The Murder Code (16 page)

‘Because he never wanted the scooter,’ I said.

‘My guess too. It wasn’t about that.’

I shook my head.

Laura said, ‘I know.’

‘Show me the rest.’

She passed me more of the other crime-scene photos. I flipped through them one by one, then put them down on the desk, feeling numb.

‘Full results of the PM aren’t in yet, obviously. I left halfway through.’

‘But?’

‘Polythene was found in the wounds.’

I nodded. I’d been expecting that—or something, at least. If Laura had left halfway through, it must have been because she’d seen enough to be satisfied.

‘Not been confirmed as that yet,’ she said. ‘But I’m convinced. This is our guy.’

‘Okay.’ I leaned back in the chair and put my hands behind my head. Stretched. ‘So now what?’

‘I’ve left Buxton to it for now. They’re keen to follow up everything at their end—which is good for us, obviously. As things stand, they’ve only got one to deal with. But we’ll be co-ordinating from now on. Young’s negotiating, but I don’t see any problems.’

‘Can’t they just take the whole thing off our hands?’

Laura gave me a sly smile. ‘No such luck.’

‘What are they like?’

‘The Buxton PD? They’re okay. Seem sharp enough. The DCI in overall charge is a guy called Franklin.’

‘Franklin?’ I said. ‘What’s
he
like?’

‘Seemed on top of things to me. Reiterated the need to work together. Pool resources. That side of things will be okay, I think.’

‘Are they asking for anything?’

‘Not so far. Co-operative, like I said. They’re going to come over tomorrow for the daily briefing: bring us what they have and take a little of what we’ve got. Share it all and see if anything leaps out.’

I nodded slowly.

‘In the meantime, we need to get all the data relating to Kate Barrett factored in to our investigation. In case it’s part of the pattern.’

‘If there is one,’ I said.

‘Yeah.’

But even if there was, how were we supposed to make sense of it? It was hard enough thinking in terms of our city, never mind expanding the investigation to neighbouring towns. Was he going to take it nationwide? Had he left us for now—possibly even for good?

And then there was the Buxton connection, which was definite now. Who was Franklin? Had I ever encountered him before? The name wasn’t familiar, but I wasn’t sure.

That tightening again. The storm clouds gathering.

Laura misread my expression. ‘I know.’

I nodded, but thought:
No. You don’t.

‘O
KAY, BILLY,’ I SAID.
‘We’ll take this at your own speed, in your own time. If at any time you get scared or upset, you just have to say and we’ll stop for a while. Is that all right?’

Billy Martin nodded—a little too quickly. I was sure he was feeling both scared and upset, because anybody in their right mind would be, never mind a twelve-year-old boy. But he was obviously determined, in the manner of twelve-year-old boys everywhere, not to let it show.

‘All right,’ I said.

We were sitting in the comfort suite: the room on the department’s second floor that was reserved for the more fragile interviewees we encountered. Laura and I were stationed on a two-seater settee opposite Billy and his father. A child support officer was seated away to one side.

The room was set up more like a living room than an interview room; all the normal accoutrements were hidden as far out of sight as possible, so that the most ostentatious thing was the black-ball camera up in the corner. Billy didn’t seem to notice that anyway. His gaze kept darting between me, Laura and the floor, as though he didn’t want to meet anyone’s eyes long enough for them to notice how scared his own were.

I felt sorry for the kid. He looked even younger than he was—just a skinny rake of a thing with messy brown hair and an old T-shirt that looked hand-me-down and two sizes too big for him. His jeans were ragged and tattered at the bottoms, where his cheap trainers had scuffed away the fabric, turning the denim there into muddy strings.

The pity was mainly because of his father, though, who didn’t seem concerned enough about his son’s ordeal to me. He was just sitting there, fat arms folded over a fat belly, his face reddened by annoyance—for all the world as though he’d been summoned here because his son had done something wrong. We were compelled by law to have the man present, but I think all of us—including Billy and his father—would have preferred to do it without.

‘All right,’ I said again. ‘Can you tell us why you were in the woods in the first place?’

He shuffled awkwardly. ‘I was playing.’

