Nightmare City (21 page)

Despite the agony attached with movement, Rider leaned
forwards between the seats. His mouth was only inches away from
Jacko’s ear. ‘If you ever call me barmy again, Jacko, I’ll fucking
kill you. D’you understand?’ he rasped hoarsely.

Isa stared at him, completely dumbstruck.

Jacko’s mouth dropped open. He didn’t dare look at Rider. As a
barman, the same threat had often been uttered to him by drunken,
violent customers, but it had meant nothing. Rider’s words,
however, shook him to the core. He was very frightened of the man
who was now his boss.

Rider gave Isa a warning glance and leaned back in the leather
seats. His face bore the beginning of a sneer. His top lip
quivered. His eyes seemed to change to deadly, emotionless orbs.
There was a cruel, determined look on his battered features. A look
that Isa hadn’t seen for ten years, one she had never wanted to see
again, one which meant deadly trouble.

He had metamorphosised before her eyes. He had reverted to
type.

Rider looked out of the car window, his nostrils flaring
angrily. He was aware of the change, too. Like a monster had been
reawakened inside him; or some dreadful death-bearing virus,
perhaps. Part of him wanted to fight and neutralise it, to destroy
it for ever, but it was growing with every second, becoming an
unbeatable force, taking over his whole being and personality,
driving him on.

A force that meant he would extract revenge.

The worst thing about it was that he was quite enjoying the
sensation. Rather like injecting a controlled drug. Something he
knew he shouldn’t do, but once it was done and the euphoric
sensation was creeping through his veins, it was great. Like he’d
been asleep for ten years and had now risen from the
ashes.

Those bastards didn’t know what they’d unleashed.

He saw the tears forming in Isa’s eyes. Ignored
them.

But before he went over the edge, there was one last good
thing he wanted to do.

About twenty minutes after seeing John Rider, the consultant
visited another of his patients on the morning round. The name of
the patient was Shane Mulcahy and two days before, the consultant
had been forced to remove a severely damaged left
testicle.

Throughout Shane’s short stay in hospital, the only period he
had been quiet and pleasant was when he’d been under general
anaesthetic. Otherwise he had proved himself to be the
stereotypical lout, minus the lager. Nothing was good enough for
him. The food was ‘shite’. He would have preferred beef burgers and
chips all the time. He was rude to the nurses, whom he called
‘tarts’, to the doctors, of whom he was slightly afraid, and his
fellow patients, who he thought were all silly old
bastards.

In short, he had been a complete arsehole.

‘
Well now, how are you feeling, young man?’ the consultant
asked, checking the notes.

‘
How would you fucking well feel if you’d had one of your
bollocks kicked off?’

‘
Not terribly well, I imagine. Having said that, I’d probably
be much less of a pain in the arse to everyone.’

Shane sneered up at him, folded his arms and looked away, his
lips muttering silently, his face in a sulk.

‘
Let’s have a look then.’

A nurse drew the curtains around the bed, pulled back the
bedclothes and removed the dressing.

‘
Like what you see?’ Shane sniggered, trying to cover his
embarrassment in a show of bravado.

The nurse took a deep breath, looked coldly at him and said,
‘I don’t like anything about you.’

‘
Twat,’ he hissed.

The consultant bent over and inspected the shaved and swollen
genital area. He probed around more harshly than necessary. Shane
let out a yelp of pain and a tear formed in his eye.

‘
Sorry,’ said the consultant.

‘
Like fuck you are.’

‘
You’re fit to go. Make an appointment at Out Patients for
Friday. A couple of weeks and you’ll be as right as rain. It won’t
affect your manly functions in any way.’

‘
Good. An’ I want you to be a witness against the cops for me.
I’ll be seein’ me solicitor as soon as I get out of here and I’m
gonna sue those bastards for every penny they’ve got.’

‘
I shall do what I have to,’ the consultant said. He wrote
something on the notes and hung them back over the end of the bed.
‘Though I deplore what happened to you, I would make the
observation that you probably deserved what you got.’

At 10.30 a.m. they were in an unmarked CID car heading east
out of Blackpool along the M55. Henry was driving; Lucy Crane was
passenger. ‘What do we know about this guy?’ Henry
asked.

He actually knew as much as Lucy, having discussed the man at
length in the bar the night before, but wanted to hear it all
again.

Lucy riffled through the papers on her knees and extracted a
photocopied entry from
Who’
s
Who.
She read out a few salient
points, ad-libbing occasionally, about Sir Harry McNamara,
multi-millionaire businessman.

‘
Educated Lancaster Grammar,’ she was saying, ‘then Oxford. .
. blah blah. . . owns a big transport company, worldwide business.
. . went into politics mid-80s. . . became an MP in ‘83, but
retired in ‘87 to pursue his business interests. Supposedly donated
lots of money to the Tories and is a good friend of the former
Prime Minister, who visits him privately from time to time. Lives
in Lancashire. Has homes in London and the Channel
Islands.’

‘
Rich bastard in other words,’ commented Henry. ‘Not that I’m
envious, you understand.’

‘
Nor me.’ She turned up some newspaper cuttings and skimmed
through them. ‘Second wife an ex–model ... been linked with a
couple of glamour pusses - and prostitutes. Weathered a storm a
couple of years back linking him with a hooker. Wife stood by him
and they declared their undying love for each other ... how
touching. . . arrested in Blackburn last year for kerb crawling and
drink driving.’ The last piece of information came from police
reports.

‘
The Marie Cullen connection. . . makes you wonder,’ sighed
Henry.

‘
Doesn’t make him a killer,’ Lucy warned him.

‘
Makes him a good starting point.’

