Fountain Of Sorrow (The Christy Kennedy Mysteries Book 3)

by Paul Charles

  “Well, maybe it is. Maybe this is all that there is, all that I should be expecting. But, in this permanent state of doubt, we’ll never - sorry, I mean I’ll never - find out, and I do need to try.”

  “Hey, look ann rea, as I said I’m a grown man, do you really realise this? Sometimes I don’t think that you do. Sometimes I think you think I’m an innocent, a kid. Well, I’m not and I do need to get on with my life as well. Believe me, I can deal with this. But you know now that I think the important thing, more than anything, is that I just want to get on with my life, and if this is not going to work then so be it and let’s deal with it, for heaven’s sake.” He spoke firmly, but he wasn’t sure where his words were coming from. Here he was inviting the person he’d loved most of all in his life to dump him. He took a large gulp of wine, finishing off his newly filled glass. He rose from the sofa again, topped up her glass and refilled his own. He stood alone by the fireplace, barely looking at her.

  “But you know,” he said, “I can’t abide all this shit about, “let’s try to split up for a while and see how it works,’ It’s always, always a recipe for a disaster. The writing is on the wall at that point. If you take something apart to see how it works or how good it really is, you’re never able to put it back together again the way it was.”

  “Okay.” was the one-word reply from a voice barely able to speak it. “Okay?” “Yes, okay!” “Yes okay we spilt up, or yes okay we don’t?” Kennedy felt his anger rising. “We should split up. It’s not right like this. Christy, I want tolove you, I really do. It’s just that I don’t seem…” ann rea struggled for words.

  “It’s okay, ann rea, it is really,” Kennedy said as he went back to the sofa. ann rea rose to meet him. They held each other tightly, gently swaying, Kennedy patting her on her back, saying, “It’s okay.”

  “But I don’t want to lose you as a friend.” ann rea was now sobbing unashamedly.

  “Let’s just deal with this part first, once we manage to get over this I’m sure we’ll be friends, it’ll just take time,” Kennedy replied, himself now close to tears.

  They stood there in his living room hugging each other, letting the beginning of the healing time pass.

  Kennedy spoke first, sometime later when ann rea’s sobbing had subsided.

  “You should go now.” “Could I not stay tonight?” “I don’t think that would be right. You should go.” “But I don’t want to leave you, Christy.” ann rea was now cryinguncontrollably.

  “We need to start the ending, ann rea, it’s wrong delaying it, it’s only going to make it harder,” Kennedy said, mustering all the resolve he could. He felt himself a single split second away from saying, ‘Okay then, let’s just go to bed and we’ll deal with it tomorrow,’ but he knew the tomorrow would become a couple of months of hurt, and not just for him.

  “Oh Jesus, Kennedy, look at me, I’m a mess.” She kissed him, sealing her resolve. It was a goodbye kiss, a long, passionate kiss but a goodbye kiss all the same. It was a kiss where they both tried to convey what they had meant to each other, and they broke it off in a mellower mood.

  They spoke no further. ann rea gathered together her things and made to leave. She turned to face him in the hall and was about to speak but then quickly turned away and let herself out, closing the strong, protective door behind her.

  On Saturday night at ten forty-five precisely, Detective Inspector Christy Kennedy lost the love of his life. While on the other side of the door, anyone witnessing ann rea’s gentle consistent sobbing would not have believed that she would ever love anyone in her life more than she loved Kennedy at that point.

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  On the seventh day of this case, Kennedy walked to his office via Primrose Hill, he didn’t feel so bad, at least not as bad as he thought he should. He’d slept okay, thought about ann rea a bit, not as much as he thought he was going to. But then again he figured the gap which she was now making in his life was not yet evident since it was only a matter of ten hours, seven of which he had been asleep, since they split up.

