Dead Wrong

by Helen H. Durrant

  “Who was that, Kelly?”

  “Joyce Pope. She was a dreadful woman. She had David scared half to death. She had his brother too, but he wised up and got out. David was too young so he couldn’t take him with him.”

  Ruth and Calladine looked at each other.

  Was that why Richard Pope had been killed? Calladine wondered. Was it possible that Morpeth had a new identity and Pope could have jeopardised it? He’d certainly have recognised him, he’d have seen him often enough when his mother had fostered David. Michael Morpeth must have worried that Richard would have given the game away. But whom was he masquerading as?

  “Kelly, if David’s brother, Michael, came back to Leesdon would you know him, could you pick him out from a current photo?”

  “Michael was into punk back then. He had his hair dyed jet black and half of it shaved off. His face was often covered in odd makeup. He didn’t hang out with the local kids and he was a right weirdo. So, no I might not, particularly if he’s smartened up, got a regular hairstyle.

  That meant that Michael Morpeth could be living among them. And Kelly was right — he would be an older, toned-down version of the lad everyone recalled from back then. He could pass unnoticed but not to Richard Pope.

  “On that day I took him to Michael,” Kelly continued. “He was creepy, but I knew he’d sort him out. David would do anything for Michael and vice versa. David was odd, like I said, but Michael was worse. David wasn’t always a good lad, but Michael was evil. He used to make me shudder, but he was always okay with David.”

  There was a sudden knock on the door. It was Imogen. She peeped in and gestured towards Calladine.

  “The emails and stuff that were sent to Lydia Holden. They were sent from the IT suite at the community centre and they have cameras in there.”

  Ruth smiled. “Thanks, Imogen.

  “What was Michael like? I’ve seen photos of David and he was small for his age but overweight.”

  “He was fat, you mean. That was half the problem, that and his autism. Michael and David were very different. Michael was tall, wiry, with dark, longish hair which he had done in a punky style.”

  “Do you know where he went when he left the Pope’s?”

  “At first he went back to his mother. She was a drunk — a hopeless woman. After that — after she killed herself — I don’t know what he did. I wasn’t really bothered, to be honest. He wasn’t talked about much. No one liked him.”

  “Thank you, Kelly. I’ll get you a lift home. We may need to talk to you again, so no more disappearing — okay?”

  Kelly nodded and rose wearily off the bench.

  “Ice gave me a hard time, but I wouldn’t want him dead. You will get whoever did this, won’t you?”

  Calladine nodded. He was beginning to believe now that he really would.

  “The emails were sent from the community centre. Not very clever.” Ruth pointed out.

  “Perhaps he had no choice,” Calladine mused. “Whoever we are looking for, Michael Morpeth or not, has a place — perhaps in the wilds, up near the moors. What chance they have broadband up there?”

  “We’d better go take a look. They keep logs and have good security. With any luck we may get a look at our man. We could certainly do with that particular piece of the puzzle.”

  Chapter 22

  He could hear Lydia began to sob as he opened the cellar door.

  “Please . . . don’t do this. I won’t tell anyone. It can be our secret.” She called out to him, her voice faltering with emotion.

  He laughed. Secret or not — he didn’t care. It was time for him to be selfish, enjoy a little me time. The others, the young men, had been boring compared to her. All that chopping, coming up with inventive ways to dispatch them. Mash had been good though. His disembowelment had been a treat to watch. The look on the youth’s face when he’d realised the full implications. Thoughts of the horror of waiting in so much agony for the end to come had brought on that feeling again, the one he enjoyed so much.

  But she was different. Lydia Holden was beautiful, with a lovely female body to lavish his attentions on. He’d keep her for a while, and have some fun. All his relationships with women, the few there’d been, had ended in tatters. This time he’d call the shots. She was in no position to complain or to refuse him. He felt the excitement rise. There were a lot of things he wanted to try on that sweet body of hers. It’d be good practice for when he made a play for Kelly.

