Singled Out (22 page)

‘I will. I will. But, please, now just listen to what I'm saying. There
is
a logic to it. If you look at them my way, the murders become a sequence, all triggered by the same thing.'

Kent shook his head. ‘I can't be long. I've got to go back to the office and –'

‘Listen, Kent. Please. Just let me tell you what I've worked out.'

He emitted a grudging sigh. ‘Very well.'

‘I've never told you about my wedding night.'

‘I should bloody hope not. And if you imagine I'm interested, you must think I'm some kind of pervert.'

Laura ploughed on, ignoring him. ‘Basically it was a disaster. First Michael virtually attacked me, then when I fought back he became impotent. He couldn't get it up and, in fury, he left the hotel room and apparently spent most of the night walking the streets.'

‘So? What's my reaction to that supposed to be? Sympathy?'

‘No, Kent. As you'll probably remember – because you were there – the reception was at the Dorchester, and that's where we were booked in for our wedding night. And it was in a square in Mayfair that the body of Pauline Spanier was found the following morning. On the 27th of June 1967. She'd been strangled.'

In spite of himself, her brother was now paying attention. ‘What're you suggesting?'

‘I'm suggesting that Michael stomped out of the hotel in fury and hatred. Hatred of all women perhaps – certainly hatred of me, the woman who had, in his mind, exposed him, who had made him impotent. As he walked the streets, seething with rage, he saw a girl who looked a little like me. Enough like me for him to attack and vent his hatred for me on her.'

‘You're saying that Michael … strangled this girl?'

‘Yes. Then move on six years and we have the Melanie Harris case …'

‘What!' Now he seemed angry. ‘What the hell are you on about? We know who committed that murder. It was the bloke who topped himself in the police cell. For God's sake, I was on that case. I know what happened there.'

‘You didn't have proof. The man was never charged.'

‘No, but I know the evidence we had that enabled us to bring him in for questioning. Anyway, why do you imagine he committed suicide if he was innocent?'

‘I don't know,' Laura persisted, ‘but just listen to me. At least listen to my alternative scenario.'

Kent shook his head grumpily. ‘All right.'

‘After I moved out from Michael, I kept having the feeling that he was watching me, spying on me if you like, to see if I was getting up to anything with other men … being unfaithful to him is probably the way he'd have regarded it. Well, on the night of the 17th of October 1973, I did go to bed with another man.'

Kent looked confused for a moment. Then he said, ‘Oh. Oh, would that have been Tom's father?'

Laura nodded. ‘I think Michael must have been spying on me when I met the man. I saw him the following morning and he made some cryptic remark about knowing everything I got up to. I think he realized what was happening when I took the man to a hotel in Paddington, and once again the rage took possession of him.

‘Melanie Harris's body was found in a car park quite near the hotel. I think she had the misfortune to meet Michael that night – and the even bigger misfortune to look a little like me.'

‘But … are you suggesting that Michael somehow knew every time you had sex and that made him strangle anyone who looked like you?'

‘Something on those lines, yes. And I think Tom had made that connection, which is the reason why he collected …' She dried up.

‘Collected what?'

‘Oh, nothing.' Though Laura's own thinking had moved on, she must not forget that, so far as the police were concerned, her son remained their prime suspect. She didn't want to draw their attention to his files of ambiguous research. ‘Anyway, yes. I think that, in Michael's increasingly unhinged mind, my having a sexual relationship triggered his homicidal tendencies.'

‘But …' Kent laughed in disparagement. ‘If that's the case, why aren't the last twenty years littered with women's strangled bodies? Surely you've had sex more than twice since you left Michael?'

‘I had a sexual relationship with Philip, but that was in New Zealand, so Michael didn't know anything about it. Otherwise there has been nothing.'

Kent couldn't resist the dig. ‘Huh. You're the one who kept telling me that all that abuse during our upbringing wouldn't stop us from having normal relationships with the opposite sex.'

‘Hasn't stopped you, has it?'

