

The Mindhunter

Len Cooke

Published by Red Panda Press at Smashwords 2013

Copyright 1993/2013 Len Cooke

Also by Len Cooke

September

The Illusionists

The Time Travellers' Guide to Total Chaos

or

Harry Sandy and the Zandron

The Extraordinary Adventures of Charlie Frank

The Guardian Angel

This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to any events, persons, alive or dead, is purely coincidental. The characters are fictitious products of the author's imagination

The Mindhunter

1

Monday, April 5 1993, Manchester, England

The young woman looked anxiously at her host, searching for reassurance her posing pleased him and as he brought up the camera she smiled once again. There was a flash of light followed by a whirring sound as the Polaroid ejected the print.

'Haf, finished?' she asked, in broken English. She hoped he had, the flat was unheated and without her clothes she was beginning to feel very cold.

The man smiled, signalling for her to sit on the edge of the bed. After a moment he joined her, putting a seemingly affectionate arm around painfully thin shoulders before, still smiling, he gently placed a piece of nylon twine around her neck.

'There is just one last thing,' he began, soothingly; 'now you have to die for me!'

The girl's English was poor, very poor and, confused; she looked at him for understanding. He grinned at her reassuringly and pulled the twine taught before listening with an almost academic interest to the croaking that instantly followed. Then he watched, fascinated, as blood vessels in the bloated, darkening face began to rupture and raw, animal-like fear, flooded into the girl's once beautiful, bulging, blue eyes.

She struggled, violently, at first angry that he was hurting her so much. Then, as she realised what he was trying to do to her and that her very life was being stolen, her emotion quickly changed to one of complete, abject, terror. The man was powerful, far stronger than herself in her drug-weakened state. For a few more seconds, in an agony of indescribable pain and fear, she continued to struggle. At last, however, without fresh oxygen to replenish that already consumed by her weakened muscles, she began to fade. Mercifully, she eventually lost consciousness and – two minutes later – her life!

*

Later the man looked down at the blackened, broken-veined face and, satisfied with his work, took yet another photograph. Then, easily, lifted the still-warm corpse off the bed and stood before a large mirror on the wardrobe door, the freshly murdered victim unmoving and limp in his arms. For some time he admired himself holding his prize; frequently turning from side to side, straining to see how he looked from different angles, different perspectives; trying to decide which view made him look the most masterful.

The reflection pleased him; it was proof of his power, his dominance; confirmation that he had been in complete control of the whole drama. He had been surprised how easy, how pleasurable it had been to kill but now, now he understood. He also knew that there were lots and lots of girls and that all he had to do, to recreate his present feeling of excited euphoria, was – murder them!

He placed the pathetic corpse back on the bed, for the briefest moment looking sad. The killing had been too quick; it had all been over in a couple of minutes and now he wanted to do it again and could not. He then made a promise to himself, a promise that, in future, he would take more time over the act of taking a life; would prolong the feeling of power that stealing the existence of another human being gave him. He smiled, grimly, looked back to the mirror and nodded; yes, he thought, next time it would have to last much, much longer and next time could not come too soon!

Saturday, April 17 1993, Wasdale, the English Lake District

On the southern side of Wastwater loom the great screes of Illgill and Whin Rigg. Almost two thousand feet high and rising sheer out of the lake, their slopes of loose, mainly grey shale, are well-weathered and occasionally, dangerously mobile. At the foot of these great ancients and in parts only a few feet above this deepest of English lakes, lies a pathway. In places barely a foot wide and elsewhere completely obliterated by falling boulders and shale, the route is more of a treachery; a walk for the very keen, extremely foolish, or those, perhaps, who have some other, less obvious purpose.

Overhead in the still, blue calm of the April afternoon, a buzzard, hanging on the lightest of thermals, circled lazily, eyes keen for rabbit or vole. It is likely the hawk had seen the grey-clad figure of a man as he picked his tortuous way along this precipitous and perhaps foolhardy route. It is a fact that he was not observed by the small throng of eager aqualung divers preparing to enter the Water from the far shore.

As the solitary figure drew level to this pre-engaged group, he paused, his breathing now shallow and ragged. This was by no means entirely due to his physical exertions for he was a young man and although displaying a slight limp, extremely fit. However, for a full five minutes he remained quite motionless as he stared at the divers' point of entry. Then, slowly, his body began to sway.

At first this was erratic with no obvious sense of rhythm, but soon the movements became more regular and synchronous. Suddenly, a full eight minutes after the divers had submerged everything intensified. Unexpectedly early, a diver broke surface and made for the shore with as much speed as he could muster. Immediately, the man's breathing became louder and significantly more laboured; the pelvic motions stronger and more violent. The diver ripped off his flippers and ran up the short, steep beach. Once at the top dumping bottles, weights and mask. As he drove off at high speed, in the direction of the Wasdale Head Inn, the solitary and clandestine observer tore frenziedly at his clothing before, very quickly, reaching orgasm. Such was the violence of the catharsis he began to shake, uncontrollably; then, quite exhausted, fell heavily to the ground.

*

Detective Chief Inspector Kate Hoagan shivered and tugged on the zip of her Barbour. She had arrived at Wasdale a little before three o'clock, now, at nine, she was cold, tired and hungry.

Hoagan shivered again, cursing that in her haste to leave home she had not brought with her a warm sweater. She stood at the side of the lake, a scene of intense police activity. Despite the presence of so many colleagues and the gentle throb of the diesel generators that serviced the floodlights, Wasdale was still eerily quiet.

Earlier that afternoon she had looked out across Wastwater towards the high screes; in the afternoon sunshine grey, green and red. High overhead a buzzard, in seasonally territorial mood mewed warnings of tenure to others of his kind. Even then, in broad daylight, Hoagan had found the area surprisingly threatening. Wasdale was a great and ancient place, a glacial valley guarded not only by the screes but also the towering monuments to a different age, a different reality. As she looked east, along the length of the lake, she, like tens of thousands before her, felt intimidated by the awesome majesty of the terrain. By Great Gable, Scafell Pike and ancient Yewbarrow; peaks that, even in April, had far more than a light dusting of snow above two thousand feet. These, she knew, were the immortally enduring guardians of Wasdale, the sentinels of antiquity itself.

*

It was dark now, not crow-black for the sky was cloudless and starlit but dark enough to remove the threatening landscape from the immediate consciousness. Hoagan gazed across the lake in the direction of the night-cloaked screes. Why was she feeling so uneasy? She stared hard into the darkness and shivered. There was something nasty crawling up her back; gradually, inexorably, vertebra by vertebra something intangible but, something nonetheless, was crawling up her spine. She pulled the wax jacket closer to her body; not because of the cold; this was more a protective, comfort reflex. Was it her imagination or a sixth sense trying to tell her, to caution her; to warn her that something was out there, something indescribably evil, in the blackness, waiting for her, wanting her, perhaps even trying to destroy her?

'Divers are up, ma'am!'

Startled back to reality, she looked to the water's edge where four police divers were struggling ashore with their pathetic, broken, burden.

'Thank you, John, tell the men to put the body in the forensic tent and keep everyone else back.' Twenty minutes later she was squinting, her eyes only slowly adjusting from the darkness of the Wasdale night to the brightness of the tent interior. She lit a Marlboro, patient as the pathologist finished his notes.

Doctor Lionel Dawson was in his late fifties, balding, of a squat build and significantly overweight. Hoagan smiled, sardonically, he was still dressed in what she assumed were his gardening clothes.

'Interesting case this, chief inspector,' Dawson stood up, his face showing the tireless enthusiasm of the career scientist. 'Where would you like me to begin?'

Hoagan took a long pull on the cigarette, it was not helping much. She often envied those who had a less keen sense of smell than herself. 'Just tell me what you know,' she replied; making it clear she did not share his excitement. She produced a voice-activated pocket tape recorder and placed it on the table near the feet of the body.

Dawson nodded and consulted his notes. Hoagan took her first real look at the greyish yellow, partially bloated remains and was shocked at how young the girl looked.

'The body is that of a white female, height approximately five feet three inches. Age...I'm going to put her age, tentatively, at around eighteen.'

'As old as that?' Hoagan was surprised.

'Yes, there's a little tolerance on that of course. Some of us look our years, some don't, that's life I'm afraid. I'll try to firm up on age at the full PM.' Hoagan nodded, gesturing for him to continue. 'Death appears to have been caused by strangulation,' Dawson pointed to bruising around the neck. 'The body has been subjected to multiple stabbings and in the case of the breasts, mutilations.'

She followed the movement of the ruler Dawson was using as a pointer; as he had observed the body had numerous stab wounds, also the girl's nipples had been removed.

'Christ!' said Hoagan, 'looks as though we have a right fruit cake here! How the hell do I tell the poor kid's parents about this?' That was not Dawson's problem and he merely shrugged. 'Can you say whether the stabbings and mutilations were ante or post-mortem?' she asked.

'Yes, but that will take at least a week. Adjacent tissue will have to be examined for evidence of bleeding.'

'How long after death do you think it was before she was put in the lake?'

Dawson shook his head. 'Too early to say; too many variables.'

'Can't you make an informed, unofficial guess?'

'Unofficially, I would say that she's probably been dead for one to two weeks, especially bearing in mind the apparent total lack of animal damage to her body. However, it will be six to seven days at the earliest before I'll be in a position to go firm on that.'

Hoagan nodded gratefully, Dawson had a reputation for being a stickler for facts; he also enjoyed a similar one for invariably being correct. 'Thank you,' she began, 'that's useful.'

Dawson moved to the girl's head and opened her mouth. Both rows of teeth were decayed, especially the bottom. 'The condition of the teeth is interesting,' he began. 'I'm not a dentist, but I do know this condition can be explicable through cocaine abuse.'

'Really?' Hoagan sounded sceptical. 'Not sweets, chocolate, pop; I mean, effectively she's only a child, isn't she?'

Dawson shook his head. 'It's the extent of the decay, especially when one considers that, in the UK, we have free dental care for people up to this age. All her deciduous teeth have gone, these are adult teeth. For these to have deteriorated so quickly I feel that there may have been an aggravating factor.'

Hoagan shrugged her shoulders, Dawson's theory, if proved correct, could be of use. Drug taking was an expensive hobby, invariably paid for by crime. If the girl was on drugs the chances were she would have a criminal record. Aside from revealing her identity, a search of her files may say much about her biography. Perhaps even reveal the name of her killer! She made a mental note to have the girl's fingerprints distributed to all UK forces as quickly as possible.

Dawson moved to the girl's legs. 'I've removed the chain, you might find this interesting.' He moved the corpse onto its side; again Hoagan followed the pathologist's pointer.

'What does it say?' she asked.

'VFI,' said Dawson. 'It appears to have been cut into the flesh with a sharp knife.'

'VFI?' Hoagan screwed up her face in disgust. 'Surely to God he hasn't carved his own initials into her body.'

Dawson shook his head. 'Not my area; knew you'd want to be told about it though.'

Hoagan nodded. 'Yes, if you've finished we'll get some shots before she goes to the mortuary.'

*

It was nearly ten o'clock before Hoagan was ready to leave Wasdale. As she opened the door of the police car she once again turned towards the screes, just under a third of a mile away across the water.

'Are you all right, ma'am?' Her driver looked concerned.

'Oh yes...yes, I'm fine thanks,' she replied. 'For a moment I felt...oh it doesn't matter, just take me home please.'

*

The man who had been watching the activity across the water lowered his binoculars and glanced skywards. It was too dark now for him to consider trying to navigate the dangerous scree-path. He had brought warm clothes with him, in anticipation of a long and cold night outdoors and he would now wait until dawn; then, in the half-light, would begin to make his own, very cautious, way home.

*

Hoagan walked out of the mobile incident room into the pleasant warmth of the April afternoon. The normally quiet and peaceful dale had become a scene of intense police activity. A large area of ground, adjacent to that part of the lake where the girl's body had been found, had been cordoned off. She watched, with professional interest, as over thirty police officers crawled across this sanitised area, carrying out a painstaking fingertip search. In the lake itself, divers were trying to ascertain if more bodies were lying there, silently awaiting discovery. This was a particularly difficult task; Wastwater was large and its depth made the search extremely limited. She moved her gaze across the lake towards the, thankfully, no longer threatening screes. The unpleasant sensation of the previous day had now disappeared, nor was she experiencing the unnerving and inexplicable presence of evil. She smiled, whimsically; quite clearly, yesterday she had been oversensitive. Extreme violence, especially a murder case, often upset her. As a professional police officer she was always telling herself that she should distance herself from emotion but she was only human and therefore could not always obey her own good advice. There were too many memories; she herself had once been there, at the brink, at the very edge of the abyss. She shrugged and still deep in thought, began to walk, slowly, along the edge of the lake.

The young police officer's dog-like eyes followed her, as once again the breeze pushed the blue cotton dress against the contours of her still firm and youthful looking body. Earlier, in the incident unit, he had been impressed by her beauty, that indefinable mature, graceful beauty; often unpredictable in youth and that so few women really acquire as they enter middle age. The chestnut hair cut in a bob, the well-formed facial features, only possible with a flawless bone structure, the laughing, hazel eyes and white teeth; framed against a tanned and almost, blemish-free skin.

The gravelly voice of a committed career smoker brought him back to reality. 'Are you listening to me lad?'

PC David Broadbent quickly turned away from the window and sat beside his superior. 'Yes, sir, sorry, sir.'

Detective Inspector John Hawthwaite smiled with understanding. 'Good looking woman, isn't she?'

The twenty-year-old probationer constable was embarrassed and he started to fiddle, nervously, with his pen. 'Hmm, yes, I suppose she is, sir; bit old for me though; I mean, I know it's hard to believe but they do say that she's...well – that she's over forty.'

Hawthwaite chuckled. 'One should never discuss the age of a lady, Broadbent, didn't your mother ever tell you that?'

The young PC's face turned crimson. He tried to change the subject slightly. 'Is it true what they say about her and that terrorist bloke?'

Hawthwaite moved his six foot five inch frame into a more comfortable position in the chair and pushed a thoughtful hand through thick, greying hair. 'There's been lots of things said about Kate Hoagan over the years lad, most of it bullshit, but some of it true.'

The younger man looked in anticipation at the well-lined, baggy-eyed, hunted face of his inspector. Disappointment replaced the emotion as Hawthwaite looked at his watch.

'It's lunchtime lad, go and make us a brew.' Hawthwaite caught the probationer's look of disappointment and grinned. 'Then I might just tell you everything you always wanted to know about DCI Hoagan – but never dared ask!'

*

Hawthwaite sipped at the hot tea before taking a bite out of the pre-packed ham and tomato sandwich. He studied the younger man, carefully, his keen, blue eyes noting the thick, dark hair and aggressive good looks; the resemblance to the former force detective chief superintendent, albeit a few years ago, was uncanny. 'Did your uncle never tell you about Mrs Hoagan?' he asked.

'No, sir, I know that as the detective chief super he would know all about her but he's never told me anything. He hardly ever talks about work.'

Hawthwaite looked surprised, put down his half-eaten sandwich, lit a cigarette and leant back in the chair. 'I've known Kate Hoagan for nineteen years. She joined the force as a graduate, at the age of twenty-one.'

'What was her degree in, sir?'

'Politics...I think,' Hawthwaite laughed. 'God knows how she managed that, at times she's the most politically incorrect person I've ever met! Anyway, by the time we were celebrating our twenty-third birthdays Kate was married, me nearly so. I was her tutor constable for a time, so we worked together, in the same sub-division, from the same nick.'

'Where was that, sir?'

'Ambleside,' Hawthwaite paused, his expression suddenly nostalgic, 'they were great times, those twelve months. We had youth, energy, money and with the Lake District as our beat one of the biggest playgrounds in England to enjoy all three.' His expression suddenly darkened. 'Then, one wet, March night, it was all blown away by a madman!'

He took a long pull on his cigarette, talking slowly, more thoughtfully. 'Kate had married a high-flyer, an Irishman called Jack Hoagan. Like me, he was one of the original sixty-nine entry of police cadets.' He laughed, wryly. 'With divorce rates reaching forty percent these days it sounds corny to say it but they really were devoted to each other.

Well, in the early hours of this particular night shift, Sergeant Jack Hoagan was driving his Panda through the town of Ambleside. At about three a.m. he clocked two men in a Ford Escort RS Two Thousand and I suppose his training and natural curiosity got the better of him. Anyway, he radioed in the vehicle's index number and sure enough – bingo! It had been stolen in London the week before!'

Hawthwaite stubbed out the cigarette and started nibbling at the remains of the sandwich. 'Jack told his sub-divisional control room that he was going to have "words" with the driver. Less than two minutes later, Ambleside Nick was swamped with three-nine calls.'

'What had happened?' asked Broadbent.

Hawthwaite smiled, sadly. 'The good burghers of Ambleside were not used to the sound of gunfire at three in the morning and wanted reassurance that the earth was still safely revolving on its axis.'

'And Jack Hoagan?' asked Broadbent.

Hawthwaite held up a hand, indicating patience. 'The radio operator at Ambleside was an old timer; he put two and two together immediately, especially as he couldn't raise Jack. He informed HQ who put out a county alert. They knew what type of vehicle they were looking for from Jack's radio call; they also had the index number. Kate was on duty that night, she was part of an experimental rapid-response team. They had the use of a high-powered, three-litre Capri. There were two of them, Kate and an older, much more experienced officer – John Wilson. Their brief was to tour the southern part of the county and be ready to assist the conventional lads in case of really serious trouble.'

'Conventional?' asked Broadbent.

'Kate and her colleague were armed! That was certainly unconventional in nineteen seventy-seven. They were just off the A Five-ninety, parked up in lay-by having their bait when the call came through. All they were told was that there had been reports of gunfire in Ambleside. There was no mention of Jack, or even that an officer had been shot, just the description of the suspect vehicle and that the occupants were probably armed.'

Hawthwaite threw the crust of his sandwich to a black-headed gull, patiently guarding the incident unit door. Another one arrived from nowhere and stole it. 'They took off immediately of course', he continued, 'heading west and they'd just turned right at Newby Bridge when a car, driven at a suicidal speed, came towards them from the direction of Ambleside. It was a Ford Escort RS2000, being driven so erratically it very nearly forced Kate, who was driving, off the road.

'What did she do then?'

'Turned round and gave chase, at times they were both touching a hundred. As you know that road is notoriously dangerous today, it was ten times worse sixteen years ago!'

'What happened?'

'As I said, Kate was driving. She was about four hundred yards behind the Escort; she'd lost a lot of time turning the Capri round in the narrow lane to Ambleside you see. As she approached High Newton, she'd lost sight of the suspect vehicle but she could just make out slow moving headlights coming towards her. Then, inexplicably, they stopped dead. A sixth sense, woman's intuition, whatever you want to call it, told her to slow down. She was glad she did for as she came round the first of the series of bends she saw it!'

'Saw what?' Broadbent was becoming extremely agitated with Hawthwaite's protracted narrative style.

The inspector grinned, he enjoyed storytelling and he regarded Broadbent's impatience as a compliment to his art. 'The Escort had taken those bends at something like sixty miles an hour. Dangerous to say the least at the best of times, with a wide load heading for the Barrow shipyard coming the opposite way...!'

'Bloody hell! What happened?'

'The lorry driver had obviously swerved to avoid a collision. Unfortunately the road was quite wet; the trailer jack-knifed and pushed the cab into an old beech tree at the side of the road. He must have been travelling at a fair old lick himself; although the tree stopped the lorry dead it didn't stop the steel plates. They just kept on going, cutting their way through the cab, the driver even the beech itself. As Kate came round the bend she was just in time to see the tree crash down on the remains of the cab!'

'And what of the men in the car?' asked Broadbent.

'They'd taken avoiding action by swerving up the left-hand banking. It's very steep there and they went over their centre of gravity. After landing back on the road they slid along upside down for a hundred yards, eventually ending up facing west, the direction they had come from.'

To the further annoyance of Broadbent, Hawthwaite paused again, this time to light another cigarette. 'They checked out the lorry driver first, waste of time of course, he was sat on top of the plates with his legs under them.' He waited momentarily for the anticipated expression of disgust from his listener and, not disappointed, continued. 'Then they made their way to the car.'

'You mean that they just ambled over towards the Escort, without properly covering each other?'

Hawthwaite once more held up a cautionary hand. 'The car was on fire, in fact by the time they reached it, it was well away. Too hot for them to get closer than about thirty feet and they couldn't make out whether anyone was still inside. There was nothing for them to do really, other than get reinforcements, call out the fire service and make the scene safe for other approaching motorists. They were just about to take up station to do that, one at the eastern approach, one at the western, when Kate saw John Wilson's head explode, "Just like an overripe melon dropped onto a concrete floor," so she said.'

'Christ! What did she do?'

'She didn't comprehend what was happening at first. Think about it, what would you do if my head were suddenly to explode in front of you? Not your average every day event, is it?'

The younger man shook his head with awed and terrified understanding.

'She watched Johnny Wilson's knees buckle, staring at him as he collapsed onto the floor. Then, suddenly, she'd joined him. Something had hit her in the chest, no noise, nothing, just a blow to the chest as though someone had hit her with a sledge hammer. For a moment she simply lay there, in shock I suppose. She was in a lot of pain too but as it turned out she'd not actually been shot, not as such anyway.'

'I'm sorry, sir, I don't think I follow.'

'The bullet had hit her pocket radio, in the NiCad batteries of said, to be precise. That's what saved her. However, in doing so it had rammed the thing into her chest, breaking a couple of ribs. One of those ribs had punctured her lung; therefore, naturally, she thought she'd been shot. It was then that she heard the laughter.'

'Laughter?' Broadbent sounded confused again. 'Who in God's name was laughing?'

'Well, Kate said it was more of an insane giggle rather than a laugh. As I said earlier, the RS Two Thousand was on fire and by this time it was blazing like hell itself. Just after she heard the giggling she saw a man walking towards her, quite slowly and silhouetted by the flames. Her first instinct was to raise her weapon which, oddly enough, she'd managed to hang onto. Then she saw the sub-machine gun the man was holding, a Sterling Patchet, very accurate, very, very silent! She decided that as he was already covering her, discretion was the better part of valour. She just lay there and let him come on.'

'Who was he?' asked Broadbent.

Hawthwaite's expression now changed to one of intense hatred. 'Sean Liam O'Malley, better known to his friends, and enemies alike, as – Doctor Sean O'Malley; a complete psychopathic killer and fucking nutter extraordinaire!'

'Doctor?'

'A nickname acquired due to his penchant for the chain saw; you see he was an amputation specialist. Most of his ilk kneecapped as a punishment, or used a drill. O'Malley preferred to leave them something more permanent to remember him by. Or should I say remove something more permanent? Dependent upon the gravity of an offence he would take a hand, an arm or a leg. But he always boasted that he was never a thief and sure enough, a few days later, the severed limb was delivered back to the home of the victim; usually via the unwitting services of the Royal Mail!'

'Good God, that's, that's...that's sick!' by now Broadbent was beginning to feel quite ill; Hawthwaite noticed.

'You all right, lad?' he asked.

'Yes...yes, I'll be all right, sir...but tell me, was he IRA?'

'No, they wouldn't have him, he was too much of an individual, wasn't a good fit into a team. So he and his brother started up their own little band of friendly assassins specialising in attacks on economic and political targets in mainland Britain. Special Branch thought that he'd probably been doing a recce at Windscale on the night of Jack Hoagan's murder.'

'Windscale?'

'The former name of Sellafield – the nuclear re-processing plant.'

'So what happened to Kate...I'm sorry, DCI Hoagan?' Broadbent was anxious to hear the end of the story.

'O Malley came and stood over her, teasing her with the machine gun. He pointed it at different parts of her body, making as though he was about to shoot, then changing his mind. As I said he was a nutter, he was just playing with her; you know, on some kind of power trip. Kate knew she was finished; she just lay there staring up at him, looking at his hideous eyes. They were illuminated by the blazing car, "black and evil they were," she said. She still has nightmares about those dreadful eyes to this day.'

'Did he speak to her?'

Hawthwaite shook his head. 'No. he just giggled, insanely, all the time.'

'How long did this go on for?'

'She can't remember, she said that it seemed like hours, but...in a situation like that, putting a time on things is difficult. I suppose it probably wasn't more than a couple of minutes.'

'What saved her?'

'There was a very loud bang, like a gunshot. The investigation team thought at the time it was probably a burning tyre exploding. Anyway, whatever it was, it distracted O'Malley for a crucial couple of seconds. He was standing side-on to the car and as he turned, instinctively, towards the sound Kate just took her opportunity; she brought up her Walther PPK and emptied the magazine into him. She's a damned good shot is Kate; seven times she hit him...in the back, and as he fell he dropped the Sterling onto the road, causing it to discharge a round into his leg. The bastard had loaded it with dum-dum bullets and the round nearly blew it clean off!'

'That was ironic,' observed Broadbent.

Hawthwaite nodded thoughtfully. 'Yes lad, you'll find there are lots of ironies in police work.'

'You said there were two men in the car, what happened to the other?'

'Burnt to death, a fitting end for a man who had the blood of over a dozen people on his hands; he was also thought to have been responsible for the attempted bombing of an Army barracks on the mainland.'

'And Jack Hoagan was dead?'

'Oh yes, O'Malley shot him three times with a handgun. He was DOA at Barrow Hospital, I'm afraid.'

'I thought you said O'Malley had a silenced machine gun?' said Broadbent.

'As well, he used a Browning High Power on Jack, blew his face away with it.'

'God! How did Mrs Hoagan take it?'

Hawthwaite leaned forward in the chair, his face intense. 'She didn't; at first she wasn't told, she was quite ill you see. Not just from the punctured lung, she'd got some sort of poisoning from the fabric of her uniform. She was in quite a bad way for about a week or so, delirious, hallucinating. Effects of the poison so they reckoned; then, as she slowly recovered, she started asking more and more for Jack.'

'Who told her?'

'Her father, felt he had too in the end, she was behaving very strangely.'

'In what way?'

'She was what they call hyper vigilant, you know, wouldn't sleep, always on the alert. Then when she did sleep she had the most terrifying nightmares; she'd wake in the early hours screaming for her husband. She also became extremely depressed because she felt guilty she had not died along with John Wilson.'

'What happened when her father told her the bad news?'

'Her condition worsened, she tried to kill herself...twice. Told everyone that she was worthless, blamed herself for never once thinking that the policeman who had been shot in Ambleside might be Jack. She was also being heavily questioned by officers from a visiting force, about the incident.'

'Why, when she was so ill?'

'Simple, an offender had been shot in the back, by a police officer, seven times! O'Malley had also arrived in the mortuary in instalments!'

'The severed leg?'

'Indeed, but above all other things that focussed the attention of the House, O'Malley was gunned down by the brand new widow of the man he himself had butchered not half an hour earlier!'

'Of course,' said Broadbent, 'so the matter was actually raised in parliament then?'

'You bet it was; there was a fair left-wing element in the Commons in those days.'

'So what happened, how did she eventually manage to get over it?'

Hawthwaite shook his head. 'She's never got over it; I don't think anyone can fully recover from something as traumatic as that. There were two main events that helped her on the road to recovery. The first was the arrival on the scene of a guy called Jim Warner, a former major in the American Army Medical Corps. He was over in the UK on a reciprocal exchange with one of our blokes. Warner had seen service in Vietnam and the Middle East, with the Israelis, as an advisor or something. Anyway, he was an expert in battle shock and its effects and after his first session with Kate he diagnosed PTSD.'

'Sorry?'

'Post Traumatic Stress Disorder; in nineteen ninety-seven he was probably one of the very few psychologists in Britain who was really into its causes, effects and more importantly how to treat it. Anyway, he was the business; he stopped the harmful interrogations immediately and started doing what should have happened much earlier.'

'What was that?'

'Basically, letting her talk herself out of her depression; he allowed her to convince herself that whatever she was at odds with herself for was a load of bollocks. Took a long time of course but he more or less got there in the end.'

'You said that there were two things,' said Broadbent.

Hawthwaite smiled now. 'Yes, ten weeks after she had lost Jack and killed O'Malley, she discovered she was pregnant. Fortunately, the poison did not affect the child.'

'Jack's?' asked the young PC, foolishly.

'Of course it was Jack's,' Hawthwaite sounded indignant, 'Mary Hoagan was born on Christmas Day.' He laughed quietly, suddenly becoming more reflective. 'Mary Hoagan...ugly little brute she was, but as pretty as a May morning now. Yes...fifteen years ago,' he shook his head, 'seems only five minutes at times.'

'Obviously she was cleared of unlawful killing then?' asked Broadbent.

'Oh yes, the press would have lynched the sods with any other finding. They made her a national heroine; I mean, you can imagine the headlines in a case like that, can't you?' Hawthwaite became serious again. 'However, there was one man who vowed never to accept the findings of the police enquiry.'

'Who?'

'One, Michael Daniel O'Malley, Sean's twin brother; he swore a vendetta against her. Threatened that no matter how long it took, he would personally find her and kill her. He needn't have made that threat; the O'Malley's are a large, incestuous family of militant lunatics. Sean had four other brothers and two sisters, any of whom would have been only too happy to have done the deed.'

'So why didn't they?'

'Fear and respect; fear of Michael and respect for the fact that they were supposedly devoted twins, therefore it only seemed right that he should have the satisfaction of the revenge. Undoubtedly, of the two of them, Sean was by far the most evil and quite the maddest, but Michael had had his moments.'

'Has he ever tried to carry out his threat?'

'No, fortunately he, personally, has not had the chance. He was banged up for attempted murder in...oh...it must have been nineteen seventy-three, The Judge recommended he serve, at least, twenty years.'

Broadbent did the calculation. 'That's up this year! Isn't she worried?'

'No, we'd been after Michael for some time. He was pencilled in for a number of other offences, including murder, but we hadn't enough evidence to make it stick in court. Now the State have him under lock and key he should rot there for the rest of his life; especially with the vendetta against Kate still in place. Mind you, she carries her own personal weapon with her at all times, just in case. Has a permit from no less a person than the home secretary himself!'

'But she's never had to use it?' asked Broadbent.

'No and let's hope she never does! You are very fortunate working with DCI Hoagan, lad, she's one of the best in the business. A good boss to work for, approachable, fair, up-front etc., but not someone to take the piss with; she gives the job a hundred percent and expects everyone else to do the same.'

The telephone suddenly burst into life, quickly returning both men to the present and Hawthwaite looked quizzingly at the young PC. 'Well – get on with it lad, get on with it, see who it is.'

2

Monday April 19, 1105

Little Haythwaite, Cumbria.

The girls giggled their way across the large lawn at the front of the college until, eventually, the tallest one, red-haired and attractive, turned to the only male in the group.

'Where do you want us, Timothy?'

'This will do fine, Bec',' he replied, 'under this big tree, the lighting's just right.'

'What sort of a tree is it?' asked someone.

'A wooden one,' said the tall, red-haired girl and everybody laughed.

The girls joked and chattered, watching as the good-looking male photography student began setting up his equipment.

The session lasted just over an hour, the girls taking it in turns to pose, first fully dressed, then in the bikinis they had been wearing underneath.

The location the photographer had chosen was only a few yards from the main road. Passers-by, mainly men, frequently and unashamedly stopped to admire the bodies of the young women and throughout the session, one of the girls would comment on the appearance of yet another, openly lecherous, middle-aged male leering through the college boundary fence.

Oddly, none of the models saw the young man in the large, blue van; parked on the main road. He too, like the student, was feverishly taking photographs.

*

Rebecca Standish sat alone under the huge chestnut tree. She was worried about her next essay and knew she would still have to put a lot of work into it if she was to achieve a good grade. That was why, that lunchtime, she had not gone into town with her friends.

'Excuse me.'

Rebecca looked up from her textbook, squinting slightly in the bright, afternoon sunshine. The speaker, she thought, to be about twenty-three, good looking with blond hair to the shoulders; the large, gold earring in his right ear suggesting a hint of interesting non-conformism and only a raggy, badly-trimmed moustache, spoiling the generally pleasing, overall image.

'Yes?'

'I wondered if you could help me?' he spoke well, gently, educated yet boyish. 'I'm afraid I'm lost.'

Although Rebecca had put her skirt back on, she felt his dark eyes removing the bikini top she was still wearing. Surprisingly, she didn't mind, the stranger seemed so gentle, kind; it also helped that, now she had studied him more carefully, she considered him to be classed as – seriously attractive.

She stood up, noticing immediately he was a good four or five inches taller than herself and she began to admire his lean and powerful body. Yes, yes, she thought, here was the sort of man she could definitely get to know better.

'Where do you wish to get to?' she asked.

'Relton,' he replied, 'there's a quarry there; I have to deliver something.'

'Relton Quarry?' Rebecca looked confused. 'That closed down years back.'

The man shook his head. 'It's been re-opened – a few weeks ago.'

Rebecca was thoughtful for a moment. Her studies were boring, Relton Village was on her way home; her only lecture that afternoon was economics – even more boring. 'Look, I can show you where the quarry is and then you could drop me at home, if you like?'

Rebecca bent to pick up her text books. 'I'll just pop back into class and leave a message for my friends. They might wonder where I've gone.'

The man looked concerned. 'Err...I don't think I've really got the time to wait,' He looked across the large lawn; the nineteenth century college building was nearly a quarter of a mile away.

Rebecca shrugged. 'Okay, it's no problem; I told everyone I may go home early to work on my essay anyway.'

*

'There it is,' said Rebecca, 'I'm sure it's still closed, there's no sign to say it's back in use.'

The driver shook his head. 'I can't understand it, the address on the despatch note definitely states – Relton Quarry. Look, the gate is open; shall we drive in and have a quick look?'

Rebecca considered the question; David had so far been great fun, not like most of the immature college boys she knew. It was a pleasant afternoon, and much better than sitting in a stuffy lecture theatre. 'Why not?' she agreed, smiling.

The access road to the old quarry was a good mile and a half long. They saw no one for the whole of the journey, only grazing sheep and the occasional rabbit that, startled by the unusual presence of a motor vehicle, hopped quickly out of their way.

Eventually, the driver stopped the van in the middle of the vast, deserted, lunar landscape and shook his head. When he spoke his voice was tense, nervous. 'Looks as though you were right,' he acknowledged. 'The place must have closed down years ago.'

It was at that moment Rebecca heard his breathing become and she turned, quickly, to discover why. She found her new companion was smiling at her but the smile terrified her for the eyes, which before had seemed kind and warm, were now black, seemingly fathomless, and quite, without pity. Childlike, in a naïve and futile attempt at self-delusion and in complete denial of the awesome tragedy she now knew she had a starring role in; she feigned ignorance. 'Are you all right?' She asked the question as though a child; concerned she had somehow hurt one of her playmates in fun and did not wish to be in trouble as a consequence.

The eyes gave her the unequivocal answer! A waterfall of panic now engulfed and began to drown her. She tried to open the van door but it was stuck firm. She tried again, forcing down the handle, pushing against it, heavily, with her shoulder. She was sobbing violently now, consumed by an overwhelming feeling of loneliness; desperately wanting to be back with her friends, back under the chestnut tree, laughing and joking.

The driver moved towards her, fumbling for something unknown behind her seat. Now Rebecca began to scream, her blood-chilling, unheard cries echoing again and again off the cliff-like walls of the old, isolated and long-abandoned quarry. She turned away from the door now, ready to claw, bite and kick; but even in her blind and total panic he was still smiling!

The blow, to the back of her head, brought welcome blackness and as she slumped, comatose, the man lifted her out of the passenger seat and placed her on the black, plastic sheet in the back of the van. Quickly, he then cut away her clothes with a razor-sharp knife and began to fondle her pert, firm, young breasts. A few moments later, Rebecca awoke to find the man gently bathing her face with cold water. Instantly, she realised she was naked; was it all over now? Had he finished with her, done whatever evil thing he wanted to do to her? Would he let her go home now, home to Glen her pet dog and her parents and friends?' She tried to move but a blinding, sickening pulse of agony knifed through her head and she collapsed backwards onto the sheet, weak from the effects of sheer terror and appallingly agonising pain.

Carefully, he lifted her head and cradled it with his left arm. Equally carefully, he eased the nylon twine about her neck. At last the eyes of his victim opened, staring – terrified – pleading; now he could tighten the noose, now he could listen to the croaking, feel the struggling body weak against his own as its resistance to him slowly faded. Eventually, beaten and defeated, the girl once again lost consciousness.

The man looked at his watch; he had another hour before he would have to leave. Perhaps he would be able revive her twice more before a final strangling. Then he must drive back and smuggle her corpse into the flat. He had learnt much from the first girl but he was enjoying this killing far, far more. He smiled, still unable to come to terms with how easy and enjoyable it had been!

He pushed her head back to open the airway before putting put his red lips against the purple of the girl's. Then, slowly and methodically, just as he had been taught in first-aid class, he began to blow life-giving air into her, almost empty, lungs.

*

Hoagan eased herself off Trevarrick and collapsed back onto the bed. She reached across to the bedside cabinet, found the cigarette box, lit two and handed one to her lover. She could never come to terms with the fact that he only ever smoked after sex and her thoughts led to a wry smile; he still smoked heavily, nevertheless. She propped herself up on an elbow, watching him as he rested, running an interested and gentle hand through the soft corn of his of his thick, yellow hair. Hair matted with sweat after the exertions of the past hour.

His blue eyes studied her in turn and he grinned, put an arm around her shoulders and pulled her to him. 'How's the case going?' he asked.

Hoagan frowned. 'Thanks, Bill, after a really good shag you ask me about work; have you never heard of the afterglow effect?' Trevarrick shook his head. 'Well, believe me, you've just blown it away,' she admonished, while snuggling closer to him. 'Anyway, as you've asked I don't know why, but I've a bad feeling about it.'

'How do you mean?'

Hoagan was momentarily silent, thoughtful. 'I don't think the Wastwater girl is going to be a one-off.'

'Why'?

'Because it has all the hallmarks of a sexually motivated killing; and, if I'm right, history tells us that these guys don't kill once. After the first time they keep on and on, it's as though they feed off it.'

'Have we had similar cases in Cumbria before?'

She shook her head. 'Not many, in fact we have very few in the whole of the UK – thank God. Murderers such as this are notoriously difficult to catch. They often strike at random, invariably the only motive being sexual. They can kill four or five even a dozen people before having a quiet spell. Then, suddenly, the urge comes back and off they go again.'

'Haven't you got any leads at all?'

Hoagan blew a cloud of smoke towards the open window. 'Only sperm, Forensics came up with zilch, we had a zero return on the fingertip search of the area and nobody has seen a bloody thing. That gives me one hell of a problem.'

'You're waiting until he strikes again?' said Trevarrick.

Once more Hoagan was silent. 'I'm afraid I am, but if you want a small wager then I'll bet he won't take long about it. We don't even know how many he's killed already. By putting the body in the deepest lake in England he probably thought she'd remain undetected forever.'

'How deep is Wastwater?'

'About two hundred and sixty feet.'

'So how come the divers found her, amateurs can't go down that far, can they?'

'She landed on a shelf, ninety feet down. Matey Boy dropped a clog!'

Trevarrick stubbed out his half-smoked cigarette. 'Do you think he's local?'

'Don't know; most people do know that Wastwater's a good place for dumping something you want to hide. Corpses have been found in there before.' She leant across him, reaching for the ashtray and he toyed with one her nipples.

In turn, Hoagan's hand searched for him and she smiled when she found him ready. 'I do hope you realise that at this rate you'll end up a chain smoker – with lung cancer!' They both giggled, loudly.

One of Trevarrick's neighbours, repairing a fence after the winter gales, heard Hoagan giggle. He shook his head despairingly, if only he had a glamorous job. He reached for another piece of wood; why couldn't he have been a police helicopter pilot? The women Trevarrick had had, in the twelve months he had lived there! The neighbour shrugged with resignation and started hammering again.

Saturday, April 24

Ulpha, the Duddon Valley, Cumbria, 0550

Arthur Beckton, farm labourer of thirty years, drove the Land Rover over the cattle grid. After the heavy rain, the previous evening, the morning was dry but misty and he knew that until the sun began its work, mist would continue to cling, eerily, to the slopes of the fells. He shivered involuntarily, the dampness making him feel cold.

Suddenly, something made him glance to his left, up the fellside. He rubbed his eyes, were they playing tricks with him? He looked again, there was someone sat there, propped against a rock. Impossible, he thought for, whoever it was, was naked! He pulled the Land Rover into the side of the road and started to climb. All the while convinced he was approaching a dummy; a dummy placed there for the entertainment of some of the local Young Farmers. It would be just like them to have a laugh at his expense. Yes, they would be around somewhere, hiding, enjoying their little joke!

Beckton was twenty yards from his goal when he realised the Young Farmers were not having fun. With only another five to go he started retching.

*

The man wept openly, kept on his feet only with the support of Hawthwaite and one of Hoagan's constable's. 'Yes...yes...' he sobbed, 'that's, Rebecca, that's our little girl.' He looked at Hoagan, his eyes those of a despairing, broken man. 'How could anyone do such a thing, Mrs Hoagan – how?'

Hoagan was experiencing a kaleidoscope of different emotions, anger, frustration, helplessness, pity. She shook her head, trying to think of something to say to this shattered, decent, human being but...there was nothing she could say. She held his hand, patting it, as she had often patted her daughter's when, as a small child, she too had been hurt.

Two minutes later, as they led him out of the police mortuary; she thanked God he had only seen the girl's face and had been spared the sight of his daughter's mutilated body.

*

'Virtually the same MO as the Wastwater girl,' said Dawson. 'Including the same peculiar signature,' he pointed to the markings on the calf.

'You said "virtually",' observed Hoagan, 'what's different.'

'He may have tried to have an encore this time, Kate; you know, make the fun last a little longer.'

Hoagan stared at him icily. 'No I don't know; what are you talking about?'

'There's evidence he strangled her at least twice before finally killing her. The ligature has been repositioned; that's unusual; probably resuscitated her so he could have the pleasure of doing it all over again!'

'Jesus Christ!' said Hawthwaite. 'Have we got one here?'

'What else?' insisted Hoagan.

'She was hit on the head, possibly with an engineer's ball-pein hammer. The blow stunned her and whilst hard enough to crack the skull, it did not immediately kill her. She definitely died from loss of breath.'

Neither police officer found the pathologist's sick humour amusing. 'Is that it?' asked Hoagan. 'What about date of death?'

'Early this week I'd say, Monday, Tuesday. When was she reported missing?'

'Monday,' said Hawthwaite.

'That's about right then,' Dawson started to unroll his gloves. 'You'll have my full, written report in due course. Now – if you'll excuse me, I've an appointment with your chief constable at the golf course.

*

'What do we know then?' Chief Superintendent John Richardson looked at Hoagan across the desk. His shrewd, grey eyes, seemingly permanently fixed on her own. Richardson was fifty-four years old, the wispy remains of his almost white hair and classic, male pattern baldness, testament to the fact. He also knew that they had problems.

'Precious little, sir,' Hoagan looked at her notes. 'The Wastwater girl still hasn't been identified. Personally I think she was on the game, although only eighteen she was dosed-up with syphilis and herpes; a cocaine addict, in poor health and seriously underweight. As with the second victim, sexual intercourse took place before death. The thing that surprises me is we've no record of her with Missing Persons. Her prints and description have been circulated to all UK forces, no criminal record, nothing – it's as though she never existed.

'What about the latest girl?'

'Very similar MO, apart from a serious head wound, he probably knocked her unconscious to prevent her struggling too much. Oh...there were bruises to her left upper arm and shoulder, as though she had been trying to open a door.'

'A car door?'

Hoagan shrugged.

'What about background?' asked Richardson.

'Totally different, here we're talking about a middle-class teenager. Parents are both school teachers, the girl was studying for a diploma in business studies. The sort of daughter every mum and dad dream of having, bright, happy, popular and beautiful. From what I can gather, having spoken to her friends, she was a great person to be with.'

Richardson sipped at his coffee, thoughtful. 'So, Kate, where do we go from here?'

'To-date the only thing we've had of any use to Forensics is a sample of his sperm. Thoughtfully, he left us another one in the latest girl. Blood tests give a match and we're running a DNA on both of them.'

'Fingerprints on the body?' asked Richardson.

'No, the Wastwater victim had been too long in the water. Rebecca had been washed, well-washed.'

Richardson raised his eyebrows. 'Washed?'

'That's right,' said Hoagan. 'A few smooth glove prints – that's it.'

'This guy either reads a lot, or he's very bright.'

'Both.'

'Tell.'

'He spirited that girl away from college as though there was only the two of them left on earth. That needs balls and cunning.'

