Midnight Murders (10 page)

‘That will change. If you are intent on shopping, why don't I show you where those shops are? I don't want to be pushy, but – '

‘I look like a scarecrow.'

‘I didn't say that.'

‘I did,' he said easily. ‘And if you show me where the shops are, I'll know where to look.'

She parked her car in the multi-storey car park on the fringes of the pedestrian area, and waited while he lugged his stick, then himself out of the car. She slowed her pace to his as they walked towards the town centre.

‘Here's the arcade.' She paused outside its entrance, sandwiched between two large department stores. ‘The shop with the purple sign is the best. But whatever you do,' she lowered her voice to a whisper, ‘don't go to the hairdresser here. It has to be the one on the marina.'

‘I'll remember.'

‘See you.'

She disappeared into the nearest boutique. It had a window display of feminine lingerie that drove him away as soon as he looked at it. He could almost hear Peter's jeering laugh, the one he reserved for pathetic old men reduced to ogling women's underclothes in shop windows.

He glanced up and down the arcade. One of the better things about a midweek afternoon was a half empty town. Taking Lyn's advice, he steeled himself and passed through the doorway of the shop she'd recommended.

Inside he was faced with a bewildering array of racks crammed with clothing. That closest to him held jeans, above it hung sweaters, and beyond were rows of trousers and shirts.

‘Can I be of any assistance, sir?' The boy was young and anxious to please, an employee working on commission.

‘I'm just looking.'

‘If there's anything I can do to help, please ask.' The boy retreated behind a counter.

Trevor flicked through the jeans rack. They were cut differently to the ones he remembered. He held up a pair, chosen at random, realising he didn't even know what size he was.

‘They won't fit you, sir. Those are a thirty-six waist. I'd say you were a thirty or thirty-two,' the boy hazarded. Trevor replaced them on the rack. He'd been a thirty-six inch waist before he'd been injured. He realised he'd lost weight; but that much?

‘If you'd like to try these, sir? They're the same style, but more your size.'

Buying a new wardrobe was simpler than Trevor had expected. He was the only customer, so he had the undivided attention of the assistant, who managed to be helpful without being pushy. Trevor tried on the jeans, when he saw they fitted, he picked up a second pair. He flicked through the sweaters and found two he liked. He wandered over to the racks of trousers, and bought two pairs, a couple of casual shirts, a new jacket to replace the worn-out grubby antique he was wearing. An hour and a half later, the dust had been blown off one of his credit cards, he had a bundle of carrier bags, and the clothes he had worn into the shop were stuffed in a bin at the back of the arcade.

Outside the shop, he paused and looked down at his fabric trainers. Two doors up, he spotted a shoe shop. He picked up two pairs of designer trainers, and two pairs of leather shoes. Unable to decide between their various merits, he bought all four pairs, and discarding the shoes he was wearing, left the shop wearing new trainers.

Exhausted, he recalled that he wasn't far from the taxi rank. He took a short-cut through one of the stores and recalled chasing a drug dealer through the crowded aisles one Saturday afternoon. He doubted he was capable of chasing a tortoise the way he felt now.

The department store, like the arcade, was half empty. But as he staggered along, he inadvertently bumped into an old woman who scuttled away. He suddenly realised that he wasn't alone in feeling afraid. There were others who felt terrified every time they set about the simple everyday tasks of life; shopping, walking down the street, even opening the door to the milkman. Perhaps he wasn't so different from the rest of humanity after all.

He stopped at the menswear counter and looked at some boxer shorts and socks. Juggling with his bags and stick, he tried to pick up a pair of shorts, but only succeeded in dropping everything. An assistant came to his rescue. She picked up his stick, returned his carrier bags to his numbed fingers, and packed the underclothes he chose. He almost fell into the cab when he reached the taxi rank.

The hairdresser Lyn had recommended proved easy to find. He left his parcels at the desk and asked for an appointment. Lucien was busy but George was free. George was tattooed, camp, and chatty. Trevor relinquished himself into George's care, closed his eyes and listened to an on-going diatribe against the town councillors, who apparently had an unjustified prejudice against bikers.

According to George, his hair was out of shape, out of condition, and would disgrace a shaggy sheepdog. If nothing else, George certainly knew how to take his time over cutting and shaping. A gopher brought Trevor coffee, strong and black, the way he used to drink it before hospitals had regulated his life.

‘There you are, sir.'

Trevor opened his eyes and scarcely recognised the face that stared back at him from the mirror. He was seeing himself in an entirely new light. One that he wasn't too sure he liked.

