by Nick Louth
‘So what about William Mordant? Do you believe he can be rehabilitated? Or do you believe he is merely manipulating us all to obtain easier conditions for himself?’
‘The short answer is: I don’t know. Our professional staff have a variety of opinions. But only he really knows. We do know that he is a highly intelligent, highly manipulative individual who has from his record shown no compunction whatever in killing when it suited his needs. Having said that, his behaviour here is, or seems to have been, nothing short of impeccable.’
‘What was his actual crime?’
Lamb sighed and levelled his gaze at her. ‘The privacy of our patients is very important. We are really not allowed to discuss their medical history, which in most cases would also include their interactions with the criminal justice system. Details of Mordant’s case are, uniquely, not in the public domain, unlike those of most of our more notorious clients. Indeed, in his case even I am not privy to the full details. However, seeing as you are about to meet him, I think it would only be fair to let you know exactly what you are dealing with before you decide to go ahead with this project.’
Lamb stood, walked over to his office door and locked it, then knelt by a small safe. He fiddled with the combination lock, opened the steel door, and brought out a thin A4 envelope.
‘None of my staff have seen this. I will deny that I have ever shown it to you, and can only permit you a brief glimpse.’ He passed it across to her. She opened the envelope, which was unsealed. Inside was a poor quality photocopy of a court document, stamped Ministry of Justice: restricted and countersigned by an official in 2007. Whole sections of the original seemed to have been blacked out by marker pen. Shorter redactions seemed, from their context, to be names, addresses, ages and descriptions. Anything that might identify those involved.
‘It doesn’t look like you are supposed to have this,’ she said.
‘Normally I get full details. But in this case I got a fairly useless summary. I absolutely wasn’t having that, and had to go right to the top of the department before the MOJ would reveal even this. They still won’t tell me why. As you will see, it’s still well short of the full story.’
The baroness flicked through until she saw a section highlighted in the margin, part of the judge’s summing up. Then she began to read. As she did so, an icy chill slid down the back of her head and neck. Her hand went to her mouth involuntarily as she absorbed the sparse but grisly details, a horrifying nightmare of crimes committed by this man. In the end she pushed it away. ‘I’ve never in my life read anything like this.’
‘Neither had I. And believe me, I have seen most things.’
Lamb took back the sheet and returned it in the envelope to the safe. ‘Do you still want to go ahead?’
There was a long silence. ‘Yes, I do.’
‘Alright, just a few more things. I take it that security have all your personal belongings and so forth? It is very important, particularly with this patient, that you don’t discuss any personal information: where you live, your phone number, names or locations of relatives, or anything that could be used to track you down or put you or them at risk. Do not show him any document or image you wouldn’t be happy for him to keep.’
‘He won’t try to take…’
‘No, I mean he has an eidetic memory. He can visualise and retain anything you show him, to an almost photographic degree.’
‘Good grief.’
‘You will recall some of the drawings he has done, purely from memory or imagination. This capability has only recently come to our attention, and we can’t be sure he hasn’t already used it to memorise security keypad sequences, that kind of thing.’
‘Do you think he would try to escape?’
‘Well, on balance I doubt it, but it’s not that simple. He could sell or barter information with patients who would like to escape, and there are plenty of those.’ Lamb rubbed his face as if he was very tired. ‘Right, now I’ve scared you silly, perhaps you would like to meet him?’
* * *
Lamb guided Suzannah downstairs where he introduced her to Clive Harrington and two very large and capable-looking black female nurses, who introduced themselves as Serena and Hope. All three then led her through seemingly endless security doors, some of which they opened with keys from a very large bunch, others by using keypads. Finally, they arrived at a door with a glass panel. Through it she could see a man sitting at a table, seemingly deep in thought.
He looked up as they walked in, smiled and stood. She was shocked at how handsome he was, a gymnast’s physique, high forehead and strong jaw. Most of all the cold power in those blue, blue eyes. ‘Lady Earl, I’m delighted to make your acquaintance.’ He put out his hand, and the nurses parted to let her reach forward and shake it. His handshake was cool, firm and utterly businesslike. She was impressed too by his knowledge of the traditional term for addressing a baroness.