'Another thing that doesn't gel about this case is the two totally different approaches to corpse disposal.' said Richardson. 'I mean, with the Wastwater girl he went to great lengths to sink her where he thought she'd probably never be found. Yet he left Rebecca where he could guarantee she'd be seen, almost as soon as it started getting light!'

'Don't ask me to explain that, sir, I'm not a psychiatrist!'

Richardson nodded his balding head. 'No – but I'm sure there's something significant in my point. How about bringing in a forensic psychologist?'

Hoagan looked unimpressed. 'I've already had the services of two astrologers offered; I'm not sure which I prefer. The last time I had any dealings with a shrink we arrested a guy on suspicion, he fitted the projected profile like a glove.' She smiled sardonically. 'The victims had all been repeatedly raped, over a period of hours by a lone maniac. When we stripped him, for forensic evidence, one of the lads asked him where he kept his tackle.'

'Ah yes!' Richardson smiled, memory returning, 'the man who was badly wounded in Aden – very difficult!

'Very bloody embarrassing,' qualified Hoagan. 'We're probably the only force ever to arrest a dickless man for rape!'

*

Hawthwaite stopped the Cavalier by the railings and Hoagan offered him a cigarette. He lit it before starting to climb out of the car.

'Wait,' said Hoagan.

Hawthwaite eased the door to. 'What's the problem?'

'Just look,' she said quietly. 'Just take a minute, John and look.'

The huge sports field of St. Martin's college was alive with students. Laughing, running young men were kicking a football. Groups, scattered at random on the grass, worked on projects, revised for the June exams, made a mess of their homework. On the footpath, next to their car, a procession of eighteen to twenty-three-year-olds made their way into town. Their laughter suddenly silenced as they walked past the chestnut tree.

'How, John? How the fuck did he manage to spirit her away from here without a single person seeing it happen?'

'He must have known her.'

Hoagan looked at him. 'Did he? Did he know the Wastwater girl as well?'

Hawthwaite pulled on the cigarette. 'How else, I mean somebody must have seen something.'

Hoagan shook her head and opened the car door. 'Let's take a closer look.'

They walked up the large drive then turned off the tarmac, onto the grass, and towards the giant tree. A handful of people, mainly students but not all, stood underneath the magnificent new foliage. No one sat propped against its gnarled trunk today, the ancient timber had become a shrine, a focal point of anguish, a symbol of both fear and remembrance.

As they approached, a middle-aged woman laid a wreath of spring flowers against the three or four dozen already in place. She rose, crossing herself and sobbing. The mourners sensed rather than saw them coming, they turned as one, staring, unfriendly, mistrustful. Hoagan produced a warrant card and she smiled, gravely, understanding. 'My name's Hoagan,' she began, 'I'm heading the hunt for Rebecca's killer, were any of you people her friends?' The tension eased, palpably, and Hoagan was pleased she had not produced a press card.

A red-haired girl stepped forward out of the psychological protection offered by the group. 'I was, but I've already given a statement to the police.'

The girl was probably nineteen, eyes as red as her hair through crying. Hoagan put a motherly arm around her, cuddled her as though she were Mary. 'What's your name, love?' she asked gently.

'Sally,' said the girl, once again tearful.

'Were you one of the girls doing the modelling for Timothy that day, Sally?'

'Yes,' Sally was sobbing now, her tears blackening Hoagan's navy dress.

A chaffinch, feathers bright, walked tamely around Hoagan's feet. Generations of students had fed the chaffinches under the chestnut tree, until a week ago.

'Listen Sally, I don't want another formal statement from you, I just want to try and get to know Rebecca. It could be important, so will you help me?'

Sally eased herself away from her and looked at the policewoman, baffled. 'Will it help catch the horrible person who did this?' she asked.

'It just might,' said Hoagan, gently. 'So – will you help me?'

Sally glanced down and saw the chaffinch and brightened. 'Of course I will,' she said, 'of course I will.'

*

David Douglas Benson, put the newly purchased plastic box on the workbench. He looked at the neatly arranged tools on the walls of the garage, then at his list.

Five minutes later, having placed everything he thought he would need on the bench, he began packing them in the box; meticulously ticking each item on his piece of paper. There were six in all; a small, ball-pein hammer, a length of nylon twine, Stanley knife, scissors, a pair of mole grips and the sticking plaster he had brought from the house.

Finally satisfied, he locked the garage door and drove, happily, to work.

*

'Useless,' said Hoagan. She moved away from her desk, leaving Hawthwaite poring over the photographs.

'What were you hoping to find?' he asked.

Hoagan stared out of the village hall window, her temporary murder HQ. In Lendale, the ewes were still heavy with lamb and two of them grazed, peacefully but noisily, less than four yards from her window.

She turned back into the room, angry, frustrated. 'I don't know, John, really I don't. I just want a clue; you know I was hoping against hope that he might have been accidently photographed, but of course he hasn't.' She looked at him, helplessly.

'Don't let this get to you, Kate,' he cautioned. 'As you well know this could be a long enquiry.'

Hoagan sat down, wearily. She looked at her deputy, eyes sore with concentration and too many cigarettes. 'Are you saying I'm becoming too emotional?' He remained silent. 'There's going to be some fucking emotion when he does it again, John,' she continued. 'And the terrifying thing is I know he's going to do it again and again and again, until we finally stop the bastard!'

*

The solicitor watched his grey-haired, late middle-aged client study the carefully compiled documents he had brought for him. At last the man looked up from the papers and as he removed his glasses, smiled, cynically. When he spoke the brief, who was totally new to the case, remembered his initial surprise at noting there was scarcely any trace of his client's ancestral accent.

'Do you think they'll go for it?'

'Yes I do,' said the lawyer, 'as my colleague told you, the question of a release, against the wishes of the local review committee and the parole board, would normally be a non-starter. However, as you've just read, you have a number of things going for you.'

'How much credence is the appeal court likely to put on your new evidence?' asked the prisoner.

The solicitor removed his own spectacles and proceeded to clean them with his handkerchief. He spoke slowly, matter-of-factly, knowing the man was hanging on his every word. He smiled, inwardly; he loved nothing more than a captive audience, where better than a prison to find one? 'I would say that a few years ago your chances would have been extremely slim. However, in recent times the British legal system has taken a significant beating with one flawed conviction after another being thrown out by the Court of Appeal. Therefore, we have to put your own case into perspective, into the context of the current, socio-political climate.'

The legal man paused and he studied the face of the listener, seeking assurance he was capable of understanding what was to be a somewhat technical argument. The prisoner remained inscrutable however, his dark-brown, almost black eyes, boring into those of his advocate's and compelling him to continue.

The eyes were unnerving the brief; he knew the prisoner had once enjoyed a reputation for being extremely dangerous. Perhaps, he considered, this was not a client to pose in front of too much. 'Well...' he continued, hesitantly now, 'my firm feels that the secretary of state will look at our case favourably. That is, when we present him with the alternative of yet another acutely embarrassing appeal. Indeed, we are convinced that they will regard it as something of a fait accompli. You see, you have already served over twenty years, if you count the time on remand before your trial. They could, at a pinch, legitimate it on that alone. Then there's the Anglo-Irish Accord to consider. A humanitarian gesture, at this time, would perhaps be seen to have a useful political knock-on. The British Government are desperate to reduce troop numbers in Ulster, the more sympathetic Dublin are to Whitehall's plight the greater the cross-border co-operation etc., etc. Also, the so-called "special relationship" between the UK and the USA is no longer quite as firm. With a less approachable regime in place in the States and with the president being lobbied by a powerful, pro-Irish faction...' The solicitor held up his hands.

The man looked confused. 'If both the local review committee and the parole board have said that I'm unsuitable for release, surely the home secretary has to abide by that decision?'

'Not in the case of a non-national who is to be deported. You must understand that most of the conditions, normally applicable to a British subject, are irrelevant to you.'

'How long will it take?' asked the man.

'Oh, a matter of weeks, we have some very influential friends in extremely high places; that's what your friends are paying for!' The solicitor laughed, nervously. 'There is one other point I would like to take up with you...if you don't mind?'

His client remained impassive making the brief feel uncomfortable. He was receiving none of the usual, grateful enthusiasm to which he was accustomed; in fact, this man was being positively hostile. The interaction was undermining his confidence, making him question his whole self-concept, a situation that was ridiculous. He straightened up in his chair; he must be much more assertive with this client. 'In nineteen seventy-seven you threatened a vendetta against the woman who killed your brother; indeed, amongst other factors, this was a major consideration of both the LRC and the parole board in their rejection of your case. Without question, this item will be raised by the home secretary and therefore we must have an answer in place. So – where do you stand on that issue now, Mr O'Malley?'

The man's eyes suddenly turned to dark ice, the pupils pin-sharp. He was silent for a full minute, his face a mask of ambiguity and during all of that time he stared, unwinkingly, at the prison officer leaning disinterestedly against the wall in the far corner of the interview room. Then, slowly, he bent forward and in a hushed voice, for the first time the accent he had learned as a boy in the slums of Dublin clearly evident to the listener, he began, very carefully, to speak.

3

Monday, May 3, Bowness-on-Windermere, Cumbria

The unusually long fine spell had lasted, unbroken, into the third month of spring. Thousands of Bank Holiday fun-seekers had cursed up the M6 Motorway; leaving the drab of town and city, to play for a day in England's most beautiful national park.

Bowness had been invaded by t-shirts, shorts, trainers and ice cream guzzling children; gift shops heaved with anxious grandmothers, screaming toddlers and a plethora of different tongues. On the vast lake, windsurfers competed with yachts and sailing dinghies, all anxious for a share of the gentle, inadequate breeze and young people from London swept past them, their water-skis gouging foaming anger out of the calm, blue waters of the ancient lake.

The police officer put down his camera and watched the BMW begin to move towards the car park exit. For a moment he merely observed the little brown teddy bear in the rear window, bouncing up and down on a piece of thin elastic. As the bear disappeared right, onto the main road, the policeman started the van's engine.

*

'Let's stop here,' said Sharon West, 'they have a special picnic spot, we can have our lunch.'

Rachel Clarke nodded, indicated right and pulled into the Forestry Commission car park. Under tall larches, half a dozen empty cars were shaded from the early afternoon sun. The property of walkers, concluded Rachel.

The blue van stopped directly behind them. Rachel saw it in her mirror and was about to become abusive when she saw the driver. 'Shit!' she said. Her friend looked now.

Both girls watched as he came to the passenger door window. He was hatless and in shirt sleeve order. Sharon thought he seemed to be in his early twenties; he was also exceptionally good looking, his uniform suiting his dark, typically close-cropped, hair.

'Yes, officer?' said Rebecca, nervously.

The policeman smiled. 'Are you here on holiday?' he asked, gently.

'Yes,' said Sharon, 'why?'

The policeman forced his eyes away from her large breasts, caught up in a shirt tied at the waist. 'I'm on a special information patrol. We've had a spate of murders in these parts lately, some areas have been declared dangerous for young women to be on their own.' He paused momentarily, for effect. 'So, with a killer loose in the park, I and some of my colleagues are on a public information exercise.'

'Oh...that sounds nasty,' said Rachel, 'you'll protect us though – won't you, officer?' Both the girls giggled and the policeman smiled.

'I have a display of large maps in the back of my vehicle showing areas to avoid. Would one of you like to have a look?' He grinned and the grin was a winner.

'I'll look,' both girls spoke at once.

The policeman shook his head. 'I have a problem there, you won't both fit in. One of you will do.'

Rachel almost leapt out of the car. 'I'll look; I am the driver after all!' Sharon watched, peevishly, as her friend disappeared with the hunky policeman and she turned the radio on, loud.

*

Ten minutes later the policeman's face reappeared at the window, anxious, concerned. 'Can you spare a minute, your friend's not well. I think it may be the heat.' Sharon nodded, immediately climbing out of the BMW. She thought Rachel had been a long time.

They walked to the back of the van, Sharon at first finding it odd that the windows were so dark. The policeman opened the door and Sharon, looking for the large maps, could only find Rachel lying on the floor of the van; but why did she have sticking plaster on her mouth! Terrible realisation as to the appalling answer to her question hit her at precisely the same time as the hammer! Sharon's knees buckled, she felt sick, her hand-to-mouth reflex informing her that most of her front teeth were broken. Instinctively, she raised her hands protectively above her head but they too splintered under the irresistible might of the terrible hammer. The third blow, heavier, and delivered with much more force, killed her instantly!

*

Two hours later James Westbrook, his wife Marcia and their two grandchildren, returned from their walk. It was Marcia who commented on the BMW; the passenger door was wide open, as though someone had left in a hurry.

*

The patrol car swept into the Grizedale Forest picnic area, the driver stopping behind the Forestry Commission Land Rover. He nodded to the forest ranger then went straight to the BMW. Amazingly, although the door was wide open, nothing appeared to have been stolen and the car radio was playing pop music. He did not touch it; he did not touch anything.

*

Hoagan watched as the two Alsatians worked the car park. Suddenly, one of them stopped, four yards behind the BMW. The handler bent down to see what the animal had found so interesting then, satisfied, looked at the chief inspector.

'Looks like blood, ma'am!'

Hoagan and Hawthwaite walked over. The ground was quite rocky at that point, in places faintly stained to a rusty, coppery hue.

'Thank you,' Hoagan said to the handler. She turned to Hawthwaite. 'Get SOCO to take some swabs and see if you can find out what the missing girl's blood groups are.'

*

They watched the vehicle carrier leave the picnic area, the BMW lashed to its ramps. In the back window the little brown teddy bear still bounced up and down on the piece of elastic, but it was lonely now.

John Richardson leant against Hoagan's car. Without even the hint of a breeze, curls of blue pipe smoke rose slowly into the young foliage of the larch above him. 'Who put out the alert?' he asked.

'The mother of one of the girls, sir,' said Hoagan. 'She promised to phone home last night, when she didn't the mother got worried. She telephoned the guesthouse in Langdale, where they were supposed to be staying. When they'd not arrived by midnight she phoned us. The forest ranger found the vehicle, thought it had probably been stolen and rang the local nick.'

'What made him suspicious of the car?' asked Richardson.

'Apparently a couple found the vehicle seemingly abandoned, with a door wide open and the radio on,' said Hawthwaite, 'they notified the park rangers by telephone.'

'I wonder if he knew these two girls, as well.' Hoagan sounded unusually sarcastic.

Hawthwaite stared at the ground for a moment, not knowing quite what to say. 'You definitely think it was Matey?' he managed at last.

'No doubt about it, John, I can smell him.' she replied flatly. 'Two of them this time, what the hell is he going to do for an encore?'

Richardson screwed a knife deep into the bowl of his pipe. 'Judging by the amount of blood on the ground he attacked one of them in the car park. Not his style to date, I mean, it's a bit messy.'

Hoagan looked at him, sadly. 'He hasn't perfected his style yet, sir; he's still serving an apprenticeship.' She looked across the now quiet picnic area, scene of so much happiness over the years. Her parents had brought her there for picnics as a child. She in turn had used the place with Mary.

She shivered, the temperature was dropping. Tomorrow the weathermen had promised lots of what the Lake District was good at providing – rain. 'We must get a warning out on national television. I'm not naive enough to think that we can stop him, but the public have a right to know about the risk to their safety.'

'That'll please the tourist trade,' observed Hawthwaite.

Darkly, Hoagan moved towards her car. 'Bollocks to the fucking tourist trade.'

*

'What exactly is your message for the public, Chief Inspector?'

Hoagan turned from the presenter and looked into the camera lens. 'In the past few weeks two young women have been found brutally murdered in Cumbria. Two more have disappeared. Whilst every available police officer is working on the enquiry, at this stage we have to say that all women, in the Cumbria area, must consider themselves at risk until the perpetrator, or perpetrators, are apprehended.'

'Do you think there is a connection between the murders and the disappearance of the girls at the picnic spot?' asked the presenter, obviously enjoying the tabloid sensationalism of the interview.

Hoagan chose her words carefully, she could see the headlines in the morning press, hear the phones ringing at HQ. 'Until we are convinced otherwise I am making that assumption.' She had said it now; she was in a no-win situation, say nothing and be flayed alive by the press later. Say something and be castigated by vested-interest for sensationalism.

'Is there any way the public can help the police with their enquiry?' asked the presenter.

'Yes, there are a number of areas where the public can be of assistance. For one thing, anyone who was in the Grizedale Forest area yesterday or today, we would ask them to come forward, especially if they remember seeing the red BMW. Secondly___'

David Benson switched off the television and smiled. He picked up the mole grips and the plastic apron that he had wiped clean earlier. Then, whistling softly, went back into the bedroom to carry on with his work.

*

Arnold Monson manoeuvred the lorry into position, the arms of the lift straddling the skip. As the lorry came to a standstill his friend and colleague, Charlie Fox, jumped down from the cab to affix the lifting chains.

Arnold turned on the radio, wanting to know if the atrocious weather of the last few days would continue. The radio was old and had to be tuned manually, with care. He had just found the local station when the face of his friend appeared at the side window. At first Arnold thought Charlie was ill, the man had turned white and his whole body was shaking, as though with fever or...fear!

Arnold opened the driver's door. 'What's the matter, Charlie?'

Charlie wanted to tell him, but couldn't. Instead, arm still shaking, he pointed anxiously towards the skip.

*

The noise was deafening as the heavy rain hammered, ceaselessly, on the temporary awning and the almost gale force wind tugged, angrily, at the nylon structure. Hoagan watched as Dawson completed his notes, any other time she would have been delighted to have seen the arrogant medic waist deep in garbage, not today though, not like this.

Dawson climbed out of the skip, aided by one of the scenes of crime officers. He peeled off his rubber gloves, dropping them into a plastic bag held by his assistant.

He looked tiredly at Hoagan and Hawthwaite. 'The first girl appears to have been dead for over a week. First guess is she suffered fatal blows to the head with what looks like a hammer. Some of her fingers have been broken, probably as a result of trying to defend herself. She has severe facial injuries, a broken jaw and a number of teeth have been shattered. She may have turned at the wrong time as the killer was aiming at the back of her head.'

'That was Sharon,' said Hoagan, 'she would have been the passenger, she couldn't drive. It looks as though she was probably killed at the picnic spot.'

'If she was, she was lucky,' observed Dawson. Hoagan looked at him, thinking she had never seen the medic so badly shaken. 'The second victim died yesterday.'

'Are you sure about what you're saying? asked Hoagan. 'Both girls disappeared on the third of this month, that's nearly ten days ago!'

Dawson eyed the policewoman aggressively.

Instantly, Hoagan knew she said the wrong thing to the ever-touchy perfectionist and she held up a hand. 'Okay, okay, sorry, that was a shock reflex.'

Dawson nodded, the atmosphere in the small tent was charged. 'What do you want to know first, what he did to her before he killed her, or how he killed her?'

*

Detective Superintendent John Richardson quietly filled an aged briar from a significantly older leather pouch. Over the door, of the newly decorated office, a quartz clock ticked symbolically and without looking up from his task, the Cumberland and Westmorland head of CID began to speak.

'I've had a long talk with the chief, Kate,' he began, quietly. 'We can't go on like this; the guy is taking the piss to some significant and quite unacceptable tune!'

Hoagan nodded, she been nodding for the past half hour, every time Richardson had commented about a detail of the four cases to date and the contents of the latest pathologist's report. Richardson continued. 'In the States they have had maniacs who went on to kill more than two dozen times. Often they're only caught by sheer good luck or because they get careless. We can't afford to wait for this bastard to get careless. Apart from anything else, unlike the Yanks, we haven't got the population.'

A flicker of a smile crossed Hoagan's face; it seemed Richardson's inborn, dry cynicism never left him. She knew he was right though, Dennis Nilsen murdered at least fifteen men, only coming to the attention of the police when he unwittingly blocked the drains of his flat with pieces of cadaver. Peter Sutcliffe, the notorious Yorkshire Ripper, helped himself to the lives of thirteen women and only a routine enquiry by uniformed police officers, observing known areas of prostitution, stopped him going on to fourteen, or fourteen dozen.

Richardson was lighting his pipe now, the culmination of a ritual Hoagan considered akin only to a Japanese tea ceremony. When he had finished with the matches he peered at her through the haze. 'So, Kate, we've decided to ask for help.'

'Not the bloody Met, sir?' Hoagan was sitting up now, suddenly much more interested. 'We don't need any poseurs clumping round Cumbria in size fourteen city boots. This is a rural area; they'll be like ducks out of water here. I remember how they strutted round Derbyshire, when we were there during the miners' strike; most of them used to ponce around like dogs with two dicks!'

Richardson knew his chief inspector, knew that any professional detective guarded his or her cases most jealously. He could understand how asking for help smacked of failure, an inability to cope. He now had the task of selling his idea to this most talented member of his staff. Hoagan would work with whoever he told her to work with, but he wanted her full co-operation. Without that he knew that he may as well not bother. 'I have spoken to the Met, Kate.'

Hoagan's chin thudded onto her chest.

'But not for homicide support from their CID. I've asked them to recommend the name of a mindhunter!'

Hoagan was confused. 'Sorry, sir, I'm not with you.'

'It's a buzz word for a psychological offender profiler. The Americans are into it in a big way. Seems they look at the MO of the offender and come up with a profile of the murderer. Where he's likely to live, what his occupation is, what sort of background he comes from, etc., etc.'

Hoagan sneered. 'I take it they arrive complete with crystal ball?'

Richardson smiled. 'The Met have recommended an American, a Doctor Emilia Taylor. She's a lecturer in behavioural science at the University of the Southern United States, Texas. She's also worked with the FBI on five different serial killings and from what I am told – she is the business.'

Hoagan lit a cigarette, she was looking extremely unhappy. 'You know my views about this, sir we discussed them only the other week.'

'I know, Kate and I do understand. But you must accept that that was years back and we used a British profiler. The American's have been in this game for over twenty years. They have enormous expertise and of course they're learning all the time.'

'Why can't we at least use a Brit?' asked Hoagan, 'Surely we've got someone half-decent – by now?'

'We have, but there is no one available. I do know that one is recovering from a heart attack and won't be available for at least three months. Another is___'

'Don't tell me,' said Hoagan, 'the other is in the States!'

Richardson laughed. 'Yes, yes as a matter of fact he is, on a lecture tour.'

'Amazing,' Hoagan smiled sardonically, 'so when is Emilia going to arrive and astound us with her clairvoyance?'

'She arrives at Manchester Airport tomorrow, on the early Heathrow shuttle. I've arranged for a driver to collect her, she'll be with you by lunch.'

Hoagan stood to go. Richardson had one last cautionary word. He was unmistakably serious. 'Kate, I want you to give the American your full co-operation. This case is getting seriously out of hand; you must run with her all the way, do I make myself clear?'

Hoagan picked up her bag and looked at Richardson's face, earnest, dedicated. 'If she wants a large pot, herbs toad's legs and essence of weasel shit then she'll get them. Believe me; I want to catch this bastard more than almost anything I've wanted in the whole of my life.'

Richardson watched as the door closed behind her and struck yet another match; for some reason he couldn't concentrate on his pipe that day.

Manchester

There were three women, two in their early twenties; the other the customer put at around thirty-seven, thirty-eight. He chose the older one. There was a small sign on her desk which read 'Mrs Joanne Kirkby'.

'Good morning,' he smiled, pleasantly.

The woman glanced up from the computer screen and found herself looking at a tall young man in his twenties, his jet-black hair cut fashionably short. He was exceptionally good looking and his dark eyes, dancing with warmth and intelligence, were looking at her – interestedly!

'Oh...hello?' Joanne, although not unattractive, was, she accepted, not one of the world's most glamorous women and yet, and yet somehow, this customer seemed to flatter purely by the way he looked at her. 'Can I help you?' she asked.

'Yes, my name's David Benson, I called in a few days ago, to discuss rural properties. He produced a data sheet, glued to which was the photograph of a farmhouse. 'I wondered if someone could show me around. I'm free right now, if that is at all possible?'

Joanne Kirkby took the paper from him and keyed the first ten letters of the address into the computer data base. Benson watched as the simple statement 'UNSOLD' flashed up on the monitor.

'Yes,' she smiled, admiring his expensive antique leather coat, 'the property is still on the market, so yes, we could go now, if you wish?'

'Fine, I have the whole day free, perhaps I could buy you lunch afterwards?'

Joanne looked awkwardly at her two younger companions. 'Err...well...we'll see how the time goes, Mr...?'

'Benson,' he helped.

'Yes, sorry, Mr Benson, it's quite some way you know, well out into the country. But if we have time...' She looked smugly at the younger women before once again returning her attention to the 'Greek god'. 'I'll get my coat and car keys.'

'We'll take my Porsche', Benson volunteered, 'it's right outside.'

Joanne disappeared into the private staff area. She returned a few minutes later, her companions immediately noticing the freshened make-up and newly-brushed, red hair. They looked at each other knowingly, giggling quietly, jealously.

'Right then,' she stood in front of her desk, clutching a raincoat, her green eyes soaking up Benson's Hollywood grade features.

As they moved towards the door, one of the younger girls called Joanne back. 'Yes?' she asked, impatiently.

'Shouldn't you ask him for some ID?' whispered the girl. 'You never know who you're dealing with these days. You know the standing instruction on solo house visits with men.'

Joanne looked maternal. 'Look at him, he's hardly the type to be a rapist or a murderer, now is he, Penny?'

Penny shrugged her shoulders. 'I don't know what the type is, Jo, I do know I don't want to find out though. At the very least you should ask for some ID off super-poseur and tell us where you're going.'

Joanne looked pained, as she had often done with her own children when they were young and too demanding. 'Okay, I'll compromise,' she acceded, before hastily scribbling down the address of the farmhouse on a piece of scrap paper.

*

Benson looked around the large kitchen, the low-beamed ceiling pleased him, as did the traditional tiled floor. He did not like the Aga however; being too much of a modernist he instantly decided that that would have to go. He looked through the Georgian style kitchen window. 'How near is the next dwelling?' he asked.

'Nearly half a mile,' said Joanne, 'it is very remote, is that a...' she hesitated. 'Is that a problem for you?'

Benson shook his head. 'Oh no, in fact that's ideal for my purpose.' He turned away from the window and began undressing her with his eyes. He had done it earlier and he knew she enjoyed it. 'Could I see the outbuildings now please?'

'Of course,' said Joanne. She led the way outside and Benson followed, taking the opportunity to admire her legs.

There were three outbuildings and Benson seemed most interested in the oldest of them. It was stone-built; in places the walls were nearly three feet thick and apart from a couple of small ventilation holes, it was windowless.

Joanne noticed that he seemed more interested in the outbuildings than the residence. 'This is an eighteenth century construction Mr Benson, very solid, good for another two or three hundred years.'

Benson smiled on hearing her stereotypical 'estate agent speak' and he nodded. 'Yes...yes I agree with you. Are the owners still asking two hundred and fifty thousand?'

'They are, but that includes the two acre paddock and the garden itself is three quarters of an acre.'

Benson was thoughtful. 'How long has it been on the market – at the current price?'

'About a month, they dropped it two thousand.'

'Tell them I'll pay two-forty – cash.'

Joanne Kirkby breathed deeply, if her client accepted, this would be her first major sale for over a fortnight. The recession had taken a significant toll of her commission during the last couple of years.

'Right then,' Benson made towards the door, 'you must let me buy you lunch to celebrate.'

Joanne followed as he went into the sunlight. Unhappily married to a selfish, macho police officer, she would have much preferred to have gone to a hotel with him, even if he was a number of years her junior.

Later, in the car on the way back to her office and after an excellent lunch, she asked him why he was so interested in the outbuildings. For the first time that day she seemed to have asked a question that shook his self-assured composure and, for a fraction of a second, he lost his air of total self-confidence. Surprisingly, Joanne did not notice.

'It's...it's some research I'm thinking of carrying out.' He replied, dismissively.

'Connected with your job?' Joanne was inquisitive.

'My hobby,' Benson looked at her briefly, his eyes smiling, once again confident.

'Oh, what's that then?' she asked.

Benson was thoughtful; then he grinned. 'Listen, Joanne – you don't mind if I call you, Joanne do you?'

'No,' she said positively.

'When I get the place all fettled up, I'll make a definite point of showing you. I'll probably be having a party to celebrate anyway.'

Joanne relaxed back into the comfort of the reclining sports seat. That was something she would look forward to.

Benson kept his eyes on the road, but he was thinking of Joanne, in the outbuilding. She would look nice in there when he had completed the alterations and had moved in the equipment. Yes, he was pleased he had chosen someone who vaguely knew him as his first guest; that would make the exercise much more fun!

May 14, 0920, the Home Office

'Good morning, Charles, take a seat, how are we today?'

Charles Greer, lean and pale to the point of cadaverousness, sat in front of the massive, walnut desk. 'Fine thank you, minister, how are you?' he replied.

The Right Honourable Nicholas Ranby MP, latest beneficiary of the last dramatic re-shuffle of a now tired and discredited government, smiled. 'Well...I suppose that very much depends on what you are going to say to me, Charles.'

Greer walked around to the minister's side of the desk and began spreading out papers. 'We have a number of considerations this morning. The Chief Constable of Devon wishes to increase his establishment by three percent. Manchester and Salford want to discuss more emergency funding. As you know, they've recently had a riot with a police officer murdered. Cumberland and Westmorland are also bidding for special funding; they have a major hunt on for a serial killer.' Greer shuffled quickly through the rest of the papers. 'The rest is rather routine stuff really, that is with the exception of the O'Malley case.'

Ranby picked up the dossier entitled 'Michael Daniel O'Malley'. 'What's this all about?'

Greer resumed his seat. He looked at the still youthful, moustached face of the forty-five-year-old minister. 'It's about his review for release; this is a particularly complicated case so perhaps it would help if I gave you an overview, first?'

Ranby nodded. 'Yes do that, but for God's sake don't make it too technical; remember I've only been in office for a week!'

*

Ranby put down the papers. 'Well, in view of what you tell me, it all seems rather straightforward. Now let me see if I have understood you. The man is clearly dangerous; although he has served out the tariff of his discriminatory life sentence, he has at least a dozen other serious offences, some of them murders, pencilled in against his name. The man is withdrawn and uncooperative, as such the LRC and the Parole Board are unable to assess how he may behave, once released back into society. There is also the consideration of this so-called vendetta, against the policewoman who killed his twin brother.'

Greer smiled; his new boss was unquestionably bright; he already had experience of how quickly he grasped facts. 'Yes, sir; I think you've summed up the case, against release, extremely well.'

Greer's tone indicated that there was something not yet said; something that, so far, he had not been told. Ranby looked at the man, eyes questioning. 'Do I take it there are factors in favour?'

The civil servant eased himself into a more comfortable position in the chair. To-date, he had been perfectly frank with the minister. He had discussed all the conventional attributes that had to be considered and given the formal position of the two main review boards. That had been easy, what was to follow would be the hard part. He reached into his brief case, producing a new set of documents. 'A few days ago I was approached, informally, by a firm of solicitors acting on behalf of O'Malley's family.'

Ranby nodded and waved the speaker on. 'A few weeks ago they were approached by the O'Malley's; they claimed to have evidence that Michael's original conviction may have been flawed.'

'In what way?' asked Ranby.

'As you are now aware, in 1973 O'Malley was given life imprisonment, for the attempted murder of the then chancellor of the exchequer. The recommendation, at the time, was that he serve at least twenty years.'

Ranby nodded.

'The main thrust of the prosecution case, at time of trial, was a confession that he supposedly made to the police. In it, he stated categorically that he planted the bomb under the minister's private car with the intention of murdering him. The police maintained throughout that his confession statement was verbatim, made without duress and completely voluntary.'

'That seems rather an odd thing for a terrorist to do,' said Ranby.

'At his trial O'Malley pleaded not guilty, insisting that the police had beaten the confession out of him. Of course we are talking about 1973 now. British policemen were decent honourable types then; it was inconceivable that they could use such third world tactics.' Greer smiled, ironically. 'In fact, I think the BBC was still transmitting re-runs of Dixon of Dock Green at the time.'

'So nobody believed him?' said Ranby.

Greer nodded. 'The O'Malley's have shown Michael's confession to two highly respected forensic linguists; people used in UK courts as expert witnesses. They are categorically convinced that the police were lying. The whole document uses Standard English with no trace of dialect; this is impossible if the statement were really verbatim. At the time of his arrest, O'Malley had a strong Dublin accent; he always spoke in the vernacular. The syntax of his sentences also suggests that he was responding to questions, rather than speaking freely.' Greer stood up and handed the linguists' depositions to Ranby.

'Well, yes,' began Ranby, 'we've had occasion to consider appeals, against conviction, in similar circumstances before; but this new information, on its own, is unlikely to convince their lordships that the original conviction was flawed.'

Greer produced more papers from his briefcase and spread them on the minister's desk. 'These are Photostat copies of ESDA impressions.'

'ESDA?' said Ranby.

'Electro-Static Detection Apparatus,' replied Greer; 'used for the examination of indented impressions. As you know, if you write on one piece of paper with a ball point, you will indent the paper beneath it. This device is designed to pull up those indentations, electro-statically. The writing is formed using toner powder, on a piece of Mylar; it is then preserved with clear sticky tape.'

'Most impressive,' said Ranby. 'Now you mention it, I have read about the technique before.'

'What you see before you, sir, are copies of witness statements; witness statements that were never brought to the attention of the court at the time of O'Malley's trial!'

For the first time that morning Ranby looked confused. I'm sorry, Charles, I don't think I'm following.'

Greer picked up one of the better Photostats and placed it in front of Ranby. 'The writing you can see was taken from a piece of paper, a piece of paper lying under the original that was physically written on. What is recorded there, is the actual manuscript of what was written on the sheet above it.'

Ranby now studied the documents closely. Both statements were by women, dated April 1972. In each case the witness was adamant that on the night O'Malley had supposedly planted the device he had been tucked up in bed with them, both of them. The women had English surnames and lived in London.

'Why were these witnesses never brought to the attention of the court?' he asked.

'I don't know, sir but I do know that both women were killed in a car crash, some ten months before his trial.'

Ranby suddenly looked worried. 'That seems rather unfortunate, for O'Malley.'

'Or fortunate for the prosecution, sir, depending on your perspective.'

'You're surely not suggesting___'

'No – no, I'm not; however, as I said, these statements were in place well before the trial. The death of the two women should not have prevented them from being read to the court. I have seen the transcript of the trial, they were never produced.'

'How did you say the women were killed?' asked Ranby.

'High-speed blow-out on the M-One; according to their sister, they received a telephone call from a man claiming to be a journalist. She claims he asked them to meet him at a service area near Rugby. Said he was interested in the case and that he had information that may be of use – in their fight to clear Michael's name.'

'I take it he never came forward?'

'No, sir.'

Ranby shook his head. 'Who confirmed that the car had a blow-out?'

'The police.'

'That was convenient, for the police I mean.' Ranby looked thoughtful. 'How did the O'Malleys acquire the indented papers to have the ESDA test carried out?'

'Couldn't say, officially the originals never existed of course, I've confirmed that with the Met. The O'Malley's do have significant funds behind them and they could have paid someone, on the inside, to do some serious rooting. The indented papers will contain statements concerning other, completely unrelated people and crimes. That's what would give them authenticity in a court. Before being written on they would effectively have been blank sheets you see. All someone with access to archives would need would be a date to give them a starter.'

'You say the O'Malleys have "significant funds". I take it this money comes from unlawful activities?'

'Not all of it, we think some came from America. To many wealthy Irish Americans, any vehicle they can use to have a go at discrediting the British State is good news. They treat cases such as this as a cause celebre! If they win it reinforces their anti-British perspective, it's also good publicity for future fund-raising campaigns in the States.

'Are you satisfied that the statements are genuine?'

'Yes,' said Greer, 'apart from the sister, there are other members of both families willing to testify that the handwriting and signatures are genuine.' Greer started shuffling the papers again. 'The O'Malley's have also acquired the services of two graphologists. These are their depositions.'

Ranby cast the briefest eye over them, before sitting back in his chair. He watched Greer retake his own seat. 'Okay Charles, amaze me, what do they want?'

'It's quite simple, sir, they want O'Malley out.'

'Or they go for an appeal?'

'Exactly.'

'Hmm, the release, on appeal, of a man who's been unlawfully imprisoned for twenty-one years, possibly for political reasons, would go down like a lead balloon with our ally across the Pond. At the moment we're trying to make the Americans more amenable to terrorist extradition so something like this blowing up in our faces could set us back ten years. To say nothing of aggravating the already, almost impossible task, of getting suspected bombers out of Eire.'

Briefly, Ranby studied some of the papers Greer had left on his desk. 'What about O'Malley's vendetta against the Cumbrian policewoman?'

'Apparently he's quite angry that that is still being held against him. I'm told he maintains he only made the threat in a fit of pique. An emotional outburst of grief and frustration made at the time of his brother's death, they were twins after all. He has not repeated the threat since and he's categorically insisted that his family take no unilateral action against her.'

'Am I right in saying, that as O'Malley is a non-national, he would be immediately deported on release; also, that, if necessary, I can sign his release against the recommendations of the LRC and the Parole Board?'

'That is correct, sir.'

Ranby made some notes then looked at his under secretary. 'Apart from yourself, who else in the department knows about this?'

Greer smiled cynically. 'No one, O'Malley's lawyer came to me direct.'

Ranby now also smiled; but this was more the self-satisfied smirk of the conspirator. 'I don't see any medical reports here, Charles,' he observed.

Greer was confused. 'I'm sorry, sir?'

Ranby pointed to the papers on the desk. 'I can't find the medical officer's report, you know, the one about O'Malley's serious heart condition strongly recommending urgent release on medical grounds.'

Understanding suddenly hit the civil servant. 'Oh...yes...yes; I'm sorry, of course; I'll get on with that right away.'

Ranby waited until the door had fully closed behind his aide before he picked up the telephone and began to dial a number.

4

Dr. Emilia Taylor was a slightly overweight, thirty-seven-year-old. Five-feet five inches tall, dark-haired, pony-tailed and only moderately attractive, she made a sophisticated use of make-up to enhance her less than striking appearance. In line with Hoagan's stereotypical expectation, she wore denim jeans and a rather baggy, light blue sweater, under which was a blue-checked cotton shirt. She also sported an expensive pair of Reebok trainers.

'Welcome to Cumbria,' said Hoagan, offering her hand as the American entered the small, Lendale Parish Council committee room that was currently serving as her office, 'I'm Kate Hoagan.'

The two women shook hands before Taylor turned to the PC who had driven her from Manchester Airport. 'Thank you,' she said, smiling.

Hoagan found the academic a seat, thanked the driver herself and after shutting the door settled herself behind her desk and began studying her newfound ally, carefully. The mindhunter, she thought, looked tired. 'I take it you had an enjoyable journey, doctor?' she asked.

'Tiring but yes – thank you; by the way, call me Emmy.' Hoagan nodded, she was a little surprised at the American's accent, it was nothing like as strong as she had expected. She offered her a cigarette. 'No thanks,' said Taylor; 'gave them up years back. Err...I take it my baggage will be okay, left it in the trunk of the police car?'

'No problem, when you're ready you'll be taken to your accommodation, may as well leave it in the car for now.'

'Where have you checked me in?' she asked.

'The Grey Goose, at Broughton, it's a sixteenth century coaching house.' Hoagan paused, suddenly concerned. 'I take it that's all right? I mean you didn't want a stuffy hotel, at least that's what your admin people thought.'

Taylor grinned, broadly. 'That sounds just fine, I enjoy English pub life. As you say, hotels can be so impersonal and really stuffy. I had the dubious pleasure of staying in one in London last night.'

Hoagan looked at her watch. 'It's getting on for twelve, are you ready to eat?'

'Try me,' confirmed Taylor.

Hoagan stood and moved towards the door. 'Good, then you're in for a treat. There's a cracking little pub in the village, they do the most amazing steak and kidney pie. As she held the door open for her guest she asked how much notice she had been given about her trip to England.

'Oh...about twenty-four hours, I guess,' replied Taylor.

'Good God!' exclaimed Hoagan.

'Often goes with the territory I'm afraid. My kids call me the "flying shrink"!

They both laughed, Hoagan was beginning to like the American already. She was relaxed and informal, lacking the edge and superior attitude often present in some of her British counterparts.

*

Hoagan had invited Hawthwaite to join them and as the trio tucked into the fine food offered by the inn both officers quizzed Taylor about her background. They discovered that she was a Bostonian, her mother English, her father a Texan oilman. It had been her mother who had cultivated the less obvious American accent, helped by the mid-Atlantic pronunciation peculiar to New England. When she was fifteen the family had moved back to Texas where she had received her higher education; subsequently becoming a lecturer in psychology.

A mother of two boys, she had been married to a fellow academic for four years. Divorce became equally academic when she found him in bed with two of his students, both male. For the past six years she had been closely involved with law enforcement agencies as a profiler. She had been to England once before but never the Lake District, an area she insisted must be one of the most beautiful places on earth. As the coffee arrived, Hawthwaite asked about the history of profiling.

Taylor spooned an unhealthy three lumps of sugar into her drink and nodded, thoughtfully. 'Yes, most people ask that. Sophisticated profiling, as we know it today, really started in the early nineteen seventies. It was an FBI agent, a seriously switched-on guy, who decided to carry out in-depth interviews with mass murderers. He went from jail to jail, often in his own time, chatting to them, trying to understand them, attempting, I suppose, to get into their minds. He collected a lot of useful data and when his superiors got to know about his activities they took the line that rather than stiff the guy they would fund him to continue.'

Hoagan laughed derisorily, she looked knowingly at Hawthwaite. 'I can see that happening over here.'

Taylor shrugged. 'I think you have to put things into perspective. If my memory serves me right, you have around eight hundred homicides a year in the UK?' Hoagan nodded. 'Currently, in the States, we have around twenty-four thousand!'

Hawthwaite whistled through his teeth. 'That's some murder rate!'

'Exactly, it's also, highly political. Therefore, you could say that the substantial investment into profiling was politically expedient.' She paused and looked keenly at her host. 'Isn't that precisely why I've been brought into this case?'

Hoagan nodded. 'Yes.'

'Anyway', continued Taylor, 'from that initial data base the FBI have over seven thousand cases on disc. Everything we know about a killer is now put on file. His age, education, IQ, method of operation, how he killed, how the bodies were disposed of, his family background, the list is almost endless. They get requests for help not only from all over America but from many foreign governments as well.'

'How exactly do you work?' asked Hawthwaite.

Thoughtfully, Taylor worried the edge of a chocolate mint wafer with her incisors. 'Police officers, like yourselves, tend to work in a top-down mode.' She looked at her hosts, sensing their confusion. 'You go to the scene of a crime and work backwards from it, from the top down if you will. You are looking for clues, anything that will give you a lead as to the identity of the perpetrator. An MO that's the hallmark of a known criminal; forensic evidence, a hair, cigarette end, foot print etc. The nearest you often come to thinking about the mind of the criminal, is when you ask about motive.'

'That's traditional policing,' observed Hoagan.

'Of course,' agreed their guest, 'and nine times out of ten it works. But when you do that, when you look into the mind of the criminal and ask what motive he or she had for committing the offence, you are then working from the bottom up. From what motivates the perpetrator to commit the actual offence itself. However, when you have a killer, operating in an apparently totally random way, whose only motive appears to be sadistic, sexual or both, you have a problem. Invariably, unless he's noticed by someone or he leaves Forensics with something that can be traced back to him, or very nearly back to him, he's snowed you.'

'So how do you work?' asked Hawthwaite.

'We look at everything you look at, forensic evidence, the crime scene; the idiosyncrasies of the killer, what we would call his signature___'

'How do you mean "signature"?' asked Hoagan.

'The precise way he murders his victims and treats the body post-mortem. For example, some killers remove something, let's say a breast, they retain it as a trophy. It keeps their fantasies alive; it's something they can masturbate with as they relive the pleasure of the killing. Many such murderers even keep photographs or more commonly, nowadays, video recordings; they perform very much the same purpose.'

'Yes,' began Hawthwaite, 'that ties in with our___'

Taylor held up a hand. 'Please, John,' she began, forcefully, 'don't tell me anything about the cases I'm going to be studying here. It's vital I keep a totally open mind, until I've personally seen all the facts.'

'Oh...sorry,' Hawthwaite reddened, embarrassed.

Taylor smiled. 'I didn't mean to offend you; it's just the way I like to work.'

'It's okay, I think I understand.'

'Anyway, the basic idea of profiling is the use of the database. Clearly, it's not going to tell you who actually carried out the homicide. But it can give you a good steer as to the type of person involved. We ask questions such as. "Who is this guy? Where's he from? What's his background? How does he earn a living?" In other words we are going from bottom to top; as I said, not the name of the individual, but the type of individual.'

'What sort of profile can you come up with?' asked Hoagan.

