The One a Month Man (2 page)

‘And Tina Marlowe was one of the pissed?’ I said, hoping to give the story a kick up the bum.

‘She’d had a few, certainly.’

‘Which pub?’

‘The White Horse, between Blackwell’s bookshop and Trinity College.’

‘Was she a student of Trinity?’

‘No, St Hilda’s – another college on the bank of the Cherwell.’

‘Any significance with the two colleges being beside the Cherwell?’

‘No, Lady Margaret Hall is north of the city, whereas St Hilda’s is south and on the opposite side of the river.’

‘Could be someone with a motor-launch or houseboat, trawling the river fishing for females,’ I said.

He pulled a face that revealed to me that this theory was one that hadn’t been considered, but he didn’t debate it – the reason for which I was soon to discover.

‘Did any of the victims know one another?’ I continued.

‘One can’t be a hundred per cent certain about that but
apparently
not. The only known links between the four is that they were all students on carefree nights out and separated themselves from the safety of numbers to become snapped up by a self-appointed, lurking Reaper. Tina was with two female friends and four male students. The lads, all from Trinity, knew about a party and were planning to gatecrash. They were chatting up the girls and trying to cajole them into tagging along. Tina’s two friends agreed to go, but she had a headache developing and took a raincheck. She’d suffered from severe classic migraine since childhood. Her vision was beginning to break up and she was seeing flashing lights. So she gave the party a miss. Said she’d better hit the sack as quickly as possible. One of the lads, who had wheels, offered to give her a lift to St Hilda’s, but she declined, saying a walk in the cool air might blow away the woodpecker in her head.’

‘Such trivial decisions so often choreograph destiny,’ I observed, abstractly.

‘If you say so,’ he said, clearly not the philosophical type. ‘Where was I?’

I’d irked him again by stemming his flow.

‘Tina decided against partying,’ I said, easing him back on track.

‘That’s right. She set out on foot from the pub. By this time there was a dusting of snow. She was wearing a duffel coat, scarf, woollen hat, sheepskin gloves, jeans and fur-lined boots. With her head buried inside the hood of her coat, she walked briskly, cutting through to the High from Broad Street, via Turl Street, which won’t mean anything to you until you’ve studied a city-centre map or, better still, retraced the route she took, which was direct. Despite the weather, the pavements were heaving with pedestrian traffic, mostly students. All revellers, getting into the Christmas spirit, which tends to last year-round here. When Oxford swings, it’s usually good-natured. Not like from where you hail.’

I allowed the sniper’s fire to pass overhead, as if unheard and missing its target.

‘She crossed the High and headed past University College towards Magdalen Bridge. Now she was not far from her
destination
, barely five minutes away. The Botanic Gardens were on her right as she approached the bridge over the river. Not so many people about now, but plenty of cars and buses. Not a remote spot by any means. Halfway across the bridge she was overtaken by a male jogger. She thought he must be keen or bonkers; only a fanatic would be out running at that hour in snow. He was wearing a dark blue tracksuit; Oxford blue. She reckoned he was at least six feet tall. Well built, though she had only a rear view of him. He quickly drew clear of her, melting into the night. On the other side of the bridge is a roundabout, where Tina turned right, now just farting distance from her college. And that’s when it happened.’

‘The jogger was waiting for her?’ I surmised.

‘She had no idea where he came from, but suddenly he was behind her again, and this time he grabbed her around the neck and gagged her with a gloved hand. Despite feeling unwell and
being overpowered and outmatched, she fought like a tigress, kicking backwards and also managing to bite him through his woollen gloves, making him curse. “Fucking bitch!” he swore, but not very loudly, almost under his breath. He spun her around so that she could see his face.’

‘Full frontal?’ I said, bemused. ‘He wanted her to see his face? Intending it to be the last thing she’d see before dying?’

‘Oh, yes. And how! His face, you see, was covered by a “Scream” mask. She was petrified, naturally. As she prepared to turn to make a dash for her college, he said, “Oh no you don’t!” and punched her in the mouth, breaking four of her front teeth. Holding her by the shoulder with one hand, he pulled something from his trouser pocket. Any idea what it was?’ he tested me.