‘No, no, of course not,' said Kent, ‘… but it doesn't sound as though your life has been a fairy story of fulfilment, does it?'

She didn't take issue with him on that, but continued expounding her theory. ‘As I say, I have not had a sexual relationship with anyone since Tom's conception … until last Saturday night.'

‘Philip?'

Laura nodded. ‘And on Sunday morning the body of Emily Howard, a girl who is said to have resembled me, was found strangled in Brandon Hill Park.'

Kent was impassively thoughtful and silent, as Laura went on, ‘And you told me that someone fitting Michael's description had been seen in Bristol last week.'

‘I feel besieged, yes,' Laura said on the phone to Philip the following evening, ‘but I also feel certain that I'm right. It's my having sex that brings out Michael's murderous instincts.'

‘Hm. Kind of thing that might put off potential boyfriends.' Philip regretted the pleasantry as soon as he had said it. Their own relationship had not been discussed since they had last met, and he wasn't yet ready to bring it back into focus. He moved hastily on, ‘Is Kent setting up a search for Michael?'

‘No. Kent, while admitting that my theory is neat and contains an unlikely degree of coincidence, remains sceptical. He keeps saying nothing can be decided until they've talked to Tom.'

‘And there's no sign of Tom?'

‘No.'

‘You're still not worried about his safety, though?'

‘Not really. I'm still worried about his situation, and occasionally I get these panics that my theory about Michael is rubbish and Tom really did strangle Emily and …' She sighed. ‘But no, I'm not concerned about his physical well-being. I think he's just deliberately lying low somewhere.'

‘Hm. And Kent's still keeping up your protection … the surveillance?'

‘Yes. And he's round here quite a lot himself. He's behaving as though he thinks something else is going to happen.'

‘What kind of thing?'

‘Difficult to know. Kent never was the world's greatest communicator. But I assume he must be worried about the possibility of an attack on me.'

‘From whom?'

‘I'd say Michael. He'd probably still say Tom.'

‘Have you got any protection yourself?'

‘I've got a gun.'

‘Really?' Once again Philip's conventional values were challenged.

‘I did a feature on
Newsviews
about how easy it was to procure guns in central London. Ages ago, this is, early seventies. Anyway, it seemed a good opportunity to procure myself one. I've never fired it. Don't even know if it does fire.'

‘Hm. Well, you look after yourself.'

‘Course I will. I was thinking, Philip …'

‘Yes?'

‘The only way we can advance now – assuming Tom doesn't suddenly put in an appearance – is by finding out more about Michael … talking to him perhaps …'

‘But where is he?'

‘No idea. I was thinking, though … so far as I know, his mother's still alive.'

‘Oh?'

‘She was always very devoted to him. That's the basis of most of his problems. I can't imagine she hasn't got some means of contacting him.'

‘So, are you going to ring her to find out?'

‘She'd put the phone down on me. Never been her favourite person – and certainly wouldn't be now after the way I've treated her precious baby.'

‘Laura, do I detect I'm being asked to do something?'

‘It would really help. Just see if you can find out where he is, what he's been doing. I'm sorry to ask you, Philip, but –'

‘Don't worry. Of course I'll do it.'

Once again Philip was keener to serve Laura by positive action than to explore their emotional relationship.

It was only half past eight when Laura put the phone down, but she felt infinitely ready for bed. No one could continue to live life at the level of tension she had suffered for the previous few days, and her body suddenly gave itself up to exhaustion.

The effort of getting upstairs seemed insuperable, but somehow she managed it. She flopped down on the bed – ‘just for a second' she told herself – and her eyes closed. She got more than a second of oblivion, but not much more, as the phone shrilled her awake.

‘Hello?' The word was instinctive; her brain had not yet come back to life.

‘Hello, “Mummy”.' His sardonic tone was unmistakable.

‘Tom. Tom, you must come back. Listen, this call's being recorded so they can find out where you're –'

The line went dead.