'Depends very much on data availability and our own experience; maybe the social class the guy comes from. We still tend to be most at ease with people from our own socio-economic class. We can identify with them; we often share a common background with them. A killer who predominately preys on the middle class may well come from the middle class himself, however he may be merely making a statement to himself and those whom his crimes affect. In the case of multiple murderers that means society writ-large of course. Racial issues are relevant – whites tend to kill whites and vice-versa. How organised is the murderer? Is he highly organised, planning his killings down to the last detail? Or does he make lots of mistakes; like leaving plenty of forensic evidence around for you to ultimately nail him? This can be indicative of age, experience and the guy's IQ. We do know, from the results of analysing the backgrounds of many serial killers, they often had a disturbed childhood, maybe missing out on a suitable significant other'

'I'm sorry?' said Hawthwaite.

'Role model,' qualified Taylor. 'Someone he could look up to, identify with, to learn moral and social values from. They may have been abused, not necessarily sexually. Many of them perceive the world to be a hostile place, they consider themselves marginalised, even rejected by society, therefore they feel free to prey upon its members. They are often loners, maybe never having had a close sexual relationship with a female, or if they have, it went drastically wrong. So they begin to fantasize, they masturbate to pornography and their imagination. The problem is, the longer it goes on the more the fantasy takes over, so much so that eventually it can become their reality. Invariably they become incapable of having deep, interpersonal relationships; so as soon as they are threatened they escape back into the world created by their imagination, their comfort zone if you like.'

'So they exist in a world they understand, by creating it themselves?' asked Hoagan,

Taylor nodded. 'Yes, simplistically that's quite a useful way of understanding them. It's a vicious circle; they can't get close to real people, so they invent scenarios. They clearly find their fantasies easy to live with because they can control the imaginary actors who live in it.' Taylor paused, suddenly extremely serious. 'Control is the key word; it's not just about them understanding their world, they want to control it. Once they step into the "real world" they usually have to kill their victim to be in control.'

'What do you mean by "usually"?' asked Hoagan.

'The sadist will torture a victim until he or she conforms to requirements. They may well kill them later; perhaps the victim falls ill through abuse or the perpetrator just tires of them. They cannot allow them to return to society for obvious reasons, so they have to be destroyed.'

Hawthwaite looked confused. 'You mean the sadist may not torture just for the sake of inflicting pain, that he may use pain and fear in order to achieve control over the victim?'

'Exactly,' said Taylor. 'Once the victim conforms, for example becomes a sex slave, there is no need for further violence from the perpetrator. He has what he wants – control!'

'So he's not really a sadist then, in that he may not inflict pain solely for the pleasure of it. It's simply a vehicle to achieve a means to an end?'

'Yes, Kate,' agreed Taylor, 'that may be the situation. But of course individuals, as we all know, are different; we cannot put everyone in the same box. There are genuine sadists about who derive great pleasure from torturing people. They may not wish to use force for any reason other than the knowledge that what they are doing is painful to someone else. At the end of the day though, it is still a form of control. To inflict pain, or not to inflict pain is their choice, they control it; they have dominance over a victim who may be desperately pleading for pity.'

Hoagan studied the American carefully; she had been extremely dubious about bringing her onto the case. However listening to Taylor for the past half hour had made her realise that she was very much like herself, every inch a dedicated professional. On the other hand, however, whether she subsequently accepted Taylor's findings was a different question altogether.

'So you base your profile on a sort of law of averages?' said Hawthwaite.

Taylor inclined her head and shrugged. 'Err...I guess you could say that, in a loose sort of way. We psychologists still like to think of ourselves as scientists you know. We would be inclined to say that we derive our profiles scientifically; from reliable and factually based empirical data, obtained using a strict methodology.' She noted the look of complete bewilderment in Hawthwaite's face and smiled, apologetically.

Hoagan, who also had a degree in the social sciences, albeit politics, could sympathise with her deputy as he struggled with Taylor's lexicon; she softened the blow to his ego. 'We'll both stick with averages, John. Provided Emmy can help us it won't matter how she comes up with the goods, or what she calls it when she does.'

Taylor looked at her watch, it was one-thirty. 'Well thanks for the lunch, but if you don't mind, I think I'd better get back to your office, I have a lot to look at. By the way, I'll need an IBM compatible computer and a modem.'

'No problem,' said Hoagan. 'May I ask why?'

'Because I've been given permission to access the FBI mainframe in Atlanta,' she replied, 'provided you're prepared to release all details of the killings to them.'

Hoagan was surprised. 'I'll have to clear it with HQ but I can't see a problem with that.'

'Good,' Taylor's brown eyes were now bright with the anticipation of the hunt, 'well – let's get to it then – shall we?'

*

David Benson picked up the telephone. 'Yes?' he said, quietly.

'Mr Benson?'

'Speaking.'

'Jo Kirkby here, Scafell Estates.'

Benson smiled. 'Hello, Jo, got some good news for me?'

Joanne sounded excited. 'Great news, your offer's been accepted, two hundred and forty thousand pounds.'

'That's good,' Benson sounded pleased. 'I now want you to put my house on the market.'

'Great,' she replied, 'I'll get someone to come round and get the details.'

'When?'

'This afternoon, around four, we have a man in the area; I can contact him by radiophone.'

'That's good, thanks for your help, bye.'

Joanne sounded disappointed that he was terminating the conversation so quickly. 'Okay then, bye.'

Benson put the phone down and walked into the lounge, smiling. In a few weeks time Joanne would be seeing much more of him than she could ever imagine.

*

'Bloody hell, it looks as though the bastards have really stitched us up!'

'Yes, prime minister, they've certainly done their homework.' agreed Ranby. 'The snag is, it looks very much as though O'Malley himself was on the receiving end of some pretty fancy needlework, back in seventy-two and three!'

'I don't think we have any option quite frankly,' said the prime minister, throwing the dossier onto the desk. 'I mean, even if the appeal went our way and I wouldn't like to bet it would in the current climate, we'd still have the British justice system being compared to that of some third world fruit-based economy.'

'Exactly my point,' interrupted Ranby, 'either way, an appeal would be most damaging. It would give Irish republicans, all over the world, ammunition for a decade!'

The prime minister looked confused. 'What I can't understand is why they don't use this. I mean, as we've just agreed, whichever way the dice were to fall they win points for the Cause, we lose!'

'O'Malley is fifty-eight years old; an appeal could take another couple of years, especially if we filibuster. O'Malley's people know that and from what I can gather, speaking to the governor of Britannia, he's become an old man; prison has exhausted him, dried him out. He has grandchildren he's never seen and a mother who's sliding downhill fast. He knows that if he doesn't get out soon he's going to die inside, psychologically at least.'

Ranby walked over to the window and for a moment watched one of the gardeners defy the heavy drizzle as he trained a climbing rose up one of the boundary walls. Then he turned back into the room, suddenly even more serious. 'I am certain O'Malley's been involved, both directly and indirectly, in some heinous crimes, including murder. However, having now had chance to look closely at this particular case, I'm virtually convinced that, in this instance, he was innocent!'

The prime minister shuffled uneasily in his chair, he did not want to hear this; not with all the other problems he had to struggle and cope with at the moment. If he were to shoot himself in the foot just one more time he knew he would become a permanent cripple. He also knew that, historically, the members of his party had never possessed a single, sentimental streak between them; they had therefore never had any time for cripples, or any other form of lame duck! So, whatever decision he took today had to be the right one and having made it he had to be Teflon-coated if he wished to survive! 'Remind me where he stands regarding the vendetta against the police officer in Cumbria?' he asked.

Ranby was fiddling with the winder on his watch. 'We have a categorical denial that he has any intentions of pursuing that threat. In his favour, he has, over the years, prevented his family and friends from attacking her; we know that from his letters and phone calls home. As I said earlier, for nearly all the time he's been banged-up he's maintained it was only a spontaneous outburst of anger; a natural reaction from any twin, whose identical sibling had, apparently, been quite brutally gunned down from behind.'

'There may be questions in the House and you said something earlier about legitimating a release.'

Ranby smiled, cynically. 'He has served his tariff, more if you count time on remand. If necessary, release due to his heart condition would be seen as a humanitarian gesture.'

The prime minister nodded, allowing himself a small, conspiratorial smile. 'Yes...yes...I must say, Nicholas, I really must say that I do like the medical touch – very, very professional.'

Ranby chuckled. 'I think you've forgotten my time in MI Five, before I became an MP. I was brought up with the ethos of always having to legitimate what was in the best interests of, "national security"!'

The prime minister suddenly relaxed. 'Of course, stupid of me to have forgotten; we are dealing with the national interest here. We could not possibly discuss, in depth, something so important in the public arena of the Commons. Yes, sign the Life Licence, Nicholas and raise a DA-Notice while you're at it!'

Ulverston, Cumbria

Hoagan parked the Cavalier, collected the bottle of Chablis and the plastic bag containing the takeaway, alarmed the car and walked up the drive to Trevarrick's front door.

She thought at first that the house seemed unusually quiet then she remembered that the force helicopter had been in action twice that day, looking for parties of people reported lost on the fells. Trevarrick would not have been long back therefore and no doubt she would find him in the shower. She smiled; he would be pleasantly surprised when she joined him; earlier she had told him, by telephone, that she would be working late and would not be able to see him.

Music greeted her as she let herself into the house and immediately her face darkened for she knew the piece only too well, knew exactly what it meant. She placed the wine and takeaway on the hall carpet and crept upstairs. Trevarrick's master bedroom was at the rear of the property and she moved stealthily towards it along the long landing, the music becoming gradually louder. The door was open and through the crack Hoagan had a full view of the bed. It was occupied by a young girl, on her hands and knees, breasts swinging pendulously as, slowly and in time to the melody, Trevarrick worked her from behind. On the dressing table stood a bottle of cheap Hock, obviously, thought Hoagan, good enough to impress an eighteen-year-old.

For a brief moment a terrible anger gripped her; an overwhelming feeling that she had been abused and betrayed. Indeed, she almost felt that the tender moments she had had with this treacherous man, during the last three months, were now tantamount to nothing more than rape. She toyed with the idea of bursting in on the lovers, making a scene, ruining their evening, probably terrifying the girl whose young, firm body, her former lover was obviously enjoying so very much.

Self-control overcame her emotions; no – she would not let this lying, deceitful ram shatter her dignity, her pride. Quietly she retreated back down the stairs, collecting the wine and takeaway before escaping into the kitchen for a think. The air was heavy with the smell of food; two microwave meal packets were still on the worktop, dirty dishes on the table. She knew Trevarrick's style; the girl was there for a session and would not be leaving until the morning.

Hoagan looked at the plastic bag; five minutes earlier she had been ravenous, looking forward to a good meal and an evening of love, comfort and moral support. Something she desperately needed at this difficult and stressful time in her career. Waves of anger once again welled up inside her as, tearfully, she fumbled in one of the kitchen drawers for the bottle opener before unpacking the, still hot, Cantonese chicken curry.

*

Hoagan stood in the doorway of the lounge and looked at her handiwork. The expensive CD player, in the corner of the tastefully and newly decorated room, stood with its disc drawer open. The CD tray now filled with curry sauce, as was the turntable and tape deck. The three-piece suite soaked in Chablis and over the mantelpiece, on the new wallpaper and written in bright, red, lipstick, the single word – 'thanks!'

She was about to leave when another idea suddenly came to her and she stopped by the telephone. It took her a few minutes to obtain the number she required but, eventually, was able to dial it. Then she placed the handset on the hall table, the metallic pre-recorded voice just audible above the sound of Trevarrick's bedroom music.

*

At ten-thirty the following morning, Bill Trevarrick came downstairs to make breakfast for himself and the young girl with whom he had shared his evening. Surprised to find the telephone off its cradle, he lifted it to his ear. A voice was telling whoever was listening of the anticipated weather conditions, for the next twenty-four hours, in Canberra, Australia. Flushed with anger he crashed the handset onto the cradle. Thinking the worst of the girl in his bedroom, he began to go back upstairs, then, something stopped him. Hesitantly now, he followed the trail of rice that appeared to start in the kitchen and lead into the lounge.

*

'Yes?' said Hoagan into the telephone.

'What the fuck did you do that for?'

'Why, Bill, you sound really angry. Had a hard night have we?' Hoagan smiled.

'Do you know, do you have any idea whatsoever how much it costs to dial Australia?'

'Certainly, about seventy pence a minute cheap rate and eighty something peak – plus vat of course!'

'A minute! A fucking minute! What time did you make the call?' Trevarrick was almost whining into her ear.

'About seven-thirty, last night,' she replied, grinning.

'Shit!' Hoagan could hear a calculator being operated at the other end. 'That's...Christ – that's over six hundred pounds! You bitch!'

'Have you added the vat, Bill?' Hoagan moved the handset away from her ear as the irate and wounded flier, in class-one martyr mode, let forth a tirade of abuse.

The Cornishman began to bring himself under control. 'I could have you arrested and charged for this you know, it's criminal damage and theft. I could ruin your career.'

Hoagan nodded. 'Yes, yes, you certainly could, but how do you think your macho friends down at the cricket club would react, when they read about the case in the papers? And what about the golf club, I hear that you're up for club captain next year, or should I say – were?'

Trevarrick growled something obscene and inaudible, then. 'I want my key back.'

'I've left it there; I have no wish to hang on to it.'

'Where is it,' he asked?'

'In the back garden, in the septic tank; I managed to raise the lid just enough to pop it in.'

'Shit!'

'Exactly – bye, Bill, don't call again.'

'Who was that mum?'

Hoagan turned to find her daughter staring at her, anxiously. 'Oh...nobody important dear,' she replied, 'excuse me a moment will you?' Hoagan ran upstairs into the bathroom and seconds later Mary heard the sound of a nose being blown.

*

'So you're selling up are you?' said White.

David Benson gave Raymond White another beer and settled into a luxurious leather armchair.

'Yes, Ray, I've fancied living in the country for some considerable time.'

White, a significantly less than bright, effectively unemployable no-hoper; gulped greedily at the beer. 'When will you be going then?'

'Oh, as soon as possible; but there's a fair amount of renovation and modernisation needs doing first, could be quite a few weeks.'

'Will you still need to borrow the flat?' asked White.

Benson was thoughtful for a moment. 'Probably, I'll let you know.'
White looked anxious and, nervously, combed his dirty, shoulder-length blond hair with his fingers. 'Are we still going to have parties?'

Benson smiled. 'Of course we are, Ray. In fact I thought we'd go out and get some women tonight, would you like that?'

White brightened; he had been horny all week. Without any real money of his own he had little prospect of pulling females unless he was funded by Benson. He could never understand why the younger man had befriended him. He was so much cleverer than himself, good looking, wealthy. He appeared to have so much going for him, yet, he was such a decent guy. Benson had bought him clothes and often allowed him a share of the good life that, under normal circumstances, he would only have ever been able to dream about.

Benson looked at his friend and, thinking how fortunate he had been to discover such a willing stooge, smiled, smugly. Indeed, when White had confided in him with his life story it was as though he had been especially reared for the role.

Raymond Elvis White had been born thirty-two years earlier, in a damp, rat-infested slum in the near centre of Manchester. His mother had been a part-time whore, part-time wife and part-time parent. His father, a huge, mainly drunken brute of a man had, by the time of his son's birth, spent most of his adult life in the Army.

The first eight years of Raymond's life were, if not happy, at least consistent. During that period his father had been stationed mainly in Germany and Hong Kong, only returning to the UK three times during the whole period. On the final occasion it was to spend two months in Colchester Military Prison. The Army had taken a dim view of his physically assaulting a junior NCO he thought had cheated him at cards.

Raymond had grown up to the sound of drunken men violating his mother's body for the price of a cooked meal. Occasionally, when he was bored, he would sit on the landing, peering into her door-less bedroom. He would watch, fascinated, as sometimes three or four customers a day came to indulge themselves with the street whore. Many of the men he recognised as he let them in at the back door, they were mainly from the local area. Once, even one of the teachers from his school came. That had made him feel important but unfortunately he was always sworn to secrecy. 'Don't ever tell anyone about what goes on here Raymond.' His mother had said. 'If the police find out, they'll take you away forever and put you in a home and you'll never see yer eld mam again!'

Raymond had heard many terrifying stories of what went on in children's homes and he had no wish to find out whether they were true. He loved his mother, despite her occasional drunken irrationalities, he felt secure when he was with her. This was the environment he had been brought up in, his reality, and having no wish to swop it for the frightening unknown, kept his mouth tightly shut.

One day, when he was five and had been attending school for a month, he asked his mother two questions. The first had been why there was not a single door inside the house, as his friend's homes had; the second had been to enquire where his long-absent father was. She told him that the doors had been burnt years ago because they could not afford coal or firewood. As regards his father, there she could not help him. She had last heard he was in Germany, but that was two years before.

One Saturday afternoon, when Raymond was eight, a man came to the front door. His mother, who was servicing a regular client at the time, had always told Raymond never to answer caller's knocks when she was working. Raymond sat on the stairs watching the diffused profile of the man through the stained, decorative square of glass. The man knocked harder; then started to kick the door. Frightened, the boy ran upstairs and did the absolutely forbidden; he went into his mother's room and dived under the creaking bed. As he did so, the sound of wood splintering came from the hallway.

Raymond's memory as to what happened after that was rather vague. He could remember the intruder shouting his mother's name and hearing the sound of movement in the two downstairs rooms. Then the footsteps began to come up the stairs. He could also remember that the bed had stopped creaking and the voice of his terrified mother wailing. 'No, Chalky! No!'

The almost naked customer also began to scream when the huge, muscular figure of William, Chalky White entered the bedroom. Raymond felt the bed lighten as someone alighted from it. He could now see two pairs of feet on the floor, one encased in bright, shiny black boots, the others, slightly smaller, covered only in stockings. The intruder said something to the man with the stockings but Raymond couldn't hear what it was, both the man and his mother were wailing so loudly. Then, one of the khaki-coloured legs was brought up quickly. The customer fell to the floorboards, his pain-racked eyes now visible to the hiding boy. He wretched violently, terror engrained into his face. He was there for only a few seconds however for the khaki-clad man bent down, a huge tattooed hand lifting the unfortunate punter up by the hair.

At that point, Raymond's memory failed. There was only one thing he could recall, later, much later as he stole out from under the, once again, creaking bed, he noticed the boots. They were no longer bright and shiny; both were now covered in a red, sticky looking substance.

The customer suffered severe fractures to his facial bones and a few broken ribs. Ex-Grenadier Guardsman William White was sentenced to three years for GBH to the man with the stockings and twelve months for breaking the nose and arm of his wife. The sentences, in the more liberal times of the early nineteen seventies, were to run concurrently.

It took a good six months for Raymond's mother to recover from her ordeal, but she never properly worked at her ancient craft again. The court, for some obscure reason had omitted to take into consideration, when sentencing her husband, the four-inch cut the belt buckle had made on her face. With her nose poorly set at an unusual angle and the bright, scarlet scar running almost the full length of the left hand side of her face, customers no longer queued at the White's back door. Those who had learned of the unfortunate treatment handed out to the customer with the stockings, were also extremely reluctant to chance their luck. 'What if Chalky should escape?' many of them had asked themselves.

The following three or four years were hard for Raymond and his mother; State Benefits allowing few luxuries for the boy. What little remained at the end of the week, subsidised by the pittance his mother made from her handful of still loyal customers, invariably going on brown ale and bingo.

Raymond was eleven when he next saw his father. It was in the dark, austere offices of a divorce lawyer the day after his father was released from prison and this time Raymond actually saw his face. Chalky White had nothing to say to his son; in fact he only looked at his boy once during the whole ten-minute procedure and even then it was with total disinterest.

Two months after the final divorce settlement, Uncle Roger moved in. He was unlike his father in two very distinct ways. Small and squat, he lacked the muscles of Chalky White and the ever-present urge to use them; also, a devout Methodist, he did not drink. Three months later, Sally White became Mrs Sally Turnbull.

Raymond soon discovered that although his stepfather treated his mother well, he hated him. Turnbull was of that breed of religious fanatic the world has consistently found so dangerous. The saving of Sally, from a life of sin and debauchery, had been a Messianic mission for the authoritarian lay-preacher. That he could succeed in saving his new wife from the devil, Turnbull had no doubt; however, regarding the less than desirable product of her loins he was less certain. Raymond, Sally had once unfortunately told him, had been born illegitimate and although she had subsequently married William, she could not honestly swear, before her newfound deity, that he was Raymond's biological father. To Turnbull, therefore, the boy came to symbolise the highly unsatisfactory elements of his new wife's less than desirable past. Illegitimacy was a finite condition, no amount of praying or renunciation of what went before could help the boy. He was, therefore, an unredeemable societal outcast and as such, to the puritanical, God-fearing Turnbull, a major embarrassment.

Aside from authoritarian intolerance, Roger Turnbull also had a darker, sadistic side to his troubled and heavily flawed personality. When Raymond did something Turnbull disapproved of, he did not hit him; he used psychology instead. As such, Raymond repeatedly found himself confined to his room on bread and water for a day or even a whole weekend. Once, during the school holidays, he was locked into his now re-doored bedroom for a full week.

Between the ages of eleven and fifteen, Raymond White never went on a holiday. His mother and stepfather did, but not Raymond. He was left to fend for himself at home, or occasionally scrounge a meal at his mother's sister's house. Unfortunately for Raymond his aunt lived in a slightly more upmarket part of the city and she discouraged such visits from the child of her poor relation, eventually banning him altogether when he was thirteen. Later, she told his mother that his appalling language and complete lack of table manners were a bad example to her own children.

Raymond left home, and school, when he was fifteen. Within six months he was serving a twelve month sentence at a borstal for burglary and theft. When he was eighteen, somewhat belatedly, he discovered girls.

His first date ended with his arrest for rape. He had met her a week earlier at a disco. Like him she was eighteen years old and, also like him, not very bright. Nevertheless, she agreed to go with him to the pictures the following Saturday. After the movie he walked her home. They stopped in a street being cleared of slums and at Raymond's suggestion entered one of the derelicts. Perhaps surprisingly the girl was still a virgin but she thought she knew exactly what to expect, after all she had seen lovemaking lots of times on the movies. Her friends had also told her how wonderful the first time was.

Three hours later the girl arrived home, sobbing, sore and feeling very frightened and guilty. Raymond also knew about lovemaking, he had watched for hours, from the darkened landing, as men had made love to his mother. He knew that to do it properly he had to be rough and that his penis could be used in a variety of ways, insertion into the vagina being only one of them. Raymond, conditioned by both nature and nurture to be less than understanding and empathetic, had therefore been determined to try out everything on his first date.

The judge, a female, took a distinct and understandably unfavourable view of Raymond's attempts to sodomize the rather naïve eighteen-year-old. Her instincts inclined her towards an extremely lengthy custodial sentence. However, this was tempered by reports from social workers who described to the court Raymond's, at times, violent and often insecure upbringing. A psychologist also confirmed that the eighteen-year-old misfit had an IQ of only eighty-five; further, that his behaviour was classically symptomatic of a deprived childhood, bereft of adequate role models. Raymond White, they jointly pleaded, needed help, not incarceration.

The judge heard them and duly compromised, she gave him three years. When, with remission, Raymond stumbled out of captivity at dawn two years later, he immediately tried to find his mother. For three months he trekked around the streets of Manchester desperate to locate the only person who, in his twenty years of life, had ever shown even the remotest interest in him. He failed; the Turnbulls were now running a successful guest house in Morecambe and Raymond was no longer an agenda item. Accordingly, Roger Turnbull had covered their tracks well, even going to the extraordinary lengths of changing his and his wife's surname. In those days Methodist lay-preachers and proprietors of respectable guesthouses needed a rapist, semi-literate son, like a politician needed a homosexual affair publishing. Raymond's mother, having found security for the first time in her life, did the obvious – she also made strenuous efforts to forget about him.

For the next six years Raymond did what many in his position do, he became a navvy. The nineteen eighties saw a boom in the building trade in the UK, a boom that had an insatiable demand for labour. His work took him all over the country, often the only credentials employers found necessary to ask for being a strong back and a willingness to toil in appalling conditions for wages below the official union rate. When he was twenty-six he found himself making love to a woman again.

She was the landlady of the sparse boarding house where, for ten pounds a day, he enjoyed bed, breakfast, a packed lunch and a cooked evening meal. The woman, a widow, was in her mid-fifties. A kind, matronly figure, both her boys had grown-up long since and she had become lonely. She recognised a kindred spirit in Raymond and soon he was having the landlady along with the bed.

Margaret Cooper gave Raymond three things, affection, security and hours of tuition in how to treat a woman gently, both in and out of the bedroom. In his way, Raymond came to love her and she him. At one stage there was even talk of marriage. However, this idea was vetoed by Margaret's two sons who insisted that Raymond was far, far too young. When she rejected this factor, they proceeded to tell her of the research they had carried out into her young lover's past. Even this failed to shake her resolve, what Raymond had been before was irrelevant, it was, she informed them, what he was like now that mattered.

Undoubtedly the wedding would have gone ahead had not her sons, in desperation, delivered their final ultimatum. If she married him, they told her, she would not only never see them again, but also her four grandchildren. Margaret Cooper was far from stupid; she knew what her sons' real motives were for in the false, economic boom of the nineteen eighties, property prices and therefore their inheritance, were rocketing. Soon after talking to her offspring she awoke one morning, looked at the sleeping Raymond in bed next to her and shrugged pragmatically. Later that day she drove to her solicitors' offices and re-made her will. In it she made clear that Raymond would have twenty thousand pounds from her estate. The remainder would go to her grandchildren, when they were twenty-one. Unfortunately, she never bothered to tell Raymond.

He stayed with Margaret for four years, four years of learning how to be a decent human being. Margaret was a good tutor and albeit without the State recognised piece of paper, they worked, lived, loved, laughed and cried together for those four long and very happy years as man and wife.

However, in the early hours of a May morning, in nineteen ninety-one, Raymond awoke, startled. Margaret was shaking and making whimpering sounds. Initially frightened, he turned on the light and tried to wake her. Her eyes were open but glazed; then a strange rattling noise came from her throat. Raymond didn't know that she had just had a massive cerebral haemorrhage but, instinctively, he did know that she was dead.

He did not call the ambulance then; instead he cuddled up to her lifeless form staying with her for the rest of the night and most of the following day. All the time weeping the tears he had never wept as a child.

The sons, who both lived in London, arrived within hours of Raymond telling the world of their mother's death. They gave him two hours to pack and leave or suffer a severe beating. He left in thirty minutes.

Raymond had walked away from the building trade, to work in Margaret's boarding house, in nineteen eighty-seven. Jobs then had been falling off trees; it was now the middle of nineteen ninety-one and all the trees had gone. For the next eighteen months he wandered almost aimlessly around the country in search of work, unaware that in a solicitor's safe in Nottingham, a piece of paper said that he was worth twenty thousand pounds. Desperate for work, he washed dishes, scrubbed floors, polished cars bounced people out of night clubs; nothing lasted. Then, one night, in a singles bar in Manchester, he met fate in the form of David Benson.

Benson was the complete antithesis of himself. Good looking, well educated, wealthy and confident. For some reason, that the less than adequate reasoning powers of Raymond could understand, the two men hit it off straight away. For the next two hours, aided by copious quantities of beer provided by Benson, Raymond told him everything there was to know about Raymond White, warts and all. When Benson heard that he was desperate for work he offered him a job sorting out the garden of his then new home. They had remained, intermittently, an unlikely duo ever since.

*

Benson looked across at the snoring girl; she was out to the world. Hardly surprising he thought, after consuming over half a bottle of Bacardi.

Carefully, he eased himself out of bed. Earlier, he had deliberately left the bedside light switched on, now he could easily see the two used condoms he had thrown on the floor. He picked them both up before moving out of the room and across the landing. The door of White's bedroom was open, it was dark inside.

Silently, Benson groped on the floor at the side of his friend's bed. Eventually, he found what he had come for and smiled, Ray certainly had been horny; there were three of them. He replaced two of the three with his own and began to move out of the room.

'What are you doing?'

The voice was sleepy but inquisitive; momentarily it cut through Benson like a knife. It was a warm night and as he turned he could just make out the girl's form in the gloom, she was lay on top of the bed – naked. Benson came over to her. 'Just getting some more rubbers,' he whispered.

'Horny sods,' said the girl, still only half awake. She rolled over and went back to sleep as, silently, Benson crept back to his own room.

*

Benson put the drink on the bedside cabinet and shook White roughly by the shoulder.

'Hmm?' he growled, sleepily.

They had allowed the girls to stay until late the previous evening and White had made a meal of the situation. Also sampling the one Benson had been with most of the weekend, when the latter had complained of boredom and asked for a change. Benson had finally thrown them out, with their taxi fare, at eleven pm.

'Come on you idle bugger!' He shook the semiconscious White even harder. 'There's a mug of coffee here.'

White managed to drag himself up against the headboard. Benson gave him the drink. 'Can't I stay in bed a bit longer, Dave?' he groaned.

Benson looked at him, at the red eyes the scruffy unshaven face. 'No bloody chance, I've told you, I want those jobs you've been doing, for the past week, finishing. You know the rules; you have to pay for your fun, one way or another!'

White sipped the coffee and screwed up his face in disgust. 'Christ! This tastes fucking lousy, what is it?'

'It's your mouth that's lousy, Ray; I'll bet you've not cleaned your teeth for weeks! Get it down, it'll wake you up.' Benson watched as, grudgingly, White did as he was bid.

Satisfied, Benson retrieved the empty mug and went back downstairs. He hoped the eight ground-up sleeping tablets that he had stirred into his friend's coffee would not kill him. Not yet anyway.

5

Benson looked at his watch for the third time in less than a minute; he was becoming bored with waiting. The service station car park, surprisingly for the time of year, was busy with tourists, but so far he had seen no one he was interested in.

He looked beyond the building, to the small decorative ornamental lake where a pair of mating swans were in the middle of their protracted and complex courtship ritual. He smiled, cynically, despite his weekend of debauchery, with the two slags, he was still feeling horny; conventional sex, it appeared, could no longer do anything for him.

A large wagon pulled into the lorry park, Benson watched, idly, as both the driver and a dark-haired young woman, wearing shorts, jumped down and walked towards the service station. As they disappeared into the complex he settled down into his seat, it could, he decided, be a long wait.

*

'So how's it going?' Hoagan collected the drinks from the bar and moved to one of the small, lounge tables.

'Oh...I think I'm getting there.' Taylor sounded tired, Hoagan thought she looked it. Apart from asking numerous questions, mainly associated with interpretation of reports and geographic location of crime scenes, Taylor had so far given Hoagan nothing in return.

The policewoman shrugged, mentally; the rules of the game had been spelled out the day Taylor arrived. She would not say anything until she had closely examined all the facts; had visited all crime scenes and had carried out extensive data cross-checking with the FBI computer. Impatient as Hoagan was for information therefore, she knew that if she started to hassle the psychologist now she would be moving the goal posts in mid-game. She also knew that Taylor was too professional to allow such a move. 'You look tired,' said Hoagan, neutrally.

'Yes...yes I am,' replied Taylor, 'but I've got to be back in the States by the end of this week; she smiled. 'My niece is tying the knot.'

'And you promised to be there?' said Hoagan.

'Indeed,' Taylor looked wistful for a moment, 'young love, how we've all had our dreams in youth, often only to have them shattered later!'

Hoagan snorted, cynically. 'I don't think dreams are necessarily the prerogative of the young, Emmy.'

Taylor's shrewd, brown eyes caught those of the detective. 'Do I detect a hint of personal experience here?'

Hoagan lit a cigarette, inhaled deeply and almost despairingly and after a moment of thought told her about Trevarrick.

'Oh dear, how old was the girl?' asked Taylor.

'About eighteen,' said Hoagan.

Taylor nodded understandingly. 'Ouch! That would make it far worse, someone so much younger than yourself.'

Absent-mindedly, Hoagan ran a fingertip around the rim of her lager glass, then – angry. 'It wasn't so much that I felt inferior, I mean, my own daughter's sixteen next birthday. When you get to reach forty you don't expect a man of thirty-eight, who's supposed to be a caring lover, to go around bonking a woman who's barely reached her majority. I could never have trusted him alone with Mary after that – never!'

Taylor asked the question gently. 'What happened to Mary's father?'

Hoagan nearly replied that that was a subject she never talked about. To-date, Jack had been the only man who had ever really meant anything to her, in or out of bed. His memory belonged to her and her alone; she did not like sharing him with others, except for Mary.

Taylor sensed the conflict within Hoagan, noted the semi-hostile body language. 'I'm sorry; you must think I'm being nosey; I promise you I'm not, I'm just interested that's all, but if it's painful then please forget I asked.'

Hoagan saw the concern in the American's eyes. The woman had asked because she was genuinely interested, not through nosiness, of that she was certain. 'Look,' she began, 'why don't we order lunch and then I'll tell you; but I warn you, it's quite a long story.'

Much later, as they were driving back to the murder room, Taylor asked Hoagan what music had been playing on that fateful evening in Trevarrick's home.

'Ravel's Bolero,' she replied, 'he liked to build up slowly and climax with the crescendo.'

'Really, just like in the movie then.' Taylor's tone hinted that she was at once both appalled and intrigued. 'How long does the piece last for?'

'It depends on the recording, his lasts precisely thirteen minutes and forty-eight seconds.' Hoagan was smiling for she knew what was coming next.

'Hell, that's not very long is it? said Taylor. 'When I was a student a boyfriend of mine was seriously into the Eighteen Twelve Overture,' she giggled girlishly. 'You know – all those cannons and bangs? We never actually did it to...' she giggled, embarrassed. 'Having said that I suppose it might have been quite good fun really; mind you, that only lasted about a quarter of an hour as well!'

Both women were laughing now. 'There's something I forgot to mention,' Hoagan added. 'Bill had a repeat button on his CD player. It was very rare he finished with the first crescendo, that was the fun of him in a way; when it got to the end he'd start all over again, nice and slowly.'

Taylor looked impressed. 'Dare I ask how many times the music usually repeated, before he...well...you know?'

Hoagan considered the question. 'It's an alcohol related activity, as you are aware.' She spoke with mock seriousness. 'I'd say___'

Taylor held up her hands despairingly. 'Please, please, don't tell me, I don't think I really want to know!'

They were still laughing as they walked into the murder room, ten minutes later.

*

The woman and the driver came out of the building and walked back towards the lorry. Benson watched, frustrated; she was no more than eighteen or nineteen years old and would have been ideal, had she been available.

The driver entered the cab and after opening the passenger door, handed the girl a travel bag. Benson sat up, suddenly more interested; the service station could hardly be the end of her journey, he thought. Clearly the man was not going much further in her direction as such she had decided that she had a better chance of another lift from the busy motorway service area, rather than some remote, access road.

Benson began to breathe heavily; the anticipation of sex and killing already having a drug-like effect on him. Then, as the heavy articulation moved slowly away from the now waving girl he started the van engine. He waited until she had walked to the beginning of the slip road. She was obviously experienced at thumbing lifts, not going too far down the slip, too near the motorway where the police might have moved her on. At last, just in sight of where he was parked, she stopped and placed her bag on the road. Benson began to move.

He was within thirty yards of the girl, and in the lorry park himself, when another truck slowed and stopped in front of her; he cursed, banging the steering wheel in childlike frustration for, obscured by the large container on the vehicle's trailer, he could no longer see her. He pulled into an empty parking space; all he could do now was wait and hope. At last the driver of the container truck began to rev the engine, causing blue smoke to billow from the cab-mounted exhaust. Then, slowly, the huge vehicle moved away, down the slip road and as it moved Benson saw that the girl was still there! Quickly this time, he drove forward and pulled alongside the young hitchhiker.

Julie Bennet opened the van door and looked admiringly at the driver. He had blonde hair down to his shoulders. Muscular and incredibly good-looking, she thought him to be no more than twenty-two or three. The sort of man she often dreamed of after she had been to the cinema or watched a movie on television.

'Where are you going?' he asked, his laughing eyes dancing all over her face as he spoke.

Julie thought they were kind, interested eyes and they excited her. 'Manchester,' she said, her accent southern England and lower working class.

'Jump in.'

Benson put a tape in the cassette player. 'I take it you're into Michael Jackson?'

'Oh yeh,' Julie sounded bubbly, excited.

Benson looked at her legs, she was a tall girl and they were sun-bronzed, shapely and long. He desperately wanted to take her now but he knew he would have to be patient. This was to be his last victim for some time and he would have to make the most of her body. As he began to head towards the motorway, his precious cargo sitting next to him, he nodded to himself as he considered that the wait would no doubt be more than worthwhile.

*

The local police station, at Lendale, whilst too small to use as a murder HQ, had nevertheless all but been taken over by the enquiry team. The Victorian building provided numerous rooms for the hundreds of suspect interviews that had, and still were, being carried out. Anyone in the force area who had a record of sexual offences, or was even only pencilled in for such crimes, had to be processed. Alibis checked, blood and DNA samples taken and clothes examined for forensic evidence.

Hoagan had called into to the station to discuss progress with Hawthwaite. As she walked along the top corridor of the building a door opened, the anxious face of a young detective constable staring at her excitedly. Hoagan recognised him as a probationer constable; in the first week of his mandatory training secondment to CID.

'Excuse me, ma'am.'

'Yes,' she replied.

'I think I might have found the murderer.'

'Oh,' Hoagan looked suitably impressed.

'Yes, ma'am – he's in here,' whispered the PC, 'made a full confession so he has.'

Hoagan half-smiled and walked into the interview room. Sat at the desk was a ferret-faced, emaciated looking individual aged, Hoagan thought, around sixty-five. He was wearing a filthy flat cap and an ancient, grease-engrained sports coat. Although he also sported a shirt and tie, from the condition of both Hoagan assumed he had not washed either since his fortieth birthday.

'Who do we have here then?' Hoagan addressed the question to the man, as she took a seat opposite.

'Charlie Potts, miss,' Charlie held out a hand that had not seen soap and water for at least weeks, possibly months; Hoagan ignored the gesture on health and safety grounds.

'Well, Charlie,' she continued, 'what's all this about you being the murderer of the girls then, is it true?'

'That's right Miss, I strangled 'em, all of 'em.' He laughed childishly, his appalling, intermittent and badly decayed teeth, framed against ruby-red, greasy lips and quarter-inch long, grey-stubble whiskers.

'Did you enjoy sodomizing them as well?' Hoagan was looking at him, accusingly.

Charlie was thoughtful for a moment. 'Sorry?'

'Did you enjoy sticking your dirty, greasy, little dick up their arses?' she asked, bluntly.

For a few seconds Charlie seemed totally nonplussed. Behind her the probationer flushed red with embarrassment. 'Err...err...course a did – why?' he asked, grinning stupidly again.

'Do you know what the penalty is for wasting police time, Charlie?' she asked.

Charlie shook his head. 'No.'

'I can get you five years hard labour, Charlie' Hoagan clicked her fingers, 'just like that.' She stood, staring at him as though he had only recently crawled out from under a bucket filled with animal slurry. 'Sit there for a moment then piss off – out of my nick and out of my enquiry; if I so much as hear your name mentioned again, let alone your pulling a stunt like this, I'll have you deported – to Iraq.'

She pulled the young detective to a corner of the room and, smiling, whispered in his ear. 'Okay now?'

The probationer looked embarrassed, confused and idolising all at the same time. 'But...but he definitely confessed, ma'am. I mean he was absolutely adamant, knew the dates and places where they disappeared, everything.

Hoagan was still smiling. 'All out of newspapers; murder enquiries attract Charlies like there's no tomorrow. Always discuss something he couldn't possibly have found out from the media. That's one of the reasons why we don't tell the press everything; none of the victims have been sodomized in this case.'

Understanding suddenly dawned and the constable nodded, flushing redder than ever. 'I'm with you; sorry, ma'am.'

Hoagan patted him on the shoulder and as she turned to leave the room, said. 'See this idiot off the premises and chalk it up to experience.'

'Ma'am?'

She turned again. 'Yes?'

'You can't really get five years hard labour for wasting police time, can you?' he whispered.

Hoagan shook her head. 'Sadly...no,' and as she left the office was surprised that he had not also queried her threat to deport the man. However, in some cases, she considered, it would be an extremely good idea though.

*

'Whereabouts in Manchester are you going, Julie?' asked Benson, as they pulled onto the motorway.

'Nowhere in particular, I just thought I'd give it a try.' She looked thoughtful for a moment, then stared at him, waiting for disapproval. 'I've run away from home you see.'

Benson could hardly believe he had been so lucky. 'Where are you from?'

'Southampton, originally, but my parents moved to Glasgow two years ago.'

'And you don't like it?'

'Oh...yeh,' she replied with typical teenage vagueness. 'It's my parents I don't like, especially my stepfather; he's a right control-freak.'

'If you're struggling for somewhere to stay in Manchester I can fix you up, on a temporary basis.' Benson looked at the girl, his eyes kind, warm, inviting.

'Really, oh that would be great.'

He smiled. 'It's a flat; not the Ritz you understand, but it'll do till you've got something organised, it belongs to a friend of mine.'

'Won't he mind?' asked Julie.

'No, he's going away for a long time. In fact he's leaving tonight, later on; I'll be seeing him off myself.'

'Where's he going to?'

'Benson began to laugh, his eyes briefly unnerving his passenger. 'Good question, down under, I think.'

'You mean Australia?' she asked, but her newfound landlord only started laughing again.

*

Benson removed the condom and flushed it down the pan. Then, still naked, carried the corpse of Julie Bennet into the shower. He washed her for a full five minutes, eventually leaving the water running while he made a phone call.

'Yeh'

'Ray? it's Dave.

'Dave? where are yeh?'

'I'm at your place; I thought I told you to get the fuck out of there?'

'Sorry, Dave, I must have fallen asleep again after you left.'

'Haven't you been to work, done that job I told you about?'

White was hesitant. 'Err...no...sorry, Dave.'

'You were supposed to meet me here at five,' Benson, as always, sounding totally convincing.

'Sorry, Dave,' White was whining now.

'What time did you wake up?'

'Err...about an hour ago; a'm still really sleepy though.'

Benson looked at the cheap, quartz clock over the television. It was nine-thirty; the drugs he had given him had been more powerful than expected. 'It must have been all that shagging you did at the weekend.'

White laughed, stupidly, at the other end of the line.

'Listen, I want you to come over here – now,' insisted Benson.

'Right now?' White was moaning again.

'Yes and there's something I want you to bring me; it's a small, red, plastic box. It's in the fridge sealed up with masking tape; I've written "keep off" on the lid.'

'Oh yer, a saw that earlier, when a were makin' me tea. What's in it?'

Benson gave an audible sigh of relief; obviously Ray had not taken it upon himself to look inside.'

'I'll show you when you get here; have you got any money?'

'A few quid left from what yer lent me at weekend.'

'Get a taxi then, I'll see you in a few minutes.'

Benson put down the telephone, went back to the still running shower and with the corpse in the foetal position at his feet, began to wash himself, vigorously.

*

The large house was quiet, Mary was away for the evening, staying with a friend, as such it also felt unusually empty. Hoagan went immediately to the telephone answering machine in the lounge; there were no messages. With a shaking hand she poured herself a large whiskey, something she would regret in the morning but now...now, she just felt desperately lonely.

*

David Benson looked at Ray White, unconscious on the settee. When he had eventually arrived at the flat, two hours previously, Benson had plied him with Scotch. Now, for the second time that day he was sleeping heavily, the drink once again having been laced with a powerful sleeping draught of crushed tablets.

Benson stripped and went back to the shower. He lifted the girl into a sitting position, before standing over her, his hand working briskly. Twenty minutes later, having showered again himself and thoroughly rewashed his fifth victim, he dried himself and dressed.

Thirty minutes later he had one final look around the room; before rechecking the contents of his holdall. Everything seemed to be there, wigs and other theatrical props, towels, bedding, clothes, toiletries. All that had to be packed had been. The hypodermic syringe and the two condoms he had concealed in the red plastic box, were also safely in place.

*

Half an hour after his friend and benefactor had left, Raymond White came to semi-consciousness. He had been dreaming, dreaming of a large, cuddly, middle-aged woman; a woman who had been the only person in his life that had ever come even close to actually loving him for what he was.

He was feeling extremely drowsy and a little nauseous. Someone, somewhere at the back of his mind was trying to tell him something, to warn him of...to warn him of danger! There was a crushing pain in his chest and he was finding it difficult to breath. He began to cough, by doing so aggravating his blindingly painful headache. Then he remembered who had actually disturbed his dream, taken him from the comforting arms of his middle-aged bed-partner; it was another woman and she too was lying on a bed, this time in a door-less room. Her face was friendly, affectionate even and she was signalling for him to conceal himself under the bed, to hide from danger. For a brief moment he very nearly did so, but then he caught sight of the face of the man with her. He had khaki trousers around his ankles and Raymond could tell he was angry at his intrusion. He tried to raise himself off the settee but it was too much effort and he collapsed back into welcome half-consciousness. He didn't want to hide under his mother's bed anymore; he had grown up now and he only wanted to be with the middle-aged, cuddly woman – the woman who loved him.

