Watcher

by Grace Monroe

  The chill knifed through me, my mouth was parched. I glowered at him for several moments, then I stood up unexpectedly and made for the door.

  ‘Hold up a minute, Brodie. Don’t be irrational. Don’t you want to finish our game?’

  ‘The police have to release you in ten minutes,’ I lied. ‘There isn’t enough time for them to pin anything on you – what do I care about some redheaded whores? You didn’t take my sister.’

  My fingers were already on the handle. I turned to face him.

  ‘By the way – I still think your dad won,’ I said. The hair on my arms and the back of my neck were electrified.

  ‘You’re the winner, Brodie. You won – you got the Ripper off – how good does that feel?’ he asked.

  Fury bubbled inside me but I remained utterly still.

  Thomas Foster tittered, a soft, joyless giggle.

  ‘I sold you a lie about Katya Waleski and you made it work – you even thought it was Moses Tierney’s fault. Anyone was to blame except the prettiest boy in town.’ He fluttered his eyelashes like a Disney character, mocking me. I knew about the halo effect and I had fallen for it.

  I held my thumb and forefinger up, giving him the Loser sign.

  ‘LOSER,’ I mouthed.

  ‘Oh hell, I’ve gotta tell somebody. Look at them … the whole of Lothian and Borders police force have been scouring for evidence. He’s the only adversary I respect,’ he said.

  Thomas Foster waved the image of The Watcher in my face.

  ‘He’s had backup – he’s been feeding information to Bancho. Even together they still couldn’t catch me.’ Thomas was gleeful, it all spilled out of him, he’d been dying to boast.

  I looked up at him and said callously: ‘Okay, what’s the twist? Why redheads?’

  ‘Well, I’ll give you a clue, ma’am. The man you call The Watcher – he likes redheads … you could even say he loves them. But that’s his private business; we respect a man’s secrets. If you want to know more, you’re gonna have to ask him yourself.’ He nodded at me, as if he was about to tell me to ‘have a good day’.

  ‘I know you didn’t pick on Eastern European girls because they were sex slaves – that must have made it hard for you. It was too easy … just cattle. No one even missed the bitches,’ I said.

  ‘That depends,’ he said in a slow, cold drawl. ‘Maybe someone else was afraid when these girls went missing. It might draw the authorities’ eyes elsewhere.’

  ‘More secrets,’ I said.

  He made his thumb and forefinger into a gun, he pointed it and clicked. Winking his left eye he said ‘Gotcha’, and his laugh filled the room.

  Bancho knocked impatiently on the door. I opened the door. His hand went up and closed it; leaning against it he whispered in my ear.

  ‘It’s gonna be fun watching you … when they open up my cell and give me a fiver for the taxi home.’

  ‘One last chance – tell me who he is!’ I snatched the photographs from his hand.

  ‘See, that’s the funny thing. You already know.’ He fell against the wall and started to laugh. He was still laughing as I walked down the hallway, laughter that would disturb me in the stillness of the night for years to come. Bancho was waiting; I stopped and whispered in his ear.

  ‘Before you release Thomas Foster, you are going to receive an anonymous phone call. Take the information you’ll be given seriously.’

  Chapter Sixty-Eight

  City Vaults, Niddry Street, Edinburgh

  Saturday 29 December, 10.45 a.m.

  ‘Detective Bancho …’

  I was making the phone call in the back of a police car on my way to the vaults. The most fundamental ethic a lawyer has is client confidentiality. As Foster remarked, it’s more sacred than the secrets of a confessional, and I was about to breach it. Bancho played his part. He pretended he didn’t recognize my voice, and he ignored the fact that my name came up on his mobile.

  ‘I have information which will lead to the arrest and conviction of Thomas Foster. Tell Patch that Thomas Foster has Blaschko’s lines.’

  ‘Blaschko’s lines?’

  ‘The lines of Blaschko … it’s an extremely rare unexplained phenomenon of human anatomy. Tell Patch that Thomas Foster’s chest is covered with the S-shaped pigmentation patterns. Blaschko’s lines are an invisible pattern built into human DNA … When a layman sees them it looks like stripes.’

  I’d learned about Blaschko’s lines many years before, when Patch was lecturing us as law students. He had been involved in a case where DNA evidence had been proved to be fallible.

