The Fourth Victim

by John Mead

  Lukula nodded, though she was none too happy at Alima’s involvement, seemingly based on her being known to the chief, and glanced at Merry who still seemed preoccupied and unconcerned at the development.

  ‘Don’t worry, Julie,’ Swift continued, noting the expression Lukula had pulled and understanding her concerns, ‘Doctor Hassan will still rank as a civilian, she is there to advise and assist you not to direct you. I’ve sought advice over her role, as she has been Jenny’s therapist, however it’s clear that the ward doctor, under whose care she is currently, has the role of protecting her medical interests. If that person tells you to stop the interview on medical grounds, then do so, if Hassan suggests you stop then listen to her advice but it will be your call. You can bring her into the incident room but she shouldn’t be allowed to wander around freely. Does that clarify?’

  ‘Yes, thank you, sir,’ Julie smiled her appreciation, glad she worked for such a perceptive govenor.

  ‘That leaves us with Turner to deal with, CPS are pursuing the prosecution of Alan Turner for sexual assault. Ray and Matthew can you ensure everything is in order for that? As for the killing of his step-daughter evidence is at best circumstantial and his wife still confirms his alibi. However, I don’t want the pressure taken off even while we are looking at Cowan, admittedly she is a better fit currently, but it remains an open race and Turner is in the number two spot.’

  ‘An ideal position for the little shit,’ Rosen pointed out, causing groans of approval.

  ‘You mirror my own thoughts,’ Swift informed Rosen, in complete seriousness. ‘So, although I want you to pull up everything you can find on Cowan and pass it to Matthew, I want you to keep digging into Turner, his wife and brother as my gut tells me there is still more to be found on him.’ Again Swift paused, glancing around the incident room, knowing what he was about to say wasn’t going to motivate anyone.

  ‘As you know, in addition to the spate of local gang related stabbings the rest of the team are involved in, there has been a terrorist incident and now a race-hate attack, sparking fears of reprisals, all involving knives though the motivations are very different. The impact on resources across the Met is dire and manpower is stretched as thin as a gnat’s whisker. So I am asking Matthew to continually review his manpower needs to see if anyone can, even if only for a short and temporary period, be released for other duties. I’m sorry, I realise the effort everyone is putting in and that you will all want to see the case through but we no longer have that luxury.’ At least Swift had the decency to hang round for a few minutes, in case anyone had concerns they wanted to raise, though none did as they all knew what drove the job these days.

  Matthew had been in no mood to speak with Swift, he knew Jenny Cowan was a strong suspect but would be difficult to pin down, it would take time though a smaller team could still crack it. Too add to his concerns he’d had a message from family liaison informing him that Joanne Hensley was being trolled, with some very nasty and unfounded statements about her and her daughter now circulating on social media sites. Merry looked at the examples the officer had sent him, suggesting that Lynsey had been killed because of her and her mother jointly prostituting themselves. Merry contacted the Online Hate Crime Hub to see what could be done to track and stop the attacks, then contacted the family liaison officer to suggest they jointly visit Mrs Hensley.

  Given his recent indiscretions Merry hardly felt himself best placed to offer support to the dead girl’s mother but, as he still led the inquiry team, he wasn’t going to shirk this. He’d do his best to reassure Joanne Hensley that the team were still moving forward and that they wouldn’t tolerate the abuse she was receiving. For what little real good it would do. At least she still had the police on her side unlike Maureen Turner who probably felt the world was against her. One way or another, Merry thought, interviewing Jenny Cowan tomorrow would determine the course of the investigation and whether or not he owned up about his knowing Jackie or kept quiet. Whatever he did he’d keep Julie out of it, she’d done him a favour which he wouldn’t forget.

  Neither Merry nor Lukula felt at ease listening to Doctor Hassan’s briefing, adding to their woes was the fact that they had both dressed for a cold day and the hospital interior was sweltering hot. The doctor responsible for Jenny’s medical care had made himself known, told them he would check on his patient regularly and that she had a buzzer to signal any distress she felt, then disappeared again. Doctor Hassan’s list of dos and don’ts added to the officers’ growing frustrations.

