When the Evil Waits

by M J Lee

  She sat on the bed.

  He remained standing – there weren’t any chairs.

  ‘It’s Mrs Irene Carsley, is that correct?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘It’s Irene McMurdo. I’ve reverted to my maiden name. I prefer to use that.’

  ‘OK. Can I call you Irene?’

  ‘You can call me whatever you want.’

  Ridpath could see the woman was trying to put on a brave front, but the fact her hands were shaking gave away the shallowness of the pretence.

  ‘As I said, I’m seconded to the Coroner’s Office…’

  ‘You’ve come about David?’ she interrupted.

  ‘I’m sorry for your loss.’

  She brushed back the lanky ring of hair from her eyes. For the first time, Ridpath could see the pain in them as they darted from left to right, red-rimmed and swollen.

  ‘Who could do that to him? He was such a bonny, wee bairn. Always happy, never cried.’

  ‘That’s what we will find out, Mrs— I mean Ms McMurdo.’

  ‘David wouldn’t hurt a thistle. He was such a good little boy.’ Her voice began to break.

  Sitting there alone on the bed, Ridpath could sense her loneliness, the terrible isolation, but at this moment, he had a job to do. ‘When was the last time you saw David?’

  The eyes stopped moving for a second as she thought. ‘About a week ago. I used to send them a text and meet them in the park. I couldn’t go back to the house, he would have killed me.’

  ‘Who would have killed you?’

  ‘Michael, who else? That’s why I left. I couldnae stand it any more.’

  Ridpath would circle back to that later. For now, he wanted to stay focused. ‘You didn’t text that day?’

  She shook her head. ‘I was at work, I couldn’t go that day.’

  He took out his notebook. ‘Where do you work?’

  ‘At Greggs.’ She laughed as if remembering something. ‘Daniel and David always joked that I smelt like a sausage roll.’ The voice trailed away and she stared into the distance.

  ‘Daniel, what’s he like?’

  ‘Loves his sports, does Daniel. Not one for his learning but loves his football and his basketball. He plays that a lot, tall for his age.’ Then she looked at him directly for the first time. ‘I had to leave them both, though. I couldnae take it any longer.’ She repeated the last line like a mantra.

  ‘Mr Carsley?’

  She nodded. ‘We were rowing all the time.’

  ‘What about?’

  ‘Money. Always money. He was on a zero-hours contract at the warehouse so we never knew whether he would be working or not. And then he was laid off right at the beginning of the lockdown. In early April, I packed my case and I left…’ She began to weep silently, ‘…leaving the boys behind. I’ll never see them again.’ She lifted her head to stare at him again. ‘Why didn’t he take me instead of David?’

  Survivor guilt, Ridpath understood it so well. You were left behind all alone when they died, like standing on a platform when a train pulls out of the station, knowing you will never see somebody ever again.

  ‘Have you been to see a counsellor, Irene?’

  She shook her head. ‘I’ve seen my GP, he gave me some tablets. Can’t afford counsellors. And anyway, how are they going to help me? It’s my fault all this happened. If I’d been there…’ Once again, her voice trailed.

  ‘They can help you understand and cope with this difficult time. Here’s my card, if you give me your phone number, I’ll message you some free contacts who will be able to give you advice and counselling.’

  She took the card but didn’t reach for her phone. Instead she seemed to be staring off into the distance again.

  Ridpath followed her eyes. A picture of the two brothers was on the table next to the sink. There was nothing else there.

  Ridpath had to do his job. ‘On the day that David disappeared, Irene, where were you?’

  ‘That’s what the other copper asked.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Turnbull, he said his name was, accused me of kidnapping my own children. Can you imagine? He said I’d kidnapped David.’

  ‘Sometimes, we have to ask questions, it’s just part of the job.’

  ‘But to accuse me of kidnapping and killing my own son?’

  Ridpath couldn’t justify Turnbull’s questions so he didn’t try. ‘You haven’t told me yet, where were you at about 1.30 p.m. on 21 July?’

  ‘Where I always am at that time. At work in Greggs.’

  ‘Can anybody confirm that?’

