by Stan Mason
***
Three days passed and Ellen began to prepare for her return to school. The summer break was coming to an end and there was work to do with regard to the arrangement of schedules and the order of the lessons each day. The work took her most of the time, especially as she had been asked to take on another subject for the senior students and had to review the subject deeply.
Hunter had enjoyed the weeks they had spent together during the holidays. Nonetheless, he looked forward to picking up his wife at the end of each school day to take her to the little cafe for tea. The pregnancy was making her look even more radiant than usual and she was ready to relate the good news about her condition to the headmistress at the start of the new school term. However, there were still many months to go before she went into labour so she would be able to enjoy teaching for the best part of two whole school terms.
After the last call from the killer, Hunter adjusted his mind with the case. He considered the threats to be idle words from a man who was insane, believed that he would never carry them out. Subsequently, he was no longer was obsessed, chasing every clue and hunting for any information which might lead him to the killer. In fact he was quite prepared to allow further details to emanate from one source of another in its own good time. Clearly, the killer would still continue to murder women but, in Hunter’s opinion, there had to be a break in the case somewhere... sometime... somehow.
Everything remained quiet for a while and then a minor breakthrough came when Meredith contacted him one evening to tell him that another woman’s body had been found in the same place on Vernon Beach. The architect could hardly believe that, as three bodies had been placed there by the murderer, the police did not have a man guarding the spot dau and night. Without delay, he drove to the beach to meet the reporter there who was armed with a photographer to take pictures of the body. Watson had turned up with a small posse of men who covered the dead woman’s body with a tarpaulin and they stood around idly as though protecting it from the public. Lights had been set up on the beach and it was clear that the body would remain within police security until an ambulance came to take it away. However, the killer had left the body there and was long gone.
‘Raped, beaten and strangled?’ ventured Hunter to the senior police officer.
‘You’ve said it,’ returned Watson sombrely. ‘The bastard’s struck again.’
‘I’m sure the pathologist will prove that she’s just had an abortion,’ added the architect blandly.
‘That we know for certain,’ returned the policeman. ‘We found a calling card of an abortion clinic on the body.’
‘May I see it?’ asked Hunter eagerly.
‘I’ll show it to you provided you don’t go there. It’s our job to do that.’
‘It’s a deal,’ the architect told him.
Watson produced the card which stated ‘Dr. J.E. Corby... gynaecologist,’ identifying his business address and telephone number.
‘He may have done all the abortions,’ suggested Hunter thoughtfully, ‘but it doesn’t move us any further on in the case. Can I see the body?
The police officer opened his hands indicating his agreement. ‘Be my guest,’ he muttered, ‘but be ready for a shock. It isn’t what you’d expect to see with a dead person.
The architect went over to the body and raised the tarpaulin carefully. He took a pace back as he saw the savaged face of the woman. She had been battered to death in a most horrible fashion. Her nose was broken, her upper lip was torn, her jaw had been smashed and there were bruises on her forehead. He dropped the tarpaulin quickly at the awful sight.
‘Oh, my God!’ he managed to utter looking at the senior police officer. ‘The madman who killed her was a monster! How could he harm a defenceless person in such a brutal manner!’
At that moment, an ambulance arrived to take the body away to the morgue. Hunter shook his head in disgust. The woman was in her early twenties... in the prime of her life... and it had been snatched away from her brutally by a lunatic.
Although he had promised not to visit the offices of Dr. Corby, he went there the following morning, waiting for the police to arrive. They came at ten thirty and he followed them into the surgery. There was a small smart reception area with another room where operations were carried out. They went through to the surgery finding the doctor reading through some medical notes of a patient. He sat on an executive chair behind a desk facing a surgical bed in the centre of the room where the operations were carried out. Dr. Corby looked up at as the intruders entered pointing their identity badges at him.
‘What can I do for you gentlemen?’ he asked smoothly, unfazeed by the sudden presence of a posse of policemen.
‘We’re here about a woman found dead on Vernon Beach last evening,’ stated Watson bluntly.
‘The physician stared at them bleakly. ‘What was her name?’
‘We don’t know that yet. Here’s a a photograph taken of her. It’s not very pretty.’ He produced a picture taken by Meredith’s photographer the previous evening, placing it on the desk in front of the doctor.
Corby took a few seconds to examine it before recognition came to him. ‘She’s pretty beaten up,’ he responded meekly. ‘Her name’s Lauren Buckley. At least that’s what she called herself when she came here. You must understand that many women prefer to hide their true identity in their condition. She was just over ten weeks pregnant.’
‘So you admit she had an abortion here,’ cut in one of the other policeman.
‘I didn’t say that,’ countered the doctor sharply sitting back in his chair. ‘She came here for an examination and arranged to have the operation two days ago. However like many women, she either changed her mind or found someone cheaper. Possibly someone running a back-street operation.’
The atmosphere deflated like a lead balloon as the import of his words struck home.
‘You have no idea where she might have gone then to have the operation?’ asked Watson miserably.
‘I’m afraid not,’ came the reply. ‘It could be anywhere or, as I said, she might have changed her mind.’
