Stuart MacBride - Birthdays for the dead

Frank!

Gagh Frank blinked, hairy paws smearing red across his face.

I grabbed the lens and pulled; the camera strap yanked his head forwards, clunking it into the window frame. I twisted the Canon through ninety degrees turning the strap into a noose. Pulled harder. Knuckles like burning gravel, fingers aching.

Ash! Don t be a dick, let him go!

Frank gurgled.

Another twist and there it was a small hatch marked

SD Card, set into the camera body. I flipped it open, pushed on the plastic edge, and the SD card popped up. About the same size as the end of my thumb, but rectangular, with one corner cut off. I gritted my teeth and pulled it out. Stuck it in my pocket. Let go.

Gaahhhhh Frank scrabbled away, clambering over the gearstick and the handbrake, camera clunking against the steering wheel.

Jennifer grabbed my sleeve. What s wrong with you?

I jerked my arm away, leaned on the window ledge and glared inside. The car smelled of stale digestive biscuits, cigar-ettes, and cold coffee. Listen up, you little fuck: I see you anywhere near here again, I see you at all, I m going to turn that telephoto lens of yours into an endoscope. Understand?

Frank just coughed and spluttered.

Ash! She grabbed me again.

I spun around and shoved. Jennifer staggered back against a Porsche the car alarm blared, the lights flashing on and off.

Get this into your thick little skull: it s over. I don t owe you a damn thing.

Her eyes were two cold slits, wrinkles creasing either side of her narrowed lips. Teeth bared. Who the hell do you think you are? She spat at me: a gobbet of frothy white that spattered against my chest.

I turned and walked away.

This isn t over, Ash, you hear me? This isn t over!

I pulled the curtain back. Feeling any better?

Dr McDonald perched on the edge of a hospital gurney, her left eye partially closed, a square of white wadding taped to her forehead and cheek. No.

Doctor says it could ve been a lot worse. Just superficial really.

She scowled at me. It s sore.

I offered you painkillers.

I m not taking pills from a man I barely know, I mean they could be anything: roofies, GHB, Rohypnol, Ketamine

Roofies and Rohypnol are the same thing. And trust me: you re not my type.

Her bottom lip protruded a little, then she sniffed and hopped down from the gurney. The body deposition sites were stupid, I don t mean the park: the park isn t stupid, but burying a dead body there is. Only a set number of people have easy access, and what if someone looks out of their window and sees you with your shovel and a big black-plastic bundle. Who s Jennifer?

None of your sodding business, that s who.

I dropped my vending-machine coffee in the bin. Far as we can tell, Cameron Park s been a wilderness for the last twelve years. Council cut the maintenance budget, told the residents it was their responsibility, so it all went feral. The sounds of an afternoon in A amp;E echoed through the corridors muffled swearing, a young man sobbing, some drunken singing. Door-to-doors spoke to an old biddie been living there for sixty years. She says people dump their garden waste in the park all the time.

Well, that s not very public spirited of them Dr McDonald frowned down at the floor. A series of lines were painted on the cracked linoleum: yellow, blue, red, purple, white, and black. She placed one foot on the black line, then the other, both arms held out sideways as if she was walking on a tightrope. Teetering along.

I pointed in the opposite direction. Exit s that way.

She kept going. This goes to the morgue, doesn t it?

No, it goes to the mortuary. You watch too much American TV.

Sounds a lot more genteel, doesn t it: mortuary, a morgue is full of serial-killer victims, a mortuary is somewhere you go to see Great Aunty Morag who s passed away at the ripe old age of ninety-two.

You re still going the wrong way.

Follow the little black line. She grabbed my arm and gave a skip. Like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz.

Around the corner and deeper into the hospital. The paintwork was cracked and grubby, the gurney bumpers scuffed and dented, the floor patched with strips of silver duct tape. Paintings broke up the magnolia monotony, landscapes and portraits mostly, all done by school children.

Dr McDonald didn t even look at them. Detective Chief Inspector Veeeber that s German, isn t it, but shouldn t the pronunciation be Veber, or Veyber, I mean I m sure he knows how to pronounce his own name, but

Weber will let Smith get comfortable saying Veeber for a couple of weeks, then change the pronunciation on him. Give him a hard time for getting it wrong, and go right back to the start. I smiled. I ve seen Weber keep it up for months. Be surprised how quickly little things like that can break somebody.

She shrugged. Seems a bit cruel

Serves him right: he s a prick.

We walked along in silence for a while, enjoying the twin reeks of disinfectant and stewed cauliflower.

Dr McDonald stopped. There s something significant about the deposition site not only where it is but the nature of the burials themselves. I mean did you see Lauren Burges s body? He didn t even bother to put her head back in the right place, just wrapped the whole lot up, dragged it out to the middle of the park and dumped it in a shallow grave.

A voice behind us: Beep, beep!

We flattened to the wall, and a hospital bed trundled past, pushed by a balding porter with a squint smile. A pair of chunky nurses brought up the rear, gossiping about some doctor caught taking a female patient s temperature the naughty way. The guy in the bed looked as if he d been hollowed out, leaving waxy skin draped over a framework of brittle bones, wheezing into an oxygen mask.

Don t you think that s strange? As soon as they were past, Dr McDonald hopped back onto the black line. I d expect someone like the Birthday Boy would want to keep them as trophies, Fred and Rosemary West only started burying their victims in the garden when they ran out of room in the house, they wanted to keep them near, but the Birthday Boy dumps them like a wheelbarrow full of lawn clippings.

Well, maybe he s My phone rang. I dug the thing out and checked the display: MICHELLE. Arseholes I grimaced at Dr McDonald. I ll catch up.

She shrugged and wobbled away, through a set of double doors, still following the black line.

I hit the button. Michelle.

Twice in one day.

Lucky me.

I saw you on the news. Her voice was even more clipped than usual. I thought Susanne was a blonde, have you traded her in for someone younger already? Is this one a stripper too?

I told you: Susanne isn t a stripper, she s a dancer.

She dances round a pole: it s the same thing.

Bye, Michelle.

But before I could hang up: We need to talk about Katie.

Oh God. What s she done now?

Why do you always have to think the worst?

Because you only ever call when you want someone to read her the riot act.

A grey-haired woman in a flowery nightie shuffled down the corridor, wheeling a drip-on-a-stand along beside her.

That s not A pause about long enough for someone to count to ten and when Michelle came back, her voice was groaning with forced cheer. So, how are you settling in?

The old dear scuffed past, glowering at me. You re no allowed on your mobile phone!

Police business.

She flipped me the Vs, then wandered off. No supposed to be on your phone in a hospital

Ash? I said how

It s been three years, Michelle: think it s maybe time to stop asking?

I was only

It s a shitty little council house in Kingsmeath: the drains stink; someone keeps flicking dog shit into my back garden, which is a jungle, by the way; and that useless bastard Parker is still crashing on my couch. I m settling in just great.