Unquiet Souls: a DI Gus McGuire case

by Mistry, Liz

  As Gus rested his hand on Beth’s shoulder he could feel the tension radiating from her. After his experience with his godson Billy, he had some idea what Beth was feeling. He also knew that nothing he or anyone else could do would make this any better for Beth. He could only watch the events on the recording unfold with her.

  Scream man grabbed Molly and pulled her upright, as effortlessly as if she weighed nothing. A chair skidded across the room landing on its back at his feet. Holding the girl in one arm, he flicked the chair upright and flung her onto it. In a fluid movement he spun it round, so the frightened girl stared straight into the camera. Then, from his pocket he took out a bundle of cable ties. He yanked her arms behind the chair and wrapped one round each of her wrists. With a vicious tug, he secured Molly to the chair. Then he pulled her legs together and yanked another tie round both feet.

  Again he paused for effect, seemingly leering at the camera through his mask. ‘Now for the action!’ He dug into his pocket again and took out a substantial tool wrap, which he laid on the mattress. With tantalising precision, he opened it and took each item out of its sleeve. One by one he held each tool up before the terrified girl’s eyes. With his gloved finger he caressed each blade and sharpened edge before replacing it in the wrap. Finally, he lifted a pair of shears and snapped them open and shut repeatedly, close to Molly’s nose. She whimpered and struggled against the ties.

  In the kitchen, Beth groaned.

  Gus swallowed hard, dreading what this man would do next.

  In a weirdly, distorted sing-song voice the Scream man turned to the camera. Snapping the shears open and shut, he said, ‘Bitch, you wouldn’t believe the damage these lovely little things can do.’ He laughed and then moved round behind the chair. Gently he moved Molly’s curls to one side, revealing a delicate ear. His head jerked towards the camera, as he opened the shears and positioned them so that Molly’s ear lay between the blades.

  ‘Oh my God.’ Beth’s voice was barely a whisper.

  The camera panned in and out as Scream man taunted them. Gus realised that someone else was operating the camera. Probably the elusive Sid Smith, he thought.

  Then, with a sudden movement, Scream man jerked the shears backwards catching Molly’s ear lobe with the blade. She yelped and a small rosette of blood bloomed on her lobe for a second, before dripping onto her t-shirt. He laughed, low and guttural. Then, casually reached out with one finger, caught a drip of blood on the tip and raised it to the mask. His tongue slithered out from the leery mouth hole and lapped up the blood.

  ‘Mmm, the first taste of revenge. So sweet.’ And he spun round, grabbed a handful of Molly’s curls and yanked it above her head. The skin on her face pulled taut and her neck muscles pulsed as she strained upwards to try to release the pressure. Tears rolled down her face and dripped off the end of her dimpled chin. With the shears snapping widely behind her, the man laughed again. Abruptly, he whooped in imitation of a Native American warrior and snipped twice. Dancing away from the chair, he held a handful of curls in his raised fist like a scalp. Raggedy clumps of hair fell sparsely around Molly’s head. She looked like a bedraggled scarecrow.

  Still whooping, the camera followed the almost maniacal man, as he danced round the room then abruptly stopped. ‘Rest assured, bitch, this first blood is not enough to calm my unquiet soul. Speak soon.’ The screen went blank.

  Beth screamed, jumped from her chair and lunged towards the blank screen. ‘Molly.’ The single word sent shivers up Gus’s spine. He moved to help her back into her seat but before he could do so she turned. Face red, eyes flashing she hurled herself at Jessie, her arm outstretched. Her hand connected with the other woman’s cheek in a resounding slap. ‘This is your fault. You just couldn’t stay away from that piece of vermin could you? Now look what you’ve done to Molly.’

  Jessie lifted a shaking hand to cradle her cheek. Eyes clouded in anguish, she stared at her daughter-in-law.

  With flashing eyes, her anger unspent, Beth raised her arm to strike again. Janine sprung to action, but it was Alex who reached her first. He was a second too late to prevent her delivering a second resounding slap to Jessie’s already red cheek.

  ‘Come on now, Beth. You can’t do this,’ said Alex, but Beth shrugged him off and stood towering over the shell-shocked woman.

  ‘Get out of my sight. Just get out of my fucking sight.’

  Janine, professionally unflappable, gently manoeuvred the older woman from her chair and guided her out of the kitchen, saying as she went, ‘I’ll take Jessie to her flat.’

