The Operator (Bruce and Bennett Crime Thriller 2) (38 page)

‘She had more to say about her theory in the phone
message... you’ll never believe this, she thinks he’s the Operator.’

‘Archer!’

‘She thinks he killed at least the first two, yes
I know it’s far-fetched, but actually he may have attacked the Membership Secretary
which could be attempted murder. And Erica herself was attacked. Possibly. And
she is so very attackable.’

Will brought Hassan up to speed on the catapult
theory. ‘It sounds fairly harmless... but that Golf Club bloke nearly died of
his head injuries. As it is, he may have long-term brain damage. Foot down,
mate, Erica’s in deep bother and this is when she decides to go running.’ Because
I wouldn’t listen to her.

Running. What else could Erica
do now? Go to Archer’s house and accuse him? Fat lot of good that’d do. He
might murder her, or more likely, just laugh in her face. She had no proof at
all. She had no way of contacting the lads at a moment’s notice. And they’d
just deny everything. Will wouldn’t be interested, even if he ever listened to
her message. The theory did sound crazy, even to her. She could just imagine his
sardonic expression, his blue eyes narrowing. Battling against the wind along
the seafront was an outlet for her pent-up rage, as she headed for the river
mouth and the northern of the twin piers. Along the promenade, past the grotty
bit with the boarded-up souvenir shops and amusement arcades full of young kids
wasting their money and their lives, along curving rows of hotels and B&Bs,
most proclaiming vacancies or full of weekend stag parties; past the church and
the long sands, where as usual some brave souls were belly-boarding or trying
to surf.

The ruined castle on the headland of the river
mouth got nearer, as her breath came harder, the wind kept rising, and the
thoughts in her brain kept coming but getting nowhere. The sky was darkening to
a slaty wet mussel-shell colour, and the matching sea moaned in sympathy with
the wind keening in the overhead wires. Waves were beginning to lash the sea
walls below to her left. She could hear the familiar ‘wump!’ as tons of water
met solid rock and concrete, flinging up curtains of spray.

There must be something I can do, she repeated
like a mantra. Suppose Anderson never recovers fully, or is brain-damaged? He’ll
never go to trial, but they’ll assume he did all three killings. She wasn’t
convinced he’d killed Gupta either. No, Erica. Keep to the point... A bus swung
past, its slipstream all but sucking her and her bike into the traffic. It was
a relief to get off the road and down the hill to the beginning of the pier.

Waves were appearing over the top already in puffs
of smoky spray. The big wrought iron gates at the entrance to the pier were
still open. Hardly anyone was on the pier itself in the bitter cold wind and
rising sea. There was a clutch of people on the concrete platform on the open
sea side of the start of the pier, watching the waves from safety as the wind
built them up higher, stronger, whiter. At this rate the harbourmaster would be
emerging from his little hut soon to close the pier. She felt a strong urge to
get to the end, even if she’d only have to turn round and run back again.
Standing out there, as if on an island, just her and the sea, she’d find calm
in the heart of the storm, and answers.

She ditched the bike against the salt-corroded
railing, and ran through the gates. As she pounded along the pier, waves flew
higher on her left, trying to climb over the pier wall. On her right, inside
the harbour, it was calmer, but the contained swell was still impressive. The
moored fishing boats and the green and red buoys marking the safe channel for
big ships bucked frantically like rocking horses on crystal meth.

A father and his two children and a middle-aged
couple passed her heading back to land, already wary of the increasingly
dangerous waves. Dark irregular patches on the path showed where water was
landing, and the two children were sopping wet. Kids could never resist daring
the waves. Soon, larger and larger volumes of water would leap the wall, swill
across the path, and gush from the pier through the railings on the right into
the harbour. She kept going, heading for the stubby little lighthouse on the
end. She focused on getting that far, determined to go round its hollow body,
stand if only for a minute on the very end of the pier.

She’d always shaken her head sadly and wisely when
newspapers reported that someone had been washed off a pier or some rocks, or
fallen from a cliff, or capsized a boat while not wearing a lifejacket. Now the
risk didn’t matter. Getting to the end was something she could set her sights
on and achieve, and that seemed more important than anything at that moment.
Something she had control over.