  But then, he thought, how could anyone feel bad while walking over Primrose Hill on a morning such as this. It was truly a magical place and, to make matters even better, he had spied two magpies as he entered the park. He recited the “one for sorrow, two for joy” rhyme and said, quietly to himself, “Well you know, maybe this is what I needed, to get this thing with ann rea finally resolved, and if it’s not going to be her, and after last night that is certainly the case, at least that part of my life is over and resolved, and now it’s time to get on with the next part. And I’ll take two magpies anytime to start anew.”

  One good thing you could say about Kennedy: he was great company for himself and he had over the years grown very used to his own company and, in fact quite liked it. Liked it to a degree that at that point, early on the Monday morning, he didn’t feel as much the loss of ann rea as he felt of having escaped from a situation which, on paper, was never going to work. He knew not why: old baggage, he was a romantic; she wasn’t, lots of things. But he knew that accepting it wasn’t going to work and that it was over, and having the will to get on with things, was turning out to be a bit of a major relief.

  He knew for a fact that soon in his lone moments his memories of the times with ann rea would come flooding back. He’d hear the fun things she had said, or would picture them together in an intimate moment; and then he would definitely feel the loss, and a great a loss it would be, too.

  But not today; today was for drinking the many pleasures of Primrose Hill. Primrose Hill was unique in that it had all the soul you needed when you walked over it and equally it had all the fun and colour you needed when you were lost in it with your lover. But today it was for crossing, recharging one’s batteries and getting to North Bridge House and tying up the many loose ends on the Forsythe triple murder.

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  At North Bridge House there were few signs that Camden CID were detaining a triple murderer in their basic, but clean and freshly painted cells. Kennedy was immediately visited in his office by DS Irvine, looking less haggard than on Saturday evening. Irvine explained that he had been able to spend some time with Forsythe in the cells making his peace with her. He had successfully explained to her that there really wasn’t much else that he could have done other than help set the trap which had eventually snared her.

  Apparently, according to Irvine, she was now over it and accepted that, as Irvine now reported to Kennedy trying to raise a smile, “A man’s got to do what a man’s got to do.”

  But the good news was that she was ready, willing and able to talk with Kennedy and was foregoing her right to have a solicitor present.

  Kennedy elected to have Anne Coles present with him on the interview. He began with the now-traditional intro for the benefit of the ever-present third eye, the tape recorder. He announced those present, PC Gaul, standing by the door, WPC Coles and himself on one side of the barren table and Dr Annabella Forsythe alone, as requested, on the other.

  Forsythe looked as happy as someone on Prozac. She appeared stress-free, laid back and willing them to throw any and all questions at her.

  “Could we start with Neil Burton?” Kennedy began.

  “Yes,” Forsythe replied quietly, ever so quietly, barely competing with the ticking of the clock, “although he wasn’t the first, I’m sure you know that by now. Jerry Mac Kane was first, but that was up in Birmingham, and both of them were the same, they held a leg each, you see.”

  “How did you meet up with Burton again?” Coles inquired.

  “Oh, it was easy. The low-lifers of Camden Town all have their locals. I found out which pub he hung out at, it didn’t take long really, and I went and checked him out a few times first. Then I dolled myself up and went back and allowed him to chat me up. It’s so easy with you men,” said Forsythe, “you make eye contact with a man and he thinks he’s pulled. He puffs up his chest and steps in for the kill. They think that t
hey are doing you a favour. I got him drunk, whispered in his ear that I was up for a bit of outdoor activity, you know, I implied I

  wanted to have some fun with him in Regent’s Park. He nearly fell off his chair. At one point I was convinced he was coming in his pants, he couldn’t believe his luck.”

  “So you…” WPC Coles prompted.

  “So I took him up Parkway, whispering in his ear about how great it was going to be under the moon, and when we got to Gloucester Gate Bridge I suggested we sit up on the bridge for a while. We were at this end on the left. I got the idea when I used to wander around this area a lot, just before I left. At this side of the bridge, I don’t know if you’ve ever seen it or not but there’s a plaque showing a wild dog attacking a hapless traveller, and that’s when I first started to think about ridding the world of the four of them. I knew this would not be easy, though, because they were all stronger than me.”