‘Nice to finally meet you William,’ she said, for all the world as if she were dealing with a newly appointed junior minister, rather than a psychopathic murderer.
‘I would have preferred to receive you in my studio where most of my work is, but alas…,’ he shrugged to indicate that his hands were metaphorically if not literally tied.
‘I’ve seen plenty of your art, William. I really believe that we might have come up with an exciting project which could help the public understand a little more about the important work that goes on here.’
He nodded appreciatively. ‘You are, it seems, a very courageous woman. I admire that very much.’ He made eye contact with her and conveyed much more than admiration.
Oh, my.
‘Here’s my business card,’ Mordant said, passing it across. ‘It’s actually just the new Wōdan art sales website that I’ve had set up with some of the money raised through the Künzler sales. Of course, I’ve never seen it myself. We aren’t allowed the Internet in Broadmoor.’ He shrugged.
‘I can’t give you mine,’ Suzannah said, looking at the nurses. ‘They kept my bag at security.’
‘Oh that’s alright,’ Mordant said. ‘I know where to find you, if I need you.’
Something lurched inside her stomach. She tried to get a grip. He only means the House of Lords, you fool. But it seemed more than that.
* * *
SIXTY-FOUR DAYS
It was a week later when Baroness Earl of West Bromwich shrugged off a thin and rather worn bathrobe which had Broadmoor stitched on the collar and sat entirely naked on a metal-framed blue plastic chair between two fan heaters. ‘How would you like me?’ she whispered hoarsely. At her insistence, the only other person in the room was the Jamaican nurse Hope Trenchtown, with an attack alarm, a walkie-talkie and as Lamb had reminded her, a black-belt in karate. The director was taking no chances.
At first Mordant said nothing, his brows lowered and a slight pout as his eyes surveyed her body. It was like being X-rayed. He slowly walked around her, like a leopard assessing its prey. She had been a life model before, years ago. She had enjoyed the frisson of exhibitionism, having a roomful of students artistically explore her skin, which made her aware of every part of herself. But this was more intense. Mordant walked up to her and arranged one arm over the back of the chair, and lifted one leg so that she was more exposed. His hands were cool, comfortable and businesslike. His eyes were not. He looked up and cupped her chin in one hand. Those narrowed, almost indigo, eyes were so powerful she could hardly meet the gaze. He stood a few feet away, and with a sketchbook made some rapid strokes across the paper. The comforting sound of the pencil and the buzz of the heaters was all that could be heard apart from her own quite fast and shallow breathing.
‘Now, Lady Earl, I’d like you to sit like this,’ he said, indicating that she should reverse so the back of the chair was between her thighs.
‘What you might call the Cabaret pose,’ she said, moving the chair. Mordant looked quizzically at her, to the point where she felt compelled to explain herself. ‘Yo
u know, from the film with Liza Minnelli and the famous erotic chair dance?’
Mordant nodded ambiguously, and kneeled in front of her, with the chair back between them. He gently opened her knees a little wider. He then gently grasped her hips and encouraged her to slide forward so that the tops of her thighs were tight against the two chrome uprights. Just two feet away, his captivating eyes slid down from her face to dwell on her dark pubic hair, framed in the gap between the seat and the plastic back support. Something about the brief touch and this focused exposure had given her an acute sense of arousal. A moist, hot hunger pulsed within, matching her ragged breathing.
For the next fifteen minutes Mordant sat on a stool three feet away rapidly sketching her, mixing sharp confident strokes with light crosshatching movements. Her skin tingled in the breath of warm air, and her growing excitement. Finally finished, he flipped over to a fresh sheet, and something inside her clenched hard, yearning.
‘Lady Earl, do you do yoga?’ Mordant asked.
‘Years ago, yes.’
‘Please stand up.’ She did so. He took away the chair and unrolled an exercise mat. ‘Sit down, arms braced behind you. Feet facing me slightly apart. No, a little more.’
She adopted the position he described.