  ‘This isn’t going to be much of an interrogation,’ Lukula muttered to Merry as they waited outside the room as Alima checked to see if Cowan was ready.

  Merry was taken aback as they were ushered in. Though propped up in the hospital bed, looking wan with her left arm bandaged, a drip attached to her right, looking thinner and with her hair pushed back, it was still unmistakably Jackie.

  ‘John, this is Detective Inspector Merry and Detective Sergeant Lukula,’ Alima spoke clearly, carefully pronouncing each word as if talking to a confused and slightly deaf elderly patient, despite the alert eyes that scanned the newcomers.

  ‘Good morning,’ Lukula began, ignoring what they had agreed as she was determined to take the initiative.

  ‘I’m not so certain of that, lass,’ John’s voice stunned them both, it was light but throaty with a pronounced Scottish accent, exuding a confidence totally at odds with the frail looking female in the bed. ‘First I wake to find myself in this place all cut about, then the police are here to speak with me. I assume your visit isn’t just a social call?’

  ‘No, John,’ Doctor Hassan retook the initiative as both Merry and Lukula seemed lost for words, ‘they are here to ask you some questions. Do you feel up to answering them?’

  ‘Fire away, I’m dying of curiosity to know what they want,’ John’s tone was not sarcastic though his eyes told a different story.

  ‘We are here to ask you some questions about three young women who have been killed,’ Lukula asked now feeling on familiar territory, quizzing a suspect. ‘We believe you know two of the women, Lynsey Hensley and Jody Grahame.’

  ‘Their names aren’t familiar,’ John was quick to answer.

  ‘They worked in a supermarket near the Berner Centre, you will have seen them there.’ Lukula was savvy enough to realise that it was Leanne and not John who worked with the girls.

  ‘I’m not one much for shopping, girlie,’ came the laughing response, whether it was a deliberately evasive response neither Lukula nor Merry could tell.

  ‘Do these help?’ Lukula asked, letting the ‘girlie’ go, passing him pictures of the three girls, ‘That is Lynsey, then Jody and finally Madeline Turner.’

  John studied each picture carefully, finally saying, ‘They are sweet young things, aren’t they. All dead you say, such a terrible thing, they have a look about them but no, I don’t know them.’

  ‘What do you mean by “a look about them”?’ Merry asked, causing Alima to scowl at his insistent tone.

  ‘Ah, the undertaker speaks,’ John stated, his eyes dancing with laughter though his visage was solemn enough. ‘I thought you were here to measure me for my coffin, Big Man. Tell me how did my arm get hurt?’

  ‘You cut yourself,’ Doctor Hassan smiled, pleased at John’s lucid responses. ‘Do you remember how?’

  For a moment John looked perplexed, then said, ‘I remember a hand holding mine and a knife, then nothing until I saw the girl in the water.’

  ‘A girl in the water?’ Lukula asked.

  ‘Yes, floating,’ John struggled with his memory, trying to pick out the details, ‘I’d clocked off work from the brewery, I was the nightwatchman, and I’d walked back to town past the ruined castle, past the train station and down by the loch. There was a policeman in the water, trying to lift the young girl, he was up to his knackers in the icy water and it must have been a painful
job.’

  ‘Where was this?’ Merry asked, interrupting and causing Alima’s eyes to signal he had broken the rules once more and should take more care.

  ‘As I told yeah,’ John pointed out a touch impatiently, ‘on my way home from work. The women were there: three hens cackling, clucking about the girl. “The poor thing,” they chattered, “it is no surprise, she was always trouble,” they crowed, “the slut deserved it,” they chirped. All three women were ever loving but never kind.’

  Merry and Lukula exchanged glances wondering what this meant, whilst Doctor Hassan suggested, ‘Is it a dream, John? Are you telling us about a dream?’

  ‘A dream, aye possibly, who knows,’ John mused. ‘A dream can seem like real life and real life a dream.’

  ‘The three women, John, are they the young women we showed you pictures of?’ Lukula asked, thinking she had worked out the puzzle. ‘Is that why you said they had “a look about them”?’

