by steve higgs
The male cop handed my driver’s license back to the female cop as he said, ‘I’m out. This is way too new world weird for me.’
Simon snarled at me with gritted teeth, ‘I want you out. I want you out tonight. Your things will be waiting for you in the garage when you get there.’ Then, before I could protest or argue, he spun on a heel and stormed off.
It was silent in the back of the ambulance for a few seconds and as time stretched out and no one said anything, I got angry. Angry at how I felt now. So much had happened that I should have been able to control, but I hadn’t. I let it happen and Simon dumping me felt like the last straw. I looked around at all the faces staring at me.
‘Yes, I’m a guy, okay?’ I snapped in my normal voice.
Karen said, ‘Ewww.’
Then the paramedic leaned across to reattach the blood/oxygen monitor and I slapped it away. Ignoring his cry of protest, I shuffled my backside off the gurney and back onto the pavement.
‘Hold on,’ said the cop. She looked like she had seen it all before or heard it all before and was just too bored to be surprised by it. ‘I still need to get a statement from you.’ Then she saw the desperate look in my eyes and let her shoulders slump in defeat. ‘We can do it over there out of everyone’s way.’
She pointed to spot on the pavement a few feet away. It wasn’t private, but it was far enough for me to feel like I wasn’t being watched by everyone. We didn’t get there though. A shout that rang above the sound of everything else going on, stopped us both short.
‘Hey tranny, what’s going on with your hair?’ I turned to see Police Constable Patience Woods approaching me at speed, her ample hips swinging as she came. I knew her through Amanda. The two women had been beat cops together until quite recently when Amanda quit and took the job at Blue Moon. Patience had a way with words that was just plain offensive, but she always seemed genuinely pleased to see me. ‘I got it from here, sugar,’ she shouted. The cop with me raised a hand to show she was fine with handing me over and walked away.
Then Patience arrived, finally catching up to where her presence had been felt several seconds earlier. She was like that; her personality a whole lot bigger than the woman it was stuck inside. ‘Hey girl,’ she said, offering me a high five. I glanced beyond her to where I could see a more senior officer frowning in her direction. ‘You should fix your hair, sugar. You don’t look right without it.’
I mumbled my thanks and used the light shining on a nearby car window to get it straight. When I had it in place, Patience said, ‘You look like crap, girl. Why don’t you tell me what’s been going on and how you come to be in a house that’s on fire.’
So, I told her all about Tempest and Amanda being away, to which she asked, ‘Do you think those two are finally hooking up? I swear, at the speed they were moving, I thought I was gonna have to grease up his thing and push him into her.’
I snorted at that point, finally finding something funny in the chaos around me. I had no car, I had nowhere to live and I had no boyfriend it seemed. Patience made me laugh though, not just then, but several more times as I told her about the Sandman and how I was trying to be an investigator too.
She took my statement, in her usual half-assed kind of way and confirmed I was free to go. Go where though? That was what I had to ask myself. I could collect my things from Simon’s place tomorrow or whatever, but it was cold out tonight despite the heavy blanket the firefighters gave me, and I had nowhere to go and no way to get there. I could ask gran if I could move back in. I knew she would say yes, but I wasn’t going to wake her in the middle of the night, hammering on her door to be let in.
Forlornly, I looked at my car keys and clicked the plipper thing to open it. When the lights flashed to announce it was unlocked, I sobbed a little laugh that it still worked, but then I spotted my solution for the night. I still had a key to Tempest’s house on my keyring. It was right there, hanging from the bunch with all the others. He had given me the keyring a few weeks ago when his office burned down and he wanted me to work from the office in his house until he could get a new place.
He wasn’t there and I was certain he wouldn’t mind. I still felt uncomfortable about just letting myself in without his permission though, so I sent him a text message to say I needed a place to stay and was going to crash on his couch until the morning and hoped that was okay. It was close to three in the morning in France which meant he most likely wouldn’t read the message until after I had stayed the night, but as I looked around to see if there was any chance I could get a lift back into Maidstone, my phone pinged and his reply was there on the screen: I should sleep in the spare room and stay as long as I needed.
At least something was going right for me, but as I stared sleepily out the back window of Patience’s squad car as we swept along the country lanes, I couldn’t help but wonder who the Sandman was and how he had known about me. Was the house bugged? Was he watching from across the street? Whoever he was, he had known enough to target my car.
Patience was good enough to drop me off in Finchampstead right outside Tempest’s house. I thanked her and said goodnight then stumbled into the house, grabbed a shower because I stank of smoke and my face and hands were filthy and finally, at close to four in the morning, I sank into cool, crisp sheets and fell instantly asleep.
The sound of a man quietly singing Mr Sandman woke me up.
Tempest’s House. Sunday, December 4th 0447hrs
I sat bolt upright in bed, drenched in nervous sweat and breathing hard from the shock of his voice only to find myself alone. I clutched at my chest, my heart still racing from the vivid dream. I slept fitfully after that, eventually winning the fight for sleep sometime around six and sleeping right through until almost ten when the sound of my phone ringing woke me.
