The Jackdaw

by Luke Delaney

  ‘That’s right,’ Griffith agreed again, his eyes still darting around the room, his voice never changing from simple anxiety, his body still restless, his complete lack of reaction to the inference in Sean’s question that he’d possibly acted strangely in coming home before calling the police instantly satisfying Sean that he was in no way involved in Georgina’s disappearance. ‘A lot of people in my office know Georgina. She used to work there. It’s how we met, so I immediately asked them to call the police while I came straight home. I had to be sure, you see … be sure she wasn’t here. I know – stupid isn’t it – but for some reason I just had to know for sure it was Georgie on Your View and not somehow, someone else. I suppose that makes me a bad person, doesn’t it – wishing this on someone else?’

  ‘It’s not unusual,’ Anna spoke for the first time. ‘In a situation as rare and traumatic as this it’s perfectly normal to want to be absolutely sure what you think is true, is true. It helps us to accept and deal with the reality of the situation.’

  ‘You sound like you know a lot about it,’ Griffith told her, almost managing a slight smile. ‘Amazing what they teach you cops these days.’

  ‘It is indeed,’ Anna told him, drawing a look of quiet disapproval from Sean.

  ‘So you noticed her running shoes were missing.’ He tried to get Griffith back on track. ‘Then what did you do?’

  ‘Like I said – I called the police.’

  ‘Without checking to see if any of her other running gear was missing?’

  ‘That would’ve been pointless,’ Griffith told him. ‘Georgina buys so much running gear it’d be impossible to tell what if anything was missing. Besides, the coat she left for work in, her handbag, her laptop, was all here, on the kitchen table, where she always dumps it, but not her phone. She takes it with her, to listen to music when she runs and for calls and timing herself. So she had to have gone for a run.’

  ‘Yes,’ Sean agreed. ‘And you said she usually runs in a park not far from here called South Park?’

  ‘Yeah,’ Griffith answered. ‘It’s just the other side of the King’s Road, at the end of Peterborough Road.’

  ‘Does she ever run anywhere else?’

  ‘Sure, maybe, but not very often. The park’s her favourite.’

  You snatched her from the park, didn’t you? Sean spoke silently inside his mind. It had to be the park because that’s where you knew she’d go and you knew she ran there because you’d watched her – learnt her routines. But did you follow her from her work or did you wait outside her house and then follow her? Or maybe you took the chance you’d just get lucky and waited for her in the park. No, you didn’t follow her from her work – there was no need once you knew where she lived. And you wouldn’t wait for her in the park unless you knew she was coming, because you plan too tight for that. No, you waited for her outside her flat and then when you were sure she was going running you drove ahead of her and waited for her in the park. I know you better and better, my friend.

  ‘Sean,’ Anna broke through to him. ‘You all right?’

  ‘Yeah. I’m fine.’ He quickly turned back to Griffith. ‘Have you noticed anyone hanging around your flat? Has Georgina mentioned noticing anything like that?’

  ‘No,’ Griffith told him with certainty. ‘Nothing.’

  ‘What about a vehicle, specifically a white panel van, but he could have been using any vehicle.’

  Griffith’s eyes widened. ‘Wait a minute. You think he’s been watching her … planning this. Oh my God. You do, don’t you?’

  ‘I have to consider it,’ Sean told him flatly. ‘Today may have been the first time he’d ever seen Georgina, but I have to consider the possibility he watched her.’

  ‘How long for?’ Griffith asked. ‘How long has he been watching her … us for?’

  Sean sighed, realizing Griffith was too smart to string along. ‘I don’t know for sure – days at least.’

  ‘Jesus Christ,’ Griffith exclaimed. ‘We’re going to have to sell the flat – move out of London, even if she’s still …’ he choked up.

  ‘She’s still alive,’ Sean promised. ‘I know she is. We have every police officer in London and the southeast looking for her.’

  ‘It fits his profile,’ Anna explained. ‘We really are as sure as we can be she’s still alive.’

  ‘Please, God, I hope you’re right.’

  ‘We’ll find her,’ Anna tried to reassure him, ‘and she’ll heal. With support she’ll get past this.’

  ‘So you haven’t noticed any vehicles hanging around?’ Sean got back to the questioning.

  ‘No,’ Griffith answered. ‘Not that I’ve been looking, but I will be in the future, every damn day of my life.’

