Fade to Black (16 page)

“Right,” said Michael, half-turning in his seat and eyeballing a wizened old man in an even older green, Jaguar soft-top.

“Shall I kill him to get him off our tail?”

“Would you mind?” she replied coolly, glancing at Michael. “He really is tiresome.”

“The boys are already on it.”

She looked across at him and saw he wasn’t smiling. A mild panic rippled through her. “Michael, you do know I was only—”

He laughed. It was a deep, rumbling sound, full of genuine amusement. She liked the sound of it a lot.

*****

Arthur Wendell disembarked the tube at Tottenham Court Road, as did the pimply faced kid he had so comprehensively spooked earlier. Just for devilment. He followed the kid too closely down the corridors, towards the stairs to the Oxford Street exit. The kid eventually broke into a stumbling run and that was enough for Arthur. Job done. With a laugh, he branched off for the Tottenham Court Road exit. He touched his Oyster Card at the ticket barrier and it obligingly allowed him to emerge into the pale, spring-summer sun. It wasn’t yet midday; there was still plenty of time, he reasoned.

“Yer havin’ a party mate?”

Arthur spun around and looked down to see a filthy, legless man in what was once a cream coat, selling a ‘social’ magazine. According to the cover, the girl on the front was in need of something.

“Are you talking to me?” Arthur asked, noticing the man was unshaven and had wedged himself into the corner of the tube station building where two stone walls met. The man had setup shop up on a tartan rug, a stock of magazines protruding from a large, black leather bag.

“I asked if you was havin’ a party.”

“A party? Why would you ask me that?”

The man laughed, the mucus in his lungs bubbling like a pot of hot custard. He pointed at Arthur’s legs.

“Cos’ if you was, I reckon ya could invite yer trousers down!”

Again, the liquid laughter. Arthur looked down at himself.

“What on earth are—" He cut-short his question as he saw at once what the magazine seller was on about. His trousers sat above his ankles by some margin.
I have
grown, maybe as much as two inches! Jesus!

“Jesus has nothing to do with it,”
Mr. Black said.
“That’s down to me and I’ll thank you to remember it.”

Arthur walked quickly away from the legless man, the laughter echoing behind him. He found a shop-front window and studied himself in the reflection.

“What else have you done for me, Black?”
Arthur saw immediately that his hair was just a little thicker than it had been even an hour ago. A wave of excitement flowed through him. He studied every inch of himself as best he could. Nothing else seemed different.

“Better find a clothing shop, eh? Can’t meet the scrumptious Paula looking like I’m wearing my little brother’s clothes now, can I?”

Arthur didn’t have to look far. Across the road stood a bright new men’s clothing store, almost as if it had been created for him. Three minutes later, he was immersed in racks of expensive trousers, jackets and shirts with the attentive Thomas hovering like a hummingbird around him. Arthur had flashed his credit card as he walked in and Thomas had dropped the seventy-something gentlemen he had been serving like a tired old boyfriend.

*****

Allie saw Michael twitch. Something had grabbed his attention.

They had only travelled a hundred yards in the clogged traffic and were still in the St. James’ park precinct. She glanced enquiringly at him.

“He’s here,” Michael said calmly. Allie returned her gaze to the road; cars were moving again.

“I hadn’t realized there was any doubt,” she said.

“No—no doubt. I mean he’s active right now, on a mission.”

“Mission?”

“He’s hunting again.”

“You can feel that?”

“Oh yes. I can feel him, Allie; I just can’t
find
him.”

She turned the wheel right, the car gliding onto Victoria Street. Her stomach churned at the thought of another victim possibly hacked to pieces.

“That’s my job, right? To find him.”

Michael took some dark, wraparound sunglasses from his coat pocket and put them on.

“Right. That’s the deal—has
always
been the deal.”

“Always?”

“Read the book your father gave you. I told you. It’s all in there.” He stared straight ahead.

“Well,” Allie said, “this is turning into a newsy little conversation.”

Michael smiled and peered at her over the top of his glasses, like a college professor might.

“We aren’t going to get too many more opportunities to run through this stuff, Allison.”

