The Shadow Walker (5 page)

“You've made inquiries among this lot?” Nergui asked.

“We've started,” Doripalam said. “Nobody saw or heard anything last night, so they say.”

“Nothing?”

“So they say.”

Nergui nodded. It was always the same. It had, apparently, been the same at the hotel. No one had seen or heard anything. “Still, we have to keep asking. We may get something eventually.”

“You never know,” Doripalam said.

Nergui shook his head. This was going nowhere. It was all just routine stuff, which Doripalam would handle as well, if not better, than he could. Forensic examination of the victims' bodies. Attempts to gather any relevant data they could from the records. Links to any previous killings—though Nergui could think of no obvious ones. Routine questioning of possible witnesses. The usual grind of investigative work. But, unless they could begin to unravel the mystery of who the victims were,
Nergui couldn't see them making any headway. It wasn't the kind of thing he would say to the Minister, but the best hope of their making further progress would be for the killer to strike again. Ideally, he added to himself as an afterthought, without actually succeeding.

As it turned out, Nergui's unexpressed wish was soon granted, though only in part. The killer struck again, and unexpectedly quickly. Unfortunately, he was all too successful.

The call came at around eleven the following morning. Nergui was in his new office in police HQ, reading and rereading through the police reports on the previous killings. He had not thought it appropriate to turf Doripalam out of the office that had previously been his own, and had been quite happy to lodge himself in a small, unused room at the end of the corridor, with only a cheap desk and an empty filing cabinet for company. He hoped that this was at least sending the right message to Doripalam and the rest of the team.

Even before he picked up the phone, his instincts were telling him that this was not good news.

“Nergui? It's Doripalam.”

“What is it?”

“There's been another one.”

“Already? The Minister was right for once—this is getting a dangerous place to live. Where?”

“The Chinggis. In one of the bedrooms.”

“You're joking.”

“I don't hear you laughing.”

Nergui was silent for a moment. The Chinggis Khaan was one of the city's newest hotels, built in response to the growing business and tourist trade in the city. Any incident there would have major repercussions, maybe even international repercussions. The Minister, it was safe to predict, would not be happy.

“Do we think it's linked to the others?” Nergui asked.

“It's difficult to say,” Doripalam said, after a pause. “This one's different.”

“Different how?” Nergui asked, already dreading the answer.

“I think you'd better come see for yourself.”

It took only minutes for Nergui to reach the hotel in an official car, sirens screaming. The Chinggis was a striking building, a successful attempt to bring Western-style service and luxury to the city. Some of the other hotels, including the Bayangol, had subsequently emulated its style, upgrading their previously basic facilities to something that might begin to meet Western expectations.

Nergui waved his ID pass at the reception and was directed across the expansive lobby to the elevators. He glanced around him at the dark mirrored walls, the thick piled carpet, the clusters of Japanese and Western tourists waiting to start their morning's excursions. He'd been in the place a few times before for conferences and formal meetings, but hardly knew his way around. Nevertheless, it wasn't hard to find the room number that Doripalam had given him. There were officers dotted throughout the lobby and by the elevators, discreetly deflecting guests to ensure they didn't approach the crime scene accidentally. They nodded to him as he passed.

The bedroom also had an officer stationed outside. Nergui was glad they were doing this by the book, but hoped that the police presence didn't itself stir up concerns. Still, the hotel had more than its share of high profile visitors from overseas. Probably the other guests would simply assume that some international celebrity was among them.

Doripalam waved him in. The room was impressive, Nergui thought, and compared favorably with those he had seen on his travels in Europe and the US. In other circumstances, he would have thought it luxurious, with its wooden paneling and plush king-size twin beds. As it was, his attention was entirely dominated by what lay on the nearest of those beds.

For all his experience, Nergui almost found himself gagging. The rich smell of blood was overwhelming, even though the scene of crime officers had thrown open the windows in an
attempt to render the atmosphere of the room bearable. The two officers had stationed themselves, understandably enough, by the open window.