‘A condom,’ I guessed.

‘Right.’ He looked mildly disappointed with my correct answer. ‘“This is for your Last Supper, after you’ve helped me fill it!” he said. And that’s when she kicked him, with all the strength she could muster, in the bollocks. By then, he’d also pulled out a knife and a stocking. The kick winded him
sufficiently
to give her enough start to make it to St Hilda’s before he got his breath back.’

‘He didn’t drop the knife or stocking?’ I said.

‘Unfortunately, no.’

‘Any witnesses?’

‘None.’

‘Even though you said there were quite a few cars and buses around?’

‘That was before she made the turn at the roundabout. However, there were clues. Firstly, she was positive that he spoke with a transatlantic accent; either American or Canadian. Voice experts collaborated with her for days, playing recordings of all the regional accents of the USA and Canada, but she couldn’t narrow it down beyond his being North American. Nonetheless, that seemed a pretty useful lead.’

‘Did she get a handle on his age?’

‘In his twenties was the best she could do. He was athletic in stature, so the detectives initially working the case pencilled in the possibility that he was a student. With hindsight, the luckiest break for the investigation was the busting of Tina’s mouth and the loss of her four front teeth.’

My curiosity must have been emblazoned across my face because he quickly elaborated.

‘The teeth smashed from her mouth were recovered by
scene-of
-crime magpies. Those were the gnashers that had bitten through the attacker’s gloves, drawing blood. Just a little. Just a few droplets, which the freezing temperature had frozen.’

‘Have the teeth been preserved uncontaminated?’ I asked eagerly.

‘Oh, yes, but thirty years ago forensic science wasn’t
sufficiently
advanced to help the detectives beyond determining blood group. Not very helpful because the blood group was the most common.’

‘But put together with the Yankee voice, physical build, and age range, there was quite a bit to work with, I’d have thought,’ I reasoned.

Sharkey showed no dissent. ‘What went on three decades ago here is none of my business. It’s history. My concern is what we do now. We have a second chance. We have to avoid a second cock-up. Lots of young men were pulled in for questioning. Their voices were taped and played to Tina.’

‘Did they get any mileage from that angle?’

‘A few potential candidates. For quite a time now, the US and Canada have been well represented among Oxford University’s fraternity. But they all had alibis.’

‘What about bite marks on a hand?’

‘By the time the team had weeded out most of the North American students, all minor wounds would have healed, but hands were examined and one young man did have fading
scars that could have been caused by teeth, a police doctor confirmed.’

‘So there
was
a suspect?’

‘Not for long. He was from Washington DC. A senator’s son and rowing Blue. Richard Pope. Studying law. But really here just to row. An athletic import. His voice was played to Tina.’

‘And?’

‘She couldn’t be sure.’

‘What about his height and general physique?’

‘Just about right, but Tina was too uncertain and wavering for her opinion to be anything near a positive ID. Anyhow, his alibi was enough to eliminate him. He was with his parents, who were staying at the Randolph Hotel that weekend. They were over for some pre-Christmas shopping. Richard Pope was into his third and final year.’

‘At which college?’

‘Balliol.’

‘But he wasn’t in residence the night of the attempted murder and/or rape of Tina Marlowe?’

‘No, he dined with his parents at the Randolph and stayed with them overnight.’

‘But not in the same bedroom?’

‘No, he had an adjoining room, with a connecting door. They dined late.’

‘Verified by staff?’

‘Oh, yes. The maître d’ remembered them, mainly because of the generous tip he was given. After dining, they watched TV in the parents’ room and were together around the time that Tina was turning into a vampire, sucking human blood from the bastard we’ve waited thirty years to ID.’

Something about Sharkey’s last statement made my antennae flutter. ‘So what’s new thirty years on?’

‘What’s
new
is that we now have the identity of the “One-
A-Month
Man”. Definite. Beyond all doubt.’

Now I really was getting a taste for this case. ‘Who is it? Why hasn’t he been arrested? Why do you need me?’ My questions tumbled out like coins from a hole-riddled trouser pocket.

‘A few more facts before I give you answers.’

He was determined to stretch the suspense.

