Wychwood

by George Mann

  Elspeth flicked through the rest of the photographs, grimacing.

  “His name was Geoffrey Altman,” said Peter. “A gamekeeper over at Ascott-under-Wychwood. He was found like that almost two weeks ago, in the woods on the grounds of Ascott Manor. So far we’ve drawn a total blank. He was a widower who’d disassociated himself with his family over twenty years ago, and no one with any motive or anything obvious to gain from his death. He was close to retirement. Until today, we couldn’t even make sense of the symbolism. We just assumed it was some bizarre ritual, cooked up by a crackpot obsessed with the occult.”

  “You might still be right on that count,” said Elspeth, closing the file. “But it seems very clear that this poor man has been dressed to resemble another member of the Carrion King’s court.”

  “The Master of the Hunt,” said Peter.

  “Precisely,” agreed Elspeth.

  Peter closed the file. “There are going to be more, aren’t there? More deaths. Who were the other members of the Carrion King’s court again? The Master of the Pentacle, The Confessor…”

  “The Fool,” said Elspeth.

  “The Fool,” echoed Peter. He looked thoughtful as he took another swig of his beer. “So we’re looking at another three potential victims for starters. Unless we can find the killer first.”

  “So what about the Winthorpe lot?” said Elspeth. “It seems too much of a coincidence that Lucy was the owner of a theatre putting on a play about the Carrion King. Especially as it looks like she was dressed in the missing costume, too. Do you suspect someone from the theatre?”

  Peter shrugged. “I suspect everyone until I can prove otherwise. That’s my job. But it seems likely that one or more of them have something to do with it. Although they claim they were all in the pub until late on Thursday night, and Patel says it all checks out with the landlord. All of them except Vanessa Eglington, who says she stayed behind at the theatre to finish up. Alone. There’s no way of corroborating her story.”

  “And she did say that things were a bit tense between her and Lucy,” added Elspeth. “Although… she just doesn’t seem the type. To be a killer, I mean.”

  “There is no type. Not in my experience. But there are other considerations. She’d have had a hard time manoeuvring the body on her own. She’s only slight. Although she might have had an accomplice.”

  Elspeth nodded. “What about Geoffrey Altman? Is there any link there, between him and the theatre lot?”

  “Not as far as we can tell. They all have alibis for the night he died, and there’s no history of any contact between them – or at least not any that we’ve uncovered so far. Patel was pretty thorough, and he’s spent today confirming everyone’s movements. But we can’t rule out anything yet. They could be unconnected – although that seems unlikely – or there could be more than one killer, working together.” He shrugged. “We’ll just have to keep digging.”

  “What about the other costume? It looks as though Altman was dressed in similar stuff, too. Had that come from the theatre?”

  Peter shook his head. “No. It’s different from the one they’re using in the play. But it’s much less elaborate than the coat, and therefore easier to copy – just a bit of fur and some antlers. Anyone could have done it, if they’d had the inclination.”

  “I suppose,” said Elspeth. She took another sip of her drink. “The husband?”

  “John Adams? It doesn’t seem likely. Although he’s not sure where Lucy had been on the night of her death. She’d told him she was going out with a friend from Heighton, but the friend says they had no such arrangement.”

  “And where was he?”

  “He has a watertight alibi. He was at the snooker club all evening. We found her handbag in the car park with her phone in it, and the history shows that he called her three times before going to bed, but couldn’t get an answer. When he discovered she still wasn’t home in the morning he called the station.”

  “So what now? I suppose you’re trying to find out where she’d been, tracking CCTV, that sort of thing?”

  “As far as we can,” said Peter, “while we wait for the autopsy results. We’ve got uniforms searching the woods, too, looking for her discarded clothes, or anything left behind by the killer.” He reached for a pork scratching and munched on it loudly. “I keep going over what you said, though. About the Consort being a ‘fallen woman’. That could have some bearing. I mean – it seems obvious now why Geoffrey Altman was chosen as The Master of the Hunt, being a gamekeeper and all…”

  “So you think Lucy might have some sort of sordid past?”

  Peter shrugged. “Again, too early to tell. But we’re looking into it.” He drained the last of his pint. “But thanks to you we have another line of inquiry, too.”

  “The Carrion King,” said Elspeth.

  Peter nodded. “Whoever the killer is, they clearly have a deep fascination with the legend. So that’s where we look next. We try to pin down anyone in the area who might be able to point us in the right direction. The theatre group is a start. But there might be others. People who can help shed a little more light.”

  “Ah, now that’s where I can help,” said Elspeth. “I’ve been looking into the legend in a little more depth. There’s quite a bit online, and one of the websites I found pointed me to a bookshop in Heighton. The owner is a man named Philip Cowper, and he runs a small imprint from the back of the shop, publishing local interest books. Apparently he’s authored a book on the Carrion King called The King in Shadow. I was planning to call in tomorrow to pick up a copy and see if I could get anything useful out of him.”

  “Then we should go together,” said Peter.

  “Alright. But I think I’ve earned another G&T, don’t you?” She held up her empty glass.

  “You’re on,” said Peter, getting to his feet. “And then you can tell me what you’re really doing back.”

