a sad-looking bandstand and allotments off to the left. He glanced back. Still no one. The route re-joined the riverbank at Chiswick.

  The rain held off for the entire hour that Watts ran. When he got back to the White Hart he stopped beneath the balcony of the pub to cool down. It was muddy and Watts inhaled the strong tang of the river. He looked out at the individual rowers sculling by. He took deep breaths, resting a hand on his chest. His chest was his breastplate to keep people out. That’s what Molly used to say.

  He cleaned the muck off his trainers and put his tracksuit trousers on over his muddy legs and walked up the passage beside the pub and across to the café.

  When he left the café he bought a pint of juice and the newspaper from the supermarket across the road. He checked his father’s car, an old Saab convertible, hadn’t been stolen in the night from its on-street parking space. It hadn’t but someone had parked a battered old deux chevaux bumper to bumper with it. Watts decided against driving today.

  Traffic was already building along the road by the Thames as he walked beneath Barnes Bridge. Early-morning commuters were filling the pavement on their hurried way to the station.

  He glanced at Caspar’s house as he walked by. He stopped when he saw the door. He stepped into the porch.

  The door was black with a gold-coloured mailbox and a door-knocker in the shape of a lion’s head. Above the knocker, a bloody heart had been nailed to the door. Thorns were sticking from it.

  Watts looked up and down the street. A steady flow of people were passing beneath the bridge on their way to work. Something made him look up at the parapet of the bridge. Was it his imagination or did someone duck back out of sight?

  He looked back at the door and at the blood pooling on the doorstep.

  Gilchrist’s head emerged from the toilet bowl for the third time.

  What the fuck happened last night?

  Whatever they’d eaten in the restaurant had not gone down well. That had happened before in some mild form and she only blamed herself. Eating such pure food after a week of her usual rubbish always discombobulated her system. Always. But this seemed more. She almost felt like she’d been hallucinating at one point. She’d certainly had some weird dreams.

  Maybe it was the wine. Who knew organic wine had such a kick?

  Great. Her first day back at work and she was wrecked. And nagging at her was the thought that something definitely out of the ordinary had happened with her friend Kate Simpson. But what it was she wasn’t entirely sure. How had they ended up in the same bed?

  She was getting ready to go into work when Kate rang. She realized within a moment that Kate was as befuddled (and embarrassed?) as she was.

  ‘Main reason I’m ringing is to see if you know the police position on this Wicker Man thing.’

  Gilchrist heard the slight tremble in Kate’s voice. ‘Wicker Man thing? Don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  ‘Sarah, I think you’re about to. It’s going to be big.’

  ‘I’ll get back to you. How are you feeling?’

  ‘Aside from running off to the loo to be sick as a dog every ten minutes, you mean?’

  ‘You too?’

  Simpson was between calls so Gilchrist let her go, then, her own interest piqued, called the desk sergeant at the station. ‘It’s DS Gilchrist . . .’

  ‘You can’t fool me, ma’am,’ the sergeant said. George Appleby. Nice man. Old school. Which meant he’d cracked a few skulls in his time.

  ‘George, I know I’ve not been around for a few weeks but it is DS Gilchrist. Sarah.’

  ‘No such person. We do have a Detective Inspector Gilchrist though.’

  ‘Yeah, yeah.’

  ‘Congratulations, Sarah. Well deserved.’

  ‘Thanks – but it’s only acting.’

  ‘It’ll be yours as long as you don’t mess up.’

  ‘My point exactly, George.’

  He chuckled. ‘So how can I help you today, Detective Inspector?’

  ‘What’s going on with this Wicker Man?’

  ‘Nasty. Very nasty.’

  ‘Nasty how?’

  ‘There was somebody inside when it went up.’

  ‘Alive?’

  ‘Not now but possibly then, yes.’

  ‘Jesus.’

  ‘That’s what he is alleged to have said. Or words to that effect. A couple of people heard him call out before the flames or the smoke got to him.’

  ‘Poor sod. OK. Thanks, George. Who’s in charge of it?’

  ‘Don’t think it’s been assigned yet.’

  ‘Can you put me through to the chief constable?’

  Hewitt’s assistant, Tracy, put Gilchrist on hold for five minutes. During that time, Gilchrist tried not to think about the acrobatics going on in her stomach.

  There was a click on the line and then Hewitt’s voice: ‘DI Gilchrist – first day in and already you have something to tell me about our troubled teenagers? Even though you’re not, I understand, actually in?’

  ‘Only just started on the teenagers, ma’am.’

  ‘But not from your office, evidently. Why are you calling?’

  ‘I wondered if you had something else for me to investigate.’

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘Ritual murder. This person burned to death in a Wicker Man?’

  Hewitt paused. ‘Why should I give that to you?’

  Why indeed?

  ‘I thought it may tie in with the church desecration,’ Gilchrist stammered. ‘Plus there may be a link to the satanic abuse of children – if you believe those satanic abuse nutters who still lurk in the dark corners of conventional psychiatry.’

