‘Hope you aren’t going to arrest me for being in possession of a vicious animal.’
Wesley had heard it all before, the jibes against his chosen
profession. And over the years he had learned to ignore it. Della still lived back in a time when all police were ‘pigs’
and agents of an oppressive state. He’d given up trying to convince her of his good intentions long ago.
She sat down on the sofa, spreading out her ankle-length black skirt. She still wore her greying hair long, a couple of starry
hair slides holding it back from a high-cheekboned face lined from years of smoking and too much wine.
It had taken Wesley a while to get used to Della; his own parents, who had travelled to London from Trinidad to study medicine,
were upright, churchgoing people, concerned with the importance of education and establishing themselves amongst the professional
middle class of their adopted country. In contrast, the feckless Della brought chaos in her wake and possessed an unpredictable
quality that still made him slightly uncomfortable. Fortunately Pam had inherited the temperament of her conventional and
long-suffering late father: she certainly wasn’t her mother’s daughter.
Della bent down and released the kitten from its basket. It was jet-black and elegant for its age and before it could begin
an inspection of its new surroundings, Amelia picked it up and held it to her cheek while her brother tried to pat any visible
patch of fur. The kitten didn’t seem to mind the attention in the least. In fact it began to purr, a loud noise for such a
tiny scrap of life.
‘What shall we call it?’ Pam asked, trying to bring some order to the proceedings.
‘Kitty,’ Amelia shouted, frightening the little creature which leapt from her arms and disappeared under the sideboard.
‘The Egyptian cat goddess is called Bastet,’ said Michael earnestly.
‘Sounds a bit rude,’ Pam muttered under her breath.
‘We’ve got plenty of time to decide,’ said Wesley, retrieving the kitten from its refuge. As he stroked its head, the volume
of the purring increased until it sounded like a small motorbike engine idling outside in the street.
Hospitals have many places to hide at night. Unused consulting rooms; store cupboards; curtains pulled around an empty bed.
But Clare Mayers’s attacker opted for a bolder approach. After discarding a heavy coat in an empty side ward, the attacker
grabbed a stethoscope left on a trolley by some careless medic and walked confidently along the corridor without attracting
a second glance from passers-by.
However, after peeping through the window into the room where Clare Mayers slept and seeing a young black nurse standing by
the bed, writing furiously on a clipboard, the attacker continued down the corridor before marching purposefully back. But
the nurse was still there, sitting in the chair by the bed as though she was settled there for the night. The attacker wondered
whether to wait. The nurse was bound to have to see to another patient or answer a call of nature sooner or later.
Then a uniformed policeman strolled slowly down the corridor, paying the attacker no attention. The policeman knocked at Clare’s
door, said a few whispered words to the nurse and stepped inside.
The silencing of Clare Mayers would keep for another time.
Edward was a lively boy and, as a new teacher with little knowledge of the young, I found his exuberance difficult at times.
He loved his father’s collection and would delight in reciting the more gruesome customs of that ancient civilisation. Edward
was very keen to tell me that the brains of the dead were removed by a hook inserted up a nostril and that the internal organs
were removed and stored in Canopic jars. I felt that perhaps this wasn’t altogether a suitable subject for so young a boy
but it seemed that his father had furnished him with the information so I was in no position to chastise him for his precocity.
Victoria, in contrast, was a quiet child who would lay her dolls in little coffins her father had ordered the estate carpenter
to make for her. She would then conduct funeral rites of her own devising, often based on those of the Egyptians. I felt that
those children, exposed as they were to their father’s collection of mummies and grave goods, were perhaps developing an unhealthy
obsession with death. However, as Sir Frederick’s paid employee, I felt I could raise no objections. Besides, I myself found
those things fascinating so how could I deny that rich area of knowledge to young minds?
I had little to do with the servants although when I encountered Walter Hungate in the grounds on one occasion, he chided
me for allowing the children to follow unchristian ways and for omitting to take them to church on Sundays. I merely smiled
and stated that Hungate could think what he wished. I answered only to Sir Frederick.
On another occasion I found Hungate drunk one evening by the kitchen garden. He seized my arm but as I shook off his hand
he put his face close to mine. I could smell ale on his stale breath but it was his words that most disturbed me.