  Beth turned to Gus, her face hard and emotionless. ‘Find my daughter before those bastards hurt her any more.’

  Gus nodded once and turned to Compo. ‘Get as much as you can from the recording and the email, ok?’ He turned to Beth and Alex. ‘Does he have permission to access all your devices?’

  Beth waved her hand dismissively. ‘Of course.’

  ‘Right, we’ll need that in writing. Compo, get on to it, please.’

  Relieved to leave the tension that reverberated in the kitchen, Gus walked through to the room where Compo had set up his equipment the previous day. The two officers who were monitoring the phone lines greeted him as he entered. With a tense smile of acknowledgment, Gus said, ‘You lot answer to Compo, ok? He’s in charge of all things technical. Any activity on the phones?’

  The older of the two men stretched his arms out in front of him. ‘Not a bloody peep.’

  Gus left them, hoping things were quiet in the kitchen now. Alice was talking quietly to Beth when he walked back in. Alex, tea towel flung over one shoulder was washing a few dishes and Compo was working some sort of magic on his PC. Gus smiled when he saw that someone had placed a plate of biscuits next to him, which he was absent-mindedly devouring as he worked.

  ‘Beth,’ said Gus, pulling a chair out and straddling it. ‘I take it, from your reaction earlier, that Alex told you that Jessie visited her son?’ When Beth inclined her head, he continued. ‘I know you’re upset and I know this is a hellish time for you, but there must be no repeat of your behaviour tonight.’ Beth refused to make eye contact so Gus continued. ‘You want us to find Molly, don’t you?’ When she responded with a slight nod he thrust his point home ‘Well, in that case you won’t distract us by attacking Jessie again, will you?’

  Her head jerked up and her eyes met his. When she spoke her tone was subdued. ‘I won’t touch her again. I want you to focus on getting Molly back. That’s all I want.’

  Gus turned to Alice. ‘Can I have a word, DC Cooper?’

  Alice followed him into the hallway and as soon as the kitchen door closed behind them, she released a huge sigh. ‘That was bloody awful, wasn’t it?’

  ‘Emotions are running high.’ He raked his fingers through his dreads. ‘Hopefully my meeting with the WP agent tomorrow will throw up some clues. I’m also going to visit James Clegg in Littlehey, Cambridge. I want to see if he can throw any light on the matter. Maybe he’ll be a bit more forthcoming now his daughter’s at risk. You’ll head up the briefing in the morning, but before that, I want you to drop me at the airport.

  Chapter 68

  Thursday 6am, Bradford

  Alice manoeuvred down Marriner’s Drive to Emm Lane. The road was a death-trap and she wished she’d asked Gus to meet her on the main road. The slight drizzle the previous night had frozen and Alice was sure she was in danger of skidding into one of the parked vehicles. As she finally turned left followed by a right at the traffic lights onto Manningham Lane she heaved a sigh of relief. ‘Thank God that’s over with. Thought I was going to hit that blue Rover.’

  Gus slowly released his grip on the dashboard and glared at her. ‘Fuck’s sake Alice, couldn’t you have got a pool car? This thing of yours is like a sardine tin. By the time I get to the airport my leg’ll have seized up.’

  Alice, glanced sideways at him, lips pursed. ‘Stop bloody moaning. At least my Mini smells better than a dead rat’s arse, unlike a p
ool car.’

  Gus snorted. ‘Dead rat’s arse! Now that’s funny.’ He took out his phone, pressed a speed-dial number and held the phone to his ear.

  Alice fiddled with the radio and listened to Gus’s conversation with DCI Chalmers.

  ‘Hi Nance, just to update you, I’m on my way to interview James Clegg in Cambridge and then I’m meeting the Graves’ WP agent. Alice is leading the briefing.’

  She saw Gus tilt his head to one side as he listened and wished the traffic light would hurry up and change.

  ‘Janine got the GP to make a house call and he sedated Jessie so hopefully Beth will have calmed down a bit by the time she’s awake again. Janine’s on hand and is alternating between the main house and the granny annex. Compo’s set up base there with another two techies for now, so we’re on hand if and when they contact her again.’

  Seeing Gus rubbing his thigh, Alice felt slightly guilty that she’d not opted for a slightly bigger pool car. Gus caught her eye and still speaking to Nancy said, ‘Hope the media are a bit more lenient with Beth this time around. Can you keep the WP thing under wraps for a bit longer?’