  Elspeth sighed. She supposed she should have seen that coming. She tucked a strand of loose hair behind her ear, and smiled. “Okay, DS Shaw. I’ll submit to questioning. But it’s going to cost you some crisps, too.”

  He went off to the bar, laughing.

  Elspeth leaned back in her chair, chewing on her bottom lip. All she could think of was Geoffrey Altman’s blank, slack-jawed expression.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Had it always been this way?

  Had he always harboured such bitterness?

  After so long, he could no longer be sure. Memories, he’d found, became dulled with overuse, like a favoured blade. What once cut deep and clean now left only a ragged, uneven scar. Equally, the mind was prone to flights of fancy, or at the very least, to colouring the events of the past with the learning of the present, twisting those memories until they were no longer pure.

  Back then he’d been a different person. He’d known confusion, sorrow, fear, the burning need to belong – but he could never have imagined he would develop such a capacity for loathing. And yet, as he watched the woman preening in the mirror, he felt that hatred swelling inside of him, bursting to get out.

  Soon, he would let it. He would harness it.

  Around him the Wychwood was silent and still, save for a gentle breeze stirring the treetops and the shrill cawing of a crow, somewhere deep amongst the twisted boughs. It was dark, and only a thin sliver of moonlight breached the canopy above, casting the copse in a weak silvery light. The nearby branches became sinister jagged silhouettes, taking on eerie, human qualities, as if the trees themselves had gathered in a circle around this place to watch while it was done.

  Being here, in the place where it had all happened – it made him feel alive. The heady scent of the damp earth seemed somehow primeval, transporting him to a simpler time. Here, he felt connected to the past in a way that he never had elsewhere. That he never could. Here, he felt part of something bigger than himself.

  He knelt in the soft loam, scoring channels in the dirt with the end of a stick, describing the ancient sigils that wo
uld allow him to enact his vengeance. It was a surprisingly simple ritual, its success predicated on the will of the caster. And willpower was something he had in abundance. That was something they’d forced him to learn.

  He glanced again at the mirror, propped upon the ancient stump of a tree. The woman in the silvered glass was leaning close, studying her own reflection as she made her preparations for bed.

  She looked gaunt and tired. Ugly.

  Even now, despite days of studying her pathetic routine, the sight of her shocked him – how time had ravaged her once-delicate features, leaving her craggy and lined and downtrodden. Here was a woman who had been beaten by life, who dragged her miserable carcass around her house each day without a single ambition beyond her own survival. And soon, he would take even that from her. It was no less than she deserved.

  He watched as she tugged a brush through her wiry mop of hair. It was thinning now, with age and mistreatment, and peppered with strands of dull grey. It was unkempt and uncared for, much like the woman herself.

  She had wasted her life. That was, perhaps, her greatest crime – that she had lived for so long, free from prosecution, and that she had done nothing with those stolen days.

  He realised he was grinding his teeth. There it was again – that sickening hatred, boiling up inside of him. He wanted only to be free of it. And he wanted her to suffer.

  He drew a deep breath. His heart was racing. The time had come.

  He locked eyes with the woman in the mirror.

  She seemed to recognise immediately that something was wrong. Her face creased in panic, her eyes widening. He felt her trying to turn away, but he held her gaze, forcing her to remain before the mirror. He always had been stronger than she’d given him credit for.

  Slowly, he raised his arm and opened his hand.

  Confused, horrified, the woman mirrored his action, dropping her hairbrush to the floor. She had no idea what was happening. Tears were forming in the corners of her eyes, trickling down her cheeks.

  He grinned, and the woman grinned back at him, gormless and hollow. Her eyes told a different story.

  Carefully, almost delicately, he puppeted her hand, reaching out for the pair of scissors she had left upon the top of the dressing table. Her fingers closed around the handles. He raised his arm again, and she followed suit, holding the scissors high above her head, the tip of the blades pointing towards her belly.

  She emitted a tremulous sob as realisation finally struck.

  He exhaled, savouring the moment. Then he brought his fist down violently against his belly, and watched, fascinated, as the woman plunged the scissors deep into her own flesh.

  Blood welled instantly, spilling out over her fist.

  He didn’t even allow her to cry out, before raising his arm again, and again, and again, causing gouts of thick, oily blood to rupture from her veins. He didn’t stop until her body crumpled to the floor, unable to support itself any longer, a patchwork mess of blood and ruptured flesh.

  Then he kicked away all traces of his sigils, collected his mirror, and left.

  Behind him, the trees whispered excitedly as the breeze stirred their leaves.

  CHAPTER TEN

  It was late when she finally got home, feeling a little worse for the wear. Her mum had already gone to bed, and the house was still and silent. She crept along the landing, trying to avoid the floorboards that creaked. She was surprised she still remembered where they were – like a muscle memory, returning to remind her of her misspent youth.

  She reached her room, clicked the light on, and collapsed onto the bed.

  Peter had walked her to the door, claiming that he’d never hear the end of it from her mum if he let her walk back on her own, after what had gone on in the woods the other night. He’d given her a peck on the cheek, and she’d been more than content to leave it at that.