As he made the last journey of his life, down an ever-narrowing tunnel that became increasingly darker, his lips formed the beginning of a word, a word that started with the letter – M.

Tuesday, May 18, Manchester

At 6-31 am precisely, the brass contacts, on the immersion heater timer switch in Raymond White's flat, came within a millimetre of each other. The timer switch was old, the contacts worn and partially coated with verdigris. Unable to make a positive electrical contact the current, as it had done every morning for the past three years, jumped the small gap; a faint, blue spark momentarily illuminating the inside of the switch box.

Paul Daniel Hawthorne rode his bicycle leisurely along Crofter's Lane and looked proudly at his new digital watch, bought with his own money earned from his early morning paper round. The liquid crystal display told him the time was 6-31 a.m. After passing a parked, blue Transit van, he came alongside a large, grey, run-down block of flats he knew as Merebrooke House. As he did so he was surprised to see one of the ground floor windows explode, silently, out onto the street. Along with the glass, that seemed to scatter in all directions, the curtains, rag like, also belled out of the new opening and as he gazed in wonder at the shattered window, two things reached Paul's brain almost simultaneously. The first was the ear-splitting noise of a colossal explosion, the second, a shard of triangular shaped glass, five inches long and deadly sharp.

Paul did not see the remaining consequences of the explosion, he was already dead. The Victorian brick walls, weakened through years of damp and neglect, crumbled outwards. The two upper floors, previously held in place by these now, devastated supports, came down to join the ground floor. Everywhere there was dense, grey, dust and it blew outwards from the collapsing building, obliterating the scene of immense destruction in an impenetrable, choking cloud.

Along with Raymond White, twenty other people lived in Merebrooke House. Fifteen of those would die sometime during the next five minutes, two more within a week. Of the remaining three, one would be crippled for life, the other would never see again.

In quite literally a matter of seconds, David Douglas Benson, psychopath, serial killer and more latterly, arsonist, had taken his life score from six to over twenty. Later that day he would watch the results of his handiwork on television. Whilst most of the nation would gaze in awe and horror, as the appalling death toll was revealed, Benson would only smile. Indeed, he would consider the violence of the explosion an unexpected bonus and completely unconcerned at the consequences of his criminality, would then return to scrutinising the provisional plans for the refurbishment of his newly purchased house and outbuildings.

6

Tuesday, May 18

Murder Room, Lendale

Hoagan looked at Hawthwaite's progress report and shook her head.

Her deputy smiled. 'Makes depressing reading, huh?'

'I think the title "Progress" is something we could easily be done for under the Trades Descriptions Acts.' Hoagan threw the report onto her desk in disgust. 'We've interviewed over five hundred people, half of those potential suspects. God alone knows how much junk we've sent down to Forensics. I've had over one hundred and twenty officers on the case and what have we got to show for it?'

Hawthwaite offered her a cigarette. 'Try – bugger all.'

She lit it and blew a cloud of smoke at the ceiling. 'I've had words with the DS and he's agreed that I appear on national television – Crimewatch – on Thursday night.'

Hawthwaite nodded. 'Can't do any harm, Kate. This guy's unreal, almost like a ghost. Somebody must have seen something, however insignificant.'

'Well – if someone has seen something they'll know on Thursday night that it may be important. By the way, you'll have to front up to the case in my absence.'

Hawthwaite shrugged. 'No prob's, I don't have anyone to rush home for these days.'

Hoagan saw the sadness in her deputy's eyes. As usual he was trying to hide the hurt but the wound was too deep – too painful. 'How long is it now?' she asked.

'Since the divorce?' she nodded. 'Two months.'

'And it still hurts?'

Hawthwaite's eyes began to glisten. 'You wouldn't believe it, Kate. I never, ever thought I could feel as bad about anything.'

Hoagan remembered the day he had come into her office twelve months previously, clutching a piece of paper. He had thrown it at her, venomously. 'Look at that,' he had said, almost beside himself with grief and frustration and bewildered, she had read it; it was from his wife, Carole. The message was simple; she had left both him and the children. There was no other man involved, she just wanted her freedom. Marriage and motherhood, she had decided, were just too restrictive.

Although at the time they were extremely busy, Hoagan had immediately given him a week off. Seven days to find her and try to get the pieces of his life back together again. He had left the kids with his mother and gone in search of his wife of the best part of sixteen years. He found her, after leaning heavily on her brother, living in a flat in Lancaster. They argued – pointlessly; he pleaded with her – pointlessly; he begged, mentioning the children – pointlessly. But Carole Hawthwaite had changed psychologically; that often inexplicable change that occasionally happens to people. She was no longer the person he had married, loved and shared a home and four beautiful children with. From that moment on he knew he had lost her. She still looked like Carole on the outside but inside, where it really mattered, there was someone else. Even if she had come back he realised it could never be the same; the woman he had given most of his adult life to had, in effect, quite simply died. Now his children were cared for most of the time by their paternal grandmother. God, thought Hoagan, was nobody happy and content these days?

Hoagan was feeling extremely awkward, not knowing what to say to this gentle bear of a man who, totally out of character, now seemed so out of control of his life. She was saved by a knock on the door, it was Emilia Taylor.

The psychologist entered the room, clutching a sheaf of tractor paper. She glanced at the two detectives, immediately sensing she had intruded on something intense and very private; an ear-bashing for Hoagan's deputy, perhaps? 'Hi...err...look, shall I come back later?' She smiled awkwardly, standing stiffly, schoolgirl-like, in the doorway.

'What's the problem, Emmy?' Hoagan asked the question trying very hard not to sound frustrated at the unwelcome intrusion.

Taylor looked slightly more comfortable. 'No problems, Kate, I think I've finished that's all. Just wondered if you were ready to hear my preliminary conclusions?'

*

Hoagan spoke into the tape recorder microphone, giving subject title and date. A firm believer in thoroughness, she also had a less than average memory. Taylor helped herself to a large mug of black coffee from a conference flask and once again the two detectives were to find themselves impressed by the American's complete command of her subject and easy ability to articulate.

'I've studied all four homicides in depth,' she began. 'This includes autopsies, police reports, witness reports, such as they are, and forensic evidence. I have also visited the scenes of corpse abandonment and, where known, abduction point locations. The killer's signature, associated with victim's one, two and four, is indicative of a psycho-sexual killer. The strangulation by hand of such victims is well documented as being sexually orientated. The fact that the offender then proceeded to repeatedly stab his victims, post- mortem, and mutilate their breasts, is also in line with that profile expectation.'

'Can you remind me as to the reasons you believe the killer would wish to mutilate the bodies so badly after death?' asked Hoagan.

'Sure, it's probably a matter of control, a statement of domination. He has the power to do whatever he wishes with the corpse and he confirms this to himself and the society he is angry with, by such acts. He is also penetrating the body as in the sex act itself. The removal of part of the breasts somewhat falls into the same category, but those pieces of cadaver are also useful as trophies. Something he can keep for future masturbatory fantasies. Do remember that these people have their own reality, a pre-prepared script just like any other playwright and, like a playwright, they write people in and out of their fantasy world as they wish.'

'So this savage behaviour is all part of some carefully pre-rehearsed plot?' Hawthwaite sounded quite amazed.

Taylor smiled at him, nodding. 'I guess you're not too far away there, John. Now then,' she continued, 'other aspects of the signature include the ritual cleaning and, of course, the carvings on the leg. The ritual cleaning is often associated with a fascination for the corpse itself, maybe a form of reverence. The killer may well wish to keep the body, say as company, for necrophilia or merely to admire it; as say you may admire a golf trophy. However, in this case I'm not so sure it's that simple. There is no evidence of necrophilia having taken place on any of the corpses, nor have they been cosmetised.'

'Sorry?' said Hoagan.

'Sometimes the killer will wash and shampoo the hair, re-do the make-up to his own requirements. As I said, there is no evidence of this having taken place. Therefore, I'm going to suggest that our murderer is cute, that is, forensically very aware. We've not found a single fingerprint on any of the bodies, nor for that matter, apart from semen, any other really useful forensic evidence. They had all been washed, thoroughly.'

'So the washing may not be part of his script?' said Hoagan.

'Exactly,' confirmed Taylor. Once again she was being reminded how bright the English policewoman was. 'The cleaning is probably nothing more than an act of forensic intelligence. It is possible that he masturbated over the corpses; again this comes back to his craving for dominance, for control. He will at such times also be remembering what he has done to the victim, reliving the act of rape, violation and murder. Washing his semen off them therefore, along with anything else that could point the forensic finger at him, is sensible. There may be nothing psycho-sexual about it all.'

'But he has left semen in all the bodies,' observed Hoagan.

'Yes he has,' agreed Taylor, 'and you will be able to nail him with that evidence when you catch him. But of course, you have to catch him first.'

'So why go to all the trouble of washing the bodies to remove forensic evidence when he leaves us his DNA fingerprint in the victim's vaginas?' Hoagan sounded decidedly unconvinced by the psychologist's argument.

'You haven't got his DNA profile in the archives?'

'No,' agreed Hoagan.

'But you may have his fingerprints?'

'Well...'

'Well yes, of course you may, you just don't know because he's not been careless enough to leave them for you to check. There's other forensic evidence besides fingerprints, dust, clothing particles, earth, etc, etc. Anyone of those could have given you a clue but he's seen to it that in that area you're out of luck. He has left you something, semen, but it's nothing you can actually trace him with. He's teasing you, he feels confident that he's not going to get caught. That may well be his undoing at the end of the day.'

'What about the use of the hammer?' asked Hawthwaite.

'Purely a means of disabling his victim; he did not hammer the first girl, nor did he use it on one of the two girls in Grizedale Forest. The girl he kept alive for so long was strangled half to death, then bound and gagged. Her friend had to be shut up quickly, hence, in her case the hammer. It seems clear that she turned at the critical moment and caught the hammerhead in her face. They were outside his vehicle and he panicked, killing her with the third blow according to your Doctor Dawson.'

Taylor took off her glasses. 'This killing is interesting because it lends some weight to my earlier theories. You are aware that he never bothered with that victim after he had killed her; apart from washing her? No stabbing, no carving of the leg?' Both her listeners nodded. Again this points to the fact that he is not a necrophiliac and that he only washes victims to get rid of forensic evidence. He did not even remove the hammered girl's breasts; they may have been useless as trophies of his power and dominance because he had not sexually dominated her when she was alive. Their symbolism would, therefore, have had no value for him. It is unlikely, even, that he masturbated over her corpse; he had no sexual memory of her, she had never been a player in one his scripts. This type of killer enjoys killing, usually by strangulation, during the sex act. As I mentioned to you a few days ago, they will try to revive a victim again and again, reaching orgasm each time until either they are exhausted or the victim dies.

Taylor returned to both her glasses and her notes; for the first time hesitant as the silence in the room was broken only by laughter from the main office next door. 'The manner of the killing of the fourth victim suggests that the murderer is undergoing a change in his demands,' she said, quietly.

'What sort of change?' asked Hoagan.

'He kept this victim alive for the best part of nine days. She was strangled repeatedly and whilst not enough to kill her, she would have had quite severe brain damage had she lived. She had been starved and was highly dehydrated, indicating an inadequate supply of water. In other words he tortured her.' Taylor once again removed her glasses and looked seriously at her appalled audience. 'I have to tell you that I think he was experimenting with this victim.'

'How do you mean, experimenting?' asked Hawthwaite; wondering whether he really wanted to hear the answer to his question.

'It is my opinion he is aware he can only carry on so long without being caught. Therefore, he maximised the use of this girl as, if you like, a guinea pig. He pushed her to the limits of her endurance, she was, as we know, quite full of drugs. They would have kept her unconscious and quiet during the day, probably whilst he was at work. She could not drink of course if she was unconscious. We also know that she was definitely bound and probably gagged for most of her dreadful ordeal.'

'Why did he break her toes?' asked Hoagan.

'Probably as a gesture of threatened "worse-to-come", if she screamed when he allowed her food and drink; that would indicate the close proximity of neighbours.'

'You mean he broke the toes to give her an object lesson, whilst she was gagged?'

'Yes, yes that's possible. I don't think this guy's a pure masochist. He inflicted pain as a tool to ensure control; it was merely a weapon, just like the hammer. He uses that to disable the victim; he used the grips on her toes to control her mind.'

Somewhere in the meadow, behind the village hall, a young lamb cried for its mother. Hoagan stubbed out her cigarette thoughtfully. 'What conclusions have you arrived at regarding the profile of the offender?' she asked.

'Before I go on to that, can I say that the latest behaviour of the killer does, as I suggested earlier, indicate what is likely to be a permanent change. He will have gained enormous satisfaction from what he did to the last girl. She was completely subservient to him for over a week. She relied on him completely for food, water, life itself. He, in turn, had total dominance over her, complete hegemony, the power of life and death, pain or no pain. He knew that police forces all over the UK were looking for her and that whilst they searched he was the only person in the world who knew where she was. Think for a moment of the enormous feeling of power and control this guy must have felt at the time. She was there, at his whim, for the fulfilment of whatever distorted role he wished her to play and there is no way he's going to forget that in a hurry. All I can say is – God help his next victim! This guy now has a whole new fantasy to play with, a completely new script!'

Taylor turned to another sheet of notepaper. 'Regarding his profile, we can say, I think unquestionably, that he is seriously bright. Probably has an IQ over one-thirty.'

'What does that mean?' asked Hoagan.

'Intelligence quotients are derived from psychometric tests of the subject. The average IQ is around one hundred. This guy's way beyond that. He is one of the most organised killers I've have ever studied or even read about. You have virtually no forensic evidence except what he wants you to have, no one has seen him. He turns up anywhere and spirits young girls away to their deaths like a will-o'-the-wisp. He is a chameleon character, changing to suit his environment and that of his victim. It is highly likely that, initially, the girls went with him quite willingly. He's probably extremely charismatic, a charmer, good looking, the very last person you would imagine to be a serial killer. I would think it likely he's in his late twenties or even early thirties. But he will probably look much younger than that.'

'Because of his ability to charm young women or girls?' asked Hawthwaite.

'Precisely,' agreed Taylor. 'He is very, very organised; that indicates maturity and experience. He certainly seems to know his way around the Lake District, therefore he may have resided here at some time, or has vacationed here on numerous occasions in the past, perhaps as a child.'

'You don't think he lives here now then?' asked Hoagan.

'No, too much chance of being spotted by someone who knows him. The Lakes are a good hunting ground though, it's an area where many people take vacations and Cumbria's beautiful and wild. Therefore, in a region like this people tend to relax, they are off-guard. Young people, or anyone else for that matter, would not expect they were being targeted by a multiple murderer. We also have to remember that serial killers are not the only ones to have fantasies. Teenage girls are always dreaming of Mr Right, their latter day Prince Charming who will come along one day and sweep them off their feet. They too can make the killer suit the man of their dreams, just as easily as they themselves fit into the character parts of one of the killer's scripts.'

'The vacational theory does not explain the local girl under the chestnut tree at the college,' observed Hoagan.

'No, it does not,' agreed Taylor. 'One thing you must not do with a profile is regard it as written in tablets of stone, it is only a profile. How often have you looked at someone, in profile, and from that limited information formed a full stereotypical image expectation of them based on experience? Then you've been surprised to hell when they turn around and give you a look at their complete face? Maybe the person has a broken nose or a scar on the blind side cheek.' Hoagan conceded the point with a shrug. 'Exactly', continued Taylor, 'but if you carefully study the profile you constructed, you would probably find that whilst in some areas you were wrong, in others you were uncannily correct. That's the same as offender profiling, we only give you a glimpse as to who these people may be and how they may think. Hopefully, from that glimpse, you can move further and faster in your enquiry and catch them. At the end of the day it's still you guys who have to match the profile to the full-frontal, despite its weaknesses and assumptions.'

'Can you explain why the killer has abandoned most of the bodies so casually?' asked Hoagan. 'We feel it's probably an ego trip.'

Taylor finished the last of her coffee then nodded to Hawthwaite who was offering her a refill from the flask. 'Sure, I think that is a reasonable assumption; it also tells us quite a lot about the guy's confidence, i.e., he has a lot of it. By dumping the bodies where they are going to be found quickly he gets a boost to his ego; we're back to power and control again here. It also sends a message to society and those who are hunting him, that's you guys. In effect, he's saying "yah-boo!"'

'But that doesn't align with the Wastwater girl.' observed Hawthwaite.

'Because she was put in the deepest lake in England?'

'Quite,' agreed Hoagan.

'How do you know he didn't plan to put her in ninety feet of water?' Both officers were stunned into silence. 'You are making a fundamental error if you underestimate this cookie, Kate. Going further, it is not impossible that, on at least one occasion, he has been at the scene of corpse abandonment at the time of corpse discovery.'

'But he wouldn't, couldn't possibly have known when the Wastwater girl would be found,' complained Hawthwaite.

'Why? She was found by divers from a local club. If they're similar to American diving clubs, like one my ex-husband used to be a member of, they often have a dive calendar. Maybe they were planning to dive Wastwater on that date, at that time, in that precise place, at least six months before. If the killer was privy to that info then he'd have no problem being present at the right moment, would he?'

'We've checked all sub-aqua club members in the area and all past members for the last two years.' said Hoagan.

'What was your motive for doing that?' asked Taylor.

'We thought we could possibly eliminate such persons, by virtue of their having too good a knowledge of the lake.' Hoagan was looking pensive; Taylor seemed to be overstepping her brief, telling her how to do her job. She bit her lip, the women was here to help – help her think in a different way, out-of-the-box; she should not be protectionist, so damned elitist, not if it got the job done. Then she remembered the feeling she had had on that April evening, standing by the lakeside; the uncanny experience of being watched by someone or – something. Was it actually possible that she could have felt the killer's presence? The thought made her shiver, involuntarily; Taylor noticed.

'Are you all right, Kate,' she asked. 'You look as though you've seen a ghost!'

Hoagan smiled, half-heartedly, but not wishing to appear foolish declined to say what was on her mind. 'Sorry, Emmy, I take your point about the divers; we'll have another look at that.'

'Anyway', continued Taylor, 'as I said earlier, this guy is full of confidence. I think he's likely to be a high achiever. It's unlikely that he's ever really failed at anything, with clearly the possible exception of close, interpersonal relationships with the opposite sex. I'm sure when you eventually nail him you'll find that, whatever he does for a living; he'll be at the top of the pile.'

'What sort of a private and social life do you think he has?' asked Hoagan.

Taylor thought about the question, her facial expression pained, as though this problem was one of the hardest she had yet had to consider. 'To begin with I think it's likely he's a university graduate; undoubtedly he will have the intelligence to have gotten there. Also, whilst something of a loner, he will not seem awkward in company. In other words he's going to be a good short-term mixer, who gets bored with people before people get bored with him.'

'What about women, you know – marriage, steady girlfriends, etc?' asked Hawthwaite.

Taylor smiled. 'I think I'm going to surprise you by saying it's just possible he's having, or has had, a long-term relationship with the opposite sex, despite what I said earlier. This is not unknown; your own Peter Sutcliffe is a good example of such a situation. However...the women he has had will probably speak of his aggressiveness; I mean, let's be fair about this, we are talking here about the ultimate in misogyny. Remember this guy likes to be in control; therefore women he has had may have left him because of his aggressive sexual behaviour and yes, John, that would include a wife, if he's ever been married!

'But would she be aware of what he's up to now, if she exists?' asked Hoagan.

'Unlikely, Kate, but it's not impossible she's concerned that he's up to something. However, if he is in a long-term relationship, he's obviously free to roam about at all hours doing his own thing notwithstanding.'

'Wouldn't it be a major problem for him, keeping a girl prisoner all that time if he had someone else in the house?' asked Hoagan.

'We don't know his circumstances,' said Taylor. 'He could have someplace to keep her, a lock-up garage maybe.'

Hoagan nodded. 'Do you think he has previous, perhaps for rape?'

'It's very probable he's raped but has never been caught.'

'What makes men go off the rails like this?' asked Hawthwaite. 'Is it their childhood or are we talking more of genetics?''

Taylor was thoughtful for a moment. 'There's a lot of evidence to suggest that childhood experiences can be of great significance. Maybe he was abused as a child, not necessarily sexually. Maybe he experienced something when very young that traumatised him. Have you come up with anything on the initials VFI yet?'

'No,' said Hoagan positively.

'Pity, as I'm sure you're aware, unravelling the secret of that coded message will probably eventually lead us to him. However, to answer the second part of your question, John, regarding genetics or predisposition, that's a difficult one.'

'Why?' asked Hawthwaite.

'How do you research it? I mean, if all the serial killers we caught had fathers or grandfathers with a similar personality defect, i.e. they too were multiple murderers, then yes it would be relatively easy to say it's a heritable gene. Of course, in reality that doesn't happen. The same applies to life experience, not everyone who is treated like shit as a child becomes homicidal. However, perhaps what we can, unscientifically assume, is that there is an interaction of genes with environment. A very special, almost unique, cocktail of nature and nurture!

'For example, has this guy got a down-on a particular class, as a result of his early childhood environment? It's interesting to note that with the possible exception of the Wastwater victim, who we know absolutely nothing about at all, all his other victims appear to slot into what you may call middle class. He may feel rejected by that class, maybe he wishes to avenge himself upon, that class, by stealing its daughters.'

'But I thought you said he's probably a high achiever?' asked Hawthwaite. 'You know, "top of the pile", etc. How do you square that with someone with a major anti against the very class he himself is probably a member of?'

Taylor nodded vigorously. 'Good point, John, the chances are that he emanates from the lower classes and has fought his way up to where he is now. He may well have experienced some resistance from the established middle classes on his way. Maybe he was rejected by the parents of one of his girlfriends. Maybe he only perceives rejection, remember, we are talking about his reality, no one else's. If he felt put-down, by those above him in the social pecking order, he could now be after revenge. It's happened before, especially in the States! Whatever motivates the guy, we know he certainly rejects societal conventions regarding the sanctity of life. This guy kills because he enjoys it and he's going to go on killing until he's stopped!'

Hoagan nodded thoughtfully. 'Yes...that theory, about revenge, sounds convincing. The second victim's parents were wealthy business people; they sent their daughter to a private college. The two girls in Grizedale Forest were also from good backgrounds and drove an expensive, aspirational car.'

'By the way,' said Taylor, digressing. 'I think he's quite tall, three of the victims were over five eight and girls don't generally go for men shorter than themselves.'

'We wondered about height,' said Hoagan. 'Normally the pathologist can make a guess from the angle of the ligature around the neck. Unfortunately, all the victims were strangled lying down.'

'Yes, possibly during intercourse!' said Taylor. She gave both the detectives a piece of typewritten A4. 'Clearly, I shall be leaving you with a copy of my fully detailed findings. However, that will be quite a long-winded academic paper in which I must justify any conclusions. This is an overview of the profile; hopefully, you will be able to circulate it throughout this and other forces. It should also serve as a useful aide-memoir.'

*

'Well, what do you think?' asked Hawthwaite. It was three in the afternoon and Taylor had retreated back to the inn where she hoped to find the peace and quiet she would need to write her full report.

Hoagan looked down the list for at least the tenth time. Without answering her deputy's question she began reading aloud, slowly. 'Age – twenty-eight to thirty-two, but probably looks early twenties; height – six to six-foot-three; hair colour – possibly fair. I don't remember anything being mentioned about hair colour?' she observed. 'How the hell did she arrive at that conclusion?'

'I asked her over lunch,' said Hawthwaite. 'She interviewed friends of the college girl and discovered Rebecca was very much into fair-haired men.'

'Good God! I'd never have thought of that, but it does seem to be something of a wild assumption,' said Hoagan dismissively before returning to the report. 'Looks, appearance and presentation – good looking, charming, well spoken. Occupation – question mark, but may involve travelling, especially in Cumbria; intelligence – high, well above average, may be a graduate. Social profile – class-climber, loner but easy short-term mixer; criminal history – could have previous for rape or other sexual assault but unlikely. Hobbies: may be into driving and owning expensive and impressive cars; may have some awareness of sub-aqua diving. Knows Cumbria and Lake District well, may have been born there or have had multiple vacations in area.'

Hoagan put the paper down and rubbed her eyes, they itched with fatigue. She looked at Hawthwaite and smiled. 'Circulate it, John, send it out to every man and his dog, it may be a load of hocus-pocus but I suppose it's all we've got!'

'Don't you accept the profile?'

She smiled, cynically. 'Do I accept the need for toothache?'

'You never gave me the impression you thought it was a completely meaningless exercise.'

Hoagan smiled. 'She's too nice; anyway we have to think of Anglo-American relations, don't we?'

Hawthwaite shook his head. 'I think that some of it is quite reasonable. We shouldn't dismiss it out-of-hand. I mean, we never did expect her to come over and actually tell us the name of the guy and where he lived – now did we?'

Hoagan lit a cigarette and sat back in her chair. Hawthwaite studied her, noticing how tired she looked. 'I totally agree with you, John when you say it sounds good; but we've still got to catch the bastard; we'll see how good it is then!'

'If we catch the bastard!' mumbled Hawthwaite, as he left the room.

*

'Any messages, Mary?' asked Hoagan, collapsing exhausted onto the settee.

Mary handed her a large whiskey. 'Two; that Cornish chap...you know the big-headed pilot, Bill Trev...'

'Trevarrick,' said Hoagan, trying not to sound interested.

'Well, he's left a message on the answer-phone, wants to talk to you. Doesn't know when he'll be back, it seems his mother's ill and he's had to go and see her; said he'd ring again.'

'Oh,' Hoagan sounded genuinely sorry; she had met Trevarrick's mother only once. The woman seemed a decent sort, unlike her son. 'What was the other one?'

Mary giggled. 'It was an American, at least I think he was American. Don't they talk funny?'

'An American?' Hoagan was intrigued.

'Someone called Warner, Jim Warner. He said he's coming over soon and that he would like to see you, while he's in the UK!' Mary drawled the final part of the message, producing a gross caricature of the psychologist's accent.

Her mother laughed then looked thoughtful. Although she had kept loosely in touch with Warner, mainly via Christmas cards, she had not seen him since the days of her counselling, sixteen years before.

Mary was also looking puzzled. 'Do I know him?' she asked.

Hoagan shook her head. 'No love, he was the man who helped me after...after your father died.'

Mary brightened. 'Great, I'd love to meet him then – the great white healer who saved my mother from the fruit farm!'

Hoagan laughed, she knew Mary was not being deliberately flippant. She had never told her just how near the brink she had been all those years ago. It had seemed unnecessary to burden someone so young and full of life with such a depressing story. Still, she thought, it would certainly be nice to see Warner again, after all those years.

'Did he say when he was coming over?' she asked.

'No, just said he'd be in touch nearer the time, but he did mention something about sooner rather than later. By the way, I've cooked us a chilli tonight.'

'What would I do without you?' Hoagan sipped the Scotch finding its smooth warmth relaxing, comforting. She smiled and held out a hand. 'Come and give your mum a cuddle.'

Mary sat down beside her; snuggling closely, enjoying the unrivalled feeling of security her mother's near-presence always gave her. 'Mum?'

'Yes,' Hoagan knew, from years of experience, that her daughter's tone was signalling the need of a favour.

'When do you think that we can go and buy my new canoe?'

Somewhere outside, in the gathering gloom, a barn owl screeched and a hint of whimsy flashed across Hoagan's tired looking face. Currently she was drained, almost to the point of total exhaustion. For weeks she had been leading the hunt for a highly dangerous murderer; a killer who seemed to strike at will and travel with the consequences of his savagery with total impunity. A man who had already taken four lives and in so doing, wrecked many more; yet now here she was, safe in the comfort of her elegant and expensive home, drinking whisky and discussing the wants, rather than the needs, of her fifteen-year-old daughter.

Yet, she considered, was this not life? Was it not true that everyone wore a number of different hats, each and every day? One minute police officer, the next – car driver, cook, mother and...and...lover. Lover? She shook her head. Oh the chance would be such a fine, fine thing. How she desperately needed to come home to someone who would cuddle her; someone strong, powerful, reassuring, someone in whose arms she too could feel safe and, somehow, protected from the grim, often relentless uncertainties of the outside world.

Mary sat up and looked at her. 'Well?' she asked gently.

'I have to go to London, on Thursday,' began Hoagan. 'I'm appearing on Crimewatch UK. I tell you what; I'm travelling by train, why don't we go down together as far as Manchester? We could get off there, visit Harrison's, buy your canoe; then I can go on to London. Your granddad will be staying here to look after you; he'll pick you up at the station.'

Mary beamed. 'That's great, can I bring Sharon as company for the journey back?'

Hoagan squeezed her. 'Of course you can, provided her mother doesn't object to her having the day off school.'

Mary shook her head. 'I'm sure she won't, she might even come with us herself!'

For the briefest moment Hoagan looked concerned; Mary noticed. 'Nothing wrong is there? I mean, you and Sharon's mum, you're still good friends – aren't you?'

Hoagan stood up. 'Oh yes...yes, we had a few words but I think we're mature enough to put that behind us. Now then, where's this super meal you've made me?'

Manchester

Divisional Fire Officer, Derek Barnes, blew a whistle and held up a hand for silence. Over three dozen exhausted fire fighters and other personnel highly trained in rescue techniques stopped work then, satisfied he had the silence needed, Barnes signalled the officer armed with sophisticated listening apparatus to proceed.

Gently, Colin Blakely, his face void of all expression other than total concentration, eased the acutely sensitive microphone into the ruins of what, up until that morning, had been a block of flats. For a moment he was unsure as to what he was hearing and twice adjusted the sensitivity of the apparatus, then he took off the headphones and spoke quietly to Barnes.

'I can hear breathing, sir.'

Barnes looked at him, sceptically. 'Are you sure, Colin? I mean, there must be hundreds of bloody tons of rubble between us and whoever's down there.'

'Positive,' Blakely was adamant and he handed the headphones to the incident leader.

For a good minute Barnes listened studiously, but unlike his junior officer he had not had specialist training in the use of the kit; sounds could be surprisingly deceptive under such unusual circumstances. Then he heard a cough.

He handed the headphones back. 'Well done, Colin, no doubt about it.' Slowly he walked away, shaking his head thoughtfully. Stood under one of the numerous arc lights were his deputy and a civil engineer, brought in as a consultant to the rescue commander. The former looked at him, expectantly.

'Well?' he asked.

Barnes turned to the engineer. 'There's at least one person alive down there – definite. We have the approximate location and I need you to look at the plans and give us a feel for the best way of getting to the victim; if there is one.'

The engineer grimaced. 'Certainly, but I must warn you, it's going to be slow.'

'How slow?' asked Barnes.

'Days rather than hours.'

The incident leader nodded and turned back towards the rubble. 'We'd best get cracking then – hadn't we?'

7

Wednesday, May 19, Manchester

Leading Fireman Daniel Osbourne signalled the crane driver to begin the lift. With his colleague, Harry Bennet, he watched as the two tons of millstone grit slowly began to rise. White dust and fragments of glass began to fall as the lintel, not slung quite at its centre of gravity, tilted slightly. Two other rescue workers hastily steadied the beam, guiding it safely away from the workings.

It was a little after two in the morning and Osbourne called for more lighting as he stared into the black, gaping hole, left in place of where the lintel had lain since the early hours of the previous Monday. Two powerful portable lights were erected at the perimeter of the void, immediately allowing the rescuers to see the unmistakable shape of an arm, poking through the rubble strewn floor of what had once been the tenement basement. A small, digital watch, strapped to the wrist of the victim, gave a clue as to the gender of their final casualty.

'She would have been on the ground floor.'

Osbourne turned to the speaker; it was Chiltern, the civil engineer. 'What's the ground floor doing in the basement?' Osbourne thought his question foolish even as he asked it, but he was tired, he was always stupidly bolshie when he was tired.

Chiltern bent down and picked up a large splinter of floorboard. 'That's why,' he said patiently. He dashed the wood against a piece of masonry; it immediately re-splintered into half a dozen smaller fragments. 'Dry rot, the place should have been condemned years back. That's one of the reasons why the spot came down like a pack of cards. The weight of the top two floors pushed the ground floor into the cellar as easy as you hammering a nail into a slab of warm butter!'

Osbourne shrugged. 'Do you reckon it's safe to go down there? We need to confirm that the owner of the arm isn't still waiting for a game of cards herself.'

'I'll have a look,' replied Chiltern, 'give me five minutes.'

*

Osbourne gently cleared the last of the debris away from the victim's bruised and blackened face. He guessed that the young girl had had a particularly traumatic death; her face was contorted with pain and the terror of her ordeal; he also assumed that at the time of the explosion she had been in the bathroom as most of the masonry covering her had been tiled. Gently he lifted her, exposing her head and for a moment looked surprised then concerned. Harry Bennett, holding the rope attached to his colleague's safety harness, noticed.

'What's the matter, don't tell me, she's asking yer fer a date?'

Osbourne, well used to the virtually inevitable gallows humour that often seemed part of the job-description of the emergency services, nonetheless looked up at him, pityingly. 'Don't be a twat! Is that copper still 'ere?'

'Yeh, 'e'll be int' nosh wagon 'aving a brew – why?'

'Tell him to get his arse down here,' said Osbourne; 'looks as though this poor little sod's been strangled as well as blown-up!'

Thursday, May 20, Broughton Mill, Cumbria

'Have you got everything, Mary, money, return tickets___?'

'Yes mum, stop fussing, I am fifteen you know!'

'We'll be late for the train and we've to pick up Sharon yet.' Hoagan had a final look in her shoulder bag. Characteristically, she had been so preoccupied with checking her daughter's needs she had forgotten to ensure her own. At last she found the hotel booking confirmation, it was under the Smith and Wesson .38 Special she had always carried since killing Sean O'Malley.

'Right then', she said brightly, 'let's go.' She opened the front door to find the postman stood in the porch; he was clutching a large envelope.

'Good morning, Fred; is that for me?' she asked.

'Recorded delivery, Mrs Hoagan,' He handed the bulky correspondence over. 'Can you sign for it?'

Hoagan signed the acknowledgement and put the envelope on the hall table. She was in the process of turning away when something told her to look again and as she did so cold, icy, fingers of fear began walking up her spine and the hairs on the back of her neck began to lift, slowly, darkly.

'What's the matter, mum?' Mary was outside, waiting for the car to be unlocked.

Hoagan looked briefly towards the front door; she was feeling hot, beads of perspiration breaking out on her forehead. This was ridiculous, she was a senior police officer; a woman who on countless previous occasions had kept her head when members of the public had long since lost their own. 'I shan't be a minute dear, just go and stand on the roadway, at the bottom of the drive.'

'But mum it's raining,' protested Mary. 'I'll get my hair wet; can't you let me into the car?'

'GET ON THE ROAD NOW, MARY – DO AS I SAY!'

Fifteen years of life experience told Mary Hoagan that her mother was not in debating mood. Quickly she went to the end of the drive and stood on the lane, now frightened and anxious as well as wet.

Hoagan looked once more at the postmark on the envelope. It didn't make sense; she was not expecting any mail from Belfast. Carefully, as though she were handling the most fragile of fragile objects known to man, she picked it up again. She ran her fingers along the length of both sides of the package, feeling for wires, springs and detonators! It was then that she spotted the sender's address, written on the reverse of the package!

*

Hoagan changed down to third, before negotiating a fairly sharp bend. 'Sorry about that love,' she said. 'It's just that, well...with a Belfast postmark you have to be careful.'

'What did Uncle John send you anyway?'

'It's a typescript, he's writing an academic work on the history of Irish terrorism from 1969.'

Mary sat back in her seat, her face screwed up in disgust. 'God, how boring!'

Hoagan laughed. 'Yes, that's what I thought when he asked me to look at it, but he is your father's youngest brother and he knows I've had some involvement with the subject,' she looked at her daughter and smiled. 'I couldn't really say no, now could I?'

Manchester

'That's the one I want mum, the Nordkapp; it's an absolutely brilliant sea canoe.' Mary's eyes were wide with excitement.

Hoagan looked at the young, smartly dressed salesman. 'Is that a good one?'

'Oh yes,' he assured, 'you're looking at the top end of the range there madam. 'Very strong, extremely sea-worthy, in fact, professionals use them.'

'What sort of price are we talking about?'

The salesman sounded apologetic. 'Err...that particular model retails at just under one thousand pounds.'

For the second time, that day, Mary looked anxiously at her mother.

Hoagan nodded, putting an affectionate arm around her daughter. 'Well...if that is what you want.'

'Oh yes please, that's exactly it!'

'Okay, I take it you deliver; we live in the south west of Cumbria?'

'No problem, madam, we deliver all over the north of England from this branch. We visit Cumbria once a week – Tuesdays – will that be satisfactory?'

*

After completing the formalities and ensuring the company had her correct address, with directions, Hoagan found herself pondering on a large, comprehensive display of sports trainers. Suddenly she remembered that for some considerable time she had been meaning to treat herself to a new pair, for her aerobics class.

As she studied the various qualities and prices of the shoes she began to feel uncomfortable and once again that day the hair on the back of her neck began, quite inexplicably, to bristle. She looked around the large store, it was virtually empty; no one was anywhere near them but the feeling she was being watched was, somehow, inescapable. Once again she glanced, nervously, around the shop, shivering involuntarily as she coped with the mystifying, but nonetheless almost tangible sensation that someone was trying to touch her, to crawl all over her. Now visibly shaken and with her normally high confidence levels having taken a battering, she took Mary and Sharon by the arm and began pushing them, complaining bitterly, towards the exit.

Friday, May 21, London, 8-30 am

To Hoagan, the traffic was unbelievably heavy. She stared, disbelievingly, out of the cab window; amazed at the number of people and vehicles around her. As she did so she also marvelled at the relentless noise they made and, after the sweet, mountain air of Cumbria, found she could actually taste the extremely unpleasant acridity of serious air pollution. Surprisingly, despite the lemming-like freneticism that was the reality of the world beyond the confines of the cab, she was feeling more relaxed than at any time in the last few months.

Her appearance on the national Crimewatch UK programme had gone well. She been understandably nervous and extremely apprehensive at the prospect of appearing on live television for the first time, but the staff at the BBC had been exceptionally helpful. They had given her a crash course in presentation, and helpful hints on stress management. This latter aid had taken the form of two whiskeys, consumed in the hospitality bar before the show. Most importantly, after her appearance, the telephones at the BBC, and in Cumbria, had not stopped ringing for many hours.

The hackney suddenly came to a screeching halt; the driver cursing almost unintelligibly in fluent Cockney. Not wearing a belt, Hoagan was thrown, quite violently, off the back seat onto the floor space.

'What the devil's going on!' she demanded.

'Don't know,' said the driver, 'this pillock in front suddenly stopped dead.'

Hoagan regained her seat and looked forward through the windscreen; the vehicle in question was a black limousine, of a make unfamiliar to her. However, she wasted no time in trying to identify the car; instead her attention was firmly fixed on the two men stood by the driver's door. Dressed in army battle fatigues, and black balaclavas, they were both carrying sawn-off shotguns!

'Bleedin' 'ell!' said the driver, throwing himself sideways onto the floor. 'Get down in the back, it must be a robbery, those bastards are armed!'

There was a muffled explosion, immediately followed by the screams of women and children running wildly for cover. One of the gunmen had discharged a round through the driver's side window and now, with the door open, the accomplice was dragging the almost headless body of the driver out onto the street. Hoagan watched in horror, as the corpse, bleeding copiously from what remained of the neck, was dumped, unceremoniously, on the metalled surface of the road.

The man who had fired the shot now tried to drag a young boy, kicking and screaming, out of the back of the limousine; while all the while the shotgun of the other man was moving, seeking a target, ready to prevent anyone foolish enough to try and stop the unfolding drama. A drama that was taking place in front of hundreds of commuters, at rush hour, in the middle of Britain's largest city.

Hoagan reached inside her bag, and took out the revolver. She looked again at the limousine, having already decided that an attempted kidnap was taking place. The small boy was still putting up a desperate struggle, clinging onto the car door handle, screaming and wailing. The man covering the attempted abduction still swivelled the shotgun, defying the crowd and Hoagan knew that if she was going to save the child she would have to be quick and very, very smart.

Stealthily, she eased open the left side cab door. Theoretically she should be invisible to the gunmen, especially when once on the road she could lie on her stomach.

'Where are yer goin'?' The cab driver, still hiding under the dashboard, had heard the back door being opened. He sounded horrified that his passenger should even consider leaving the relative anonymity and somewhat dubious safety of the cab.

'I'm a police officer,' hissed Hoagan, 'stay here!'

The driver tried to make himself even smaller, willing himself into the cab floor. He had absolutely no intention of doing anything other than taking his fare's very welcome advice.

The noise outside the cab was deafening, vehicles on both sides of the street had come to a halt and those drivers unable to see the cause of the delay had their hands resting permanently on what seemed like two hundred car horns. Quickly, Hoagan crawled around the back of the cab, then, slowly and carefully, peered from behind the protection of the rear wing. She could still see nothing of the gunmen but as she moved forward, on her hands and knees, the rough stone that dressed the roadway first tore through tights, then, more painfully, skin.

Her body was full of adrenalin now and she was fighting hard to bring her breathing under control. Unnoticed, the noise of car horns had gone, as had the wailing screams of sobbing women. Everyone witnessing the unfolding drama could hear the sounds but for Hoagan all other inputs were no longer being processed; what was unnecessary to the completion of her mission the brain had shut out, ready to concentrate entirely on the grim task ahead.

She reached the front wing of the taxi, the child had at last been extricated from the limousine and was now being dragged, sobbing and screaming towards a waiting van that had stopped in front of the target vehicle. Beyond the van the road was completely clear of traffic and Hoagan knew that in a matter of seconds the murderous kidnappers would be on their way, their precious, stolen prize, safe. Transported at speed to an unknown destination, and for the victim, an extremely uncertain fate!

The boy suddenly gave one last, violent, but undirected kick towards the man dragging him. The blow caught the kidnapper on the shin, trapping skin between bone and hard leather sole. It was clearly painful and had caught the man unawares. He winced audibly, the accomplice, walking backwards to cover their retreat, looked behind him in alarm.

Hoagan instantly recognised the distraction as something of a gift, here was her moment, she must not waste it! Without leaving her place of concealment, she acted. 'Armed police, drop your weapons now! Drop your weapons or you will be shot!'

Both men were totally and completely astounded by this unexpected and most unwanted complication to their already unravelling plans. It was the man without the child who saw her first. For a microsecond it seemed he was uncertain what to do, then, his deliberations complete, he brought up the shotgun.

Hoagan fired, twice, the bullets entering the man's body within three millimetres of each other; passing though rib and muscle, before entering into and instantly destroying the gunman's black heart.

Long before the dead man collapsed onto the London street, Hoagan had re-targeted the remaining gunman. 'Put the weapon down – slowly,' she demanded, 'then lie on the ground. Do it, do it now!'

Having seen the lightning fast destruction of his colleague she hoped the criminal would lose the stomach for war and, sure enough, he released the now passive and completely terrified child and made to lay his weapon on the ground. He had almost completed the task when, perhaps thinking about the life sentence that undoubtedly lay ahead of him, he changed his mind and brought up the gun in a desperate attempt to fire at her. The soft-nosed 0.38" round, discharged from Hoagan's handgun at a velocity in excess of eight hundred feet per second, disintegrated in his brain less than a second later.

Somewhere to her left she could now hear a siren wailing frantically and urgently; the police driver no doubt struggling desperately through the backed-up traffic. As the second gunman joined his erstwhile colleague on the tarmacked surface of the London street, a uniformed police officer, who had witnessed the whole of the thirty-second event, appeared from nowhere. He picked up the shotguns, placing them well out of the kidnapper's reach and then took charge of the screaming and much-troubled child.

From behind she could now hear the sound of running feet, followed by someone giving a warning she was more than familiar with. 'Armed police; drop your weapon and lie on the ground, drop your weapon now or you will be shot!

'Oh...shit!' said Hoagan, thinking more of the gross inconvenience to her day. 'Oh shit!'

*

Chief Superintendent Archie McDonald was forty-one years old, six-feet-three inches of solid bone and muscle and had, as all those unfortunate enough to be members of his staff would freely testify, in private, an anally retentive personality with accompanying low social intelligence. They would also, no doubt, advise the enquirer that the man was an extremely single-minded fitness fanatic, control freak and professional misogynist.