Her hair whipped about her right ear, the icy wind
knifed her left with a horrible earache. The sound of the waves hitting the huge
stone barricade beneath was accompanied by plumes of spray stinging like
hailstones. She kept running. As she got to the last third of the pier, a huge
mass of water leapt up, threw its multicoloured tentacles above her, and fell.
From the land, it would look like a fine spray. It felt like buckets of
icewater thrown over her, including the buckets. She ducked under the weight,
checked by the freezing cold shock as the crest of the wave splatted over the
path and ran down the other side. Water ran off her. Her hair was plastered
down, her clothes were lead-heavy, harsh salt was in her mouth and stinging her
eyes. She was gasping with shock but she kept going, and as she reached the
lighthouse straddling the pier’s end, another wave shot across behind her and
flooded off under the railings. It would have been hard to keep her feet if
that one had hit, but the railings would stop her being washed off. Probably.

The clamour of wind and water howled around the
lighthouse, but there was a sliver of partial shelter on the side of it
opposite to the weather’s full sound and fury. The path went right round it, on
the outside, with a kerb-like wall and an iron railing where she stood for a
second watching the sea. It was spectacular, rainbows dancing madly in the white
towers of spray, as waves flung themselves right past her, hard and cold as
hammer blows. She hung on to the rail, but the walls gave her some protection.
She’d made it to the end, and she’d have a very wet time getting back. She’d
have to get out of wind and water soon or exposure would set in. The sea was
painfully icy. She went inside the open base of the lighthouse to catch her
breath. The doorway went dark. The harbour master, come to chase her back. But
it was Harold Archer, and he was right in front of her, blocking the entrance.

He was holding a golf club, raised as if to swing,
but the handicap was hers. She was fitter and younger, but trapped and unarmed.
She couldn’t get past him and any other retreat was cut off by the storm-crazed
North Sea. If the harbour master was coming, Archer could easily belt her one
with the metal club before he got to them. It would be impossible for anyone to
see what was happening from further along the pier, especially in these
conditions. She could have ‘fallen and hit her head’ on the slippery wet
concrete.

Could she keep him talking? She thought of the
dialogues he’d had with Kingston and Chambers and the cold went to her heart.

‘I knew you’d come here,’ he shouted, loud enough
to hear above the weather, the effort distorting his face to an animal snarl. ‘It’s
where you always go isn’t it? I saw you leave the Club, and drove down to beat
you to it. You just ran right past me! I’ve been waiting for you just round the
lighthouse.’

‘Why?’ Her throat was the only dry thing on the
pier. ‘Trouble with golfer’s elbow?’ She was shivering so much her voice wouldn’t
stop shaking. She sounded scared, which made her angry.

‘Oh, no. Nothing wrong with my swing. Years of
golf have left me with strong arms and shoulders.’ He swished the golf club
with its solid metal end back and forth. She could only get past him if she
went for him, and before she could get near enough, that club could get her
first.

‘Blackett told me about your allegations. He doesn’t
believe you, or so he says, but he warned me it could affect my application for
membership until it’s all cleared up. After all I’ve been through! You have no
idea! I should have known you’d be trouble, peering over fences, asking
questions, butting in where you aren’t wanted, even going to the Golf Club! Why
did you have to interfere? And what proof have you anyway?’ His voice, shrill
enough to cut through the noise of the waves, almost wailed in self-pity.

‘Witnesses, I found witnesses,’ she lied. Without
taking her eyes from the club, she thought of her neat digital recorder. A
chance at least to get something on him, even if she didn’t survive. She
reached inside her jacket to switch it on, and remembered she’d left it, with
her phone, in the saddlebag on the bike. Shit. If I ever get out of this, she
promised herself, I’ll superglue it to my forehead rather than risk being
without it. If. Not that he’d have let her use it anyway.

‘Those bloody hooligans was it? I can’t believe
it, you and them, ganging up on me, destroying everything I’ve worked for all
my life, who are you to do this to me…’

‘Mr Archer,
you
tried to kill
me
,
remember? With a golf ball…’

‘I missed, didn’t I? Well nearly. But you wouldn’t
be put off! Bloody women, can’t leave anything alone. Everyone’s against me, no
sooner get rid of one obstacle than another springs up.’