  ‘Was anything happening at her work,’ Sean continued, ‘or in her social life or family life – anything at all?’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘An ex-boyfriend, family feud, a problem with someone at work?’

  ‘No. No,’ Griffith insisted. ‘Georgina’s from a normal family, gets on well with everyone at work. No, nothing.’

  ‘And ex-boyfriend?’

  ‘Well, if she was having trouble with an ex she didn’t mention it to me, but look … I mean, what’s the point? We know who’s taken her – that lunatic the papers are calling the Your View Killer. Ex-boyfriends, trouble at work – I don’t see how any of that could be relevant.’

  ‘Just want to check everything,’ Sean told him.

  ‘I understand, but shouldn’t you just concentrate on this psychopath?’

  ‘Sometimes,’ Sean explained, ‘not everything is as it appears.’

  Griffith threw his arms open, a little exasperated. ‘You’d know more about that than me.’

  ‘Well,’ Sean said as he stretched out of his chair and stood, Anna copying his movement, ‘if you think of anything, let me know.’ He slipped a business card from his wallet and dropped it on the glass coffee table. ‘I need to go and check out the park she may have been taken from.’ He felt his phone vibrating in his pocket and pulled it free. It was Donnelly. ‘Dave.’

  ‘Guv’nor,’ Donnelly told him. ‘We’ve found the victim.’

  Sean turned away from Anna and Griffith, as if that would somehow stop them hearing his conversation. ‘Where?’

  ‘Wandering around Putney Heath. Someone out jogging stumbled across her and called the police.’

  ‘Where is she now?’ he asked as his heart rate continued to increase. What answers would Georgina Vaughan have – knowingly or otherwise? What had she seen? What forensic evidence clung to her body and clothes?

  ‘You’ve found her?’ Griffith interrupted. ‘Is she alive? Is she all right?’

  Sean held his hand up to silence him. ‘Queen Mary’s Hospital in Roehampton,’ Donnelly told him. ‘I’ve asked Maggie and Al to go and see her.’

  ‘No,’ Sean told him. ‘I’ll go myself.’

  ‘You sure?’ Donnelly asked.

  ‘Yeah. I’ll take Anna with me. What about where she was found?’

  ‘Locals have got the area taped off and forensics are on the way.’

  ‘OK, good. Keep me informed,’ he told him and went to hang up before Donnelly stopped him.

  ‘Guv’nor – there’s something else you should know. When she was found her hands were tied behind her back, her mouth was taped shut and her naked chest was still exposed.’

  Sean said nothing for a few seconds, his mind whirling with the facts he was being told. ‘Was she blindfolded?’ he eventually asked.

  ‘No,’ Donnelly answered. ‘Why d’you ask?’

  You didn’t blindfold her because you wanted her to see her humiliation – wanted her suffering to last. ‘No reason,’ he lied, not yet ready to share his gathering storm of thoughts with anyone else, as if sharing them might somehow weaken his growing connection to the Your View Killer. ‘Try and get the local CID and uniforms to canvass the area around the heath, see if anyone saw the drop-off and check for CCTV –
we might get lucky.’

  ‘OK,’ Donnelly agreed. Sean hung up and turned back to Anna and Griffith.

  ‘Please,’ Griffith pleaded, his voice shaking and his eyes increasingly reddening. ‘No matter what, I need to know.’

  ‘She’s alive,’ Sean told him, ‘and doesn’t appear to have suffered any additional injuries. She’s been taken to hospital in Roehampton. As soon as I leave here I’m going to see her.’

  ‘Then I’m coming too,’ Griffith told him. ‘I need to see her.’

  ‘Of course,’ Sean told her. ‘I’ll get a local CID unit to take you.’

  ‘Can’t I just come with you? I mean, wouldn’t it be easier?’

  Sean cringed inside at the idea of being trapped in a car for God knows how long with a desperate boyfriend of a victim he was yet to see.

  ‘Unfortunately not,’ he half lied. ‘I need to make a lot of confidential calls en route – things you’re not supposed to hear. Sorry, but we’ll make sure you get to the hospital as quickly as possible.’

  ‘Should I just get a cab? Would it be quicker?’

  ‘Your choice,’ Sean told him, eager to be on his way. ‘Just don’t try to drive yourself, and you should probably pack a suitcase for yourself and Georgina – stay away from this flat for a while. Go stay with friends or family for a bit, until things settle down. Just let me know where you are.’

