He called his old supervisor, but was told he would not be welcomed back. In the company’s eyes, he had violated his contract by refusing to work. Frank spent the next few days scouting for another job, and even when nobody was interested in hiring him, he refused to worry.
Then he went to his Jobcentre to sign on. A nineteen-year-old girl told him that he wasn’t qualified for any allowance at all – he had left his job voluntarily. He was not covered by National Insurance because his work had not been regular.
Frank demanded to see her supervisor, and was introduced to Ian Carpenter – a thin, balding man in his middle thirties, nattily dressed in an oddly coloured jacket and tortoiseshell glasses. Mr Carpenter had simpered at Frank, agreeing that he had ‘slipped through the net.’ He made a lot of unhelpful suggestions, none of which involved his department allowing Frank to have any money. Frank shook his head in bewilderment – this man did not care if he could afford to eat, and he had stared into those gleaming tortoiseshell glasses with growing anger. Frank hated Ian Carpenter then – and hated himself even more, for begging. And he did beg. He pleaded with the man to help him out, to accept his claim ... but Carpenter had only smirked sadly, and said there was nothing that he could do.
Frank’s inheritance money ran out over the next fortnight, when he had to pay both an overdue electricity bill and a gas bill. He put his mother’s house on the market, but it was a small ex-council property, and the estate agent said they weren’t selling especially well just now. The one adjoining Frank’s on the left had been on sale for months. He began to devote the days to searching job sites, but there was simply no work to be had. For the first time, he started to feel desperate, and felt that some lateral thinking was needed to solve his problems.
Late one afternoon, he loitered outside the brick benefits office, and waited for Ian Carpenter to come out. He felt a chance meeting might yield better results, and planned to apologise for the intensity of his emotions two weeks ago, and ask the man to reconsider allowing him benefits.
Frank shadowed his prey for several blocks, along the High Street, past the Darwin Shopping Centre, to the tarmac playground of a primary school. He watched as Carpenter went into a portable classroom. When the man came out with a boy of about seven – tall and thin, just like his father – Frank hurried towards him with a warm smile, and familiar greeting.
‘Frank Dundas,’ he said. ‘You spoke to me at the Benefits Office two weeks ago, remember?’
The man’s eyes glazed, trying to recall, then he flinched with recognition. Frank chatted with false bonhomie, and Carpenter tried to shuffle away. Frank kept pace with him as he walked, detailing how he had spent the last of his money, and had resorted to putting everything on credit cards which were nearing their limit. ‘So,’ he said finally, ‘won’t you reconsider?’
Carpenter drew a long-suffering breath and sighed. ‘Mr Dundas,’ he said, ‘I’ve told you before – you have to call the Benefits Centre.’
‘I did! They won’t listen.’
‘Then there’s nothing I can do for you.’
‘You could intervene,’ Frank cried. ‘You don’t realise how much has been taken from me.’
‘That,’ the bureaucrat bristled, ‘is none of my business.’
Several times that night, Frank fantasised about killing Ian Carpenter. First, he strangled him slowly, until his eyes popped out of their sockets and pinged against the glass of his Calvin Klein glasses. Then, he shot him with every one of his long-confiscated pistols – the .357 put the most satisfying hole in his sternum, but the .22 took longer to finish him, causing more suffering.
For the next week, Frank shadowed the man every day. Sometimes he would arrange himself so that Carpenter would turn the corner, and see him loitering menacingly on the opposite side of the street. Other times he would walk several paces behind him, neither gaining nor retreating. As each day passed, he could see Carpenter growing more and more edgy.
Finally, one day, his quarry snapped, and wheeled upon Frank on the way to his kid’s After-School Club. ‘Why are you doing this to me?’ he shrieked. ‘Can’t you see that I can’t help you?’
They were on a narrow, pedestrianised street, and several shoppers paused to watch their altercation.
‘Leave me alone,’ Carpenter shouted, ‘or I will call the police! I’ll have you sent to prison!’
Frank smiled and walked away calmly. That evening, he gathered up his electrician’s tools, and disconnected the electricity, telephone, broadband and cable television at the Carpenter household.