  “So you saw the dog and you…” Coles again prompted Forsythe gently.

  “First off I thought about getting a dog, you know, and setting it on them, killing all of them. Then I realised that was pretty impracticable, it might have even attacked me.” Forsythe broke into nervous laughter. Kennedy stared at her, trying to fathom how this frail woman, dressed in cream slacks, belt removed, white baggy blouse and simple white slip-on shoes, had taken the lives of three fellow humans. He found no clues being offered in her demeanour.

  “Anyway, we were sitting on the bridge, he readied himself for his pleasure, and when he was least expecting it I elbowed him directly in the throat as hard as I could. Luckily I caught him off balance and he toppled backwards off the bridge. I jumped down after him. He’d landed on that large pile of stones and that knocked the wind out of him. That’s what I was counting on. I allowed him to regain just enough consciousness to be aware of what was happening to him and I tore into him with my scalpel. You should have seen the look of fear in his eyes as I cut him for the first time,” Forsythe reported proudly.

  “Jerry Mac Kane was the same?” Kennedy inquired.

  “Pretty much,” she sighed. “Different location, Birmingham, same come-on, use of alcohol, although Mac Kane had more front than Sainsbury’s. He really did think he was God’s gift and IŠ” She tailed off, perhaps deciding what not to say.

  Kennedy and Coles let the silence fill the room; the clicking of the clock overhead seemed to grow louder and louder.

  “You know,” said Forsythe after thirty ticks of the second hand and resumed her narrative. “The thing which surprised me the most is how easy it is to kill someone. I was quite prepared for the episode to be so horrible and upsetting that I wouldn’t have what it takes to do it again and I’d let the other three off. But when I saw that look of fear in his eyes when he realised what was about to happen to him, same with Burton, I felt fully vindicated. It was so exhilarating, and I couldn’t wait to get to the next one, Burton.”

  Coles was shocked at the (now former) pathologist’s candour.

  “And the other great thing,” Forsythe laughed, leaning over the desk, uncrossing her legs and clasping her hands together in front of her, “was that I got to carry out the autopsy. That was a great touch, wasn’t it? Mauled by a mad dog, I loved all that. I loved it so much I did it twice. And you all looked to me in my professional capacity to tell you, and none of you doubted me. You might have pondered other reasons for the injuries, but you never for one second doubted the soundness of the information I was giving you.

  “Why did you change your approach for John B. Stone?” Kennedy quizzed.

  “Well,” she said, “I was tempted to repeat the mad dog trick but I felt I might be getting a bit too careless. I didn’t mind being caught, you know, I just needed to cover up my tracks enough to be able to get the job done. And the name thing, Elliot versus Forsythe and Bella versus Anna, could only work for so long. I also knew if the mad dog attacked twice you’d be looking even closer at the victims to find a connection. And I knew at some point the Primrose Hill rape thing would come up and you’d connect all the names, so I had to make sure I kept my distance.”

  Kennedy leaned back in his chair, fingers interlocked behind his head. “So you hired Hugh Anderson?”

  “Again, I was surprised at how easy it was, I was shocked at how simple it is to commit a crime. I got the idea for the perfect alibi when I was examining bodies. I kept thinking about how the murderer nearly always left some clue to their identity. And I went from that to thinking, how about leaving the wrong clues? Clues which would lead you to Anderson and not me. You know, set it up so that a) I had a perfect alibi, I knew what time the stooge was going to start proceedings so I made sure I was in company; and b) I planted enough evidence to lead the police back to the stooge. It’s so obvious I’m surprised no one has ever used it before.”

