Steven Dunne - The Reaper

1) Deliver pizzas

2) Bring down baby

3) Cut throats.

But all the evidence pointed to a single killer, someone of Sorenson’s height and stature, entering the Wallis house that night. But then again, he’d only been seen delivering the pizzas-even a sick old man could do that. Nobody had seen who returned later to kill the victims.

Brook showed Mac the picture of Sorenson but without success.

‘Well thanks, Mac,’ said Brook standing. ‘You’ve been a big help.’

‘My pleasure. What’s he done by the way?’

Brook walked to the door and glanced again at the door of the empty fridge.

‘I can’t discuss it.’

‘Ere, he’s not the one that did that family, is he?’ Brook’s silence confirmed it. ‘The bastard. That poor little girl. What had she done to deserve that?’

Interesting how everyone zeroed in on the only aspect of the killings that was truly tragic, thought Brook.

‘We don’t know for definite. Listen. If this man comes back, I’d like you to ring me on this number.’ Brook wrote his home number on a piece of scrap paper knowing it wouldn’t be needed for anything other than the smokescreen he was about to throw up. He handed it to Mac with a twenty-pound note.

‘You don’t need to pay me for doing my duty, Inspector Brook. I’m glad to do it.’ The wound in the old man was stark.

‘Oh I know, I just thought…I need a good man on the job…’

‘You’ve no call to insult me like that. I don’t do the right thing for profit…’

‘Please take it. Treat it as a tip. Get some toys for the cat.’

Mac eyed the money with a mixture of longing and deep bitterness. Brook was appalled at the effect of his actions.

The old man stood before him, bereft even of the dignity he so scrupulously nurtured, unable to lift his dampening eyes from the money, the life-giving money. Every instinct told him to refuse it. He’d invited another person, as a guest, into his home. He’d assisted the police with their enquiries. They’d had a nice cup of tea and a nice chat and the old man had felt useful again. What could be more normal than that?

Being treated as an equal by a police Inspector, an important man who sought his opinion, his help. Suddenly he was a member of society again and could make a contribution to a community from which he’d felt ever more alienated. For a short, wonderful moment he was a human being not a shuffling relic, not a lonely, desperately sad old man who would have opened his arms to death every day, had not a tiny kitten given him the unquestioning love and companionship he needed to keep him going.

Mac closed his eyes and his hands around the money. Twenty pounds for self-respect. Bargain.

Brook turned to leave. He turned back at the sound of the old man’s voice.

‘We have a saying in the army.’ Mac stared at the floor, gazing at his own headstone. ‘Life’s like a gunshot wound. When it stops hurting is the time to worry.’

Brook hurried to his car. What was he doing? Out of nowhere he was taking an interest in other people’s lives, other people’s pain. Years of living behind the barricade of his thoughts had been replaced by pity for the plight of others. Why?

He was throwing cash around like Scrooge on Christmas Day. He could afford it but it was the kind of scattergun palliative of which he’d always disapproved and which, as he’d just witnessed, could do as much harm as good.

Then suddenly he knew and it hit him hard. An old man in a hovel, clinging to the illusion of life and companionship, only a cat to care whether he lived or died. Mac was The Ghost of Christmas Future. Brook had dropped in on his own barren existence, twenty years on.

The next morning, New Year’s Eve, Brook staggered to his door under the weight of two heavy boxes. He fumbled with his keys, balancing both boxes on his left thigh and let himself in. He stepped into the kitchen and snapped on the harsh strip light. He placed the boxes on the kitchen table and trotted back out to the Sprite for his shopping bags.

When he returned he opened the fridge. It was empty save for a carton of milk. A moment later it was full of comestibles, most of which he wouldn’t eat but that didn’t matter. For the first time in a long time, appearances were important. Appearances mattered. Not to Brook maybe but to everyone else, and it was stupid pigheadedness to put himself at such a disadvantage where human relationships were concerned. If his life were to be retrieved, he had to start where other people started-first impressions.

God forbid that anyone should walk into his flat again and see it as defeated and empty as old Mac’s. Small wonder he hadn’t seen Wendy for dust after that first night. What must she have thought?

Later that evening, Brook had set up his brand new TV and VCR-not without difficulty-and was able to put in the first of the tapes from the station CCTV. He settled down with the remote control and a ready meal chilli, briefly amused to have stumbled upon the nation’s twin pillars of obesity, after a lifetime of emaciation.

It was dull going, so after the first half hour, he put it on fast-forward but this made it too difficult to pick things out, so he abandoned the experiment and decided just to leave it running. If he missed something, so what? Unless Sorenson danced across the footbridge in a bloodstained boiler suit waving a scalpel around, Brook knew this was a waste of time. They still had nothing.

He decided to ring Amy again, see how she was getting on. He’d rung her the day after getting back to Derby on some pretext or other and it was obvious she’d been crying. After he’d pressed her to confide in him she’d told Brook of Tony’s departure.

‘I haven’t told Terri yet. She thinks he’s away on business.’

She’d seemed composed. But when she read Brook the note, the tears had begun to fall.

Dear Amy

I have to go away for a long time. Maybe forever. I can’t tell you why because you wouldn’t understand. Please realise that it’s nothing to do with you and that I love you. I can’t face telling you or Terri but please try not to think ill of me.

All my love, your darling Tony

Brook had kept her talking until she cheered up. He didn’t usually have that effect but then he rarely made the effort. They’d had a few laughs about the early years, making sure to skirt difficult areas. Maybe she just needed someone, anyone, to talk to, but Brook was still pleased to detect a note of affection in her voice he’d not heard for many years.

This time Amy picked up on the first ring.

‘It’s me again, darling. How are you today?’

‘I’m O.K.’

‘And Terri?’

‘She’s fine.’

‘Have you told her about Tony yet?’ There was a long pause at the other end. ‘Anything wrong, Amy?’

Brook heard her take a deep breath. ‘Damen. I don’t want you to ring again.’

‘What is it?’

‘I don’t want you to ring again. I want you to leave us alone.’

‘Tell me what’s wrong…’

The line went dead. Brook replaced the receiver.

At that moment Vicky hopped from the bottom step of the footbridge. The same flash of blue denim that Brook had first seen standing across the road in the cold a couple of weeks before, the same quilted coat, the same flash of blonde hair.

He checked the date on the display. It was the day before Brook had met her outside his flat.

He watched her progress across the concourse. It was difficult to make her out, the cameras in the main station were high in the vaulted roof, but she seemed to be waving at someone off-camera, someone waiting by the entrance. She quickened her step.