He said he’d seen him walking. A creature with the head of a dog and the body of a man. A Jackal Man.
Neil Watson had promised to visit Varley Castle again that morning. But before he set out from his Exeter flat he searched
the pocket of his jacket for the number of the expert from the British Museum who’d contacted Caroline Varley. When he found
the crumpled scrap of paper he flattened it out and dialled the number on his mobile phone.
Dr Andrew Beredace answered after two rings and when Neil explained the reason for his call, Beredace sounded excited, like
a child promised a thrilling birthday treat. Barely able to contain his enthusiasm, he’d said he’d drive down to Devon as
soon as he could get away from the meeting he had to attend that morning. He’d ring the castle when he knew what time he’d
be able to make it. Neil wanted to be fully prepared for his arrival so he called into his office and told his colleagues
to hold the fort at the Unit until he got back. Suddenly the more glamorous and mysterious world of Egyptology seemed more
alluring than a
desk-based archaeological assessment of some muddy Devon field earmarked for new housing.
It began to rain as he drove over Dartmoor, a fine misty drizzle that blurred the greens and greys of the landscape. When
he reached the castle Caroline looked pleased to see him and offered him coffee. He imagined that it was lonely for her in
that great, grim house and he told himself that she probably enjoyed the company. He was reluctant to acknowledge the frisson
of attraction he felt: over the years he’d been in too many disastrous relationships to hurtle headlong into anything sexual.
After telling her about Dr Beredace’s imminent arrival, he followed her into the kitchen and sat on a bench by the long wooden
table in the centre of the room while she stood by the boiling kettle, heaping instant coffee into mugs. Water dripped from
somewhere into a brace of plastic buckets on the floor. Caroline saw him looking at them.
‘Sorry about the water features. You’ll find them scattered all over the house, especially upstairs. The kitchen’s lost a
few roof tiles over the years and if you will build a place like this in the bleakest part of Dartmoor …’ She shrugged
her shoulders and began to make the coffee.
Suddenly Neil’s mind registered the fact that there were three mugs on the worktop. ‘Who’s the extra mug for?’ he asked, trying
his best to sound casual.
‘Robert – the biographer I told you about yesterday.’
Neil nodded. He had almost forgotten about the unseen Robert Delaware.
‘He’s up in the library. I’ll introduce you.’
He took the tray from her hands, playing the gentleman, avoiding the buckets on the floor.
There seemed to be a lot of stairs between the kitchen and
the library and Neil couldn’t help sympathising with all those servants of the past who had had to trudge up and down them
every day, obeying the whims of the Varley family who paid their wages and ordered their lives. Pickle, it seemed, could buy
a man a lot of power.
They arrived in the library where an array of table lamps shed pools of golden light on the polished wood furniture and floor.
A fire blazed in the grate and, in spite of its grand dimensions and the grey granite walls, the room looked positively cosy.
The man sitting on the sofa near the fireplace stood up as they entered. He was in his thirties, well-built without being
fat, with dark hair and a well-scrubbed face. He wore a pale blue V-necked pullover with a pair of beige casual trousers and
he looked the clubbable type, sporty without overdoing the exercise. Neil could have mistaken him for an escapee from a local
golf club. The last thing he looked like was a writer.
He fixed a smile to his face and held out his hand. ‘Robert Delaware. I’m working on a biography of Sir Frederick Varley.
So Caro’s called you in to have a look at the great man’s collection?’
‘I’m just having a preliminary look. I’ve contacted an expert from the British Museum and he’s due to arrive later.’ Neil
noted the shortened form of Caroline’s name and wondered how close the pair had become. ‘How long have you been working on
the biography?’ he asked politely, hoping the answer might give him a clue.
‘Only about a month. Caro’s late uncle wasn’t very happy with the idea. But as soon as Caro took over at the helm as it were
…’ He didn’t finish the sentence but the smug expression on his face suggested to Neil that Caroline was being more than
co-operative.
He glanced at Caroline who was warming her feet by the fire, holding her mug in both hands and staring into it as though she
expected the brown liquid to provide an answer to some long-pondered question.
‘Found anything interesting?’ he asked, nodding towards the heap of old papers on the occasional table beside the sofa where
Delaware was sitting.