‘By yourself?’

‘Yes.’

‘Do you often go there?’

‘Sometimes.’

Beside him, his father snorted slightly.

I said, ‘You knew to take care though, didn’t you? With the things in the news recently?’

‘I guess.’ He shrugged slightly, embarrassed. ‘But I thought it would be okay.’

‘I know. What were you doing?’

He hesitated.

‘Go on,’ I said. ‘It’s fine, honestly.’

‘I wanted to build a bow and arrow.’

‘What?’ This time his father’s snort was actually angry. ‘A bow and arrow? What on earth did you want to do that for?’

Billy slumped further into the settee, as though wanting to disappear entirely inside it. Obviously at his age—on the cusp of adulthood—it was a humiliating thing to admit, and yet his father’s response was to compound that.

It was already entirely clear that Billy Martin was a kid without many friends or much in the way of confidence. It was now becoming obvious what the root cause of that was. Honestly, it might well be the single most depressing thing police work teaches you: some kids never have a fucking chance.

I said, ‘You wanted to play cowboys and Indians? Something like that?’

‘I guess.’

‘That’s okay. It’s a good game. I used to play that myself when I was your age. I didn’t have many friends, and I got picked on. So I used to imagine I was shooting the kids that picked on me.’

His father snorted again. I ignored him, because Billy looked up at me a little more hopefully. What I’d said was true, and it wasn’t hard to remember how I’d felt at his age: gawky and awkward and lonely. You never forget these things; you never forget how it feels. There’s nothing wrong with finding play wherever you can when you’re a kid …

Buxton.

I shook that thought out of my head.

‘So you were in the woods. We know whereabouts. We’ve just come from there.’ I nearly said
the scene
, but corrected myself just in time. We’d get to that soon enough. ‘What happened then?’

Billy took a big inward breath. ‘There was a horrible noise up ahead. I didn’t know what it was, and I went to look. I know I shouldn’t have, but I did.’

‘And what did you see?’

The upset finally surfaced properly.

‘Okay,’ I said quickly. ‘We know what happened, so I don’t need you to go through everything you saw. It must have been horrible.’

He nodded. Not crying, but almost.

‘How long were you watching?’

‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘It’s hard to remember. Maybe … a minute?’

Christ.
Given the way time expanded in horrific circumstances, I guessed it probably hadn’t been that long. But even so, it must have been more than enough.

We’d already identified the victim—a twenty-eight-year-old male named Paul Thatcher. That portion of the woods had a slight association with cruising, although we had no way of knowing whether he was out there for that or something else. I’d seen the body and what had been done to it, though, and I wasn’t sure I could have watched for more than a second or two. The poor kid must have been frozen in place. Out in the middle of nowhere, not knowing whether to run or hide or what.

‘This is going to be a difficult question,’ I said. ‘But was the man alive when you saw him? The man on the ground, I mean.’

Billy took another deep breath.

‘I think so,’ he said. ‘Sort of.’

Sort of.
From what we’d found at the scene so far—and that was obviously ongoing—
sort of
made an awful kind of sense. Because, yes, Paul Thatcher was dead when we got there, but from his injuries he’d clearly been
sort of
alive for a considerable amount of time beforehand. Billy’s answer mattered because of what it implied. That even though he’d been observed torturing Paul Thatcher, our killer hadn’t panicked, hadn’t run, hadn’t even chased after the witness.

Instead, very calmly, he’d carried on with his work.

‘Can you describe him? Not the man on the ground. The other man.’

‘He was all in black and he had a mask on.’

‘What kind of mask?’

‘A balaclava? Like in the army. All black, just with the eyes showing.’

‘That’s good. Can you say how tall he was?’

‘No. He was … crouched over him, stabbing him in the stomach. Or doing something, anyway. When he stood up … I don’t know.’

‘He saw you?’

‘It was like one second he wasn’t looking at me and then he was. Staring right at me.’

Even second-hand, I felt a chill. At that point, the kid had been a good mile from any help, and he’d locked eyes with a grown man who’d tortured and killed several people. A monster armed with a hammer, a screwdriver and God only knew what else.

