As DS Brook arrived at Ravenscourt Gardens, the hottest day of the year was drawing to a close. The temperature, up in the low thirties in the middle of the afternoon, had eased to a more comfortable 22 degrees, as the sun began to fall over the horizon.
If Brook had any doubts about the directions he’d been given, they were soon dispelled when he approached the street. The lights of three panda cars flashed at the end of the road, intersecting with Ravenscourt Park.
Brook pulled up to the melee and stepped from his car. After a brief conversation with one of the constables, Brook followed him to the railing above a basement flat.
He descended the few steps to the litter-strewn yard and trained a torch onto what passed for a door. He took a step forward and skidded on the vomit of the young PC who had found the body. Uniformed arms grabbed to steady him.
‘Easy, sir,’ said a voice. It was a nasal voice, its owner pinching his nostrils to defeat the stench.
Brook wretched as the odour hit him but managed to stuff a handkerchief in his mouth and over his nose. From the entrance to the building came the stench of old putrefied meat. It mingled with, yet dominated the other smells–as royalty fraternised with lowly subjects–lording it over the damp cardboard, the sick, the dog shit and the urine.
‘You don’t have to go in there, sir. It’s not pretty. We think it’s a young girl. She…You should wait for the police surgeon.’
But Brook had to see. There was something he had to find out. He had to know if Charlie Rowlands had been right about Harlesden. Had Brook lost all feeling, all sense of the suffering of others? Was he out of reach at twenty-seven? He had to see.
‘Just a quick look, Constable. While it’s fresh.’ He caught the ironic grin of the PC and pulled back the warped hard-board that doubled as a door, then shone in the torch. A rustling was taken up inside. Brook puzzled for a second, assumed it was the wind, and squeezed his slender frame through the gap and under the police tape. More rustling–early autumn leaves caught in the draught from a broken window perhaps.
He took his first step into the chamber. The smell was worse now and Brook clamped his nose tighter. He made his way carefully towards the interior room, picking his feet over various lumps of indistinct detritus. A scurrying in the corner wheeled him round and his light fell on a whiplash tail. Rats. Brook grimaced. He agreed with Winston Smith. He hated rats.
But he thought of Harlesden, imagined Amy beside him, as he had several times since, looking on as he examined the boy, watching him as he strolled from place to place, unconcerned, stroking his chin in contemplation and smiling when a theory suggested itself. What would Amy think of him? What kind of monster was he? He had to press on, prove to himself he could still be affected. Prove it for her sake.
A moment later he was at the entrance to the murder room. He lifted the light from his feet and swept it round the space.
Brook was surprised. Even in this squalor, efforts had been made to create a homely atmosphere. Off in one corner was a tiny, one-ring stove, a screw-in gas canister still attached. A small pan sat on top. Behind the stove there were a few unopened tins. It was quite orderly.
An old pair of curtains hung across the window and a few sticks of furniture, rescued from skips, were arranged around the room. A house-proud squatter–was there anything sadder than this self-delusion? The victim had tried to create a sanctuary, a place away from confusion, impose a pattern, a personality on her environment. Pathetic really.
Brook knew then this girl was not from London. He knew because he’d had the same reaction when he first arrived from Barnsley. Fearing the encroachment of others in this massive city, his first instinct was to construct boundaries. So Brook had bought the poky flat in Fulham to have a place to shut himself off, barricade his thoughts from all the distractions, all the invitations to self-destruction. It was the only way to survive in such a place.
But the attempts at civilisation only threw the spectacle on the mattress into sharper relief. Having taken in the periphery, Brook finally moved his torch to illuminate the corpse then span away, his gorge rising at what he saw. But he didn’t puke. His heart thumped and his mouth cracked with sudden dehydration but he didn’t puke.
After a few seconds to compose his nerves, he knew he had to look again. He opened his watering eyes and took quick urgent breaths. He tried to keep the smell out but flimsy linen was no match for such perfume.
He turned again to the face of the girl, inclined towards him, head slightly raised by the makeshift pillow on her deathbed. Her eyes were gone or at least invisible in the blackened sunken orbs where they once belonged–eaten away by bacteria, maggots and rats. The hair had survived though, short and blonde with red highlights, as did that part of the ear adorned with indigestible studs. Some of the nose was also intact, some flesh still clinging to the cartilage.
There wasn’t enough left to show Brook that this had been a pretty girl, but the teeth confirmed she was young. They were clean and straight, no absentees even at the back of the jaw.
Brook took a step nearer but hesitated. That fluttering sound again, this time emanating from near the body. It was the same noise he had dismissed as the wind a moment before, louder now, and clearly made by some corporeal creature.
