Ian Rankin: Witch Hunt

“Mr. Hassan died in hospital on evening of 20 May, just as live telecast at closing concert was beaming messages by pop and film luminaries into Japan.

“Postmortem was carried out on morning of 21 May, with Mr. Hassan’s hotel (and over 100 diners from the previous day) keenly awaiting findings. Laboratory analysis showed atropine poisoning. (Atropine is an alkaline found in Deadly Nightshade. From the Greek atropos, ‘the Fate that cuts the thread of life.’)

“While still conscious, but thought to be delirious, Hassan spoke of a girl, a student probably. He spoke of her ‘beauty and generosity.’ Hotel staff when interviewed acknowledged that on the night of 19 May, a young woman had accompanied Mr. Hassan to his room. No one saw her leave, despite a twenty-four-hour reception area. Descriptions given varied. One assessed her height at nearly six foot, another at only five foot six. One said black hair, another brown. Hair was probably cropped short, and woman was fair-skinned, though tanned. European perhaps, or Asian. No one heard her speak. She had crossed the lobby with Mr. Hassan and entered the lift with him. She was dressed in black denims, light T-shirt, light-colored jacket. Mr. Hassan was carrying a plastic carrier bag weighed down with books. Reception staff got the impression the bag belonged to the woman.

“Woman has never been traced. Hassan’s previous sexual history questioned. (Widow not forthcoming.) As a footnote, woman’s entry to the country was clumsy, creating immediate suspicion. And her use of atropine, or at least the dosage used, was also clumsy, since it allowed the victim time to talk before dying. Pity is, he did not say anything useful.

“See: WITCH file.

“Final footnote: Susa is c. fifty miles from Hiroshima.”

Barclay turned to the third and final sheet, expecting more. But all he read were edited newspaper reports of Jerome Hassan’s murder, mentioning poison and the mysterious young woman. A jealous lover was hinted at. He looked up and saw that Joyce Parry was immersed in the contents of one of the Elder files. He glanced through his own sheets again, quite liking Elder’s tone — the explanation of the word “atropine”; the mention of the final night’s rock concert; that nice late mention that Hassan was a married man.

“You see the coincidence,” Parry said without warning. She was looking at him now. “An assassin is dropped off on the Japanese mainland and then destroys the boat which landed her. Now, six years later, something similar occurs.”

Barclay considered this. “Special Branch are thinking more along the lines of drugs or arms.”

“Exactly. And that’s why I’d rather you hadn’t alerted them this early on. They may be off on half a dozen wild goose chases. Then, if we approach them with new information, they’ll wonder why we didn’t come up with it sooner. Do you see what I mean?” Her glasses glinted. Barclay was nodding.

“It makes us look bad.”

“It makes me look bad.” She wetted two fingers with the tip of her tongue and turned a page.

“What’s the Witch file?” Barclay asked.

But she was busy reading, too busy to answer. She seemed to be suppressing an occasional smile, as though reminiscing. Eventually she glanced up at him again.

“The Witch file doesn’t exist. It was an idea of Mr. Elder’s.”

“So what is Witch?”

She closed the file carefully, and thought for a moment before speaking. “I think it would be best if you asked Dominic Elder that, don’t you?”

Once a year, the fairground came to Cliftonville.

Cliftonville liked to think itself the genteel equivalent of next-door neighbor Margate. It attracted coach tours, retired people. The younger holidaymakers usually made for Margate. So did the weekenders, down from London for a spot of seaside mayhem. But Cliftonville was struggling with a different problem, a crisis of identity. Afternoon bingo and a deck chair in front of the promenade organist just weren’t enough. Candy floss and an arcade of one-armed bandits weren’t enough. Too much of the town lingered in the 1950s. Few wanted the squeal and glitter of the ’90s, yet without them the town would surely die, just as its clientele was dying.

If the town council had wanted to ask about survival, they might have consulted someone at the traveling fairground. It had changed, too. The rides had become a little more “daring” and more expensive. Barnaby’s Gun Stall was a good example. The original Barnaby (whose real name had been Eric) had used rifles which fired air-propelled corks at painted tins. But Barnaby had died in 1978. His brother Randolph had replaced the cork guns with proper pellet-firing rifles, using circular targets attached to silhouette human figures. But then Randolph had succumbed to alcohol and the charms of a woman who hated the fair, so his son Keith — the present Barnaby — had taken over. Nowadays the Gun Stall boasted serious entertainment in the form of an automatic-firing air gun rigged up to a compression pump. This machine gun could fire one hundred large-bore pellets every minute. You just had to keep your finger on the trigger. The young men paid their money gladly, just to feel the sheer exhilaration of that minute’s lethal action. Afterwards, the target would be brought forward. Keith still used cardboard circles marked off from the outer to the small black bull’s-eye, and attached to the heart of a human silhouette. The thing about the automatic was, it couldn’t be said to be accurate. If enough pellets hit the target, the cardboard was reduced to tatters. But more often than not, the kids missed, dazed by the recoil and the noise and the speed.

The more dazed they were, the more likely they were to come back for more. It was a living. And yet in other ways the fair was very much an old-fashioned place. It had its ghost train and its waltzers, though this evening the ghost train was closed. There were smells of spun sugar and diesel, and the scratchy sounds of the next-to-latest pop records. Onions, the roar of machinery, and three-balls-for-fifty-pee at the kiddie stalls.

Gypsy Rose Pellengro’s small caravan was still attached to her Volvo station wagon, as though she was thinking of heading off. On a board outside the caravan door were letters of thanks from grateful clients. These letters were looking rather frail, and none of them seemed to include the date on which it had been written. Beside them was a scrawled note announcing GYPSY ROSE BACK IN AN HOUR.

The two windows of the caravan were tightly closed and covered with thick net curtains. Inside, it was much like any holiday caravan. The small sink still held two unwashed plates, and on the table sat not a crystal ball but a portable black-and-white television, hooked up to the battery of the Volvo. The interior was lit by propane, the wall-mounted lamps roaring away. A woman was watching TV.

There was a knock at the door.

“Come in, sir, please,” she called, rising to switch off the set. The door was pulled open and a man climbed into the caravan. He was so tall that he had to stoop to avoid the ceiling. He was quite young, very thin, and dark-skinned.

“How did you know it was a man?” he asked, taking in the scene around him.

“I saw you peering in through the window.”

The man smiled at this, and Gypsy Rose Pellengro laughed, showing the four gold teeth in her mouth. “What can I do for you, sir? Didn’t you see the notice outside?”

“Yes. But I really would like my fortune told.” He paused, stroking a thick black mustache, before adding meaningfully: “I think I have a lucky future ahead of me.”

Gypsy Rose nodded, not that she’d been in any doubt. “Then you’ve come to the right place,” she said. “I’m in the futures market myself. Would you like to sit down?”