Walking Into the Ocean

by David Whellams

  As they rounded the last major turn into the downtown, Stan turned to him. “You know this Father Salvez, up at the Abbey?”

  “Yes. Did you meet him?”

  “Yeah. He was walking along a trail just below the parking area. Said he didn’t know the Laskers, hadn’t noticed a thing. Any chance he’s bullshitting?”

  “No. Salvez is a non-combatant.” Peter remained sceptical about Bracher’s reasons for venturing up to the cliffs, and didn’t ask for Stan’s impressions of the sick priest. He didn’t want them.

  Every imaginable rationalization had him avoiding the media spectacle. He considered arriving late, or sending Stan on ahead. He would try to slip into the back of the room and let Maris occupy the spotlight. Of course, there were good reasons to attend, aside from Bartleben insisting that he go — or he would have insisted, had either of them bothered to call him. Peter was curious about how much the press already knew, and whether they were ready to feed public panic regarding the dead girls. He suspected that regional politicians had pressured Maris to show restraint and generally underplay the crisis. Peter had absorbed the regional papers, read a couple of Reuters feeds and the Task Force media package, but in sum, the Task Force had revealed the facts in dribs and drabs, with scant detail about the Rover’s pattern and profile. The reporters would push for particulars. Maris, controlling the show, might throw him and Stan to the pack, blaming them for the shortfall in behavioural analysis. And, for reasons he couldn’t yet pinpoint, he wanted to see Wendie Merwyn, the blond from TV-20, in action.

  The cluster of reporters and officials around the station forced Cammon and Bracher to park up the street. This time they entered through the back door, for once avoiding the Plexiglas guardroom. Peter squeezed by the crowd into the conference room without anyone marking him as Scotland Yard; even the local officers seemed to understand that he would be deferring to Hamm’s moment of fame. Two cameras and a bank of microphones had been set up in makeshift fashion, with folding chairs for the press and two long tables across one end of the room for police officials. There was precious little space for the TV camera operators to position themselves; questioners would have to crane around one or the other camera and dodge cables strung across the floor. The microphones seemed inadequate to Peter; there were only three of them, and so speakers at the front would be awkwardly passing the mikes back and forth.

  He knew that his placement at the front had been predetermined, and was inevitable. He reminded himself to stay cool and present a blank face to the cameras. He repeated his mantra: keep the two bloody cases separate.

  The meeting was still minutes away, and so he retreated to the outer room. He couldn’t find Wendie Merwyn, but he knew she would show. He spotted Maris huddled by one of the pillars, giving an interview to a newspaper columnist. Ron Hamm was nowhere in sight, although he could already have entered the conference room. A young policewoman announced that the “briefing” was about to start, and the stragglers in the anteroom began to filter inside.

  He tried to be the last in. Even so, Inspector Maris, who had claimed the Chair’s position at the head table, drew a bead on him from the far corner of the room and scowled. He almost seemed prepared to have one of his officers usher Peter out to the asphalt. Jerry Plaskow, also at the front, urgently gestured for Peter to take a seat beside him. Maris tracked him as he wound through the crowd and equipment.

  The police contingent arrayed themselves in a line behind the draped tables: Hamm, Maris, Plaskow, Peter and Finter, the slick young assistant who had briefed the officers on the Rover and who evidently now represented McElroy and the Devon wing of the Task Force. The space was both oppressive and chaotic, boding poorly for controlled interaction with the press. Peter estimated that six reporters flanked the two cameras, which appeared to be in competition rather than pooled, resulting in double the illumination necessary. He identified — barely, in the blast of light — two technicians negotiating the stopping down of the camera lamps.