  Kelly had always been the one he wanted. Even back in school, he’d liked her. But she’d gone and wasted her time on that idiot, Ice. Why do women do that? He’d never understand. Kelly and Ice. Now Lydia and that stupid detective — why didn’t they see? He was all they needed.

  These thoughts tormented him and he felt the anger rise. “Bitch. Stupid bitch. You deserve everything you get. No one is coming for you, no one knows where you are.” He leaned over her, his breathing heavy, his face florid with rage. He had to make her see — she had to be taught a lesson.

  Lydia screamed. He heard the noise she made echo in the dark, bleak space. Did she not realise how hopeless it was? That there was nothing she could do. She’d die here in agony and no one would ever know. His beautiful reporter would die realising that she’d made a huge mistake. He was the one she should have chosen and not that stupid detective.

  Was he still looking? Of course he was, the detective was like a dog with a bone. But he wouldn’t find her. He’d fret and he’d search, he’d work his team into a frazzle but it would do no good. He was far too clever for him. He’d outwitted the detective inspector at every turn, he realised proudly. And now he could claim the prize.

  She was whimpering, he hated that. He slapped her thigh. “Stop it! Shut the fuck up!”

  “I . . . I can’t help it,” she mumbled.

  “Shut up! You’re starting to get on my nerves. Why are you like this, why don’t you understand that this is where you belong — here with me?”

  He could see her shivering and even hear her teeth chattering with cold.

  “Shut it, bitch! You’re making too much noise. I can’t hear.” He was straining to listen to something else.

  “Did you hear that?”

  * * *

  Lydia had reached the end of her endurance. She couldn’t take anymore and her heart was hammering so fast she couldn’t hear anything either. She was too traumatised to even listen at first. What was he talking about? Did you hear that? he’d asked. Why — had someone come to the house? Had he heard knocking on the door? She tried to pull herself together, turning her head wildly from side to side and inhaling deeply, preparing to scream for all she was worth.

  Her body seemed to wake up and ready itself. Adrenaline, she reasoned. If there was someone here, then she had to make sure they heard her. Then she saw it. There was a series of small red lights flashing on a shelf across the room. She tried harder to listen. There came a series of low moans, followed by a loud thud. It was a baby monitor. The bastard had a baby monitor down here. Why? —And more to the point, who did he have upstairs? Surely not an infant; no one would leave a child in his care.

  Then in the blink of an eye he was gone. Lydia heard a door open followed by the sound of his footsteps as he ran up a staircase. Something had happened; something that bothered him enough to make him run like that. He’d heard something on the monitor and had gone to check it out. But what had he heard? She turned her head. Yes, this time he’d left the door open. If she could pull hard enough, get free then she’d make a run for it. But it was hopeless. She was bound with chains attached to manacles fixed to the bench.

  “Fucking, bastard maniac!” she shrieked into the gloom. “Get down here and let me go, you fucking lunatic!”

  Then he was back. “She’s fallen,” his voice quivered. “She’s up there on the floor, and she’s not moving at all. What shall I do?”

  “Who’s fallen? Who the hell are you talking about?”

  “None of your business. Fo
rget it.” And he left the room again.

  Lydia was mystified. Whatever was going on had him rattled. She had to think. This was a situation she should be ready to exploit.

  He came back.

  “I think she’s seriously hurt. I can’t stand to see her like that. She looks so small, and there’s blood . . .” There was real emotion — fear — in the words.

  Gone was the cold, calculated killer, and in his place was a man with a quaking voice, unsure of what to do next. She had to think. This sudden change of mood was a chance not to be missed. Perhaps she should offer to help him. If she played things right, it could be her chance to escape.

  “Is she breathing?” Lydia spoke gently, trying to sound as concerned as she could.

  “How should I know?” He held his head in his hands and made a sort of howling noise that reverberated around the cellar. “It’s all my fault. No it’s not.” The tone of his voice had changed again. “It’s hers. She’s a stupid old woman. Why can’t she do as she’s told? I told her not to move, but she doesn’t understand; she gets confused. I said I’d get the supper and she didn’t have to bother. I wish she’d listen to me!” His voice rose to a whine.