Brook noticed a pile of tattered clothes by the bed that the girl had removed or had removed for her. Perhaps some animal had made its home there. He peered at what looked like a shirt and a sweater. They weren’t scattered and torn but dropped into a pile implying that the girl was able to take them off on her own. Whether this was under duress or not, Brook couldn’t say.
He moved the light down. The shard of a beer bottle protruded from the girl’s throat at a right angle. Marks showed where several attempts had been made by the killer to force it in. He’d finally succeeded to such a degree that the neck of the bottle was nearly level with her chin.
A pair of grimy panties dangled from the bottle. The killer’s final act had been to wipe off his prints with them. Such presence of mind would guarantee Life if they ever caught him. If.
The fluttering again. Brook swung his torch sharply onto the pile of clothes. Nothing. No movement. Perhaps he was imagining it.
He continued his appraisal but the noise returned. He looked around now for something to work with. He found a stick and crept closer to the body and the pile of clothes. He had to put his handkerchief away to have two hands free but the smell wasn’t as bad. He’d acclimatised.
He took the stick and, holding the torch in front of him, gingerly stabbed at the material. Nothing.
He stepped back, troubled. He turned to the body and moved his light over the lower half of the girl’s torso. The knees were together and the legs were raised into the foetal position, presumably in a futile gesture of self-defence. Brook imagined a noise behind the girl and guessed there could be something nestling in the mattress.
He moved round and shone the light on the girl’s legs. Immediately the noise increased. It was the sound of animals panicking and though he tried to withdraw the light, the damage was done. A flurry of activity drew his attention and he saw something furry and quick move under the girl. As it did so, her right leg, which had been locked into the rigor mortis of sexual prurience, swung away from its neighbour.
A dozen wary eyes returned Brook’s horrified gape but wouldn’t be deflected from their meal. The rats were big, bigger than when they’d started their meal. But they were still hungry.
Brook was appalled. Appalled at this desecration, yes, but more by the attention the rats were suddenly paying him. He wanted to run but was frozen, unable to break away from the feeding rodents, cloaked in blackened viscera. He couldn’t move, he dare not move and to point the beam elsewhere would mean not knowing, not being sure where the rats were. Would they continue to gnaw at the humiliated corpse or transfer their interest to him?
Hours passed in a few seconds. Still Brook was rooted. After what seemed an age, the rats seemed to lose interest in Brook as they became accustomed to the beam. They liked its unexpected warmth and bathed in it. And they became blasé about the threat posed by Brook.
One by one they returned to their business, no longer munching with their eyes darting at him, but ignoring him so completely that Brook decided it was time to take his chance.
He reversed through the doorway into the outer room, still not daring to turn the beam onto his exit. Nearly there now. He was being an idiot. Rats didn’t attack human beings unless they were stricken in some way, and then only in the most extreme circumstances. It would be like a shoal of mackerel having a go at a shark.
Finally Brook came to a halt. He couldn’t look any longer at the girl. The more he’d drawn away, the more he could see the bigger picture. This girl had died. Here in this hell. And what was left, what her parents would want, would need to take away for proper grieving, was being defiled by these monsters.
A panic washed over him and his breath seemed to be rushing from his body. He had to get out. He turned and fixed his torch on the entrance but as he did so he heard a terrible screeching from the direction of the girl. He wheeled round and caught the full horror of the rats tearing out of the torso towards him.
He dropped the torch, hoping that was all they wanted, and ran. He ran for all he was worth, no longer caring what he stepped in or kicked over. To be outside, in the clean night air, was all Brook wanted from life now.
Nearly there. He was quicker even than the filthy animals. But as he got to the entrance, to his horror he found his way barred. He’d gone the wrong way. Or something had fallen across the makeshift door and Brook was unable to shift it. He tried again but it wouldn’t budge. He was trapped.
Brook span round in terror to see the pack of slick-haired rodents teeming past the rocking beam of his torch towards him. Then he couldn’t see them, he could only hear the scratch of their claws on the concrete, tearing closer and closer. He tried to speak but could make no noise save for a gentle whimper of despair.
Brook pushed against the wall and braced himself. All he could do was look to the ceiling, try to block out what was happening. Then maybe he could protect his face, his eyes.
The first one was on him, then another and another. He screamed and kicked out wildly, but it was no use. They were on his trousers, ripping at the material. Then one was on his ankle, his sock. It must have smelt the fetid gust of heat wafting down Brook’s leg because it squirmed into the narrow opening of his trouser leg and began hauling itself up towards his crotch, slicing through his flesh as it went.
Brook put his arms to his thigh to prevent access but realised that he was being driven nearer the ground so he stood up straight. If he went to ground he was done for.
But the rat was in his pants now–Brook could feel its snout nuzzling away at the gusset.
