Monday 1 October
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C
HARLOTTE BENN IS LYING ON THE KING-SIZE BED OF THE master bedroom. The wrong way round. Her feet, still in the shoes she was wearing when she answered the door, are on the pillow. Her husband's pillow. He won't like coming home and finding it dented. Charlotte had made the bed already, pulling the bottom sheet tight at the corners, smoothing out creases, plumping up the quilt and pillows, folding the throw, arranging the silk cushions carefully. She's going to have to do it all again when this is over.
âCan I sit up?' she asks.
âNo,' replies the voice.
âI think I'm going to be sick,' she says.
No answer.
âThis throw won't wash,' Charlotte says. âI'll have to dry-clean it.'
âNice room,' says the voice. âDid you do it yourself?'
âYes,' says Charlotte, although she hadn't. She'd used a very expensive interior designer that one of her friends had recommended. âI chose everything,' she continues. âI spent weeks on it.'
âNice use of neutrals,' says the voice in her ear. âAre they your favourites? Neutral colours, I mean?'
âThere's money in the house,' says Charlotte. âIn the safe downstairs. A couple of hundred pounds, I think. I can tell you the
p:204 combination. It's six, seven, three â¦' She can hear a rustling noise directly behind her. âWhat are you doing?' she asks.
âI wanted to ask you about morality,' the voice says. âIs it absolute, do you think? Or can it shift? Don't move, or I'll blow your head off.'
Charlotte forces herself to remain still. âI don't know what you mean,' she says. âI think you're confusing me with someone else.' She's starting to cry and wonders if mascara will stain the throw.
âIf someone you loved committed a terrible crime,' says the voice, âwhat would you do? Would you stand by them, no matter what the consequences to anyone else?'
âI don't know what you want with me.' Tears are trickling down the side of her face, the first has reached her ear. She wants to brush it away but daren't move.
âThis really is a nice room,' says the voice. âAlthough I'm not fond of neutrals myself.'
As fingers wrap themselves around Charlotte's hair, music starts to play, an old-fashioned tune that Charlotte thinks she knows but can't quite place. In spite of the threat, she starts to pull herself up and then stops. Something is touching her throat. She glances to one side, sees the white-clad arm bent at the elbow.
âI have to be somewhere in an hour,' whimpers Charlotte, and the knife at her throat trembles against her skin.
âYes, so do I,' says the voice. âAnd they say time flies when you're having fun.'
The knife tip presses deeper. Charlotte is panting. Suddenly her body can't suck in air fast enough.
âRed's always been my favourite colour,' says the voice, as Julie Andrews starts to sing about raindrops. âI think what this room needs is a few accents of red.'
I
WAS AT WORK WHEN WE GOT THE CALL. SHORTLY AFTER lunch, I'd gone into the incident room to check something with Mizon. As I approached her desk, the phone rang and she put down her sandwich to take the call. She and I were alone in the room, at least half the other team members had been assigned to new tasks. When she put the phone down, there was a crease line in the centre of her forehead.
âThat was Westminster CID,' she said. âThey've been called out to Victoria Library on Buckingham Palace Road. Someone's left a clear plastic bag with what looks like a body part in it.'
I heard all the words clearly enough. I'm just not sure I processed them.
âIs DI Tulloch in, do you know?' she asked. Without waiting for an answer, she picked up the phone again. I didn't hear what she said.
Behind me, the door opened and DS Anderson came in.
âWhat's up?' he said, looking from Mizon to me. Mizon put the phone down and quickly filled him in. He picked up his own phone. Within minutes the room began filling up. Several people looked at me for an explanation. I shook my head.
Tulloch came in and walked straight to the front of the room.
âEveryone shut up,' she called. Normally, when spoken to like that, coppers will react. It was a measure of how tense everyone was feeling that they met Tulloch's order with silence.
âIt may be nothing to do with us,' she said. âCooper was our killer and he is dead.'
She was right, she had to be.
âWe'll go calmly and quietly,' she went on. âThree cars â mine, Anderson's and Stenning's. The rest of you wait here and be ready to come over if we need you.'
Victoria Library. Oh no. No.
âLacey.'
I made myself look at her.
âYou'd better come with me.'
She left the room first. The men waited for me to follow and then came along behind us. Getting into Tulloch's low-sprung sports car wasn't easy but it didn't seem the moment to complain. We drove out of the station and along Lewisham High Street in silence.
âBody part,' I said, when we turned on to the A2. âWhat body part exactly?'
âIt's a heart,' she replied, without taking her eyes off the road. âAmong other things. I spoke to Westminster CID before I came downstairs.'
âMary Kelly's heart was taken,' I said.
âMary Kelly didn't die until November,' she snapped. âAnd mammalian hearts are very similar in structure. I have that on extremely good authority. It could be a pig's heart, a sheep's, anything.'
I didn't reply.
âI've been expecting something like this,' she said. âI sent emails round the rest of the force. The anniversary of the double event. I knew it would be too much for someone to resist. There are some very sick people out there.'
Once she started talking it seemed Tulloch couldn't stop. Pigs' hearts are readily available from any butcher. It was someone's idea of a joke. Maybe the press wanted to keep the story alive. She kept it up until we got to the library. I didn't say a word. I was too busy praying she was right.
The Victoria Library is beautiful from the outside: built of cinnamon-coloured bricks, with tall rectangular windows edged with pale stone. Tulloch pulled over at a bus stop, had a quick word with the attending uniform about keeping an eye on her car,
then went into the library through the very non-Victorian automatic doors. I followed more slowly. The fast drive over had done my ribcage no good and besides, something had gone wrong with my legs. They weren't working the way they were supposed to.