  ‘I don’t think so, the girls remind me of a girl I once knew,’ John explained, then smiled and added, ‘Or perhaps I just dreamt of her.’

  ‘Was there anyone else with the women, watching the policeman deal with the girl in the water?’ Merry asked, keeping his tone calm though his instinct was to be more aggressive and try to rattle the suspect.

  ‘A man,’ John paused and screwed up his eyes as if trying to focus on what he saw, ‘no, it was two men, one behind the other. An older man at the rear and a young tough at the front, both wearing black, in the shadows.’

  ‘Who is the girl in the water?’ but John shook his head, so Merry continued, ‘How did she get in the water, had someone hit her, with a hammer perhaps?’ John smiled and shrugged, he suddenly looked tired.

  ‘Do you own a hammer? We found one in your flat, wrapped in a Tesco bag,’ Lukula asked, sensing they didn’t have much time left with John,

  ‘It must be mine if it was in my flat,’ John yawned, struggling to stay awake.

  ‘Can you remember where you were on the…’ Lukula started to ask but got no further as John slumped to one side, then sat up looking dazed.

  ‘Where am I?’ the accent was gone, replaced by one more reminiscent of London, the voice wavering and hesitant and undoubtedly female, ‘My arm hurts. Who are you?’

  ‘Hello, do you remember me? I am Doctor Hassan,’ Alima said quietly, indicating to the officers to remain quiet.

  ‘Yes, of course, Doctor,’ Leanne said, only Leanne referred to Alima as ‘Doctor’. ‘What is happening?’

  Alima began to explain who Merry and Lukula were and why they were there and the two officers started to think they might get further on than they had expected. However, when Alima asked Leanne if she remembered how she had hurt her arm Leanne became agitated and started to cry. As if from nowhere the ward doctor appeared, and seeing how agitated his patient was told Merry and Lukula to leave, allowing Alima to stay as they both worked to calm Leanne.

  13

  Merry had phoned ahead and Swift met up with the trio at the Leman Street incident room. Alima was looking decidedly underwhelmed by the stale interior of the desolate sixties building but had impressed the others by telling them she owned an apartment in the modern glass encased tower block opposite, in Canter Way.

  ‘That must have set you back a bit?’ Rosen commented, he and Hayden were the only other members of the team present. The others, taking a break from the gruelling task of wading through the CCTV footage of the various locations they were reviewing, had gone with the admin team for a collective coffee break.

  ‘Proceeds from my book and lucrative consultancy fees cover it,’ Alima stated breezily, ‘but the views across the Tower of London and the Thames are worth every penny.’

  ‘I’d be happy to afford something under an hour’s drive from here,’ Rosen commented, without rancour, after all it was hardly the doctor’s fault that public sector pay was so poor.

  ‘How did things go?’ Swift called the meeting to order, thinking of his own apartment south of the river, although not in sight of the Thames and rather bijou it was convenient for work. However, his current partner was pushing for them to combine finances and find something more up-market.

  ‘Not good, though I’m not certain what we are judging it against,’ Merry explained, he’d made a few cryptic notes in the car on the way back and was looking them over as he spoke, his brow furrowed in thought. ‘We spoke with John, that was somewhat uncanny, close your eyes and you’d think of a middle-aged Scotsman, the affable sort you’d find propping up a bar somewhere. Open your eyes and you’d see a fay looking female staring back.’

  ‘It was disconcerting at first,’ Lukula agreed.

  ‘You’ll find you quickly get used to it,’ Alima reassured them, ‘just imagine yourself holding a conference call, where you are speaking with a group of people but only one person can answer at a time and you have to carefully keep track of who you are speaking with.’

  ‘How many changes of personality are we likely to have to deal with in each interview?’ Swift asked.

  ‘It’s hard to say,’ Alima admitted. ‘It will depend on who you start with and how hard you push. They will all have gaps in their memory so pushing them to remember things will always be a stressor. My therapy sessions tend to meander with one direct question then two or three general ones to ease back. It might pay us to rehearse a set of questions so the flow can be maintained without the pressure.’