  She smiled to herself and sat back in her chair again. “I checked with the Camden News Journal and discovered that he’d been done for GBH. They gave out his address just like that, they just didn’t care. I couldn’t believe it. That’s the thing, though - on the phone you make yourself sound official, there’s no worry about giving your telephone number, no one ever checks, and you can get whatever you need. I contacted Hugh Anderson, a professional villain, good manners, no sexual overtones at all, agreed the fee, and he went away and did his business as ordered. I made sure that at the time the crime was about to commence I was up to my neck in an alibi. And since I was doing the autopsy I was able to register the time of death as the time Anderson was doing the thumping, the exact time that I was dining in a restaurant with a friend. I also dropped the apple on the scene. Our Mr. Anderson likes his fruit, doesn’t he? He’s got to that stage in life where he thinks a daily diet of apples and pears will cancel out all the years he’s been abusing his body. I’ve seen inside those bodies and my advice to the Andersons of the world is forget the poxy fruit, smoke yourself happily to your inevitable death. Anyway the apple, just like it betrayed Eve, put Anderson at the scene of the crime, and I had every confidence that you, Inspector, with your great reputation, would do the rest. I met up with Anderson later that evening, paid him his due and went back to the fountain by the bridge where I had told him to dump Stone’s body. I’d found a baseball bat in Regent’s Park a few days before. I’d hidden it up in the lane by the Danish Church. I brought it with me after Anderson had left with his money, then I went back to the fountain and beat Stone to death.”

  Kennedy was struck by the apparent ease with which Forsythe recalled the incidents, and he noticed that Coles seemed disturbed at the way this woman was relating her story. The WPC was shifting in her seat and fidgeting with her blouse cuffs. He thought that Coles’ body language might be off-putting to the other woman, but Forsythe was now fully into her stride and nothing was going to slow her down.

  “That’s also where I went after they attacked me - the fountain. After they raped me I went and hid in the fountain, I felt that the washerwoman would protect me in a way that my parents had not. That’s where I was found. So that’s where I felt John Boy should be found. They were very clever, you know, no bruises, no torn clothes, no beating. I could even hear them saying to the police, there in the station, ‘What rape? No, no, she wanted it, she kept leading us on.’ And it was so embarrassing because I could see the police, and even my father, looking at me and thinking, ‘Well she doesn’t look like she’s been raped, maybe she did ask for it.”

  This thought could still make Annabella Forsythe Elliot shudder violently all these twenty-four years later, and as she did so now there came a distant deep thud, as if someone was aggressively slamming a far-off door. So aggressively Kennedy could have sworn that the walls of North Bridge House were shaking. Castle in a bad mood, perhaps?

  Forsythe sank further back in her chair. Kennedy wasn’t entirely sure but he thought he saw a brief smirk creep over her face.

  “And Nash? What had you planned for Nash?” he asked as the interview wound down.

 
“Ah!” she replied, sitting up in her chair again and engaging him with one of her coquettish looks, “you’ll see, soon enough!”

  Chapter Fifty

  Nash had returned to his office a happy man. Gone was the one worry, the one taint on an otherwise unblemished past. A past fit for a future member of the cabinet, and hell, maybe even a past fit for a Prime Minster. Well, why not?

  Anyone can do anything, was Nash’s motto. It was all down to putting yourself in the proper position and then having enough energy and knowledge to motivate your people. Now wasn’t that the same as running a pop group? Well, very nearly.

  He wandered around his office happy to have this free time. Most people in the music industry reach their office at the crack of lunchtime. That was more the old school really. Nash’s generation, apart from being positively more ruthless than those before, knew that a major part of any success in the music biz had to do with putting in the hours. It was all to do with putting in the hours. The early bird gets the worm and the late bird gets the west coast (of America) as it rises.

  Due to the trauma of the weekend Esther would shield him for the first part of the day, field his calls and allow him to gradually work his way back into things. Rory Nash felt like he’d been away on holiday for a month and that this was his first day back. It reminded him of his first days back at school, new smells, new crisp clean exercise books, new clothes, new haircut, newly shorn finger (and toe) nails. He could smell the fresh polish on the floor. His office was looking spick and span, the weekend cleaners had done a great job.