‘There was a road accident in London two months ago between a couple of cars. Both drivers were routinely
breathalyzed
. One was way over the limit. He was locked up for the night and charged. Before being released, a routine DNA sample was taken by swab.’

‘And the DNA national profiling database came up trumps with a match,’ I intervened, catching up. ‘The blood from Tina’s knocked-out teeth had come good after all those years.’

He didn’t bother answering as he slid a little in his chair, appearing slumped, almost deflated, most certainly not high on an adrenaline surge, which seemed very contradictory
behaviour
in view of the apparent breakthrough. Why did so much seem skewed about this case? I was about to find out.

With fingers clasped against his triple chin and his lugubrious expression unmistakably hangdog, he said, ‘It
was
Richard Pope, after all.’

A million questions stampeded from my head towards my mouth. I filtered and assembled them into orderly fashion as best I could.

‘So his parents covered for him?’

Sharkey just shrugged.

‘Where is he now?’

‘In London.’

‘Have you an address for him?’

‘Oh, yeah. The US embassy.’

Our eyes locked as, for a few seconds, we communicated by silent transmission.

‘He’s a diplomat,’ I speculated. ‘And at the embassy he’s on US soil, enjoying diplomatic immunity?’

‘Immunity isn’t an issue –
yet
,’ said Sharkey. ‘He’s not aware we’re on to him.’

‘If a saliva sample was taken, even though it was thirty years ago, he’ll remember, it’ll be filed in his brain, and he’ll know,’ I persisted.

‘He won’t be aware of his blood on Tina’s punched-out teeth; that was never made public. The media weren’t even told that teeth had been knocked from Tina’s mouth and taken away by forensics. That was one thing the lead detective did right. Throughout the investigation it was maintained that forensic harvesting had yielded bugger all.’

‘What’s his status at the embassy?’

‘CIA branch.’

‘Oh, shit!’

‘But at the moment, he’s the
least
of your problems.’

‘
Your
problem, you mean?’ I countered.

‘No,
yours
,’ he corrected me, his smile mean. ‘From now on, it’s all yours. That’s the deal I cut with your commander. He hasn’t much time for you, right?’

‘He has when it suits him,’ I mumbled, sulkily.

‘But currently he’s not suited.’ Sharkey contrived a chuckle. ‘However, he does say you’re better than good. Possibly even the best ever – when you’re off the juice, out of a betting shop, and not trespassing with your dick.’

‘That sounds familiar rhetoric,’ I said, sheepishly.

‘I’m no moral gatekeeper, Inspector. What you do socially is your own affair, within reason and as long as it doesn’t impinge on your work. So I’m prepared to be philosophical and say Commander Dan Pomfrey’s loss is my gain. OK?’

‘Fair enough,’ I said.

‘Now to the problem….’

The theatrical pause that followed was finely tuned.

‘Before you can bag the killer, you have to hunt down the victim. How’s that for a twist?’

I’m sure the look on my face must have been equivalent to a sign that warned my brain had just fused and all lights were out.

The smile that slowly blossomed across the desk telegraphed confusing messages; it was partly patronizing, partly
patriarchal
. ‘You see, we now know the ID of the “One-A-Month Man”. We know where he is. But we haven’t a clue where Tina Marlowe’s living – or, indeed, if she is even still alive. If she is among the living, she’s probably married and her name won’t be Marlowe. She might be a grandmother by now. She could have emigrated after such a trauma. She could be anywhere on the planet – quite literally. But most importantly, she probably won’t want to be found by you. We represent the dark side of her past, what she fled from; the skeleton in her cupboard. Her husband, children, in-laws and friends will almost certainly have been excluded from her secret. And one more thing: when she learns the identity of the man she’ll be expected to testify against, she’ll realize that, once again, she is in mortal danger. She can kill Pope’s career, lifestyle, and future. She can
embarrass
the US government. She could conceivably be in more danger now than on that bleak winter’s night thirty years ago. So, you see, you’re as likely to be as unpopular with her as you will assuredly be with Pope.’

‘The kind of cold case to get burned on,’ I said.

‘Pomfrey’s very words,’ Sharkey said, laughing.