  He listened for a few minutes longer and then hung up.

  ‘Looks like the vultures are on the trail. Nancy says they’re camped out in Ilkley and at The Fort.’

  Alice tutted. ‘And you know what that slimy git Jez Hopkins is like. He’s got a nose like a cadaver dog in a butcher’s; and the morals of one. Remember what he was like last year. Your dad nearly got physical with him when he wouldn’t sling his hook.’

  Gus looked startled. ‘Really?’

  Alice flicked him a glance. ‘Yeah, really. You were a bloody zombie at that time. The rest of the press had all gone back under their stones, but Hopkins wouldn’t let up. Your dad just lost it.’ She laughed. ‘Mo had to pull him away.’

  Gus shook his head. ‘Wow.’

  Alice grinned and changed lanes. ‘Is someone picking you up at Heathrow?’

  ‘Yeah, I’ve got a PC for the day. Hope to fuck they’ve got a pool car. They’ll chauffeur me around and then take me to the station for my train back’

  ‘Aren’t you flying back?’

  ‘Couldn’t get a seat. Catching the train from King’s Cross instead. It’ll give me a chance to do some paperwork.’

  Seeing the sign for Leeds Bradford airport, Alice indicated and pulled in. ‘Maybe you’ll discover another leak that will exonerate Jessie, but I doubt it. WP are notoriously efficient.’

  ‘Yeah, I think we’ve found the leak, but maybe we can trace it back from the hospital. Someone must have followed Jessie back to Ilkley.’

  ‘After four years. You’ll be lucky.’

  Gus shrugged and grabbed his bag as Alice slid to a stop outside terminal one. ‘You’re in charge Al, ok? Keep things moving onwards. Compo’s on with the technological stuff. Sampson’s brainwave could point us in the right direction. Make sure the FLO does her job and get Sadia working. Get in touch if there’s any action at all, ok?’

  Gus jumped out and with a brief wave he was off. Alice watched him for a second before putting the car in gear and heading back to The Fort.

  Chapter 69

  Thursday 8:30am

  Gus was met at Heathrow by a Welsh uniformed officer called Leonard Marconi. To Gus, he looked more Italian than Welsh, yet his accent was pure Cardiff. Leonard grabbed Gus’s bag and flung it effortlessly across his muscular shoulder, leaving Gus feeling slightly wimpish. Apparently not one for a lot of chatter, Leonard headed towards Cambridge’s Littlehey prison, stopping at a Little Chef en route for Gus to grab some breakfast. Gus was glad of the quiet to prepare for his interview with James Clegg.

  On arrival at Littlehey, Gus felt the institution’s inevitable claustrophobia closing in on him. It always unsettled him to think that the prison walls contained a concentration of evil that but for diligent policing and more than a handful of luck would otherwise roam freely in our cities. Prisons dedicated solely to the incarceration and rehabilitation of sex offenders, had, in Gus’s opinion, a more malevolent feel to them. Littlehey was no exception. Gus knew that it had once been a boy’s borstal and that now it housed only Category C sex offenders – Max Clifford being one of its more famous inmates. Mixed crime prisons were sparse and restrictive, but despite that, there was some hope. Here, Gus felt nothing but despair, and his hat went off to the wardens who worked here.

  Prison Governor Madeline McCulloch was tall and slim with bobbed hair and an expressionless face that brooked no nonsense. Her office was devoid of any personality. Gus felt it was almost as if she’d left her own self at the door and was challenging visitors to find a single iota of character in the room. Probably not a bad ploy for the governor of a sex offenders’ prison.

  She shook Gus’s hand and motioned for him to sit down. Without asking, she poured him a coffee. He inclined his head slightly and in response to her assumption that he’d have coffee, he walked over to the water cooler that stood in the corner of the room, pulled a plastic cup out and filled it with ice cold water, before returning to his seat. Smiling at Governor McCulloch, he rummaged in his trouser pocket till he found his painkillers, quickly popped two from their bubble pack and swallowed them. Sensing the underlying annoyance that tightened her face and pulled a frown between her eyes, Gus looked at her quizzically. ‘No biscuits?’

  McCulloch inclined her head and folded her arms across her chest. Ignoring his comment, she nodded to the pills. ‘Pill popping, Inspector?’

