The Night Caller: An utterly gripping crime thriller

by J. M. Hewitt

  But she saw and heard nothing but horror and shock, sobs and low concerned voices. Women’s hands gripped the arms and bodies of their friends. Men rubbed palms over faces, their eyes sad, troubled and scared. Scared, because next time it could be them.

  With a slow burning anger, Carrie pushed herself upright and raised a hand to tug gently at the curls that she had washed only hours earlier. The night air made her hair feel damp and cold.

  She pushed herself upright, walked on and found Paul working his way beyond the cordon. Like her, he was keeping an eye on the people who wandered away. All the normal people remained. They would need to be questioned, but the ones who left the scene were altogether more interesting to the police.

  ‘Anything?’ she asked without looking at him, staring beyond, behind, all around.

  ‘Nineteen-year-old Jordan Robinson,’ he replied grimly. ‘It’s not clear who he was out with, and I haven’t spoken to anyone who actually saw him go into the water.’

  Carrie settled her blue gaze on him. ‘So how do we know he went in, then?’

  This time he met her eyes. ‘They’re saying that one minute he was there,’ he gestured to the wall, ‘the next he was… gone. They heard a splash.’

  ‘And nobody saw it? Nobody actually saw him go in?’ she snapped. She felt her blood pressure rising, her face and scalp tingling with heat. ‘Get the names of the people still here, the ones that called it in.’

  A large police van pulled onto the quay, the headlights lighting up Carrie’s face for a mere moment. Her skin paled even whiter than usual in the glow before the van parked up, headlights extinguished. Carrie’s face returned to the shadows.

  The divers were here, clambering out of the side doors, wasting no time in pulling on masks, air canisters, flippers. They worked in a silence that showed this had become routine; they had dived into this canal too many times before.

  ‘I want this shut down, Paul. Do you understand?’ Her voice betrayed her emotion. ‘One person pushed is unacceptable. How many is this now?’

  He lowered his gaze and said, ‘a dozen.’

  That we know of. Neither of them said it, but they both thought it.

  ‘A dozen deaths in six years.’

  ‘But a marked difference between the first six, and the most recent,’ Carrie said, her tone lowered now so only Paul could hear her. She thought of the files she had been reading before the call came in. ‘I wonder what we’ll learn from this one when they fish him out.’

  The Pusher. Or, two Pushers, as was the theory between Carrie and some of her colleagues at the station. And there was a very definite difference. The first Pusher’s victims had been gay men, openly gay or closeted, but definitely gay. Then the MO had changed: the last six drowned had lived shadowy lives; abusers, homophobes, thieves, pimps and dealers. Discoveries that made Carrie certain that the first Pusher would not have changed his range so entirely. The first Pusher was gone, but a new, just as deadly predator had taken his place. It was her theory that the new Pusher had killed the first one.

  Not common knowledge, kept away from press and public, she thought back over her previous words, a shiver of anticipation that a new clue might be forthcoming. I wonder what we’ll learn from this one when they fish him out.

  She looked around, scanning the water, still silent and seemingly empty. But it wasn’t. Someone had gone in. A person. A body would come out.

  ‘This just happened; this is the earliest we’ve ever been on the scene, so let’s take advantage of that fact, yes?’

  ‘Apart from the Canal Street incident, last year,’ Paul said pointedly.

  Carrie’s mouth tightened. Ashlan Patel. Twelve months ago. A night she would never forget but wished she could. They had been in the area, patrolling in the wake of the recent spates of unexplained deaths. On previous occasions they had been called out to bodies that had been pulled from the canals after spending days or weeks in the water. Ashlan Patel had been fresh. His death so recent his flesh had barely cooled.