  ‘Well, there’s my manager and Doris who I work with, plus a couple of hundred customers I served. It’s our busiest time and there’s a construction site next door. Is that enough for you? It was for the other polis.’

  ‘Sorry, we have to ask.’ He closed his notebook. ‘Thank you for your time, Ms McMurdo. Would you like me to get the undertaker to contact you regarding David’s funeral?’

  She suddenly became extremely frightened, her bottom lip trembling as she spoke. ‘I couldn’t go, he’d be there.’

  ‘Don’t worry, we could make arrangements to ensure you were protected.’

  ‘You don’t understand, he’d see me.’

  ‘Who’d see you?’

  ‘Michael.’

  ‘But we’d make sure you were protected. I promise he wouldn’t be able to touch you.’

  ‘You don’t understand…’

  ‘What don’t I understand?’

  ‘He’s evil, evil.’

  Chapter 36

  A little over three hours later and Emily was done.

  By the time she cycled back to Police HQ, her hands were stiff, her legs were knackered and her bike had developed a slow puncture. She would have to leave it there for the night and grab a cab home.

  Nobody was going to nick her bike at Manchester’s Police HQ, were they? She’d better lock it up securely, just in case.

  At least now, the roads around Wythenshawe Park on her Manchester A–Z were neatly coloured in purple with the positions of possible CCTV locations marked on the map in red. Luckily the area was mainly residential, with only a few shopping areas or restaurants. And being a former council estate, it still wasn’t too wealthy, so CCTV on houses wasn’t so common. Still, she now had a list of fourteen cameras on retail shops and a school, plus six cameras placed on the outside walls of houses. She would concentrate on the shops where she had seen CCTV, before checking the houses.

  Back on the MIT floor, Chrissy was still at her desk, as were a few of the other detectives. Turnbull wasn’t there, though.

  ‘Hiya, Chrissy, still here?’

  The police research officer leant forward and whispered, ‘Still doing Ridpath’s stuff. Why are you here?’

  ‘The same. What’s the file number for the list of CCTV cameras checked in the investigation?’

  ‘I’ll dig it out and send it to you.’

  Emily Parkinson returned to her desk, taking off her jacket and cracking her knuckles. The building air con was off and the room had that stale smell of unwashed policeman.

  She switched on her computer and logged on. Chrissy had already sent her the file number, so she searched for it on the server, pulling it up.

  Turnbull’s team had been diligent. They had used the house-to-house teams to log any CCTV but had only reviewed the main cameras on the roads and some of the cameras on the shops.

  She checked the list against her log of cameras and found they’d missed an ATM in a convenience store, a camera in a chippy and one of the school’s cameras, and they hadn’t picked up any of the house cameras. Perhaps they were briefed to ignore those.

  She heard a cough as a shadow arched over her.

  It was Turnbull. What was he doing here this late?

  She clicked off the page she was looking at and closed the A–Z as he walked round to her side of the desk.

  ‘Still here, Emily? Claire Trent has you
working late.’

  ‘Nearly finished, boss. It’s real no-brainer stuff. Tedious.’

  She crossed her fingers, hoping he wouldn’t look at her screen.

  ‘Nothing is tedious if it helps solve a crime. What are you working on?’

  He leant in to check her screen. As he did, she could smell his eau de cologne – it was a heavy, woody smell, like the air after bonfire night.

  Luckily, her screen now displayed a long list of map coordinates and numbers.

  ‘She’s got me logging CCTV locations, boss. She’s been asked to provide an up-to-date assessment for the ACC.’

  He stretched his neck, turning his head as he did so. ‘You’re right, it is tedious. You’d better be off home, though, it’s been a long day.’

  ‘Just going, boss,’ she said, logging off her computer.

  ‘You need to let me know what you’re working on in future, Emily. I checked the log sheets and there’s nothing down.’

  ‘Sorry, boss, forgot to do the time sheet.’

  ‘Don’t forget to do them, they’re important. They allow us to see which detectives are busy and which ones are no longer needed in the organisation. They are telling me we’re overstaffed at the moment.’

  ‘Who’s they, boss?’

