He suggested we go to my place, so I told him my boyfriend would be there, but he started rambling on about not taking people back to his flat and how last time had been an exception, until I pulled another two fifties from my wallet and thrust them into his hand. He smiled.
We went to my car, fixed with false plates, and drove to his shithole in southeast London where I was sure not to park too close to his block. Telling him I didnt want to take the risk of being seen walking to his flat with him, I suggested that he go ahead and leave the door unlocked.
I waited a couple of minutes, then, as the street was empty, no one staring from windows, I walked to the flat. The block was old, cold, and smelled of piss, but he had been a good boy and left the door unlocked. I quietly entered and flicked the lock on. He appeared around the corner at the end of the corridor, from what I knew was the living room. He spoke.
Was that you locking the door?
Yes, I replied. Cant be too careful these days.
Afraid someones going to burst in on us and spoil the party?
Something like that.
The excitement was unbearable. My stomach was so cramped with anticipation I could hardly breathe. Inside, my mind was screaming, but I was still wearing my nervous smile as I walked into the living room.
The whore knelt by his CD player. I told him I wanted to clean up a little and headed for the bathroom down the hallway.
I took my bag with me, and quickly, if somewhat awkwardly, pulled on the suit, the shower cap, rubber gloves, and finally the plastic bags over my shoes. I looked in the mirror, filling my lungs with air drawn in hard through my nose. I was ready.
Fully prepared, I returned to the living room. He turned and saw me dressed and resplendent. He started to giggle, covering his mouth as if to stop himself.
He spoke to me. Is this how were going to get our kicks tonight then?
They were the last words he spoke, although he may have said please a little later. By then the blood bubbling up into his mouth made it just a gargle.
With a smooth, swift, practiced hand I grabbed an iron statue of a naked Indian he kept on his side table and I used it to smash his skull, not hitting him hard enough to kill him straightaway, merely to render him semiconscious and virtually paralyzed. He had been on his knees when I hit him, which was good-less distance to fall meant less noise when he hit the floor.
I watched him for a while, standing over him like the victor in a prizefight, watching his chest rise and fall with each painful, strained breath, the blood initially spurting from the wound in his head, then slowing to a steady flow as his heart grew too weak to pump it at the pressure his body required to stay alive. Every few seconds his right leg would twitch like a dying bird.
It wouldnt have been as I had dreamed if he hadnt been at least partly conscious when I went to him with an ice pick I found in his drinks cabinet. I needed him to be alive as I cut him. I needed to see him try to stop me each time I pushed the ice pick into his dying body: not stabbing frenziedly, but placing it deliberately against his pale skin. Now and then he would reach up and pitifully try to defend himself from the torture. I told him not to be a naughty boy and continued with my work. It was a shame his brain hemorrhaging had caused his eyes to turn red, as I had wanted to contrast his blue eyes against the pale bloodied skin. Next time Id do better.
It wouldnt have been as I had dreamed if he hadnt been at least partly conscious when I went to him with an ice pick I found in his drinks cabinet. I needed him to be alive as I cut him. I needed to see him try to stop me each time I pushed the ice pick into his dying body: not stabbing frenziedly, but placing it deliberately against his pale skin. Now and then he would reach up and pitifully try to defend himself from the torture. I told him not to be a naughty boy and continued with my work. It was a shame his brain hemorrhaging had caused his eyes to turn red, as I had wanted to contrast his blue eyes against the pale bloodied skin. Next time Id do better.
His perforated body almost began to disgust me, to make me want to flee from the scene, but I couldnt stop yet. Not until all was as close as it could be to how I had seen it in my mind the first time I knew I would be visiting him. When he finally died, a slow, quiet hiss of air escaping from his lips and the breaches in his chest wall told me that my fun had come to an end. I put on a clean pair of surgical gloves and took the three hundred pounds in cash I had given him earlier from his pants pocket. I really didnt want to leave that behind. I carefully and quietly broke apart some furniture and generally arranged the room as if a violent struggle had occurred. Next I used the syringe Id brought to draw blood from his mouth and sprayed it about the room: on the walls, over the furniture, on the carpet, making spray patterns to suggest a violent struggle had taken place. Then I moved to the corner of the room I had left clean. I removed my protective layers and put them inside a plastic bag and put that bag inside another plastic bag and repeated this twice more. I ensured that each plastic bag was tied securely and finally put the bundle in my knapsack. I put new plastic bags on my feet, not wanting to take the chance that I might step on a spot of blood-that sort of evidence can be difficult to explain. I put on another clean pair of rubber surgical gloves and left the living room. I would burn all of it in my garden the following evening, the safest way to dispose of such incriminating items. To burn them in a public place risked attracting attention, while burial would leave them at the mercy of inquisitive animals.