And then the pain. Pain like he’d never felt before. Searing, blinding. ‘Please get them off me, get them off me, get them off me.’
‘Get them off me!’ DS Brook woke with a start and took a deep breath. His face was drenched with sweat, his hands clammy. The drone of police chatter on the radio brought him back and he sat up to open the window and adjust the driver’s seat. The cold night air revived him. He drained his Styrofoam coffee, now cold, and began breathing normally again.
Soon he was flipping his notepad open and shut to stave off boredom. He knew all the tricks to enrich his life.
He glanced at the crossword on the passenger seat but decided against it. His brain was overheated enough. Instead he closed his eyes to ease the sting of too little sleep.
His shift had finished hours ago. He could have been at home now, with his family, arm round his wife, enjoying a spot of synchronised gaping at their brand new daughter, a small pink parcel of helplessness and need, the better part of him poured into that vulnerable vessel.
Brook thought of baby Theresa and smiled briefly. But then he saw the Maples girl. Her empty eye sockets glared at him. Black holes that pulled in all Brook’s happy thoughts, all his hope for the future.
He remembered her face, a contortion of pain, that strange grin of pleasure that sudden death can bestow on lifeless features. But she wasn’t lifeless. There was movement…
Brook shuddered but kept his eyes shut tight. It was no use. He couldn’t separate them. He couldn’t think of little Theresa without the girl, Laura, intruding. Theresa, who came into the world as Laura was being butchered. They were the same in Brook’s mind. Indivisible. To Brook it was a rebirth, the girl had been reincarnated, savagely taken from the brutality of the world to start again as Brook’s daughter. But it was no second chance. Brook knew the world now. His daughter was doomed. Doomed to repeat the cycle of innocence corrupted. And it was all Brook’s fault. He’d brought another victim into this terrible world.
Brook wanted to open his eyes but the ache endured so he focused on the case. Forget little Theresa, think of The Reaper–Brook’s name for him. How to catch him? How to win?
The lure of detection calmed him, drew him away from those immobilising minefields of emotion and allowed him to go on.
The moisture too returned to soothe pupils that felt as if they’d had a vigorous rubdown with a harsh towel. A tapping on the window jolted him back.
‘It’s Sergeant Brook, isn’t it?’
The mocking tone irritated Brook. He wound down the window and contemplated Victor Sorenson’s expression of forced bonhomie. If anything his demeanour seemed even more triumphal than it was the last time they’d met.
‘What can I do for you, sir?’ Brook replied with just the right amount of feigned respect.
‘It’s an unpleasant evening. I thought you might like a drink. Unless, of course, you’re on a case.’
Brook looked back at his prey, sifting the pros and cons. His eyes were even more impenetrable at this late hour.
He had on the same clothes as their previous interview, or very like them, and clutched an umbrella in his bony hand to keep off the rain.
‘I’d be delighted,’ Brook beamed back, trying to ape the tone of phoney good manners. He stepped from the car and followed Sorenson’s meagre frame across the road and into the hall of his imposing home. The ivy dumped several large droplets of water down the back of Brook’s neck, causing a shiver as he crossed the threshold.
‘Don’t be afraid, Sergeant,’ grinned his host, catching the reflex. Brook smiled back and removed his raincoat, which Sorenson hung on a wrought-iron coat rack. He deposited the umbrella in the porch and closed the front door. All extraneous noise was now silenced and Brook could hear sombre melodic voices floating down from above.
‘Mozart’s Requiem. Do you know it?’
‘I’ve heard it.’
‘A fitting epitaph, wouldn’t you say? Please.’
Unlike their first meeting, lights burned brightly, so Brook stepped quickly ahead of Sorenson, meaning to take his time reaching the study. He needed to examine what he saw, try to get a better feel for his opponent. He got the impression Sorenson wanted the same thing. So Brook trudged carefully up the stairs, Sorenson fell in behind.
As they climbed, Brook tried to take everything in. He examined the decor of the hall as well as the pictures on the walls–muted colours, soft rich carpets, marble steps, old oak banisters, discreet lighting. Everything was supremely tasteful and orderly. The set designer had done a magnificent job.
One or two of the pictures seemed familiar and conformed to Brook’s evolving image of The Reaper and his obsessions.
‘Do you know this work?’ asked Sorenson, nodding at a large triptych framed in carved wood, at the top of the first flight.
‘The Garden of Earthly Delights by Hieronymus Bosch, isn’t it?’
‘Quite right, Sergeant.’
‘Don’t ask me how I know that,’ Brook added with a self-effacing expression.
‘Being a policeman, I suppose you’re bound to know it.’
‘Am I?’
‘Of course. Apart from lending his name to a selection of superior power tools, Bosch was obsessed by man’s inclination to sin, in spite of his fear of God’s punishment. And sin is your raison d’etre, is it not?’
