Hands of the Ripper (26 page)

‘I was too eager!’

‘You were. Never mind. It’s not important.’

Laura’s ringtone came dancing through the house, a jolly Katy Perry tune that had no place in this quiet house that reeked of death.

‘Shit.’ John hung up.

‘OK,’ said Jane, ‘that’s OK, ring the police next.’

‘Yes, the police.’ He dialled again.

‘Emergency. Which service?’ Janice Tilsley had been working an eight-hour shift by the time the call came through. The little patience she possessed had been worn down by a series of prank calls over the course of the morning. ‘They should send the little bastards to
prison
,’ she had told Simon, who manned the desk next to her. ‘I think they do,’ he replied before taking another call of his own.

‘Police,’ replied the voice on the other end, so quietly Janice had to strain to hear it.

‘Was that police, caller?’

‘Yes, someone’s been stabbed.’

‘Sounds like you need an ambulance to me, then.’

‘I probably do, yes.’

‘Connecting you now.’ Janice routed the call through to the Emergency Medical Services. ‘Connecting 020 7840 8400.’

‘That’s my number,’ said the caller.

‘I know, dear,’ said Janice. ‘I’m talking to the Medical Services. Says someone’s been stabbed.’

‘They have,’ the caller insisted, ‘me. And a woman. Had her throat cut.’

‘Who am I talking to?’ asked the Medical Services operator, taking the call.

‘John Pritchard, I live at—’

‘We’ve got your address,’ chipped in Janice, trying to be helpful.

‘You’ve been wounded?’ the Medical Services operator asked.

‘Stabbed, yes. But that’s not the problem.’

Sounds like it to me, thought Janice, the poor bugger could barely speak up.

‘I’ll have an ambulance on its way as soon as possible,’ the operator promised, ‘do you want to hold the line?’

‘I want the police. Laura’s in trouble.’

‘Laura?’

‘My daughter-in-law … she’s gone with her and if someone doesn’t stop her then …’ the line went quiet and Janice strained to hear. It sounded like he was talking to someone else. ‘I’m telling them,’ he was saying, then someone’s name? Jay?

‘I’ll call the police,’ said Janice.

‘Shall I hold the line?’ asked the Medical Services operator.

‘I can manage,’ Janice replied, irritated.

‘Ambulance will be with you in approximately twenty minutes,’ the operator announced, then disconnected.

‘Connecting you with 020 7840 8400,’ said Janice.

The police operator answered. ‘Hello, what’s the emergency?’

‘He’s been stabbed,’ said Janice, ‘but we’ve called an ambulance.’

‘You need to get Laura,’ the caller was insisting, the two of them talking at the same time, ‘she’s going to St Paul’s.’

‘Is he delirious?’ the police operator asked.

‘Who knows?’ Janice replied. ‘Apparently Laura’s in danger.’

‘Who’s Laura, caller?’

‘Are you talking to me?’ asked the caller, his voice fainter than ever.

‘Yes,’ the police operator replied, ‘who’s Laura?’

‘My daughter-in-law. She doesn’t know that Anna’s dangerous. They’re going to St Paul’s. Anna’s going to kill her.’

The caller gave a cry of pain and the phone clattered out of his hand.

This is the stuff, thought Janice, this is what you signed up for, not those nasty kids with their pranks.

‘Caller?’ asked the police operator.

‘His name’s John,’ Janice offered.

‘John? Can you still hear me John?’

There was another cry of pain plus the rattle of something against the phone receiver.

‘I think he’s dropped it,’ suggested Janice, ‘can’t be easy if you’re stabbed, can it?’

‘We’ll send a car,’ the police operator said and disconnected.

‘Did you hear that, caller?’ asked Janice, ‘the police are on their way.’

John finally managed to pick up the phone just as it cut off.

‘The police are on their way,’ he told Jane.

‘How long will that take?’ his wife replied, ‘you can’t wait for them. You’ve got to do everything you can, haven’t you?’

‘Yes,’ he agreed, ‘everything I can. God it hurts. Hard to think.’

‘I know, darling, the pain gets the better of us all in the end, I remember the names I called you, the threats I made.’

‘Doesn’t matter.’

‘Call a taxi. Quickly.’

John had the local firm on speed dial. ‘Sladen Cabs?’

‘I need a taxi straight away, to St Paul’s. It’s urgent.’

‘Done something you need to confess?’

‘Sorry?’