‘Are you licensed to practise here?’ asked one of the policemen perniciously.
The doctor stared at him with a doleful expression on his face. ‘Undertaking abortions is unregulated in terms of the law,’ he snapped curtly. ‘Now, if you don’t mind, I have work to do. Good day, gentlemen!’
Hunter and the policemen filed slowly out of the surgery and made their way miserably to their vehicles.
‘Bloody doctor!’ muttered one of the policemen. ‘I bet he was struck off the medical register years ago. Why else would he practice abortions? I ought to check up on him to teach him a lesson in manners!’
‘What happens now. Where do we go from here?’ asked the architect, disappointed that the calling card has led them to a dead end.
‘Well,’ stated Watson glumly, ‘we’ll have to wait for the pathologist to determine whether this Lauren Buckley, or whoever she is, had an abortion. In any case, it looks as though the serial killer’s struck again.’
They left Dr. Corby’s clinic to return to the police station but Hunter drove directly to the morgue. He sought the pathologist and soon found her. The woman shrugged her shoulders in despair at seeing him again and was annoyed when he approached her with a request to determine whether the dead woman had undergone an abortion. She tried to put him off but he kept insisting that Watson wanted to know which influenced her to undertake the examination.
‘Wait outside,’ she told him eventually. ‘I’ll let you know shortly.’
He sat on a seat in the hallway while she examined the body which lay on a stretcher-bed in the theatre. Ten minutes later, she emerged with a wistful expression on her face.
‘You’re right,’ she said, wiping her hands on a towel. ‘She had an abortion recentl
y.’
He nodded briefly. ‘Thanks for you help,’ he told her appreciatively. ‘I thought as much.’
He left the morgue with anger flooding through his veins. It would take him a long time to delete the awful image of the dead woman’s face as she lay lifeless on the beach. He could still not believe that someone would harm another human-being in such a brutal manner but the evidence had been there facing him. The only thing left to complete the circle was to go directly to the police station to inform Watson of the situation.
‘Why do I have the feeling that you could do much more to catch this murderer?’ he muttered to Watson in the policeman’s office. ‘I have to say that you seem to be dragging your heels.’
The senior police officer opened one of the files on his desk. ‘Mr. Hunter,’ he began tiredly, ‘you have more knowledge of this case than anyone else... with your mediums operating at full strength... but we have followed up every clue... interviewed every suspect...’
‘Except Antonio Perrera,’ interrupted the architect rudely. ‘You didn’t find him.’
Watson paused to control his temper. ‘No we didn’t find him but you told us that he couldn’t have killed those women because he had a solid alibi. As I was saying, we have devoted a great deal of time and resources to this case. We know he’s a serial killer, and there’s lots of details we can latch on, but don’t worry, We’ll catch the man.’
‘Yes,’ criticised Hunter harshly, ‘after he’s raped and killed a dozen women... maybe more! You saw the state of that woman, Lauren Buckley, on the beach. I really don’t know how you can sleep at night.’
‘That’s the problem, Hunter, I don’t,’ he responded sadly. ‘I lay awake all night with the responsibility laying heavily on my shoulders. But that’s my job; that’s what I’m paid for.’’
Hunter left the police station without sympathy for the senior police officer. There was a killer at large and someone had to make him pay for his misdeeds!
4
Two days later, a call came through from Jessica Harrow, the seance medium. She sounded extremely upset and almost broke into tears, asking Hunter to ring her back later in the day. When he did, he found her voice extremely unstable as he tried to make sense of the conversation.
‘At the seance last night, your dead wife’s spirit broke into the proceedings again,’ she told him unsteadily. ‘I don’t think I can tolerate much more of it.’
‘Look,’ he advised her sharply, ‘I’d rather you didn’t contact me again. Somehow all the information you’ve given me leads to absolutely nowhere. So go back to your seances and leave me alone!’
‘You don’t understand, Mr. Hunter,’ she went on beginning to stabilise. ‘The information you get from the spirits is simply a small piece of a giant jigsaw puzzle. You need to gather all the parts together to make a complete picture.’
‘That’s all very well but I have to do something to rid myself of Ruth’s spirit. You don’t realise my position. I’ve married someone else. I don’t need her to haunt me! In any case, she must be aware that I’ll catch the killer soon.’’ There was a pause at the other end of the line. ‘I’m afraid you haven’t long to do that. Limbo is only a temporary place to linger if you’re a spirit. The problem is that if a spirit stays there too long, it could remain there for ever.’
‘What are you telling me?’ he asked impatiently.
‘Ruth’s spirit has only a short time left before she remains permanently in limbo. If the time expires, both her spirit and that of Amy Chester will remain there together.’
‘It means she can haunt me for the rest of my life,’ he groaned. ‘Tell me, how long does she have before permanency occurs?’
‘I really don’t know,’ confessed the medium, ‘but I can tell you there’s a degree of urgency. How close are you to catching the killer?’
‘How long’s a piece of string,’ he replied coarsely. ‘I have no idea.’