L
unching alone at a historic restaurant in the High Street, I trolled through the file. Thirty years ago, Richard Pope was twenty-four years old, six feet and three inches tall, weighing thirteen stone. His complexion was described as fair, matching the mug-shot, eyes ice-blue. Hair black and cropped short. He had a strong, stubborn face with a square, pugilist’s jaw. His build was said to be muscular: what else would you expect from a beefy Boat Race oarsman? The physical dimensions told me nothing about the man behind the mask. The ‘Scream’ mask.

Of course, there were no recent photos of him. The CIA weren’t in the habit of circulating publicity shots of their
operatives
, especially if they were involved in
black ops
, such as trying to blow up dictators with explosive cigars or conspiring with gangsters to have presidents rubbed out; little party tricks like those.

Flicking backwards through the file, I came to his statement, made some three weeks after the assault on Tina Marlowe.

Not today, he wouldn’t, I mused, reflecting on how mores had moved on and how documents such as this gave an insight into social history and evolution. I remembered the furore when the government proposed forbidding smoking in restaurants, then pubs. Now it seemed as distant as ‘pea soup’ London smogs.

A page of scribbled, handwritten notes was stapled to this
statement
. A detective had confirmed that there had indeed been a special Friday edition of ‘
Match of the Day
’, plus the fact that the Arsenal v Aston Villa and Manchester United v Chelsea games had been the first two matches screened. Staff in the restaurant had no difficulty recalling that the Popes had been the last diners to leave the restaurant on the Friday evening. A night porter observed the Popes ambling up the stairs, locked in animated conversation. The porter was attracted by the strong aroma from the cigar smoke and Theodore Pope’s sonorous voice. None of the staff on duty that evening saw Richard Pope again until around breakfast time on the Saturday morning.

In the clear
, a Detective Ian Samuels had scrawled at the foot of the sheet of notes.

But he wasn’t and isn’t
, I murmured. Detective Samuels clearly was no Sherlock Holmes, but he was probably a retired chief constable by now.

There were a couple of things I wanted to check in Tina Marlowe’s statement before I forgot. Had she mentioned smelling alcohol or aftershave on her attacker? Richard Pope had shaved at the hotel before dinner and had drunk a few glasses of wine, plus a port, with his meal. It took me a few minutes to locate the relevant statement and to scan it,
stepping-stone
fashion over buzz words.

There was nothing in the statement about Tina smelling drink or male perfume. Of course, Pope had been wearing a ‘Scream’ mask, so his mouth would have been covered, which could have accounted for the absence of smell on his breath. Maybe he
didn’t use aftershave, though I doubted that. More likely,
insufficient
questions were put to Tina and Pope. The detectives were just going through the motions, I sensed. They’d written off Pope even before they interviewed him. He was a senator’s son, for God’s sake. He came from Ivy League stock. He was an Oxford Blue and a big-shot attorney-in-the-making. And so was Ivy League serial killer Ted Bundy.

The more I delved into this case, the more Ted Bundy kept trespassing on my thoughts, like a stealthy pickpocket; just a shadow, but his presence unmistakably there; the nimblest of intruders. Bundy’s complete first name was Theodore, the same as Richard Pope’s father. Bundy was a sex-thrill murderer. In just two years, he killed more than twenty unsuspecting young women. Like Pope, he was very intelligent, a student of law and psychology. He had even worked in the USA, on a state governor’s political campaign committee. In Washington high society, he was talked about as a future president. Political
bankrollers
had already highlighted the similarity between Bundy and President Kennedy; both dashingly handsome, both
irresistible
to the opposite sex, both academic high-flyers.