‘You must be! Only joking, pal. What’s the address?’

John gave it to him. ‘How long?’

‘With you in a couple of minutes, we’re all sat on our arses till the schools kick out.’

The operator hung up.

‘Any minute now,’ he said.

‘Well done,’ Jane replied, ‘that girl’s right, you know, you are a good man.’

‘I’m a dead one.’

‘Probably. But not yet. I’d put a coat on. Try and hide the state of you. Taxi’s not going to want to take you anywhere looking like that.’

‘Maybe the police will get there in time.’

‘Maybe. Maybe not. Think of Michael.’

‘I should call him.’

‘And tell him what? Put a coat on.’

‘I will.’

John struggled towards the coat rail by the front door, tugging a waterproof jacket of the hook and slowly pulling it on.

‘She can’t help it, you know.’

‘Anna? I know. She’s not a bad girl.’

‘But you’ve got to stop her.’

‘Yes.’

‘Do you love her, do you think?’

‘Don’t ask me that, Jane.’

‘I just wondered. You kept going to those meetings hoping to talk to her, moved her in when she asked.’

‘Just trying to help.’

‘I wouldn’t mind. The dead have no right to be jealous after all.’

There was the sound of a car horn outside.

‘It’s here.’

‘Yes.’

John opened the front door and waved to the taxi driver. He turned back for a moment.

‘You might be right,’ he said, ‘I might love her.’

‘I know. Go on. Be quick. Save her.’

John walked out to the taxi, the door hanging open behind him. As he turned to get in the car he could see his wife, sat on the top of the stairs.

‘Haven’t closed the door mate,’ the driver said. ‘You’ll have the place empty by the time you get back.’

‘It’s never empty,’ John replied, and carefully climbed in.

‘Not far,’ said Laura as they climbed up out of the tube station. ‘I can’t believe you’ve never been.’

‘To St Paul’s?’ Bad Father replied. ‘I’ve been lots of times.’

‘You liar! You told me you’d never been allowed.’

Bad Father cursed himself. He had to remember who he was or she would get suspicious. But it was so hard. There were so many people in Anna’s head, it was hard to hold on.

‘All right then,’ he replied and smiled before realising that Laura wouldn’t be able to see it so it didn’t matter. ‘I’ve never been.’

‘I can’t wait to have a good look around,’ Laura said, laughing at her own joke.

They walked along Cheapside before turning into the park and cutting along to the main entrance of the Cathedral.

‘I’ll pay,’ said Laura, ‘that’s if they still let us in. What time is it?’

‘Half eleven,’ said Bad Father looking at the watch on his wrist. He stared at the wrist for a moment, rubbing it with his fingers. Anna’s wrist, he thought, not my wrist. These aren’t my hands. None of this is mine.

He felt a surge of disorientation and he squeezed Laura’s arm even tighter.

‘You all right?’ she asked.

‘Just wobbly for a minute.’

‘Probably being in the sight of God!’ Laura joked.

Was that it? Bad Father wondered. Was God trying to tell him something?

He found it so hard to listen these days. God spoke much more quietly than he had used to.

He would have to listen very hard.

‘Why St Paul’s then?’ asked the cab driver. ‘You meeting someone is it?’

John had started to feel cold, even though he was aware that he was sweating. Self-consciously he mopped at his forehead with his fingers.

‘No,’ he replied. ‘It’s my daughter-in-law; she’s in trouble. That’s why I have to be as quick as I can. Can you drive fast?’

‘So the cameras tell me. What sort of trouble?’

John couldn’t decide whether to tell him or not but then realised that the more the cabbie knew the harder
he
’d try and help.

‘It’s a long story,’ he said, ‘and the short version will sound ridiculous. But she’s with a woman who suffers from severe mental problems. I’m afraid the woman might hurt her, maybe even kill her.’

‘Aye,’ the taxi driver agreed, ‘some women will do that.’

‘The police are on their way, but they don’t know either of them so I’m trying to get there as quick as possible. Try and stop her.’

‘Well, if the police are involved they can hardly give me a ticket can they?’ the driver reasoned, putting his foot down.

Constable Tony Hinds parked up outside John Pritchard’s house and strode along the path to the door.

‘Hello?’ he called through the open door, ‘hello? Mr Pritchard?’ He could hear the sound of the ambulance en route. The siren jogged him along and he stepped inside. ‘John Pritchard?’ he asked again, pushing open the lounge door just as the ambulance pulled up and two paramedics came running up the path.