‘Oh yes. There’s fascinating stuff amongst the family papers. I found all the notes Sir Fred made during his trips to Egypt
stuffed in cupboards and there were boxes of letters in the muniment room downstairs. By the look of it nobody had touched
them since his death.’ He reached out and touched Caroline’s hand. She pulled hers away gently but firmly. ‘It’s going to
take months to go through it all and I can’t finalise my first draft until I’ve finished. Imagine me stating something as
fact then finding a letter that contradicts it. Wouldn’t do at all.’
‘I suppose not.’
‘There are some who wouldn’t be so scrupulous of course.’
Neil said nothing. If Delaware was being cautious about his primary sources, he guessed that it was because he didn’t want
to make a fool of himself by using duff information in his book. Or perhaps he just wanted an excuse to stay at the castle.
‘I heard about the tragedy … Sir Frederick’s son, John.’
Delaware’s expression suddenly became a little guarded, as though he didn’t like the way the conversation was going. ‘My book
will focus on Sir Fred’s achievements as an Egyptologist. From the pickle factory to the Valley of the Kings and all that.’
‘So John won’t get a mention?’
‘Probably in passing,’ he answered quickly. ‘Sir Frederick endured personal tragedy when his son committed suicide and all
that.’
‘What about the murders?’ Neil wasn’t sure why but he didn’t feel like letting the subject drop. ‘Caroline told me that four
women were murdered. Surely that warrants a mention.’
Delaware opened and closed his mouth but before he could answer, the phone on the table by the window began to ring. Caroline
rushed to answer it, as though she was relieved to escape. She returned a few moments later, holding the telephone out like
an offering.
‘It’s for you, Neil. Dr Beredace from the British Museum.’
As Neil took the instrument, Robert Delaware stood up, drained his coffee mug and left the room, giving Caroline a charming
and apologetic smile.
According to police records, Alan Jakes had been charged with sexually assaulting a woman he’d picked up in a nightclub ten
years ago. However, there’d been no conviction. It had been her word against his and for some reason the jury had believed
his version of events.
The phone on Wesley’s desk began to ring and he rushed over to answer it. It was Trish Walton on the other end of the line
and she sounded worried.
‘Clare Mayers is wide awake and she wants to discharge herself.’
‘Is she well enough?’
‘I wouldn’t have thought so.’
‘I’ll come straight over.’ Wesley put the phone down, wondering why he’d been so hasty. If the girl had made up her mind to
leave hospital there was nothing he could do. But he couldn’t help feeling that she was safer there in the
hospital than back at home. Especially if it had been her mother’s ex, Alan Jakes, who had attempted to strangle the life
out of her.
As he made his way out of the CID office Gerry Heffernan was on his way in. He looked harassed – late as usual – and when
Wesley told him where he was going the DCI just muttered ‘silly girl’ before explaining that he was in a hurry: the DS from
Neston who was dealing with the January assault enquiry was coming to see him in ten minutes to compare notes.
Wesley left the heated police station and walked in the cold drizzle to the hospital nearby where Trish was waiting for him,
pacing up and down the corridor outside Clare’s room.
‘The doctor’s in there with her now. Let’s hope she can talk some sense into her.’ Trish looked anxious, as though she was
getting too involved.
‘There’s nothing we can do if she’s made up her mind, Trish. We can only advise her to stay put.’
The door opened and a young woman doctor came out. As she swept off down the corridor, Wesley could tell by the look on her
face that she’d been trying to talk some sense into Clare and failed. Wesley gave a token knock and entered the room, Trish
hovering behind him.
‘Hello, Clare. I hear you want to go home?’
‘Can’t stand hospitals,’ she said in a coarse, barely audible whisper. Her hand went up to her bandaged throat.
‘Neither can I but it’s really the best place to be at the moment.’
‘I’m fine,’ she croaked weakly.
‘Is your mother picking you up?’
She shook her head slowly as though the effort was agony.
‘I’m getting a taxi.’ She winced as she sat up and tried to loosen the bandage around her neck.
‘Painful?’
She didn’t answer.