Coming awake, I looked around for it, found myself hopelessly disorientated until I remembered where I was and then still couldn’t find it or my handbag until after it had rung off. As it switched to voicemail, I found it along with last night’s clothes tucked in a pile at the foot of the bed. The caller was Tempest but he hadn’t left a message so the phone reset itself to standby mode as I picked it up.
I called him back. ‘Hi, Tempest. How are things in France?’
Tempest sounded like he was in a great mood when he started talking. ‘It’s beautiful here. Amanda and I are going to have one more day on the slopes and head home tonight. We should be in the office tomorrow morning as usual. How are things back there? Did I understand correctly that you have split up with Simon?’
I scratched my head as I wondered how to answer. He was having a great time and hopefully was now involved with Amanda so there was no good reason to tell him all about how awful my last twelve hours had been. I gave him the skinny version. ‘My car got kind of destroyed and yes I split up with Simon. I just needed a place for the night though. I’ll be moving in with gran again today. Thank you so much for letting me crash here last night.’
‘Hey, no problem. I’m glad you had a key. What happened to your car though?’
‘Oh, um, well, with you both away, I decided to look into another case. Chief Inspector Quinn hired us actually,’ I admitted carefully, unsure what Tempest’s reaction might be.
‘Really?’ he asked, sounding utterly unbothered. ‘Well, that’s new. What’s the case?’
This was so typical for Tempest. Hear the news, process and move on. I told him about the drowning that wasn’t a drowning and about the swamp monster and the two new murders and Jan Van Doorn although I left out the bit about Jan having a delicious-looking bum.
When I finished, he said, ‘Well, you don’t have to do anything, but if you feel like pursuing this, please do so carefully. With us away you have no back up. Oh, and you should take my car until I get back. We’ll have to sort you out some new wheels early next week. It’s no good you being immobile and trying to walk to work or get the bus. Don’t go doing anything daft like getting a loan either, I clearly owe you
extra pay for solving cases you haven’t been telling me about. We can discuss it when I get back. The keys are in the utility room next to the front door.’
I wasn’t sure I had heard him right. ‘You want me to take your car until you get back?’
‘Yes,’ he replied as if unsure why I would be seeking conformation.
‘Your Porsche?’
‘Yes.’
‘Righto. Just wanted to check.’
‘It’s just a car, Jane. Have fun with it though.’ We disconnected the call and I leapt from bed to look out the window at his car. Tempest drove a bright red Porsche Boxster S with a full factory-fitted body kit and huge wheels. It looked fantastic, especially when compared to my little Ford Fiesta. The Porsche wasn’t new, but it wasn’t exactly old either and I knew he kept it in immaculate condition.
Any thoughts of moping about were gone. I had a car to drive and I was going to do just that.
There was no milk in the house, so I took my coffee black and strong. I was tired but the buzz from the caffeine soon had me moving. I had a whole list of things I needed to do, such as speak with gran and confirm I could move in with her, collect my things from Simon’s, and get some serious research done into the Sandman and the swamp monster cases. So far, I had been in possession of the swamp monster case file for twenty-four hours but had barely looked at it. That was unlike me; I was the research genius.
Clothes was a big problem too. What I had on yesterday was trashed, or at least far too stinky from smoke to consider putting back on. I looked in Tempest’s wardrobe for some old bits I might borrow but all his clothes were simply too big for me to wear though I did borrow a hoody to go over my sweaty sports gear which I reluctantly put back on because it was the only option I had.
First things first, boot up the computer in Tempest’s office and do some research. I wanted to build up a background picture for each case, so I started with the Sandman as I was convinced he was the one that tried to kill me last night. At the office, I ran a set up with three screens which made opening files and moving information about very easy. Using a single screen felt like I was trying to do it on a blackboard or something, so I switched to making notes on my tablet by hand.
There were no entries anywhere for the Sandman; he just didn’t exist. I wasn’t looking for a person called the Sandman, of course, but for references to a person that appeared in people’s houses at night and sang to them. There were supernatural press sites and other places to look but I got no hits at all. It was perplexing. You might wonder why I was still throwing my time and effort at the case given Karen’s attitude last night, but she hadn’t actually released me from the investigation so my plan was to do what I could and hand it over for Tempest to continue on his return.
Just when I was ready to give up and start looking at the swamp monster case instead, I decided to perform a search for the Sandman after all. Using the search term sung to sleep by a spooky sandman, I got a hit.
It was two years old and posted by a woman named River Tam. It was on a forum for people suffering recurring nightmares and there was a lot of conversation that followed her starter topic. I read it all, which took a while, but it was all the same thing. In her first post she claimed she suffered vivid dreams in which a man was sitting in her bedroom singing Mr Sandman to her. This was it! This was evidence that the man plaguing Karen Gilbert had done it before.
People responding to her post gave her remedies and coping techniques to stop the dreams recurring and how to manage the night terrors when they occurred. Two replies later, she told the group she no longer believed they were dreams and that someone was coming into her house. The responses then were mixed. Most people were supportive but didn’t believe her, some were just plain cruel and told her to stop being dramatic: they’re just dreams.
