Primal Cut (23 page)

Osuka nodded, pleased that he had helped his friends. ‘Kanji’ meant ‘soul mate’. In the heat and horror of the Burmese jungle, that was precisely what he had become.

At that moment, Osuka heard two loud cracks ahead of him. Before his eyes, Kanji’s jaw exploded in a haze of blood and splintered bone. Kariudo fell backwards, a black hole in the centre of his forehead. He could hear shouting from his officer, suddenly silenced by the staccato cracks of a British Bren-gun. Osuka grabbed his rifle and fell to the floor, his eyes hunting for targets in the undergrowth. Machine gun fire spat bullets into the mud ahead of him. He returned shots into the jungle but could see nothing: the British soldiers had become harder to fight. They had learned from the mistakes of 1941 and 1942.

Two hundred yards away, the main body of the British platoon heard the gunfire resounding up
from
the gully. Sergeant Rae ordered the remainder of his force into action, leading them slipping and sliding down into the undergrowth himself.

Osuka tried to marshal his thoughts. He had not been hit. He had a small amount of cover behind the branch that he and his friends had been sitting on. He called out to the other men in his squad but heard no replies. They had been stupid to sit in such an exposed position. His officer was an idiot. However, the British army were supposed to be fifteen miles from this location. Perhaps things were not going as well as they had been led to believe. Something thudded into the mud beside him. Osuka turned his head and spotted the grenade a split second before it went off.

After the explosion, the jungle fell silent again. The smoke of discharged weapons hung in the air. Gendall’s men advanced cautiously into the clearing, Hillen’s Bren-gun ranging over the Japanese corpses in case one moved suddenly or tried to run.

‘We got ’em, Corporal,’ Baines said cheerily. ‘I nailed my yellow bastard right between the eyes.’

‘Look for the pilot,’ Gendall ordered, peering down on the now headless remains of Ryoushin Osuka. He heard footsteps behind him and swung his gun in the direction of Sergeant Rae and the rest of his platoon.

‘Secure the area,’ Rae ordered. ‘We move out in five minutes.’

Gendall
waved Rae over. ‘Looks like an advance patrol. Six men. One officer over there by the plane; four privates and one private first class here. Single stripe on the arm see.’

Rae nodded. ‘This is our plane.’ He pointed to the squadron code on the Hurricane’s fuselage. ‘I doubt the pilot got out of here alive.’

‘There’s blood in the cockpit Sarge,’ Hillen called out. ‘No sign of our man though.’

‘Where is the silly bugger?’ Gendall asked.

‘We need to get out of here,’ Rae said. ‘Let’s record the coordinates of this place, salvage any paperwork from the cockpit and double-time it out of here before the rest of the Imperial Army turn up.’

‘Sergeant Rae! Corporal Gendall!’ a voice screamed from behind the wrecked plane. The two men turned and ran in the direction of the shouting.

Behind the mangled Hurricane, partially obscured by foliage, hung the remains of Squadron Leader Nigel Wilde. His body had been stripped and strung up against a tree, his hands tied together above his head.

‘Jesus Christ,’ Rae muttered. ‘Those fucking bastards.’

The body had six portions of flesh removed: one from each arm and two from the thigh and calf muscle of each leg.

‘What the bloody hell have they done?’ Gendall
asked
, transfixed by the horror in front of him.

Rae shook his head. ‘You remember that story we heard about those Aussie engineers.’

Gendall stared at him. ‘You are joking me? You mean they carved this poor bastard up and ate him?’

‘They were eating when we popped them, weren’t they?’

‘Three of them were.’

‘There you go. I’ve heard it’s a kind of mark of honour. You eat your enemy if he proves his valour. The Japs think the Burmese are animals. But we are prime flesh, I suppose.’

‘I think I’m going to puke,’ Gendall span away and retched violently onto the mud.

Rae turned to the infantryman who had discovered Wilde’s remains.

‘Cut him down, son. Do it now before the rest of the lads get back here.’

‘Will do, Sarge,’ came the immediate reply.

Rae led Gendall away from the corpse and back to the centre of the clearing.

With great care and no small amount of fascination, Private Cornelius Garrod pulled out his army knife and cut the remains of Squadron Leader Nigel Wilde to the jungle floor. After he had done so, he pulled a small camera from his pack and took a picture.