  Carrie felt a familiar pull in her stomach. Instantly she was back there, beside a different waterway than the one they stood in front of now. Paul dragging him out, Carrie trying to revive the man at the same time as shouting out for bystanders to stay where they were as Paul put a call out for the medics. And the man in the hat across the other side of the water, the only one not panicking. The only one not showing any shock or horror. The man who had almost smiled, knowing that Carrie couldn’t reach him unless she waded across the water. The man who watched her waste precious minutes running to the footbridge to try and reach him. So little information to identify the mystery man. A beanie hat, dark skin – skin that suggested a Mediterranean descent. The stain on his T-shirt. Hard to see in the gloom of the night, but a stain which looked suspiciously to her like blood. And the biggest clue any of the similar cases had thrown up so far; a flash of a tattoo on a dark arm. Not a full image, not even half an image. Not enough to go on, but enough to keep her awake at night, as if she needed more reasons for her insomnia. But lie there she did, trying to see more, trying to remember more, to no avail, for the past year. She was sure that tattoo was the key that would lead them to shutting this thing down.

  The failure burned as much tonight as it had a year ago. The half image of the tattoo imprinted on the inside of her eyelids. That black mark that had wound around the man’s upper arm. Instinctively, automatically, as she had for the last year, she looked straight at the arms of the men on the quayside. It was winter now; anyone with half a brain had a thick coat on, but still she looked. After all, Ashlan Patel’s death had been in the winter, and that man had stood there, bare arms on show, tattoo signalling a warning out into the night.

  But there was nobody here tonight who was sleeveless.

  Carrie swore quietly, frustrated.

  ‘Lock this area down,’ she snapped to a passing constable. ‘I want details of everybody here. Nobody leaves until we’ve got their information and statement.’

  It was a ridiculous request. This canal was heaving with people. Open ended, it backed on to a residential area on both sides. There were walkways and alleys all around it. Impossible to keep people inside.

  Carrie’s breath caught in her throat as she turned a full circle, saw even now how people were wandering away, back to their homes, back to the trams and pubs and restaurants. Carrying on with their social lives now the excitement was abating.

  She pulled at her damp hair. It was Ashlan Patel and Canal Street all over again.

  Her radio shrieked. She pulled it from her belt, turning her back on Paul as she talked through the static. She turned back to face him. He cleared his throat, blinked, waited.

  ‘I’ve got the alleged victim’s address.’ She nodded towards the back streets that lined the Salford canal. ‘We’ve got time to establish who he is, if it’s him we’re looking for, then get back to Forensics. It’s just through here.’

  ‘Do we have enough witness statements?’ Paul asked.

  ‘Uniform’s here, they can carry on.’

  ‘Right,’ he said. ‘Let’s go then.’

  The sound of the car woke Jade, an unusual occurrence in the normally quiet residential street. Fully awake, staring into the darkness, she lay still, one hand on her chest, feeling her heart thumping under her palm as it always did when she was woken so suddenly.

  Moving carefully, Jade pushed herself out of bed and went to the window. The car was moving slowly down the road. A police car, she saw now.

  She moved back to sit in the bed. The rozzers weren’t here for Jade. There was nobody she cared about enough to warrant them coming to her house, not now Nan was gone. Except Nia and she was right here in Jade’s bed, stretched out with her arms touching the headboard above her head, sleeping soundly through the commotion.

  The engine stopped, doors slammed shut simultaneously and Jade threw back the sheet and crept back to the window. The police car was parked outside, unoccupied. There was no sign of
which house they had gone into.

  With a fleeting glance at Nia, she moved silently across the room and down the landing to peer out of the windows at the back of the house. His room, Jordan’s, overlooked the back gardens and the ginnel that she’d stood desolately in on her first day here so many years ago. She opened the window, leaned out and squinted at the closed bedroom curtains. Was it a lamp light she could see through the thick, dark material?

  A thought occurred to her. How sad that in their two homes, only four people needed to be accounted for. Because that’s all there was; Jade, Emma, Jordan and Nia.

  Jade let the curtain fall. She got back in bed and buried into the warm body of her sleeping daughter, falling back into an uneasy sleep.

  Five

  THE NIGHT OF THE PUSH

  Somehow Emma moved into the hallway and looked down the corridor at the shadows that showed through the frosted glass of the front door.

  The knock came again, gentle but insistent.

