The Ladykiller (59 page)

‘Hello, Kate.’ Patrick’s voice was normal and she swallowed hard.

‘Patrick.’ She let him drive. The closeness of him made her feel breathless. She could smell his aftershave. Despite herself she was glad to see him. This fact, admitted to and accepted, annoyed her.

Patrick drove to his house and she got out of the car and followed him inside. They had barely spoken a word. In his dining room the table was laid for two and the smell of a delicious roast assailed her nostrils.

He held her seat for her and she sat down.

‘I’m sorry, Kate. I know that what I did to Dan was wrong. But I swear I was just trying to help you, that’s all. I wanted the CIB off your back and that was the only way. I had no intention of hurting him, just scaring him.’

Kate could hear the desperate tone in his voice. Could see the absolute honesty in his face. But she also could feel the pull that this man had on her. She looked around the beautiful room: at the plush carpet, the watercolours on the walls, at the expensive linen and cutlery, and knew that she had missed all this but most of all had missed the man. Missed him with all her being, no matter what he had done. He was like the breath of life to her and she needed him. Whatever the attraction was between them, it was powerful enough to make her admit that what he had done to Dan didn’t really matter when he was with her, when he was close to her, when she could reach out and touch his face.

She looked at Patrick and he looked at her. It was more than an exchange of glances: it was like a tangible force, there between them. Each knew the other intimately, each felt the attraction that had brought her here today. Each wanted the rift between them breached so that they could get on with their lives.

Kate’s eyes were like dark pools of liquid light. Patrick searched them for some sign that she had relented. That he was forgiven. As she picked up her wine glass and smiled at him, he felt as if someone had given him an injection of pure happiness.

‘Cheers, Pat.’ She sipped the heavy red liquid and as she did so knew that there was no going back. She had accepted his way of living one hundred per cent. Dan would be forgotten, everything would be forgotten, except for their urgent desire.

Patrick opened the serving dish that had been placed on the table by Willy just as they had driven up and filled Kate’s plate with slices of beef.

As she took the plate from him their fingers touched and the jolt that went between them was like a physical pain.

‘How’s Willy?’

Patrick filled his own plate and grinned. ‘He’s fine.’

‘Good. I rather like Willy.’

And she did. She knew that Patrick would go mad if he knew that Willy had been to see her, but it was the talk she had had with him that had helped her sort out her own mind.

‘Can I see you tonight, Kate?’

She smiled, taking a mouthful of juicy beef and wiping her lips with a napkin.

‘I don’t see why not.’

Putting down his own knife and fork he walked around the table and took her in his arms. They did not kiss, but as he rubbed his face in the softness of her hair, she felt as if she had indeed finally come home.

He was dangerous to her, she knew that. But she was determined to have him.

An hour later she was back at work, lighter of heart than she had been for days and raring to go. She looked and felt great, something which was noticed by just about everyone in the incident room.

DS Spencer, still smarting from Amanda Dawkins’s practical joke, whispered into Willis’s ear: ‘Screwing a villain seems to cheer her up no end.’

Willis gave him a dirty look. Spencer got on his nerves. In fact, Spencer got on everyone’s nerves.

‘Why don’t you piss off, Spencer?’

Willis walked away from him. Collating all the blood tests was much harder than anyone had thought, but it had given them an added impetus. It was a new avenue. It was their big chance to catch the Grantley Ripper.

When a man was blood tested his fingerprints were taken also. If he had a record then the fingerprints were matched. It was another way of confirming their alibis. If a man had no criminal file then his passport or some other form of identification was necessary. A driving licence was adequate, but something with a picture on was much more solid. This is what was taking all the time. Not enough manpower to keep abreast of the mounting names. Still, it was better than nothing and much better than they’d had before.

Willis picked up yet another file. He was dealing with the known sex offenders. Due to a delay in the computer system, they had only just received all the names of sex offenders in the area who had been tried and convicted in other parts of the country. These were known as ‘floaters’, passing through on their way to another prison sentence. They were the flotsam and jetsam of the criminal world, hated by police and villains alike. The pile was in alphabetical order and Willis picked up the first file.