  Relishing the dance they had embarked on Gus smiled. ‘Prescription medication, Governor McCulloch. No need to have me thrown in the cells just yet.’

  She gave a sudden sharp bark of laughter and unfolded her arms. ‘A policeman with a sense of humour? Few and far between in my experience. I know you want to speak to James Clegg, but what exactly can I do for you?’

  Gus explained the situation, ending with a question. ‘What can you tell me about Clegg? I mean how he is now? What sort of prisoner is he? Who are his friends? What’s your gut reaction about him?’

  McCulloch rested her elbows on the arms of her chair and steepled her fingers before her lips. She sighed. ‘Well, one thing I do know about Clegg is that he’ll be gutted to hear about his daughter, absolutely gutted. Throughout his time here, he has consistently adhered to the WP process regarding his mother and child. This news will devastate him.’

  She paused as Gus sipped his coffee and frowned. ‘Regarding friends? Well, the truth is, he has none. He’s a loner. He complies with every request we make and participates in every initiative, but he adamantly refuses to consider rehabilitation. He maintains that his family is safer with him in prison. Anything else, Inspector?’

  ‘I’m interested in the knife attack four years ago that hospitalised him.’

  Swivelling her chair slightly she pressed a key on her PC and tutted. ‘Hm, in my opinion that was a bit strange. There had been no history of aggro between the two prisoners and the attack, by all accounts, was unprovoked. Gordon Redwood, otherwise known as Gogs, was a small-time thief who’d got done for cottaging and grooming underage boys. He’d been due out in a matter of months. He often played pool with James.’ She popped specs on the end of her nose and studied her PC. ‘He admitted it after we found the blood-covered shiv in his cell. He said, and I quote, ‘Clegg dissed my wife’. Apparently he called her, and again I quote, ‘A fat whore who gives blow jobs to black bastards and Pakis down Leith Docks.’ Gogs’ wife lives in Edinburgh.’ She leaned back and tapped the leg of her specs on her front teeth thoughtfully. ‘That never really rang true with me, though. For all Clegg’s paedophilic tendencies, he was an educated man and certainly no racist. I can’t imagine him using that sort of vernacular.’ She shrugged. ‘On the other hand, he didn’t deny it.’

  Gus sipped his coffee, enjoying the caffeine hit from the smooth blend. ‘So, if ‘dissing’ his wife was a fabricated motive, what do you think the real motive was?’

  McCulloc
h leaned forward. ‘That’s just it. No one was snitching and Clegg refused to identify Redwood as his attacker. It was all very strange. We put Clegg in protective custody and moved him to another wing, but really, there was nothing else we could do. Redwood got a year added to his sentence.’

  ‘Ok,’ said Gus drawing the word out. ‘So, what was James Clegg like as a prisoner?’

  McCulloch smiled. ‘Now, I can tell you that, Detective Inspector McGuire. James is a model prisoner. Obedient, quiet and toes the line. Keeps himself to himself. He goes for therapy for his ‘condition’.’ She drew quotation marks round the last word with her fingers.

  Gus snorted and mimicked her actions. ‘By ‘condition’ I take it you mean his propensity to defile young boys?’

  McCulloch sighed and nodded. ‘Exactly. I think it torments him that he has these feelings. He’s one of the few sex offenders I’ve come across who requests chemical castration on a regular basis.’ She grimaced. ‘The powers, influenced by his psychiatrist’s report, have to date, refused this. Physically, he has deteriorated since first being incarcerated and I see no sign of that reversing.’

  ‘My heart bleeds.’

  ‘Well, I can see you’re no bleeding heart liberal, Inspector. But these men are under my care and so,’ she caught his eye and held his gaze, her expression firm, ‘you will treat him with the utmost respect during your interview. He is being punished for his crimes and you will not seek to torment him in any way.’

  Gus straightened in his chair and smiled lop-sidedly. ‘Whilst, of course, I respect the motive behind your ‘directive’, I will remind you that I am interviewing him to gain intelligence on a series of child abductions and both sexual and physical abuse of the said children. His own daughter has also been abducted. I will use whatever means I have at my disposal to get the answers I need. He could be key to putting the rest of his little gang of merry men behind bars, where they should have been twelve years ago.’ He stood, dreads bobbing round his head. ‘I’ll need to speak to Gogs Redwood too. Any idea of his current whereabouts?’