The white cotton sheets of the bed were thoroughly soaked with blood, and there were further splashes on the carpet and pale walls. The blood was beginning to turn from red to brown, but clearly the killing was relatively recent. The chambermaid had discovered the body when entering to clean the room in the midmorning. Nergui thought that she could never have imagined how much her cleaning skills might be required, though he guessed she wouldn't willingly be back in this room for a long time.

The body was spread-eagled on the bed, dressed in blood-caked cotton striped pajamas. Nergui would have described the body as lying face up, except that the face was definitely not looking upward. The head had been severed from the body, but this time had not been removed from the scene. Instead it had been placed neatly on top of the television set, gazing impassively at its former owner on the bed.

Nergui opened his mouth but could think of nothing to say. Doripalam and the other officers stood silently, looking almost smug that for once there was a sight that had rendered the legendary Nergui speechless.

In fact, Nergui had been struck by two overwhelming thoughts almost simultaneously. The first had been sheer mindless horror at the enormity of the sight that lay before him. The second was to realize that the mutilated figure before him was a Westerner.

What, he thought before he could stop himself, would the Minister have to say about this?

“I'm impressed,” Drew said. “This is excellent. A lot better than most of the hotels I get to stay in.”

Nergui gestured him to sit down. “I hope beer's okay. We still have good contacts with Eastern Europe, so can get some decent stuff.” He lifted the glass and gazed thoughtfully at the contents. “Czech. They know how to make beer.”

“Beer's perfect,” Drew said, with complete sincerity. His early morning departure from Manchester seemed a lifetime away, and the long and fragmented journey had only compounded his sense of disorientation. And now, in a country where half the population lived in tents, he was drinking beer in the kind of anonymous hotel bar that might be found in any capital city in the world. Soft piped music was playing in the background, a piano version of some pop tune that Drew half-recognized.

“Your room is okay?”

“Fine,” Drew said. “Excellent.”

Nergui nodded. “I should not say this, perhaps. But your room is very similar to the one where—well, where we found the body.”

Drew nodded slowly, unsure how to respond. It was difficult to imagine the plush bedroom despoiled by the scene he had read about. He looked at Nergui, sitting magisterially in the corner of the hotel bar, and wondered how seriously he should take him. He was an impressive figure, heavyset and tall by Mongolian standards, with a stillness and physical presence that somehow enabled him to dominate the room. His even
features were distinctively Mongolian, wide-eyed and broad cheeked, his clean-shaven skin dark and almost leathery, as though it had been burnished by the sun and wind of the desert. His dress was mildly eccentric—a plain, dark, good quality suit contrasting with a shirt and tie both in what Drew supposed was salmon pink. But it would not be difficult, Drew thought, to imagine him, centuries before, riding out as a member of Genghis Khan's armies, leading the conquest of the known world.

Nergui's bright blue eyes watched Drew intently, his blank face giving no clue to his thoughts or feelings. Doripalam sat beside him, a slighter and paler figure, toying aimlessly with a menu from the table, apparently disengaged from the conversation.

“I'm sorry,” Drew said. “Is it okay if we speak in English?”

Doripalam glanced up, smiling faintly, brushing his thick hair back from his forehead. He had the same wide-eyed features, but on this young face the effect was of openness and eagerness, perhaps even naivety. “We will teach you some Mongolian while you are here,” he said. “My English is not so good as Nergui's but if you speak slowly I can follow.”

“I can translate for Doripalam if we need to,” Nergui said. “But he is too modest. His English is really very good. More and more of us are trying to learn, since it seems now to be the international language.” He turned to Doripalam. “We should tell Drew what we know so far about our fourth victim.”

“Well,” Doripalam said, “as you know, his name was Ian Ransom. He was a geologist in the mining industry, with a contract with one of our mining consortia. He had been in the country before, on two occasions I think, working on contracts. We spoke to the company involved. They say he was an excellent employee—a specialist in his field, a hard worker, all of that. But we see no motive for the killing. He was not robbed—there was a wallet with currency and credit cards in his jacket in the wardrobe.”