  To start, Maris stood up, causing the two cameras to lurch to the right, like prison-tower searchlights, and everyone at the table winced in the glare. He set his voice an octave lower than normal and, after first testing his microphone, struck his theme. “Good afternoon. Thank you for coming. As chief of the Whittlesun Force and acting chairperson of the Joint Police Task Force, it is my sad duty to confirm that the body of Molly Jonas has been found. We will provide forensic details concerning the victim in due course, but assuredly within the next twenty-four hours. Today, we will respond to questions about the search for, and discovery of, Miss Jonas. I caution you not to be too speculative about this series of crimes, because I and my colleagues certainly won’t be. My colleague, and chair of the Task Force, Chief Inspector J.J. McElroy, cannot be here today, but I will adhere to his policy of respecting the dignity of these young crime victims. We are intent on conducting a methodical and thorough investigation, drawing upon the police forces of Devon and Dorset Counties, and any additional police agencies that can help across Southwest Region. Finally, I wish to highlight the heroic efforts of Lieutenant Plaskow of the RN and Ports Security, Chief Inspector Cammon of New Scotland Yard and Detective Hamm of the Whittlesun Force.”

  He sat down; the lights remained on his stoic face. There was a momentary, stiff silence. Peter understood Maris’s strategy. The conventional move would have been to anticipate their questions at the outset and talk out the clock, and thereby dictate the agenda. But Maris knew that he had few good answers yet to the basic questions about the Rover, particularly his identity, but also his predatory pattern. Filling up the time with details of the exciting hunt along the cliffs offered the better approach. Peter waited for the planted questions.

  For twenty minutes, the session took on a tentative rhythm, with a reporter posing a deferential query, with a follow-up about progress made by the Task Force. Maris soon brought the discussion back to Hamm’s bravery and doggedness, while Hamm himself modestly filled in a lightweight storyline. It was a shining moment for Ron; his gentle, factual answers, embedded in a tone of self-effacing professionalism, showed a maturity Peter hadn’t seen before. Peter himself was grateful to avoid fielding any queries himself.

  But all this was preliminary. The newspaper reporter Peter had seen outside caucusing with Maris stepped out to one side of the camera.

  “Inspector, is the predator likely to kill again soon? It’s been said that he’s following a lunar cycle. And, doesn’t his pattern of attacks, so far, prove that he’s progressing in a straight line eastward into Dorset?”

  It may have seemed at first to be a provocative question but it was another plant, setting up Maris to return the attention of the media to the work of the coordinated police agencies.

  “That,” Maris responded, “is speculative. The search we undertook yesterday — and remember that all those involved in that effort are members of the Task Force — is an example of cooperative, extensive mobilization of regional police agencies. Under Chief Inspector McElroy’s leadership, we are trying to blanket the coastal zone with a large contingent of police personnel. This strikes the right balance.”

  Peter caught Jerry recoil at the term “coastal zone.”’ The wild Channel was never so self-contained. Jerry mischievously leaned over to Peter and whispered, “Can the three of us have dinner later, Peter?”

  The three included Sarah, Peter understood, having already suggested dinner with her. He had no choice but to nod his assent.

  The same reporter played along. “How many officers have been assigned?”

  “Dozens,” Maris stated, remaining seated. “Don’t forget, we have access to the Regional Laboratory’s resources, other county forces and New Scotland Yard.”

  This stratagem was a mistake. Maris had little to deliver on the criminal profiling front. If I were a reporter, Peter thought, I’d ask if the Yard was prepared to take over the investigation. The answer would be no, but . . .

  The same reporter, a little too
eagerly, jumped in: “Has Scotland Yard done a behavioural assessment of the killer?”

  Maris saved Peter from having to dissemble. The cameras stayed on the Whittlesun chief. “We are developing our profile here. We believe the killer is a male, relatively young given that he carried two, possibly three of his victims some distance, and he’s comfortable with the territory along the coast. Even so, we’re not prepared to state that he is a local man. He seizes opportunities. We are watching.”

  Maris handled other questions artfully, sidestepping any inference that Dorset residents should panic. Peter thought it true cosmic luck that the Olympics were not mentioned at all. Several newswire and TV reporters tried to probe the issue of public fear as the Rover moved east, but Maris reiterated the tandem themes of public precaution and increased police surveillance of the cliffs. The lock-up-your-daughters refrain, in Peter’s opinion, would wear itself out soon, but for now it bought the Task Force some time. It all depended on deterring the predator from further attacks on the high cliffs. It was also fortunate for Maris that the questioning by the press reps was poorly coordinated. But Peter was flabbergasted by the complete absence of questions concerning Daniella Garvena, until he realized that someone had put the screws to the media outlets across southern Britain; they had agreed to respect the Italian family’s privacy. But how long could this manipulation last, and what promises had been made to gain media cooperation?