At 6.30 a.m., Bartholomew Garrod finished loading meat cuts into the back of the Sandway abattoir van. It was heavy work and his hands felt the chill. Garrod had always admired the energy and enthusiasm of the meat workers at Smithfield when he had worked in London. Dead meat is cold. The chill of death passed from the meat into his fingers. Health and Safety rules suggested that he should be wearing gloves. However, nobody was watching and most of the blood under his fingernails was bovine.

Having filled the small van in as organised a manner as was possible, Garrod walked across the abattoir forecourt to the site office. Robert Sandway was completing the necessary paperwork for the delivery. He looked up as the Portakabin sagged under Garrod’s weight.

‘Ah! George,’ Sandway said with a smile, ‘here is the invoice for the meat. Make sure Chissel signs it before you leave. He’s a slippery little sod.’

He handed over two pieces of paper that he had just stapled together.

‘Will do, Mr Sandway,’ Garrod replied.

‘There’s a map on the back. Do you know Cambridge?’

‘Vaguely.’

‘Follow signs for the city centre. You can’t really miss the market square. The one-way system is a bit of a pig but you shouldn’t have any difficulties. Call me if you get stuck. There’s a mobile phone in the glove box of the van. The office number is pre-programmed in.’

‘No problem, Mr Sandway.’

‘George, I really appreciate you stepping in like this.’

‘I don’t mind.’

‘You look very tired. I think you’ve been working too hard.’

‘I feel fine.’

‘I have a proposition for you.’ Sandway sat back down in his chair. ‘How would you feel about becoming a supervisor? Chief of the cutting-floor, something like that?’

Garrod was uncertain how to react. He had tried hard to be ordinary in his job and yet he had clearly attracted too much attention. ‘I appreciate that, Mr Sandway. It’s good to know that your work is recognised.’

‘George, the way you handled the boys on the cutting floor during your presentation the other day was impressive. They are a difficult crowd but they listen to you. Whatever impression that the boys give to the contrary, they respect expertise.’

‘Experience is worth more than certificates, sir,’ Garrod agreed.

‘I couldn’t agree more. Look, I’ve only been running this place for a few years. It was my father’s business really. He started out as a master butcher.’

‘Mine too.’

‘I am still very green in some ways. It would be useful for me to have someone with your wisdom helping out in a managerial capacity.’

Garrod couldn’t help but like Robert Sandway. He despised arrogance. Humility was the first step towards earning his respect. ‘I’d be happy to help out,’ he replied.

‘Excellent,’ Sandway smiled. ‘There will obviously be a big pay increase. Shall we shall say twenty thousand a year before tax?’

‘That’s very generous, Mr Sandway.’

‘Not at all. That’s the best I can offer you without bankrupting myself. The margins in this business are paper thin.’

‘That’s why we have to cut accurately,’ Garrod agreed. ‘As I was telling the boys.’

‘Quite.’ Sandway reached inside his desk
drawer and pulled out a piece of paper.

‘Have a look at this,’ he handed it over to Garrod. ‘It’s the job specification for Floor Supervisor.’

‘I’ll read it after the drop off this morning.’ Garrod folded the paper and placed it in the pocket of his overalls.

‘If you do agree to take the job,’ Sandway continued, ‘we would need to put you on the payroll.’

‘I’m sorry?’

‘Well, at the moment we pay you cash in hand. That’s not really appropriate for someone in a management position. I realise that you have had tax problems before but as you will be earning a regular income, surely you can come to some arrangement with the Inland Revenue?’

Garrod felt a stab of disappointment. This would be problematic. ‘I’d have to think about it, Mr Sandway. Those bastards just won’t leave me alone.’

‘Think about it, George. You must be approaching retirement. This is an opportunity to put away a bit of a pension. Sort your affairs out.’

‘I’ll let you know by the end of the day, Mr Sandway.’

Food for thought.

Ten minutes later Garrod was driving south, through Sawtry and Craxton, then down towards Cambridge. His mind tried to work through ways in which he could take on the job of supervisor without exposing his fraudulent identity. He had always taken pride in his work. Even when he cut people he had always endeavoured to do so with the precision and attention to efficiency ratios that a master butcher depended upon. This was his trade. For years he had lived a marginal existence, hiding his true identity, earning money through prize fighting and theft. He had crushed his true ability and with it his self-esteem. Again, his mind came to focus upon Alison Dexter. His life had become a game of snakes and ladders. Whenever he seemed to be climbing upwards, his thoughts slipped on her and he tumbled back down into obsession and fury. She would soon pay for that. With Henry Braun’s assistance, he would dismantle her piece by piece. He had already stripped away her secret sexuality with the murder and consumption of Kelsi Hensy. He hoped that he had also infected her mind with the guilt that had dogged him since the death of his brother. Soon he would consume the rest of her.