  ‘Are you telling me that Thomas Foster’s a zebra?’ Bancho sounded disappointed.

  ‘No, I’m telling you that Thomas Foster is a chimera … he has more than one type of DNA in his body. Patch needs to look at all his samples again … retest Thomas Foster: one will match with the semen.’

  ‘Bollocks – DNA is unique to each person, the samples show the semen in the girls could not have belonged to Foster – DNA can never be wrong.’

  ‘That’s the lie they sold us for a century about fingerprints … how many were hung on the back of that belief? We’re still learning about DNA. Trust me: Chimera Syndrome exists!’

  ‘What the hell’s a chimera?’ Bancho asked.

  ‘In Greek mythology, a chimera was a beast made up of a lion, a goat and a dragon. Human chimeras aren’t as drastic as that, but within the last few years we’ve discovered they do exist – no one knows what percentage of the population might be chimeras.’

  ‘So he could have at least two different sets of DNA in him?’

  ‘Correct!’

  ‘Holy shit – I’ll get Patch on to it.’

  I hung up before he used my name, and just as the car pulled up outside the City Vaults in Niddry Street. I mentally kicked myself for not having worked this out sooner. What Sonia could tell us about the place where she was held and what we knew about where she was found: this had to be the place. The vaults are a series of rooms under the South Bridge in Edinburgh. Work was started in 1785, to span the Cowgate gorge and meet up with the growing Edinburgh University. There are nineteen arches but only one is visible. The Ripper had hidden his trophies somewhere inside these eighteen hidden crypts. So many people have reported sightings of ghosts in the vaults that they are a big draw to believers in the paranormal – which was why Sonia was still alive. Thomas Foster attacked her on Hallowe’en – the only night the vaults are open to the public.

  The Dark Angels were already there, looking at home in these subterranean catacombs.

  ‘We’ve got forty-five minutes to find what we need – is everyone clear what we’re looking for?’ I said. ‘Somewhere in these vaults is the room the Ripper used to torture his victims – I’m certain he’s the type of killer who likes to keep trophies to prolong his pleasure.’

  Kailash stared at me sadly through eyes so swollen with crying she could barely open them. Her skin was free of makeup and deep lines of mourning had been etched around her mouth. She was defeated, and for the first time she looked older than her years. Glasgow Joe put his arm around her and held the torch as they set off to search.

  ‘Tick-tock, tick-tock – let’s get a move on,’ said Cal, looking at his Brietling watch. He was the Dark Angel I had seen in George Street selling drugs with Blind Bruce. My eyes widened in surprise as I recognized him as the priest from the Meadows. He stiffened. Our eyes locked.

  ‘Cal’s right. He was her favourite Xbox friend. We don’t have all day,’ Moses shouted, clapping his hands and shooing us off. We switched our torches on; they flickered over the floors and ceilings like World War II searchlights. What we sought was carefully hidden in plain sight … the Masonic way, the way of every secret society from the Illuminati to the quilts that detailed the underground maps for runaway slaves.

  What we really needed was someone schooled in the ways of secrets – my grandfather. Unfortunately, he had been sedated by his doctor and Malcolm had rema
ined behind to care for him.

  The vaults were freezing. There was no sunlight or ventilation, water ran down the stone walls; originally the vaults were mainly used as storage facilities but they were never waterproofed and eventually the merchants moved their goods elsewhere. The slum dwellers then moved in. The area became a notorious red-light district with as many as ten families occupying one room. There was no sanitation. Even today the atmosphere is oppressive.

  This was the first police search carried out within the vaults. Connie’s sweatshirt and Sonia had been found outside in Niddry Street. There was no reason to connect them – no reason unless you knew of Thomas Foster’s obsession with the place. And I wasn’t the only one who knew.

  A rat scuttled by my foot. I was on my own. I leant against the dank wall, the damp chill seeping into my bones. Tick-tock, tick-tock. Cal’s phrase would not leave my mind. Every sinew and fibre in my body locked, I held my breath as the damp smell of cats’ pee threatened to overwhelm me.