She chewed this over. No, of course they weren’t. The last day had been complete chaos.

“Yes,” Michael said, interrupting her thoughts, “chaos is the word. Things are looking black.”

She looked quizzically at him, inviting an explanation.

“That’s what he normally calls himself—Mr. Black or Chaos. Pick one. Remember, I mentioned this to you after your motorcycle accident. Presumably, this time around, it’s no different.”

Again, she picked up the weariness in his tone. She accelerated as she found some clearer road behind Victoria Station at Belgravia, quite near Chester Square and her parent’s home. She thought she might change the subject for a moment.

“There’s a lovely church quite near…”

“Yes, I know,” Michael interrupted. “St. Michael’s.”

Allie felt herself redden. Of course,
St Michael’s.
Incredibly, she’d not made the connection. The church actually backed on to her parent’s house on the corner of the square.

She saw him look over at her, a slight smile on his lips. “There are thousands of St. Michael’s and related churches around the world. It’s very…
nice
.”

It was her turn to smile. “Nice? I’ll say! Thousands of churches all built to honor you?
Very
nice indeed.”

“I’ve earned it.”

“Of course,” she blurted. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to suggest...”

“For heaven’s sake, relax, Allie.” Michael laughed. “I’ve been around a while, I don’t offend that easily!”

They drove in companionable silence until she turned the car into Old Brompton Road. They were not far from the scene of the previous evening’s carnage. Her stomach tightened. She noticed he was jigging his right leg slightly.

“Are you”—she groped for the word—“
worried
about this?”

He answered without hesitation, “Yes. And so should you. You need to be careful here.”

“Right. By the way, I’ve asked the contract photographer from last night to meet me here. I’m keen to get some more photos of certain aspects of the scene.”

Michael lifted an eyebrow.

She ploughed on. “I felt the photos didn’t quite show everything I had expected.”

“Interesting,” was all he said.

The crime scene was clearly visible from some distance up Earl’s Court Road. Two police vans blocked King’s Lane and the blue and white SOC tape flapped wildly in the strengthening wind. Allie brought the black car to a halt two hundred yards away.

“This is as far as you go, Michael. I’m sorry.” She held up her hand to forestall his protest. “How exactly could I explain your presence, do you imagine? A consultant? My brother? You see the problem.”

The expected protest did not come. “I don’t need to see it, Allie. You’re the detective.”

She stared at him. “That’s it? No argument?”

“Nope. Well, that is unless you felt something at the scene last night, then that’s a different matter.”

Allie turned the engine off. “Like what?”

“You tell me,” he countered. “Did you feel anything beyond utter revulsion?”

She narrowed her eyes at him. “You
know
I did, don’t you?”

Michael sighed. “Not exactly… well, yes. Tell me.”

She told him about the dead girl screaming off the wall at her and of crashing to the ground as if she was pushed. He opened the car door. “I’m coming with you. Make up any story you want.”

Allie was dismayed to see Sergeant George Houghton was still at the crime scene. “George!” she yelled, waving to him as she approached. “What in God’s name are you still doing here?”

Houghton blew gently on the surface of a takeaway coffee. A volcanic amount of steam rose from it. He looked up and tried an exhausted smile.

“Hey, girly. You can’t have had much sleep your little self!”

“Ha, not a lot, but at least I’ve been home for breakfast and a shower.”

George was studying Michael. “George, this is Michael. He’s… assisting me with some thoughts on the murder.”

Houghton stuck out a hand the size of a plate. Michael didn’t take it. Houghton glanced at Allie before lowering his hand. Allie merely shrugged her shoulders.

“So, Michael,” said George, forcing himself to be polite after the handshake rebuff. “You’re a profiler are you?”

“I have some thoughts on what we’re dealing with,” Michael replied.

“So do I, son,” George growled. “A fucking… sorry, a sodding psychopath, that’s what.”

Michael agreed and asked if he might just have a wander around. George lifted the tape, but barred his way with an outstretched arm.

“You know not to touch anything don’t you… Michael?” It was phrased as a question, but it wasn’t. George Houghton wasn’t staying up all night to have this Nancy Boy profiler screw it up.