Nearly two weeks later, the police invited him to the station for a chat. By the time they released him, returning his belt and shoe-laces, he had been given a date to appear in court, and left with no doubt that the evidence weighed heavily against him.
Now, with a small hacksaw, he sawed away at the barrel of his shotgun, knowing that his life was truly over. Whether he could actually be sent to prison for what he had done, he didn’t know – but even if he couldn’t, how would he continue to live? In days, his phone and Internet would be disconnected for non-payment – and the utilities would not be far behind. His career prospects were hopeless, and he was better off dead.
And at least there would be the satisfaction of seeing Ian Carpenter go first.
Carpenter usually picked up his boy at half-past five, always passing an oak tree next to a low brick wall on a lane a few hundred yards from the school. At a quarter-past five, Frank stood there with his shotgun wrapped in an old beige overcoat. The satchel of shells hung at his side. His plan was simple – when Carpenter passed, he would remove his gun from the coat, unfold the stock, walk towards him, place the muzzle as close to the back of Carpenter’s head as possible, and pull the trigger. When Carpenter fell, he would squeeze a round into his back, just to make sure he was dead. By then, Frank assumed, onlookers might have been attracted to the scene, but they were unlikely to approach an armed man. There would still be time to sit on the wall under the tree, reload, and quietly end his life. He had sawn off the barrel of the gun specifically so that he would be able to reach the trigger with the muzzle in his mouth.
Things did not go according to plan.
Frank waited under his tree until well past the usual time. A few people passed – mostly women, heading to the After-School Club’s mobile classroom – but there was no sign of Ian Carpenter. At five forty-five, Frank began to get nervous, and wondered whether he should go home and try again another day. The thought angered him – he had psychologically prepared for this, for his own death, and especially for Ian Carpenter’s. He did not want to lose momentum. He did not trust himself to return.
Walking hurriedly towards the school, Frank scanned the avenue that paralleled its forecourt. Down near Welsh Bridge, he saw a gangly thin lad round the corner and disappear onto Bridge Street. Even at this distance, the boy’s similarity to Carpenter was unmistakable.
Frank gasped. How could he have missed him? He began to hyperventilate. He’s come another way, he thought, and began to trot down Quarry Avenue. I’ll have to kill him in front of the kid. He yanked his overcoat off the gun and dropped it on the pavement, fumbling to bring the stock to its full size, and then clutched the gun with both hands. He quickened to a sprint; a woman rounding the corner from Claremont Bank yelped in shock. Frank ignored her, and continued to run. Several other pedestrians looked at him with dim surprise, but nobody tried to stop the man running with the shotgun. Finally, Frank emerged on a small shopping street. Immediately, he spied the boy loitering outside a butcher’s shop and stumbled ungracefully. He caught himself, and walked resolutely onwards.
The butcher’s shop’s door opened with the sharp ding of a bell, and a thin woman emerged carrying a white plastic bag. With her free hand, she reached out for her son. Frank stopped, and time seemed to freeze. He stared at the woman, as she grasped the young boy’s hand and began to pull him away.
Shit! he thought. It’s the kid’s mother ... Carpe
nter sent his fucking wife!
He bellowed after the woman in rage.
As if in slow motion, he saw her turn and notice him. She began to scream. Frank realised he was exposed in a busy street with a shotgun in his hands – and his intended victim was nowhere near. He would have to make the best of a bad situation. He could not kill Ian Carpenter ... but he could ruin his life.
Frank dashed the remaining few yards towards the woman. When he was within two feet of her, he squeezed the shotgun’s trigger and discharged its shell squarely into her chest. The recoil bruised his shoulder and jarred him back. Mrs Carpenter tried to scream as she fell, but the sound was replaced quickly by a choking gurgle. She was still clutching her young son’s hand, and the momentum of her fall swung the boy in an arc towards her. Frank pumped the fore-end, and his second shot caught the boy as he wheeled around, squarely between the shoulder blades. He was dead before he hit the ground.
At a nearby intersection, two cars collided. Pedestrians shrieked and scattered.