‘The problem, Mr. Hunter, is that your wife is affecting my work. I hold seances almost every night of the week and people come to hear messages from their loved ones. The spirit of your dead wife keeps coming through, interfering with every seance. She keeps coming through blocking out everything else. If you don’t find that killer, she will effectively end all my future seances because people will not attend them.’
‘I wish I could help you,’ explained Hunter. ‘I’m doing the best I can.’
‘Could you perhaps try a little harder,’ she pleaded.
‘I can only do my best,’ returned the architect, ending the conversation on that note. ‘Mediums,’ he thought to himself. ‘Telephone operators listening in from one world to the next and none of them producing anything of true value.’ He regretted that Ruth’s spirit interfered with the woman’s seances but there was nothing he could do about it.
As the conversation with Jessica Harrow ended, Ellen walked across the threshold of Lampshire Secondary School at the start of the new term. She wasted no time in approaching the headmistress’s to impart to her the news of her pregnancy. The staff room was soon buzzing as word got around and she was soon congratulated by all the other teachers. She then reacquainted herself with the students, most of whom were fourteen and over, moving smoothly into the teaching mode after a break of seven weeks. Everything had returned to normal until mid-day when the pupils stormed out of the class for lunch and the classroom was empty. Ellen started to wipe the blackboard clean when the door opened slowly and someone entered the room. She turned slowly to find a man standing there with a knife in his hand. He moved swiftly towards her pointing the knife directly at her throat so that she could feel the sharp point on her skin.
‘Don’t scream, don’t move, don’t do anything, Mrs. Masters,’ he warned sharply, keeping the knife firmly at her throat.
Ellen’s head moved up at the sharpness of the weapon as she looked directly into the man’s face recognising him immediately from the photograph shown to her by Brett Duncan.
‘Do you think you can rape and murder me in this classroom?’ she countered without showing any fear. ‘Someone will come through that door in a moment and you’ll be apprehended and made to pay for your misdeeds.’
‘I don’t think so,’ returned the killer confidently. ‘You see, they’ve all gone out to lunch except the mathematics teacher and he’s got his head in a newspaper with a pile of sandwiches in front of him.’
‘What do you want with me?’ she demanded, knowing that he could slit her throat with a single movement of his wrist.
‘I don’t want to harm you, ma’am. I just want to leave a message for your husband,’ he told her flatly. ‘Tell him to lay off the case or next time I’ll come for you. I’ll repeat that in case you didn’t understand me. I’ll come for you! If he didn’t take me seriously in the past perhaps he will now.’
‘You know he won’t take any notice of you,’ she returned, becoming angry at being held hostage. The man was arrogant and dangerous but she refused to be frightened of him even though he could kill her in an instant. On the other hand, she knew that he didn’t intend to harm her... certainly not on this occasion. ‘I’m with child,’ she went on recognising the man’s weakness with women who had undergone an abortion.
He stared at her with an element of surprise showing on his face and moved the knife away from her throat which he lowered to his side. Then he moved forward to get closer to the teacher placing his hand on her stomach.
‘So there’s life in you,’ he said with admiration showing on his face. ‘Good... good!’
She thrust his hand away fearlessly, staring directly into his eyes. ‘Why don’t you give yourself up and seek help. I’m sure you can get right with counselling. The way you rape and beat women and then murder them is sheer insanity. If you give yourself up you can claim diminished responsibility.’
The killer’s face turne
d to a scowl. ‘Don’t you tell me what I can do or can’t do, lady!’ he snarled. ‘I’m the one in charge here.’ He raised the knife again but this time it was held well away from her.
‘I’m serious,’ she told him frankly. ‘You need help. I can arrange for it if you want.’
‘I don’t think the police would look at it the same way,’ he said, stepping away from her and lowering the knife again. ‘All I’m asking you to do is to pass a message on to your husband to say that your life will be on the line if he doesn’t stop meddling into my affairs. Do you understand?’
‘Oh, I understand all right!’ she snapped curtly. ‘I understand that you’re a weak individual who preys on women who’ve had an abortion. You and your sister ought to be put away for life in Broadmoor.’
He smiled easily at the insult and went to the door. ‘Do you know, you’re feisty. You have a way with you, lady. If you weren’t married I might have asked for your hand myself.’
With that final remark, he left the room with Ellen still standing by the blackboard with the chalk remover in her hand. She screwed up her face in anger as she realised she could have struck the man on the head with it but it was too late now. She had shown no fear but the threat of danger lurked in the future if Hunter didn’t stop his investigation. How could she possibly prevent harm coming to her if her husband refused to comply? If it was simply her life she might have run the risk. However, she now had an unborn child to think about.
When Hunter met her after school she told him about the incident. He began to rant and rave at his inability to stop the man, rambling on about the lack of security at the school. Ellen eventually calmed him down but the truth was that he had to end the investigation quickly one way or the other. On no account could he allow harm to come to his wife.
He wasted no time informing Watson of the attack on Ellen, demanding that a policeman be seconded to the school to protect her. He was successful in his plea for within two days a member of the police force was allocated the job and he said inside the hallway of the school with his main directive to protect the teachers. Nonetheless, Ellen needed to be on her toes, watching for anyone coming at her during the day or the night.
