Chris Simms - Killing the Beasts

Jon nodded to the uniformed officer at the back steps and then let himself into the flat. He wandered into the front room and stared at the carpet where the body had been lying. Then he glanced round the walls, taking in the immaculately arranged books lining the shelves. His eye was caught by a set of drawers; the uppermost one was fractionally open, as if it had been pushed hurriedly back in. He wedged a pen into the slight gap and pulled the drawer out. Bills and documents were arranged in neat piles. TV licence, gas, electricity, telephone.

Crouching down he opened the cupboard door to the side, grunting with satisfaction when he saw the stack of photo albums. Slipping on the gloves, he began flicking through. The front page was labelled, 'Oberammergau, 1999.' An alpine setting — some sort of a play about the crucifixion. He recognized the friend, Emma, amongst the beaming members of the coach party.

He went through the other albums and wasn't surprised to find only harmless photos of churches. Frowning, he walked through into her bedroom, feeling slightly guilty as he opened up her bedside cupboard and peered inside. A little rush of excitement played up his spine when he saw a stack of small magazines. He lifted the top few out and read the titles with disappointment. The Everlasting Life. Our Creator Cares About You. The Search for God . Religious magazines delivered by women who turn up on your doorstep and stare a little too intensely as they hand them over. Jon nodded in grim acceptance: try as he might, he couldn't imagine that any of the type of snaps found in Polly Mather's flat would turn up here.

In the kitchen he started idly looking through the cupboards, amazed to see that she even had a system of labels on each door to denote which items should be eaten first. Examining what was stored on each shelf, he noted there were quite a few promotional packs of merchandise — no doubt part of the same economical approach that led her to collect the coupons and tokens on the hallway table.

He looked in the top drawer and saw knives, forks and spoons neatly lined up. The drawer below was labelled 'Miscellaneous'and was full of odds and ends — spare batteries, rolls of sellotape, a box of plasters, bags of foreign coins, a pack of chewing gum, tubes of indigestion tablets. The bottom drawer was full of tea towels, mostly souvenirs from places like Scarborough, Cromer and St Ives.

Jon straightened his legs and, sighing deeply, began to mentally sift through what the investigation had uncovered so far. The pairs of cups that had been recently washed up in Polly Mather's and Mary Walters' houses had yielded nothing to forensic examination. The CCTV lead had turned out to be nonexistent. No usable fingerprints had been lifted from Mary's doorbell. Phil Wainwright had a solid alibi for the night of Mary's death — he was staying at his mum's over in Burnley. He thought about Polly Mather's flat. The contacts magazines seemed the most promising lead, but tracing the three pay-as-you-go numbers was impossible.

Absolutely nothing seemed to link the victims and he was painfully aware that, due to the lack of solid leads, the investigation was stalling in its very earliest stages. Hoping that someone else might have made a significant discovery, he set off back to the station.

The top floor of Longsight police station made a city trading room seem sedate. Officers were scurrying between desks, others were on the telephone or furiously entering their reports onto HOLMES. Messages were being shouted from all directions.

Making his way between the tables, Jon headed for DCI McCloughlin's room. He saw him inside, surrounded by other senior officers. Jon knocked and was immediately beckoned in.

'Gentlemen, this is DI Spicer, 'McCloughlin announced. 'He was taking care of the investigation while it stood at one victim and was first in with me at Mary Walters' flat.' He turned to Jon. 'The autopsy on the third victim, Heather Rayne, has just come back. She had been dead for over a day, which actually makes her the second one to be killed.'

'One a day for the past three days,' Jon said, staying by the door.

'Precisely. And every time my bloody phone rings — which is almost non-stop — I'm expecting it to be news of number four.'

He pointed through the windows of his office at the white boards that stood at the top of the main room. The usual smattering of victims' photos adorned each one with various other names and addresses dotted around below. What was missing were the crucial interconnecting lines between each victim. Jon had never seen such a lack of them.

'As you can see, we're still thrashing around in the dark here. Any progress on your part? What was the score with the CCTV at Mary Walters' place?'

Jon shook his head. 'Afraid it was just that — a notice. Mary Walters pinned it up to put off curb crawlers bringing their pickups round into the back yard. I've just had a talk with the owners of the flat above. They spend their lives in the office so had very little to say.'

McCloughlin shook his head. 'Well, there were two recently washed up cups on Heather Rayne's draining board. This bastard knows the victims, I'm certain.'

'What's the profile so far of the latest one to be found?' Jon asked.

McCloughlin spoke from memory. 'Heather Rayne. Single, aged thirty-two. A high flyer at Kellogg's where she worked as a training manager in the IT department. An upstanding member of the community, helping to raise money for various local projects through sponsored runs and the like. Also active in the local branch of the Conservative party. No familial or obvious social connections to the other two victims.'

The room was silent for a few moments before McCloughlin continued. 'Jon — you've had a fairly good look around two of the victims' flats. Go and view the crime scene video from Heather Rayne's property and check the white boards. See if any angles show up.'

Taking that as his cue to get going, Jon replied, 'Yes sir,' and went to find the video room. Other officers had obviously been watching the tapes late into the night — a full ashtray and a box of matches had been left on the corner table. Opening the window slightly, Jon looked hungrily at a half-smoked cigarette. Rothman's. His favourite brand before giving up. He loaded the tape marked with Heather Rayne's name into the cassette recorder.

The footage opened on a leafy street, the sound of starlings arguing in the background. The video panned towards the victim's property, the picture moving across a fir tree in the front garden, the edge of a Jaguar coming into the other side of the screen as the officer started walking up the short path leading to the front door. A hand extended into the frame and pushed the front door open. The picture dimmed out and then objects slowly took shape. As the camera made a slow sweep of the hallway area, something began nagging at the back of Jon's mind.

He rewound the tape, unsure of what he was looking for. The footage started again, birds twittering, fir tree, edge of the Jaguar, front path, door. Glancing at the ashtray, he jabbed the pause button, unable to quite work out what had caught his attention. It was as frustrating as having a word on the tip of his tongue. He rewound the tape again. Still it wouldn't come. Angrily he reached over and lifted the half-smoked Rothman's out of the ashtray. He sniffed the charred end, aware that most of the tar, nicotine and various poisons would be concentrated in the cigarette's last third. Hating himself, he lit it up and took a deep drag. As the harsh smoke started his brain dancing, he thought back to the first victim, Polly Mather. He remembered the Subaru Impreza belonging to the neighbour jutting across on to Polly's half of the shared drive. He remembered that a Lexus was usually parked in the third victim's backyard, near to Mary Walters' door. Staring at the TV, he saw the front corner of the Jaguar intruding into the screen. Pulling another lungful of smoke from the cigarette, he stubbed it out and got up. Feeling like he was walking on cotton wool, he entered the main incident room and went over to the allocator. 'Charlie, can you tell me who's compiling the vehicle index for Heather Rayne?'