He was being teased. But Brook was that rare breed, a copper who’d taken the time to think about his role. ‘Not at all. My concern is the law.’
‘Is there a difference?’
‘A huge one as I’m sure you know. I lock people up when they break the law. That’s my job. I don’t arrest a man for coveting his neighbour’s wife, or for being slothful, or proud, or vain.’ Brook gave his host a piercing look, which Sorenson greeted with an appreciative nod.
‘A good answer, Sergeant, though not quite correct. You lock people away after they’ve broken the law.’
Brook entered Sorenson’s study and sat down in the high-backed leather chair indicated to him. The embers of a coal fire glowered in the grate and Brook stretched his legs to allow small blue flames to nibble at his damp feet. ‘Don’t you ever question what use you are if you can only act in retrospect?’ Sorenson asked from the drinks cabinet, his back to Brook.
‘That’s a perennial frustration of police work, agreed. I suppose the best I can hope to achieve is the protection of the innocent from those who would steal from them or do them harm.’
‘But that can’t happen unless a crime has already been committed.’
‘True. But part of protecting the innocent is also seeing that they can’t be punished for something they haven’t done.’
‘A philosophy the guilty use to their advantage.’
‘Maybe. Nevertheless, arresting a killer, after the fact, can and does prevent further crimes.’
Sorenson turned and handed Brook a heavy glass containing a generous measure of the same whisky he’d had on his first visit. The name escaped Brook and he couldn’t make out the label. He took a sip and recalled the delicious smoke of his first tasting. For a second he speculated whether it might be poisoned and noted, with an amused twitch of the lip, his indifference to the prospect.
Sorenson sank into an identical chair opposite Brook and beamed at him. ‘Doubtless, that will be a great comfort to Mr Elphick and family.’
Brook’s answering smile was thin. He was in the home of a child killer, after all. ‘Unfortunately our after sales service seems to be more in-demand these days.’ Sorenson chuckled at this. ‘We can only hope to learn from what we see and be ready next time.’ The significance in Brook’s voice was not too clumsy.
‘You think there’ll be a next time? For this killer you seek? For this Reaper?’ Sorenson’s eyes answered his own half-hearted question. ‘I mean, it’s been a year now.’
‘I’m sure of it.’
‘And where do you think this killer might strike?’
‘Somewhere local. He’s not a young man.’
Sorenson chuckled again. ‘Isn’t he?’
Brook’s attempt to ruffle his opponent’s ego didn’t appear to have hit home. Perhaps Sorenson’s vanity applied only to his work.
There was a marked silence after that slingshot though it didn’t seem to be the result of any souring of the mood. Perhaps it was tactical, so Brook waited for his opponent to open the next door on their tussle.
When Sorenson did speak he had some difficulty phrasing what to say.
‘Do you ever dream, Sergeant?’
‘Dream?’ Brook shifted in his seat. This was a road down which he didn’t wish to turn. It was an odd question and one that provoked another. How could this man home in so accurately on Brook’s weak spots? It was unnerving. He became uneasy but tried not to show it. There was something about Sorenson that disturbed. It should’ve been his crimes but wasn’t–Brook had been unaffected by his handiwork. It was his mind, his thoughts, his questions, his probing. And what he said to Brook without speaking made even the silence between them seem like an interrogation. Sorenson was a man who could say more with his eyes than his mouth and when he did, when he looked at him with that mocking stare and amused superiority, Brook imagined himself being stripped bare and paraded for amusement, like some conquered chieftain through the avenues of Ancient Rome.
Those black eyes. They saw all. They had a power that enabled Sorenson to see through people. Through skin and bone and cartilage, right through to the essence of being. Several times Brook had experienced the feeling that events in his past, his feelings and even his soul were available to Sorenson for examination. Everything that made Brook tick, and more importantly, threatened to stop him ticking, was as accessible to Sorenson as a daily paper.
Again those eyes were doing their work. Boring into him. As they penetrated, Brook felt his whole life being downloaded, taken from him and placed on file in the brain of his opponent. If knowledge were power, Brook was at Sorensons mercy.
But how would he use the information, the psychological insight? Would he use it? Did he just want to know Brook or was there another motive? What did Sorenson want from him apart from stimulating conversation? An audience for his vanity? Someone to manipulate? Certainly Brook had no fear that Sorenson meant him harm.
But what did he want? And how did he know about what came to Brook in dreams? If he did know. Perhaps he was guessing. Perhaps Sorenson had merely stumbled onto the thing that was eating away at Brook’s mind, taking his rest, threatening his sanity. Did he ever dream? Christ! Brook hadn’t stopped dreaming since finding the Maples girl.
‘I see that you do.’