Name: Desmond Addamson.

Willis flicked through the file: rape, arson and flashing, along with robbery with violence. He had turned up in Grantley in the middle of January. Too late for the first murders. He picked up the phone. The man had better be checked out anyway. He would start with his probation officer. As he picked up the phone, he knocked the pile of files from his desk. He dropped the phone and tried to save them. Too late.

The files landed with a muted thud and papers were strewn everywhere. A small cheer went up from the others in the room and Willis smiled good-naturedly as he bent down to scoop up the papers. He would be there for ages putting all the papers back in their proper folders. He placed the last lot on the desk and there, staring up at him, was George Markham’s face. Younger, with browner, thicker hair, but unmistakably George Markham.

Willis glanced at the photo without seeing it.

George had had a nice cup of tea and was now in the process of thinking how to get Elaine up into the loft. He had thought long and hard about where to put her and then it had come to him in a flash of inspiration. There was only one problem: Elaine was big. How was he to get her up there?

The answer was so cunning that he grinned with satisfaction. He was clever all right.

He stood up and looked at Elaine’s body, wrapped in the incongruous plastic bags.

‘I’m off out, dear, I won’t be long.’

He went into the hall and put on his good overcoat. Then, carefully locking up, he drove to Grantley shopping centre, parked his car in the multi-storey car park and walked through the town centre to a small plant hire shop.

Stellman’s Plant Hire had been in Grantley for twenty years. It was the first time George had ever been in there and he stood uncertainly among the debris of lawnmowers and wallpaper strippers. A young man came up and smiled at him.

‘What can I do you for?’

‘I beg your pardon?’ George’s voice was timid once more.

‘A joke, mate.’ The boy stared at George and shrugged. ‘What can I do for you, sir?’ He tacked the ‘sir’ on the end at the last second.

‘I . . . er . . . want to lift an engine out of a car. A friend of mine is going to put a new engine into my car, you see.’ George’s voice trailed off. He should have prepared what he was going to say.

The boy was all the business now.

‘I see. You want the Haltrac.’ Seeing George’s confusion, he grinned. ‘The small block and tackle. It will lift about a ton, but it’s lightweight. Not like the old ones of years ago. You just set it up and Bob’s your uncle. Manual lift, the lot. How long would you want it for?’

George smiled now. This was easier than he’d thought.

‘Oh, a couple of days at most.’

‘All right. I’d have it for the week, though. If it pisses down with rain then you won’t be doing much. It’s cheaper that way anyhow. It’s eight quid a day, but only sixteen quid for the week. Plus VAT of course. Mustn’t forget Maggie’s curse, must we?’

George was overwhelmed. The boy could sell, that much was obvious. But at that moment George would have paid any amount for the tool in question, and in fact was shocked that it was so cheap.

‘Whatever you think is best. Can I take it now?’

‘’Course you can.’

The boy began to make out the paperwork and George paid him in cash. He left, the Haltrac held firmly in his hands. He drove back home feeling quite lighthearted.

Once indoors he began the serious work of the day. First he opened the loft hatch and, after cleaning it thoroughly, placed it on his bed. No need to make everything dirty. He hated mess of any kind. Then he brought the block and tackle up the stairs. He walked up the stainless steel, safety conscious steps that led to the square hole in the ceiling of the landing and began phase two of his operation.

Lifting himself into the loft, he looked around him critically. The roof sloped upwards and running parallel on each side were three sets of purlings, large pieces of wood that supported the roof joists. He went back down the ladder and returned with a length of half-inch-thick polyester rope in a lovely bright blue colour. He lashed this around the left-hand purling, tying it tightly, and did the same on the right-hand side, giving the rope a good hard tug to make sure it was secure. The purlings were eight feet from the floor and he balanced himself precariously on a large packing case to secure the rope.

He got off the packing case and jumped up, grabbing the centre of the rope to make sure it was secure. He held on to it for a few seconds, swaying, his feet off the ground. It was perfect.