She wrote three more posts. In each she grew more convinced that she was being targeted by a man. After that, all the posts were from other people.
I opened a new search and looked for her specifically. She was easy to find because her username on the recurring dream forum was her name, whereas most people used something else like Dreamless123 or Krugersafterme22.
Though finding her wasn’t a problem, where I found her was: She was in the obituaries. There was a picture and a few sentences. The blurb of her obituary didn’t tell me anything useful, but my jaw fell open when I took a second look at her picture: it could have been Karen Gilbert. They looked so similar it couldn’t be a coincidence. Forcing myself to move on, I opened yet another search, this time looking for a police report or newspaper article that would tell me something pertinent.
I found it soon enough. River Tam disappeared from her home one night and was found by a farmer eight days later. She was in a field and arranged as if asleep with a blanket over her and a pillow under her head.
I snatched up my phone and called the number for Karen. It rang a few times, long enough for her to see whose number it was and then the line came up busy. I tried again, this time getting the busy signal almost immediately: she was rejecting the call. I would have to go there.
Go where though? Where was she staying? I had no idea. I didn’t even have an email from her to which I could send a message because she had walked in off the street. I could send a text though so that was what I did. Skipping any apology for deceiving her over my gender, I told her the Sandman had struck before and she might be in more danger than we realized. I ended it with a plea that she call me.
Further research to find other victims got me nowhere but time was ticking on and I really had to deal with other things. That I couldn’t reach Karen was scaring me; she didn’t know how much danger she might be in. Tapping my phone on my chin as I tried to work the problem in my head, I grasped what felt like my only option and called Jan.
He picked up straight away. ‘Hello. Is that you, Jane? Are you okay?’
‘Um, yeah. Why do you ask?’ His voice was filled with concern as if I might not be okay at all.
‘Weren’t you in a house fire last night. Patience told me all about it. I didn’t know that you two knew each other.’
Oh yeah: the fire. ‘Yes, thank you for asking. I’m fine. My clothes stink and my car got burnt out, but otherwise there’s nothing wrong with me. I called to ask you a question actually.’ I skipped over how I knew Patience because it wasn’t important and because it would give me something to use as a conversation starter later.
I heard him grab a pen and click it. ‘Go on.’
‘The house I was in was that of a client. I am emailing you some screen shots and documents right now. You remember I told you about a guy breaking into a woman’s house to sing her a song? Well, that’s my client and he is using some kind of incapacitant on her.’
‘An incapacitant?’ he interrupted. ‘Like a date rape drug?’
‘Possibly. I haven’t got very far with that yet and she hasn’t had an incident since she approached the firm so I couldn’t get her blood checked even if I wanted to.’
He sighed quietly at the other end. ‘That most likely wouldn’t show anything anyway. Date rape drugs like Rohypnol are basically benzodiazepine, a drug originally designed as a pre-anesthetic. The metabolites in it leave the body immediately so the only way to find trace amounts is through a urine sample but that has to be collected swiftly after the attack and rarely is because the drug causes amnesia, disorientation and confusion. They have got so developed now that they are almost always untraceable by the time the victim is alert enough to report the crime. Is he assaulting her?’
I shook my head even though he couldn’t see it. ‘No, so far there is no sign that he has even touched her. Check the second file I sent though.’ I waited for him to get it open.
‘The body in the field?’ he asked.
‘Yes. River Tam, the victim in the picture, reported the exact same MO before she vanished and was later found dead. The stalker breaks into their house and sings Mr Sandman to them while they are drugged. River Tam mig
ht be the only murder victim but there could be more. The ritual she reports is too close to my client’s for it to be coincidence and see how she is arranged in the field? It looks loving. He sings them to sleep, kills them and then arranges them delicately. But something changed last night and it might have been my presence at the house. I don’t know who he is or how he might have connected me, but I go to her house and the next thing I know my car is burnt out and her house is on fire. Now my client won’t answer my calls and I don’t know where she is and I think she might be in extreme danger.’
‘You want me to help track her down?’ he asked, already knowing the answer.
‘I’m going to go at it from my end too, but I think we have to contact her friends and family and find out where she is.’ I felt relieved to have some help finally.
‘Okay. I’m on it. I’ll let you know what I find.’
He sounded like he was going to end the call, so I jumped in again quickly. ‘Jan, about the other case?’
‘You mean the swamp monster?’
‘Yeah, that one. What do you think about setting a trap to lure the killer out? I discovered that both the victims were on Meet Market, the online dating agency…’
‘The one with the unofficial slogan, “Who wants a bite of my meat?” Really classy site that one.’
‘That’s the one. Well, they were both using it. I’m playing a big hunch here but if they were deliberately targeted, it seems like a good way to lure the killer out. I can create a fake profile and claim to be a police officer, use a couple of library shots and photo-processing to superimpose my face, that sort of thing. What do you think?’
‘Um, well I see two major flaws.’ I hadn’t expected this. He was being instantly negative. ‘Firstly, you’re a girl. And secondly, you’re a girl. I realise that technically this is the same point repeated, but it seems like such a big point that it warrants saying twice.’