  ‘Excellent idea,’ Swift agreed. ‘I can’t see things going forward much until we have a clear picture of what Jenny knows.’

  ‘I don’t understand why John seemed to remember another person’s hand on his during the suicide attempt,’ Merry commented, still pondering his notes.

  ‘I suspect he briefly started to emerge during the attempt and then quickly faded, so his recollections might be muddled,’ Alima reiterated, she had told him so in the car and was annoyed he’d raised it again here, ‘or it could have been when I was there and trying to bandage her arm. I’m still not certain who made the attempt, I’m most suspicious of Leanne but I didn’t get to question her that much, the ward doctor was concerned how agitated she was becoming. The fact is if I’d been able to work with her longer I believe she would have stabilised and we’d have made more headway.’ When a breakthrough came Doctor Hassan wanted no doubt in anyone’s mind that it was down to her intervention.

  ‘I still think that what John was trying to tell us in someway links the past with present,’ Merry stated, knowing Alima had taken a very different view in the car, dismissing John’s ramblings as ‘just a dream’.

  ‘How is that?’ Swift asked, noticing Lukula’s nod in agreement and Doctor Hassan shaking her head.

  ‘Jenny Cowan,’ Merry summarised the case notes that Rosen had pulled up, ‘was a vulnerable, blonde-haired, seventeen year old when she was attacked. Hit over the head and left for dead in an icy pool, within the grounds of the ruined Inverlochy castle. She was found and saved by a local policeman, in the wee small hours, on his way home from a night shift. There was no evidence of robbery nor sexual assault but, given her background and her strange ways, various possible motives for the attack were considered: was it a man she had been leading on, was she buying or selling drugs? The suspects they turned up all had alibis, including her brother who seems to be a nasty thug, and in the end the investigation petered out. Unlike our victims, but against all expectations, Jenny recovered. She was already thought a strange and wayward individual but her behaviour became even more erratic until her doctor had her sectioned. If this doesn’t ring any bells with our current case, then I don’t know what does?’

  Alima sat tight-lipped, annoyed but not saying anything as Merry spoke, she didn’t want Jenny’s past being dragged up, at least not like this, but then she decided to take a risk, ‘The connection is obvious, though I feel conflicted as Leanne’s therapist in pointing it ou
t.’

  ‘Which is what?’ Merry demanded, surprised Alima had conceded his point given how strongly she had so recently argued against it.

  ‘Although each of the personalities exist as separate individuals they will share a collective id,’ Doctor Hassan explained, feeling herself reassert control with each word she spoke. ‘It gives them all a common framework of references and understanding. So it is possible they all, or at least some of them, share some memories especially of traumatic events but they will see them from very different perspectives, possibly even as dreams.’ She paused realising she had lost her audience. ‘I believe John’s dream is how he perceived the attacks. The various elements of the dream are symbolic of what he witnessed, that one of the personalities is responsible for the killings.’

  ‘That is going to be difficult to record as evidence and put before a jury,’ Rosen commented before anyone else could speak, echoing the collective thought that this was too vague to constitute a lead.

  ‘This isn’t going to be a typical case,’ Swift ruefully stated, scowling at the thought of how things were going to bog down in the collective experts’ psycho-babble. ‘Matthew, can you and Doctor Hassan work on setting up a series of interviews, Cowan’s fingerprints on the bag are enough to justify her arrest.’

  ‘Can I suggest,’ for once Merry felt strongly enough about a line of inquiry to challenge his superior head on, ‘Julie and Hayden do that with Alima. It will take time for all parties to become settled with Jenny and her many personalities for anything productive to come out of the interviews and, frankly, I think female interviewers would be less intrusive. In the meantime I’d like to go to Fort William and get more background on Jenny Cowan’s case, along with the incident in Newcastle,’ Hayden nodded in agreement as she hadn’t had much response from the Newcastle force to her requests for information. ‘It would add weight and understanding to any motivation we put forward, otherwise we are relying a great deal just on the Tesco bag evidence and her own muddled testimony.’