Frank paused for a moment and blinked, reaching into his satchel and pushing two more shells into the magazine. He focused on the mother and child, who sprawled together in a bloody puddle. The sight was awful, and caused his mind to blank. He could not remember what he had intended to do next, where he had intended to go.
The door to the butcher’s shop pushed open behind Frank with a ding and he whirled towards it. An overweight man in a stained apron leaned out, and Frank discharged another shell. Because of the distance and the sawn-off barrel, the pellets flew wildly and sprayed him in the side. He stumbled, and crumpled into a foetal position on the pavement. His body heaved and gasped, and Frank – propelled now by the very hopelessness of his situation – stepped over the shaking form, and crossed to the High Street.
He pumped the gun and, at random, fired at the first person he saw – a young fellow in a shell suit, whistling as he unlocked the door of his illegally stopped Vauxhall Corsa. The blast caught him in the side of the head, and threw him down.
Fuck, Frank thought dully, that kid’s never done anything to me.
He began to run again, making for St. John’s Hill. In the distance, a police siren wailed. Frank ended up in the Quarry Park, where he reloaded, and ended the life of an elderly woman who had been walking her Labrador. The dog yelped wildly and cowered next to the body of its mistress. On a bench nearby, a young woman jiggling a pram looked up and screamed. Like clockwork, Frank jerked his gun towards her and squeezed the trigger. With the blast ringing in his ears, he noticed that the mother’s arm was bloody, but the bulk of the pellets had ripped through the vinyl of the carriage. The mother was wailing as Frank stumbled closer to her.
He groped in his satchel. One shell left. The woman twitched with terror. Frank tried to smile at her. ‘Don’t cry,’ he said hoarsely. ‘I – I’m really sorry.’
He felt the urge to explain to her what had happened, to gain her understanding ... but he didn’t try. He wasn’t that crazy.
Frank Linden Dundas glanced away from the mortified woman, down at his shotgun. It was shaking now.
‘I won’t kill you,’ he mumbled, as he felt his knees buckle. Frank allowed his body to sink down until he was crouching on the grass next to the mother and the bloody baby carriage.
He knew he could not kill this poor, whimpering woman. He needed that one, final shell for himself.
SEVENTEEN
On the seventh day of August, five people – including a seven-year-old boy and a nine-week-old infant girl – were murdered by forty-two year old Frank Linden Dundas in Shrewsbury town centre of Shrewsbury, Shropshire. Two other adult victims, including the dead baby’s mother, were wounded, and the killer ended his own life immediately after the outrage.
As in the aftermath of similar shootings, the press and public engaged in a fierce debate of the issues raised by such a tragedy. Several of the papers called for an outright ban on all rifles and shotguns, while others took the line that there was no adequate legislation against the behaviour of madmen. Still others advised a tightening of the rules allowing shotgun ownership. The Home Office moved quickly to set up a public enquiry.
The tragedy pulled press attention away from the Aberystwyth case, for there had been no new killings for over a week, a week in which the killer appeared no closer to being caught.
Sara and Eldon Carson sat in her living room. The roller blinds had been pulled, casting a weak, blue-grey haze of light across their still forms. Today, news of the ‘Midlands Massacre’ was on every news source, and on everyone’s lips.
‘A baby,’ Sara said faintly, ‘he killed a baby.’
Carson sat brooding, but his eyes were dark with unspoken emotion.
‘I could have stopped it,’ she repeated for the fifth time. ‘You could have stopped it. I could have let you.’
In the pit of Sara’s stomach churned bilious dread.
Every random thought led back to the horror in Shrewsbury, and every thought of the dead people – the dead baby – caused pangs of something like illness to stab inside her. ‘I doubted you,’ she said, ‘and you were telling the truth.’
‘Yes,’ he agreed. They both understood what she was guilty of; there was nothing more to add.
Sara swallowed, but her mouth was dry and her parched throat knotted at the effort. ‘You can leave now,’ she said in a cracked voice. ‘I won’t say anything.’
Carson appraised her with a calculating gaze. ‘No,’ he said finally.