McDonald finished reading Hoagan's statement, passed a hand through close-cropped, greying hair, looked up and stared, coldly, at the attractive policewoman who had so recently arrived into his somewhat 'sterilised' world from 'Toytown'. Hoagan, now tired after a long and traumatic day, took the opportunity of working on some notes she was in the process of making after reading the transcripts of a number of interesting telephone calls to Crimewatch, made as a result of her successful television appeal for information the previous evening.

The Cumbrian had caused McDonald some significant embarrassment. Twelve days previously, one Mark Nathan Carter, had insisted upon seeing him personally. He had told McDonald of his concerns that an attempt to kidnap his son may be made in the near future. McDonald had asked Carter for evidence in support of his claim, Carter had none; only that he had been approached by a man some two weeks earlier; a man who had offered him a substantial sum if he were to informally allow him use of his jewellery import infrastructure. Carter was 'making enough money', he had told the man whom he suspected of drug smuggling, he also told him to 'clear off'. Two days later he received a telephone call with a final ultimatum. 'Co-operate or lose your son!'

Carter had immediately hired a minder to look after his boy and, like any normal member of the public, sought assistance from the police. Unfortunately, McDonald had taken an instant dislike to Carter. For, amongst the police officer's numerous irrational prejudices was a hatred of Jews and despite Carter's surname, the policeman well knew that the businessman was of that faith.

The meeting had lasted five minutes during which time McDonald had told the jewellery importer that he would need at least another five hundred men were he to offer protection to everyone who came to him for assistance after similar threats had been made. Without concrete supporting evidence, therefore, there was nothing the Metropolitan Police could do for him. Three days later, Carter delivered to the police station a cassette recording of a further telephone conversation he had had with a member of the gang. It had lain in McDonald's in-tray ever since, that was, until that morning!

A less complicated, more intelligent human being might have made the most out of a bad situation. McDonald's flawed decision making and subsequent reluctance to do anything other than turn a blind eye to Carter's plight, had allowed, or very nearly allowed, the gang to carry out their threat. However, despite the death of the minder, the gang's target, the boy, was safe and both the gunmen were dead. McDonald therefore, in the manner universally predictable of his ilk, displaced his wrath at his own shortfalls onto the policewoman from the 'Bush'. It was she who had dared to come armed onto his patch; it was she, a woman, who had recovered something priceless from the flawed product of his own bigotry, intransigence and flawed decision making.

McDonald was about to use his standard and generally highly successful interrogation technique. A technique acquired after many years service, first with the City of Glasgow then the Metropolitan Police. Honed finally to perfection during his three-year tour with the Flying Squad, it consisted, quite simply, of intimidation and domination until he had a satisfactory conclusion.

'I have read the report you've given my officers, Hoagan,' he began. 'It doesn't satisfactorily explain why you were wandering around my part of the capital with a loaded revolver in your handbag. Most women I know seem content with make-up, purse and a couple of Tampax!' McDonald leaned forward on his desk, accentuating the broadness of his shoulders, adding to the overall psychological image of irresistible force.

Hoagan looked up from her notes and smiled at him, unexpectedly and quite disarmingly. 'Make a habit of studying women's handbags do you?' she asked.

McDonald's face began to redden. 'May I remind you, Hoagan, this is a very serious matter; you have, by the possibly unauthorised use of a firearm, taken the lives of two men; I therefore advise you to co-operate fully, it's your arse that's on the line!'

Hoagan settled back into the chair, not only giving the impression of being totally relaxed, she was totally relaxed. During her career she had met McDonald before; not in person, but she had certainly met him in another guise. Unfortunately the police force attracted such testosteronal entities; beings stuffed full of their own importance; little men, inadequate men, men who hid behind a shield of aggression and intimidatory body language to conceal their own shortfalls as human beings. Desperate to achieve dominance over everyone, especially the inferior member of the species – women; they symbolised a bygone age of male paternalism, of dominance both in and out of the workplace. They often made appallingly bad man-managers, either because they did not care about their staff, did not understand them, or because they were far, far too busy protecting and boosting their own pathetic egos to even think about them.

As Hoagan expected, she had been disarmed and arrested at the scene of the shooting. Initially she had been the subject of some interest and a source of amusement to the numerous officers who had questioned her. They quickly realised however that they were dealing with a senior no-nonsense professional police officer in every sense of the word. After that and with her explanation as to why she was carrying a concealed weapon confirmed, they treated her with deference and respect. That was with the exception of the egotist now confronting her across the large, cheaply veneered, chipboard desk.

'You've read my report, McDonald,' she replied; 'there's nothing more to tell you. As you may recall, when you took your oath, our prime directive is the preservation of life. I am a senior professional police officer; I did my duty this morning the way I saw fit. You have my statement; I can't make it any clearer. If you want it translating into brail, French or Double fucking Dutch I suggest you arrange it at your own expense.' She stood up, collecting her coat and bag.

McDonald turned white; no one had dismissed him so simplistically since he was at primary school. Slowly, although up to that point he had hardly had any dealings with her, the appalling truth dawned. The woman was superior to him in every way, apart from raw brute strength. Psychologically, educationally, intelligence wise, she was light years ahead of him. She was also in no way reliant on him to safeguard her career. In fact, he had no control over her whatsoever!

'Sit down, Hoagan,' he commanded, his breaking voice giving away the self-inflicted stress he now found himself under. 'I would like to remind you that I am your senior officer, I still have questions to ask you!'

Hoagan looked tired and sounded extremely bored. 'Bollocks! No you haven't, McDonald you've just got a seriously inflated ego you desperately need get under control. Helping you in that area is not in my job description.' She began walking to the door then paused. 'After pulling your cock out of the custard – and spending all bloody day in this madhouse I've had enough! In my opinion the ratepayers of Cumbria have given the Met sufficient of my time. I've gone through the incident half a dozen times with your staff, it was witnessed by one of your own men and now you've got a report on the facts longer than War and Peace. As far as I'm concerned, enough is enough. I'm in the middle of a major murder enquiry back home, an enquiry that I'm now going back to lead. You know where to find me if you want me.'

Saturday, May 22, Police HQ, Ambleside

The headquarters of Cumberland and Westmorland Constabulary was situated in an old manor house on the outskirts of the famous town of Ambleside, sited on the shores of Lake Windermere. The chief constable, Sir Peter Wrigley, enjoyed a suite of offices in what had once, in the ancient building's previous incarnation, been the library. Wrigley was a tweedy, old-fashioned type, only a few weeks from his sixtieth birthday. Surprisingly short, wiry and insignificant looking, he still sported a full head of black hair that most people, including Hoagan, thought he dyed.

She had only been in 'God's' office a few times previously and as Wrigley studied the faxed copy of the Metropolitan Police report, on her previous day's 'adventures', she took the opportunity of studying the room's contents. The walls were oak-panelled in the fashion of the eighteenth century. On them hung numerous paintings, mainly depicting and symbolising life in the police force from the mid-nineteenth century onwards. At the back of the chief's chair hung a posed, official photograph of Her Majesty the Queen. In the far corner of the room, a two hundred and fifty year-old grandfather clock, reputed to be worth over ten thousand pounds, ticked and tocked loudly and – like herself – patiently.

At last, Wrigley looked up from the report, smiled and removed his glasses. 'My God, Kate, you were busy yesterday!'

Hoagan returned the smile and nodded. 'Yes, it was what I think you might call – different, sir!'

'Tell me,' he began to chuckle. 'Did you ask the gunmen to – "make my day"?' Hoagan smiled, weakly. She knew that Wrigley's political views about violent offenders were very much right of the extreme right of centre. On more than one occasion, during interviews with the press or in television appearances, he had happily identified himself with the hang 'em and flog 'em brigade. Wrigley tapped the fax with a finger. 'As you know, for some considerable time, mine has been one of the few voices within ACPO to have advocated the routine arming of police officers. No doubt some parties will think I deliberately set the incident up.' They both laughed, but this was a serious affair, difficult to trivialise and the mirth was half-hearted.

Wrigley had known Hoagan for almost all of her police career. He had been a chief inspector in admin when she had shot O'Malley and lost her husband. He was one of those Englishmen, rarely found in the late twentieth century, who enjoyed an almost unique mix of all the major pre-requisites necessary for brilliant man-management. If he considered that one of his officers had acted inappropriately he would not prejudge. Instead he would discuss their decision-making processes with them. If merit was to be found in their case, he would find it and take it into consideration. If not however...!

Perhaps where Peter Wrigley differed so much from many modern managers, in whatever public sector field, was his refusal to be intimidated by politicians and those in positions of authority over him. This had been his ethos throughout a long and distinguished career. As with all chief constables, he too had served his time at the coalface and he knew how difficult 'bobbying' could be, especially in the late twentieth century. As such he would defend, against all comers, those of his officers who had made a decision, no matter how flawed, that he could uphold with some credibility. Subsequent to receiving his knighthood this was especially true. Realisation that he was out of the frame for the Metropolitan Commissioner's job meant that he had now reached his own personal ceiling and it is an unremarkable truth that the ambitious are prepared to take far more risks at such a final stage of their career.

Wrigley was especially pleased with the way Hoagan had handled the London incident. For one thing it demonstrated that routine arming of the police was a far from speculatively useful concept. Secondly, he had no doubt that Hoagan had acted in the best interests of everyone when she intervened and shot the gunmen dead. Thirdly, with over fifty, sympathetic witnesses to the affair, one of whom could have been an unarmed and therefore contextually impotent police officer, he knew that her actions should bring credit to the force and probably a gallantry medal for herself.

After a gentle knock on the door, Wrigley's secretary, Janet Moore, appeared with a tray of coffee and biscuits. As Janet poured, Wrigley asked Hoagan for more details about the attempted kidnap. Hoagan told him everything she knew then Wrigley asked her why she thought the unarmed chauffeur had been shot.

'He was ex-special forces.' she replied. 'They must have known that, that's why they neutralised him.'

'But how the hell did they expect to get away from the centre of London, in rush hour?'

Hoagan smiled. 'They stopped them right outside a multi-storey car park. The top floor is uncovered; they had a car at the bottom and a helicopter waiting on top.'

Wrigley looked impressed. 'Very professional, well the parents of the boy wish to meet you, Kate. I've arranged for them to be here at lunchtime tomorrow, we can all dine together in the senior officers' mess.'

Hoagan shook her head. 'If it's all the same to you, sir, I'm going to be pretty damned busy for the next couple of days. Don't forget, I've been away since Wednesday, I've a lot to catch up on.'

Wrigley looked at her, studiously; whilst always a stickler for professionalism, he nevertheless had an excellent reputation for concern about the welfare of his staff. 'How are you, Kate I mean psychologically?'

'Oh I'm fine, sir, thank you. They gave me a good de-briefing down there. They have trained counsellors on-call all the time.'

'So you're not having the traumas you experienced after O'Malley?'

'No, at least not yet anyway; in fact I know it sounds brutal but – well as they reminded me at the de-briefing – if I hadn't shot them – they'd have got me. That may well have been disastrous for the boy!'

Wrigley laughed dryly. 'I don't think it would have done you much good either, Kate!' He became thoughtful, his eyes briefly turning to the fax on his desk. 'Err...what exactly did you say to this McDonald chappie?'

Hoagan turned a little pink; she had climbed down out of her tree now and was feeling much less angry. With the return of her objectivity she could also be self-critical of her outburst the previous day. She smiled, whimsically. 'He was being extremely rude and provocative; I think I told him to "bollocks", sir! You must remember I'd been under a lot of stress that day. It had been a late night at the BBC and the past few weeks have really taken it out of me. I'd gone through the incident at least three times already and I just wanted to get back here.'

She was sounding apologetic and Wrigley waived away her justification, eyeing her understandingly. 'Good, in your place that's what I'd have told him; perhaps even something a little stronger!'

Hoagan looked at him, surprised at such candour. 'Sorry?'

'After you'd psychologically floored him, McDonald went and had a drip to his commander, about your attitude and lack of co-operation. He's filed a formal complaint, it's here, attached as an annex to the report on the shooting.' Wrigley removed some papers from the main report.

'What did the commander say, sir?'

'He told him to "bollocks" as well!' Wrigley tore up the report and threw it into the bin. 'Apparently McDonald is to be investigated by Internal Affairs for his handling of the whole affair. He'll be lucky not to get a severe arse-kicking; the new commissioner is desperate to improve the force's image; cowboys like McDonald he does not need.'

Hoagan watched as he toyed with his coffee, he was taking an age stirring in the half spoonful of sugar he allowed himself. She knew there was something he wanted to say but perhaps didn't know how best to approach it. At last, however, he looked at her, sympathetically.

'I'm afraid that until the full enquiry into this affair is complete and the coroner has returned a verdict of justifiable homicide, which I very much expect he will, I'm going to have to suspend you from duty, Kate.'

Hoagan stared at him disbelievingly. This was a factor that she had not even considered; it was of course foolish of her not to have done so. She did not need Wrigley to explain the rule book. Use of firearms was, invariably, only sanctioned by a senior officer of the contextual force area. Special units such as the diplomatic protection squad or special armed response units had implied permission to open fire if either their charges, or they themselves, were threatened, but Hoagan had not been in that position. She was a visitor in the area of a foreign force; she was not even in her official police capacity, as the Metropolitan Police had not needed to be informed. Although her firearm had been issued with the authority of the home secretary, it was on the expressed understanding that it was for the protection of herself and her family, to counter any possible attack by a terrorist group. Blowing away a killer and kidnapper, in rush hour London, did not, therefore, enter the equation.

'You understand my problem?' Wrigley searched Hoagan's eyes for understanding. He knew she was one of the best officers in his small, rural force and had the roles been reversed he hoped that he too would have had the courage to take the same course of action. It was a bitter pill for him, in particular, to swallow. He was rewarding an act of impromptu heroism; that most probably had saved a youngster's life, with suspension. Symbolically a word that always seemed to be associated with wrongdoing.

Pragmatically, Hoagan nodded. 'Yes...yes, sir I do understand, although I cannot say that I'm very happy about it.'

'Take a holiday, Kate you deserve one. Get yourself off somewhere with Mary, how is she by the way?'

'Oh she's fine thank you, hard at it at school though; we can't really go away just yet.'

'I understand they confiscated your weapon?'

'Oh yes...evidence.'

Wrigley was looking unhappy again. 'We had a telex from the Home Office yesterday, advising us they no longer feel you need to have a personal handgun.'

'They've revoked the permit?' Hoagan sounded surprised.

'No, I got John Richardson to ring London to find out what's going on. All they would tell him is that the situation, re-O'Malley, has changed.'

'They didn't say why?'

'No, that's all they said. They've left the question of arming you down to me.'

'And what decision have you made, sir?'

Wrigley opened a drawer in his desk. 'Initially, bearing in mind that you've not had a single problem in the past sixteen, years I was inclined to agree with them. I do know you never liked the idea of having a loaded weapon around the house. If the Home Office considered that the risk had reduced so much...well. Then, somebody gave me this.' He handed her a newspaper, already open at the appropriate page. 'Top right-hand corner, Kate.'

Hoagan briefly noted it was the New Irish Tribune, dated two days previously. Then she looked at the photograph he had indicated. For a second, ice-cold fingers wrapped themselves around her heart as a tragic and terrifying memory returned. Staring at her, across a void sixteen years wide, was the face of the man who had killed her husband and whom she had later destroyed herself. Although the face was much older and fatter and the greying hair now thinner, she knew she was still staring at the face of Sean O'Malley – otherwise known as – 'The Doctor'!

She had stood up to take the paper from Wrigley, now, heavily; she regained her seat before hastily reading the small report that appeared underneath the photograph.

O'MALLEY RETURNS AFTER TWENTY-ONE YEARS

Michael Daniel O'Malley, jailed by the British Government for attempted murder in 1973, is pictured with his ailing mother and other family members after arriving at Dublin Airport yesterday. Patrick O'Malley, Michael's youngest son, was conspicuous by his absence. It is rumoured he has been delayed in America, where for the past two years he has relentlessly brought his father's case to the notice of sympathetic Irish Americans. They in turn have funded a private investigation into the safety of O'Malley's conviction and have been lobbying powerful Irish American politicians to pressurise Whitehall for his release. It is expected Patrick will meet up with his father in the next few days.

The British Government's case against O'Malley has always been controversial amongst Irish intellectuals and republicans. Ever since his arrest, in 1972, for the attempted murder of the then chancellor of the exchequer, Douglas Sylvester, there has been doubt as to London's underlying motives. These concerns were aggravated significantly when two key witnesses, supposedly both mistresses of O'Malley, were killed after a high-speed blow-out on the M1 Motorway only weeks before he was due to go to trial at the Old Bailey.

Notwithstanding, O'Malley's lawyers, at the time of trial, maintained that the sisters had given definitive statements to the Metropolitan Police. In those statements, it was alleged, O'Malley had been at home with both women during all of the night in question. However, the existence of the documents has always been refuted by the Metropolitan Police and the Home Office. With the absence of any formal written statements, from the two dead women, their alibi was deemed purely hearsay and therefore inadmissible to the court.

Sources close to O'Malley and members of the republican movement cognoscenti are convinced that the UK government deliberately 'fitted-up' the Irishman. Despite repeated denials, he has been heavily pencilled in for a number of murders and bombings, not least of which being the attempted 197O attack on the British Army Barracks at Colchester with his brother. A further source, reputed to be on intimate terms with the O'Malley family, has hinted that Michael was only released to avoid embarrassment to the UK Government. This after new evidence, apparently only made available by the latest forensic technology, has suggested that the original case against the self-confessed terrorist really was seriously flawed; evidence that the British Government did not want testing in a court of law.

Whatever the rights and wrongs of the affair, O'Malley has paid a significant personal price having spent over a third of his life behind British made steel doors and bars. Even now, officially, he has only been released on medical grounds. Yesterday he refused to comment on the safety of the conviction that put him out of circulation for over a fifth of a century. When asked how he intended spending the rest of his life he merely said he would be taking a long vacation, possibly in Holland, with friends.

'My God!' said Hoagan. 'They really were identical, weren't they? At first I thought that was Sean. Even after all this time the resemblance is remarkable. She put the paper on the desk. 'Were you aware they were going to release him, sir?'

Wrigley looked angry, not irate but angry enough for Hoagan to believe him. 'No...no I did not, Kate. I've been onto the Home Office this morning; can't get a sensible answer out of the buggers. It's a hush-hush job, no doubt about it. They've even put out a D Notice, hence no comment in any of the UK newspapers.'

'What I can't understand is why they've released him,' began Hoagan, shaking her head, 'even if he has a medical condition. I mean, his fingers are so bloody it's not true. Once you catch hold of the O'Malleys of this world you hang onto the sods!'

'One thing I did find out this morning, on your behalf, Kate. The Home Office are adamant that his vendetta against you is now a dead duck. Apparently, and you'll be both delighted and relieved to hear this, they have his written word on that!'

Hoagan looked into Wrigley's mocking eyes and laughed, cynically. 'His word? His word? I wouldn't trust that toe-rag to empty my dustbin. In fact it wouldn't surprise me if he hasn't already landed a job in Iraq, teaching social skills to Saddam's secret police!' She handed the newspaper back to him. 'Interesting that they no longer consider I need a gun, sir. I mean, now they've released O'Malley they would have to say that, wouldn't they?'

'I think you're right, Kate,' agreed Wrigley. 'Knowing we would eventually find out he'd been released, that's why they felt obliged to advise me about your armed status. Very clever, anyway, they've left the decision, and the responsibility to give you another weapon, down to me!'

'And what is your decision, sir?'

'It's a no-brainer as far as I'm concerned. The armourer has been briefed to fix you up after you leave here.'

Hoagan smiled. 'Thank you, I'd much prefer not to have to bother, but under these changed circumstances...'

And you, and I, have young Mary to consider,' added Wrigley.

'I certainly do, especially now,' she agreed.

'I've notified special branch,' said Wrigley. 'They'll keep me informed if any of the O'Malley family try to enter the UK.'

'What about Michael himself, do you think he try something?'

'Can't see it, Kate; he'll immediately be in breach of the deportation order and could very easily find himself back inside,' he grinned, 'and something tells me he'll not fancy chancing that!'

8

Monday, May 24, 'B' Division HQ, Manchester Constabulary

Detective Chief Superintendent Arnold Lockhart finished reading the reports his CID team had prepared then looked at the evidence piled on his desk. There was a small plastic toolbox, a set of mole grips, scissors, adhesive tape, nylon twine, screwdriver and a hammer; they all had a label attached to them reading 'REPLICA'.

'How long before Forensics get through with the real things?' asked Lockhart.

'Don't know, sir.' Detective Inspector Phillip Morris watched, impassively, as his lantern-jawed chief studied photographs of the strangled girl.

'You've got a positive ID on her?'

'Yes, sir, her name's Julie Bennett, an eighteen-year-old missing person from Scotland. Her mother's confirmed the ID.'

'She'd been raped as well as strangled?'

'That's right, pathologist reckons it was probably last Monday – the seventeenth. According to Forensics, the sperm in her body is the same blood group as one Raymond Elvis White. He had the ground floor flat where she would have been before the tenement collapsed.'

'What do we know about White?' asked Lockhart.

'He died in the same explosion; thirty-two years old, a general no-hoper who had previous for assault and rape!'

Lockhart's eyebrows lifted momentarily. 'Had he indeed?'

'Yes, sir, got three years for buggering a teenage girl against her will.'

'And you think that this guy may be the Lakes' Murderer?'

Morris was slightly hesitant. 'I think it's a realistic possibility. We'll know for sure when we get the DNA profile on his sperm and a positive on the material from his van. They've definitely found traces of hair and blood in the Transit.'

Lockhart nodded. 'Or if Forensics can make a connection with the tools.'

'They may do, although they've been well-scrubbed there's a good chance the screwdriver was used as the stabbing weapon.' said Morris.

'Bit early to get too excited,' said Lockhart. 'I mean the Lakes' girls had their tits cut off, they were also stabbed repeatedly. This girl was in one piece when they found her.'

'It may be White had had enough. He'd consumed a large amount of whiskey and drugs; it then appears he turned on the gas.'

'A psychopath with a conscience,' Lockhart laughed cynically, 'that's a new one!'

'Shall I let Cumbria know what we've found, sir?'

Lockhart was thoughtful. 'No, try and get as much gen out of them as you can first; you know – pathologist's reports etc. But don't be too generous as to why at this stage; let's be sure of our facts, we don't want to look like a bunch of prats to a bunch of woolly-backs, do we, Phil?'

*

Hoagan found her father exactly where she knew she would. He turned as she put her arm through his then smiled, delightedly, and gave her a hug. 'What brings you to this neck of the woods?' he asked. 'I thought you were bows-under hunting that serial killer bloke?' Hoagan gave him a whimsical smile and told him. Bill Davies shook his head disbelievingly and turned back to his study of the numerous moored boats in Walney Channel. 'Suspended for doing your job; my God, the country's going from bad to worse, how long are you likely to be off work then?'

Hoagan shrugged. 'Good question; could be as long as three or more months.'

'On full pay I take it, at taxpayer's expense?'She nodded. 'And the result is a foregone conclusion; you'll not be in trouble?'

'As foregone as it can be; there were over four-dozen witnesses and from what I can gather no one, as yet, has disagreed with my side of the story. Both the kidnappers had previous for assault and armed robbery.'

Bill Davies shook his head despairingly. 'I just don't know what this country's coming to I really don't; how can anyone be suspended for doing their job? Too many bloody do-gooders around, that's the problem today! They want to put 'em all against a wall and shoot the buggers!'

Hoagan grinned; her father and her chief constable had almost identical views in this area. Yet Bill Davies was a die-hard socialist, her chief almost right of the extreme right. She shrugged; such was the perversity of life. She nudged her parent gently in his oversized stomach. 'Listen, I didn't come here to have one of your political lectures.'

Bill looked at his daughter, eyes slightly hurt. 'A'm sorry lass, what can I do for yer?'

'Well I rather thought I might take you for lunch,' she replied.

Her father brightened, before looking concerned. 'Not in one of them fancy foreign restaurants I hope.'

Hoagan laughed. 'No, dad, in a pub, where they serve real food and real ale – where else?'

Tuesday, May 25, Amsterdam, Holland

The room was quaintly old-fashioned, cottage furniture neatly dressed in flowery loose covers, the wallpaper a perfect match. At the windows the curtains, red and sensual, remained drawn and tied back, privacy being afforded by thick, expensive, net curtains. Numerous ornaments decorated the mantelpiece, including a bone china windmill and a little Dutch doll. On the wall above, an oil painting depicted two naked lovers engaged in the sexual act of soixante-neuf.

Patrick O'Malley watched as his grey-haired and seemingly rapidly aging father drew on the spliff causing the pungent odour of cannabis to hang, heavily, in the air. In turn, Michael studied his son. Up until half an hour previously they had not seen each other for over twelve months. As Patrick was only twenty-two, Michael had never seen him other than in the visiting rooms of one of Her Majesty's prisons.

'You did well, lad.'

Patrick, the youngest of three other siblings, smiled awkwardly but with pride. 'It was hard work, but it paid off in the end and you're here now, out of that damnable country, that's the main thing!'

O'Malley smiled. 'How did you find the Americans?'

Patrick laughed. 'Most are okay but some of them must be the greatest hypocrites on earth. They're terrified of terrorism at home but generally couldn't give a fuck about what goes on outside their country. In the company of some Irish Americans you can't go wrong. They'll tell you how great you are to continue the fight against the "old enemy"; they'll happily give you dollars and the best of hospitality.'

'Even when they know the money may be used to buy arms or explosives?' asked the older man.

'No problem, as I said, provided you aren't going to use it on their doorstep. On the last night I was there I got an invite to the house of a U.S. Senator. He personally told me to keep on with the "fight"...the fight mind you. He said a Cause such as our own required the use of all means possible to overthrow an illegitimate regime. So then I asked him whether he thought it right that many previous U.S. governments had sought to de-stabilise legitimate, democratically elected regimes considered hostile to them in other parts of the Americas.'

Michael drew heavily on his cigarette. 'I didn't know you were an expert on the politics of the Americas?'

Patrick grinned cynically. 'I'm not; I don't really know anything about it. I just wanted to see his reaction, that's all.'

'And what did he say?'

'Told me I was still wet behind the ears, that I didn't know what I was talking about.'

O'Malley smiled and stubbed out the joint. 'You shouldn't knock the Americans, Patrick. Remember, it's mainly their dollars and influence that eventually got me out of that stinking British hole. You're still very young, an idealist, if someone hands you a meal ticket you take it, it's called survival! Frankly I couldn't give a damn what they think; if they support the Cause then they're good enough for me.'

Patrick nodded, before becoming thoughtful. 'Father?'

'Yes?' Michael eyed his son, studiously.

'What are we going to do about Uncle Sean's killer? I mean, now you're out of the way of the Brits, and they can't touch you, isn't it time we sorted her out once and for all?'

Michael remained silent for some moments but when he did speak his eyes were suddenly much darker. 'Patrick, I gave my word that not only myself but also my family, would never go after her or any of her kin.'

Patrick eyed his father with disgust. 'You can't be serious; we're talking here about a woman who killed your identical twin brother. Shot him seven times in the back, then when her gun was empty, blew his leg off with his own weapon.'

'Have you any conception what twenty-one years inside does for you, Patrick?' Michael held up a hand preventing an answer. 'Of course you don't, no one can understand unless they've actually done it!'

'I know; it must have been terrible, especially being imprisoned by the Brits!' acknowledged Patrick. 'But you were the one who swore an oath, an oath on your brother's grave!'

'An oath that means nothing to me now; I was a relatively young man then; I still had some fight left in me. It was a spontaneous knee-jerk on my part although, at the time, I meant it, God knows I meant it; in those days I didn't just hate Kate Hoagan, I hated the whole world!'

Michael shook his head despairingly. 'It's too late now; I've changed; twenty-one years of being banged up inside takes the heart out of any man. Slopping out, having virtually no freedom, not being allowed to even make a decision about what to eat or wear. They'd tell you when you could have a shower or sometimes even a crap! After a while you lose all your confidence, eventually, when someone shouts "shit!" you automatically look around for the shovel!'

Patrick lowered his head; he could not believe what he was hearing. He had spent months in America, lobbying politicians and wealthy Irish Americans; actively seeking their political and financial support, desperate to find the means of getting his father out of prison, anxious that when he had done so the family honour could be retrieved. 'So you have no intention of fulfilling your vowed pledge to avenge your brother's murder?' he asked.

Michael looked at his son, patiently, understandingly. 'Do you know how many people I have killed, Patrick?'

Patrick wanted to tear his eyes away from those of his father's, but he could not; instead they held him, compelled him to stay and to listen. 'No, father, no I don't.'

'Twenty-six,' Michael nodded knowingly. 'Twenty-fucking-six and your Uncle Sean's score was something like fifteen. Between us that's forty-one! More than enough for any family – wouldn't you say?'

'I'm not suggesting that you go on killing for the Cause, father. God knows you've suffered enough for a united Ireland. What I am saying is that this is our own private war. We are not asking you to do it, any of us will take the job on, just give us your blessing.'

Michael was beginning to look weary. 'Do you know what your Uncle Sean's nickname was, Patrick?'

'Doctor I think...why?'

'Do you know why he was called "The Doctor"?'

Patrick looked confused. 'No, no I don't think I do?'

Michael explained about the chain saw. 'Do you think that a man like that should be avenged? Or to put it another way, do you think that maybe Ireland's now a safer place without him?'

Patrick stiffened and for a fleeting second Michael saw the flash of hatred, the merciless O'Malley streak of madness flicker across the dark eyes of his son. 'No, father I do not; whatever Uncle Sean did he did it because he believed he was right to do it – for the good people of Ireland.'

'You poor, pathetic, naive child!' Michael nearly spat the words. 'Your uncle did it because he was a fucking psychopath, a sadist who enjoyed inflicting pain, a man who got-off by terrorising people. He didn't do it for the Cause; he did what he did it for himself; your uncle was a self-centred egotistical murderer, he simply legitimated his activities by identifying them with the Irish Tricolour!'

Patrick sprang to his feet; the conversation was destroying the very core of what he had always believed in, what he had always had faith in since he was a small boy. When he had been at school his peers had looked up to him. He was the son of a famous freedom fighter, imprisoned by the evil Brits. His uncle had been mercilessly cut down by the cowardly Brit police and one day, one day his death, and the manner of his death, must be avenged!

'Father!' Patrick screamed the word. 'Vengeance is what we have waited for, for years! It's not yours to take away from us!'

Michael sat back in the chair, suddenly feeling deeply fatigued. It had been said, the very words he did not want to hear had, at last, been spoken. The decision was no longer his own. Now he was out of the clutches of the Brits the family felt free to take whatever course of action they thought fit. They were all relatively young, still looking at life as though it were black and white. To them there was no blurring of any of the idealised images that created their beliefs. To-date their lives had been relatively uncomplicated by many of the consequences of the violence they obviously hungered for.

'Sit down, Patrick.'

Michael spoke to his son as he would have spoken to one of his men twenty-one years earlier. This was a voice Patrick had never heard on any of his visits to the English prisons. It was the voice of authority, a voice that demanded instant obedience. For the first time in his life he found himself looking into the face of a ruthless terrorist, an uncompromising killer and it terrified him. 'You are wrong if you think that the family, as we know it, can take the decision.'

Patrick looked at his father quizzingly, moving his head from side to side as if that would help understanding. 'How do you mean, father, "as we know it"?'

Michael lit another cigarette, inhaling deeply before he answered the question. 'If Sean had had a child, then who do you think should decide?'

Patrick shrugged a shoulder; the question had made him feel uncomfortable, out of his depth. The change of tone, the dark, marble eyes; this was a side of his father he was not comfortable with. Fighting for one's country was a romantic ideal; it had never really occurred to him that his father could be so awesomely powerful, simply with body language and speech alone.

'But...but that's hypothetical, Uncle Sean never had a family, he never even married!' Even as he spoke the words he knew the reply was weak, even naive.

Michael stared at his youngest son, pityingly. 'Since when does one have to marry to have children?'

Patrick's eyes widened and became saucer like; they searched his father's face for understanding. 'Are you saying that he had a child?'

'Answer my question, Patrick, who should make the decision?'

Patrick nodded, slowly; he looked down and spoke to the expensive, thick-piled carpet. 'Yes, yes, it would be just; that a child should have the right to decide the fate of his or her father's murderer. To decide over life or death for someone who had taken such an important life.'

On the small table, at Michael's side, were writing pad and pen; now he hastily scribbled down a name and address. 'Here,' he handed the paper to Patrick, 'you must go and see her, ask her where Sean's child is.'

Patrick handled the paper almost reverently. 'She...is....she is the mother of___?'

'She may be able to tell you where my brother's child, your cousin, can be found. Speak with her, find the child and then ask him or her to come and see me.'

'Why did no one ever know about this?'

'Nobody needed to know,' replied Michael. 'It's possible that even your uncle never knew he was a father!'

Patrick scrutinised his father's eyes. 'Why?'

'Perhaps he was never informed; as I've told you, he wasn't fit to be a parent.'

'Did this woman have a son or a daughter?'

Michael shrugged, tiredly. 'I don't know, that is something you will have to find out.'

'So you agree that he or she will decide then?'

Michael nodded. 'He or she will decide what the family must do and we will accept that decision.'

A teenage girl suddenly appeared at the open door of the room. She was naked, except for a man's shirt that she wore unbuttoned. She walked into the room, intermittently exposing her breasts as the garment moved with her body. She sat on Michael's knee and began to stroke his thinning, grey hair.

'We're ready for you now, Michael.' Her English was good the Flemish accent thick.

Michael began to play with one her breasts, gently teasing the nipple hard until the girl giggled. He looked back to his son. They've arranged a live demo for me. Some well-hung black guy's doing three of them,' he laughed, 'then it's my turn.'

His son looked embarrassed. 'A demo?'

Michael smiled. 'When you've not enjoyed the pleasures of the flesh for over twenty years you're entitled to a refresher course.' He pushed the girl to her feet, smacked one of her buttocks, playfully and winked at his son. 'Want to try some?' he asked. 'These are serious professionals you know, you'll be amazed how much you might learn.'

Patrick flushed redder. This man, who was his father, had proved to be nothing like the idealised, romantic freedom fighter he had always imagined him to be. Instead he smoked cannabis, drank too much, had sex in brothels and worst, had reneged on his long-standing vendetta against the family's sworn enemy.

'Err...no thank you; I'm tired; I think I need an early night.'

'You can stay here, Patrick. I'm sure I can find you something to keep you warm in bed.'

Patrick shook his head, vigorously. 'No, no thank you, I'll get back now.'

Michael put an arm around the whore as he watched his son approach the door. 'Are you calling in tomorrow, before you leave for Dublin?'

'No, I'm booked on the early flight; I'll talk this over with the family, let you know how we get on.'

O'Malley slipped the girl's shirt off her shoulders before they left the room. On the landing outside he spoke to the whore, thoughtfully. 'According to his mother, Patrick took after her; he was the educated, sensitive one and that is why I'm surprised he is so interested in having his pound of flesh.'

The whore's English was good but not good enough to understand the subtlety of the cliché; she looked at him through confused eyes. O'Malley laughed at her expression, then, running with her into one of the larger bedrooms, said. 'Bugger the demo!'

*

Later, back in the unfamiliar surroundings of his hotel room, Patrick looked again at the piece of paper. The name he thought he had heard before; he was certain the woman had been contacted some months previously by his father's solicitors. The location however he definitely knew, it was the same county that the murderess bitch Kate Hoagan lived in!

Wednesday May 26

'Yes?'

'Kate?'

'Hi, John, how's it going?'

'Until two minutes ago it wasn't, then we had a call from Manchester, they reckon they've found our man, Kate!'

Hoagan moved the phone to her other, better ear. 'Say again, John.'

'I've just had a Detective Inspector Morris on, from Manchester Constabulary. Do you remember hearing about that explosion in a block of flats, last week?'

'Yes.'

'Well...they reckon they've found our serial killer, complete with his last victim, in the rubble!'

'Christ! What makes them so sure?'

'Don't really know, they didn't want to say too much over the phone but they reckon they more or less have conclusive proof. I'm just about to go down there now, with the detective super.'

'Shit! Is John Richardson with you now?'

'He's doing a briefing at the moment – in the main hall.'

'Listen, thanks for letting me know, John. Am I going to drop you in it if I have a word with him?'

'No, he told me to ring you; he probably knew I'd have done it anyway so he just made it official.'

'Look, as soon as he's free, ask him to give me a bell will you?'

'Sure, see you, Kate.'

Hoagan replaced the phone and restarted work on her brother-in-law's typescript on terrorism. After a minute she realized she was not reading a single word and put it down.

*

'No chance, Kate,' said Richardson, firmly, 'I appreciate how you feel but I'm afraid it's absolutely out of the question!'

Hoagan was sounding desperate. 'Listen, sir; I know that what I'm asking is impossible, but since when has the impossible stopped me in the past?'

Richardson was becoming angry. 'I'm almost sorry I told Hawthwaite to tell; you know the rules, Kate; God knows you should know them better than most. At the moment you're suspended pending the outcome of an enquiry into a potentially very serious charge of unlawful killing. Right now, as far as the force is concerned, you're not even a police officer. Manchester also know about your adventures in London and that you're temporarily off the case – on the bench as it were. If you turn up there we're going to look like the herd of woolly-backs they already think we are! So no, Kate; I very much appreciate your concern, and your keenness, but what you're asking is a complete non-starter!'

'Sir?'

'Yes?'

'Sorry!'

Richardson chuckled. 'I know you had to try it on. We'll let you know the craic as soon as we get back; I'll send Hawthwaite round to brief you, personally.'

'Thank you, sir.' Hoagan replaced the phone again; then threw her brother-in-law's book across the room.

Dublin

Liam O'Malley's eyes darkened as they glared, disbelievingly, at his younger brother. 'He said what?'

'He said that the decision to go after Hoagan should be left to Sean's child,' repeated Patrick.

'Fucking hell! Has he gone soft in the head? What have the Brits done to him?'

'He's an old man, Liam; surely you saw that when he was in Dublin.'

Liam shook his head. 'Not really, I know he's aged but he only spent one night here, before clearing off to Amsterdam. We thought he was probably just tired from the journey. We never mentioned the vendetta, thought it best left until he'd had chance to get his act together.' Liam studied Patrick's face. 'Do you think he'll change his mind? I mean, it might take months for him to readjust back to any sense of normality.'

'No I don't think so; he's a beaten man, Liam; as he more or less said himself, twenty-plus years inside takes away a man's soul, it must do. He's past his sell by date; all he wants to do now is fuck young women, drink alcohol and smoke cannabis; in all honesty who can blame him?'

Liam looked at the address his father had scrawled on the writing paper. 'All the family will be here tonight, I'm going to suggest to them that we at least try to find this long-lost cousin. When we know who he, or she, is we can discuss the way-ahead then; before we approach him or her with our conundrum.'

Patrick nodded. 'That makes sense, can you imagine going along to a perfect stranger and saying. "Excuse me; are you aware that your father was a famous Irish freedom fighter, murdered in cold blood by a British policewoman? You weren't? Well we don't like her either, so how would you like to even the score by taking her out for us?"' Liam smiled, tight-lipped. 'The thing is,' continued Patrick, 'who can we send to Cumbria? If any of the family were to go the Brits will be all over the place!'

'Don't worry about that,' replied Liam, 'if it comes to the crunch I know just the man for the job.'

'That's it then,' said Patrick, 'it's out of our hands now; tonight the family can decide whether to send an envoy or not!'

Manchester

John Hawthwaite turned away from the pale, confused face that was staring, blankly, back at him. 'So, you reckon this guy's our serial killer, do you?

Arnold Lockhart pushed the drawer to with his knee. 'We think so,' he said noncommittally, before turning to Richardson. 'Come back up to the office, John, there's a lot to show you.'

Hawthwaite and Richardson followed Lockhart out of the basement police mortuary; Hawthwaite taking the opportunity to look silently unconvinced at his chief superintendent.

From behind his desk, Lockhart, dark-haired, thin and long-faced, beamed at the two visiting police officers. Satisfied he had their attention, he nodded for Phillip Morris, his detective inspector, to begin reading selected items from his report.

Morris was a thirty-year-old graduate entrant, hungry and ambitious. He had a weak, boy-like face, not helped by a limp, wet and pouting mouth. That he was almost certainly aware of the impression given by the latter feature was evidenced by a badly trimmed, ginger moustache. His close-cropped hair, already prematurely sprinkled with salt grey flecks, was a further attempt to distract attention from an inadequate, sulking face and make him look more aggressive. Hawthwaite considered that as a diversion, and prop, the haircut did not work.

'Raymond Elvis White was thirty-two years old,' began Morris. 'A product of a violent drunken Army private and a part-time whore; on the rare occasions the father came home he usually made it his personal responsibility, as an initial priority, to kick the shit out of the mother. At the age of eighteen White had a conviction for assault and anal rape, on a similarly aged girl; for that offence he served two of a three-year sentence.

According to his mother's sister, White had a long history of social inadequacy. Apparently his mother used to screw her clients in front of him before the child even attended school. As I've already said, his father was an equally useless role model, that was when he was actually home and either not away soldiering or banged-up in some Army prison.

'You've got all this from White's aunt have you, Phil?' asked Hawthwaite,

Morris looked up from his report. 'Yes, John, his biological father died last year, his mother had remarried and we're still trying to trace her.'

Hawthwaite made some notes and gestured for Morris to continue.

'So, I don't think that any of us need a bloody psychologist to tell us that White had the right background for being a prime suspect.' Morris looked at the two visitors for agreement. He made do with a nod from Richardson. 'In nineteen eighty-seven, White had a relationship with the landlady of a Nottingham boarding house___'

'Is this also from the aunt?'

Morris began to look irritable. 'No, John, we got this from his employer. Look – I think it would be better if we kept questions back till I've finished the overview.' He looked at Richardson for support.

'Yes, John,' said Richardson. 'I think Phil has a point, take notes of anything you want to query, apart from any really important points that need instant clarification we can come back to details later.'

Hawthwaite shrugged and made notes.

'According to the employer,' continued Morris, 'the relationship, which was with a much older woman, finished in nineteen ninety-one following her death from natural causes. White then stooged around for a while, taking on a variety of unskilled jobs until a few months ago he met David Benson.'

'Who is?' It was Richardson this time.

'David Benson is an executive of Feldbrooke Holdings, they own a number of major retail outlets specialising in sports and leisure equipment. We've had a long chat with Mr Benson, he's only a young guy himself, but very, very upmarket. Seems he felt sorry for White, took him under his wing and gave him a sort of unskilled, Man Friday job. You know, run an errand here, deliver this there, nothing too complex; he also had him help out in the garden and other odd jobs at his home.'

Hawthwaite looked apologetically at Richardson. 'Sorry about this; sir, was White an employee of the company, this Feldbrooke Holdings, or did he just work for Benson?'

'Technically the former, but in reality he mainly worked for Benson in a private capacity. From what we can gather it was more of a one-sided philanthropic arrangement. Apparently, White was no great shakes when it came to brain power, so he wasn't exactly overworked. Benson has admitted that he paid him casually, on the side, you know – black economy.'

Lockhart was anxious to progress. 'Tell them about the flat, Phil.'

'White was found dead in the flat along with the corpse of Julie Bennet, an eighteen-year-old missing person. She was reported missing, to Glasgow Police, on Monday, the seventeenth of May. Her body was found in what remained of the shower. Forensically, her corpse was as clean as a whistle, apart, that is, from the seminal fluid in her vagina. It's the same blood group as White's, and that found in Rachel Clarke, Rebecca Standish and the Wastwater girl. We'll have the DNA report in a few days. Julie had been sexually assaulted and strangled and Forensics tell us that the ligature of nylon twine is made of identical material and belongs to the same batch your man used on his previous victims.'

'No stabbings or carvings on the leg though,' put in Hawthwaite.

'No....White had overdosed on sleeping tablets, he also had alcohol in his body to the tune of three times the legal driving limit. Personally, I think that, this time, he'd had enough; got himself drugged and pissed, then turned on the gas fire.'

'So you think he suddenly became full of remorse for his evil deeds and killed himself?' Hawthwaite must have sounded cynical, Lockhart jumped in.

'Yes...yes, I know what you're inferring; a psychopath with a conscience, that's exactly what I said. Apart from what we've told you so far there are three other factors you don't yet know about, John.' Lockhart nodded to Morris.