  I continued to walk forward. The ground was uneven and the darkness became my friend – no one could see my tremors. I followed the scratching of the rats. How could there be so many when there was nothing to eat? I forced myself on, wishing I had on my heavy bike boots instead of the stiletto sandals. My toes poked through holes in my tights and I could feel the claws of the rats as they ran across my foot.

  I found Cal, the Dark Angels’ chemist, quickly enough. Just as I expected, he was prodding the girl with him to make the discovery. Like the Pied Piper, he was surrounded by rats as he stood in the shadows doing what he did best – watching.

  ‘Cal, are we close to finding something?’ I asked, struggling to keep my voice calm. I listened, the echoes from the other search parties sounding very far away. The smell of damp decay hung heavy in the air like a wet blanket.

  ‘Yes, I can almost guarantee it.’ His voice was cold; he knew I had unearthed his secret and a sad smile crossed his face.

  The scratching of the rats was very close, every scrape of their claws on the dirt sent goose pimples up my arms. Fear-induced sweat trickled down my spine, a painful water torture I was desperate to wipe away, but the nibbling, foraging sound of the rats kept me frozen and spellbound.

  Slowly, carefully, I placed my hand inside my right jacket pocket, my fingers searching for salvation. It was empty. Nervously I rummaged around in my left pocket, but it was futile. There was nothing I could do with an empty cigarette packet and a box of matches. The stupid bastard Bancho had forgotten to give me my Swiss Army knife back.

  I was unarmed and about to confront The Watcher. He observed my every movement, including the way my face fell when I realized I was defenceless. I pulled the cuff of my jacket over my hand to pretend I had a weapon.

  He put the flashlight into my eyes, blinding me, and he slowly tilted his head to one side and smiled. A menacing chuckle escaped from his lips; he was enjoying this. The pretty Dark Angel scrambled about in the dirt struggling to move an eighteenth-century whisky barrel. Crimes of robbery and murders are not new in the vaults.

  ‘Just lift it up – and be careful,’ he hissed.

  ‘Well, shine the bloody light down here so I can see!’ she snapped back.

  I felt him falter, should he stay or go? In that moment he made his first mistake. He shone the light down into the recessed archway. The whisky butt was made in the eighteenth century from oak to hold over five hundred litres. The girl tried to lift it up. But then she hesitated for a split second. She could already smell the death and decay. She dropped her corner down onto the packed earth with a thud; shaking her head from side to side she backed away from the cask, standing on my toes in the process.

  None too gently I threw her aside. Lifting up the oak cask was no easy job. My silent mantra was repeated over and over: I hate this, I hate this. It was no good; it was too heavy. I needed his help but the question was, would he give it? He placed the torch down on the floor. The girl had already run away and we were alone in the shadows as we lifted the giant whisky butt up and threw it into the back of the recess.

  It bounced and rolled against a wall. I screamed … and screamed. The rats were undisturbed by my shrieks and happily continued to gnaw on the feet of the dead girls. Some of the toes were still painted pink with pearl nail polish. I don’t know how many bodies we still hadn’t found, but I knew from this putrid pile that it was a hell of a lot.

  I didn’t stand a chance. Hypnotized by the horror of the scene before me, the first I knew of the attack was the prick of the needle. Even in my terror, unconsciousness was not welcome.

  Chapter Sixty-Nine

  Mayfield Private Clinic, Edinburgh

  Tuesday 1 January, 2.45 p.m.

  ‘I’m Dr Watchman. You’re in the Mayfield Clinic. Do you know what happened?’

  ‘I was hit. Just once – but once was enough.’

  ‘No, you were drugged. You hit your head on the way down,’ he corrected.

  ‘What is your name, Ms?’ he asked.

  ‘Brodie, Brodie McLennan.’

  ‘How many fingers am I holding up?’ He shone a light in my eyes as he fired these questions at me. All I could see were toes with pink nail varnish and all I could hear was the sound of rats gnawing. I fought back the hot bile that rushed into my throat.

  ‘Four. No, wait … two fingers. You’re holding up two fingers.’

  ‘Are you experiencing any pain?’

  ‘Is the Pope a Catholic?’

  ‘Are you experiencing any pain?’ he asked again.

  ‘My head feels as if it has a troupe of dancing elephants on it. Oh, and I want to vomit … real bad.’