“I do,” Michael said pleasantly and walked directly down the lane.

George raised his eyebrows at Allie. “Don’t ask,” she said with a dismissive wave.

She looked south along the road and saw Banks and Strauss pushing through the front gate of a small cottage with no garden or trees in the front yard. She shook her head. George noticed.

“What’s up?” he asked.

She pointed towards the two detectives. “I’d have liked those two to door-knock separately, not go around like a couple of kids selling biscuits.”

He looked at them. “Yes,” he said. "They don’t relish this foot-slogging stuff, do they?”

Allie guessed they had grizzled to him earlier. “It seems not.” She looked again at him and asked him for a second time why he was still on duty.

He looked about furtively and just said that he sensed that things were not quite ‘right’ and that he felt an obligation to hang around. Allie assured him that she understood and that he could go now and be confident the scene would be looked after.

George made to walk off, but hesitated. “How are you, Allie? After last night, I mean.” He smiled. “You were flat on your arse at one point, I seem to recall.”

“I was!” She chuckled until the details came back. “I felt a revulsion and sorrow that I have never felt before.” She didn’t quite know why she told him that, but it seemed the thing to do.

“You’d be a sociopath if it didn’t bowl you over,” said George. “By the way, any joy on an identification of the victim?”

She told him there wasn’t and that no one had been reported missing, either.

“Probably a druggy, poor little thing,” George said. Allie explained that no drugs of any consequence were present in her blood, what there was left of it.

“Well then, somebody’s boyfriend or parents don’t give a toss about her then, do they?”

They were interrupted by a male voice enquiring after an Inspector St. Clair. Allie turned to see a tubby, short man with unruly orange hair. He was about forty, buckling under the weight of two enormous black cameras strung about his neck and a large, grey bag hoisted over his left shoulder.

“Mr. Blight,” Allie said, holding out her hand. “Thanks for coming.”

George took the opportunity to farewell Allie. He nodded curtly at Blight—he remembered him from the early hours of the morning—they were never going to hit it off. Allie pointed at the larger of the two cameras. “Is this the infrared one?”

Everett Blight reached for the camera and cradled it in his hands, a little too lovingly for Allie’s liking. She didn’t like where his thoughts might be going.

“Detective St. Clair, if ever—”

“Forget about it, Mr. Blight. Many have tried; all have failed. Come with me.” She led him down the lane, fighting her own internal battle to remain calm. Blight, she noted, seemed not to have any trouble.

Allie studied the red brick wall and saw that the photos were true to reality, there was nothing written on it. She endured a moment of doubt, then asked him to take some infrared shots right along the length of it. She saw again the Victorian-era metal security spikes, noting how they had been bent over at right angles to allow the woman to be impaled.

“May I ask why?” Everett said in his most obsequious tone.

Allie was momentarily startled. She had been lost in thought. “Sorry?”

Blight presented his best smile, seemingly unaware of the effect his yellow teeth might have at close quarters.

“Just asking why you want infrared photos of the wall. I mean, it’s just a wall.”

“Humor me, if you will, Mr. Blight.” She gestured toward the wall, then handed him her card.

“I won’t hold you up.”

Allie gazed around the scene as Blight fiddled with bits of equipment and checked the light and a thousand other little things. In the moments she had spoken with him, Allie had again had the benefit of a magnified view. She saw the redness around his nostrils, the dark capillaries under his eyes, the broken veins on the bridge of his nose and the scaly skin around his eyebrows. Mr. Everett Blight, Allie decided, should eat more vegetables and ingest a little less cocaine.

“There’s a bag over this fence.”

The voice was right in her ear. She spun around to realize Michael had done it to her again. He was waving to her from a distance down an adjacent connecting laneway.

“I’ll be back in a minute, Mr. Blight,” she said and started down toward Michael. Everett Blight lowered his camera and watched her walk away. He licked his lips and made a purring sound. “What a stunner,” he said, not quite to himself.

“And way out of your league, Ginger,”
a voice in his ear advised. He smacked himself in the temple with his camera lens as he whirled to see who had spoken. There was no one.