‘We need a stretcher?’ asked one of them, spotting Hinds.

‘Not for her,’ the constable replied looking at Aida Golding’s body. He reached for his radio. ‘On site now, control,’ he said. ‘No sign of Pritchard, there’s a dead woman here though.’

‘Bonus,’ came the voice of control, ‘the caller also mentioned St Paul’s I’ll route a car there now.’

*

‘I’m sorry but we’re closing the galleries early today,’ the woman in the ticket kiosk explained, ‘we have an early service.’

‘Oh but we’ve come such a long way,’ Laura lied. ‘Please? It’s bang on half past now, if we’d been just a minute earlier you’d have let us in.’

‘I’m not allowed,’ the woman insisted. She looked at the blind girl and felt guilty. The woman seemed so sad. Her carer didn’t look much better, pale and sickly. That I spend my days doing this, she thought, cashing in on a house of God and then turning them away when they really want to go in. She looked around, trying to see if her supervisor was nearby. Derek Porter could be a horrid little jobs-worth when the mood took him. She remembered him ranting for five minutes over the theft of some pencils from the gift shop. The fact that he would refuse these two was the deciding factor.

‘All right,’ she said, ‘but be quick and don’t tell anyone I let you past.’

‘Thank you so much!’ Laura said, laughing and squeezing Anna’s arm. ‘We won’t be any trouble.’

‘How much longer?’ asked John, as worried about whether he would last the journey as arrive there in time.

‘Who can tell with this bloody traffic?’ the cabbie said, slamming on the horn. ‘Ten minutes maybe?’

Ten minutes. With every jolt of brakes and swerve of the wheel, John felt weaker. He wanted to check his wound but knew that if the driver saw that he’d stop
immediately
. He was pretty sure it was bleeding again.

‘You’ll manage,’ said Jane from the back seat, ‘you’re stronger than you give yourself credit for.’

‘I’ll have to be.’

‘Have to be what, mate?’ the driver asked.

‘Nothing, just thinking aloud.’

‘So what’s wrong with this woman, then?’

‘She hears voices, controlling her.’

‘I know how that feels,’ the driver said, snatching for his radio as it barked at him. ‘Ten minutes,’ he told it, ‘I’m on a lifesaving mission.’ He dropped the handset into the ashtray, ignoring the sound of laughter coming from the speakers.

‘I always think though,’ he said to John, ‘you know, when you read these stories in the papers and that, people who say voices told them that Tom Cruise was the son of the devil and must die. What I always wonder is this: what if the mad buggers are right?’

‘Have you ever climbed so many steps?’ Laura asked, as they arrived at the Whispering Gallery. ‘It reminds me of the time I walked up from Covent Garden station rather than use the lift. How bad can it be? I thought. By the time I got to the top I could barely walk, my legs had gone numb. I walked out onto the pavement and just toppled over!’

Bad Father didn’t reply, just stepped through into the gallery and stared out into the open space. It was like being in the mouth of God, he thought. ‘Wonderful!’ he said and savoured the sound of his voice echoing out into the void.

‘Give me your arm,’ asked Laura, ‘or I’ll trip over something and panic the priests.’

Bad Father led her away from the entrance, staring up at the alabaster statues looking down on them.

‘There’s always someone higher up,’ he said, staring up at their cold, imperious faces. ‘But at least they’re blind too.’

‘What are you talking about?’ said Laura, laughing and patting his arm. ‘Describe it to me! Let me see it!’

‘It’s big,’ he said, struggling to put the place into words. ‘So big.’

‘You don’t say! Let me sit down so that you can go to the other side and then you can whisper it to me.’

‘All right,’ said Bad Father, putting her down on the bench.

‘You have to whisper though,’ she said, ‘if you speak too loudly it doesn’t work. Talk to the stone and it carries all the way around,’

‘I know,’ Bad Father replied, irritated at the way she was talking to him. Like he was stupid. Like he was a child.

He kept walking, listening to the sound his footsteps made as they echoed around the dome above them. Were they perhaps sounding out in heaven even now? If so it can hardly have been the first time his actions had been heard among the Great Host.

‘I am a child of God,’ he said, thankful to be using his own voice once more, feeling stronger for it, more in control. ‘And I will do anything in the name of the father.’

*

‘Thank you!’ John got out of the car and nearly fell over. His legs were so weak now, he was by no means sure he could even work his way around to the main entrance.