‘His eyes were just … empty.’

‘Empty?’

They reminded me of … this story. The kids at school. They told me about someone who killed a cat. I couldn’t imagine what sort of person could do that. But when I looked into his eyes, I realised …’

‘
This
type of man?’

Billy nodded.

‘So you ran?’

He nodded again, but then hesitated, perhaps realising that it didn’t sound as brave as he so obviously wanted to be.

‘Don’t worry,’ I said. ‘The kids at school, they would all have done the same. Hell, I probably would. You did the right thing.’

‘I fired at him first, though.’ Billy leaned forward, suddenly emphatic. ‘I fired at him.’

His father snorted again. ‘With your bow and arrow?’

‘Mr Martin,’ I said. ‘Do you want to shut the fuck up?’

The man stared at me, jaw falling slack.

‘No, seriously,’ I said. ‘Shut the fuck up.’

Laura tapped my knee. I leaned back, and let her take over for a moment.

‘Mr Martin,’ she said. ‘What my partner is trying to say is that we need Billy to feel free to give his own account of what happened.’

I was about to interrupt, because, no, I was trying to say that I wanted the man to shut the fuck up, but Laura tapped my knee again.

‘Personally, I think he’s been very brave.’ Laura smiled at Billy. ‘You ran. Like Detective Hicks said, that makes total sense. Trust me, it’s fine. But then what?’

‘I ran for a long time. I didn’t dare look behind me until I got to the stream.’

‘And what did you see?’

‘Nothing.’ Billy looked miserable. ‘Just empty woods. He wasn’t chasing me or anything.’

It had apparently taken the last few seconds for my insolence to land in Billy’s father’s head. He unfolded his arms and leaned forward and was about to assert his authority on the situation.

‘Listen—’

‘All right then,’ Laura said, sounding breezy. ‘I think we’re done for now. Let’s leave it there. Thank you all for your time.’

She glanced up at the camera in the corner as we stood up. The child protection officer would deal with the additional details. Laura and I headed for the door.

But as I got there, I hesitated, and then returned to where Billy Martin was sitting and knelt down in front of him. Didn’t even glance at his father beside him.

‘Billy,’ I whispered. The interview was over, but I didn’t want the camera to pick up the lie I was about to tell him. ‘I want you to know something.’

He looked at me nervously. ‘What?’

‘I shouldn’t tell you this,’ I said. ‘But just between you and me. You hit him. Enough to slow him down.’

He stared at me.

‘I did?’

‘You hit him.’ I smiled. ‘Good job. That’s why you got away.’

D
EAR DETECTIVE HICKS

I notice you have failed to acknowledge my previous letter. Obviously, I did not expect you to reply directly. I was far too careful to allow you to trace my message, as I’m sure you will have discovered. You will find similar efforts have been taken with this one, although no doubt you will be compelled to check. That is one of the reasons I will stay ahead of you. You have too much to do, while I have only one thing. So far, my code is unravelling exactly to plan.

But you told the press you have received no correspondence from me. If you are ‘holding back details’, I quite understand. However, it may be that you are unsure whether I am the man you are looking for. If that is the case, I am enclosing proof that should satisfy even you. I would hate to think you weren’t taking me seriously. I want to beat you fair and square.

So let me help you, as much as you deserve.

The people who have died mean nothing to me. By now you know that they are strangers to me, that they have done me no personal wrong, that they have no obvious connection to me. But I am telling you something else. Their
deaths
mean nothing. The murders are irrelevant to me. What I am interested in is the pattern below the surface. Can you break it? That’s what matters.

Why murders then? Because the stakes are very high, in ways you cannot possibly understand. And I want the finest minds concentrated on cracking my code. Challenging the police, on their own ground, is the ideal solution. After all, you are soldiers of a kind. You have enormous resources. If anyone can do it, it will be you. If not, I win, don’t I? I beat you. You don’t seem to be doing very well so far. But please keep trying. A hollow victory is no victory at all.

In the meantime, as mentioned above, I enclose proof that I am the man you are looking for. It should be incontrovertible. It will also reveal something that will surely be of interest to you, something it is only fair you know.