  ‘If, as you say, Sarah, those psychologists are – to use your technical term – nutters, there is no connection.’

  ‘Best to be sure, don’t you think, ma’am?’

  Hewitt was quiet for a moment. Then: ‘You’ve seen the film, I suppose?’

  ‘Films, I believe,’ Gilchrist said. ‘One a terrible remake of a terrible sixties hippy thing.’

  ‘But you know about th
em both.’

  ‘I do. And about Wicker Men. Against my better judgement I once went to a wedding reception just outside Hebden Bridge in Yorkshire where, as the climax of the party, they set fire to one of these Wicker Men.’

  ‘With the happy couple inside it?’

  ‘No, ma’am.’

  ‘I always think going north of Watford is unwise. And that was a wedding you say?’

  ‘It didn’t last.’

  Hewitt barked a laugh then became more solemn. ‘Unfortunately, this one did have someone inside. Burned to a cinder.’ Hewitt sighed. ‘God, what a city.’

  ‘I’m guessing that God had nothing to do with it – rather the reverse.’

  ‘These were pagan worshippers in the films?’

  ‘They were. Not to be confused with black magicians. Modern pagans are all supposedly benign – hugging trees and worshipping the moon and all that. Not generally known for human sacrifices. Or, indeed, animal ones, as I think they are all veggies.’

  ‘Hmm. All right, Sarah, I’ll put you on the investigation as well as that of troubled teenagers.’

  ‘As well as?’

  ‘You drew the connection, not me.’

  ‘Yes, but I was thinking of the Wicker Man investigation as a potential way into a future troubled teenager investigation . . .’

  ‘In tandem, Sarah. Unless you don’t want the Wicker Man investigation? Because this is the only way I can justify giving it to you. There’s copper theft from railways to fall back on, too. That’s a more pressing problem.’

  Gilchrist ground her teeth.

  ‘I’ll be delighted to do the investigation in parallel with my work with the task force,’ she ground out.

  Hewitt was brisk. ‘Get on with it, then.’

  EIGHT

  ‘There’s a heart nailed to your front door,’ Bob Watts said. ‘I’m hoping it’s animal not human.’

  ‘Yeah, we found it,’ Fi said, her voice sounding even throatier down the phone line. ‘It’s a sheep’s heart.’

  ‘Someone has killed a sheep and torn its heart out?’

  Fi rasped a laugh. ‘You’re not a cook, are you, Bob? This is Barnes – it’s from the local butcher.’

  ‘They sell sheep’s hearts?’

  ‘They do. Getting the ventricles out is a bit of a bugger but they’re very nice stuffed. Tender. I think Jamie has a recipe.’

  ‘What’s the significance of it?’

  ‘It’s a warning.’

  ‘Warning about what?’

  ‘Somebody is threatening us with doom – or worse.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Some devil-worshipping nutter, no doubt.’

  ‘You’re not worried?’

  ‘Happens every couple of months. Have you decided about the Crowley book yet?’

  ‘I wanted to talk to you about that. I’ve had another offer.’

  ‘Come round for lunch. Caspar’s will be mostly liquid but I’ll rustle something up for you, me and our lodger.’

  Watts put down the phone and picked up the card of the man who’d made the offer on Moonchild in the occult bookshop. Vincent Slattery, an antiquarian bookseller from Lewes.

  He phoned but the call went straight to voicemail.

  With nothing else to do and his curiosity piqued by the odd inscription in Pearson’s book, he’d been in touch with Colin Pearson’s publisher to try to arrange a meeting with the author. Pearson’s publisher, after a bit of to-ing and fro-ing, had given him a number with a Brighton code. Watts dialled it now.

  Someone picked up the phone and immediately replaced it. When he tried again the phone was engaged. He gave up after ten attempts over the next hour.

  The rain had relented although the sky remained angry. Gilchrist didn’t feel sick any more but she had sudden moments of dizziness and twice she thought someone had called her name. When she turned to respond, however, there was nobody there.

  She went down to the beach to look at the remains of the Wicker Man. The entire structure had collapsed into a black, smoking mound only partly covered in grey foam. The policeman keeping guard by the tape was young, short and pink-faced. She showed him her warrant card, conscious she was towering over him.

  ‘I’ve been put in charge of this investigation. Detective Inspector Gilchrist.’

  He looked at her warrant card and frowned.

  ‘All right,’ she said. ‘Acting DI. And you are?’

  ‘Constable Heap, ma’am.’

  ‘First name?’

  ‘Bellamy, ma’am.’

  ‘Bellamy?’

  ‘Ma’am.’

  ‘That’s quite unusual?’

  ‘Actually quite common, ma’am.’

  ‘As a first name?’

  ‘Not quite so common.’

  ‘So how come?’

  He shrugged. ‘I wish I knew. I never thought to ask my parents when I was young and when I thought of it they weren’t around to ask.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  He gestured to the smoking debris behind him. ‘There are worse things in life.’