  Peter glanced at Maris’s smug face. The inspector was doing a fine job of burning up the time, and was almost home, safe as houses.

  Wendie Merwyn, whom Peter had failed to see lurking behind one of the cameras in the middle of the room, stepped forward. She focused on Peter. “Has New Scotland Yard been directly involved? Is there some thinking that the Yard should take over the Rover case?”

  Peter knew where she was going with this, and so did Inspector Maris. Peter was tempted to shunt the question off to the Whittlesun chief, but he was saved by the failure of Merwyn’s cameraman to follow her line of sight. The bright lights stayed on Maris, and he jumped in.

  “At the risk of sounding bureaucratic, the Yard is providing cooperative liaison. They have volunteered all their capacity, as needed, but the Task Force remains a Regional operation, and that is sufficient for the moment.”

  It was apparent to both Peter and Maris that Merwyn, not surprisingly, was digging for a headline, and “cooperative liaison” wasn’t it. But his non-reply left an opening for a supplementary from the blond news anchor — Why, then, haven’t you made more progress? What, then, does Chief Inspector Cammon bring to the table, and why was he gallivanting around the Jurassic Cliffs yesterday morning? But she posed neither question. Peter found her intriguing.

  Hamm’s energy was flagging, and Maris moved to sum up. Peter saw the risk: they were hopeful of getting away unscathed, but Maris had been too vague. He had to give them something for the front page, yet his wrap-up was more of the same.

  “We are doubling our police presence inside Dorset, but it makes sense for residents not to wander, not to let their children go off without supervision and, naturally, not to talk to strangers. You know each other and you know your community, and you are in the best position to notice the unusual . . .”

  He thought he was safe, but Wendie Merwyn stepped forward again. This time Peter was staring into a lens and bright lights. She had been redirecting the camera, and that was the reason she hadn’t launched a supplementary question. Now, she stood almost touching the head table. The camera swooped in on her, and Peter sensed that it would soon turn to his face for a close-up reaction.

  “Chief Inspector Cammon,” she began in her mezzo newsreader tone, “I understand that you are managing the investigation into the death of Anna Lasker, and the disappearance of her husband.”

  Peter stated calmly: “I am assisting, and . . .”

  “Assisting when you are not leading searches along the cliffs for the predator known as the Rover. Which is Scotland Yard’s priority?”

  “Neither investigation is being led by New Scotland Yard.”

  “Chief Inspector, can you tell us where the Lasker case stands at this point? It has been two weeks or more. Do you know where André Lasker is?”

  Maris stood up but the camera failed to move over his way. “The investigation of Mrs. Lasker is continuing and is making progress,” he said, to hollow space.

  “Has an arrest warrant been issued for Anna Lasker’s murder?” she persisted, with the camera still on Peter.

  “No.”

  “Why not?” she said.

  “Because,” said Peter, “Anna Lasker committed suicide.”

  CHAPTER 21

  Why the hell had he done it? He didn’t know. (Stan Bracher, later reporting back to Bartleben, said, “That’s the kind of crap Cammon is always pulling.”)

  Perhaps only Merwyn, Maris and Peter immediately understood his revelation. Other reporters had been entirely focused on the Rover murders and resented her shifting attention to a local crime on which there had been little progress. Peter’s answer certainly begged a follow-up, but Maris at once called the session to an end, and everyone stood up, eager to leave the stuffy room. For once, Peter was glad to be short, and he attempted to slip away through the outflowing police detectives. He only succeeded in evading Maris by the quick assistance of Jerry Plaskow. He caught the eye of Bracher, who offered only what Peter’s mother would have called a “watery” smile; there would be no rescue by the Canadian, and Peter decided that Stan would have to find his own way back to the hotel. Jerry took him by the elbow and hustled him out the back of the Whittlesun station and into the parking area. They paused, out of breath.