‘You’re safer here, you know. But I expect the doctor’s told you that already.’ When he got no reaction he carried on. Now
he was there and she was alert, he thought he might as well ask a few pertinent questions. He sat down on the visitor’s chair
and glanced at Trish who was standing at the end of the bed with a benign expression on her face like an actress trying to
play the part of Florence Nightingale.
‘Alan Jakes was at the Anglers’ Arms the night you were attacked. I take it you saw him?’
She gave a feeble nod.
‘Did you speak to him?’
With a great effort she cleared her throat. ‘He just said hi. That’s all.’
‘Did he have a car?’
‘He has different cars all the time. He works in a garage.’
‘Do you think he could have seen you leave and followed you down the lane in his car?’
There were tears in Clare’s eyes now. The question had upset her for some reason. ‘No … I don’t know. But whoever it was
had a dog’s head. He was wearing a dog’s head. I want to get dressed. I want to go now.’
‘Do you mean a mask … like a cartoon dog? The Disney dog maybe? What’s his name? Goofy is it?’
She shook her head and gasped with the pain.
‘No, it wasn’t like that. It was a head … with pointed ears. I want to go home.’
She flopped back on her pillows, exhausted. Trish caught Wesley’s eye and gave a small shake of her head. It was
useless. The girl was going home whether they liked it or not. And she was sticking to her story.
Suddenly Wesley wanted to speak to Alan Jakes more than anything else in the world.
It seemed that Alan Jakes had vanished into thin air. None of his workmates or known associates had seen him since the weekend.
Which, for Gerry Heffernan, rather seemed to suggest guilt. Clare’s story about the dog-headed man might well have been concocted
to throw them off the scent. Jakes wouldn’t have been the first man to become entangled with his lover’s teenage daughter
and he probably wouldn’t be the last.
When Wesley returned to the incident room he found Gerry in his office, swivelling to and fro on his black leather executive
chair, reading a lab report. When he heard Wesley enter he looked up.
‘There’s something odd about this case, Wes. I don’t think it’s a straightforward sex attack. After all, the girl wasn’t interfered
with, was she? He just tried to strangle her – nothing else.’
‘He didn’t have time to do anything else, Gerry. Danny Coyle came along in his van and disturbed him.’
‘The popular theory of the moment seems to be that this Neston attacker’s changed his MO. Maybe he intended to assault her
when she was unconscious, then kill her.’
Wesley shrugged his shoulders. ‘Maybe. They say that sex attackers have to up the stakes all the time to get the same thrill.
But in this case don’t you think the change is rather …’ He searched for the right word. ‘Drastic. He went from a quick
fumble to calculated attempted murder. If it was the same man, surely there would have been something in between.’
Gerry looked up. ‘Who needs criminal psychologists when they’ve got you? Anyway I’ve had people out asking all the known sex
offenders in the area where they were on the night in question. They’ve all got alibis and there are only two dodgy ones –
a kiddy fiddler who lives alone, hence no witnesses, but I don’t think this is his style at all. Then there’s a character
with two rape convictions who lives with a mother who’ll swear black was white for her nasty little darling.’
Wesley raised his eyebrows. ‘Is he a possibility?’
‘He would be if he hadn’t broken his leg last week falling off a ladder. Who says there’s no justice in this world? Then there’s
Alan Jakes – I reckon he’s our number one at the moment. I take it someone keeps trying his address?’
‘Oh yes, but there’s still nobody home. Karen Mayers gave us his sister’s address in Dukesbridge but no luck there either.’
Wesley’s mobile began to ring. He muttered an apology to Gerry and pressed the key that would stop the tinny rendition of
Eine Kleine Nachtmusik
.
After a brief conversation he ended the call. ‘That was Ian Petrie, my old colleague from the Met. He says he’s got some information.
If I go now, I’ll only be half an hour.’
Gerry frowned and looked at his watch. ‘Go on, then. Assure him of our co-operation … providing it only takes ten minutes.
Tell you what, while you’re out will you get me a pasty? I just fancy one.’ He patted his large stomach. Since his lady friend,
Joyce, had gone off to stay with her recently widowed sister, his noble attempt at healthy eating had been abandoned, confirming
Wesley’s suspicion that it had been rather half hearted in the first place.
‘Large or small?’
Gerry gave a wicked grin. ‘Large. I’m a growing lad.’