Brook mulled it over, not knowing how to continue. ‘In my profession you see things…’
‘Of course.’ Sorenson made no attempt to prompt Brook further. He merely nodded sadly and gazed into the fire. Brook was wrong-footed by this sudden glimpse behind the curtain, a glimpse of affection for humanity, a glimpse of regret for Brook’s pain. He suddenly found himself willing to tell all but unable to articulate it. The moment passed but Sorenson wouldn’t be denied.
‘Tell me.’
Brook looked into the fire and remembered. It hadn’t been that long since they’d found her. Six months. Less maybe.
Brook hesitated then set off. Perhaps he could offload his burden onto someone who deserved it. ‘There was a girl. Laura Maples. She died a few months ago.’
‘Ah yes. Not far from here. I read about it. Ravenscourt Park. Who was she?’
‘Who was she?’ Brook was unprepared for the simplicity of the question. He spoke as though he hadn’t been thinking about it constantly. ‘She was nobody. A routine murder victim. Another street girl meets a sticky end.’
‘But she was more than that.’
‘She was a…No. To her parents perhaps.’ Brook stared blindly at the bright eyes and toothy grin of the schoolgirl smiling up at him from the fax tray–everything shiny and young. Her hair, her skin, her silver necklace with little hearts on it, strategically placed over her shirt and school tie to flag up her gentle rebellion.
‘She was seventeen when she arrived in London, and quite pretty in a fresh-faced kind of way. She’d left her comfortable, stifling existence in the country and headed for the golden paving stones of London. No reason. No family strife, no abusive father, no lack of love or prospects. It was just that, for some, that’s not enough. For some’–Brook managed not to add ‘of us’. Sorenson had enough psychological crowbars–‘the sheen of optimism, the embrace of life departs early.’
‘So she headed for a better life.’ Sorenson’s smile didn’t offend.
‘No. Just a shorter one. You know the story from here. She’s homeless, her money runs out, she ends up on the streets. She’s young and healthy, she can make good money. Only the street isn’t a shopping mall for the exchange of goods and services. It’s a jungle. She stands out a mile. It’s her first time.’
Brook stared into the fire, unable to blink. His eyes began to complain once more. ‘She’s picked up by a punter who goes back with her to her squat in Ravenscourt Park. She’s got an old mattress and a small camping stove and a few candles…’
Brook took a sip of his drink. ‘We can’t tell if he ever intended to pay but once they’re inside it becomes clear he doesn’t have to. He’s in a derelict house with a naïve girl. It has a piece of urine-soaked hardboard for a door. There’s nobody to stop him. Nobody.
‘And what can she do? This pretty, nervous girl with little idea of the rules. So he decides. Why pay when it’s more fun to take?’
‘He rapes her.’
‘Why not? He’s a strong man. She’s a powerless girl. It’s an old formula. But it doesn’t stop there. Maybe she’s crying, she gets upset and provokes him in some way, he’s hurt her, violated her, torn off the necklace she’s been wearing for years, a keepsake of his conquest. It cuts into her neck and she starts to scream.
‘Or maybe, finally having such power over someone, even this gauche, stupid girl a long way from home, awakens something in him.
‘He’s never had power before, he’s nothing, no-one respects him, no-one is in awe of him, no-one is aware he even exists. But this girl knows. She sees his power, fears it and he revels in it. He sees her fear and feels his power over her and it feels good. He wants more. He has the power. He feels it welling up inside him, the ultimate power over life and death. Suddenly he’s a god. He is God. He can choose. He has the power to transform her into something else: a lifeless monument to his power.’
Brook halted on that crescendo and took a moment before going on. ‘And so, that night, her insignificant life ends. There’s an old beer bottle on the floor. He breaks it and uses it. Gently does it. Don’t rush it. Feel the fear, her fear, feeding into him, leaving her weak, making him strong…’
Brook screwed his eyelids shut again, having forgotten to blink for a while–that, and the fire, has desiccated his eyes. If he keeps them closed perhaps he can imagine himself in the light and the warmth of an empty place–empty of all but Amy and little Theresa. And the girl Laura–shiny, full of life and hope.
‘And you haven’t caught him?’
‘No. And we won’t.’
‘How long was she there before you found her?’
Brook looked at his host. Bulls eye again.
‘At least a month, maybe six weeks. We found her in summer. The smell…’ Brook couldn’t hold Sorenson’s gaze. His mouth tightened around the rest of the story. Sorenson’s eyes probed, waiting. Waiting until Brook became uncomfortable, not long. He felt obligated to finish but couldn’t get past, ‘There were rats…I…’
‘I see.’ Sorenson nodded in contemplation but little evident sympathy. ‘And was your horror confined to your visceral disgust at what the rats had done to her soft young flesh?’