  “Do you want me to help?” Lydia posed the question as calmly as she could. “I think you do. I think you need someone to look at her; someone who can judge what’s going on.” She tried to sound matter of fact. He must believe that she could really make a difference. “I have first-aid training, you know. I can do CPR and everything. Has she knocked her head?”

  “I don’t know. Should I check?”

  “That’s a good idea. Yes, go and check and then we can work out what to do.”

  He disappeared again. This was surreal. He’d become a different entity. He was dithering, almost pliable. She’d never get a better chance. If he would only untie her, then she might still have a chance.

  Now he was actually crying. “There’s a lot of blood. All over her head, running down her face, and she still hasn’t got up.”

  Lydia put more urgency into her words, “She obviously needs help. If we don’t act straight away, then a bang on the head could be very dangerous indeed. We don’t want anything awful to happen to her, do we? Because we know who everyone will blame? They’d say it was our fault, but we can put them right, can’t we? We can tell them what we did for her. How brave we both were.”

  “First-aid training? You’re not just saying that to fool me into letting you go? Because if you don’t help her I’ll be very angry and it’ll be worse for you.”

  “No, no, of course not. I can see that this is serious and I wouldn’t lie about something like that. At one time I almost became a nurse,” she lied. “I can help, I know I can, and you know this is the right thing to do, don’t you? Think how terrible it would be if she died.”

  He let out a high-pitched, quivering scream, and went to her side again. “I can’t lose her. I need her to live. She’s all I’ve got left of the old life.”

  He was pulling at the chains. She’d done it — he was releasing her. Lydia felt a surge of relief as she was finally able to sit up and rub some life back into her limbs. So far so good.

  “Where is she? Upstairs?”

  “We’ll go slow. You first, and she’s in the kitchen. Top of the stairs, turn right.”

  “Do you think I could have a blanket or a robe? I’m naked and cold and you’re embarrassing me, staring like that.”

  He looked her up and down, as if seeing her for the first time, and threw her a dirty old sheet, which Lydia promptly wrapped around her.

  “Up you go. One false move, and you’re history, bitch. Understand?”

  Lydia nodded. She understood only too well. This would be her only chance. Whatever she did now had to be final. This maniac would kill her if she failed.

  Upstairs, she could see that the building was old; a largish house or even a farm. The walls were made of local stone, like the mill she lived in. The furniture was old — dark wood, and covered in dust and junk. No one had cleaned for a long time. The curtains were drawn tightly closed, but the fabric was thin. There were no street lights outside, but she could just make out the light from the full moon in the night sky. The countryside then — perhaps up in the Pennines somewhere, above Leesworth.

  “Why did you leave her so near to the fire? Her arm has been lying across the grate and it’s badly burned.”

  The elderly woman was lying unconscious on the kitchen floor. She looked terribly frail, almost emaciated. There was a large gash across her right temple, which was still pouring blood. From the way she lay, it looked as though she’d fallen from her chair.

  “I’ll need a clean towel. In fact, fetch two, one for her head and one to soothe this arm.”

  He went to a drawer in the side of a large oak table and produced two thick tea towels.

  “I want you to keep this one pressed hard against the wound on her head. We need to stop the bleeding.”

  He was dithering again. He didn’t seem to want to touch the woman. “Go on. Press it hard. I need to soak this one in cold water for her arm.”

  Amazingly, he did as she told him without argument. He was kneeling beside the woman, rocking back and forth on his knees and whispering to her.

  “Who is she?” Lydia let the water run until it flowed icy.

  “My grandmother. We can’t let her die. I need her.” And now he was pleading with her; only minutes ago, he’d been planning to kill her.

  “Don’t worry, she’ll be okay. Are you going to call for an ambulance?”