‘I've left it a bit longer here,' George pulled on a few strands above Trevor's left ear, ‘to hide the scars. They look rather nasty. Accident?'

‘Yes,' Trevor lied. It wasn't just the sight of the scars that wound their way up as far as his left temple that had shocked him; it was the bloodless lips, the thin face and the sunken cheeks.

‘Will there be anything else, sir? We do a nice range of toiletries and aftershave.'

‘I'll take a look.' Trevor was beginning to understand Lyn's passion for shopping. There was something comforting about spending money; as if the new image he was buying would change his entire life.

He added a carrier bag of cologne and toiletries to his collection, and limped outside. The clock on the bell-tower of the marina struck five. A pub loomed before him; a blackboard outside bore the slogan;

HOME COOKED PUB FOOD AVAILABLE ALL DAY.

He realised he hadn't eaten anything since the toast he'd shared with Lyn that morning. He stumbled across the cobblestones and went inside. It was empty apart from a couple of middle-aged women.

He ordered a pint of beer, and a large steak with chips and salad. It had been a long time since he'd tasted steak. And Spencer was right; the first step was the hardest to take. Now he'd actually made it, he felt capable of tackling almost anything.

His mouth watered at the prospect of the steak. He downed his pint and ordered another. Life wasn't so bad after all. Why had he waited this long to pick up the threads?

CHAPTER TEN

‘Does the name Elizabeth Moore mean anything to you?' Dan sat in the one comfortable chair Tony's office offered apart from the administrator's own.

‘She used to be a staff nurse here.'

Dan thought he saw the same flicker of interest in Waters' eyes that he had noticed when Rosie Twyford's name was first mentioned. ‘When and why did she leave?'

‘She left about three months ago, but I'd have to check the records for the precise date. She accepted a nursing post in America. We were sorry to see her go, but that's life in British hospitals. Pay and conditions for psychiatric nurses are far better in the States than here.' He blanched. ‘Don't tell me that one of the bodies you dug up last night was Elizabeth?'

‘It appears to be likely.'

‘No!'

Dan thought the cry carried more than shock. There was something deeper in it, something personal. ‘We also have reason to believe that the other victim we found last night was Claire Moon, an ex-patient.'

‘Excuse me.' Tony's PA, Angela Morgan, walked into the room and laid a tray of coffee, milk and sugar on his desk.

‘We also found the corpse of a dog,' Dan continued to watch Tony reactions. ‘Large, hairy, breed unknown. Grey dog with white at the tips of its fur.'

The secretary jerked her hand as she spooned sugar into Tony's cup, knocking it over. ‘I'm sorry.' She rushed into the outer office in search of paper towels. ‘But that sounds like Honey Boy, doesn't it, Mr Waters?'

There was a pained expression on Tony's face, but it was difficult to determine whether it had been prompted by the spilled coffee, the news of two more girls found buried in the grounds, or the dog.

‘Who owned Honey Boy?' Dan asked.

‘He was a stray. You must remember Honey Boy, Mr Waters.'

‘Of course I do,' Tony answered irritably.

‘He practically lived in this office last Winter Inspector Evans,' Angela prattled. ‘He turned up in the grounds starving, without a collar. We rang the pound, but they said if they took him in and he wasn't claimed within a few days, they'd put him down. Well, it isn't as if this is a proper hospital that needs to be kept sterile or anything, so we kept him. We all chipped in with food, and… ' she dissolved into tears.

‘Just when I decided to take him home with me he disappeared,' Tony said shortly. ‘I already own two dogs, so another one wouldn't have made that much difference.'

Tears trickled down Angela's cheeks. ‘We searched everywhere, then assumed that he'd gone back to wherever he came from. It was a shame, because Mr Waters would have given him such a good home. I tried to persuade my husband to take him in, but we live in a flat on the marina. It's not very big, and Honey Boy was a large dog and we have two cats… '

‘Angela, go to personnel and pull Elizabeth Moore's file, and give patients' records a ring and ask them to send up the file of a Claire Moon.'

‘Yes, sir.' She dabbed her eyes with a tissue, and left the room.

‘Efficient secretary but over-emotional,' Waters declared.

‘You must have hundreds of patients passing through here in a year,' Dan commented.

‘Around five thousand, which is average for a town of this size,' Tony lifted out the coffee-stained papers from his in-tray and shook them over his bin.

‘Do you remember Claire Moon?'

‘Yes.'

‘Do you have much contact with your patients, Mr Waters?'