Brook blinked as though smelling salts had been administered. ‘Sorry?’
‘Yes, but for whom?’ Brook looked into the fire, seeking solace. Sorenson continued to bore into him. ‘Regrettable though the death of Laura Maples may be, the horror that you feel is not for her ordeal but the physical desecration inflicted post mortem. Am I right?’
‘Perhaps.’ Brook continued to gaze at the fire, aware of the mistake he’d made. Sorenson couldn’t be affected by anything Brook, or anyone else, had seen.
‘Surely the greatest pain or humiliation or mental torture has to be dispensed while still alive, while able to feel, to sense. The dead don’t suffer, my friend.’
Brook raised his eyes to engage Sorenson’s, fighting the triumphant smile beginning to crease his lips. Suddenly he was close. ‘Or cry.’
Sorenson smiled back, unperturbed at the excitement in Brook’s eyes. He looked away and nodded, then back at Brook. ‘Did you cry for Laura?’
Sorenson emitted a sharp laugh. Brook saw that his host was pleased with the reply. ‘And did you cry for Sammy Elphick?’
A pause. ‘No.’
‘Because there were no rats?’
‘Because he was nothing. A blight on the planet.’
‘But did that mean he deserved to die?’
‘No. But it means he won’t be missed.’
‘And the child, Sergeant?’
‘Who?’
‘Sammy Elphick’s son.’
‘What about him?’
‘Will he be missed? Did you cry for the future that was taken away from him?’
Brook was unsettled. Don’t answer.
‘Did you?’
Brook drained his glass and stood to fetch a refill sanctioned by a wave of his host’s hand. Sorenson remained unmoved as Brook poured and returned to his seat. Brook stared once more into the fire that was all but out. He took another long pull at his glass and gasped at the wrench on his throat.
He swirled the warm brown liquid around the glass and watched crystals dance against the dim glow of the ashes. Anything but look at Sorenson. Eventually he spoke, in a murmur he hoped would be difficult to distinguish but which instead seemed to echo around the room like a gunshot. ‘No.’
And there they sat. Hunter and hunted, in no particular order, occasionally drinking, rarely moving or even looking at each other. At one point, Sorenson revived the fire with some dry fibrous logs and the two busied themselves inspecting the progress of the flames. From time to time the dull cracking of the logs would turn to spitting and Sorenson would nimbly jump up to return a hot ember to its place.
The heat blazed now and began to scorch the right side of Brook’s face so he forced himself up to stroll around the study, inspecting books and paintings and record collections again. He looked back at Sorenson whose eyes had closed. His head remained upright, however, and Brook guessed that he wasn’t asleep. Perhaps he was being invited to leave–or provoked into some indiscretion.
He drained his glass and placed it carefully on a coaster on the writing desk and picked up a piece of blank A4 paper that had been folded and stood upright. On closer inspection he saw it was a home-made birthday card, indecipherable apart from the childish crayon sketch of someone who could be Sorenson.
‘From my nephew. Very talented, don’t you think?’
‘Nephew? Your brother’s son?’ Brook asked, remembering the photographs of Sorenson and his twin.
‘Not any more, Sergeant. My brother Stefan died.’ For once Sorenson was unable to meet Brook’s eyes for fear of revealing too much. The hurt was clear in his expression.
‘I’m sorry.’
‘Don’t be. It’s been two years. I’m over the worst. Losing a twin, they say, is like cutting off a limb. For once, they are not wrong. Twins are aware of each other from the moment they’re born. Did you know that? Fifty years with a different person who is in fact you. A person who knows what you know, feels what you feel, says what you were about to say. Fifty years.
And then nothing. No more. You’re alone. You stand by the bed and watch as your own being withers and dies. All that you took to be a reflection of yourself changes into a caricature of what you are and becomes a kind of sick celestial joke. No rats, Sergeant. Just cancer. Eaten, yes, but not post mortem. My brother, part of myself, eaten alive, from the inside, knowing it will not stop hurting, ever, until everything stops.
And, God, does it hurt. To see the agony in his eyes, fear cloaked by the lions smile, pierce you, beg you to help, to do something, to put a stop to it. Then when you don’t, when you can only stand and watch and shrug and smile back, see the look in the eyes turn to hate. Why me? Why not you? Do something. Are you enjoying this? Did you cause it? Do you want me to die? Help me!
‘That’s the worst thing I’ve seen, Sergeant. That’s what I dream about. You’re not leaving?’ This time it was a question suffused with human warmth, revealing a loneliness that mirrored Brook’s. It put Brook on his guard.
‘It’s late.’