‘Now I’d like you to perform the crab.’
She looked at him, giving him time to admit that this was a joke. It clearly wasn’t. ‘I have to say that this isn’t something a peer of the realm is asked to do very often,’ she laughed. She got an answering grin from the nurse, but none from Mordant. ‘It’s a long time since I tried.’
‘Lady Earl, you have a wonderfully lithe body, I’m sure you will manage admirably. There is an artistic purpose to it.’
She lifted her hips off the ground until they were in line with hips and shoulders. ‘Okay?’
‘That I would suggest is a table. I think you can do better. You will recall that you need your hands braced with fingers pointing towards your feet so that you can let your head roll back as you lift your body.’
Once she had turned her hands her hips rose more easily and she was surprised how easily she was able to arch her torso upwards. It was certainly a strain, and her arms started to tremble. ‘Okay?’
‘Just a little higher. I want to stretch you. Now on tiptoe.’
With a grunt, she lifted her pelvis another inch and let her head hang right back with her hair touching the floor. Slowly, she raised herself onto her toes. She was excitedly aware of how graphically exposed she was. The sacrifices one makes to the cause of rehabilitation.
‘Superb,’ said Mordant. ‘It will just take a minute.’ The sound of the pencil moving rapidly etched out the unbearable seconds as her frame struggled to hold the pose. Another huge, slow internal clench pushed out from her pelvis.
‘I can’t hold it any longer.’
‘Yes you can. Imagine your body is a truculent member of the government, and master it with your willpower, as you do them.’
Her limbs began to tremble more violently, and a shuddering sensation started in her belly. She fought to suppress a gasp that was building inside her, but failed. Just as she was starting to fall, strong hands caught her and lowered her gently to the floor. Looking up into the face of this prodigious man, she knew then that he was absolutely aware of what had just happened to her. He’d barely laid a finger on her, but had engineered it. A small one, but a real one. Somehow, he instinctively understood her. All that betrayed it was a slight smile. But they both knew that she was his.
* * *
THIRTY-FOUR DAYS
Dawn Evans had never been north of Hemel Hempstead before. Her four-year-old Nissan Micra had done all its mileage in what was cosily termed the Home Counties. Almost everyone she knew was more likely to fly to Majorca or Lanzarote than to travel north to Sheffield or Leeds. The north, now that really was another country. When her friend Sue had been told to go on a training course to Birmingham she had rolled her eyes and moaned about it for days, even though she’d never been before.
Today’s journey showed Dawn’s own travel confidence was more limited still. Even venturing onto the dreaded M25 had given her butterflies, with the London orbital road’s aggressively driven four-by-fours and white vans right on her tail, filling up her rearview mirror, even when she sped up to seventy. Then north on the A1(M), filled with roadworks and speed cameras. She passed Hatfield and Stevenage in heavy showers interspersed with dazzling sunshine, but gradually the weight of traffic diminished and the countryside opened up through the wide arable lands of Cambridgeshire. Glimpses of rolling hills and butter-stoned spires around Stamford were a surprise, and she drove into the town, stopping just outside a newsagent-cum-post office. Her pristine atlas showed she was not much more than halfway to her final destination.
Will had said he owed someone a favour, and he would be forever grateful if she would facilitate it. There was no greater vote of confidence in her than when he had whispered his bank PIN code into her ear. Getting access to his bank card at Broadmoor had been easy. She had gone to see the clerk at patient storage, and signed the Patients’ Possessions Register. She had been shown to his locker, found the art book that he had requested and signed it out, but taken the cash card too. This was the card that paid for his clothing, laundry and personal care. It was drawn on the account into which his welfare benefits were paid. This must be some favour. The amount he needed had required her to make three trips to the cash machine on successive days because it exceeded the daily withdrawal limit.