‘Why the hell did you tell him the line was bugged?' Kent's voice on the other end of the phone was furious.

‘I thought it'd make him realize he couldn't escape for ever. I thought … I'm sorry, I was half-asleep. But you can trace where the call was made from, can't you?'

‘Probably,' he grunted. ‘Almost definitely be a public call-box, and when we get there, he'll be long gone.'

‘Look, if Tom rings again, I won't –'

‘Not fucking likely to ring again, is he? Listen, we've been trying to sort things out for you, Laura, and if you don't cooperate yourself, we can hardly –'

‘I wasn't deliberately not cooperating.'

‘No?'

‘What do you mean?'

‘Telling Tom the line was bugged could sound, to someone who was a bit suspicious of your motives, like you were warning him off.'

‘I wasn't. I just wasn't thinking.'

There was no disguising the anger in her brother's voice. ‘If you hear anything from him again, Laura, you fucking well tell me – all right?'

‘Yes. Yes, Kent,' she replied, feeling like a naughty schoolgirl, as he slammed the phone down.

Twenty minutes before, she had been prepared to sleep round the clock, but now Laura was totally awake. It would be another long unwinding. She poured a large glass of wine and tried, without success, to focus her mind on some television programme. It was about half an hour later that she heard the fax machine signalling an incoming message. She moved through into the study and read as the typewritten lines advanced out of the slot.

‘Dear Mummy,

In sending a fax, I'm taking the risk that there aren't any police actually with you in the house, and that you'll see this first and destroy it as soon as you've read it. If the police do see this message, that'll only mean the end will come quicker.

I know I should give myself up and I know the whole thing will soon be over, but if it's possible I'd like to speak to you alone, just to put my side of the story, to explain to you what really happened. Meet me at the Leigh Woods end of the Suspension Bridge. I'll go there straight from here and wait till eleven o'clock. If you haven't arrived by then, I'll do what I know I should do and –'

Something went wrong with the transmission. The ensuing print broke up into wavy lines, then vanished. The machine's guillotine neatly sliced off the one sheet. Laura waited, but no second sheet followed. Nor was there an attempt to retransmit the original one. She inspected the paper in her hand. Though the time was printed at the top, there was no originating fax number.

A new cold fear took possession of Laura. She hadn't previously thought there was any danger of Tom killing himself, but the threat was implicit in his message. His choice of rendezvous made the possibility chillingly more plausible. The Clifton Suspension Bridge, with its sixty-metre drop into the Avon Gorge, had always been a magnet for the suicidal.

Kent had ordered her to let him know the minute she heard anything from Tom, but she couldn't tell him this. The arrival of her brother with a posse of policemen might easily panic the boy into jumping. Whereas, if she could talk to him on her own, Laura might be able to calm him, persuade him to give himself up.

She felt the sick terror that had gripped her when Tom had had measles as a two-year-old. He had been very seriously ill and she had known, from the grim anxiety in the doctor's eye and the speed with which the child had been rushed into hospital, that his life was in danger. She remembered the visceral anguish of that time, the prayers to a God she hadn't thought she believed in. Please save him. Even if he's disabled by the illness, please keep Tom alive. The same feelings were echoed now. Even if he has to spend the rest of his life in prison, please keep Tom alive.

It was a keen, cold night. Laura drove with obsessive concentration. As she neared the toll booth, she reached into her pocket for the ten and five pence coins she had in readiness. She slowed and wound down her window to slip them in the slot. She heard the spectral sighing of the wind through the metal uprights ahead. The red and white barrier lifted.

The car felt the tug of the wind as it crossed the span of Brunel's magnificent structure. The whole roadway seemed to sway from its suspending chains. The bridge itself was brightly illuminated and, though she could only see spots of lights from buildings around the gorge, Laura could sense the emptiness of the giant void beneath. She looked keenly along the pedestrian walk-ways and tried to separate the shadows that hugged the windmill-shaped structure of the far pier. But as she went through the arch and past the barriers, there was no sign of any human figure.