“What about the work he was engaged in?” Drew said. “Any possible motive there?”

Nergui shrugged. “Mining is a difficult industry here. Rapid growth. Lots of money to be made. New players coming into it all the time. Massive foreign investment, not all of it particularly legitimate. We're a mineral rich country and everyone would like a slice of it. So, yes, it's possible. But we can see no real evidence in this case. Ransom was a specialist, a scientist. He wasn't senior enough to get involved in anything risky, I would have thought.” He took a mouthful of his beer. “But we're keeping an open mind.”

“There's not a lot I can add,” Drew said. “We looked at Ransom's domestic circumstances, in case that shed any light. He was divorced, two children—two girls who live with his wife, who's remarried. He lived in Greater Manchester—decent house, decent area so presumably did all right financially. He seemed to have lived alone and, as far as we know, wasn't in any kind of relationship, maybe because he traveled so much. He had a doctorate in geology, and started his career after university with British Coal—that was our state mining industry, now largely closed down—”

“Ah. Your Mrs. Thatcher,” Nergui said.

“Our Mrs. Thatcher,” Drew agreed. “Ransom took early retirement from British Coal about fifteen years ago, and has worked as a consultant since then, largely overseas. Worked in India, Australia, South Africa, China and, of course, here. Seems to have been a bit of a loner.”

“But nothing there that would provide a motive?” Nergui said.

“Not that we can see. I suppose when someone travels like that there's always the possibility that they might have got involved in something dodgy—”

“Dodgy?” Nergui asked. It was the first time he had shown any uncertainty in following Drew's English.

Drew laughed. “Dodgy. Um—dubious, criminal. That kind of thing.”

“Ah,” Nergui said. “I understand. Dodgy,” he repeated slowly, as though committing the word to memory.

“So, yes, it's possible. But there's no evidence of it. He didn't seem to be living above his means, for example, so there's no sign of him having an income from another source.”

Nergui nodded slowly. “So we both seem to have arrived at the same conclusion,” he said. “It's quite possible that there's no significance at all in Mr. Ransom's unfortunate involvement in this.”

“You mean he was just selected at random?”

“Well, of course that is possible. If we really are dealing with a psychopath here, then it may be that the killings are simply opportunist. Perhaps the killer just spotted Ransom in the street. He would have—how do you say it?—stood out in the crowd here.”

“He certainly would,” Drew said. It was an unnerving thought, given that his own Caucasian features would presumably draw the same attention. He looked around the bar. Four men, all Mongolians, dressed in Western-style business suits, had come in and were drinking beers at the far end of the room. One of them glanced over and smiled vaguely in Drew's direction. Drew looked down at his beer, feeling inexplicably vulnerable.

The restaurant maintained the standard of the rest of the hotel. The food was nothing special, but certainly comparable with that provided by most business hotels in Europe. The atmosphere was pleasant enough—dark wood, dim lights, pleasant service, even a cocktail pianist meandering through a selection of familiar melodies. Nergui remained an entirely charming host, advising on the food, suggesting they stick with beer rather than moving on to the mediocre and highly priced wine list. “It's your choice,” he said. “But the beer is better.”

In other circumstances, Drew would have found the experience thoroughly enjoyable. Here, though, it was impossible to ignore the looming presence of the killer. Drew looked uneasily around the busy restaurant, with its chattering mix of locals and
Westerners, and hoped that the presence was only metaphorical. He couldn't understand why he felt so rattled—after all, in his time he had strolled willingly, if not always comfortably, around some of the rougher parts of inner city Manchester. It was odd to feel this level of discomfort in an upmarket hotel dining room.

Nergui carefully dissected his prawn starter. “I suppose that is the place we have to start—whether there is any significance in Ransom being the victim.” He shook his head. “If he was simply chosen at random, then our difficulty is even greater.”