He let go of the rope and dropped lightly on the balls of his feet. He felt quite gay. It was like when he was a child and they played on the bundle swings, hanging precariously above the ground, then that wonderful feeling of dropping on to terra firma. He smiled to himself and then repeated the whole process again, swinging for a few seconds more this time, swaying from side to side.

Then the significance of what he was doing penetrated his brain and he was businesslike once more. He went down the ladder and brought up the block and tackle. He placed the hook on the top of the tackle on to the rope, letting the tackle itself drop through the loft hole. He was ready.

He felt a thrill of anticipation course through his whole body. He went back to the kitchen. Holding Elaine’s body through the plastic, underneath the arms, he began dragging her through the hall and up the stairs. Elaine’s dead weight was more than he had bargained for and he had to leave her propped up on the middle of the stairs while he went for a cold drink. He was sweating like a pig. His euphoria was wearing off now and he was feeling positively disgruntled. Elaine always made everything so difficult. Every time he planned something, she messed it up.

He pursed his lips together into a hard line, the water forgotten in front of him as he brooded.

Half an hour later he was startled when the harsh trill of the telephone rang through the silent house. It was probably that nosy bitch again, Elaine’s so-called friend. He pulled himself from his seat to answer the phone. The blood-spattered kitchen had not penetrated his consciousness yet.

‘Hello.’ His meek, humble voice was back.

‘George?’ His heart sank. It was Renshaw.

‘You there, Georgie boy?’

‘Yes. Hello, Peter.’

‘Bad business that yesterday and I told that cow Denham what I thought about it as well. You’re still on for tomorrow night though? Bugger the lot of them, we’ll have a night to remember, what?’

‘Tomorrow night?’ George was puzzled.

‘Your leaving do, of course.’

‘Oh . . . Oh, yes. Yes, I’ll be there.’

‘Good. Meet you in the Fox Revived at eight thirty, OK?’

‘Yes. That would be lovely.’

‘I don’t blame you for getting on your high horse, you know, George. That bitch needed taking down a peg or two. They all do in the end.’

‘Quite.’

‘See you tomorrow then?’

Yes.’

The phone went dead and George replaced the receiver. Peter Renshaw was right. They did all need taking down a peg and he was the man to do it!

He walked up the stairs and stared at Elaine’s grotesque form. She was another one. Ripping the top of the bag he watched, fascinated, as Elaine’s orange hair tumbled into view. Then, taking the long hair in chunks, he wrapped it around his hands and dragged her bodily up the remaining stairs. The action forced her head from the bag and he laughed at her milky eyes. Glazed now and dry, they stared up at him passively.

With one final heave he had her on the landing. Then, pulling the tackle down, he hooked it into the rope that trussed her in the black bags. Satisfied, he went up the ladder and then, pulling the steps up behind him, picked up the slack rope that was attached to the pulley on top of the tackle and gradually pulled Elaine up into the loft.

It was easier than he’d expected. She lifted up as easy as pie and when she was dangling, her exposed head hanging sideways, staring at him as if in surprise, he tied the rope around one of the lower purlings and surveyed his handiwork. He felt almost gleeful again.

Elaine’s body was swaying gently to and fro and he watched her in fascinated amusement. Her skin was a greeny-grey colour now and he thought she looked quite ill. He shrugged. The sooner he tucked her away the better.

But he had other things to do first. Placing the steps down once more, he climbed down and retrieved the loft hatch from the bed. Then he replaced it carefully, leaving Elaine dangling there in the dark loft. He took the steps and put them back in his shed then he walked purposefully into the kitchen. He looked around at the chaos and made little tutting noises before rolling up his sleeves and filling the sink with hot water.

He certainly had his work cut out for him today!

It took him all of three hours to clean the kitchen. The pristine white floor tiles would not come up to their usual standard. The blood left rust-coloured marks and finally he took out a bottle of Domestos and spread it liberally over the tiles. The thick liquid was then spread evenly, ammonia burning George’s hands and eyes. Finally he was finished and the floor looked better. Much better. But the stains were still visible. He tutted again and shrugged. He had done his best.