‘Not usually. But a Sunday paper did a feature on her while she was here, and I monitored the interviews at the request of the Trust.'

‘Worried about adverse publicity?'

‘Concerned about misrepresentation. Claire's father is Arnold Moon.'

‘The businessman?'

‘If you can call a multi-millionaire a businessman. She came to this town to go to university and went off the rails. She was in here for drug and alcohol addiction, and made a good recovery.'

‘Where did she go when she left?'

‘Spain. Her parents divorced and her mother remarried a Spanish hotelier.'

‘No one contacted you to say that she never arrived there?'

‘I'd have to check with Angela. We frequently receive letters from the families of ex-patients who are trying to get in touch with them. It's common for voluntary psychiatric patients to discharge themselves and go missing. You should know that, Inspector. Some of them must end up on police missing-persons files.'

‘Was Claire Moon a voluntary patient?' Dan kept the questioning firmly on track.

‘Again, I'd have to check. The chances are, with drug addiction she would have been.'

Dan left his chair. ‘When the files arrive, would you send copies to our mobile HQ? And I'd be grateful if you'd keep the identities of the victims to yourself for the moment. Rosie Twyford's mother is coming up this afternoon to identify the corpse. We're trying to contact Elizabeth Moore and Claire Moon's families now.'

Bill stood in front of a clear board fixed to the rear wall of the mobile headquarters. He glanced around at the twenty or so men and women crammed around him.

‘Everyone here? Right, we'll start with the victims. Constable Grady?' He relinquished his spot to Michelle, who stood stiffly to attention in her immaculate uniform. She consulted her notes.

‘First victim we found, and the last in chronological order of death, was Rosie Twyford.' She pointed to a blown-up photograph of Rosie they'd found in the hospital files. ‘Blonde hair, blue eyes, five-foot six-inches, heavily built, twelve stone, twenty-five years old. She suffered from clinical depression. She worked in administration in the old hospital until she was admitted as an in-patient. Rosie was discharged from the ward six weeks ago, but continued to attend outpatient clinic. Her psychiatrist was Dorothy Clyne who discharged Rosie from the clinic last Monday, as yet we haven't found anyone who saw her after she left Ms Clyne's office on Monday afternoon until she was dug out of the flowerbed on Monday morning.'

‘You and Peter are returning to her bed-sit to interview her neighbours?' Bill asked.

‘This evening, sir,' Michelle replied. ‘We think that the second victim was murdered approximately two months ago. She hasn't yet been formally identified, but we have reason to believe she was Elizabeth Moore who worked here as a staff nurse. We're waiting for hospital administration to send us her file.' She glanced at Dan who gave her an encouraging smile. ‘We think the last victim found, and the killer's first, was a patient, Claire Moon, but as her body hasn't been formally identified either, we can't be certain of her identity.'

‘Thank you, Constable Grady,' Bill took over again as she sat down. ‘I called this meeting because I want to save time on individual briefings. A psychologist is working on the killer's profile – ' Peter groaned. ‘Sergeant Collins,' Bill turned towards him. ‘Would you like to share your thoughts with us?'

‘Psychologists are often proved wrong – '

‘And on occasions are proved right,' Bill countered. ‘Have you any better suggestions on how to catch this killer?'

‘Police work.'

‘This is police work, Sergeant. Twenty-first Century style. At this moment the psychologist is feeding all the information we have into a computer that holds data on all known serial killers. And that's what we have here. A serial killer who could strike again at any moment. We don't know whether he picks his victims at random. All we do know is that they all had connections with this hospital and our killer appears to have a knowledge of the hospital layout. We probably wouldn't have found any of his victims if a patient hadn't spotted him burying one in the garden. Our killer also knows how to pick his time. All the victims were either on the point of leaving the hospital, or they were voluntary patients whose absence wouldn't be missed. Because as far as we have yet ascertained, none were reported missing.' Bill pointed to notes scribbled on the far right of the board. ‘The pathologist has confirmed that all the victims were drugged before death. It's also possible they were kept alive for days before burial, because Rosie Twyford and one of the other victims had needle marks in their upper arms. In Twyford's case, twenty-five separate syringe punctures. In the other victim the pathologist found twelve. The reason why he can't be more specific is because one of the victims has very little skin left. What he can confirm, however, is traces of drugs in the organs of all three victims, including tranquillisers and curare, which has a paralysing effect on all the muscles in the body. However, in Twyford's case the effect was wearing off at the time of burial.'