She opened her briefcase and took out the bigger of the two envelopes she had smuggled out of Broadmoor yesterday. William had told her that the thick A3 package was of art samples to help publicise his forthcoming auction. It was addressed to Stardust Brands, some kind of agency, at an address in central London. Dawn had several times smuggled small items out of Broadmoor for Will, but she’d worried that with two envelopes, one of them large, under her coat yesterday, she was taking a really big risk. Though the main job of security staff was to stop items being smuggled in for patients, there were also spot checks when heading out for staff as well as visitors. But it was just as Will had predicted. At half past one in the afternoon the security staff were too busy searching those coming back in after lunch to detain those heading out.
Once Dawn had posted the package, she wished she’d had the courage to open it and take a peek. She always liked to see what his latest work was, and had taken great pleasure in the way she was sharing in his growing fame. Dawn couldn’t stop thinking about Will: wondering what he was working on, the highbrow music he listened to, and that strange boyish obsession with fashion models, women he could never hope to meet. She’d soon wean him off all that. With her love and support she was confident that he would one day win his freedom, especially as he’d now made some friends in high places. Even a bishop, for goodness sake! Then she could have him all to herself. She imagined the home they might share, full of art, music and harmony. Even children. Will had not only been the most important relationship in her life, but could transform her career too. So long as she continued to be careful. Don’t dream too much, she warned herself. There was still much to do to persuade the world of his innocence, and right this miscarriage of justice.
Back in the car, feeling as happy as she had in a long while, she stopped to eat the low-fat cream cheese and lettuce sandwich she had carefully wrapped earlier.
Back on the road, she headed north for Newark, traversing endless dual carriageways and roundabouts. After passing Lincoln and Wragby she found herself on A roads that seemed to have less traffic than the Wokingham back lane rat run she used to get to work. Finally, after four hours driving, she saw the dock tower of Grimsby, a place that had vague connotations of fish and poverty. She looked down at her list of directions, wishing she owned a sat-nav. Freeman Street wasn’t hard to find, but the Anchor Sports Bar on Bethlehem Terrace was elusive. For forty minutes she traversed grids of depressing terraced housing, lin
ed with dented cars, wheelie bins and satellite dishes. She was too shy to ask for directions. But finally she spotted the Anchor, and pulled up on the pavement as everyone else had. The sign was faded to anonymity, there were grilles on two of the windows and a Staffie with a ripped ear chained up to the A-board outside: ‘Sindi – classie gentlemen’s entertainment’ was promised for Saturday night, a fiver on the door. A filthy grey Ford, engine running, was parked just a little ahead. The shaven-headed driver looked at her in the mirror. He got out, flicked the ember of a roll-up into the gutter, and walked towards her. He was big, about thirty, clearly gym-fit under the T-shirt, jeans and trainers, and exuding a vague menace in the roll of his gait. He opened the passenger door, and slid in beside her with a gust of fag breath.
‘Dawn?’ he said. ‘Karl.’ He stuck out a huge hand with bitten nails and a tattoo on each finger. She gripped it briefly. ‘Got the money then?’ he asked.
She leaned behind, took the briefcase from the backseat. She opened it and handed Karl the letter and the fat envelope of cash. He peeked at the cash and flicked through the notes. Then he opened the sealed letter. Dawn was surprised at the speed his eyes flicked over the text. He turned to her and grinned like a hyena contemplating a dead wildebeest. A ripple of fright ran through her. Of course this was going to be illegal. How could it be anything else?
Karl got out of the car, grabbed a heavy black holdall from the boot of the Ford, and dumped it on the backseat of her car. ‘Here’s the lock-up to take it, alright?’ he showed her a garage-type key, with an address in Stoke Newington, London N16 written on the plastic tag. ‘Don’t mess with the bag,’ he warned her. He got back in his car and drove off.
For Will, she had pushed well outside her comfort zone. For him, she had compromised herself ethically, professionally and sexually. She had even allowed him to use a mobile phone which she had smuggled in, uncomfortably, in a plastic bag inside her body. Now she was almost certainly going to be an accessory to breaking the law in a bigger way. But there was no way back. She had cast in her lot with the devil. And, my God, she had enjoyed every second. After a few minutes thought, she reached into the glove compartment and the blister pack of blue tablets from the sick bay that Will had told her could help, and swallowed two more. Soon she felt confident enough to drive to London.