  He pointed up towards the ceiling. ‘Always looking for savings, aren’t they. So do let me know what you’re doing, won’t you?’

  ‘Of course,’ she said brightly.

  He turned and sauntered back to the office.

  The man was a total arse, thought Emily, but an arse who held her future in his hands. ‘I hope Ridpath knows what he’s doing,’ she said out loud.

  Chapter 37

  After interviewing Irene McMurdo, Ridpath returned home to his empty house. Polly was nowhere to be seen. Or heard. Or felt.

  He made himself a sandwich and sat down to FaceTime Eve.

  ‘Hiya, Dad,’ she whispered.

  ‘Sorry I missed you last night, I was working.’

  ‘I guessed,’ she whispered again.

  ‘Can you speak up? I can hardly hear you.’

  ‘I don’t want Paw Paw to hear. She thinks I’m asleep.’

  Ridpath checked the clock. Where had the time gone?

  He had walked the streets after the interview, going over the case again and again in his mind, her final words echoing in his head. ‘He’s evil, evil.’

  ‘I’ll call you tomorrow.’

  ‘No, no… Dad, let’s talk now, she won’t mind.’ A pause while she checked her bedroom door. ‘I got your message last night. Sounds like you’re busy.’

  ‘I am. This case, it’s full of problems.’

  ‘I know you can’t tell me, but I hope you find him, the man who did it. I spoke with my friends and they’re all scared.’

  ‘Tell them to be careful at the moment. Don’t talk to strangers and definitely don’t accept lifts from strangers. And always stick together, don’t go off on your own.’

  ‘You sound worried, Dad.’

  Ridpath thought of the criminal profiler’s report. ‘Just be careful, OK?’

  ‘Will do, I’ll tell my friends. Have you thought about what we talked about?’

  Ridpath tried to remember. ‘Yes,’ he answered noncommittally.

  ‘And?’

  ‘And I need more time to think.’

  ‘Dad, I need to move back home soon. Granny is driving me crazy. She wouldn’t let me go out tonight to meet my friends. All she says is “Bad men, bad men”, over and over again. I can’t take it any more.’

  ‘You can come home soon, dear, as soon as I finish this case.’

  ‘You promise?’

  Ridpath closed his eyes. Could he promise his daughter? Or would he let her down again? ‘I promise,’ he finally said.

  A deep, commanding voice from the screen. Eve raised her head and spoke Cantonese. ‘Ho lah, ho lah. Ngo jiu fan gau lah.’

  He always loved it that his daughter could switch languages so easily.

  ‘I have to go to sleep now, Dad, orders from the Granny Dragon.’

  ‘OK, sleep tight, sweet pea.’

  ‘Remember your promise, Dad. When the case is over, I can move to live with you.’

  ‘I remember, Eve. Sleep well and take care.’

  The screen faded to black.

  Ridpath was left alone in the apartment. On the wall above the television a clock ticked loudly, counting down the hours. Outside the window, Manchester was quiet as the last rays of summer sank beneath the rooftops.

  Ridpath rubbed his eyes. He knew he couldn’t break his promise to her again.

  Not again.

  Chapter 38

  He wanted to go hunting again.

  He needed to go hunting again.

  They were talking to him, the voices from the cellar.

  It was time to hurt the boys again.

  He hummed his little ditty as he prepared his mother’s cocoa, adding the diazepam to sweeten it.

  One day soon, she could sleep forever.

  Sleeping Beauty or Sleeping Ugly?

  He knew which he would pick.

  On the Fourth Day

  Friday, August 7

  Chapter 39

  They met at the Coroner’s Court the following morning.

  Chrissy was late as usual, but still wearing her City scarf, while Emily Parkinson had used her own car to drive to Stockfield. Her aching legs couldn’t pedal another yard.

  ‘Right, Emily, why don’t you start?’

  ‘I biked around the area near the park looking for CCTV and found quite a lot. I then cross-referenced the locations with those already checked by Turnbull’s team…’

  ‘And?’

  ‘There are a few his team didn’t find. I’ll visit them after this meeting.’