‘Perhaps it is. I’ve enjoyed our talk. Thank you for coming.’ He rose to show Brook out. Brook watched him walk across the study to open the door. What a piece of work Sorenson was. Easy company. Brook was rarely at ease, even at home. Perhaps he was home.
‘My pleasure.’
‘You can see yourself out, I’m sure.’
‘Of course.’
Sorenson returned to his chair and this time slumped down in a manner guaranteed to show his fatigue. Brook wasn’t convinced. Was he really going to sleep or was this an invitation? After a moment’s thought he decided he couldn’t pass up such an opportunity.
‘Goodnight.’ Brook closed the study door behind him and clumped noisily down two flights to the front door. He opened and slammed it shut with exaggerated force.
For a few seconds he stood completely still, waiting, listening for the noise of the study door opening. When a moment later, nothing had registered he picked his coat from the rack and kicked off his shoes. He wrapped them in his coat and set off back to the first floor, all the while listening for movement from the floor above.
The first door he tried opened into a small room dominated by a large wooden chest with slim drawers, the kind used by artists and architects to store sketches and paintings. Brook flicked on the light and inspected a couple of drawers at random. They were full of neat sketches and plans separated by tissue paper and appeared to be designs for some kind of building. Notes on the designs were in a foreign language Brook assumed was Swedish. Sorenson was a dual national, Brook had discovered, and had moved to London from Stockholm in 1960 as part of his father’s chemical company expansion.
Brook extinguished the light and moved onto the next room. This time the door creaked slightly but after a moment’s panic on hearing footsteps from the study, Brook was relieved to hear the strains of music once more, followed by footsteps, presumably returning to the chair. He waited a moment longer.
No door opened but there was something–another noise, closer to home, in the room he had just entered–and the hairs on the back of Brook’s neck began to tingle. Somebody was whistling quietly, behind the door he’d just opened. Brook stiffened, assessed his alternatives, then realised what it was. The light was off. Somebody was sleeping.
He listened for a sign that he’d disturbed the occupant but the breathing remained regular and deep. Who was in there? Brook was sure from his skimpy file that Sorenson was a bachelor who lived alone. Then again the file wasn’t very up-to-date. But married? No. There was nothing in Sorenson’s manner or lifestyle to suggest that he’d recently found his soul mate.
Brook decided he had to risk a look. He inched his way further into the room and peered tentatively round the door clutching the bundle of coat and shoes in his moistening palms.
What he saw made him stand erect, relaxed, forsaking the tension of defensive readiness. A small nightlight softened the gloom and in its glow stood a bunk bed with two small children fast asleep, contorted into positions only young physiques can master.
The girl was on the bottom, her face turned to the light for comfort. Her eyes were screwed tight but her mouth lay open allowing its liquid contents to seep along her cheek and into the pillow. Her light brown hair was matted and she gripped a glassy-eyed teddy bear to her throat.
The top bunk was much darker and quieter than the girl’s. Brook fancied that its occupant was male but he couldn’t be sure. If he’d had a sister, he’d have bagged the top. The girl looked about five or six. He couldn’t see the boy but he looked smaller.
Brook felt the need to linger, to see that no harm came to them. He had no idea how long he watched the children sleep. He realised, when he thought about it later, that he had forgotten where he was for that moment in time, that he was in the house of a suspected child killer.
And as he gazed at the sleeping infants, Brook remembered that he himself was a father and for the first time the thought moved him. He had responsibilities now. And until he could get home to his own family, to protect and care for them, he felt the need to safeguard these surrogates.
Finally, he closed the door as softly as he could and crept back down to the ground floor. Either he’d misjudged Sorenson completely or he’d been set up. Was it possible that he was meant to see the children to shatter all the presumptions Brook held about Victor Sorenson–The Reaper?
Yes it was. But that still didn’t account for the fact that two young children, possibly his brother’s orphaned children, felt so safe in Sorenson’s midst, so able to abandon themselves to sleep, under his roof.
Even if it was a set-up, Brook knew one thing had changed in his perception of Sorenson. He didn’t hate children, not enough to kill without reason, at least. That had been the hardest thing to square away in Harlesden–the Elphick boy–and it was clear now that Sorenson hadn’t killed him out of some pathological loathing for young people–if he’d killed him at all. Brook began to harbour his first doubt.
He stood by the front entrance and contemplated his next move. The front door beckoned to him. He wanted to go home to his family. He wanted to fall into the arms of his wife and make everything right. He wanted to sneak with her into Theresa’s room and watch their new baby sleep, that foolish smile, exclusively patented for new parents, deforming his face.
Instead he stepped through the door that led off the main hall, snapped on the light and closed the door behind him. He was in a spacious living room, sparsely furnished. It wasn’t as cosy as the study and Brook guessed it was rarely used. What furniture there was seemed thrown together as though this room contained all that was left of the pieces that didn’t belong in other, more organised rooms.