  Emma shrunk into the shadow of the stairs. If she didn’t open the door, they couldn’t tell her. Strange, half-formed thoughts rushed at her. What if they got a battering ram and broke the door down? She would have to deal with the repair of that at the same time as trying to deal with… whatever else they were going to tell her.

  ‘Mrs Robinson?’

  The voice, which came from inside the house, directly behind her, sent Emma rushing forward. A hand clamped down on her shoulder and Emma turned, a cry escaping from her.

  A plain-clothes policeman stood in her hall. He had simply walked through the open back door.

  ‘Miss,’ Emma blurted.

  ‘Excuse me?’

  She looked at his hand, still holding onto her shoulder, before staring down at the carpet. ‘I’m Miss Robinson,’ she whispered. ‘Not Mrs.’

  He nodded, moved past her to open the front door for another officer, before returning to the kitchen to close the back door. He stood by it, crossed his arms and cleared his throat. The other officer, the one who had been knocking, came in. A woman this time, tall and pale with hair that was suspiciously wet. Emma looked at her; had she been in the canal? But no, her clothes looked dry enough. She raised her eyes to meet the woman’s, saw the sympathy that broke up her hardened face. Emma turned away.

  ‘Can we sit down?’ The voice of the woman officer was smooth, warm, not at all like the way the local rozzers usually barked at people.

  Cornered, she pushed her back to the wall, shook her head from side to side. ‘Noooo… noooo.’ It was a sound she’d never heard, much less ever made herself, a growl, low down in her throat, almost a whisper.

  For long moments there was silence. Emma chanced a look at the man.

  ‘Is he… is my son…?’

  It was the woman who spoke up. ‘Miss Robinson… Emma? I’m Detective Sergeant Carrie Flynn, this is my colleague, Detective Constable Paul Harper…’

  She was coming at Emma, her words fading as a rush sounded loud in Emma’s ears. Emma watched the officer’s mouth moving with fascination, half fearful at this new phenomenon, that she couldn’t hear a word the woman was saying. Then the officer’s mouth formed new words, words that Emma still didn’t hear, but understood anyway.

  ‘There’s been another incident at the canal…’

  Her mouth opened, ready to scream, but instead there was a silence. Emma’s body jolted, sent her spinning in the hallway. She felt hands on her arms, the woman again, DS Carrie Flynn, holding her firmly, leading her away deeper into the house.

  Carrie led the conversation, feeling Paul’s eyes on her. But it wasn’t really a conversation; the mother – she glanced at her notebook – Emma, wasn’t taking anything in. Her eyes glazed, she blinked rapidly, switching her unseeing stare between them.

  She’s not listening, Carrie thought, and changed tack smoothly, as she’d had to do so many times before. She explained again: someone had gone into the water; the witnesses – made unreliable by drink and God knows what else – had either seen it or heard it, or heard it from someone who had seen it. And the person who had fallen or been pushed was the son of the woman who now sat in front of them.

  Emma’s eyes were staying closed for longer each time she blinked. She was lost, shocked, blindsided. Carrie understood the feeling better than anyone. Even though it had been over two decades ago, she still recalled the way a person’s mind could shut down when it had taken in too much. She stopped, swallowed and bowed her head. This was the worst news she could ever bring to someone. But the professional side of her had questions, things she needed to ask to establish whether this was a crime of the same kind that had befallen Ashlan Patel last year.

  And all the others before him, Carrie thought grimly.

  Paul cleared his throat as he broke in. ‘Mrs Robinson – Emma, does Jordan have any distinguishing features, any tattoos or scars?’

  Emma blinked at him. ‘No,’ she whispered. ‘Neither.’ She paused before looking straight at Paul. ‘Can I see him?’

  Carrie dipped her head again; beside her she felt the shift in Paul’s breathing as he withheld a sigh. Emma had misunderstood: she thought there was a body to view, to identify. She remained stoic and unfeeling in order to make her understand.

  ‘Emma,’ she said. ‘We don’t know yet what has happened to Jordan. We have reports that he went in to the canal. We have people out there, searching, but as yet, we haven’t found him.’