Her mind riffled through possibilities. Should she
tell him she’d already passed her suspicions on to the police? Then what – he
might feel he had nothing to lose by killing her anyway. With what he’d done
already, that would be nothing to him. Except he’d never done it face to face
with a conscious victim. Maybe she could keep him talking until the
harbourmaster got here to check the pier was empty. (If, if, he was coming at
all.) She did have a knack for making people spill their guts… trying to blot
out this image, ‘You said I’ve no idea, so tell me, why did you do it?’

His face was screwed up like the butt-end of a pepper,
anxiety, anger and fear shrivelling his features.

‘Why?’ he shrieked. ‘I started with nothing,
nothing! Years and years scrimping and saving, working all hours, doing night
classes to get more qualifications, working my way up the housing ladder, all I
wanted, dreamed of, was a nice house by the sea next to the Golf Club. Where my
parents worked like peasants for members who wouldn’t so much as say good
morning to them. I was determined to make it, however long it took.

‘That bastard Kingston conned me! Sold me a house
at an inflated price, promised he’d get me straight into the club, then once I’d
signed the contract, he reneged. Of course it turned out it was all up to that
pompous fart of a Membership Secretary, and his precious rules! Rules to keep
out riff raff, oh yes Kingston told me that, you should have seen his face! He
was loving it! He’d known all along! Riff raff!’

With each adjective, and without irony, he swung
the club; it sheeeshed through the salty wet air. She tried not to flinch.

‘And oh,’ he went on, ‘how Kingston loved to keep
rubbing it in! Always coming round, calling over the fence every time I went in
the garden - how was the club membership going, wasn’t it a long list, what a
shame I had to sit and watch others play or drive fifteen miles for a game, so
sorry he couldn’t help, ‘I’m not Jesus Christ, you know,’ he’d say with that
damn smug face of his, oh he loved to see me squirm. Me! Hard-headed,
successful business man, pulled myself up from nothing by my own efforts and my
own wit, conned by a bloody quack!’

 Jesus Christ, with his crown of thorns. Or spikes.
Nails in his hands. ‘You’re not the only one Kingston hurt.’ Erica tried to
dilute his paranoia. But he wasn’t interested in anyone else. Like Kingston, he
had tunnel vision and himself filled his field of view.

‘Anyway, he’s not so smug now, is he? Neither is
that fool of a Membership Secretary. I always was a good shot, you know, always
been a demon putter. Found a catapult, dropped by those thugs when they were
running off, very powerful one I have to say. I used to fire balls I found on
the course at Kingston’s windows, plants, at night, just to relieve my
feelings, I felt so powerless! Then one day, I saw the secretary from my
window, standing on the course in broad daylight, and I just - fired. On impulse.
Whack! Bang on target. Saw him go down like a sack of spuds. God it felt
good... then I was worried sick. But nothing happened. Nobody knew. I even sent
him a get well card!’

He laughed, swishing the club in time with his
mirth. Would that harbourmaster never get here, surely the pier was dangerous
enough by now…

‘Then I heard that Kingston had advised Blackett
to keep the old rules until they knew if the other bloke would be coming back…
that night, I heard a disturbance, those bloody young thugs out the back, high
on drugs probably. I looked out my bedroom window, saw Kingston burst out of
his house, sounding off at them over the golf course fence. They must have
scarpered pronto, I didn’t see them. I had the sadistic bastard in my sights. I
didn’t think I’d hit him in that light, but no! Another bullseye! Hell of a
smack on the back of the head, he went down like a dead man, and did he have it
coming… and you know, it felt fantastic! Then everything blurred, I don’t know
… I don’t remember... and still, after he’s dead, still there’s something in
the way – you! But I had less luck with you didn’t I?’

Erica wasn’t feeling so lucky right then. She was
shivering violently, her back pressed against the damp rough wall, Archer
filling the space in front of her. He must have bashed Kingston with the stone
right where the golf ball hit. To hide the tell-tale wound. To make sure he couldn’t
resist or taunt Archer any more.