The inspector left his seat and went to a large security cupboard, locked by a combination. When he returned he placed a large, buff envelope and a toolbox on the desk. 'This is a replica of a toolbox we found at the flat; the original and what it held are still with Forensics. It contains a number of interesting items.' Morris carefully laid the contents of the box on the desk. 'One screwdriver, we feel that this may have been the weapon used in stabbing the other girls. Stanley knife, your pathologist's report suggests such an implement for the carving on the legs, nylon twine, same type as that found around the neck of the girl in the flat; sticking plaster,' he looked up, 'sticking plaster in an unhygienic toolbox? Mole grips, used we believe, to crush the toes of his penultimate victim.'

'You say Forensics haven't finished with the originals yet?' asked Richardson.

'No, sir,' replied Morris, 'we do know that they have been very well scrubbed; Preston have had little joy so far.'

'Excuse me,' put in Hawthwaite, 'but the evidence is very circumstantial. Apart from, perhaps ultimately a positive DNA on sperm, so far you've really got nothing concrete to lay-on this White chap.'

Lockhart reached for the buff envelope. He broke the seal and emptied the contents onto the desk. There were four Polaroid photographs, all of different females. The first one showed a girl lying on a bed. She was naked, her open-mouthed expression revealing the appalling state of her teeth. But it was not her teeth that fixed Hawthwaite's attention; instead he had his eyes firmly fixed on her face. It was swollen and blackened, the veins prominent and angry. Around her neck a piece of yellow twine. He had first seen the girl weeks before, in the police mortuary at Ambleside. Since then, as her mortal remains remained unclaimed, the press had affectionately dubbed her 'The orphan of the mere'.

In silence Richardson and Hawthwaite looked at the rest of the photographs. All the girls were there except for Sharon West. Hawthwaite remembered what Taylor had told them and concluded that Sharon would not have rated a photograph for the killer had never dominated her sexually, never controlled her whilst she was alive.

The Cumbrian detectives placed the photographs carefully on the desk. 'That looks pretty conclusive to me.' Richardson looked at his deputy. 'Got any problems with that, John?'

Hawthwaite shook his head, he had to. But something was telling him, telling his copper's nose that somehow, something did not quite fit. 'No, it all seems very conclusive, but we're still only looking circumstantially, sir.'

Richardson scoffed. 'What do you want, John, a signed confession? I mean, we've got a convicted rapist, with a well-documented seriously bad childhood. We find the body of a dead girl in his flat who's been strangled using the type of twine predicted by the pathologist. In four cases there's a blood match to his sperm and they've found his tool box containing all his sordid gadgets. And if that is not enough, he had his own chamber of horrors in the photograph collection. Yes...yes you're right, it is very circumstantial, it's also very, very convincing.'

'What's the third thing, sir?' Hawthwaite looked expectantly at Lockhart.

'Although White's van had been well scrubbed, SOCO found hair and traces of blood. The blood and hair can be matched to two of the dead girls.'

'You say you've got no positive DNA fingerprints back from Forensics yet?' Hawthwaite directed his question to both their hosts.

Lockhart nominated himself spokesman. 'Not yet, John, it takes time.'

Hawthwaite was looking thoughtful again. 'I take it White was assessed by a psychologist when he was on remand for rape?'

Morris appeared confused. 'Sorry, John?'

'When White was convicted of the rape, had he been seen by a psychologist?'

'Yes, yes he had; sorry don't see the relevance.'

'Did they assess his IQ?'

Morris appeared slightly ruffled by the apparent irrelevance of the Cumbrian inspector's line of questioning. He glanced at Lockhart for support.

'What are you getting at inspector?' asked Lockhart.

Hawthwaite produced Taylor's overview of the anticipated offender profile. 'I take it you've seen this have you, sir? It was distributed to all UK forces.'

Lockhart glanced at the paper. 'Err...briefly, black magic isn't it?' he laughed and shook his head.

Richardson fumbled with his glasses and leant across the desk, indicating to Lockhart he wanted sight of the document. Lockhart handed it to him. 'I bloody hope not, Arnold. Cost the ratepayers over ten thousand pounds to have this done!' He turned to his inspector. 'What's your point, John?'

'The profile predicts a high IQ, sir, I just wondered___'

'What the bloody hell has the killer's IQ got to do with it?' Morris was becoming rattled at what he perceived to be a pointless debate over semantics. To him the case was cut and dried; furthermore, he was thinking of his own vested-interest. Despite having been handed White on a plate, his squad would still be credited with having brought to a successful conclusion a highly political murder enquiry. As in any sport, it was what the score card looked like at the end of the game that mattered, not how the score was achieved.

'According to the mindhunter we brought in from the States', began Hawthwaite, 'the killer was very, very bright; the way he washed his victims after killing them, his forensic awareness, the fact he appeared to have the ability, literally, to charm any woman he fancied and lure her to her death. This White guy doesn't seem to go anywhere near that aspect of the profile, not if he's the no-hoper you reckon he was. He was also pig ugly, and by the sounds of things, most probably in a brain-sharing scheme!' He glanced at Richardson for support; unfortunately he found the man sitting on a fence.

'Christ, John,' Morris's voice was increasing in pitch, signalling his frustration. 'We've known for bloody years why these perv's wash their victims; it's all part of a ritual, part of the overall picture.'

Hawthwaite also began to turn up the volume. 'According to Taylor, she___'

'Hang-on, just let's relax shall we?' Richardson held up a conciliatory hand and looked at Lockhart. 'Like I said, Arnold, we've paid a lot of money for the trick-cyclist's profile. Although I must admit that the evidence against White seems damned near conclusive, at the very least it'll be interesting to see how academic theory compares with near certain fact.'

Lockhart shrugged, much to the visible annoyance of his inspector. 'Okay, as you say, it'll be interesting.' He smiled smugly at Hawthwaite. 'Let's go through it then, John, point-by-point.' Morris sat back in his chair, his wet, limp mouth beginning to pout even more.

Hawthwaite read from the profile. 'Age – twenty-eight to thirty-two.'

'Bingo!' put in Morris. 'White was thirty-two.'

'The profile predicts he will look much younger,' added Hawthwaite negatively, 'White looked nearer forty!'

'Carry on, John,' said Richardson.

'How tall was White?' asked Hawthwaite.

'Six-one.' said Morris.

'That fits then, she said, six to six-three.'

'That's two points to us, I'm beginning to like this woman,' said Morris.

'Hair colour – possibly fair.'

'How the fuck could she know his hair colour?' asked Morris.

'She asked friends of the college victim what sort of guys she had been attracted to,' explained Richardson.

'Well, White's hair was shoulder length and blond,' said Morris, happily.
'Suspect is likely to be charming, good looking and well-spoken,' continued Hawthwaite.

Morris glanced slyly at his chief. 'From what we know, White could hardly be described as any of those,' said Lockhart; already beginning to sound bored.

'May do quite a lot of travelling.'

'Yes, Benson had him running about quite a bit,' agreed Morris.

'Distance work, Lake District etc?' asked Richardson.

Morris shook his head. 'Don't know; we'll have to check that out.'

'Well, with respect, I think that is a priority,' observed Hawthwaite, before continuing. 'Will be of above average intelligence, may be a university graduate.'

'From what we know he was an underachiever at just about everything, apart from mass murder!' Morris laughed, weakly; Hawthwaite ignored him. Morris retrieved one of the papers on Lockhart's desk. 'You asked earlier about his IQ? According to the psychologist, who assessed him for the court at the time of the rape case, he had an IQ of around eighty-five. That's fifteen below average.'

'Yes, that made him about as bright as a ten watt bulb during a power cut.' The cynicism in Hawthwaite's tone was undisguised. 'I think that if we're going to assume White did all the killings, on his own, then we really are kidding ourselves.' His audience stared back at him, blankly. 'Social profile,' he continued, 'class-climber, loner, easy short-term mixer but probably unable to sustain an intimate, long-term relationship.'

'Well he certainly wasn't a class-climber, unless you count his relationship with Benson. He also told his aunt he'd had a four-year love affair with a granny in Nottingham!' Morris was laughing again.

'Could have previous for sexual assault, probably rape.

'Exactly, that's about the only thing you've said so far that makes any fucking sense.' Lockhart gave Hawthwaite a dismissive look.

There were a few more attributes; Hawthwaite decided to leave them unsaid. He had the distinct impression that whatever was contained in the psychological profile, unless it aligned with the, by now fixed perspectives of the two Manchester policemen and even his own chief superintendent, he would be wasting his breath. He stared expectantly at Richardson; the way-ahead was now very much his decision.

'We do seem to have a few discrepancies,' said Richardson, by now also sounding bored and disinterested; he lit his pipe before, meditatively, to Lockhart. 'When will you have the DNA fingerprints?'

'With respect, sir,' said Hawthwaite, 'I think that "discrepancies" is hardly the word. White was ugly and almost brain-dead compared to the expected profile. I mean how was he going to be bright enough to pull all those young, attractive women, kill them and make them reappear, forensically sterile, like magic? The profiler thought it likely the killer may have had major problems with long-term relationships, yet he shacks up with a woman for over four years!'

'Did she say such a relationship was a definite no-no?' asked Lockhart. Hawthwaite shook his head and Lockhart shrugged whilst holding up a realistic hand.

'Four or five days, sir,' said Morris, ignoring Hawthwaite and answering Richardson's earlier question about DNA.

Richardson pulled thoughtfully on the briar. 'That's going to put a stop to any academic debate. If it's categorically proven to be White's sperm in those bodies then that's it. Psychological profile or no profile there's no evading the facts.' Richardson looked at his inspector. 'Sorry, John; I know you were taken by Taylor and her report but...well...facts are facts. By the way, what did Kate Hoagan think of it?'

Hawthwaite now knew that this really was the end of the discussion, but he still doggedly pushed his perspective. 'She didn't, sir, but in all fairness, I think it wouldn't hurt to have a closer look at this Benson chap. I mean, how old is he? Is he blond-haired and good looking?'

'David Benson is dark-haired, wealthy and a high-flying executive; he doesn't need to go around raping and strangling women and young girls. I should imagine he can have virtually any bird he feels like pulling, anytime, anywhere!' Lockhart looked at Richardson for support. 'We asked you to come down here to agree that, with the exception of a few odds and sods, the Lakes' Murders case is all but sorted, John. Not to have a full-blown academic debate!'

Richardson looked at his watch. 'Is there a decent pub round here, Arnold? I could really use a pint and I'm bloody famished.'

9

Hoagan curled up on the settee, pulling her skirt down over her knees; for once Hawthwaite was pleased, she had good legs, distractingly so. 'So they've more or less convinced themselves that this White chap is Matey Boy?' she said.

Hawthwaite nodded, swallowing a mouthful of coffee. 'Yes, they're cock-a-hoop down there; you'd think they'd just won the bloody pools. Evidence against White is coming in all the time. We went out for an hour, down the pub for lunch; when we returned to the nick Forensics had confirmed more hair found in the van belonged to the Wastwater girl.'

Hawthwaite suddenly looked tired and he dry-towelled his rubbery face with his hands. 'Quite clearly this White guy's been involved in the killings, but...well...he's so far away from Emmy's profile. I mean, I just can't believe he's pulled off all those kidnappings and murders on his own.'

Hoagan placed her coffee mug on an occasional table. Once again she quickly scanned through the psychologist's report. 'You do know I'm personally very sceptical about this, don't you, John? I mean, I didn't want her in the first place, she was Richardson's idea. He was the one panicking about the bloody press and public concern; frankly I thought he brought her in far too early.'

Hawthwaite nodded. 'Sure, but as Richardson himself said, it's cost the taxpayer ten grand. I think that on that basis alone it's worth a look at.'

'Ten thousand pounds is a spit in a bucket, John. The enquiry has cost around a quarter of a million to-date and that's not even counting this month's overtime.' Hawthwaite shrugged. 'What if I still disagree with you?' Hoagan's eyes searched his for an answer to her question; she knew how stubborn her deputy could be. In fact, it was well known that once he had a bee in his bonnet Hawthwaite was even worse than the proverbial dog with a bone.

He shook his head, resignedly. 'Write a report giving my own point of view, then bugger-off down the pub!' He smiled, resignedly. 'To be honest with you, Kate, in a way I hope they are right; I'm absolutely bollocksed, I really could use a holiday.'

Grinning broadly, Hoagan eased herself out of the settee. She went to the drinks cabinet, her guest suddenly brightening as she returned with a bottle of Glen Fiddich and two glasses. 'In that case,' she began, 'we'll continue this in the garden; it's far, far too pleasant an evening to stay indoors.'

*

For the third time that morning, Brendan Donoghue drove slowly past the large, expensive looking, former vicarage. He was uncomfortable with the task his employer, Liam O'Malley, had entrusted to him; a task that he had foolishly agreed to do his best to carry out. 'Twill give yerself a lesson, Brendan, so it will,' he muttered quietly to the empty hire car. 'A man should never make a promise to do somethin' when he's under the influence, especially when it's something he doesn't really want to do at all!'

Slowly, hesitantly, he turned the vehicle around in the narrow country lane and, with great reluctance, headed back in the direction from which he had come.

*

'Yes?'

Donoghue stepped backwards from under the overhanging porch and began shuffling his feet, nervously. He looked up to the face of the middle-aged, grey-haired woman who had answered his summons and smiled. 'Would I be addressing Mrs Caroline Crossley?'

For the merest fraction of a second fear flickered across the woman's eyes but Donoghue was too nervous himself to notice. 'Yes?' she said, uncertainly.

Her rigidity did little to put the Irishman at his ease. 'Err...my name's Donoghue...Brendan Donoghue.' He held out a hand, the woman took it, reluctantly, briefly. 'Hmm,' he looked around, the large, rural, front garden, as though expecting to find himself the focal point of a dozen pairs of eyes; his hesitation now making the woman even more anxious. 'Would it be possible for us to talk inside?' he asked.

'What is it you want, Mr...?'

'Donoghue.' he repeated, 'I've been asked to contact you by some friends of mine.'

'With regard to?'

Donoghue was feeling extremely uncomfortable, it was a delicate matter he had called to discuss, not the sort of thing one would debate on the doorstep of the home of a complete stranger. The Irishman stood up straight. 'Mrs Crossley, I am here representing the interests of the O'Malley family.'

The woman literally slumped against the door frame, Donoghue lunged forward, fearful that she might actually collapse. He steadied her, noting how she was shaking, that her face had turned the colour of freshly-hewn limestone.

'You'd better come in,' she said, wearily; her frightened and shocked blue eyes looking briefly into the concerned green of her caller's. As they moved inside she managed a weak smile. 'You know, Mr Donoghue, I've been waiting for your knock for a long, long time.'

*

Donoghue placed the tea tray on an antique mahogany occasional table, positioned between them. 'There y'are now, that'll be doing yer a power of good so it will,' He smiled easily, 'milk, sugar?'

'Just milk, thank you,' she replied.

He began to pour the hot tea. 'Tis sorry I am that I put the fear in yer, Mrs Crossley. Tis sorry I am indeed.'

She shook her head, slowly, then smiled. 'I knew why you were here as soon as I heard your accent, Mr Donoghue.'

For the first time since their rather traumatic and unusual meeting, Donoghue studied his host carefully. Caroline Crossley had greying, wiry hair swept up into a large, untidy bun on top of her head. She was attractive, for her age, but characteristic of so many country women, who spend long hours outdoors, numerous small, facial veins had burst under the relentless attack of the chill, Cumbrian winds; the inevitable consequence of which being a ruddy, purplish complexion that, at first glance, added more years to her actual fifty-five.

Donoghue settled back into the comfort of the deep armchair. He sipped at the tea, wondering, despite many rehearsals on the trip to England, how best to come to the point of his visit. However, his problem was solved for him.

'I heard on the Irish radio, we receive it quite clearly in this part of Cumbria, that Michael has been released.' Caroline spoke coolly, matter-of-factly.

Donoghue was taken aback. 'Err...yes...yes, he has.'

'How is he? I understand there was mention of heart trouble?' The woman spoke with some small degree of affection, surprising the Irishman once again.

'I understand he's very well; tired and much older of course, but well.'

Caroline smiled, sentimentally. 'It's many years since I last saw him; has he changed much?'

Donoghue shook his head. 'I couldn't be telling yer, ma'am; I've never met the man, either before he was imprisoned, during or since.'

Carefully, Caroline chose a chocolate biscuit from the selection Donoghue had brought from the kitchen. Now she studied him, keenly. He was very typically Irish looking, his features proud, attractive. She thought his long eyelashes, that formed a dark, oval frame for piercing green eyes, would be the envy of most women. His hair, still black and thick, was loosely combed into a fringe, giving him an innocent, boyish, almost vulnerable appearance. 'You make a good cup of tea, Mr Donoghue,' she said, eventually, 'tell me, what else are you good at?'

Her guest began to feel uncomfortable again. Unlike him the Englishwoman was typically middle class, educated and confident. He fiddled, nervously, with the handle of his cup. 'To be honest with yer, I'm not very good at anyt'in',' he smiled, wistfully, 'not even the horses!'

Caroline laughed, visibly relaxing now after her initial concern at Donoghue's unexpected and apparently unwelcome arrival. She finished the biscuit and after taking another sip of tea, eyed him shrewdly, more positively. 'So, Mr Donoghue, perhaps you would be kind enough to tell me precisely who sent you, why and what can I do for you?'

Donoghue thought about his pre-rehearsed speech but could not remember a word of it; instead he ad-libbed. 'As I said earlier, Mrs Crossley, I've been asked to visit you by the O'Malley family.'

'Who, exactly?' she insisted.

'Liam, Liam O'Malley.'

Caroline looked confused. 'I don't think I recall the name, is he one of Michael's children?'

'Yes – he's the oldest.'

Caroline nodded. 'And the purpose of your visit, Mr Donoghue?' she smiled at him, disarmingly. 'Why are you here?'

'It's...it's, err...it's a delicate matter, about a child that Sean O'Malley might have fathered!'

Caroline Crossley's face remained totally impassive, not a single muscle in her weathered face giving Donoghue the slightest hint of the blind panic now erupting within her. Slowly, still desperately attempting to retain the impression of being in control of the meeting, she eased herself back into the settee. 'Do you know anything about Sean O'Malley, Mr Donoghue?'

He shook his head. 'No – no I don't.'

Caroline stared at him, grim-faced. 'Sean was one of the most terrifying men I have ever met, Mr Donoghue.' She spoke passionately, with undoubted conviction. 'He was totally evil, had absolutely no regard for human life whatever. He was killed in nineteen seventy-seven, a blessing it must be said for all of us who had been involved with him.' She crossed herself, hastily, her lips tightening. Donoghue thinking she was, perhaps, regretting the outburst. 'What do the O'Malley's know of the child?' she asked.

Donoghue shrugged, lamely. 'All I know is that Michael has asked that his family trace him or her. Apparently he wishes to meet...with...' He shrugged again. 'I suppose it's understandable really.'

Caroline Crossley shook her head, slowly. 'No, no, there's got to be some ulterior motive other than a wish to find a long-lost neph___' Caroline groaned out loud as she realised her terrible error.

'So there was a male child?' said Donoghue, trying not to sound too triumphant.

Caroline sighed, deeply and she ignored his question replying instead with one of her own. 'Tell me, Mr Donoghue, how do you come to be involved in this quest?'

Donoghue emptied his cup, carefully replacing it on a porcelain coaster protecting the highly polished table. 'I'm a gambler, Mrs Crossley, a pretty worthless gambler. I'm forty-five years old and I've gambled for thirty of them. I once had a wife, two lovely children, a house and a job. Now I've virtually nothing more than the clothes you see me in today.

Two years ago I had even less, after gambling away my house, car, even my daughter's ponies. I lost everything, family, job; I almost took my own life. I was in debt to the O'Malley's to the tune of fifty thousand pounds.'

'The O'Malley's?' Caroline sounded confused.

The visitor smiled, whimsically. 'They own a chain of bookmakers.'

'Of course,' said Caroline.

Donoghue suddenly became very serious. 'They're not a family to upset, Mrs Crossley. I was lucky not be killed, even luckier not to end up maimed for life!'

'So what happened?'

'They offered me a job.' Donoghue's eyes were wistful again, 'I collect their debts!'

Caroline thought the quiet, nervous Irishman the most unlikely debt collector she could ever imagine. Leaning forward she poured herself another cup of tea then held up the pot, Donoghue shook his head. 'You don't strike me as a heavy, Mr Donoghue; I should imagine you find it quite a difficult task.'

'Not at all,' he spoke quietly now, more assuredly, 'you're probably thinking I'm not really cut-out for such a role?' His host nodded. 'Ninety-eight percent of people pay within twenty-four hours of my visit,' he continued. 'I'm just the polite red reminder, like the one you get from the water company if you haven't paid your bill. I don't go round again; Liam sends somebody else, somebody very different from me, the second time!'

There was something extremely ominous about the way Donoghue spoke the words 'second time' and Caroline shivered involuntarily. Was her visitor deliberately threatening her, or had he quite unwittingly given her a signal of what to expect, later. What the consequences may be for her if she did not tell him what his masters had sent him to find out? 'Do you enjoy your work, Mr Donoghue?' she asked.

'The O'Malley's own me, Mrs Crossley. Yes they pay me a small wage and provide me with a bedsit, but with the continuing interest on my outstanding balance it will take another ten years, at least, to work off my debt. The word "enjoy" doesn't enter into it, it's what I think educated people, like yourself, would call – a fait accompli!'

Caroline stiffened, fixing his green eyes with the cornflower blue of her own. 'Are you my polite, red reminder, Mr Donoghue?'

The Irishman looked away, eyes sad, unhelpful.

Caroline stood and walked to the large, Georgian Bay window at the end of the lounge. In the garden, two blue tits ignored her as they hopped around an old, moss-encrusted, elm bird table. Then, without turning around, she began speaking. 'It may have surprised you that I let you into my house, Mr Donoghue.'

'Yes,' he agreed, remaining seated and sensing that at this moment she wanted space, hopefully for what would turn out to be something of a confessional.

She turned now, easing herself slowly, almost arthritically down onto the window seat in the bay. 'Once there were four of us, four girls. I am the eldest, followed by two twins. The youngest sister is now forty. The twins were the really clever ones, in nineteen sixty-two they went to the LSE, by nineteen sixty-four they were heavily into politics, especially Catholic politics. They were typical students I suppose, caught up in rebellious times, influenced by the innumerable liberal movements and causes of the nineteen sixties. They frequented Irish bars in London, studied Irish history – they were Catholics when all's said and done. Anyway, they found a cause they could identify with; they also found a willing and able teacher, his name was Michael O'Malley. Michael was the archetypal revolutionary leader; young, charismatic, articulate and erudite,' she snorted, 'he could convince an Inuit he needed a winter holiday!

'Both the sisters fell for him, hook, line and sinker. They worshipped him almost as though he were the Messiah re-born.' Caroline held out a hand in a gesture of helplessness. 'Do you understand what I mean, Mr Donoghue? You are familiar with the type of irrational sycophancy that those of us on the outside, looking in, find so incredibly difficult to comprehend or explain?'

Donoghue nodded. 'I do, Mrs Crossley, there are a number of obscure religious sects that could be said to fall into the category you have described.'

'Indeed,' Caroline agreed, 'in late nineteen sixty-four the three of them started sharing a flat together and my sisters shared Michael O'Malley. Christmas of that year was a sad affair for we Crossleys; two months previously both our parents had been killed, in a plane crash in Africa. As such, it was decided we would all spend the New Year in London, at the flat. Michael also invited Sean. New Year's Eve was a tremendous and unforgettable occasion; we all went to an Irish bar and had the most tremendous time. The drink flowed like water and, of course, there was a ceilidh band. We didn't return to the flat until the early hours and with the exception of Sean we were all completely smashed. Then, it started!'

Donoghue looked puzzled. 'I'm sorry?'

'Sean had been peculiar ever since he had arrived the day before. Now he let everyone know in no uncertain manner what was on his mind, he wanted Susan.'

'Susan?'

'One of the twins, he couldn't cope with the notion that both the sisters were Michael's lovers. He thought that as Michael had two women, to provide him with carnal fulfilment all of the time, the least he could do on New Year's Day was to loan him Susan.'

'You make it sound as though he thought Michael actually owned the girls,' observed Donoghue.

Caroline nodded vigorously. 'Exactly, that is precisely how he viewed the situation. Of course both, Susan and Michael refused to even consider his request. There was the most frightful row that ended with Michael thumping Sean. As I said, with the exception of Sean we'd all had a lot to drink but, sober as he was, he overpowered Michael quite easily and knocked him out. Then, with no one powerful enough to stop him, he dragged Susan, kicking and screaming, off to the bedroom.'

'Didn't you try to stop him?' asked Donoghue.

'Sean was the maddest, most frightening person I have ever met in the whole of my life,' she replied, 'his eyes...' She paused, Donoghue thinking the memory of that London night still very distressing for her. 'His eyes were black pools of hate, in fact he was totally beside himself. Michael told us later that as a child, Sean had always been spoilt. Whatever he wanted he more or less got, otherwise he used to throw the most spectacular and uncontrollable temper tantrums. That night he wanted, Susan and he was absolutely determined he was going to have her. As he pulled her into the bedroom he warned us not to do anything to try and stop him; that included calling the police. He actually threatened to kill her if we did.'

'So what did you do?'

'We were utterly terrified of him, and I mean terrified.' She paused, studying the face of the listener. 'Have you ever been so frightened of something, or someone, that you've been unable to move, hardly able to even breathe?'

Donoghue nodded. 'With the O'Malleys – yes – on numerous occasions.'

Caroline seemed pleased that he understood and hoped he would not think her cowardly or foolish. 'We didn't know what to do. I stood outside the bedroom door at first and even though Susan was screaming I could still hear her clothes being ripped off. Then he hit her a few times to shut her up. After a while she just became quiet and she let him get on with it.'

'Didn't the neighbours complain or come round to find out what all the noise was about?'

'The building was empty, apart from us; it was New Year; everyone must have been away at parties.'

'What happened then?' asked Donoghue.

'After about ten minutes we managed to revive, Michael. When we told him what was happening he too went berserk. He broke the bedroom door down, dragged Sean off Susan and half-killed him.'

'But surely he was still very drunk?'

'I've never seen anybody sober up so fast in all my life,' explained Caroline. 'Also he didn't take any chances that time. He hit, Sean with a large, glass ashtray!'

'So that was how Sean came to be a father, Michael was too late?'

'Yes, Michael hurt him badly that night; in fact I'm sure he'd have killed him had we not stopped him. Anyway, Sean had to go to hospital and Michael banned him, permanently, from the flat; none of us ever saw him again after that.'

'How do you know the child was, Sean's? I mean, clearly, there was the likelihood the child belonged to Michael?'

'Yes,' agreed Caroline, awkwardly. 'You're right, not all Catholics obeyed the Pope, even in nineteen sixty-four, but children were not an agenda item for the trio of lovers. Michael always wore a condom.'

'What happened to the child?'

'Even though termination was then illegal, Michael knew a doctor who would have done it for her. Susan wouldn't hear of it though.' Caroline smiled, sardonically. 'Contraception was one thing an abortion would have been a murder to her –good Catholic lass you see. So, under assumed names, she and I went away, to a quiet place on the South Coast run by the Church.'

Donoghue produced a pen and notepaper. 'Do you know where this place was?'

'The Romney Marsh, Whitestone-on-Sea, Kent. I can't remember exactly where it was, or who ran the spot; but she had the child there and immediately after giving birth it was handed to the local priest It was all very hush-hush you know; all I can tell you is that she had a boy.'

Donoghue looked confused. 'If Michael's lover had a child surely he would know its sex?'

She shook her head sadly. 'It was a taboo subject with him. Yes, of course Michael knew she'd had a child but he never asked anything about it, nor was he told.'

'What happened after that?'

'Things went more or less back to normal for quite a few years. Sean disappeared off the scene, it was said he joined the IRA in nineteen sixty-nine; you know at the start of the present troubles? He wasn't with them long though, too independent to work in a team and they did not like his excesses. He went his own way, killing and maiming people, using the Cause to justify his bloody excesses.'

'Did he and Michael ever work together, as terrorists?'

'For a while, after Sean left the IRA; but there was a great deal of animosity between them. I'm afraid I lost touch with both of them after they started killing.'

'So you knew they had become terrorists?' Donoghue sounded surprised.

'Yes.'

'But you never considered reporting them? Were you a sympathiser?'

'I supported the Catholic Cause in Ulster at that time. As I'm sure you are aware, we were treated like second or even third-class citizens. Many of them didn't have the vote, sometimes there were three or four families living in one house! They were also cruelly discriminated against in the workplace. Very few had decent jobs; they were mainly given to the Protestants and the police were also very biased, especially the B-Specials. But I never advocated or supported the use of violence.

'Anyway, what would have happened to my sisters if I had given him away? They were still living with, Michael. It was a classic Catch-twenty-two situation. If I had shopped him the police may have wanted to prosecute my sisters for harbouring a wanted terrorist. Even if the police hadn't taken any action, Sean and Michael's men would have been after revenge. I just kept my mouth shut, have done ever since!'

Donoghue nodded, understandingly. 'And then Michael was arrested, fitted up by the English police?'

Caroline scowled at him. 'Fitted up by Sean, the whole assassination attempt was devised by him, I'm sure of it. When it went wrong he made an anonymous call to Scotland Yard, claiming that Michael did it.'

'But why should he have done that? To his own brother; I mean___'

'Because as I said earlier; he was totally evil! Framing Michael did two things; one he avenged himself for the beating and humiliation his brother had given him. Two, whilst the police were quite happy kicking the daylights out of Michael, in some London cell, Sean was free to take over leadership of their small band of killers. I'm not a psychiatrist but I believe Sean was a true psychopath, he had no conscience whatsoever. With, Michael out of the way he became even more cold-blooded. No one dared stand up to him, dared try to control him.'

'The women who supposedly gave Michael an alibi were your sisters then?'

'Yes, there was no supposedly about it. Michael was definitely with them that night.'

'How do you know?'

'They were my sisters; I just know they were telling me the truth. There was no point in their lying to me; whether he was with them or not it wouldn't have made a scrap of difference to our relationship!'

'Blood is t'icker than water.'

'Precisely, Mr Donoghue; with the death of both our parents, I had, as the older sister, also taken on a sort of mother figure role. There are very few mothers who would disown a child.'

'The O'Malley's seem convinced the Brit police killed the two sisters to stop them testifying in court. Do you agree wit' t'em?'

'Sean had them killed, for precisely the same reason. All the police did was take the opportunity to destroy their statements. They were not given in the presence of a solicitor you see, no one knew they existed, except for the police and myself. I told, Michael's solicitor about them, after the twins were killed.' She shrugged, resignedly. 'Didn't make any difference, in those days, if the police said they didn't have something then they didn't have it! They were whiter than freshly driven snow.' She looked at him sardonically. 'Perhaps now we all know a little better.'

'Have you always lived here?' he asked.

'No, we originated from Shropshire.'

'So, if you don't mind my asking, how did he know where to find you?'

Caroline breathed heavily and stared at the ceiling, her expression suddenly one of regret. 'He asked one of his fellow prisoners to trace me, after the prisoner had been released. That was two years ago. Michael knew that I had moved to South Cumbria, but he didn't know where. Anyway, somehow the man found me and gave me a letter from Michael.' She paused momentarily, sighing sadly. 'To be honest it was a letter from someone I no longer knew; full of pathos and regret it was a letter from a beaten and broken man, a man who realised that he had thrown away the best years of his life; a man who had had virtually everything and then lost it – all of it – forever!'

Donoghue squirmed uncomfortably in his chair; he knew only too well what she was saying. He had been there, indeed, was still there. 'Did you reply to him?' he asked.

'Yes I did.'

'And?'

'I've not had any further direct contact with Michael. But his solicitors did write to me some months ago, asked if I could validate some handwriting for them; it was my sisters.'

'And did you?'

'Oh yes, yes; it was the statements they both made, the ones which mysteriously disappeared. Since then I've been awaiting a call.' Suddenly she looked much older. 'I should have known better than think I could hide from them, Mr Donoghue. The O'Malley's can never leave alone that which they think they possess.'

Donoghue was feeling uncomfortable again; he changed the subject. 'As you know, Mrs Crossley, it is wit' reference to Sean's child that I wish to speak wit' you.' Caroline nodded. 'Did Sean ever discover that he was a father?'

'I don't think so,' she replied.

'What makes you so sure that Michael never mentioned it?'

'Michael loved both my sisters more than most men ever love one woman. But I know that, Susan was always his favourite. He was deeply hurt by the rape, had it been anyone other than his twin brother he'd have undoubtedly killed him. No...Michael never, ever, mentioned the child to anyone, of that I'm certain.' She stared at him knowingly. 'Until now that is!'

Donoghue was thoughtful. 'One thing does puzzle me.'

'Yes?'

'If, there was so much animosity, between, Michael and Sean, why did he declare a vendetta against the Brit policewoman?'

'Three reasons I think, one of which was guilt.'

'Guilt, what did Michael have to feel guilty about?'

'That he never had chance to make his peace with Sean, you see, at that time he had no idea it was Sean who had set him up. Despite their differences, Sean was his twin brother; no one in the world could ever be as close to him again! Psychologically the loss of a twin can be quite catastrophic.'

'And the second reason?'

'Machismo.'

'Sorry?'

Caroline snorted, derisively. 'This took place twenty years ago, Michael was thirty-eight. At that age he would still have been full of testosterone and I'm sure that he thought it the manly thing to do at the time. Thirdly, it was, perhaps, a signal of family unity against the hated Brits.'

'Do you think he means it now, when he says the vendetta is dead?'

'Tell me, why are you here?' she insisted.

Donoghue was momentarily startled by her sudden change of tack. 'As I said, Michael wishes to find his nephew.'

'For what purpose?' Donoghue looked blank and he shrugged. 'Exactly,' she continued, triumphantly, 'find the answer to that question and you will probably have the one to your own.'

Donoghue looked at his watch; he had been there over an hour. Caroline Crossley had been candid beyond his wildest expectations and she had told him things he would never have dreamed of asking. He stood, preparing to leave.

'Thank you for your hospitality and your candour, Mrs Crossley. I'm afraid I've taken up too much of your time.'

As they walked down the hallway to the front door, she had a word of caution for the Irishman. 'Be careful, Mr Donoghue, remember, you are dealing with an extremely dangerous if not seriously unbalanced family!'

Donoghue turned and smiled at her, whimsically. 'After our conversation today, more dangerous than I ever thought, Mrs Crossley; but I only serve them, I don't pose a threat to them in any way.'

She put a hand on his arm and looked at him tenderly, almost, he thought as his mother had once done. 'Knowledge itself can pose a threat, Mr Donoghue, perceived or otherwise; so, as I said – do be very careful.'

Donoghue was about to leave when he turned in the open doorway. 'As I also said earlier, Mrs Crossley, you have been extremely candid. You need not have told me anything, why did you?'

She nodded, understandingly. 'When Susan had the child she made me vow two things if something happen to her. One, should the boy ever turn up on my doorstep, wishing to know the truth about his mother and father, that I would tell him; the same was to apply should Michael, at some time in the future, ask about his nephew. You clearly came here at Michael's request,' she shrugged, 'so, I have kept my promise.'

Donoghue looked puzzled. 'Why should your sister have wanted her son to know about the O'Malleys, I mean, they're hardly a family he could be proud of, are they?'

'Susan considered that everyone has a right to know their heritage. Remember, she was one of the nineteen sixties' neo-liberals, always destined to be fighting one cause or another. If she hadn't met Michael, she'd have been in a commune somewhere. Either that or wandering around California, chasing rainbows with flowers in her hair.'

As Donoghue made his way down the drive to his car, Caroline Crossley watched him from the front door. She wondered if he would take her advice, about not saying too much of what he knew to the O'Malleys. Shaking her head, dismissively, she went back into the house and picked up the hall telephone before selecting a pre-programmed redial code.

'Hi, it's me,' she said, nervously when the other party eventually answered. 'I just thought I'd let you know, I've had the long-awaited visitor from across the water, it's started already!'

*

'Patrick?'

'Is that yerself, Brendan?'

The sound of Patrick O'Malley's voice relaxed, Donoghue; he much preferred dealing with the younger, educated brother. 'Tis an all, Patrick. I've some good news fer yer.'

'That's good, Brendan, Liam will be well pleased.'

Donoghue told him about the child. 'What do yer want me to do now?' he asked when he had finished.

'There was a brief, muffled conversation at the Irish end of the line then Patrick came back to him. 'How was she with you, Brendan? I mean, how co-operative?' Donoghue told him. Patrick was quiet for a moment, then. 'Go back to your hotel, Brendan. Ring, Liam at home tonight, say about seven o'clock, he'll give you further instructions.'

Donoghue replaced the telephone handset and smiled. Whilst in England he was to be given an allowance against expenses, drawable daily from the National Westminster Bank. The agreed daily allowance was seventy pounds. Whilst by no means a fortune, he had not had such a sum for years. He had quickly concluded, therefore, that if he stayed down-market he would be able to indulge himself, quite comfortably, in his favourite pastime. Whistling happily now, he left the public phone booth and started across the road in the direction of the betting shop he had spotted earlier.

*

'So that's it then?'

John Richardson nodded into the phone. 'Yes, Kate, all bar the shouting, that's it.'

'You don't think John Hawthwaite has a point, about the major discrepancies between the anticipated profile and this White character?'

'The evidence against White is already overwhelming, Kate and when we receive the DNA reports, in a few days, they will categorically identify White as the originator of the seminal fluid found in the vaginas of all the murdered girls.'

'You're convinced then?'

'Completely.'

'What about this Benson chap?'

'What about him?' Richardson, always on the edge of intolerance, was beginning to sound irritable.

Hoagan knew better than anyone that crime in the early nineteen nineties was in danger of reaching epidemic proportions. Heads of criminal investigation departments, in forces all over the UK, had never been under much pressure to obtain results. She could understand and sympathise with her boss's anxiety to close the case; however, he had brought in the mindhunter, it was now, she considered, up to him to justify totally ignoring her expensively procured offender profile. 'John feels he should be thoroughly investigated,' she replied. Hoagan knew Richardson, she also knew he was just on the verge of throwing a serious wobbler.

'Benson may fit Taylor's profile but he's not the type to be a serial killer,' returned her boss. 'For one thing he's too successful; those guys are always no-hopers, like White. Another thing, there's no way someone as bright as Benson is going to leave his calling card in the bodies of all the victims; not when he's gone to all the trouble of cleaning them the way he did.'

Hoagan cleared her throat. 'As you know, my own views on profiling have always been pretty negative, however, I can see John's point. The profile, for the most part, does make sense; the killer was clever, very clever. Raymond Elvis White, whatever his name was, doesn't even fit my copper's nose expectation, let alone Taylor's profile.' Hoagan knew Richardson's skin would begin to seriously prickle if he thought he was being harried. She spoke easily now, unhurried, the archetypal salesperson. 'Are you definitely satisfied that he's completely out of the frame, sir? I mean, that he didn't help White in any way to get the women he raped and killed?'

Richardson was clearly not in debating mood. 'I'm not interested in Benson, Kate. Nor would you have been but for that damned American woman!'

Hoagan smiled, mischievously, the great, all-seeing mindhunter had now been relegated to "that damned American woman" but in trying to be fair, Hoagan had already conceded that Richardson was probably right about Benson, even though she had never met him. However, he had brought Taylor in, ostensibly against her better judgement. It wouldn't hurt to rub his nose in it, just a little.

'There's something else you don't know, Kate,' continued Richardson. 'The last sex victim, Julie Bennett, was seen accepting a lift from a blond-haired man answering White's description, driving White's vehicle, on May seventeenth. We've checked with Harrison's the sports retailers. Apparently Benson used to give him odd jobs there; on that day he should have been cleaning the store windows, he never turned in.'

'Where was he seen, sir?'

'Great Mere Service Station, on the M6 in Cumbria.'

'How reliable was the witness?'

'The witness was infallible, a high-definition security video camera, sited on the exit slip road. It's normally used for clocking the index number of vehicles whose owners had neglected to pay for their petrol.'

'Is the video good enough to give a positive ID?'

'The man who picked up the girl was driving a vehicle owned by Harrison's and had shoulder-length blonde hair. This Benson chappie has short, black hair and no, I'm not interested in theories about wigs!'

Hoagan smiled, she had wound up the senior detective better than an old clock. Now, however, was the time to retire gracefully. 'Thanks for letting me know, sir. Have you told John?'

'The Manchester lads will tell him; he's on his way there now, to tie up all the loose ends etc.'

Hoagan, never one for fighting lost causes digressed completely. 'Have you heard anything from the Met, sir?'

'No, you know the score, Kate; we won't hear anything from those chaps until it's all sorted. Then you'll have to attend the coroner's inquest.'

'That'll be fun!'

'I suggest you take a holiday, it'll do you good, you could use a break.'

'That's what the chief said. I can't just now, I've got people arriving this weekend; I also don't want to take Mary out of school.'

'Well, enjoy your time off; God knows I could use a break myself. Bye, Kate, I'll be in touch as soon as I know anything.'

'Bye, sir.' Hoagan put the phone down, grinning, impishly.

*

'Liam? It's Brendan, Patrick asked me to phone.'

'Return on the first flight tomorrow, Brendan.'

Donoghue was more than a little disappointed. He had enjoyed the relative freedom from the O'Malleys made possible by leaving Ireland. 'Don't you want me to go to Kent, Liam? I could have a sniff about down there; see if I could pick up the trail.'

Liam spoke with unusual warmth, kindness even. 'No, Brendan, you've done well. Kent is a job for someone else, someone with specialist skills, so get on the early flight in the morning; I'll have you met at the airport.

Donoghue put the telephone down; suddenly there was an unsettled feeling in the pit of his stomach. In all the years he had known Liam O'Malley never once had he spoken to him with even the minimum of civility; today, however, he had been very civil, pleasant even and that, he concluded, was why his stomach was feeling unsettled.

10

Friday May 28, Manchester

For reasons best known to British Airways, the information desk was unmanned. Hoagan glanced up at the still blank arrivals information board. Swearing quietly, she walked briskly to the ticket desk.

The airline clerk, an attractive, immaculately uniformed woman in her early twenties, was busy interrogating a computer. Satisfied she now had the information her client required, she looked up from the console, smiling. 'Yes, Mr Donoghue, that's fine, I can confirm your seat on this morning's early flight.'

Hoagan watched, absentmindedly, as the clerk amended her customer's documents before handing them back. The man thanked her, his accent thick, almost poetic, very Dublin. Hoagan smiled, when the man spoke he reminded her of Jack, he too had been born in the capital of Eire. As he turned, to make his way to the check-in-desk, he accidently collided with Hoagan.

'Sorry,' he smiled, nervously, apologetically.

Hoagan returned the smile. 'No problem,' she confirmed quietly, before moving forward to take his place at the desk.

The clerk told her an electrical fault was affecting the notice board. It was as well she had checked however, due to mechanical problems the Heathrow shuttle would be two and a half hours late.

Resigned to her fate, Hoagan began walking towards the cafe in the arrivals' lounge. She caught another brief glimpse of the Irishman, now stood in a queue, at one of the numerous check-in-desks. As she passed him she could not help but notice how very, very sad he looked.

*

Donoghue came through customs into the excited hum and crush of the arrivals' area. Quickly he searched the faces of the expectant crowd, momentarily surprised that none of the O'Malley brothers seemed to be waiting for him, and then he noticed Sheena. Grinning he walked towards her. He always felt less threatened when Sheena O'Malley was around. It wasn't just that she was female and gentle; he also felt she was the only member of the family who had any real time for him, as a person.

'Good to have you back again,' said Sheena, as he approached her. 'Had a good trip have you, Brendan?'

'I have an' all, Sheena. Brief it was – but okay yer know.'

The red-haired colleen smiled. 'I'm to take you to my house; Liam wants to have a good talk with you, about what you learned in England.'

Brendan suddenly felt uneasy again. Sheena lived over twenty-five miles north of Dublin, in a remote coastal property near Drogheda. If Liam only wanted to talk, surely they didn't need to do it all the way out there?

Sheena saw the concern in his eyes. 'Nothing to worry about, Brendan, the boys are pleased with the job you've done. Liam thought it would be much better to talk in the peace and quiet of Tramore Cottage.'

Donoghue smiled, weakly. Tight-lipped and anxious he picked up his case, following her, dutifully, out of the building.

Seven miles north of the airport, Brendan glanced once more into the passenger side wing mirror. The black Sierra was still behind them. The same black Sierra that had been following them since they left the airport. Unhappily he settled back into his seat, trying hard to find a more comfortable position. It was difficult; his stomach cramps were just too painful.

*

'My God, Kate! I'm sure you're prettier now than you were sixteen years ago!' Warner put down his case and after lifting her off her feet gave her a mighty, breath-robbing, hug.