  “No! No. I don’t want anyone coming here.” He was yelling again. “I know your game, bitch. You think I’m stupid. Well I’m not, so forget it.”

  The old woman on the floor really did need proper help; she was in a bad way. Lydia looked around, her eyes frantically searching for something — a weapon to hit him with. It had to be hard, and it had to be heavy. She’d only get one chance.

  “This is a kind thing you’re doing. I won’t forget that you helped me — and her. I never forget things like that. Ask Kelly.” His moods veered crazily, and Lydia knew she needed to get out of here before he became manic again.

  “But it doesn’t change anything. It can’t. You know too much about me. You’ll tell others — that inspector of yours, and he’ll lock me up. I can’t have that. I can’t let that happen.”

  “Is she coming round yet?” Lydia pointedly ignored this comment.

  “No, she isn’t doing anything. She’s not moving, and the bleeding won’t stop.”

  “Put your head on her chest. Check if her breathing’s regular.”

  He bent down low with his back to her. This was it. She wouldn’t get a better opportunity. By the fire there were a number of heavy objects, including a heavy cast-iron poker.

  Lydia darted to the side and grabbed it. It was now or never. Swinging it high she sprang forward and brought it crashing down across the back of his head.

  She saw the blood spurt. She saw him turn momentarily with a look of utter shock on his face. Then she watched as he fell onto his back — unconscious.

  Lydia had no time to dwell on what she’d done or to think about the old woman. She scuttled around the kitchen looking for something to tie his hands with. She found a leather belt and fastened it around his wrists as tightly as she could. She used the tieback from the curtains to bind his ankles. Now she needed to find a phone.

  Despite rendering him helpless, she was still very nervous about leaving him in the kitchen; he might wake up and get out. But she had no choice. She had to get help, and she couldn’t just kill him in cold blood, despite what he’d done to her. She made a quick search of the house. She searched the cluttered furniture in the sitting room, until finally she found her things — most importantly, her mobile phone. Now she could call for help and get the hell out of here.

  Chapter 23

  “I want a word with the IT technician, and whoever looks after your security, please.” Calladine flashed his
warrant card at the woman sitting at the community centre desk.

  “Craig Barker looks after the IT suite.” She pressed a button on the intercom.

  “Craig to main desk!” Her voice rang out across the complex.

  Craig Barker was young, and looked very much like all the other youths who used the computers here.

  “Yeah? Want a machine? Do you have login details?”

  Calladine shook his head. “No, son, we don’t want to use anything. We want to ask you some questions. I’m DI Calladine and this is DS Ruth Bayliss.”

  The young man shrugged, and deposited a piece of well-chewed gum in the rubbish bin.

  “Fire away.”

  “A couple of emails were sent from here earlier on this week. I have the headers. Are you able to show me which machine was used and tell me who used it on those days?”

  Craig looked at the paperwork. “Yeah, follow me . . . I keep a log: machine number; IP addresses. Just give me a minute.”

  Calladine looked at Ruth and raised his eyebrows. So far, so good.

  “Yep, here we are. PC number ten. I’ve got the user down here as a Mikey. He stayed for thirty five minutes then left.”

  “Do you have any CCTV?”

  “Should have. Want to look?”

  Calladine and Ruth followed Craig to a side room and watched as he rummaged through a number of CDs.

  “This should be the one.”

  They watched a number of customers come and go over the afternoon. They were mostly lads from the estate, and no one was making any attempt to hide their identity. Then they saw him.

  He had on the same hooded top as he’d been wearing when he took Lydia. He spoke to the girl on the IT reception desk for a few moments, signed the log book and slipped onto a chair in front of a computer. He was at it again, making sure that his back faced the camera at all times. Another rear view — great!

  “Is there any way we can get to see his face?”

  Craig grinned. He got himself comfortable at the keyboard, as if waiting for something. Then, just at the very moment their man turned his machine off, he froze the screen. For a second or two the reflection shone back at them. He was caught in his own blank monitor. Craig zoomed in, and it was just possible to see him face on.