There was an oddment of a suite. A winged chair, in a dark blue material, sat on one side of the cold black fire grate with a two-seater sofa, in faded brown suede, on the other. There was nothing on the walls but a large mirror over the fireplace flanked by a pair of ornate wall lights. The screen he’d seen from the road on his first visit guarded the lace-curtained bay window.
Brook was already retreating through the door and was about to switch off the light when he spotted something that made his heart leap. In a corner of the room, partially covered by curtains drawn across French windows, sat a pile of sturdy boxes.
Brook put down his bundle and scampered over to examine them. The delivery note on the top box revealed that the boxes had been dispatched nearly three months ago and yet, the seal on the boxes hadn’t been broken–a brand spanking new Compact Disc player, top of the range, and not even unpacked. The most expensive new technology not even opened or examined.
Brook’s eyes narrowed. He knew. It was time. Time for No. 2 and this was the Reaper’s entrance ticket. For video recorder to Harlesden, read Compact Disc player to the next family of victims.
Brook swung round at the sound of the door handle being turned. He looked feverishly for a hiding place. He didn’t dare slip behind the curtains for fear of them moving, opting instead to leap into an alcove, where he pushed himself back against the wall and held his breath. He closed his eyes briefly, then, recognising the absurdity, opened them at once.
He listened for the door opening but heard nothing. Then he saw and his heart fell into his socks.
Slowly, very slowly, and without a murmur, the door was swinging open. He saw it, frozen, in the mirror above the fireplace, which meant he could be seen in it, by whoever walked in.
Move, his nerve ends told him. Move. Slide down the wall, pull the curtain across your face, do something.
But he couldn’t move. He couldn’t wrench himself away. His eyes were locked on the door’s progress and he could do nothing but watch, his mouth dry, the moisture having fled to his brow which had erupted in beads of sweat.
Then it stopped. The door moved no further. It hadn’t swung open and he couldn’t be seen. But what was happening? Who was on the other side of the door? Was it Sorenson? What was he waiting for? Brook’s heart was about to implode. Still no movement. The door wasn’t opening, wasn’t closing. Why?
Brook couldn’t move. He couldn’t breathe. He could feel though, feel the springs of sweat, now galvanised into rivulets, cascading down his face. He’d had too much whisky.
The whisky? Perhaps it had been poisoned. Or drugged. His pores were trying to tell him something. He was in a bad way and if he didn’t pull himself round…
Brook made a vow at that moment. If he got out of this house with his job, his liberty and his life intact he was going to clean up his act. No more stalking, no more nights away from home. He’d get help. It wasn’t too late. He could still be a husband, a father.
With a sharp and unavoidable intake of air, which sounded like a passing steam train, Brook watched Sorenson’s bony talon reach through the aperture between door and wall and flick off the light. Brook was caressed by the darkness.
The bar of light stumbling in from the hall narrowed to a shard and Brook began to regain his senses. But a sliver of light remained and Brook could hear no sound of Sorenson moving off. Then again, he hadn’t heard him arrive either. The man’s footfall was non-existent.
Brook waited for what seemed an eternity before moving. When his lungs were functioning properly again he tiptoed to his coat and slipped on his shoes. He moved to the door and put his eye to the crack of light.
His every fibre screamed as he stared directly into Sorenson’s baleful eye and he leapt back from the door with the yelp of a startled puppy.
He reached out a hand to the light switch and flooded the room with light and grabbed the knob to pull open the door, swaying back slightly for safety’s sake.
There was nobody there. Nobody. No sound of someone on the stairs, hurtling through the house. All was quiet save the wheezing from Brook’s overworked lungs. He must have imagined it. A trick of the light. Or the product of his over-stimulated imagination. Whatever it was, Sorenson wasn’t there. He was in his study. Brook could just hear the comforting muffle of classical music. What was happening to him? He was losing it. He had to get out.
He slipped his coat back on and, in one bound, Brook was through the front door, closing it swiftly but with only a faint click. He ran to his car without looking back, not seeing the wind, if it was the wind, ripple at the curtains of Sorenson’s study window.
Only when Brook was hurtling through the deserted streets of Kensington did his equilibrium start to return. Finally he was able to slow the car to a more respectable speed. He began to feel again, began to be aware of things, sensations, noises. With a start, he looked down at his left hand and saw the delivery note from the unopened boxes lodged there, becoming smudged from the sweat of his palms.
At the next red light, he squinted at the document. With a sigh of pleasure, he found what he was looking for and nodded. The serial number of the CD player.
Brook forgot his promise. He was safe now. He didn’t need help any more, didn’t need to go home to his family. He had all the help he needed right there in his hand. ‘Gotcha!’