  ‘My God. D’you think he could still be watching us?’ Griffith asked.

  ‘No,’ Sean told him. ‘Not him, anyway.’

  ‘Then who?’

  ‘Reporters, Mr Griffith,’ Sean told him. ‘Reporters.’

  Donnelly sat on the side of DC Paulo Zukov’s desk and waited for him to finish on the phone. Zukov soon hung up and turned his head towards him.

  ‘Got something that needs my particular skill set, have you?’

  ‘I didn’t realize you had a skill, let alone a set of them,’ Donnelly cut him down, continuing to talk before Zukov could think of a reply, ‘and I hope you weren’t wasting the Commissioner’s cash using a police phone to call your boyfriend.’

  ‘I’m as heterosexual as the next man,’ Zukov told him. ‘Not that there’s anything wrong with being gay. We are an equal opportunities employer, you know.’

  ‘Save the political correctness for your sergeants’ board, son,’ Donnelly mocked him. ‘Right now I need you to get over to Putney Heath, relieve the local CID and make sure the forensics do what they gotta do. Take someone with you if you need to.’

  Zukov sighed dramatically. ‘I suppose I’ll be stuck there all night,’ he complained.

  ‘You’re a single man,’ Donnelly pointed out, ‘no wife, no kids. What do you want to rush home to? Think of the overtime you can waste on wine and women.’

  ‘Normally that’s exactly what I do,’ Zukov explained, ‘but …’

  ‘But what?’

  ‘But we’ve got the Toy Taker trial starting this week,’ Zukov continued. ‘If I’m called to the Bailey to give evidence I’d rather not be falling asleep in the witness box.’

  ‘You young pups are getting soft,’ Donnelly moaned. ‘Being knackered comes with the territory, son, and who d’you think you are, referring to it as “the Toy Taker trial” – some kind of tabloid journalist? It’s the Douglas Allen trial to you, sunshine.’

  ‘Yeah, well it’s not just me that’s not happy about it. Half the team’s been complaining.’

  ‘Oh aye?’

  ‘Yeah. They should have left us alone until the trial was over. It’s pushing it too far running a new investigation and the trial at the same time. Way too far.’

  ‘Aye, well,’ Donnelly fixed him with his most intimidating look, ‘I’ll be sure to share your concerns with Assistant Commissioner Addis when I next run into him. I’m sure you’ll enjoy directing traffic in Barnet. Don’t forget to shine your boots.’

  ‘Ha, ha,’ Zukov answered, ‘but it won’t be me directing traffic if the trial goes tits-up.’

  ‘Really? Then you must have forgotten that shit rolls downhill,’ Donnelly reminded him.

  ‘Not this time,’ Zukov replied with a grin. ‘Addis doesn’t care about the likes of me – doesn’t even know we exist. It’s bigger heads he’ll want on his trophy wall.’

  ‘You know what?’ Donnelly told him.

  ‘No. What?’ Zukov walked into the trap.

  ‘I liked you better when you didn’t think too much.’ The grin slipped from Zukov’s face. ‘Now get yourself over to Putney and sort out the locals before I put you on permanent door-to-door inquiries.’ Donnelly gave him a victory wink and headed back to his own office. He might have wiped the smile off Zukov’s face, but it didn’t alter the fact he’d been speaking the truth.

  Sean and Anna drove along Roehampton Lane on the fringe of southwest London before it turned into Surrey. The area couldn’t have been more different to the other districts that surrounded Richmond Park. Putney, Richmond, Sheen were all wealthy areas, but Roehampton remained an un-gentrified and intimidating place – hideous tower block after hideous tower block infested the skyline as boarded-up shops and cheap, non-franchise takeaway food outlets dominated the local retail businesses. People wandered around like outcasts, the uneducated rejects from a superior society that had exiled them to this strange kind of living hell – hooded gangs of teenagers a plague on the streets as chain-smoking underage girls tried to impress the local gang members by wearing as little as possible.

  Sean soaked it all in. ‘Jesus,’ he muttered. ‘What a fucking dump.’ Anna didn’t answer.

  A couple of minutes later he pulled into the huge, virtually empty outside car park that serviced both visitors and staff at the hospital. He had little trouble getting a space relatively close to the entrance, parked and climbed from the car, stretching his stiff muscles. It had already been a very long day. Anna came round to his side.