Hoagan would have liked to have returned the compliment, but she was surprised how much the psychologist had aged during the intervening years. Although he still carried himself well, and he had defied the law of averages with regard to middle-aged spread, most of his, now silver hair, had disappeared. His once handsome face had become rubbery and lined and the formerly proud chin confused and blurred by two, lesser ones.

The American put her down and reached out to his companion standing at his side. Taking him by the arm he pulled him forward. 'This is, Casey', he began proudly, 'my eldest son.' Warner slapped him playfully on the back.

She looked up to the face of the dark-haired, six-foot-two inch tall, muscular American Marine. She had been expecting him. Warner had told her, by letter, that Casey had a four-week furlough he had decided to spend in the UK. She already knew that Warner's oldest son was thirty-three years old; what she had not anticipated, however, were his exceptional good looks.

Casey held out a hand, Hoagan thinking it more of a shovel. 'Hi,' he said warmly, his eyes sky blue, interested. 'I've heard a lot about you, Kate.'

Hoagan looked inquisitively at Jim Warner.

The older man held his hands in the air. 'All of it good, Kate. All of it good I can assure you.' They all laughed, easily.

*

As Sheena skilfully negotiated the Mercedes around the hairpin, that took them off the main road and along the rough track leading to her isolated cottage, Donoghue's eyes were fixed on the reflection of the car behind them. Without reducing speed the driver passed the turning, continuing towards Drogheda. Suddenly, he felt much more comfortable.

The cottage was almost a mile off the public road, a mile of twists and turns, during which the property could be seen only intermittently. Here, although the landscape was fairly flat, Tramore remained hidden by a high hedge of hawthorn.

As they eventually came to rest, in the small, loose-stoned area that served as a car park for the cottage, Donoghue was surprised to note that Liam's car, a jaguar, was missing. The only vehicle present being a green Discovery. Once again the neurotic Irishman began to feel anxious then the figure of Dermot O'Malley appeared at the side door.

Donoghue brightened; he turned to Sheena as she climbed out of the car. 'I thought we were meeting Liam here?'

Sheena smiled reassuringly. 'He'll be along later, Brendan. In the meantime we'll have some breakfast and you can talk to Dermot and me.'

Much more relaxed than at any time that morning, Brendan followed the woman towards the side door. Although Dermot was the second oldest brother, Donoghue hardly knew him. He was probably the quietest, most withdrawn member of the family.

With his stomach no longer knotted with tension, the prospect of breakfast suddenly appealed and he moved quickly and cheerfully into the house. Had he turned around at that point he might just have seen, fleetingly, in a gap in the hawthorns, the shape of a black Sierra moving slowly down the farm track towards them.

*

Jim Warner finished the last piece of steak and nodded, approvingly. 'That was good, Kate, English cooking has improved out of sight since I was last here.' He took a mouthful of beer, licking his lips appreciatively. 'This is drinkable too, not like that keg rubbish they used to sell.'

Hoagan grinned. 'I think it's what the market calls a consumer-led revival. The brewers were happy with keg, it was killed beer, easy to transport, didn't need to settle and was a doddle to serve. Unfortunately their customers didn't agree with them. You're drinking what is now called – real ale.'

'It's real all right,' agreed Casey, 'it beats lager and it sure as hell is strong too!'

'So,' said Hoagan, looking at the senior Warner, 'what's your itinerary, Jim?'

'Well, as I wrote you, I have series of psychology lectures in the UK over the next two weeks. London, Birmingham, Oxford and Edinburgh. If all goes to plan I should wrap the last one, in Scotland, by the Thursday of the second week. Casey and I were then planning to have a few days in the Highlands. Warner smiled, knowingly. 'You know, Kate the grand tour of one's ancestor's stomping grounds. We American's tend to become very neurotic about our origins; we need to confirm that we actually have a past, that we were not simply invented in seventeen seventy-six. You Brits on the other hand are too complacent about heritage; you tend to take it all for granted.'

'I didn't know that Warner was a Scottish name?' said Hoagan.

'It isn't, it's Norman English. Ross is though, that was my mother's maiden name. I'll bet you weren't aware it was the wife of one, John Ross, who designed the original Stars and Stripes.' Her brother-in-law, Colonel George Ross, was a signatory to the American Declaration of Independence!'

'You sound like a fairly militant bunch,' Hoagan chuckled, turning to Casey. 'And what have you decided to do, whilst your father is imparting his wisdom and probably preaching revolution to the future intelligentsia of Great Britain?'

Casey looked a little awkward; hesitantly he made a question out of a statement. 'Well, I know you offered pop to show me the Lakes and the Yorkshire Dales.'

Hoagan nodded. 'Yes I did, whilst I'm suspended I've got virtually nothing to do. Mary's at school, so – yes, I'd enjoy it.'

'And it'll be okay to stay over at your place?'

'No problem.' Hoagan was fairly certain it would not be a problem, however, only time would tell. For now though the muscular captain of Marines had impressed her in every department. He was charming, well educated, intelligent and at thirty-three, mature. She just hoped he would not feel too awkward being escorted by an older woman. Not that she actually felt older than him, nor did she feel she looked it.

The waitress arrived with the lunch bill. Warner grabbed it immediately, insisting on paying. After settling, he ordered a further round of drinks before looking carefully at Hoagan. 'How about telling us the full story of your suspension, Kate?' He looked at his watch. 'I mean, we've got an afternoon to kill.'

When she had finished, both Americans sat staring at her in disbelief.

'You know, Kate,' said Jim Warner, 'England's a funny old place; you've been suspended for what you did, in the US they'd have given you a personal bravery citation!'

*

'So you've told us everything have you?' Sheena smiled, warmly, at her guest.

'Yes, Sheena, that's everything. I was hoping... Sorry, I thought, that maybe you'd have wanted me to go to Kent to see if I could find out where the baby was taken.'

Sheena shook her head. 'No, Brendan, as, Liam told you, that job will require specialist skills. You've done well, found out much more than we'd expected.' She looked at her watch, reached for the remote control unit and switched on the television. 'Wait here for a moment will you? I just wish to have a private word with Dermot.'

Donoghue watched them leave the large, oak-beamed lounge. As they closed the door behind them, he turned up the television volume. The midday news had just begun, a presenter telling him that one of England's most wanted and brutal serial killers had definitely been identified in the ruins of a collapsed Manchester tenement. Quickly bored, he dialled up the racing pages on Teletext.

Sheena pulled heavily on her cigarette. 'I knew this would happen; that Crossley woman told him far too much for his own good.'

Dermot leaned against one of the kitchen sink units. Through the window, in the far distance, a mixed flock of seagulls and crows danced, weaved, and fought for pole position behind a plough-towing tractor. 'We've known Brendan a long time, sis. He's harmless enough; Liam has him well under control.'

Sheena shook her head, aggressively. 'That's not the point, you don't think Liam will wish to pursue the vendetta now do you, now he knows what a shit his uncle really was?'

Dermot still studied the foraging birds. 'Do you think that's why father had us contact the Crossley woman, so that we'd hear the truth about Uncle Sean from another, independent source?'

'Maybe,' she dowsed her cigarette in the sink, immediately lighting another. Dermot could tell she was excited, agitated. 'Anyway,' she spoke coolly now, gravely, 'he'll have to disappear!'

Dermot looked at her, momentarily stunned. 'We can't do that, Liam would never agree to it.'

Sheena scoffed. 'He would if we told him what he had found out.'

'But that would defeat the whole object, you said so yourself. Liam is proud of the family name; he wouldn't wish to pursue the vendetta knowing what a sadistic, traitorous bastard Sean really was.'

'Then we'll have to think of something, won't we. Tell him something, other than the truth that will make him agree with the killing.' Dermot shook his head, uncertainly. 'It's not just the vendetta, Dermot; Donoghue's a compulsive gambler, there's no way people in our position can afford to have a loose cannon like Brendan Donoghue around. What happens if he decides to impart his knowledge to the wrong people for the price of a wager on the tote? We all have the family reputation to consider.'

Sheena's breathing was becoming ragged, heavy; her eyes blackened by the coldness of her heart. Dermot knew the look and the mood well, it frightened him, it always had.

'I still think we ought to talk to Liam first, even if we don't tell him the real reason.'

'Fuck Liam, he won't have any say in the matter, it'll be too late. There's no way we want someone like Donoghue, who'd sell his own mother for a betting slip, having that sort of knowledge about us. Think about it, he knows that Sean was a rapist and such an evil, egotistical bastard; he even set up his own twin brother for a life sentence!'

'You believe all that?' asked Dermot. Sheena glowered at him as though he was a child and Dermot knew it was pointless to argue with her, it always was. 'Where's the gun?' he asked downcast.

Sheena shook her head. 'No, I'll do him, he won't suspect me, are the boys outside?'

'Yes, what do they do with the body?'

'Dump him in the North, that way he'll just be another sectarian statistic.' She felt above one of the kitchen units, eventually retrieving something heavy and metallic, wrapped in an oil-soaked rag. She removed the automatic from its protective covering and placed it in a plastic shopping bag. Then, followed by her brother, went back into the lounge.

'Okay, Brendan,' Sheena spoke softly, trying hard to control her breathing, 'your transport back to Dublin has arrived. Thanks very much for your help; I'll have a word with Liam, see if he can't give you a little bonus or something.'

Donoghue stood to face her, smiling, obviously relieved. As he flattened out the creases in his trousers, he said. 'Thank you – for the breakfast, I mean.'

'Least we could do, Brendan,' she replied. 'Now will you be getting a move on? I'm sure Liam will be having something for you to do.'

Brendan rounded the corner of the house before he realised that he had gambled for the very last time. It was only then, as he squinted in the bright, May sunshine, that he saw the black Sierra. Two smartly dressed men were leaning against it, talking to Dermot. As he approached they stared at him interestedly, Donoghue thinking he had once seen an undertaker look much the same way at his grandfather, but he had been ninety-seven and already dead.

He drew himself erect; it was difficult because something was crawling around the inside of his stomach; something that was gnawing its way into his cramped intestines. He turned slowly, not to plead for his life for he had felt for years that his life was not worth pleading for. Quite simply, he was inquisitive; he wanted to know who was to be his assassin. For just the briefest moment he caught sight of Sheena O'Malley, she was stood less than six feet from him, pointing a handgun at his head. He thought how beautiful she looked, her red hair flaming in the bright, coastal sunshine. Then, as a cold finger of dread began to crawl slowly up his spine he saw the black marbles of iced-hatred that were her eyes and noted the genetically endowed madness that surely lurked behind them. Then the darkness came!

Sheena walked quickly over to the still twitching body and put another two bullets into what remained of Brendan Donoghue's head. In a field, in the far distance, the foraging crows and gulls took noisily to the air. Now, triumphantly, she turned gleefully to her brother and the two men.

'I've always, always wanted to do that; anyway, he's yours now!' Then, quickly, and giggling hysterically, she ran back into the house.

Dermot watched the Sierra until it disappeared behind the start of the hawthorn hedge, then he also ran into the cottage. Sheena was in the lounge ready for him, naked. Hungrily she ran to him, seeking his lips, sucking, biting, whilst simultaneously tearing, animal-like, at his clothing.

Within seconds he too was naked with Sheena dragging him onto the floor. As he entered her she moaned and whimpered like a cornered, wounded animal.

'Fuck me Dermot,' she screamed, 'fuck me like there's no tomorrow!' Dermot moaned with her as she writhed beneath him; then he remembered why he had never been able to refuse his sister anything.

*

Liam slammed his fist hard onto the table. 'Why the fuck did you let her kill him?'

Dermot lit a cigarette and began pulling on it nervously. 'We thought it for the best, Liam.'

'For the best, for the best; you mean she thought it for the best! No doubt she had you fuck her afterwards!'

Dermot looked uncomfortable, ever since their secret relationship had been discovered by Liam, some two years previously; he had raised it at every available opportunity. Had used it to legitimate criticisms of decisions of which he did not approve. 'Listen,' he said, angrily, 'that's our business; it's got nothing to do with what happened to Donoghue!'

Liam scowled at him, his face a mask of disgust. 'It's dirty, evil and against all the rules of God.'

Dermot scoffed. 'That's good coming from you, Liam. How many men have you maimed and killed? Do you think God's going to think you're one of the good guys because you've not sampled your own sister? At least what we do doesn't hurt anyone!'

'It's the stimulus that worries me, Dermot. It's what Sheena uses as an aphrodisiac, what she gets off on that is the problem!' He bent over his sitting brother, spitting each word into his face.

Dermot sprang to his feet. 'You're not suggesting she killed Brendan just to improve our sex life, are you!'

Liam fixed Dermot's frightened eyes. 'No Dermot, no I'm not; you are going to tell me why she killed him. But I do know how irrational she can be at times; I've seen her watch men being beaten, she feeds off it, she's anybody's then!'

Dermot looked away, refusing to be intimidated. 'Anyway, what was Brendan to you? You treated him like your own personal slave!'

'Yes I did and he was a good slave; did was he was told, when he was told. I hadn't finished with him, he still owed me. In other words he was mine and I'm the only person who can decide to finish with the services of someone who owes me and is mine!'

Dermot poured himself another whiskey. 'Listen, Liam, I think, Sheena had a point, Donoghue knew about Sean and father's terrorist connections.'

'So does half the fucking world!'

'He also knew about the child. Sheena thought that Brendan was too unreliable to have confidential information like that about the family.'

Liam stared at his brother as though he was not certain he was real. 'What was, Brendan going to do with information like that?'

Dermot shrugged. 'Sell it I suppose, he would have sold his own mother for the price of a wager, if he'd still had a mother. Sheena and me were concerned about possible blackmail, we thought we were doing the right thing.'

'Why didn't you speak to me?'

'You were away for the day, we couldn't contact you.'

'Yes, I was away for a day, a day, not a fucking year!' Liam eyed him shrewdly. 'Are you sure there isn't something you're not telling me? Something else, something maybe you didn't want me to find out about father and Uncle Sean?'

Dermot shook his head, attempting to appear confused by a question that, unbeknown to his brother, had hit the bull's-eye. I've told you everything, Liam; we acted in the family interest that's all.' He smiled, almost dismissively. 'God knows Ireland's awash with the Brendan Donoghue's of this world; you'll soon find yourself another runner.'

Liam looked down at the carpet, shaking his head. 'On that basis, what about the Crossley women Brendan went to see?' He looked up at his brother. 'And for that matter, her younger surviving sister; just what the hell do we do about them, Dermot?'

*

Hoagan had enjoyed having Casey Warner around. For a week and a half she had driven him all over the Lake District, often visiting places she had not even been to herself. Their itinerary had included the homes of Ruskin, Potter and Wordsworth; the breathtaking beauty of the Langdales, the Duddon Valley, Derwentwater and Ennerdale. They had picnicked on the summit of Scafell Pike and followed Wainwright over Cringle Crags. Cruised on Lake Windermere and ridden the 'Ratty Railway' from Ravenglass.

At first she had thought the American rather dull and boring. However, as she came to know him better so too did the realisation that, unlike his father and probably most Americans she had met, he was naturally very shy. It had taken her some time to break down his reserve but when at last he had relaxed in her company she found the wait had been worthwhile.

Like herself, Casey had seen the darker, much less attractive side of life. He too had lost; lost friends and colleagues in the invasion of Grenada and during the Gulf Conflict. During the latter he had been with Special Forces, twice avoiding capture behind enemy lines by the closest of margins. Now, nearly at the end of his stay with her, she considered him charmingly different. With Mary staying at a friend's, she had also decided that they would spend his final evening making love.

The weather, always fickle in the uncertain northern climate of Cumbria, had broken. However, Hoagan did not mind; they had enjoyed good sunshine when it had mattered and the sudden drop in temperature had given her an excuse to make a log fire in the house's ancient hearth.

They sat in front of it now, on the fireside rug, their backs propped against the settee. Hoagan, who had been in jeans and shirts for most their time together, was wearing a white blouse and skirt. Her breasts, now unhindered by a brassiere, had moved easily when, earlier in the evening, she had served the meal. She knew he had noticed; she had caught his eye on numerous occasions as he had admired her still youthful looking body. At those times they had exchanged the oldest look of understanding in the world. Now they both knew what was going to happen it was only a matter of – when.

*

The clock in the hallway struck twelve and for the third time that wonderful evening, they mutually approached orgasm. Casey stopped momentarily, resting, watching the dying firelight dance once more across the hazel of his lover's eyes. As she smiled at him he moved downwards, teasing her nipples with his tongue, his fingers feeling the softness and beauty of her hair before, for the hundredth time, exploring the sensual curves of her neck and arms.

'Thank you,' he whispered, 'thank you for a wonderful holiday.'

Hoagan lifted her head off the floor, finding his mouth, seeking his tongue with her own. When she had finished, he gently lowered her back onto the cushioned floor; smoothing away chestnut hair from damp eyes and a tear-stained face.

Slowly, his powerful, muscular body began to move again, Hoagan empathising with him, two people with an instinctual understanding of each other's needs and desires; two people who, that evening, had once again found that most fulfilling and comforting of all human emotions and experiences – love.

Later, as they lay there still locked together, frightened perhaps of letting go, Casey asked her why she had cried.

Still watery-eyed, Hoagan simply smiled and she hugged his strong frame to her own soft, yielding body. Wanting him close, wanting for the first time in over sixteen years to feel really needed. Wanting, despite her modern outlook on the role of the strong, emancipated female, to feel, if only for that moment, protected – secure. Above all, she wanted what she had not truly experienced since the death of Jack; she wanted to be really loved, by a man.

Casey had smiled at her; she had not spoken a single word in answer to his question. She had not needed to; her eyes had told him everything he wanted to know.

11

BentleyMoor, Lancashire

Friday, September 17

David Benson unlocked the second of two doors and entered the smaller outbuilding of his new home. The twenty by ten-foot room still smelt of fresh paint and builders' materials. He switched on the light and finding the room now windowless and fully tiled from floor to ceiling, exactly in accordance with his plans. On the floor, still covered with the original thick slates, a drainage channel had been cut, running the full length of the far wall before eventually disappearing into the floor.

Illumination came from one low-wattage light in the ceiling, fifteen feet above. The new, dark blue tiles, barely reflected the inadequate illumination giving the chamber an almost sinister, claustrophobic atmosphere.

Benson stood in the middle of the room, smiling smugly. Despite the late summer heat it was cold, the air heavy, dank and he shivered involuntarily. A few weeks earlier, when the work had started, one of the men had expressed surprise at his plans for the old building. The workman had even suggested it would end up looking like a prison cell!

After emptying the hired van of the equipment he had purchased, he began work; he also began grinning again.

*

Detective Inspector Roger Downer walked into Hawthwaite's office looking concerned.

Hawthwaite glanced up from the computer monitor; he was struggling with a new statistical program and, for once, welcomed the intrusion. Additionally, he could not fail to notice his visitor's downcast expression. 'Morning, Rog, lost a tenner?'

Downer handed him a copy of a telex. 'We've just had this in from the Met Special Branch, might be nothing to worry about but thought you might like to let Kate Hoagan know – unofficially of course as she's still, technically, not one of us.'

Hawthwaite looked at the document; it was top and tailed 'CONFIDENTIAL'. Briefly he read the text and then looked at the special branch man. 'Thanks Roger, I'll let her know right away.' As Downer was leaving his office, Hawthwaite picked up the phone.

'Kate?'

'Hi, John,' she said, brightly.

Hawthwaite smiled, the previous day a London coroner's jury had delivered a verdict of lawful killing in the case of the attempted kidnapping his old friend had foiled so professionally and skilfully and, for the would-be abductors, so terminally. 'You sound on top of things this morning, Kate. How's it going?'

Hoagan laughed. 'Oh just fine...fine, anyway, good to hear from you, anything exciting happening?'

'Have you been told when you can come back to work?'

'Wrigley phoned me last night, said, "well done" and that I should be back in action within days. I've also been promoted, would you believe?'

'The things some people will do to climb the ladder,' joked Hawthwaite. 'Anyway, many congratulations, you certainly deserve them.'

'Thanks, I've been off for months but it seems like years and I'm really raring to go now.'

'I've just been given a snippet of intel,' continued Hawthwaite, 'it's a bit confidential for the phone, are you in all morning?'

'Sure.'

'I'll be across in an hour; have the kettle on.'

*

'So, what's the big secret?' she said, handing him a large mug of coffee before collapsing on the settee.

Hawthwaite noticed how she had changed since he had last seen her. She looked younger, more relaxed, in control of her life. The dark bags under her eyes, that had begun to age her and detract from her beauty, were now almost gone. Also the twinkle was back in her soft, hazel eyes.

He produced the telex from his pocket. 'Roger Downer gave me this an hour ago; it's from the Met SB.'

She took it and began to read. The message was brief but to the point. At 0830 hours, that morning, an Irishwoman had entered the UK at Heathrow Airport. She had flown in from Dublin, her identity, despite the use of an assumed name, had been confirmed as – Sheena Clodagh O'Malley.

Hoagan knew that her entry would have been noted by MI5 who would have passed the information on to special branch. She was also aware that there must have been no grounds for refusing her admission; however the interest of Cumberland and Westmorland Constabulary would have been highlighted by the special branch data base; hence the immediate telexing of the information.

'Before I left HQ I got Roger's people to run off what we know of Sheena from the central mainframe.' Hoagan looked at him expectantly. 'Zilch,' he continued, 'she's merely logged down as being the daughter of, Michael O'Malley. She's then cross-referenced to the main O'Malley file; as an individual she doesn't even rate.'

'How many kids did Michael have altogether?' she asked. 'I've forgotten.'

'There are four, Patrick, who we think masterminded the release of the father. He's the youngest and brightest. Next eldest is Dermot, then Sheena and Liam. The latest gen we have on them, from the RUC, is that ostensibly they are all seemingly non-political. The family own a successful chain of betting shops, throughout the republic. Although there have been some questions raised by the Garda, about involvement with the mob and with fringe extremist groups, there is no definite evidence that they've been directly associated with terrorist activity. However there is a strong chance they're not averse to fund-raising for anyone interested in blowing up a British shopping mall, or killing a British soldier or policeman.'

'What do we know about their possible criminal activities?' asked Hoagan.

'Very little, they're good at covering tracks. Liam is the operational brains behind the outfit; he has previous for associating with known members of the Irish criminal fraternity. He's pencilled in as being involved with a couple of murders and quite a few beatings. Nobody he upsets seems to want to take things further though. The O'Malley's have an awesome reputation, mainly thanks to the efforts of, Michael and Sean in the nineteen sixties and seventies.'

'So they're a sort of shadowy fringe group; nothing definite but the type of family whose name crops up time and time again during enquiries?'

'Exactly,' agreed Hawthwaite, 'an employee of the O'Malley's one, Brendan Donoghue, turned up in the north some weeks ago with a head full of lead. After some difficulty-strewn investigations by the RUC it was recorded as a sectarian killing. According to the O'Malley's he was on holiday, visiting relatives in Ulster.' Hawthwaite smiled, cynically. 'The problem was he didn't have any relatives in Ulster. The Garda and the RUC are convinced the O'Malley's are involved but have absolutely nothing whatsoever to pin it on them.'

Hoagan lit a cigarette; she blew the smoke away aggressively. 'Donoghue you say? Where have I heard that name before?' After a few moments she gave up. 'So, what's happening now, I mean about Sheena O'Malley?'

'She'll be watched, if she gets up to anything interesting we'll be told.'

Hoagan nodded. 'Yes, I know the score from my own days with the Branch. They'll be hoping she'll give them a lead into UK-based sympathisers, or even active terrorists. The important question though is – why is she here – why?' Suddenly she changed tack. 'Do we still have a fix on Michael?'

Hawthwaite laughed. 'He's still screwing himself stupid in an Amsterdam brothel. As you know he went there within a couple of days of release. According to the Dutch security police he hasn't been seen outside the place since.'

Hoagan smiled. 'Oh well, I don't suppose he can get up to too much mischief there.' She grinned wickedly. 'He's probably too tired anyway.'

Hawthwaite studied her closely, reminding himself how good she was looking. 'How are you by the way, Kate?' he asked.

Hoagan relaxed back onto the settee, grinding her cigarette into an ashtray. 'In a word, John – wonderful!'

Hawthwaite leaned forward in the chair and grinned. 'Ha-ha, Casey Warner's still an item then, is he?'

'Oh yes,' confirmed Hoagan, her whole face suddenly lighting up at the mention of the American's name, 'oh yes!'

*

Sheena O'Malley parked the hire car outside the small Catholic church. It was raining, hard, driving in from the English Channel, the strong winds whipping branches of the churchyard yews against each other. She looked at her watch, then at the notice board. There would be a mass that evening at seven o' clock and that meant she had over eight hours to kill.

She shrugged, time to find a hotel; she was tired and hungry after the journey but after food and some sleep she would come back suitably refreshed. Hopefully, once the mass had finished, she could then have a quiet, confidential word with the parish priest.

*

'What do you mean you'll be home late again?' It was lunchtime and with the office empty Joanne Kirkby felt free to shout, uninhibited, into the telephone.

'Like a told you, Jo, I've got to work.'

'This morning you promised to take me out for a meal tonight. You've been working late for the past fortnight. Who is she?'

'Eh?'

'You heard me, who are you bonking now?'

'Now listen, Jo___'

'No, you listen to me. I know your reputation, I know you like a fucking book! Good looking copper, plenty of opportunity, too bloody weak-willed not to take it when offered on the proverbial plate!'

'You've got me wrong, Jo___'

'No I haven't, Dennis, you've screwed yourself all around Manchester for years. Tomorrow night we're going to have a serious talk – received over?' She slammed the phone down; pleased she had mocked him with his own police jargon.

Quickly she dialled another number; the voice that answered was familiar, friendly, but before she had time to even say 'hello', Joanne burst into tears.'

*

Detective Constable Dennis Kirkby studied the telephone handset he had just replaced.

'Everything all right, Den.'

He turned to face the speaker. 'Yes, I think we'll have to cool it a bit that's all. Jo's getting neurotic.'

The woman laughed derisively. 'You're not giving her enough Den, women like Jo probably need plenty.'

Kirkby looked at her disbelievingly. 'Who do you think I am, Sally, bloody Superman? Christ, most of my energy goes on you.'

She giggled, childishly. 'I know, Denny and I love you for it. Now then, where are you going to do me first?' Her voice tone changed, seductive, alluring. 'It'll be cold in the bedroom, the heating's not on, how about in front of the fire.' Kirby nodded but now, after the recent conversation with his wife, only partially interested in the prospect of the 'treats' that lay ahead.

The lounge had vertical blinds at the window, angled to make it extremely difficult for anyone outside to see into the room. Sally was wearing a light, cotton sweater which she quickly pulled over her head. Her breasts were small but hard and firm, her stomach, that had never been stretched by a growing child, both flat and curvaceous. The sight of her nakedness excited him and immediately, breathing heavily, Kirkby began to fondle her. She broke away from him, sliding down her skirt and pants before lying on the rug in front of the fire.

Kirkby took off his own clothes and was about to join her when he looked at the photograph over the fireplace. Momentarily he felt awkward, concerned even. He looked again; the groom was still smiling at him, he had ginger hair, a moustache, and a weak, wet, sulking mouth. 'What the hell did you marry that dipstick for?' he asked, joining her on the floor.

Sally looked at the photograph. 'Dunno really, money I think,' she giggled, reaching for him, 'he hasn't got a clue how to use one of these though!'

She snuggled closer, still working him with her hand. 'We've got to make the most of tonight, lover; he finishes his residential senior officers' course tomorrow afternoon.'

Kirkby kissed her breasts and neck. 'What did you have in mind?'

'I thought perhaps we could have a really long session, you know, into the early hours.'

'Oh my God!' whispered Kirkby. 'That's what I thought you were going to say!'

*

Joanne Kirkby locked the office door, it was seven-thirty and already, especially with the foul weather, quite dark. With nothing better to do, now that her promised night out had been cancelled, she had worked late, preparing an urgent sales description for a client. As she turned into the driving rain, to begin walking down the street, she sighed, sardonically. At least her boss would appreciate her, even if her husband did not.

She had walked a little over one hundred yards and had just turned into a deserted side street when the vehicle pulled alongside. She thought she recognised the car immediately and walked towards it as the driver's window whirred open.

'Joanne?' The driver poked his head through the opening.

'David, David Benson?' She ran forward and opened the passenger door.

'Get in;' said Benson, easily, 'you're getting soaked!'

Joanne eased herself, gratefully, into the Porsche and smiled, happily, at the driver. 'Strewth, it's really bad out there tonight!'

Benson put the car into gear and moved quickly away. He glanced in his driver's mirror a couple of times until happy no one had seen her enter the vehicle.

'Where are you going then?' he asked casually.

'Oh just home,' she sounded bored, miserable even. 'If you could drop me off at the bus station I'd be most grateful.'

'No problem,' he replied, now driving quite slowly, 'if you don't mind my saying so, you sound really pissed off.'

'You could say that,' she agreed, noncommittally.

'What's the problem then?'

Joanne Kirkby was not a person who normally discussed her personal affairs with strangers. However, she was still seething from the lunchtime row with her husband. She was in need of sympathy and, on this occasion, had decided, she was entitled to break one of her cardinal rules in order to get it. She told him about the row and about her suspicions regarding her husband's infidelity.

They were nearing the bus station and Benson pulled the car over into the side of the road. Although there were people about now, they were too busy scurrying out of the rain to be interested in them. Even if they were, the Porsche's windows were heavily tinted and without a light inside the car, its occupants were effectively invisible. As the vehicle came to a premature halt, Joanne looked at him, expectantly.

'Listen,' he began, at his persuasive best. 'I'm in a similar spot to you tonight. I've been let down at the last minute. How would you like to come back to my new place? I've the makings of a good meal; we could crack a bottle of Chablis, cry on each other's shoulders; then, later, I could put you in a taxi home.'

Joanne thought about the offer for only a few seconds. She was convinced her husband was having an affair, having it right now as she was returning home. It would serve him right if she did go with this toy-boy; she had fancied him from the first anyway. If he was only being kind, then fair enough, but if he wanted something a little more than just company? Her own conscience was clear for – was not the gander also out and having sauce this evening?

As the Porsche pulled away from the kerb, a sheltering policeman gave them a half-interested sideways glance. Joanne recognised him as one of her husband's friends from the local police cricket team. At first she hoped he had not seen her, then, after she thought about what Dennis was likely to be doing, decided she did not really care.

*

The congregation had been small, far smaller than Sheena was used to at home. She decided the poor turn-out had probably been influenced by the appalling weather. As the dozen or so worshippers made their way to the door, Sheena hung back, behind the priest.

She watched as he bade goodnight to those stalwarts of his flock who had made the effort and when he eventually turned to speak to her there was no one else to follow.

'Good evening to you, father.'

The priest was an elderly, kind looking man. He smiled as he heard her speak. 'I trust you took some pleasure in our little service this evening?' His own accent was West Country English, relaxed, unhurried.

'I did, father, 'tis comforting when one is a long way from home.'

'Forgive me, but is that not a Dublin accent?' he asked.

Sheena smiled; the old priest was going to be a pushover. 'It is an all, born and bred so I am.'

The priest was looking nostalgic. 'I had many a happy year in Ireland in the nineteen fifties. But I must say the happiest time of all was my time spent in Dublin.'

'A grand city, father, a grand city,' she agreed.

The priest glanced quickly at her index finger. 'Are you to be with us long, Miss...?'

'O'Leary,' she replied, 'Sheena O'Leary.' She shook her head at his question. 'That I don't know, in fact to a large extent it depends on yourself. I've actually come to have a chat with you, father; if you'll be having five minutes to spare.'

The old man seemed pleased. 'Why, I've always got time to spare for a maid from Dublin's fair city.' He laughed at his joke and Sheena smiled, strategically. 'Let me lock up the church and we'll walk around to the presbytery. If we ask her nicely the good Mrs Finnegan might make us a nice hot toddy!'

Five minutes later they left the church, stooped and struggling down the windswept pathway towards the public footpath. As they approached him the man in the dark blue Orion, parked opposite, sat up expectantly. Hastily, he cleared a patch of condensation from the rain-lashed windscreen, watching as the duo turned left, then immediately left again into the grounds of the presbytery.

The man relaxed again, reaching for the flask precariously balanced on the passenger seat. It was, he decided, going to be a long, cold, night.

*

Father David Lynton relaxed into an old leather chesterfield and eyed his visitor carefully. He took a large measure of the toddy out of his glass before placing it on an occasional table at his side. 'Now then, Sheena O'Leary, what can old Father Lynton do for you?'

The priest's free use of her assumed name made her feel uncomfortable. She had done many evil things in her relatively short time on earth. Lying to priests, however, was not something even she did with relish. 'Could I ask you first how long you've been the priest here, father?'

He was thoughtful for a moment. 'It was sixty-two when I came, so that's thirty-one years.'

Sheena breathed an audible sigh of relief. 'So you were definitely here in nineteen sixty-five then?'

'Indeed I was, Sheena,' the priest was beginning to sound intrigued.

She sipped at the strong drink, allowing herself time to think how best to approach the difficult questions ahead. She decided bluntness was the least painful and unquestionably the most time-saving route. 'In nineteen sixty-five, a woman came here and gave you an unwanted, newborn child – a boy.' The priest remained totally inscrutable, not saying a word and Sheena was momentarily shaken. After such a profound statement she had expected at least some reaction. 'Is that not true father?'

'My memory is not what it was Sheena,' the holy man spoke slowly, carefully. 'We do have such instances from time to time; this particular case, you maintain, happened a long time ago. I would have to check the church records.'

She looked at him, expectantly. 'How long would that take?'

'It would not be quick, those particular diaries will be held at diocesan level. That will mean days at the earliest. But such matters are highly confidential; before I do anything I must know more about your motivation for asking this question.'

Sheena bit her bottom lip, nervously. She was about to lie again. 'The father of the child wishes to find him, to make his peace with him. He's quite ill you see, father, in fact he's dying.'

Father Lynton looked sorrowful. 'Oh that is sad.' He shook his head, despairingly. 'Such requests are, alas, not unknown. Once the human soul realises impending mortality many mothers and sometimes, even fathers, have been driven by guilt to make peace with those they feel they have wronged. It's like a cleansing process, purging oneself of sin in this life, before moving on to the next.'

Sheena was feeling optimistic. 'So – will you be able to help me?'

The priest drained his glass, slowly, and for a moment stared at her, studiously. 'You are here representing the ailing father of the child?' he eventually asked.

'Yes.'

'What do you know of the mother?'

'She died, over twenty years ago in a car accident.'

'What is your own connection with this case, are you a relative, a paid emissary or perhaps both?'

Sheena knew she could not hesitate. 'I'm his cousin.'

'How did you know the child had been brought here?' The priest spoke slowly, matter-of-factly.

Sheena had been expecting the third degree, she was not being disappointed. 'The father...my uncle, told me where to come.'

The priest nodded with understanding. 'Hmm...you must understand, Sheena, legally, there is no way I can help you, even if I could. There are legal routes allowing the child to trace back to the birth mother but not the other way round.' He shrugged. 'That is the protection the law has given the child, I'm afraid.'

Sheena slumped in the chair, her face wracked with disappointment.

Father Lynton saw her expression and smiled. 'However...'

*

Joanne Kirkby held out her glass again. 'Yesh pleashe.' Smiling, Benson filled it for the fifth time. 'I mush shay...' she giggled, aware of her level of intoxication. 'I mush shay, David, I've never seen a place transformed sho well and sho quickly.' She looked around the lounge admiringly.

Benson sat next to her on the settee. 'Yes, Jo, I'm very pleased. Did you enjoy your meal by the way.?'

'It wus wonderful, thank you.' Suddenly Joanne felt immensely tired and the room was spinning wildly, making her nauseous.'

'I think it's time you were settled down for the night, Jo.'

'Oh yesh please,' she giggled again. The glass, still half full, suddenly slipped out of her hand, its contents spewing onto the new furniture. After realising what she had done she half-heartedly, tried to apologise. 'I'm very sorry, David, I don't usually get this pissed on a few glasses of wine.'

'No problem,' Benson took her hand and pulled her gently off the settee. He steadied her with his arm before walking her towards the door.'

'Where are you taking me?' she asked, as if only partially interested.

'To my new guest room, you'll enjoy it there. It's been done up especially for important visitors like yourself.'

The effects of the drug, Benson had slipped into her fourth glass of wine, plus the alcohol, finally put Joanne Kirkby to sleep. He picked her up in a fireman's lift and opened the front door. Before moving out into the rain and windswept night, he paused momentarily retrieving the ball of nylon twine that, in anticipation of what was to come, he had placed on the hall table earlier.'

*

'Would this be the one you're after, father?' The housekeeper placed a crumpled newspaper on the supper table.

Father Lynton replaced his spectacles and checked the date before hastily thumbing through the pages. He soon found what he was looking for. 'Thank the Lord for your sister, and her visits, Mrs Finnegan.'

'Thank the Lord for re-cycling, otherwise I'd never have saved it for so long,' she replied.

The priest smiled at her then returned to his study of the article. 'That is the young lady in question I should think.' He pointed to the photograph.

Mrs Finnegan nodded. 'Yes, I'm sure your right, father. It's a wicked thing she's done, coming here with all those lies about herself.'

'Tut tut, Mrs Finnegan, with a family name like O'Malley wouldn't you think of telling the odd fib or two?'

The housekeeper looked disgusted, even appalled at the suggestion. 'Certainly not, especially to a good man of the cloth; why, such a thing in my day would have___'

'A little charity, Mrs Finnegan,' he looked at her as she stood next to him. 'It says in the paper that Michael O'Malley is ill with heart trouble. Perhaps he wishes to make peace with his boy, before he's finally called to atone for his many evil deeds before the Almighty.'

Mrs Finnegan shook her head. 'You're not thinking of helping her, are you, father. 'It is trouble indeed you could be bringing down upon yourself!'

The priest glanced at his watch then stood and moved towards the hall door. 'I might just have a word about her with Father O' Gill, tomorrow.'

The housekeeper started tutting again as she collected the used supper plates. 'Always looking for another soul to save for the Almighty, twill do you no good, father; mark my words, nothing good will be coming of it.'

Father Lynton smiled, wryly as he walked into the hall.

*

'Dermot?'

'Is that yourself, Sheena, how did you get on with his holiness?' Dermot O'Malley giggled down the phone.

Sheena was frightened of no one, except for priests. She led too suspect a lifestyle and perversely, was too deep a believer for her to be otherwise. 'Listen – don't mock the clergy, he's a very nice man.'

'Oh, your man's nice is he; well – has he agreed to help us?'

'I'm to phone him in a week.'

'He did agree then?'

'He said that nothing could be done through normal channels, however he would think about my request and may make some tentative enquiries. But even if he traced his whereabouts and managed to talk to him, it would have to be our cousin's decision whether he wanted to meet with me.'

'When are you coming home then?'

'Monday evening; tomorrow I'm spending the day in London, shopping. As for Sunday and Monday, well I'll see what turns up. I'll let you know what time to collect me at the airport.'

'What do you plan on doing if the priest contacts the cousin and he agrees to see you?'

Sheena was silent for a moment. Thus far the whole thing had been more of a game than anything else. She had not seriously considered what might happen, once she ever actually met her mysterious and long-lost relative.

'I don't know, Dermot,' she replied hesitantly, 'we'll talk it over when I get back.'

13

Wednesday, September 22

Cumberland and Westmorland Constabulary HQ

Hoagan stared thoughtfully through the window of her new office; although still only the first week of autumn, the leaves of a nearby huge and ancient oak were already beginning to turn paler. A momentary hint of whimsy flickered across her face as a red squirrel, digging frantically at the base of the tree, prepared one of numerous winter larders for the harder times yet to come. Was there, perhaps, a message for her in that instinctual and driven activity? She turned at the sound of someone knocking on the office door. 'Come.'

Hawthwaite entered, pausing only to pretend polish the plastic sign that read – 'SUPERINTENDENT CID' on the office door. 'Very impressive!' he observed, moving into the room. 'I am allowed in?'

Hoagan laughed. 'Come in, John,' she moved across to a small table where a percolator was making noises like a blocked drain, 'coffee?'

'Love one,' he sat down, obviously impressed and looked around the room. 'So this is how the other half live?'

Hoagan gave him the coffee and joined him at a seat on the same side of the desk. She looked at him, warmly. 'I've endorsed your application for the DCI's job; it's up to the powers that be now.'

He shrugged. 'Thanks, Kate, I don't suppose I've much of a chance but one has to give it a go.'

Hoagan nodded. 'I'll do everything I can; the trouble is the new chief super has a preferred candidate.'

Hawthwaite nodded. 'I know, Ray Marsden, they're in the same lodge I hear.'

Hoagan looked at him, cynically. 'Like many of the more ambitious members of our little force?'

Hawthwaite sipped at the hot, sweet coffee, but there was bitterness in his voice when he spoke. 'Oh sod it, Kate. If they're set on promoting nepotistically, rather than on merit, they can stuff the bloody job!'

'Don't write yourself off too early, John. I only found out yesterday that old Wrigley's not one of the bare-breasted brigade.'

Hawthwaite seemed genuinely surprised. 'Really?'

Hoagan smiled. 'Really! Apparently he refused to join years back when he was a DCI in Yorkshire. I'm told he's not at all happy about the little clique that's grown up here over the years. You must also take some encouragement from the fact I got promotion. I mean, not only am I female and automatically a member of the strictly condemned, there's no way a woman could join the bare breasted, rolled-up trouser league, even if they wanted to.'

'Hmm,' pondered Hawthwaite, grinning, 'could be fun though. Dare one ask how you came by this snippet?'

Hoagan shook her head, firmly. 'No – but take it from me', she patted the side of her nose with her forefinger, 'it's definitely kosher, from an impeccable source, as they say.' She relaxed back into her chair, studying her visitor, closely. 'Anyway, much as it's a pleasure to see you, John – what can I do for you? Or is this purely a social call?'

'Now your back in harness, as it were, I want to take some leave – if you don't mind?'

She looked at the calendar. 'Bit late for leave isn't it? School hol's are well over.'

'My sister's having the kids; I want three weeks – on a roll.'

'Going anywhere interesting?'

Hawthwaite looked rather sheepish; Hoagan knew the look, and guessed immediately. 'Wouldn't be anywhere near Texas would it?'

'Well, I've had an offer I can't really refuse, Kate,' he explained. 'All I have to do is find my way out there, everything else is thrown in; Emmy's taking leave at the same time you see, she's promised to show me the sights.'

Hoagan grinned, excitedly. 'You know I thought there was something between you two, I couldn't put my finger on it at the time but...'

'You've got it wrong, Kate, really, we're just friends.'

'But...after you've been over there for three weeks...'

Hawthwaite shrugged. Well we do have something in common – our mutually disastrous marriages.'

'When do you want to go?'

'This Friday.'

Hoagan grimaced, 'God knows we're busy at the moment, but then when are we not nowadays? Sure, John, take the leave and have a good time; looks like you and me are setting a new trend in trans-Atlantic relations!'

'Talking of which, how's your American?' asked Hawthwaite.

Hoagan beamed. 'God, John you wouldn't believe how happy I've felt since I met Casey. What with meeting him, then his transfer to the embassy in London so we can be near each other and now me landing this promotion! Honestly, everything's come right all at once; I've really started to love life again.'

Hawthwaite nodded, genuinely pleased for his old friend. 'Well, I just hope everything turns out for you, Kate. God only knows that you deserve it.'

*

David Benson finished reading the article and put the newspaper on the arm of the chair. He simply couldn't believe his luck. When he had killed Joanne Kirkby, despite his state of mind, he had deliberately refrained from his previous habit of leaving his calling card on her body. That would almost certainly have prompted a re-opening of the investigations into the previous murders. However, he had had no idea the police would have been foolish enough to suspect the dead woman's husband.

He sipped his whiskey and smiled, smugly; it was beginning to appear that he really was invincible. Suddenly however, his face darkened, there was still no escaping the fact he had been cheated. Joanne should still be alive, imprisoned in the outhouse, as those who loved her scoured the countryside in vain. Feeling frustrated he went to his study, unlocking a large cabinet containing video recordings. He would play back one of his earlier killings – the girl he had kept in Ray White's flat for over a week before she had died.

The beginning of the footage was blurred and obscure and after a moment he cursed, realising he had the wrong tape. As he stood to change cassettes the picture suddenly cleared and he found himself watching an attractive, teenage girl. He had forgotten about the security video he had removed during a routine visit to one of his organisations' Manchester shops. She was with another teenage girl and an older woman and the three of them had been videoed in front of the trainer stand. For some reason the older woman was looking uncomfortable, anxious even.

