Dan Waddell - The Blood Detective

The centre opened, the weekend amateurs filing in to lock away their belongings. Nigel sat watching them come and go, a steady stream of people, a younger crowd than during the week, even a few children among them. Before long the room was filled with people having a coffee, catching up, poring over documents they had collected that morning and planning their day's research.

Phil, the whistling receptionist, walked in, looking around. He saw Nigel and made his way over.

'Hello,' he said in his jovial manner. 'You been here all night, then?'

Nigel nodded, hoping he hadn't found him just to make small talk.

'Have you seen Dave Duckworth anywhere?'

Nigel hadn't.

'Strange,' he said. 'There's a group of American tourists at the front desk. He's supposed to help guide their search. He's half an hour late.'

Probably caught in traffic, Nigel thought.

'Not like him, because these people look pretty wealthy,' Phil added.

'I haven't seen him since yesterday,' Nigel said eventually, remembering the conversation about his client with the rare surname, Kellogg . . .

The thought struck Nigel so suddenly, he almost jumped. Could it be a coincidence? He needed to get to the newspaper library to find out.

Foster drifted back to consciousness, drenched in sweat; only when he twitched did he feel the coruscating stab of pain from his fractured shin. He knew the break couldn't be clean. The tape had been removed from his mouth. He turned his head to one side and vomited copiously. Had he passed out through pain or been drugged once more?

He knew Karl was the killer. He knew he was the fifth victim.

'Why are you doing this?' he spat out between gasps for air, his body craving oxygen.

'As I said, retribution.' The voice remained calm, reasoned. Without malice.

A surge of pain left him speechless. He seemed to lose consciousness for a few more seconds, though it could have been longer. Sweat poured from his brow. He came round again, the last words of his assailant on his mind.

'Retribution?' he gasped eventually. 'What for?'

'If you were more aware of your family history, you would know.'

Foster tried to concentrate on what Karl was saying, to forget the pain. It took every ounce of effort.

'What about my family history?'

'You mean you haven't guessed yet?'

'I'm not in the mood for a fucking quiz,' he hissed, regretting the effort when the pain coursed through him and he vomited once more.

'It will hurt less if you remain still. The whole ordeal will be less painful if you remain still. And keep quiet, or the tape goes back on.'

Foster, feeling faint, fell silent. The soundproofing on the wall, the tape across his mouth; this must be a place where they might be heard. At some stage he knew he must gather his strength and let out the loudest scream he could muster. He might only get one chance.

'If you knew your family history, then you would know your greatgreat-greatgrandfather was Detective Henry Pfizer. The crooked German bastard who fitted up Eke Fairbairn to get the press off his back.'

The words came to him through a fog of agony.

Finally, they registered. His ancestor?

The judicial murder of Eke Fairbairn was the corpse in his family's basement.

Consciousness began to ebb away. He could not hear a thing in this tomb. The silence was broken only by the killer's voice and his own wracked gasps of pain. He tried to fight unconsciousness; next time he might not wake up. To remain alert he focused on the shattered limb, going so far as to move his leg, hoping the awful, searing pain would ward off oblivion.

'Pfizer was your ancestor,' Karl said. 'You'll be punished for what he did. Just like the descendants of Norwood, Darbyshire, Pearcey and MacDougall were. You already know this, but before he was executed the police decided to try and beat a confession out of him. That could only have taken place with the sanction of your ancestor. They fractured six bones in his body.'

Six, Foster thought. Five more to go. His whole body tightened at the thought. He must find a way to get out, to deter the killer.

'Why pick me?' asked Foster. 'There must have been other descendants of Pfizer.'

'No. You're the last one. It all ends with you. And it seems appropriate that you're also a police officer.

Thankfully. I picked the most successful of all of them. With Darbyshire, Perry, it was always the wealthiest. Call it class envy, if you want.'

Karl walked into Foster's field of vision on his left, preceded by the smell of stale smoke. Foster remembered the cigarette he'd bummed. Then he knew. That was how the killer ensnared his victims.

All were social or committed smokers. Karl found a way to introduce himself, offered them a smoke and that was it - lights out. Inhaling a cigarette doused in GHB would render you helpless in a matter of seconds, reaching the brain quicker than any spiked drink.

'Now, are you ready?' Karl asked.

Foster's mind swam. He thought of his father. The last few moments before he took the cocktail. He had remained resolute and stoical. The look of a man staring at the void and the void looking away. Death came as a release, a balm for someone so eager to escape. Would he be able to face the end of his life with such dignity?

The tape was laid across his mouth. He could taste the plastic. His left arm was unstrapped, laid outwards, wrist facing up, his hand resting on another table. Foster stared straight into the eyes of the killer, not once looking away. Karl did not return his gaze, merely lifted his boot and brought it down swiftly on Foster's forearm.

This time the break was clean. Compared to the nightmarish pain from his leg, his arm simply went numb. Foster never flinched or once looked away from the killer. He made sure his eyes bored into him the whole time he was at his side.

He waited for him to remove the tape so he could use his anger, all the pain, to let out a roar.

Nothing. The tape remained. He lost consciousness once more. He came round, the tape removed, opened his mouth but the noise was weak. He licked his parched lips. Through the haze he thought of another tactic.

'This can be done another way,' Foster whispered hoarsely. 'I know about Eke Fairbairn. I know about the injustice.' He stopped to grimace, catch his breath.

'I know about the beating, Stafford Pearcey's statement, the knife being planted, the judge's summing up. What happened was a travesty. But there is such a thing as a pardon. The case can be reopened. Your ancestor's name can be cleared.'

Karl was back out of sight.

'Eke Fairbairn is not my ancestor,' he said.

Nigel headed for the national newspaper library, making it there in less than half an hour. Inside he ordered the 1879 editions of the Kensington News. The story he wanted he'd first seen on Monday, in the issue of The Times on the day following Fairbairn's conviction. But it was only a few paragraphs. He needed more detail. When the volume arrived he flicked through to the edition for the third week of May, the first following the trial. A report of the events in court shared the front page with the story he was looking for.

MAN SLAYS WIFE AND DAUGHTERS

Yesterday morning, shortly after seven o'clock, Mr Inspector Dodd of Kensington Division received a report from a neighbour of blood washing under the front door of a house on Pamber Street. The abode was the home and business of Segar Kellogg, chandler shop owner.

Inspector Dodd proceeded to Pamber Street to find no little excitement in a neighbourhood already in foment over the appalling exploits of the so called Kensington Killer. He went to the door and indeed saw what appeared to be blood on the top step.

He knocked and received no answer. Then he tried the door and found it open. To his horror, behind it he found there a boy, unconscious yet still alive.