  The woman’s eyes were half-closed. Carrie leaned forward, twisted at an unnatural angle to put herself in Emma’s eye line. ‘Emma, do you have a recent picture of Jordan, a photograph? We’ll need to put out an appeal for information as soon as we can.’

  Emma fell back, open mouthed, slipping away from them again.

  * * *

  Emma didn’t know how much time had passed but she saw the male officer held a picture in his hands. Carefully he removed it from the frame. She glanced at the fireplace, saw the gap where it had stood.

  ‘His scarf,’ she said, suddenly. ‘I need to get it.’

  They exchanged looks of sympathy, stirring her anger again, until she reminded herself they didn’t know she’d seen it on the news.

  She didn’t know why the scarf was so important. Inside her was an urgent need to pluck it off the railing where she had seen it hanging on the TV screen. If she didn’t, it would be taken away by the council road-sweepers when they done their morning clean-up, or it would stay there, gathering frost and getting damp.

  Another thought occurred to her and she snapped her head up. ‘Can I see him? Can I see my son?’ Her thoughts tripped over themselves, that if she got the scarf, she could put it around his neck, lay him to rest in it, so he would be warm and secure. He had loved that scarf. He would be cold.

  The officers exchanged a glance which Emma hated. Her dislike of them switched to confusion. Had she already asked them that? Had they refused her? Anger coiled in her stomach like a snake.

  ‘He’s my son,’ she said, her words hissing out from between clenched teeth. ‘You can’t tell me that I can’t—’

  ‘Emma.’ The woman spoke again, her voice ringing clear as she enunciated her words clearly. ‘Emma, we don’t yet know where Jordan is. At this stage, he is still officially a missing person.’

  This time she heard her, and it was like being reborn. Heat flooded through Emma’s veins, her heart skipped around in her chest, pinpricks of warmth spreading through her limbs.

  ‘He’s not dead.’ It wasn’t a question, but the woman officer answered anyway.

  ‘Emma,’ she said. ‘We need you to wait here in case Jordan comes home. We have divers, more officers, Forensics on the scene.’

  She felt her throat working, like a second chance. No body; no death. She felt her fingers twisting her rings and deliberately she stilled her hands, breathed deeply. She mustn’t appear hysterical, yet she knew she was starting to look that way to these rozzers.

  Be normal, be in control, she told herself sternl
y. Or they won’t let you leave this house.

  ‘I’m sorry, what are your names?’ she asked, careful to make her voice sound natural.

  The woman exchanged another sympathetic glance with the man. ‘I’m Carrie. This is Paul.’

  Emma blinked several times rapidly. Carrie and Paul. Sounded like the title of one of her films on the RomCom channel. Did police officers usually introduce themselves with their first names? Another thought struck her; were they police officers at all? Was this whole thing a ruse? A stupid joke, cooked up by Jordan and his mates?

  But no… the news report outside the Matchstick Man. And the scarf, hanging forlorn on the railing. And Jordan didn’t joke. Ever.

  Remembering the scarf jolted Emma again and she spoke to Carrie. ‘I’d like to go down there, to the quay.’ She glanced down at Carrie’s hand, saw no ring, wondered if she had children anyway. ‘I’m his mother,’ she said.

  Their eyes remained on her, nothing in their stance said they were prepared to let her get up and go. Something near panic fluttered in her chest.

  ‘I’m his mother,’ she repeated, as forcefully as she could manage. ‘I want to go there, I need to be there.’

  She shifted in her chair, made to get up.

  The man exchanged a glance with his colleague before he spoke up. Paul, Emma reminded herself. Police officer Paul. ‘We can take you there,’ he said. ‘But we will need to ask you some questions; we need to get a sense of Jordan’s life, build a picture if you will, so we can investigate this thoroughly.’

  Emma looked at him blankly, his words meant nothing. She turned to Carrie as the woman officer spoke.

  They flanked her again as they left the house. After the heat of the radiators inside, and that strange warmth that had blanketed Emma when she realised they were not there to tell her that Jordan was dead, the late-night winter air bit at the skin on her face. Emma half-turned, looked up at Jade’s house. It was all in darkness.