‘I’ll be fine,’ Sara said insistently.
‘I’m sure you will. But I came here for a reason.’
‘I don’t want anything more to do with you.’
For the first time since she had released him, Eldon Carson moved from the chair. He stood, stretched, and joined her on the love-seat. ‘That’s not true,’ he said, ‘you just haven’t thought it through yet.’
She bit gently on her bottom lip.
‘Miss Sara, you need me more than anyone else you know. I know about your past – and what’s more, I know how you feel about it. Do you think your boyfriend’s going to give you more than I can?’
Sara started at Carson’s allusion to Jamie.
‘Just because you slept with him again, don’t imagine anything has changed. He represents all the same things he did before – safety, security, and ignorance. I’m offering you knowledge. Don’t make decisions about your life by default.’
Sara shook her head, but remained silent.
‘I want you to think about who I am, and what I can do. With training, you could do it too. If you’d only let me, I could help you to understand your life.’
She stared at this killer. His voice was so earnest, his expression so open ... he looked like any decent, conscientious young man.
‘What do you get out of it?’ she asked.
He sighed and smiled. ‘Something nearly every creature on earth has a right to expect,’ he replied. ‘The chance to spend some time with my own kind.’
Sara looked at him bitterly. ‘I’m your kind?’
‘You are. You’ll come to realise that soon enough.’
She closed her eyes and gently rubbed them. ‘You could make me do whatever you wanted to anyway, couldn’t you?’ she said. ‘You could reach into my mind, and deaden my resistance, just like you did when ...’
She stopped. Here was another tangent that led straight to thoughts of the dead, of a murdered baby.
‘I couldn’t,’ he said firmly. ‘My skills in that area are slight, Miss Sara, and, believe it or not, you would learn to control it pretty fast. You could probably have stopped me last time, even without using that syringe ...’
He let his voice trail away.
And the events in Shrewsbury may never have happened.
Sara lowered her gaze, but did not reply.
‘You are psychic,’ he said insistently. ‘We are kindred spirits, and that is rare. You need me.’ Eldon Carson stared at her intensely until she raised her eyes
and met his stare.
‘Don’t agree to anything,’ he said. ‘But if you’re curious, at least let me try to prove what I’m saying.’
Sara looked up. ‘How?’
His voice grew persuasive, even insistent. ‘With one small experiment.’
Jamie sat at a wood-grain laminate desk, alone in the Incident Room of the Aberystwyth Police Station. Like the rest of the building, the room’s decor was tastefully neutral. The carpet was grey, the upholstered office chairs red, the walls eggshell white. Pin boards were covered with maps, photos, and crime pattern analyses. Jamie felt sure that these things would not to help locate the offender. If he were to stay in Aberystwyth, he needed to pursue other leads, areas of investigation that drew on his unique skills.
The door creaked and Ceri Lloyd peered in. ‘I’m told you want to see me,’ she said neutrally.
‘If it’s not too much ...‘
‘Business?’ Ceri said with a sardonic grin, ‘Or pleasure?’
He smiled. ‘Let’s get some tea.’
They moved down the hall, to the station’s large recreation room. Two officers, playing pool, nodded as they entered.
Ceri eyed him over her black coffee. ‘To what do I owe the honour?’
Jamie smiled. ‘I want to ask for your help.’
She sucked in her cheeks and studied him appraisingly. ‘Do you now?’
‘This investigation’s stalling,’ Jamie said. ‘We have guys on the streets, but you and I both know that nothing’s going to happen unless he gives us some fresh clues. I don’t want to wait that long.’
‘So Jamie Harding is going to single-handedly crack the case?’ Ceri said with thin amusement.
‘No,’ Jamie replied. ‘We are. I’m going to need your local knowledge, your advice.’
Ceri Lloyd eyed him shrewdly. ‘You need to look busy,’ she said, ‘or you’ll be on your way home.’ She took a slow sip of coffee, adding, ‘And you wouldn’t want that, would you?’
Dead in Time (The Sara Jones Cycle Book 1) Page 16
