Stranglehold (25 page)

His instinct was to follow Pickering when he moved away into the shadows thrown by the high brick wall of the soccer ground. But his orders were to wait here until Ruth David emerged. There were plenty of other officers patrolling the streets of the area, which the Strangler's crimes had ensured would be well-nigh deserted until the pubs began to debouch their customers.

The other man who took a brief glimpse over the car park as Pickering delayed his departure was Charlie Kemp. Earlier, he had looked down with interest on Ruth David's dancing inside the club. When he had more time, he would give that young lady his full attention.

Now, poised at the top of the fire escape which led down from the hospitality suite, he breathed deeply for a few moments, then went back into the meeting to complete the briefing of the men who were to retail the drugs he had purchased earlier in the day.

Pickering did not have any clear idea of where he was going. His only instinct was to get well away from Ben Dexter. He found himself going not towards his home but through the streets where he had once walked with Julie Salmon. He wondered if there was something morbid in the choice his brain had made for him before he was aware of it, but he did not turn aside from the route.

He was surprised when he saw the girl, for there were few males moving alone on this moonless night, let alone females. She was standing at a bus stop, her dark shape silhouetted against the light of the lamp behind her. He could see her outline from a hundred yards away; it meant he had plenty of time to deliberate what to do as he approached.

The girl was as conscious of her isolation, of the darkness in the starless skies above her, as he was. She was wishing that her adolescent petulance had not made her defy her mother so dramatically. She had stormed out of the house three hours ago, refusing to reveal where she was going. She had been nowhere more sinister than to her friend's house; perhaps it was the very innocence of that destination which had made her reluctant to reveal it.

She was only just seventeen, only just learning that one could behave foolishly when one was in pursuit of what one fancied was a principle. She had secretly hoped that her friend's father would have run her home in his car, but the girl's parents had been out for the night. Now she felt the bravado with which she had left her friend's house seeping away through the soles of her trainers, as she looked in vain for the comforting headlights of the bus in the distance.

Darren Pickering said, ‘I don't think you're going to get a bus here, m'dear. Not at this time of night.'

‘I – I was told there should be one at any time.' She tried an older woman's haughtiness, staring past him into the night towards the bus which would not come. But she was still developing the techniques for attracting boys, not rejecting them; the dignified brush-off of an unwanted approach was beyond her present range.

Pickering's confidence grew with her uncertainty. ‘No chance, m'dear. Last one went hours ago.' He thought he was probably right about the buses, but he had no certainty: it was a long time since he had used one. "We could probably stop a taxi, if we wait a bit.'

He watched her, realizing now that he was alongside her that she was much younger than he had thought at first. He saw her dismay when he mentioned the taxi, and was near enough to her in age to know immediately what was wrong. She had no money, or very little. He said. ‘Where do you live, miss?' He spoke dispassionately, imitating the tones of the police who had stopped him so often in the days when he was a kid on a moped. They had spoken politely like that to girls, though they had reserved a more brusque and aggressive tone for him.

‘Brunswick Avenue. Number 31.' She answered automatically, a schoolgirl trained to do so. and then wondered whether she should have given up the information so easily.

He knew the place. It was a quiet, respectable road of thirties semis, parallel to the one where Julie had lived and within two hundred yards of it. It's not very far, is it? I'll walk with you, if you like.'

He had turned with the words, was a yard in front of her in the direction she had to go. He seemed to bar the way to her home, and she felt that it might be more dangerous to refuse than to accept his offer. And in truth, his large and powerful physical presence was a reassurance, when added to his friendliness. The earring and the burly forearms which thrust from the T-shirt on the summer night did not seem repulsive to her, as no doubt they would have done to her mother. It would be nice to arrive home escorted by a diligent older man: that would be one in the eye for her mother. Darren was only twenty-one, but he seemed to her immensely mature.

They walked a hundred yards without speaking. Then she took the arm which he had held awkwardly stiff at his side as an invitation since they began the journey.

He told her that he had been at the dance at the
Roosters,
but had found it boring and come away early. That seemed to her to argue an immense sophistication. She told him that she was still at school, not because she wanted to be but because she found no ready means of evasion. To her surprise, he understood about A levels and applying for universities, even told her with an air of immense experience that she should make the most of her chances, that perhaps her mum and dad had a point when they worried about her going out at nights.

As he talked to her on these lines, like a rather serious uncle, the Strangler was in both their minds. But neither of them thought it a good idea to mention him.

He shortened his stride to match hers. Once they were in step, she put her other hand across to his forearm, watched it lying there for a moment, marvellously small against the brawn of that limb, and then linked it with her other hand as it emerged from beneath his elbow. They walked for a while then without words, feeling their way towards the degree of intimacy that was appropriate to a meeting which had begun so uncertainly.

She had trainers of the same make as his, worn blue jeans, and a light green anorak. It was like the one that Julie used to wear, but a different colour: he was glad of that. He wondered how to tell her about his bike, but he didn't want to sound boastful: he knew that his enthusiasm for it might come out like that. Besides, he had been telling her to listen to what her mother said, and mothers always hated motorbikes.

She made him think that Ben Dexter had been right about one thing, after all. He couldn't cut himself off from normal relationships with girls for ever; he had to accept that Julie was gone, and get on with the rest of his life. He was enjoying having this edgy, slightly vulnerable presence at his side; enjoying the role of protector which he had allocated to himself.

They took a route which meant that they did not walk past the end of Julie's road. He was glad at the time that she accepted the slightly longer walk without questioning it. But the question it raised in her mind, the tiny embryo of puzzlement which grew first into uncertainty and then into fear, was at the root of everything which followed.