I even began thinking ahead to the trial of Richard Pope. The defence would argue that he did not fit the profile of serial killers, who were mostly inadequate and dysfunctional, lacking self-esteem, of low intelligence, devoid of humour, friendless and aggressively schizophrenic. Also buried deeply in their subconscious was a compulsion to be caught and recognized. They saw themselves as celebrities, anonymous
headline-makers
. And it was the anonymity that finally irked them to distraction. They might be filling more column inches than Hollywood stars, prime ministers or presidents and yet, in their mundane workplace and home, they were treated as losers, dross, pathetic nonentities without personality or initiative. The craving for recognition, stardom, induced them to leave little clues. They would be torn by the ambivalence of the need to
continue killing for the
sexy
headlines and the urge for exposure so that their co-workers and domineering home-partner would be shellshocked into disbelief and
awe
. They would imagine the reaction:
How could such an insignificant little runt be such a monster?
Monster! Oh, yes, that was such a turn-on word for them. The worse the label, the bigger the gratification. But Bundy defied the rule. So, apparently, did Pope, who was a gregarious young man, confident, talented, successful, gifted with a high IQ, a sporting talisman, fit and healthy, and not a hint of mental abnormality. And that would be the moment when the prosecuting counsel needed Ted Bundy as an antidote, the ace in their hole, the definitive proof that generalizations about criminal stereotyping were flawed. He would be our courtroom match-winner; back from the grave to do a good deed, something he never did while among the living. Good ghosts could come from bad lives.

If there is such a phenomenon as reincarnation, then Ted Bundy could have come back as Richard Pope, I’d already decided, even though I was only a half-day into the case and I’d only Sharkey’s word for the DNA clincher.

Theodore Pope’s statement said more about himself than anything else. He was fifty-three years old and had been a Democrat senator for ten years. Although he lived in Washington DC, he also owned a ranch in Texas, his home state and where Richard had spent his early years. Richard was their only child and sole heir to the Pope estate, which, all-told, was worth in the region of a billion dollars. As for the Friday evening in question, Theodore merely corroborated his son’s account.

Grace Pope’s statement was more interesting, particularly the last paragraph.

So she hadn’t tried the door. I flicked through the old
paperwork
; there was no indication that she’d been asked this question. Did either of them hear any noise from Richard’s room, such as snoring, heavy breathing or footsteps? Was there a bandage or a plaster on one of his hands at breakfast? From a superficial examination of the dossier, it didn’t appear that these obvious and very pertinent questions had been put to the parents. If they were covering for their son, they would have lied, of course. But at least their lies would have been on record. Neither did it seem that any of the staff on breakfast duty had been quizzed about noticing an injury on Saturday morning to Richard Pope. Already I was beginning to share Sharkey’s view of shoddy procedural corner-cutting. Not that it mattered too
much now. DNA was a noose that never failed to tighten as soon as the right neck was identified.

After lunch, I returned to the police station, where Sharkey had given me exclusive use of a room that hilariously was called an office. In size, its measurements were somewhere between a solitary-confinement prison cell and a broom closet. But it did have a desk (dilapidated), two chairs (in need of artificial lower limbs), a window (as mucky as a Victorian street urchin’s face) and a prototype computer (as slow as motorway gridlock).

The internet had become an invaluable tool for research. I Googled Theodore Pope and quickly came across a
comprehensive
biography, the most important feature his death three years ago, aged eighty. Grace had joined him eight months later. The gravity of the grave was a fearsome force in uniting separated loved ones. Never mind, the background was useful.

Richard had been engaged twice, once when he was nineteen and then four years later, while at Oxford.
Interesting
. His first fiancée was an Eleanor Reti, daughter of the mayor of Austin. They’d been dating since the age of fifteen, when they’d been students at the same expensive co-ed boarding school. Mayor Reti called the engagement ‘a match made in heaven’. Theodore Pope said it would ‘unite two important and influential Texas families’.
Spoken like a true cold-blooded, mercenary shit!
Grace believed the couple were ‘made for one another’ and would ‘produce beautiful babies’.
Yuck
! Six months later, it was off. According to Theodore, Richard had come to the conclusion that he was ‘too young to make such a lifelong commitment’. Eleanor and Richard had broken off their engagement ‘amicably, no hard feelings’, and remained ‘the best of friends’.

Fiancée number two was a Jackie Reuben, whose father was a state Republican politician. Jackie was three years older than Richard and was an interpreter at the United Nations. She could speak twelve languages, but joked that she had difficulty with American/English. She met Richard in Washington at a
Republican Party ding, but that relationship had cooled and collapsed shortly after he graduated at Oxford. After that, the only mention of Richard was that he had gone into ‘government service’ – camouflage for every institutionalized sin one could dream of, especially in nightmares.

I started making my own notes.