  An Irish nurse handed me a grey papier-mâché bowl that looked like a top hat, and when I held the sick bowl out in front of me, I noticed I was hooked up to an IV. How long had I been out? I couldn’t wait for the answer to come to me. Hot green bile came rushing from my gut; I didn’t remember eating since Christmas Day so where did it all come from?

  Nurse Boyle wiped my mouth and handed me chips of ice to suck. I leant back against the pillows. Reaching under my arm she hauled me to a sitting position and she switched on the television set.

  ‘Turn it off!’ I groaned as the noise split my skull in two.

  ‘Doctor’s orders – it stays on,’ he said, smiling. He had a nauseatingly cheerful bedside manner under the circumstances, and a fatherly but prematurely grey beard that padded his cheeks and made him look like a hamster. That reminded me once more of the rats. At least the television gave me something else to focus on, but the volume was unbearable.

  The Hibs anthem ‘Sunshine on Leith’ rang out around Easter Road. It was a capacity crowd. The green Santa hats were out in force for the Edinburgh Derby. Good God, the Derby!

  ‘How long have I been out?’ I asked.

  The doctor smiled reassuringly. ‘Three days, I’m afraid. We were concerned about possible spinal injuries so we kept you sedated to minimize further complication.’

  I closed my eyes tightly, screwing them shut so firmly it was painful. I couldn’t keep it up. The home crowd had now started up a rendition of ‘Glory, Glory to the Hibees’ as the teams came onto the pitch. Lucas Baroc ran out holding the hand of a boy who looked as if he was eight. I swallowed hard – life goes on. The crowd cheered loudly as the Hibees took to the pitch; the announcer could hardly be heard above the roar but I didn’t need to hear him. The crowd was chanting.

  ‘Connie–Connie–Connie …’

  She was holding the hand of Joe Stanley, the Hibs captain. A dyed-in-the-wool Hibee, she was never going to be happy about holding Lucas Baroc’s hand. He was the striker for the enemy. No wonder she hadn’t been overjoyed at my present. The camera was all too aware of who she was and, as the crowd continued to bellow her name over and over, the camera cut to the directors’ box to show all the family – except me. Kailash, Grandad, Malcolm, Derek, Joe, Moses, Lavender and Eddie, all there with wet faces. She turned and waved up to them. She eve
n blew them kisses. Then – little show-off – she blew a kiss to the camera. Foolishly, I tried to catch it, regardless of what the doctor would think of my concussion.

  ‘I said if you did as you were told she’d be returned to you.’ My heart stopped, every cell in my body froze as it recognized his voice. I scrambled to get out of bed but my legs and arms wouldn’t work properly. The nurse had left the room and we were alone.

  ‘Diazepam,’ he explained. ‘I wanted to tell you how I did all this for you … but you wouldn’t understand, you’d try to run away … unless I took precautions … that’s all it is … a precaution.’

  ‘Why did you take Connie?’ I hissed at him. I could feel the drugs working their way through my system, numbing my muscles as I struggled, once more, to retain consciousness.

  ‘We’ll get to that … Well done for figuring out Thomas’s secret. You went up in my estimation again …’

  ‘What’s the link between you and Thomas Foster?’

  ‘You’re disappointing me; I thought you had all that figured out,’ he said, settling into a chair beside the bed.

  ‘Call it a last request, tell me everything.’

  His smile was like the Angel of Death’s. He’d fill the IV with some poison so it would look like an accident. He could give me an overdose of insulin and Patch would think it was a complication from the head injury. Lying on Patch’s table … I’d always feared that would happen. Somehow facing the inevitable made me relax – it was either that or the effects of the diazepam.

  ‘I won a scholarship to Yale,’ he said. He sounded strangely regretful about it. ‘In my last year I was tapped to be a Bonesman. Oh, like you I thought it was a foolish society. But it had the potential to advance my career. At the initiation ceremony—’

  ‘You’re given an Anam Cara – and yours was Thomas Foster.’

  ‘Correct … Also at the ceremony we were locked in a pit for twelve hours and we had to confess everything to our soul brother … Thomas’s confession shocked me. I tried to go to the authorities but he knows the president and there is the small fact he’s a chimera.’