  ‘Great. We need some CCTV, Em.’

  ‘The techies are working on Daniel’s phone to give us location timings. They should get back to me soon.’

  ‘Even better, well done.’

  ‘You owe me a new pair of calves, Ridpath.’

  ‘Sorry, but it had to be done. Did you check the interviews with the fairground people yet?’

  ‘Sorry, no time, I’ll do it when I go back to HQ.’

  Ridpath nodded and thought for a moment before saying, ‘Yesterday, we had a chat with Michael Carsley and the boy, Daniel. It strikes me there was something they were both hiding.’

  ‘What do you think it was?’ asked Chrissy.

  ‘I don’t know, but Mrs Carsley – Irene McMurdo as she calls herself now – was scared of Carsley. So scared she didn’t want to go to her own child’s funeral. Chrissy, did you check up on him? Anything in his past.’

  ‘I got onto a friend at Police Scotland. Apparently, three years ago, Carsley was charged with assaulting his line manager at a warehouse in Falkirk. Eventually, the line manager withdrew the complaint and the Scottish Procurator Fiscal decided not to press ahead with the court case.’

  ‘Wasn’t that before the family moved to Manchester?’

  ‘It was. Hang on, there’s more. Two incidents of police being called to the Carsleys’ on account of domestics. Neighbours filed a complaint about noise. When the police got there they both accused each other of assault. Nobody was arrested but Michael Carsley was cautioned.’

  ‘So let me get this straight, both complained about each other?’

  ‘That seems to be it. He was issued with a formal warning over his behaviour the second time.’

  ‘Sounds like there was a pretty toxic atmosphere in that household,’ said Emily.

  ‘What a place for kids to grow up.’

  Ridpath remembered Mrs Challinor’s words about not judging a situation until he knew everything. ‘We need to find out more, Chrissy. See if you can talk to any of the coppers involved in the call-out.’

  ‘They probably won’t remember, Ridpath.’

  ‘Have a go anyway.’

  Chrissie made a note on her to-do list.

 
‘As I said, I met Mrs Carsley last night.’

  ‘How is she?’

  ‘Fragile. Scared. Guilt-ridden. Blaming herself for what happened to her son. An emotion not helped by her interview with Turnbull.’

  ‘I know the feeling,’ said Emily. ‘Is she at risk?’

  ‘I don’t know, but she needs help.’

  ‘When I was the FLO, I met the social worker looking after the family. I’ll give her a head’s up.’

  ‘Good,’ Ridpath let out a long sigh, ‘but not a lot of progress on my end, I’m afraid. After this meeting, I want to go to Chorlton Ees and check out the area where the body was deposited. There’s a reason David Carsley was left in that particular area, we just don’t know what it is yet.’

  ‘I don’t think Turnbull is even asking himself the question,’ said Chrissy. ‘I went to the case briefing yesterday. They’re stuck and lacking ideas. They’ve got nothing at the moment. Everything has turned into a dead end. The only thing new is the witness, Jon Morgan, told him there was somebody else with him when he discovered the body.’

  ‘Shirley Burgess.’

  ‘How did you know? Turnbull’s spitting nails, ready to throw the book at him, but I don’t think he will. Too much at stake, not least to Turnbull’s reputation. So now the mysterious woman is no longer part of the investigation and they have nothing.’

  ‘It makes our work even more important,’ said Ridpath. ‘How did you get on, Chrissy?’

  ‘Other than checking up on the Carsleys in Scotland, I found your Peter Davies. He’s a lorry driver who went away to Poland on the day of the abduction. I checked with Customs and Excise and they confirmed he passed through Dover on the 21 July. He’s back tomorrow so I left a message asking him to go to Wythenshawe police station and make a statement.’

  ‘He’s not our killer?’ asked Emily.

  Chrissy shook her head. ‘Not according to Customs and Excise.’

  Ridpath interrupted. ‘How did you get on with Liverpool?’

  ‘I called them and talked with the SIO on the murder of the boy. He’s still convinced they’ve got the killer in custody, but he sent me over the case file and the autopsy report. It confirms the MO was different, Ridpath.’