I moved quietly to the front door. I took the plastic bags off my shoes and looked through the peephole. Nobody about. Just to be sure, I listened at the door, careful not to let my ear press against it and possibly leave a mark, like a fingerprint, which I hear can happen.
When I was totally happy, I slipped out of the flat, leaving the front door open so as not to make any more noise than necessary. The statue of the Indian and the ice pick I threw in the Thames as I headed north to my hotel. The thought of the police wasting hours searching for weapons that wouldnt help their investigation in the slightest pleased me.
When I reached my hotel I slipped in through the side door next to the bar, generally used only as a fire exit. I knew it could open from the outside and had no CCTV camera trained on it. I already had the key card for my room, having checked in earlier that day. I took a long shower, keeping the water as hot as I could bear, scrubbing skin, nails, and hair vigorously with a nailbrush until my entire body felt like it had been burned by flames. I had removed the plug cover to allow any items washed from my body to flow easily into Londons sewage system. After the shower I took a long steaming bath and scrubbed myself again. Once dry I lay naked on the bed and drank two bottles of water, at peace now. Satisfied. Soon sleep came and I dreamed the same beautiful dream over and over.
CHAPTER 3
Thursday, late afternoon
Sean and Donnelly walked along the corridors of Guys Hospital, heading for the mortuary. They were accompanied by Detective Constable Sam Muir, who would be acting as exhibits officer-taking responsibility for any objects the pathologist found on or in the body during the postmortem. Sean wondered if he would bump into his wife, Kate, one of the all too few doctors attending to the never-ending flow of patients through the Accident and Emergency Department-the sick and injured from the surrounding areas of Southwark, Bermondsey, and beyond. Some of Londons poorest and most forgotten, living in public housing projects where violence and crime were seldom far away, all of their degradation and suffering going unnoticed and unseen by the swarms of tourists wandering around Tower Bridge and Tooley Street. If only they knew how close they were to some of Londons most dangerous territory.
His mind returned to the victims parents. He and Sally had called at the small town house in Putney. A desirable neighborhood on the whole, but boisterous on weekend evenings. Sally had done most of the talking.
Daniel had been their only child. The mother was devastated and didnt care who saw her fall to the floor screaming. Her despair was a physical pain. When she could speak, all she could say was the name of her son.
The father was stunned. He didnt know whether to help his wife or collapse himself. He ended up doing neither. Sean took him into the living room. Sally stayed with the mother.
They knew their son was gay. It had bothered the father at first, but he had grown to accept it. What else could he do other than push the boy away? And he would never do that. He said his son worked as a nightclub manager. He wasnt sure where, but Daniel had been doing well for himself and had no money problems, unlike other young people.
He hadnt met any of his sons friends. Daniel hadnt kept in touch with his old school friends. He came home quite often, almost every Sunday, for lunch. If he had a boyfriend then neither he nor his wife knew about it. Their son had said he wasnt interested in anything like that. They hadnt pressed him.
The father had asked what they were to do now. His wife would be finished. She lived for the boy, not him. He knew it and didnt mind-but with the boy gone?
He wanted to know who would do this to his boy-who would do this to them? Why? Sean had no answers.
As the three detectives entered the mortuary they could see Dr. Simon Canning preparing for the postmortem. A body lay covered with a green sheet on what Sean knew would be a cold, metal operating table. Water continually ran under the body to an exit drain as the pathologist did his work, so that the whole thing resembled a large, shallow stainless-steel bathtub.
Some detectives could detach themselves from the ugly reality of postmortems, bury themselves in the science and art of the procedure. Unfortunately, Sean was not one of those detectives. For days to come images of his own postmortem would blend with the memories of his shattered childhood. Meanwhile Dr. Simon Canning was busy arranging his tools-bright, shiny metal instruments for torturing the dead.
Afternoon, Detectives.
Doctor. Good to see you again, Sean replied.
I doubt that, said the pathologist. Canning was pleasant enough, but businesslike and succinct. I hope you dont mind, Inspector. Ive started without you. I was just having a bit of a cleanup before continuing. Right then, shall we get on with it?
The doctor pulled back the sheet covering the body with one quick movement of his arm. Sean almost expected him to say, Voilà! like a waiter lifting the lid off a silver platter.