Bill stared at the assembled officers. ‘From the time scale of Twyford's disappearance, we can assume that our killer abducts his victims and conceals them, probably within the hospital or the grounds, and keeps them drugged until such time as he can bury them in the garden – alive. All three corpses had earth in their air passages.'

‘He must have a knowledge of drugs and how to administer them,' Peter diagnosed.

Bill handed a marker pen to Dan, who noted Peter's observations under the heading of KILLER PROFILE.

‘Anyone think of anything else?' Bill asked.

‘The killer has to be either a doctor or a nurse,' a young constable chipped in.

‘What's your name, son?' Mulcahy demanded.

‘Constable Pike, sir.'

‘Why does the killer have to be a doctor or nurse, Pike?' Bill enquired.

‘Because he knows how to administer injections, and, he has access to drugs.'

‘There are patients here who can gain access to drugs, as well as the pharmacists, and porters who ferry them from ward to ward. As for administering an injection, any diabetic or first-aid course will give you the rudimentary knowledge.'

‘Yes, sir.' Pike shrank back into his chair.

‘Anyone else?'

‘What about the dog, sir?'

‘As you know more about that than me, tell them, Peter,' Bill ordered.

‘Like the victims, the dog was drugged with curare and buried alive. From the lab report, approximately three to four months ago.'

‘Could it have been a practice run?'

‘Nice try, Michelle,' Dan complimented. ‘But timing places it between the first victim and the last two.'

‘Until further notice we'll have debriefing sessions every night at eleven-thirty sharp either here or at the station. I don't care how much overtime you put in, or what it costs you, your family or your social life. I want this killer caught before he has the chance to turn another young woman into fertiliser. Right, gentlemen and ladies. We all have work to do. Go out there and do it,' Bill dismissed.

Trevor felt at home in the pub on the marina. The chairs were thickly upholstered, and a log fire blazed in the hearth. He watched the flames, and ate his meal slowly, but he barely managed half the salad and steak, and less than a quarter of the chips.

‘There isn't anything wrong with your meal, is there, sir?' the waitress asked, when she cleared his plate.

‘Nothing,' Trevor replied apologetically. ‘The food was fine. Just more than I've been used to eating lately.'

‘Would you like to see the dessert menu, sir?'

‘No, but thank you for asking.' He felt as though he was learning to live again. Simple conversation wasn't that difficult after all. He bought a third pint and continued to sit in front of the fire, watching the bar fill with office workers who'd stopped for a quick one on their way home. His three pints became four, and he was beginning to feel fuzzy when he heard a familiar voice.

‘Trevor, you're the last person I expected to see in here.' Jean Marshall stood in front of his table, a double gin in one hand and a bottle of tonic water in the other.

‘Sister Marshall.'

‘For pity's sake, don't call me that outside. It makes me sound like a militant nun. It's Jean. May I join you?'

‘Of course,' he moved his chair closer to the fire, to make room for her.

‘I didn't recognise you at first.' She sat in the chair opposite his. ‘I like the haircut, and the clothes. They're an improvement,' she complimented, as he moved his assortment of carrier bags from under her feet.

‘I've lost so much weight, nothing I own fits me.'

‘I wish I could say the same, but my clothes don't fit me for a different reason.' She poured half of the tonic water into her glass. ‘I haven't been home yet. Thought I'd treat myself to a pick-me-up first.'

‘Hard day?'

‘No more than usual.' She kicked off her shoes and toasted her toes before the fire. ‘It's good to see you out and about. You look – different.'

‘How?'

‘Not just the clothes and the hair but something else. Something I can't put a name to.'

‘I feel different,' he smiled.

‘See what I mean? You're smiling.'

‘I don't know why I put off going outside for so long.' He coughed, glanced over his shoulder and saw a girl blowing cigarette smoke in his direction, ‘then again, perhaps I do.'

‘You don't like cigarette smoke?'

‘Can't stand it.'

‘Then how come you're in one of the few pubs left on the marina that allow it? And how come you worked with Peter Collins? Every time I see him he has a cigar in his mouth.'

‘I used to complain non-stop. And I'd open windows wide in the office and the car, even in the middle of Winter. It's a wonder we didn't drive each other mad.' He finished his pint and looked at Jean's empty glass. ‘Same again?'

‘I'd love to, but if I drink on an empty stomach I'm going to get plastered. I need to eat.'

‘It's probably time I was going anyway,' Trevor took her refusal as a rebuff.

‘I was going to ask if you fancied a meal and a drink at my place.' She slipped her shoes back on. ‘It's just around the corner.'