There. It had happened again. Garrod had allowed his mind to wander from the issue of his promotion and fall into the pit occupied by Alison Dexter.

The van rolled on through the misty fens. Moisture settled on the windscreen. Garrod flicked on the wipers. It helped him to focus. The reality was that he could not allow himself to be placed on the payroll at Sandways. His false identity would be immediately exposed. It was a terrible frustration. Robert Sandway had shown a level of trust and faith in his abilities that had unsettled Garrod. For the first time in years, he had begun to feel a sense of pride in himself. Quite simply, he did not want to let Robert Sandway down.

Garrod was slowed down by traffic on the outskirts of Cambridge. He wound his way through the ancient city at a snail’s pace, eventually crawling into the market square from Sidney Street. The Chissels’ stall was one of the front row pitches directly opposite the Senate House. Garrod drew up in front of it. He leaned across the passenger seat and wound down the window to speak to two men, one in his late forties constructing the scaffolding frame of their stall, the other in his late teens sitting on a plastic chair and eating a sandwich.

‘Steve Chissel?’ Garrod called out.

The older man looked up. ‘That’s me.’

‘I’m from Sandway’s,’ Garrod announced.

Chissel walked around to the back of the van where Garrod joined him.

‘No Ozzie today?’ Chissel asked as Garrod
unlocked the back door of his van.

‘He’s sick this week.’

‘Who are you?’

‘I’m George.’

‘Right, George. Let’s get all this out and onto the stall.’

Garrod looked over to the teenager sitting behind the stall. Chissel read his mind.

‘Don’t expect any help from Jack. My son has a severe dose of “teenager”.’

Garrod and Chissel began to unload the meat cuts and arrange them on the stall.

‘These look different,’ Chissel observed as he looked over a set of twenty pork chops.

Garrod smiled. ‘We’re just cutting them properly now. Are you complaining?’

Chissel shrugged. ‘I won’t complain until he starts putting the prices up. You know how it works.’

Jack Chissel was now cooking rashers of bacon on a gas camping stove. The smell was making Garrod hungry.

‘Do you always cook breakfast out here?’ he asked Steve, trying to ignore his rumbling stomach.

‘He does,’ Steve sniffed. ‘I prefer the real McCoy myself. As soon as we’re unloaded, I’m off to grab a breakfast burger from the greasy spoon up there. Did you bring the dog meat?’

‘Yeah. There’s fifty bags in the smaller box.’

‘What, entrails and stuff?’

‘Exactly.’

‘It’s a right little earner that, you know. Don’t tell Sandway but it’s one of our big sellers.’

‘I can imagine.’

It took the two men about ten minutes to complete their task.

‘Right,’ Chissel looked around him, ‘we’re done.’

Garrod handed him the invoice for the meat as Sandway had requested.

Chissel tapped his jacket pockets. ‘Do you know what? I haven’t got a pen.’

Garrod smiled and handed him a biro. Chissel looked slightly deflated. He signed on the dotted line.

‘Pleasure doing business with you,’ Garrod said as he took the invoice back and stuffed it into his overall pocket.

‘Likewise.’ Chissel turned to his son, now in the middle of eating a bacon sandwich. ‘Right, Fatso, I’m off to get my breakfast.’

‘Don’t call me that,’ Jack replied between acne-bordered mouthfuls.

‘Just mind the stall, Porky.’ Chissel grinned at Garrod. ‘He’s got an appetite on him that one. Nice to meet you, George. Will I see you next week?’

‘Probably not.’

‘Never mind. Give my best to Sandway.’

Chissel slapped Garrod on the arm as he wandered off through the market in search of his burger. Garrod slammed the van doors shut and locked them.

‘Don’t mind my dad,’ Jack called out, after wiping the fat from his lips.

‘Eh?’

‘He’s always talking. He won’t shut up.’

Garrod nodded. ‘How was your breakfast?’

‘Nice. Well nice,’ Jack replied. ‘Are you from London?’

‘How did you know that?’ Garrod tensed slightly.

‘I’m good with accents. You’ve got a well strong London accent.’