They came off the M6 and headed towards Blackburn.

After having kicked it around the office for a while, Henry
and Lucy had decided on the direct approach, to treat McNamara as
if he was nobody special, just another member of the public who
knew the murdered girl.

Henry had considered making an appointment to see him, but
chose not to. Like all witnesses, he wanted to catch him
unprepared. Judging by what little he knew of the man, the element
of surprise would probably be short-lived anyway. McNamara was no
one’s fool and he would recover quickly - in seconds, probably.
Henry wanted to savour that tiny stretch of time before McNamara
became the overbearing, obnoxious sod he apparently was when
dealing with ‘lesser’ people.

Prior to setting off Henry had phoned Blackburn police and by
pure luck managed to speak to the officer in the plain-clothes
department who had arrested McNamara.

The officer recalled the incident vividly.

McNamara had been one of the most difficult prisoners he had
ever dealt with. He had demanded to speak to the Chief Constable,
belittled the officer, threatened legal action and refused to be
searched. He stalled, demanded every right - which he got - spoke
to some high-flying Manchester solicitor who gave him ‘certain
advice’. Then he played the system. He claimed himself to be unable
to give a specimen of breath because of a lung infection, unable to
give blood because of a medically documented fear of needles and
unable to give a specimen of urine because of a bladder infection.
He vehemently denied the kerb crawling, stating he was having car
trouble.

Eventually he was charged and bailed with both
offences.

In court he was represented by a barrister who specialised in
drink driving legislation; he produced two doctors who testified as
to his medical conditions and a motor mechanic who swore blind that
McNamara’s Bentley was having mechanical problems that night -
something to do with a fuel-line blockage.

Rent-a-witness.

The charges were dismissed by Magistrates who did not believe
a word but had no choice other than to accept the expert
opinions.

McNamara then instituted civil proceedings against the police
for a variety of matters, ranging from malicious prosecution to
assault and a myriad of other things. As civil claims tend to, it
was still going on.

‘
All in all,’ the officer admitted to Henry, ‘it amounts to
the fact he’s got money, power and influence. If you’re dealing
with him for anything, watch out. He’s a slippery sod and he bears
grudges.’

Henry thanked the officer. He and Lucy then began their trek
across the county, intending to combine an on-spec visit to
McNamara with a few enquiries around Blackburn about the dead
girl.

They skirted Blackburn on the arterial road. Henry picked up
the B6232 Grane Road, which would take them up onto the
moors.

Five minutes later they pulled into the long driveway which
led up to McNamara’s farmhouse. Henry said to Lucy, ‘Just so you
know, I’m dropping the word "Acting" when I introduce myself. Plain
“Detective Inspector” rolls off the tongue better and he has no
reason to know I’m really just a Sergeant.’

‘
OK,’ she smiled. ‘Delusions of grandeur, maybe, but
OK.’

The bulky figure of Sir Harry McNamara, former MP for the
South Blackburn and Darwen constituency, stood thoughtfully at the
conservatory doors of his restored farmhouse on the moors
overlooking Blackburn. It was another clear winter’s day, no cloud
or mist, and he could see the Lancashire coastline some forty miles
to the west and the little blip that was Blackpool
Tower.

Usually days like these made him appreciate what a wonderful
part of the country he lived in, with scenery to rival anywhere
else in Britain, indeed the world. And he had seen much of
both.

He placed the expensive, bulbous cigar between his fat lips
and took a long draw, blowing the resultant smoke out into the
atmosphere where it wisped away.

Today, however, he was not considering the countryside. He was
thinking deeply about the conversation he’d had with a police Chief
Inspector from Blackburn who had earwigged a phone conversation
between the cop who arrested him last year and some detective from
Blackpool. The police in Blackpool, it would appear, were
investigating the murder of a prostitute and McNamara’s name had
cropped up.

He stepped out of the conservatory and walked across the patio
to the edge of the lawn. Even though the grass had not been mown
since the onset of cold weather, it looked well. He dropped the
cigar butt onto it and crushed it to death with the sole of his
shoe.

Philippa, his second wife, who was twenty-two years younger
than him at thirty-five, appeared in the conservatory. She had
picked up his mood following the phone call and - as other minions
did (and she was under no illusion that she was anything more than
just another minion) - had withdrawn to a safe distance. She was
wary of her husband’s temper, which could be violent at times. This
time, however, there was something different in the air. He was
angry, that much was obvious, but there was fear there
too.

‘
Harry,’ she called sweetly, ‘can I get you
anything?’

He had his back to her and did not do her the courtesy of
turning. Just shook his head, made no verbal response.

‘
Tea? Coffee? Something stronger?’ she persisted
gently.

He closed his eyes momentarily in a gesture of impatience.
Still not turning he said, ‘No,’ firmly.

She left.

When he was sure she was out of earshot, he pulled a mobile
phone out of his pocket and dialled a local number.

‘
We need to have chats, soon,’ he said.

‘
When?’

McNamara gave a time and date. No location because the venue
was always the same. He ended the call abruptly.

He spent as little time as possible on mobiles. Handy though
they were, they were also dangerous. He knew he could very easily
be a target for journalists with scanners, particularly with his
reputation. He preferred the old-fashioned landline where
possible.

‘
Harry,’ McNamara’s wife called from the conservatory
door.

‘
I said I don’t want anything!’ he barked.

‘
I know,’ she said, ‘but the police are here - two detectives.
They want to see you about something. Harry, what is
it?’

‘
How the hell should I know?’

Brushing roughly past her, he mooched over to the house and
went to the entrance hall where, indeed, two detectives were
waiting to see him.