Tulloch's opposite number in Westminster CID, a tall, fair-haired man who introduced himself as DI Allan Simmons, was waiting for us inside. He looked at me in surprise (I still bore a strong resemblance to the rear of public transport) and then spoke to Tulloch.
âLeft on one of the desks just before one o'clock,' he said. âHasn't been touched. There were only three adults in the room when it was spotted. I've got them all detained and we're taking statements. No one's left the library.'
âWhat about footage?' Tulloch asked as we moved through the entrance hall, strode over police tape and through a doorway marked Lending Library. This was a large, rectangular room with an upper gallery running along three sides of it. A massive, arched skylight let in lots of natural daylight. Simmons was steering us towards the far side of the room, to where an arch was labelled Children's Library. We walked under it.
âCameras picked up everything,' Simmons said. âSomeone came in here, picked up a book from one of the shelves and then carried it next door. Back we go.'
We followed him back through the Lending Library and into another set of rooms on our left. We passed a space where several people had been working on PCs, then through double doors into another large room. Black railings with a rose motif circled the raised gallery and there was a cast-iron, spiral staircase in one corner. A huge potted palm in a steel bin sat in the centre of the room, and beyond that a police photographer was blocking our line of sight. Then he moved and the three of us stepped closer to the low table.
We were looking at a clear plastic bag, fastened tight at the top end. Its contents were part solid, part gloop, mainly crimson in colour and shining in the strong overhead lights. Tulloch didn't hesitate. She walked straight up and knelt on the carpet so her eyes were on a level with the bag.
It was on top of a book, presumably the one that had been taken from the children's section. I moved closer, saw the elaborate Celtic typeface and the image of a tall man in silvery white robes on the front cover. I got closer still and could see the title. A classic children's fantasy story I'd read many times.
The Weirdstone of Brisingamen
.
I pulled off my jacket, the room was far too hot, although no one else seemed to have noticed. A swimming pool. A park. A flower market. Now a public library. And Jack the Ripper. Dear God, who was doing this?
DI Simmons walked up behind Tulloch. He handed over a yellow Biro. âUse this,' he said. Tulloch took the pen and pushed the bag gently. Most of what we could see looked like red mush, but there were stringy bits of tissue and something decidedly more dense. Then she stood up and turned round. Her eyes went above my head.
âWas that camera turned on?' she asked Simmons.
He nodded. âWe need to go down to the admin office to view it. Are you happy for me to get this thing taken away?'
âIt needs to go to St Thomas's,' Tulloch replied. âDr Mike Kaytes is expecting it.'
Stenning and Anderson arrived as we got back to the main entrance. Tulloch put Stenning in charge of taking witness statements and then Anderson joined the two of us in the lift. We went down to the basement. Simmons had already seen the footage in question. He stepped back to allow us the best view.
âShit a brick,' muttered Anderson, as the tape started playing.
Tulloch and I didn't say a word as we watched, from above, the automatic double doors to the library open and Samuel Cooper walk in. Wearing loose jeans, a large black jacket with coloured symbols on it and a tight black cap, he walked into the Lending Library and through to the children's section. He disappeared from view and then reappeared after a few seconds with a book in his hand. Without lifting his eyes from the floor, he walked out of shot.
Simmons fiddled with the tape for a second and then we saw Cooper cross the reading room. He pulled a plastic bag from an inside jacket pocket and put both book and bag on the table. He turned and kept his head down as he left the room. Not once had he let the cameras catch a glimpse of his face.
âWe didn't release any details of what Cooper was wearing,' said Tulloch. âIf someone on our team has leaked that, I will â¦' She didn't finish.
âCooper's our killer, Boss,' said Anderson. âHe had Weston's bag in his room. We found his spunk on her â¦'
What had Cooper said on the bridge, just before he and I fell?
This is a fuckingfix.
âHow did you find his room?' I asked. I'd been in hospital when this had all taken place. âHe was pulled naked from the river. How did you know where he lived?'
âTip-off,' said Anderson. âAnonymous. Boss, it's a wind-up, it has to be. For one thing, there was no attempt to involve Flint here.'
Oh, you think?
âMark my words, Boss, there'll be a pig's liver at the Royal Albert Hall and an ox tongue at Madame Tussauds before the day's out.'
I think I could almost have grown fond of DS Anderson.
âIs Madame Tussauds Victorian?' asked Tulloch, in a soft voice.
âIn this country, yes. Trust me, I took Abigail there just the other week.'
Tulloch's phone was ringing again. She excused herself and stepped out into the corridor.
âWhy is he always wearing the same clothes?' I asked. âHe keeps his head down, so we can't see his face, but wears identifiable clothes. It's like he doesn't want us to be in any doubt we're looking at Sam Cooper.'
âNo disrespect, Flint,' snapped Anderson, âbut Cooper's in the fucking morgue at Horseferry Road. Six feet of dead flesh in a fridge.'
âSay that again.'
âWhy? What part of fucking morgue atâ'
âNo. The bit about him being six feet tall,' I said. âThat's what's been bothering me. Cooper was five foot eleven. The man we saw on camera taking Amanda Weston into Victoria Park didn't look as tall as that to me. The bloke DI Joesbury chased out of the park the next day did, but not the one on camera.' I turned from the screen to Anderson. âI just assumed it was a funny camera angle or that Amanda Weston was wearing very high heels, but it might not have been Cooper who took Amanda Weston into the park that night.'
As Anderson's eyes narrowed, the door opened again and Tulloch stood there.
It might not have been Samuel Cooper who'd killed her.
âI have to get back to Lewisham,' Tulloch said to Anderson. âCan you go to St Thomas's? Take Flint with you. Let me know as soon asâ'
This is a fucking fix.
âNo problem, Boss. And don't take any crap. It's a wind-up, I'm telling you.'
Tulloch gave him one of her tiny half-smiles and nodded at me. Then she was gone.