‘I’m from the East End originally,’ Garrod responded.

‘Wicked. I bet it’s more fun in London than up here.’

‘I wouldn’t say that. There’s good and bad everywhere.’

‘This place is a dump.’

Garrod chuckled to himself. ‘London’s no picnic, sonny.’

‘At least there are things to do. This place is a morgue. Fucking students and slags with shopping bags. Bores the shit out of me.’

Garrod looked at the cold beauty of the Senate House, the perpendicular reaches of King’s College Chapel. ‘It’s prettier here,’ he said.

‘I suppose so,’ said Jack sadly.

Garrod felt a stab of pity for the lonely teenager shivering in the bitter East Anglian morning. He remembered helping his own father, Con Garrod, on the freezing cold morning meat run to Smithfield forty years previously.

‘Here.’ Garrod walked up to the stall and picked up one of the dog meat bags that he had recently deposited there. ‘You should have a real cockney breakfast.’

‘What do you mean?’

Garrod untied the bag and tipped the contents into Jack’s small frying pan. ‘These are pig entrails: pancreas, a bit of intestine, sweetbreads. When I was back in London, I used to eat this every day.’

Jack peered at the strange collection of giblets that was sizzling in his pan. ‘But dog meat’s bad, isn’t it?’

‘Not at all. Personally, I prefer this stuff. You get a much stronger taste from the organs than from muscle. After the war, you see, cockney women like my old mum couldn’t afford to eat the best cuts of meat,’ Garrod used Jack’s fork to prod the frying entrails about in the pan, ‘so we used to eat this instead.’

Intrigued now, Jack leaned forward. ‘How do you eat it?’

‘You get a slice of bread and spread the meats on it, fold it over and eat it like a sandwich.’

Jack reached into his rucksack and withdrew a loaf of bread. He proffered a slice up to Garrod who promptly slid pieces of the cooked meat onto the bread.

‘There you go,’ he said after a moment, ‘tell me what you think.’

Jack Chissel took a nervous bite of the bread then chewed on it thoughtfully. He swallowed his first mouthful of cockney cooking.

‘It’s really tasty actually,’ he said with an edge of surprise to his voice.

‘Told you. It’s called “Pig’s Fry”.’

‘Thanks mate.’

Garrod left Jack Chissel chewing happily in the cold morning air. The market clock banged as he drove out of the square. At roughly the same time, a few hundred yards away, Alison Dexter drove her hire car out of the car park of the Holiday Inn. She had overslept in the comfort of her hotel room and was late for work. Ten minutes later she found herself caught in a traffic jam on the ring road.

Bartholomew Garrod’s Sandway Abattoir van was caught in the same jam a few hundred yards ahead.
Both were oblivious to each other’s proximity.

Stand still for long enough and you’ll eventually see everybody that you ever knew.

Better to keep moving.

Underwood was determinedly mobile. He was on the A133 heading out from Colchester towards Clacton. His hypothesis based upon admittedly shaky assumptions was that the Garrod family had connections to East Essex. Cornelius Garrod had been arrested in Great Oakley in Essex in 1960. Bartholomew Garrod had, according to Keith Gwynne, obtained his fighting dog in Clacton. These two locations were about ten miles from each other on the east Essex coast. Underwood’s theory was that Garrod was using a caravan or beach chalet on one of the sites in the area as a base. However, testing the theory was proving difficult. He had searched through Sunday without success.

There were numerous caravan sites in the region: too many for him to check on his own. And yet, here he was. Excommunicated to Clacton by DI Alison Dexter. He wondered what it was about her that prompted such extremes of emotion.

He consoled himself with the knowledge that he
was engaged in a race. They had to find Garrod before Garrod found and isolated Dexter. Underwood sensed that Garrod must have already formulated a plan. The man had already got close enough to Dexter to strike out and yet he had chosen not to. He had raped and murdered Kelsi Hensy.

Underwood considered the alternatives as he turned south-east of Clacton towards the first site on his list: Sea Breezes Holiday Centre was just outside Jaywick. He didn’t hold out much hope for this site. It had originally been constructed in early 1960. Eric Shildon had died in 1940. However, it was possible that Garrod might have changed site at some point. It was also the most southerly point on his route: somewhere to start. He pulled up in the car park at the front of the site. Out of season, it was a desolate place. Wind tumbled in brutally from the North Sea. Underwood turned off the engine.