  ‘Shall we?’ she asked, looking over to the large, brightly lit building ahead of them.

  ‘Strange how things turn out.’ Sean stopped her.

  ‘What do you mean?’ she asked

  ‘The first murder case I was ever involved with was connected to Putney Heath,’ he explained.

  ‘Christopher Richards, I remember. Where you developed your dislike and distrust of us meddling psychiatrists and criminologists.’

  Sean began to walk towards the entrance, Anna struggling to keep up.

  ‘It’s an interesting coincidence that Georgina Vaughan was dropped off there.’

  ‘Go on,’ he answered without slowing or looking at her.

  ‘It was just maybe he knows. I mean, the man we’re looking for – maybe he knows.’

  ‘Knows what? That my first case was connected to another murder that happened off Putney Heath. I don’t see how. I was just a PC at the time, on attachment.’

  ‘You were more involved than that,’ she argued.

  ‘Maybe, but the only people who’d know about it are other police. You trying to make me paranoid?’

  ‘Just seemed a little strange, that’s all.’

  They walked through the main entrance of the modern glass building and headed straight for the reception where an elderly woman in civilian clothes was manning the desk, smiling as they approached, no doubt glad for something to do.

  ‘Hello. How can I help you?’ she asked in her strong London accent. Sean held out his warrant card.

  ‘DI Corrigan, Metropolitan Police.’ The elderly woman’s smile fell away quickly. ‘You had a woman brought in through casualty earlier this evening, name of Georgina Vaughan. Can you tell us where she is now?’

  ‘Of course,’ the woman answered, instantly typing the information into the hospital computer system. ‘She was treated for minor wounds and shock and moved to a private room off the Gwynne Holford ward. Take the lift to the second floor and then just follow the green line on the floor.’ Sean knew the coloured lines on the floor system well enough, having been in more hospitals than he cared to remember.r />
  ‘Thanks,’ he told her, moving away before the woman stopped him.

  ‘You’ll have to get permission from the ward sister to see her first though,’ she told him.

  ‘Of course,’ Sean answered. ‘Not here to step on anyone’s toes.’ He managed a smile and headed to the lifts. Anna waited until they were inside before speaking.

  ‘Strange. She never asked who I was.’

  ‘No,’ Sean said, ‘but the ward sister probably will, so what you gonna tell her?’

  ‘I’m going to tell her the truth,’ Anna answered. ‘That I’m a psychiatrist employed by the police to check on the victim’s psychological injuries.’

  ‘Which is not exactly the truth, is it?’ Sean pointed out.

  ‘Must be working with you too much,’ Anna teased him. ‘Beginning to lose my moral compass.’

  ‘I may not always do the right thing,’ Sean explained, ‘but it’s always for the right reason.’

  ‘To get the bad guy locked up?’

  ‘If you like.’ The lift door slid open and Sean instinctively looked down and picked up the green line on the floor, walking without waiting for Anna, who almost broke into a jog to catch up.

  ‘And about what I mentioned before?’ she pursued.

  ‘About the man I’m after somehow knowing the first murder I investigated was connected to one in Putney Heath? I don’t think so. Just a coincidence.’

  ‘Aren’t you even going to consider it?’

  ‘No,’ Sean snapped at her. ‘That’s the plot of a film you’re talking about, not reality. Criminals don’t go after cops or try to torment them. It’s a coincidence, nothing more. If you’re going to help me with this investigation best you stay in the real world.’ Anna was about to argue, but Sean had already veered away, following the green line seemingly without looking, heading through a set of swing doors before arriving at another set that were locked. He grabbed the handles and rattled the doors to be sure before cursing. ‘Shit. Locked. We’ll have to rely on someone answering the intercom now.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘So, in my experience of getting anyone in a hospital to answer an intercom we could be here all bloody night.’ He shrugged his shoulders in surrender. ‘Still …’ he told her and pressed the intercom button long and hard. After more than a minute there was still no answer so he pressed the button again, this time keeping it pressed until the face of a middle-aged African woman appeared on the other side of the wire mesh window, her eyes asking all the questions as she looked at them suspiciously. Sean pressed his warrant card to the window and spoke loudly enough for her to hear through the door. ‘Police.’ After a few more seconds of staring at them the woman opened the door and spoke in a heavy West African accent, her nurse’s uniform visible now.