know, down there, and she just, like, faded away. And, and, it was like, electric. It was, like, power, coming to me. I could feel it, coming up my arm. Like, power.”
“I told you what it could be like. Now do you believe me?”
“I’ve always believed you, Tim. You’re so clever. And I love you.”
“And I love you.”
“When can we do it again?”
He propped himself up on his elbow. “I’m not sure,” he said. “Doing two in Heckley was clever. They weren’t expecting that. Now they’ll realise that they are up against someone special, if they’ve made the connection, yet. I’ll have to think about it.”
“When we do,” she began, “can we, do you think we could, you know, spend more time with…them?”
“With the target, you mean?”
“Yes.”
“I’ve been wondering about that myself. It’d be good, no doubt about it. Lift us on to another level. We’d have to bring them back here.”
“Would it be too dangerous?”
“No, not if we’re careful. Leave it to me. I have an idea, but it will mean some heavy work. And I’ve a couple of targets picked out already. I think you’ll like them.”
She wriggled her bottom against his loins to show her approval, and felt him harden. “I thought you were putting the music on,” he reminded her. She reached out and pressed the play button. After a few moments a simple rhythm filled the room, tapped out on a cowbell and soon joined by a bass guitar and keyboard. She turned to embrace him and he pulled the duvet over their heads as a thin, piping voice leaked from the speakers. “ This is the eye of the storm,” it sang. “Watch out for that needle, Son, ’cos this is the eye of the storm .”
One of the important pieces of information we lacked was the identity of the victim. They went through her pockets at the hospital without finding anything, and we did a torchlight search of the edge of the field where she’d been found, in case her handbag had been hurled over the wall. Negative. Dave phoned me with a brief description and said she was aged about twenty. Same as his daughter, Sophie, I thought, and wished I’d sent somebody else to the hospital.
I went back to the station to check the missing persons’ file, knowing it was a waste of time. My feet and shoulders were wet but the heating in the offices was off, so I found a portable fan heater that we’re not supposed to have and plugged it in. Gilbert Wood, my superintendent, arrived, shaking his head and making sympathetic noises, and I rang a few other people to tell them to be at the station early in the morning.
“What do you reckon, then?” Gilbert asked. “Is it another ?”
“It’s another murder,” I replied. “Whether it’s another murderer is a different question.” I’ve never understood the dread that people have that a series of deaths may be the work of the same person. Surely having one twisted hospital worker going round the wards turning off the oxygen is preferable to having a whole bunch of them who just do it once, for a kick? For the time being we’d treat this as a one-off , and do everything we could to find the perpetrator. If we were successful and could pin the other two deaths on him, so much the better. If we didn’t catch him, we’d have to take a long and careful look at all the circumstances.
“Need any help from HQ?”
“Not at the moment, Gilbert. Let’s wait until we know who she is. Somebody might leap into the frame.”
Who she was, her last movements, who she was with. Often, with attractive young women, that was all we needed to know. Young blokes, and sometimes not-so-young ones, get ideas, build up fantasies. Magazines and daytime-TVsoaps reinforce the idea that romance, perfect romance, is everybody’s right. You see the girl of your dreams, she looks across and the feeling is reciprocated, as if love was some force of nature like gravity or magnetism, that obeyed rules laid down when the universe was formed.
“I told you what it could be like. Now do you believe me?”
“I’ve always believed you, Tim. You’re so clever. And I love you.”
“And I love you.”
“When can we do it again?”
He propped himself up on his elbow. “I’m not sure,” he said. “Doing two in Heckley was clever. They weren’t expecting that. Now they’ll realise that they are up against someone special, if they’ve made the connection, yet. I’ll have to think about it.”
“When we do,” she began, “can we, do you think we could, you know, spend more time with…them?”
“With the target, you mean?”
“Yes.”
“I’ve been wondering about that myself. It’d be good, no doubt about it. Lift us on to another level. We’d have to bring them back here.”
“Would it be too dangerous?”
“No, not if we’re careful. Leave it to me. I have an idea, but it will mean some heavy work. And I’ve a couple of targets picked out already. I think you’ll like them.”
She wriggled her bottom against his loins to show her approval, and felt him harden. “I thought you were putting the music on,” he reminded her. She reached out and pressed the play button. After a few moments a simple rhythm filled the room, tapped out on a cowbell and soon joined by a bass guitar and keyboard. She turned to embrace him and he pulled the duvet over their heads as a thin, piping voice leaked from the speakers. “ This is the eye of the storm,” it sang. “Watch out for that needle, Son, ’cos this is the eye of the storm .”
One of the important pieces of information we lacked was the identity of the victim. They went through her pockets at the hospital without finding anything, and we did a torchlight search of the edge of the field where she’d been found, in case her handbag had been hurled over the wall. Negative. Dave phoned me with a brief description and said she was aged about twenty. Same as his daughter, Sophie, I thought, and wished I’d sent somebody else to the hospital.
I went back to the station to check the missing persons’ file, knowing it was a waste of time. My feet and shoulders were wet but the heating in the offices was off, so I found a portable fan heater that we’re not supposed to have and plugged it in. Gilbert Wood, my superintendent, arrived, shaking his head and making sympathetic noises, and I rang a few other people to tell them to be at the station early in the morning.
“What do you reckon, then?” Gilbert asked. “Is it another ?”
“It’s another murder,” I replied. “Whether it’s another murderer is a different question.” I’ve never understood the dread that people have that a series of deaths may be the work of the same person. Surely having one twisted hospital worker going round the wards turning off the oxygen is preferable to having a whole bunch of them who just do it once, for a kick? For the time being we’d treat this as a one-off , and do everything we could to find the perpetrator. If we were successful and could pin the other two deaths on him, so much the better. If we didn’t catch him, we’d have to take a long and careful look at all the circumstances.
“Need any help from HQ?”
“Not at the moment, Gilbert. Let’s wait until we know who she is. Somebody might leap into the frame.”
Who she was, her last movements, who she was with. Often, with attractive young women, that was all we needed to know. Young blokes, and sometimes not-so-young ones, get ideas, build up fantasies. Magazines and daytime-TVsoaps reinforce the idea that romance, perfect romance, is everybody’s right. You see the girl of your dreams, she looks across and the feeling is reciprocated, as if love was some force of nature like gravity or magnetism, that obeyed rules laid down when the universe was formed.
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