He detached her hands from his arm and slid it gently around her, feeling for her slim waist beneath the anorak and nestling his fingers gently into the warmth. He felt the slight stiffening, the tiny shiver which ran through her whole body. But he was not after all very experienced – Ruth David back at the
Roosters
understood far more about men than Darren did about women – and he did not think her reaction signalled fear. When no further movement followed, he thought it had probably been a little thrill of pleasure or excitement. Young men, as Ruth could have told him, tend to be absurdly optimistic about these things.

They had turned into Brunswick Avenue now. In a few minutes they would be at her house. He had better do what he wanted to do now, or never. He stopped and turned her towards him, sliding both hands lightly up her back, feeling her shoulder-blades, sharp and slender even beneath the layers of clothing. She pushed her face into his chest, so that he could not see her eyes.

That was a pity, for he might have seen a warning in them and desisted, while there was still time. Instead, he moved his hands to turn her chin gently up towards him. He would kiss her gently, doing no more than pressing his lips lightly upon hers. He feared rejection too much to do more than that now. In truth, there would not be much pleasure in it, but it was a necessary move in this game in which he was only pretending to understand the rules. Pleasure might come later.

It was the moment when his questing fingers touched her throat that was fatal. The image of the Strangler had been thrust to the back of her mind, but not expelled. With that touch from those strong fingers, it came leaping back like a recurring nightmare. She clawed at his arms, felt the bare flesh on the back of his hands, scratched at it fiercely with the nails she had striven so hard to grow long.

And as he gasped with the pain and the shock, she screamed. A long, scarcely human, screech which tore aside the dark night and made both of them thrill with horror. He stepped back, saw too late the terror in her eyes, fought to produce words which would still her fear and explain what he had wanted.

Speech came only fitfully, but it would not have mattered if he had been far more articulate than he was. For she went on screaming, building to a long, eldritch howl which shut out all words, all argument, all reason. It had that effect on both of them, for now he panicked in turn. He knew that she was hysterical, that he should give her face a sharp slap, restore communication between them.

Instead, he turned and ran.

The girl was soon restored. The lights went on in the quiet road, and people looked out. But it was her mother who was there first, the mother whom she had rejected with contempt a mere three hours earlier. Her mother did not think of that. She wrapped her arms about her daughter; held her tight for a moment; muttering soothing, age-old sounds of comfort; half-carried her into the house with her arms still around her; sat her in the big chair by the open fire; brought her a little brandy and a lot of tea; persuaded herself and her daughter that there was after all little damage done.

Darren Pickering was less fortunate. He did not heed where he was going. He ran with only one idea: to put as much space as possible between himself and the frightened girl who had first encouraged and then rejected him.

He was at the end of the road where Julie Salmon had lived when he ran into the arms of the policemen.

The atmosphere in the Murder Room was tense as the hours dragged past on that Saturday night.

It was one of those occasions when John Lambert wished he still smoked. There was nothing to do except wait, and waiting was a frustrating process when things were happening in the town outside and the rest of the team were most of them involved in the action.

Because of the suggestion that a police officer might possibly be the Strangler, not many of the eighty officers now involved in the hunt knew about the way in which Ruth David was being used, though of course the news of it would trickle round among them if the identity of the Strangler was not swiftly discovered.

Sergeant Johnson was the duty officer, but there was little more he could do at the moment other than to note the radio messages coming in from men and women patrolling different parts of the town. Most of them were negative, recording that there had been no sightings of males acting suspiciously or following women. No news was good news, in a sense, but everyone sensed that until there was more action from this killer no one would be able to rest easy. If he was to be arrested, the probability now was that he would have to reveal himself by another murderous move. The team would have both to frustrate that attempt and to ensure that he was captured in the process of it.

It had been a long day at the end of a long week, but Lambert did not feel tired. He knew from previous experience that when this case was over he would sleep the clock round and feel the effects of several sixteen-hour days. But for the moment, the adrenalin derived from heading this inquiry stimulated his long frame.

He was glad, though, that he did not have to deal with Chris Rushton's bureaucratic fussiness as they waited for news. The inspector would have disapproved of the deployment of Sergeant Ruth David at the
Roosters,
for sure, and reiterated his disquiet about it at every opportunity. Lambert was glad that for the moment Rushton knew nothing of it. He had looked so white and drawn after the media conference in the morning that Lambert had insisted he take the rest of the weekend off.

He wondered now whether Rushton had gone in pursuit of the wife who had left him or whether he was sitting in white-faced misery at home. He could not see that very serious young man – people of thirty were definitely young to him now – drowning his troubles in drink, or finding any other sort of escapism effective for very long.

Lambert went moodily across to his room in the CID section and tried to catch up on some of the paperwork connected with lesser cases which had been piling up on his desk during the week. His concentration was not good, and he was glad when he heard the voice of Don Haworth, who had come in to do a blood test on a drunken driver. The man's passenger would be charged in due course with being drunk and disorderly; they could still hear his noisy protests echoing up from the distant cells.

‘Any news of the Strangler?' said Haworth. The police surgeon was slotting his equipment carefully back into its box; perhaps he only asked for form's sake, knowing how the case was dominating the thinking of the station. It was good to have someone around who had other concerns than the Strangler. Lambert was grateful anew for the lively interest shown in the case by a doctor who must have a busy practice to attend to during the day. For a moment, he almost told him about Ruth David, then checked himself. Many of his senior officers had been kept in ignorance: he must not tell someone who in strict terms was outside the team.