  Gilchrist grimaced. ‘I understand there are human remains.’

  ‘Remains, certainly, ma’am. What exactly they are I don’t believe we know yet. Scenes of crime and Mr Bilson from forensics are here.’

  Gilchrist nodded and walked over to a familiar figure. ‘Frank Bilson.’

  ‘Sarah Gilchrist,’ the forensic analyst said. He was a tall, lean man, some ten years her senior, with a sharp face and intelligent eyes.

  ‘Human remains?’

  ‘Possibly. Badly burned. The fire was particularly intense around the body. Probably an accelerant. It’s slow work separating it out from the other remains. Should have it back in the lab by late afternoon. I’ll start on it first thing in the morning.’

  Gilchrist nodded and looked at the crowd of the curious gathered in small groups along the ridge of shingle some ten yards away. She walked back over to Constable Heap.

  ‘You were first on the scene?’

  He nodded.

  ‘Statements?’

  ‘Not written up yet.’

  ‘Anything of particular note?’

  ‘Some clubbers claim to have heard someone inside the Wicker Man screaming, then yell, “Why hast thou forsaken me?”’

  ‘Biblical.’

  ‘King James’ Bible, ma’am. Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? Jesus said it on the cross, according to Matthew’s Gospel. “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?”’

  Gilchrist examined Heap’s pink face. ‘You a churchgoer, Bellamy?’

  ‘Sometimes, ma’am.’

  ‘Sounds like our victim was a churchgoer. Did they say whether it was a male or a female voice?’

  ‘They couldn’t tell, ma’am. The poor soul would have been in agony.’

  She nodded.

  ‘I should point out, ma’am, that only two people heard the voice calling out. Nobody else around them heard anything but screams.’

  Gilchrist was trying to remember what the martyred policeman in the film called out. As if he’d read her mind, Heap said: ‘He sang, ma’am. In The Wicker Man. Called out a few “Oh Gods” and “Oh Lords”.’ He blushed at her surprised look. ‘I thought that might be your train of thought.’

  ‘Did you indeed?’ Gilchrist said. ‘Have you got much on at the moment?’

  ‘Someone stole something from the council’s museum and art gallery. I’m trying to find the thief on CCTV.’

  She nodded. ‘Put that to one side for the moment. Call the station and say I want a replacement for you down here then get off and write up those statements. I want them on my desk by teatime.’

  ‘Where is your desk, ma’am?’

  Gilchrist laughed. ‘Good point.’

  She walked away a few yards and phoned Hewitt. When she got through she said: ‘This Wicker Man thing, ma’am – I’m going to need an incident room and a team.’

  ‘I’ll assign you Sergeant Donaldson,’ Hewitt said. ‘It’
ll take him a day or so to tie up his other cases but then he’s yours. Have you worked with Donaldson before?’

  ‘No, ma’am, but I know him.’

  ‘A capable man,’ Hewitt said.

  ‘Yes, capable,’ Gilchrist said. But a tosser.

  ‘Sort out three constables and three support staff for yourself. Make your old office the incident room for the time being.’

  ‘Yes, ma’am.’ She glanced back at Bellamy Heap. ‘I’ve already got the second member of my team.’

  Kate Simpson was feeling pretty spacey. She’d stopped being ill but she was definitely not with it. She kept zoning out, going into weird little daydreams. Simon blathered on regardless.

  She was nervous about what might have happened with Sarah Gilchrist the previous night. She knew what she’d always wanted to happen with her friend but now that it might have she was a bit freaked. Especially as she couldn’t remember a thing about it.

  So she’d decided to focus on something else. She realized that until she’d heard her fate over the volt gun thing she’d been unable to concentrate on anything. Now she was keen to get on with her research into the wacky churches of Brighton.

  Fi Caspar led Bob Watts down a long hallway from the front door to a conservatory at the back of Caspar’s house. Watts had been expecting rock star gaudiness but the dark blue walls of the corridor were hung with expensive prints of the Thames in Georgian and Victorian times.

  The conservatory was warm and comfortable, despite the rain rattling on its roof and pelting the windows. It was bright too, with one brick wall hung with big prints of Georgia O’Keeffe’s highly sexualized flower paintings.

  Caspar got up from a deep sofa and came over to give Watts a hug. He smelt of patchouli and alcohol.

  ‘Great to see you, man.’

  Watts proffered the Crowley book. ‘Thought you might want a closer look.’

  ‘We’ve got a nice Riesling on the go,’ Fi said.

  ‘Bone dry,’ Caspar said, taking the book. ‘Bloody delicious. Pete Townshend turned me on to wine years ago. Not that he had much of a palate back then. Keith Moon, that madman, used to piss in his bottle when Pete wasn’t looking.’ Caspar guffawed. ‘Pete never noticed the bloody difference.’

  ‘He must have had a tiny willy to piss down the neck of a wine bottle,’ Fi said, pouring Watts a glass.