  She wasn’t stupid, of course – she’d seen the way he looked at her. But he was Peter. A childhood friend, and the only one she had left around here these days. He’d told her tonight about Helen, who’d been struck down with a debilitating motor neurone disease at the age of twenty-seven and was living in a nearby hospice, and Benedict, who’d made a name for himself in computer games and was in LA, making the most of the sunshine. She’d felt shock, and a momentary pang of regret on hearing the news. She’d never been good at keeping in touch with people from her past, and she’d never really been able to understand why. She had a habit of compartmentalising things, and always running at the future, never taking enough time to look back. She’d done that to her mum, and she’d done that to her friends. Maybe what she had now was a chance to put some of that right.

  There were friends in London, of course, but at the moment, they just felt too associated with Andrew. They all knew what had happened, and somehow that just got in the way. Everything was just about the breakup. There was no getting away from it. Even if they weren’t talking about it, she could see it in their eyes. And they were also so damn happy, too – married with young kids, in high-flying jobs in the city. Being around them at the moment just made everything a bit too raw.

  She knew they cared, that they all really did have her best interests at heart, but right now, she needed to be as far away from Andrew, and London, as possible.

  She dumped her clothes on the chair in the corner and turned the music on her phone on low, lying back while Natasha Khan sang her to sleep with a gentle lament.

  * * *

  Sunday morning brought with it a headache to end all headaches. Elspeth squeezed her eyes shut and rolled over, trying to ignore the light streaming in through a crack in the curtains. She was going to have to do something about that. Her back ached from sleeping in an awkward position, and her tongue felt as if she’d been licking the carpet.

  She heard footsteps on the stairs, followed by a rap at the door, and sighed.

  “Cup of coffee for you, love.” The door opened and Dorothy bustled in, already dressed and smiling brightly. “Thought you could probably use it.”

  “Hmmm,” mumbled Elspeth.

  “Didn’t you say you had to be up for something this morning?”

  Elspeth frowned, waiting for her brain to engage. There was the interview that afternoon in Heighton, with the woman who’d won the photography competition, but her mum was right. There was something else she’d planned to do, too… “Oh, the bookshop,” she groaned.

  “I’ll leave you to it then,” said Dorothy, placing her coffee on the nightstand.

  She couldn’t face breakfast, so after a quick shower, a couple of ibuprofen and another mug of coffee she hopped in the car for the short drive to Heighton. She hoped she wasn’t still over the limit. And that Philip Cowper wouldn’t be able to smell the alcohol on her breath.

  She parked the car in the marketplace and fed coins into the machine, poking at the buttons with bleary eyes until it spat out a ticket. She grabbed for it, still feeling a little queasy.

  “You could have parked at the station, you know,” said a voice from behind her.

  She turned to see Peter holding two takeout coffees. He looked remarkably together, given the amount he’d had to drink.

  She grinned. “I’m not going within a hundred yards of a breathalyser until after lunch. You led me astray. You’re a bad man.”

  He laughed and proffered one of the cups. “Well, in that case, here’s a peace offering. Although I must say in my defence, you were easily led.”

  “Thanks.” She took the coffee and walked over to the car, placing it on the roof while she affixed the ticket to the windscreen.

  “So, does your inspector know about this little outing?”

  “DCI Griffiths?” Peter looked a little sheepish. “She knows I’m following up on the Carrion King lead, and that I’m enlisting the help of some experts to do so.”

  Elspeth laughed. “So I’m an expert now, am I?”

  “Well, you were the one who spotted the connection in the first place. But probabl
y best we don’t let her know about your clandestine visit to the crime scene.”

  “It all feels a little underhand,” said Elspeth. While it was exciting to be working so closely with Peter on the investigation, she had to admit, the thought of going behind the inspector’s back made her feel a little uneasy. “I mean, don’t get me wrong. If I’m going to be writing this story I want to help, but shouldn’t we be upfront about it?”

  Peter laughed. “I would have thought your time in London might have cured you of such idealistic notions, Ellie. We do what we need to do to get the job done. That’s how this works. As long as I stay within the law and follow due process, DCI Griffiths won’t care. Promise. Like I said before, she’s interested in results. A little too much, sometimes. Besides, it’s only a visit to a bookshop.”

  Elspeth nodded. “Well, if you insist. Shall we get on with it, then?”

  Peter nodded. “Lead on, lead on.”

  Elspeth led him along the high street, then cut down a small passage between two charity shops, across a courtyard in which the patrons from a café sat smoking cigarettes over greasy bacon rolls and black coffee, and out onto Westgate, where Westgate Books was nestled between a haberdashery shop and a jeweller’s.

  It was an old, narrow building over three floors, with an impressive garret window. The exterior had been recently painted in bright green gloss, and a fresh sign, its legend written in swirling gold, hung above the door. A small table of yellowing paperbacks had been placed before the ground-floor window, along with a handwritten sign declaring them ‘3 FOR £1’. A small black tin served as an honesty box on the table beside them.

  Through the window and its heaped display of faded, curling books, she could see a grey-haired man inside, shuffling about between the stacks of books.

  “I think you’d better go first,” said Elspeth, gesturing toward the door.