  “I think we’d better run for it,” Jerry said. Neither man was encumbered by files or briefcases, and so Jerry began to jog towards the back of the lot. Moving around cars and motorcycles, and a TV-20 equipment van, they ran to the next street, and only a block later did they dare stop. They had distanced any pursuers and now, Peter gauged, they were two streets up and two over from his Subaru. Jerry made to leave in the other direction. Peter didn’t worry about whether Jerry had transportation. He was one of those soldiers who disappeared into the night, like Peter’s SAS guardian angel.

  “What was that all about?” Jerry said.

  “It happens sometimes,” Peter replied, calm now. He looked up and down the street. He had stepped back from the drama in the briefing room, and was more or less philosophical about it now.

  Plaskow reacted in the best possible way. He laughed. “Are you still up for dinner tonight?”

  “Certainly,” Peter said. “Let’s eat in the hotel restaurant. As far as I can tell, it’s decent. Do you know where Sarah is staying?”

  “Not at the Sunset Arms. I’ve arranged to pick her up at seven at the Marine Institute. Is 7:30 good for you?”

  “Sure. Gives me time to . . . recover.” He was perspiring.

  “How are you feeling?’

  “Bruises are healing. Jerry . . . ?”

  “Yup.”

  It was time to pay some dues. “Could you thank your colleague for me?”

  “Smith.”

  “Your SAS man is named Smith?”

  “No,” Jerry laughed. “Better get out of here, Inspector.”

  When Peter retrieved his rental car, he sat looking straight ahead at the empty street. The crowd from the briefing had dispersed, but it was safer to abandon the area entirely. He turned the Subaru around and climbed randomly into an unfamiliar part of the grid until he found a deserted side avenue with a view of the sea.

  The street was dead quiet. He wasn’t in the mood he expected to be in. For one thing, he felt little interest in chewing over why he’d done it. He glanced down the hill at the Whittlesun rooftops and, although he spied no landmarks, he knew precisely where the Sunset Arms stood, and how to reach it by road. He had always been terrible with compass points, and this was some kind of progress, to have picked up a new spatial sensitivity at t
his late age. It gave him new confidence. He would drive back without employing the SatNav.

  He thought about his mother, long buried in the democratic City of London Cemetery. She never suffered fools; to his knowledge, his father had managed to avoid conversing with fools entirely. His father had been a barrister, and he valued the finiteness of the law, the closure that the legal process brought to every case. His mother taught, and she was the one with the dreamier, epic view. She talked about “the stages of man.” Humans passed through archetypal phases of awareness as they matured. (She taught adolescents English and biology, so Peter supposed she knew.) A boy started out optimistic, she said, with a faith that events were subsets of an epic mechanism, a rolling machine called society. Education was about placement of your experience in that epic context. Peter remembered her caution, though, that too many men and women gave up on the vision; their dreams stalled and dissipated with old age.

  For a career policeman, the tension between the epic and the ordinary was never settled. It wasn’t even a matter of balance. You lived with both or you went a bit crazy. You might tell yourself that the Rover was a grand villain, diabolical, a one-man schizophrenic cabal, who staged Arthurian farewells in the weathered stone fields of south Britain. But this predator, he believed, wouldn’t know a Tennyson lament from a Viking ritual from a sunrise ceremony at Stonehenge. He might be all the more dangerous for his game-playing, but his classical sensibility was shoddy. Killers — especially the ones who toyed with the authorities — often believed they invented murder. All they did was reinvent clichés, inviting the pursuing detective to sink into his nightmare of the sordid, the mundane and the disappointing. The Rover would stay one step ahead, until suddenly he wasn’t, and it would take the hard slogging of the police to set the trap.

  He gave Maris some credit for understanding this. The inspector had refused to buy into the epic crime spree of the predator. Peter hadn’t meant to undermine him with his sudden revelation; he wasn’t spiteful. It was a pity that he had had to do it, but there was one fugitive out there who did think in epic terms of crime and just punishment, of guilt and free conscience, of death and the need to affirm life.