Benson giggled like a schoolboy; he knew about the older one, knew a great deal about her and had seen her on television before. She had wanted to capture him, stop him from taking his pleasure, fulfilling his destiny. It would be most fitting, therefore, that as she had had unkind thoughts about him and wanted to remove his freedom, that he should take that of her daughter's.

He re-wound the tape; yes the girl would be taken away from the comfortable life she had known and he would give her another role to play; as a star in a new drama, a drama the script of which would be written by himself, personally. All the time she was with him, until he finally tired of his prisoner, the police would be hunting high and low for her. Such was the power he now knew he could wield, such was the control he had over the destiny of those who would dare to hate and despise him!

But better than all that, whilst he pleasured himself at the girl's expense what would the mother do? How would she cope, month after month, not knowing whether her daughter was alive or dead? He giggled again, the almost hysterical giggle of the insane; perhaps, after a few weeks he ought to send the girl's mother a fitting souvenir, a momento, something like a finger or toe he could remove easily and without causing too much damage to his, still living, captive!

Benson closed his eyes, and in his mind began to write a completely new script. It had two starring roles, himself and the girl on the security video.

*

'Is that the house of Father Lynton?'

Mrs Finnegan scowled into the telephone. 'Who's speaking please?' she asked, with full knowledge as to the identity of the caller.

'It's Sheena O'Leary, is that Father Lynton's house?'

'It is, Miss...O'Leary, I'll see if the Father's free.' She placed the handset on the hall table and knocked on the priest's study door. Without waiting for a response she entered to find the cleric seated at his desk, writing.

'Yes, Mrs Finnegan?' he asked affably, looking up from his papers.

'It's that, O'Malley...O'Leary girl for you father; shall I tell her it's inconvenient?'

Father Lynton shook his head and put a hand on the phone on his desk. 'Thank you, hang up in the hall will you, Mrs Finnegan.' He picked up the handset, giving the housekeeper the look she knew meant 'that is all for now'.

'Hello, Sheena, nice of you to ring,' said Finnegan.

Sheena was immediately flustered, had he already forgotten why she would be phoning? 'Yes, father, are you well?'

'Fine, fine and yourself?'

Sheena was anxious to come to the point. 'It's about what we discussed last week, I know I'm ringing prematurely but I wondered if you'd...if you'd___'

'Yes, Sheena, I haven't forgotten our little talk and the answer is – yes, yes I can. Now listen, this is what I want you to do.'

*

When the two had finished talking, ten minutes later, a bald-headed man, sitting by a tape machine, removed his headphones and lit a cigarette; then, using loudspeakers, he played back the recording, occasionally stopping it while he typed a transcript into a laptop computer. When he had finished he plugged it into a modem before dialling a London number.

Friday, September 24, 9-10am

Detective Inspector Roger Downer took the offered seat. He had known Kate Hoagan for many years and although he was generally far from happy at having women in such senior positions, he had, albeit grudgingly, to admit that the new detective superintendent was every inch a professional. As such, however much it hurt, he found himself having to respect her.

'What can I do for you, Roger?' she asked.

'We've had a report in from MI Five, ma'am; Sheena O'Malley landed in Fleetwood at seven this morning this morning, illegally.'

'Hmm,' Hoagan tensed her lips, 'how did she manage that?'

'I don't have all the details, you know what Five are like for cloaks and daggers; it seems she was clocked leaving a small fishing port on the east coast of Eire yesterday.'

'This came from the Irish Special Branch?'

Downer shrugged. 'Don't know sources, smells of SAS to me but I'd only be guessing. All we do know is her vessel, a fishing boat, had a meet with a British trawler off the Isle of Man. She came ashore on that.'

Hoagan moved thoughtfully to her desk and sat down, remembering back to her own days in the Branch. She knew the rendezvous would probably have been monitored by any number of surveillance techniques. Ground-based radar on the Isle of Man, satellite, Nimrod aircraft or a patrol submarine somewhere in the Irish Sea, perhaps even all four. She also knew that there was no way O'Malley would have been arrested at her port of illegal entry. From the moment she landed on the mainland her progress would be closely monitored as MI5 would be hoping she would lead them onto greater and better things.

'Nice of Five to let us know; not their normal style,' she observed studiously. Downer noticed her change of mood, she looked and sounded concerned. 'What else have we got on her, I mean, where did she go after she landed?'

He shook his head. 'She was met and taken away by car and that's it, we're lucky to get that really. I suppose the only reason they told us that much is because you are clearly at such high risk they could have been severely criticised had they not. They've promised to advise on future developments – should we "need-to-know".'

'I wonder what she's up to?' said Hoagan. 'I mean, she was in the UK only last week.'

Downer nodded. 'Yes, on that occasion she entered conventionally, using an assumed name. The Met SB lost her somewhere in London, just a few hours before she was due to fly out. That's probably why Five are running with her on their own this time, to avoid any more cock-ups.'

Hoagan looked at him disbelievingly. 'Five avoid cock-ups!' Downer shrugged, he had not been in post long enough to understand what Hoagan was getting at. 'Remind me, what did the Met say she did last time?' asked Hoagan.

'Went to visit a priest in Whitestone-on-Sea, Kent; then she spent the rest of the time in London, shopping. She picked up a show, had a wander round the Victoria and Albert but made no obvious contacts.'

'No men?'

'No, apparently she doesn't bother with men, not unless you count her brothers.'

Hoagan smiled, until a few weeks ago she could have sympathised with the suspect terrorist's attitude towards the male gender. 'So Branch is officially off the case now?'

'Yes.'

'Okay, well thanks for the sit-rep, Roger.' Downer noticed she was looking anxious again. 'I think I'd better make a phone call.'

*

Sheena finished the last of the bacon and poured herself a cup of tea. She looked carefully around the almost deserted Little Chef, then, with apparent equal disinterest, glanced through the window into the large, near empty car park.

'Okay?' Her companion, a swarthy, thirty-year-old male with a hooknose and two, over-sized gold earrings in his right ear, looked at her anxiously.

Sheena's smile was more of a gloat. 'No problem, it looks as though they've not clocked me this time.'

'How do you know they were onto you in London?' he asked lamely.

She stared at him as though he were an imbecile. 'Don't ask fucking stupid questions, Derry.' She looked at her watch. 'Time you pissed off, anyway.'

Derek Fitzpatrick glanced at the restaurant clock. 'It's not half-past-nine yet,' he grumbled. 'I could use another cup of tea.'

Sheena's eyes hardened. 'You can go now, my contact may be early; I do not want him seeing you here.'

Fitzpatrick was about to object then thought the better of it. He was not sure why but something he noticed in Sheena's eyes suggested that compliance with her demands might be a very good idea. He stood and began feeling in his pocket.

'I'll get the bill, just go and...' She managed a half smile. 'Thanks for picking me up this morning.'

Birkstone High School, Cumbria

'Hi mum, you wanted me?'

Relieved at hearing the sound of her daughter's voice, Hoagan asked the obvious. 'You got the message then?'

'Sure, what's the problem?'

'Listen, I can't go into details on the phone, I just want you to be aware that you may possibly, just possibly, be in danger.'

'Why, who from?' Mary sounded anything but concerned. Her mother had, in her opinion, been overprotective all her life. She was always raising false alarms about her safety without ever giving a satisfactory explanation as to why.

'Just be careful, Mary. Stay in at lunchtime, don't talk to strangers, especially women and keep your wits about you, that's all!'

Mary was angry. 'Mother, I'm nearly sixteen years old! Who do you think you're talking to?' Mary's eyes were rolling in their sockets.

'Mary, I'm serious, this is not a game! Now then, I'm going to send someone to collect you from school this afternoon.'

'Oh no, I'm not going to be met by one of your plods in front of all my friends. You seem to forget mum, it's nineteen ninety-three, people don't like policemen anymore; they're bad news!'

Hoagan lost it. 'Mary! How dare you talk to me like that? You'll do what you're told!' Mary shook silently, full of self-righteous, adolescent angst. 'Mary? Mary! Can you hear me?'

'Yes.'

'You will stay in school at lunchtime, is that clear?'

'Yes; look, sorry, there are people waiting for the phone, bye mum.' She hung up and walked away from the acoustic booth. Her friend, who had been waiting patiently in the corridor, looked at her, expectantly.

'Problem?' she asked.

Mary shook her head, aggressively. 'It's mum, I'm certain she's falling out of her tree, she still thinks I'm an eight-year-old.'

The other girl snorted. 'Tell me about it.'

'She's convinced herself that I'm in danger; she's actually forbidden me to go out of school at lunchtime! And to add insult to injury she's sending a stupid plod round to collect me tonight!'

Her friend looked horrified. 'God, that's serious, doesn't your mother know what that can do for your reputation?' They began walking towards their next class, weaving in and out of the crush of other pupils, all bound with similar intent.

'Well, I suppose I'll have to go home with the plod,' groaned Mary, 'but at least I can make him wait until the school bus has left.'

Her friend nodded. 'What about this lunchtime?'

Mary looked at her, indignantly. 'What do you think?'

*

Sheena stood up, smiling; she had been right to be cautious, the priest was twenty minutes early. 'Father Lynton, how nice to see you,' she held out a well-manicured hand which the elderly cleric accepted, warmly.

'How are you, Sheena?' he asked, as she helped him off with his coat.

'Fine thank you, father,' she eased herself back under the table. 'Can I get you anything, tea, breakfast perhaps, have you eaten this morning?'

The priest smiled and shook his head. 'Yes I have eaten this morning thank you, but a pot of tea would be very nice.'

Having sent the waitress away with a new order, Sheena looked at him anxiously. 'Forgive me, father but...'

Lynton held up an understanding hand. 'I know, Sheena,' he smiled, 'you want the details.' Don't worry,' he comforted, 'I understand how excited you must feel.' He stared at her, affectionately. 'When we spoke last week there was something I didn't tell you.'

She sat up surprised, suddenly concerned by what was to follow, she need not have been.

'When you asked me if I could remember the incident of the baby arriving on my doorstep, all those years ago, I said I could not.' Sheena nodded. 'Well, you'll have to forgive an old man but that was a little white lie. You see – I remember the incident as though it were only yesterday. Believe it or believe it not, such happenings are extremely rare. In fact, nowadays they are almost non-existent. However, I needed time to think; such matters are, by their very nature, extremely delicate. Also, as a priest, I have to think of my oaths of confidentiality.'

The waitress arrived with the tea. Sheena, welcoming something to do, began to pour. Lynton noticed her hand was shaking and pretended to be more interested in the telephone engineers, working on the pole outside in the car park.

'What I'm trying to say is,' he continued, when she had finished, 'rather than have you leave disappointed I tried to give you the impression I just may be able to help; nothing more, nothing less.'

Sheena pushed the priest's tea towards him, simultaneously willing him to come to the point. 'Are you saying, father, that not only did you remember the incident, you also knew where the infant had gone?'

He nodded. 'Oh yes my child, that's exactly what I am saying. However, now I know that the person in question is prepared to meet you it's no longer a problem. Conversely, had the person refused, I would have simply told you I couldn't help due to legal reasons.' He sipped at his tea, smiling conspiratorially. 'Legally, it must be said, that what I am doing is unlawful.'

'So why are you helping me?'

'I'm helping both of you, Sheena. If it is the will of two of God's children to be united after twenty-eight years, who are the secular authorities to say such an event should not occur? You see, normally, the adopted child takes the lead in such matters. They have a legal route allowing them to find their birth parents. I know that the child in this case would have wished to do that some years previously. However, the names of neither of the parents were known. Call me an old romantic, Sheena, but God brought you to my house, therefore I think it was his will that you and your cousin are brought together.'

Sheena resisted the temptation to smile at what she considered false-consciousness. 'When do I get to meet him?'

'Very soon, we only have to drive to a little town on the outskirts of Manchester. I stayed with your cousin last night, he too is very anxious to meet with you!' Lynton's eyes suddenly became shrewd, searching. 'Not unnaturally, he is also most keen to meet and talk with his father!'

Sheena suddenly shivered; she looked away from the priest, her dark eyes, for once, betraying the fear that was now licking at the edges of what she perceived to be her mortal soul.

*

The small group of schoolgirls giggled their way down the high street. One of them spotted a male classmate, supposedly off on sick leave.

'Look!' she said excitedly. 'There's, Wayne Forrester. He must be wagging it off again!'

Both she and another girl began shouting his name, he swaggered across to them, his baseball cap as far back on his head as gravity would permit.

The girl who had spotted him spoke first. 'What yer doin' wanderin' around town, Wayne? We all thought yer were dyin' or something,' the girls giggled.

Wayne was what educational psychologists usually term – school phobic. For most of his life he had truanted at every available opportunity. The resultant product of this detachment from his education had left him, at the age of sixteen, barely literate and almost completely innumerate. With parents who were far too wrapped-up in their own lives and careers, it also meant the boy had virtually no idea how to behave in a manner acceptable to society at large.

However, as both his relatively wealthy parents worked, they left him in charge of a large house for the bulk of most days. As such, he was never short of friends. Like Wayne, many of the latter questioned the desirability of school and indeed its long-term usefulness in a country where there were fifty school leavers chasing every job. He was also extremely good looking and from the age of fourteen had enjoyed an awesome reputation amongst his peers as a 'bird puller'.

'What yer doin' this after', Wayne?' The questioner was the youngest and with the exception of Mary, most attractive of all the girls.

There was more giggling, then the first speaker put her arm possessively through his. 'How about a party, Wayne?'

'What, this after'?'

'Yeh...why not?'

'Got any money?' he asked.

'What for?' enquired the youngest girl.

'Booze, yer silly cunt; we can't 'ave a party without drinks. You buy the booze; I'll 'ave the party.' Suddenly, out of the corner of his eye, he saw one of his male friends.

'Robbo!' Without a single social value to restrain him he bawled out the name loudly, attracting the attention of every shopper on the small, provincial high street.

'Listen,' he said, 'I've got to go, I'll see yer at my place in 'alf an hour.' He glanced once more in the direction of his now disappearing friend, and once again raised his voice. 'Robbo yer wanker, stop! Stop!' he cried and began running as fast as he could up the street.

'Shall we then?' asked the smaller girl.

'Yeh,' said another. 'I've got a couple of quid I nicked off me old woman. Better than going back to prison for the afternoon, it's only bloody silly English anyway.'

As one they all looked at Mary, who began to feel extremely awkward. The fifteen-year-old knew only too well that the type of company she was keeping would have met with the most severe disapproval of her mother. However, since the American had arrived on the scene, her only parent seemed to think of no one else. As such, she had decided, generally, to do what she wanted to do, with whoever she wished to do it.

'Are you coming then, Mary?'

Mary shook her head. 'I want to but I daren't, I'm not even supposed to be out here today. My mother may still pop into school and have a word with the head about me and she's arranged for someone to pick me up.'

'She might what?' the youngest girl's top lip curled up towards her nose in disgust.

Fortunately for Mary, her closest school friend and the girl who had been with her during the telephone conversation with her mother that morning, came to the rescue.

'It's right; her mother thinks there's some nutter around who might be after her.'

'What?' The girl's lip was curling up to her nose again.

Mary shook her head, dismissively. 'My mother has a vivid imagination; think about it, think how unlucky I am.'

Mary's choice of words was wise; they did think about her quandary, if only for a moment. The prospect of the afternoon ahead, however, was significantly more exciting and Mary's problems were soon forgotten as they made their plans. Two minutes later, after collecting a kitty of a little over ten pounds, they were heading for the nearest off-licence and video hire shop; Mary, having been left her to make her own, very lonely way, back to 'prison'.

She walked along the high street, head bowed and feeling thoroughly depressed. Indeed, so full of anger and humiliation was the teenager that she never saw the late season tourist to the pretty market town. He was a good looking man in his twenties who, along the full length of her route back to school, took a large number of Polaroid photographs.

*

The priest stopped the car outside the presbytery. 'Here we are then Sheena, safe and sound.' He said as she stared at the relatively modern building, wondering what was waiting for her on the inside.

Weakly she returned his smile and got out of the car. The priest locked the vehicle and after taking her arm, reassuringly, led her up the short drive to the rather imposing front door. A middle-aged man, with a beery round face and wearing a priest's cassock opened it. As he did so he smiled, broadly, at Sheena.

'Hello, I see David has managed to bring you to us then?' He looked at her as though she were some priceless treasure and held out a large, welcoming hand. 'Come in child, come in.'

Almost in a state of shock, Sheena stumbled into the entrance hall.

'This is Father Gill, Sheena,' said Lynton, 'he was my assistant priest, twenty-eight years ago.'

The significance of the statement was not lost even on the disorientated visitor. 'How do you do, father,' she spoke quietly, almost reverently.

'Here, let me take your coat,' he held out his hands, laughing. 'I'm afraid I've no housekeeper to look after me at the moment, the good lady is poorly with the flu.'

Sheena removed her coat and the priest hung it on an already dangerously overloaded clothes horse. He turned, still smiling, obviously as excited about her visit as she was herself.

'Now then young lady, I've no doubt you think you've waited long enough to meet your cousin?' Sheena nodded, awkwardly. 'So do I,' he continued and took hold of her hand again, 'so do I.'

*

'Come.'

Roger Downer opened the door and popped his head into Kate Hoagan's office. 'We've had a report from Five, ma'am, O'Malley's in Fenridge at the moment, would you believe – in a presbytery?'

Hoagan put her spectacles on her desk. 'Another one, what is she up to?'

Downer shrugged. 'Don't know; she's only just arrived there; Op's want to know if we should stand down the armed response team?'

Hoagan looked thoughtful. 'Where's Fenridge?'

'A small town near Manchester.'

Hoagan shook her head, emphatically. 'No way, she's only a hundred miles away. Anyway, for all we know her visit may be a diversion. There's something cooking, Roger, I can smell it; we'll keep the team on alert, just in case.'

Downer nodded. 'Right, ma'am; I'll let Op's know.'

He closed the door with a bang and Hoagan moved out of her chair to the window. Under the oak tree a gardener was busy planting bulbs for the spring; she watched him, idly, as he accidently unearthed one of the squirrels' carefully concealed caches. Without a thought he threw the acorns, along with other rubbish, into the wheelbarrow at his side.

Shaking her head, Hoagan moved back to her desk. How easy it is, she thought, how very, very easy it is to destroy something in minutes that had taken weeks, months or even years to build. As her daughter moved into young womanhood she was becoming increasingly estranged from her and that evening, she promised herself, she would have a long, hard talk with her. It was time, high time, that she told Mary the truth about the vendetta and the ongoing nightmare she had had to live with, every single day of the past fifteen years.

*

Sheena entered the study between the two priests, Father Gill leading. At first she thought the large room was empty; then she saw the grey-suited, tall, dark-haired man at the far end of the room. He had his back to them and was staring out of the window, onto the large lawns at the rear of the house.

'Sheena, this is your cousin, Eric.' said Gill, excitedly.

The man turned to face her; he was smiling affectionately. Instinctively she began to walk towards him, her hand outstretched in greeting and it was only then she noticed the dog collar.

*

PC David Mensham drove slowly along the road outside the school. He looked at his watch, it was three forty-five and thanks to the unusually heavy traffic he was late. Now the road was alive with a mass of excited, babbling, running, shouting bodies.

Mensham decided that safe progress through the crowd was impossible. Hoagan's sprog, he considered, could wait; anyway, he was a police officer not a bloody nursemaid to the children of the brass! Still in the middle of the road he applied the handbrake and switched off the engine. As he did so a boy, Mensham thought looked no older than twelve, walked in front of the patrol car. He was an ugly specimen, poorly dressed, his face already ravaged with disfiguring acne. The child stared hatefully at the police officer through the windscreen and Mensham gazed back impassively. Suddenly, the boy spat on the bonnet, whilst simultaneously sticking two fingers in the air.

Mensham was not surprised at the behaviour; he was forty two-years old and as such mature enough not to regard the incident as an attack on his personal ego. He opened the driver's side door, intending to do nothing more than give the youth a mouthful. The boy however misconstrued and without a thought for his personal safety, dashed across the road in the direction of one of the many school buses that waited on the other side.

The driver of the Range Rover, a woman who only thirty seconds previously had collected her boisterous brood and was now driving far too fast, never had a chance. With a screech of brakes she brought the heavy vehicle to a halt, but only after the offside wheel had crushed the boy's head as if it had been an overripe apple.

PC Mensham had witnessed the whole tragic affair and instantly climbed out of the patrol car. Amid the screams of terrified and shocked schoolchildren, he took one look at the boy and shaking his head, sadly, radioed for an ambulance and urgent assistance.

*

From the sanctuary of the toilet, Mary heard the screams of her fellow schoolchildren outside on the road. She looked though the window, a huge crowd of parents, teachers, children and passers-by were beginning to congregate. Intrigued, she picked up her schoolbag and made for the exit.

It was beginning to rain and as she emerged onto the road the relatively high winds drove the water into her face. To her right, a crowd of over a hundred people had gathered and many more were in the process of running to join them. A solitary boy was going in the opposite direction however and Mary knew him.

'What's the craic, Paul?' she asked.
The boy, who was just twelve years old, became tearful. 'It's Danny Ashton, he's been knocked over!'

Mary did not know the victim. 'How is he?' she asked gently.

The boy now broke down completely. 'Copper said he's dead!'

Mary put an arm around him. 'Did you see what happened, Paul?'

'No.'

'The police are there then?'

'Yeh, a copper saw it 'appen I think.'

She patted his shoulder in a sisterly way. 'I think you ought to go home, Paul.'

The boy snuffled and nodded half-heartedly. 'Yeh...bye, Mary.'

She watched him shuffle off, oblivious to the rain which was becoming heavier by the minute. She looked at the crowd again; probably, somewhere in middle of all those people was her promised policeman. So, she reasoned, if her lift had witnessed the fatality he could easily be tied up for the rest of the afternoon. Even if he had not, she also considered, he would most certainly be too busy to be bothered with her at the moment. Unfortunately the school bus for Broughton had left just before the accident; she had watched it leave from the lavatory. She was about to return to the school, to phone her mother at work, when somebody spoke her name. She turned, surprised to find a man standing behind her.

'Mary?' he asked again.

She nodded, the man was in his twenties, dark-haired and incredibly good looking. He smiled at her. 'PC Davenport, your mother asked me to call and collect___'

'I know.' Mary looked at him more closely. He was wearing a white shirt, black tie and dark navy trousers. Over the shirt he wore a stylish leather jacket, obviously a poor attempt to hide his occupation; perhaps on her mother's orders, she concluded. She turned, looking for his vehicle, it was fortunate for David Benson that she did; his face had momentarily gaped at the ease with which she had accepted his story. Mary turned back to him. 'I thought you might have been involved with the accident.'

'Oh...no...' Despite his almost phenomenal quick-wittedness, Benson was still so surprised by his good fortune that he was finding it difficult to say anything useful. He decided that as she was clearly expecting a real police officer to collect her that would explain why she had not attempted to take the school bus. His best ploy, he quickly concluded, was to play along with his intended victim's expectation, ironically the truth now appearing to be almost identical to the fictional story he had fabricated earlier.

Mary looked at him again. 'Well?' she said assertively. 'Let's get to your car shall we? We're getting wet through!'

Benson nodded, lamely, as they set off walking and away from the crowd. After ten yards he turned left, into a quiet, narrow, tree-lined residential lane. The white Rover, he had specifically hired for the purpose that morning, was parked ten yards away.

Two minutes later he unlocked the passenger door, Mary took off her coat and climbed inside. As Benson joined her, behind the wheel, she frowned at him disapprovingly.

'Is this one of those unmarked jobs you catch poor speeding motorists in?'

Benson smiled, noncommittally, still in something of a daze at his apparent invulnerability and the ongoing ease with which he seemed to acquire whatever he wanted, whenever he wanted it.

'Oh well,' continued Mary, 'at least you're not in uniform and with the car unmarked nobody will have noticed us, especially with all that fuss going on down the road.' In a way she was sorry now that her friends had not seen her. This guy was like no policeman she had ever met before; for he was, she decided, very seriously hunky!

Benson started the engine and as the car pulled away from the kerb he glanced at her, slyly. He was relaxed now, once again in control. 'Yes, Mary...yes,' he agreed, 'with a bit of luck you may well be quite right.'

13

The phone rang on Hoagan's desk. Deep into calculating budgetary requirements for the next quarter she glared at it, angrily. Accountancy was definitely not why she had joined the police force. 'Yes?' she growled into the mouthpiece.

'Sergeant Willis here, ma'am, Op's Room; we have a bit of a problem with your daughter's uplift.'

Hoagan sat up in her chair. 'Go on?'

'There's been an RTA, a fatal, outside of your daughter's school. The officer delegated to pick up your girl witnessed the whole thing and he's going to be busy for some hours I'm afraid.'

Hoagan gagged. 'Not Mary!'

'No, ma'am, no, a young lad.'

Hoagan's sigh of relief nearly deafened the sergeant. 'So, haven't you detailed another mobile?' she asked.

'Yes, ma'am; she arrived about ten minutes ago and can't find Mary anywhere.'

'You sent a woman?'

The sergeant hesitated. 'Yes, ma'am.'

'Shit, I gave explicit instructions she was to be uplifted by a male officer.'

'Sorry, ma'am, there's no record of that in the log.'

'Is she in uniform?'

'Yes.'

'That's something, now listen, Mary's not stupid; she's probably gone back into the school.' Hoagan glanced at the wall clock. 'Tell the WPC to go into the school and find the headmistress. They have a PA, they can broadcast for her on that.'

'Very good, ma'am.'

'And, sergeant.'

'Yes.'

'I want to know as soon as the officer finds her – understood? Tell her she's to radio straight in.'

'Understood, ma'am.'

Hoagan put the phone down and reached for a cigarette, when she tried to light it she was surprised how much her hand was shaking.

*

'This a strange police car,' observed Mary.

Benson looked at her. 'Why's that?'

'Well, I can understand it's got none of the normal markings on it but you've not even got a police radio!'

'This car's experimental, we have to use pocket radios at the moment,' he replied glibly.

The explanation seemed logical and Mary turned her attention back to their route. 'You take the next on the left for Broughton.'

Benson shook his head. 'We're not going that way, Mary.'

Mary stared at him quizzingly. 'What other way is there?'

'Orders, apparently we have to keep off the obvious routes.'

'Whose orders?' Mary was beginning to sound angry. She was hungry and had arranged to have her friend come around to her house at five o' clock. The way they were going would add at least another half hour to the journey. 'Who ordered you to go via Edinburgh?' she asked, impatiently.

'The station sergeant,' Benson spoke hesitantly; he was beginning to feel uncomfortable. Quite obviously, as the daughter of a senior police officer, his passenger felt in no way intimidated by junior ranks.

'Which station is that then?'

'Err...Ulverston,' Benson pretended to be concentrating on his driving in an attempt to hide his vagueness.

'Well do me a favour will you?' Surprised, Benson glanced at her briefly. 'Use your pocket radio, and tell the sergeant I've told you I want to get home tonight. That I want you to go the normal way!' she insisted.

Benson was rapidly coming to the conclusion that in a very short time his victim would begin to start smelling an extremely large rat and after a few moments thought made up his mind.

'What are you doing?' asked Mary. They were now on a country lane approaching a lay-by and Benson was slowing the car down.

'I'm going to have to stop here, the pocket phones aren't much use when you're mobile in this area.'

The reason sounded acceptable to Mary. She knew that her mother often had problems with portable radios when she tried to use them from home. Even one room from another could make a significant difference.

He stopped the car and pretended to look for something under the dashboard. 'It must be in the glove box on your side, can you get it for me, Mary?'

Obligingly she pressed the button in the small door; it opened downwards, the light coming on immediately. 'It's not in here.'

Benson's fist hit her full on the nose as she turned to look at him. The force of the blow, restricted as it was by the confines of the car, was still enough to knock her head back against the seat belt anchor point, located on the pillar separating the front and rear passenger doors. She slumped unconscious in the seat with only the diagonal belt now preventing her from falling forward.

Within seconds, using twine he had brought with him for the purpose, he had bound her wrists and ankles, a piece of rag, carelessly discarded by a previous hirer, now serving as an impromptu but effective gag. Reaching under the dashboard he found the release lever for the boot door and he was about to drag her, still unconscious out of the front of the car when, with thick cloud and appalling weather bringing a premature dusk, the car's interior was bathed in light by the headlights of an oncoming vehicle. Shaking almost uncontrollably now, his breathing shallow and ragged, he pulled the comatose schoolgirl to him, feigning an embrace.

The car passed quickly by and, still trembling, he dragged her across the driver's seat; two minutes later he was heading east at speed, desperately trying to keep his still violently shaking body under some sort of control.

*

Sheena O'Malley sat in stunned silence in the passenger seat of Father Lynton's car. When Eric McClean had turned around she had very nearly fainted. It was not only his dog collar, the resemblance to her father and uncle was uncanny, almost, she thought, unbelievable. He had quickly told her he was Father Gill's assistant priest and with what followed she soon came to realise it was hardly surprising that Lynton had been able to trace and contact him so quickly. To begin with, he had not had to trace him at all; the priest had had contact with Eric for nearly all of the twenty-eight years since his abandonment at the Whitestone presbytery.

Over tea, Sheena was given the whole saga. Within hours of his being left by the sister of the birth mother, Eric was placed in a nursery and six months later he was legally adopted. His new parents were Scots and they took their child to Fife with them. Theoretically, Father Lynton, like nearly everyone else associated with the infant's sad circumstances, should have never seen the boy again. Indeed, this was the general ethos of the Catholic adoption service and had it not been for one of life's occasional amazing coincidences, that is how the situation would have remained.

Four months later, one Sunday morning, Andrew McClean, and his proud wife, walked into Lynton's church with their baby. McClean had been promoted by his company, his new posting was Dover and the organisation had provided him with a rented bungalow at nearby Whitestone-on-Sea. When it came time for the child to be baptised, therefore, the little Whitestone church seemed the natural venue for such an important occasion. Father Lynton recognised the child immediately; he could hardly have failed to do so, not with the pronounced and distinctive birthmark on the infant's right temple.

Lynton and the McClean family had been closely associated ever since. In later years assisting Eric find a place in a Catholic seminary, when the boy had decided his own career also lay with the Church. The question of Eric's adoption had never been raised between the cleric and either the adoptive parents or the boy himself. That was until two years previously when, with both his adoptive parents now dead, Eric had confided in his spiritual father that he wished, if possible, to contact his real, biological parents.

It had been painful for the elderly priest to apologise to the young man for his many years of silence but this eventual candour did allow him to tell Eric the truth – that they were completely untraceable. Naturally, the young man was disappointed there was no way of tracing his ancestry backwards; however, with counselling from the elderly cleric, he eventually accepted that his family tree had effectively been felled the day his birth mother had abandoned him all those many years before.

The rest of the story Sheena either new or could guess. After her visit to him in Kent, Father Lynton had immediately telephoned Eric at the home of Father Gill. The young man had instantly agreed to a meeting with Sheena, even when he had been told it appeared unlikely her real name was not O'Leary but O'Malley and that it seemed his father may well be a recently released terrorist. For Eric this was not a decision to mull over, like his friend and almost life-long counsellor, he too was an idealist romantic; always looking for, if not always finding, the good in people.

When she was told they knew the truth about her identity, Sheena had visibly squirmed in her seat. She had never been happy lying to the priest and knowing how desperately uncomfortable she felt at that moment she realised why. From that point on she was candid with them, telling them all she knew about Eric's real father, how he came to be conceived and how he subsequently had arrived at the presbytery. She told him about his father's terrorist activities and how ultimately, he had come to meet his death at the hands of a Cumbrian policewoman.

Then, for the first time since her arrival, the two elderly priests had left the cousins to talk privately together. They had much to discuss and Eric was eager for information about the O'Malley family. Sheena told him almost everything, only avoiding details of things she could be certain he would strongly disapprove. These, not surprisingly, included the family's violent, criminal past and her own incestuous relationship with her brother.

Then it was Eric's turn; unlike Sheena he had led a life dominated by the teachings of Christ. He was young, his head full of idealism and love for humankind. He spoke with zeal about his perceived mission to bring peace to the lives of all those he met. To bring the message of hope and love from the God he clearly revered above all other things. When he spoke she thought of him more as an eighteenth century missionary. He charged the atmosphere of the small study with electricity, such was the strength of his belief that Christ lived within him.

Sheena was too worldly-wise and cynical to be completely overwhelmed by Eric's calling to the priesthood. She considered him young and inexperienced, that he had yet to find out just how much evil there really was in the world. To discover how selfish and cruel people and life could be. However, meeting him had given her a new strength, a new perspective on a life that, to-date, had mainly involved the use of only one word – take.

At last she found the courage to tell him the real reason for the family's belated interest in him. She explained about the vendetta, about her own father's request that Eric be found, his counsel sought. When she had finished, he had, for some considerable time, looked at her, sadly; then, when at last he did speak, his message to both herself and the family as a whole was unsurprising, to the point and completely unequivocal.

At last, it was time for her to leave. Eric smiled into her eyes, his own forgiving, full of love and understanding. Never, in all the years of her life, had Sheena felt so inadequate; not once, hitherto, had she considered so objectively how evil and useless a life she had actually led and she considered that, more than anything else, the meeting had been a spiritual experience for her. She had arrived at the presbytery that morning not knowing quite what to expect. When, eventually, she had left that place of quiet and peaceful sanctuary, she felt a different person; decent somehow, cleaner and more at peace and rest with the world than ever before.

*

Sheena waved gratefully to Father Lynton as he drove away from the Avis office in the centre of Manchester. Thoughtfully, she turned and walked towards the large glass doors of the car hire centre. As she approached, a shining new Telecom van, passing slowly behind her on the main road, was briefly reflected in one of them.

*

Hoagan glanced at her watch, it was four-thirty. She lit another cigarette and with her concentration gone began pacing the room anxiously. When the telephone rang she grabbed it immediately.

'Yes?'

'They've stopped the school bus, ma'am, she's not on it,' said Willis.

'Shit! What about the search of the school?'

'It's a large building, ma'am; no trace of her yet.'

'Did any of her friends on the bus say where she might be?'

'Nobody seems to know. Apparently all her friends had wagged off school this afternoon.'

'And they don't know where they've gone?'

'No, ma'am.'

'Bollocks, somebody must know something. Is the officer still with the bus?'

'Yes, I think so.'

'I want those kids leant on!'

There was a slight pause. 'Very good, ma'am, I'll pass the message on.'

Hoagan broke the connection, immediately keying Downer's number.

'Roger?'

'Yes?'

'Hoagan, where's O'Malley now?'

'Last report we have she's on the M Sixty-One, heading north.'

'Coming this way then,' she said, thinking out loud rather than making a statement.

'Probably going back to Fleetwood, it's likely she'll return the way she came.'

'Mary's gone missing,' she said, amazed at how matter-of-factly she had spoken the words.

'You think Sheena was a diversion?' he asked.

'I don't know what I think, but I do know I want answers. Can you get on to Five; tell them what's happened? I want her stopped and questioned.'

'They might not agree, ma'am, don't forget it's not our jurisdiction. They've only fed us this intel because the Home Office have specifically instructed them to do so; due to the danger to you and your family.'

'I don't give a fuck what Five want or are prepared to do. If they don't stop her I'll get onto Lancashire traffic and tell them she's stolen the crown jewels and is about to assassinate the queen! Now do it, Roger, just fucking do it, that's an order!'

*

The countdown markers for the M61 services came into sight and Sheena indicated her intention to pull off the motorway. It was raining heavily now and the wiper blades on the hire car were well past their sell by date. The thick cloud had brought darkness prematurely early, motorists were driving on headlights and the streaky windscreen, aggravated by the glare, had made her eyes ache. She was also desperately tired.

She pulled into the car park, stopped directly opposite the service station entrance and switched off the engine. Immediately she rubbed her eyes before looking into the interior mirror, instantly concluding she looked ghastly. She was about to reach for her handbag, to attempt some temporary repairs to her fatigue ravished face, when she noticed the van come to a halt, fifty yards behind and to the side of her, in the lorry park.

Something instinctual warned her not to look directly at the vehicle. Instead, she carefully swivelled the mirror. It was a Telecom van, why was she concerned about a Telecom van? With no interior light on the driver was invisible and, as such, not really threatening. Or did that make him more so? Then she remembered the Little Chef that morning and the man up the telegraph pole. She was about to dismiss her fears when, perhaps from deep within her anxious sub-conscious, she saw, once again, the reflection in the glass doorway of the rental company. Suddenly, she was seized by panic. Of course, they had followed Father Lynton!

*

Hoagan walked into the special branch office, Downer was just putting the telephone down.

'Well?' she asked immediately.

'They've agreed,' he replied, moving over to a wall map of Northern England. He pointed with a ruler. 'Apparently she's here at the moment, in a service station car park. If she is a diversion they're concerned she's armed so the West Lancashire Armed Response Unit are on their way as back-up, just in case. They'll swamp her with irresistible force and hopefully have her in the bag in the next ten to fifteen minutes.'

'What happens if she decides to leave before the ARU get there?'

Downer shrugged. 'Not my specialist area, ma'am; with respect you know much more about such matters than myself.'

Hoagan nodded and looked at the map. If she did exit back onto the motorway, before armed assistance arrived, they would probably force her onto the hard shoulder further north; ideally before she accessed the much busier M6.

The telephone rang, Downer snatched at it, after a couple of seconds handing it to Hoagan.

'Detective Superintendent,' she said.

'Willis, ma'am, they've had a go at the address the girls on the school bus gave them – she wasn't there.'

'Who was?'

'Just a bunch of kids, they were about to leave when the mobile arrived. Seems they'd been having an impromptu party, most of them were drunk.'

'Drunk? Did they say anything about Mary?'

'Only that they knew she was being uplifted by one of our people after school, that, apparently, was the only reason she hadn't joined them herself.'

'What!' Hoagan tried to dismiss the implications of the statement. 'What about the school itself?'

'Nothing, ma'am; only that Mary was last seen running out of school after her bus had gone; it seems everyone was totally immersed in the RTA.' There was an awkward silence. 'I take it you've made sure she's not at home and that she has a message to ring in immediately she does get back?'

Anger flared within her, she about to hurl abuse at the man for what she considered impertinence; then she realised he was only doing his job, speaking the obvious to a person who was perhaps too emotional to think clearly and objectively. 'Yes...yes I have, thank you, sergeant.' She put the phone down, suddenly feeling nauseous; finding herself asking what had gone so drastically wrong with the relationship with her daughter.

'Are you all right, ma'am?' The inspector looked at her concerned.

Hoagan spoke slowly, nodding gently. 'Yes...yes, thank you, Roger. She moved to a spare chair. 'Do you think you could get me a cup of tea?'

There were four other officers in the smallish room and as one they all moved towards the communal kettle. Hoagan watched as the person nearest found himself automatically nominated. Somehow, from quite where she knew not, she managed to dredge up a faint smile; she knew she was looking at a classic example of the team spirit and camaraderie that had glued the British Police Force together for over a hundred and fifty years. No matter what they might think of individuals in normal times, in adversity they were all one, a band of brothers united against the common enemy; an enemy who could, in effect, be anyone who was not one of them.

*

Sheena's mind was racing. She had known that when she entered the UK on the last occasion, conventionally via Heathrow, she had been followed continuously. Liam had been insistent that, this time, the sea route, using trawlers, was virtually foolproof; it was often used as means of landing terrorists and explosives for sabotage missions in England. Therefore, she reasoned, they could not have spotted her at Fleetwood, of that she was certain; and if they had not spotted her at Fleetwood they must, therefore, have originally been tailing the priest, not her.

The question was – if they were onto her then what exactly was it they were up to? Did they intend merely to observe, or had they plans for her arrest? Even so, if they left her alone for now then once she made Fleetwood she would be putting the crew of the trawler at risk; all good Irishmen and long-standing sympathisers and supporters of the Cause for years. She shook her head, angrily; she must do everything in her power to ensure they were not involved.

Then realisation came to her. They would not arrest her now; clearly, if past experience was anything to go by they were after as large a haul as they could muster. Even when she boarded the vessel at Fleetwood, later that night, they would still not intervene. Instead they would wait until she was met at the rendezvous point off the Isle of Man. They would want to know who crewed the Irish boat, what other people were involved. Even then they may not bother. After all, they had not prevented her from leaving Heathrow at the end of her last visit; they would not know that this was her last, planned trip, to England. She smiled; yes, they could watch her forever, if they wanted to, all the time gathering more and more information about her contacts. She breathed deeply; perhaps she was being paranoid, panicking too soon. Maybe the Telecom van was just what it appeared to be. Well, she concluded, there was only one way to find out.

One minute later, carrying a small, overnight bag, she entered the service area. As she did so a dark blue Transit, sporting anti-riot mesh at its windows, entered the station car park. The driver of the vehicle immediately disembarked and made his way towards the van that Sheena had found so interesting.

*

The view from the connecting bridge, that served to join the north and southbound service areas, was good. Sheena could see most of the car park she had just left. She could also clearly make out the newly arrived van, now swiftly disgorging its twelve-man cargo of heavily armed police.

She was young, fit, wearing jeans and trainers and knew she could make a good run for it, perhaps disappearing into the countryside surrounding the southbound service area. Quickly, she glanced in that direction, more police cars were also arriving there. She nodded, grim-faced; of course the Brits were not that stupid. She knew that she only had seconds to make up her mind and that should she make the wrong decision... She grimaced and with face set hard and determined, began walking, briskly, towards the southbound service area.

*

Fifteen minutes later she left the lavatory cubicle, walked slowly to one of the washbasins and began running the tap. The toilets were busy, every cubicle occupied. A queue of elderly people began to form, probably, she thought, the entire contents of a tour bus. Using the vanity mirror above the washstand she studied her surroundings. Most of the women appeared aged and that, she realised, was not good for her anonymity.

She finished washing her hands and put her face closer to the mirror, pretending to examine some non-existent blemish. From that position she could clearly see the doorway. Leaning casually against the wall, at that point, were two women, their ages Sheena put as about that of her own. Although, superficially, they appeared relaxed and were talking casually, their eyes were on a state of high-alert; continually roaming, enquiringly, around the facility. This especially so on each occasion someone came out of a cubicle.

Despite her nervousness and anxiety, Sheena smiled. So far so good, they must have noticed her leave the cubicle moments before but at the moment they seemed completely disinterested in her. She had a final look at her reflection, the blonde wig looked perfect, the smart, two-piece, light, business suit, showing surprisingly few creases, gave her every inch the appearance of a career woman on her way home from work and very much not a fugitive from the police and security services of a country she was currently an illegal visitor in.

She moved away from the washstand, shook her hands and placed them under a nearby blow- drier. Then, after putting on a pair of spectacles and taking a deep breath, picked up her small bag and made briskly for the exit. One of the women at the doorway glanced at her and asked her a question. 'Excuse me,' she began, 'you don't happen to have the time do you?'

Crafty bitch, thought Sheena. The woman was after hearing her voice, clocking her accent. She smiled; educated in Cheltenham, she could mimic an English accent with ease. 'I'm awfully sorry,' she held up her bare wrist, 'I'm afraid I don't have a watch.' Then she was out into the main concourse, smiling and feeling pleased with herself. Thus far, she thought, thus far, she had been lucky but unable to go back to her car just what exactly should she do now?

To give her time to think she walked into the shopping area and began to browse. She thought of hiring a taxi by telephone but considered such a device too risky. How often do motorists, visiting a service station, need the use of a taxi? Yes, the police may be onto that in a flash. She could, perhaps, smuggle herself on board a coach. However, that too was fraught with risks; at the end of a day everyone would know who had travelled with them for the past few hours. Anyway, all the coaches seemed to be full of old people; she would stand out like a sore thumb! The lorry park would be full of horny drivers only too willing to give her a lift. She could promise one of them anything, and even be prepared to do it; but if she was seen, dressed as she was and propositioning such men then that too could arouse unwelcome suspicion.

She was crouching down, staring blankly at the women's section of the magazine shelves and beginning to feel concerned about her apparent lack of options, when she was suddenly pushed from behind. She turned, angrily.

'I'm sorry.' The man straightened himself up. 'I was reaching over you, for something on the top shelf, I'm afraid I lost my balance.'

Sheena glanced at the publication in his hand; it was a soft-porn magazine. She looked up at him, something about his unusually attractive features reminding her of someone she knew but couldn't just bring to mind who. He was wearing a leather jacket over a dark, blue sweater, peeping over the top of which could be seen part of the collar of a white shirt. A quick look at his navy-coloured trousers and fear began to crawl, unwanted, up her spine. Suddenly she heard herself asking a question. 'Are you a police officer?'

He smiled, dismissively, as though her question was a joke. 'No, what on earth makes you think that?'

Always the consummate actor, Benson convinced her and she relaxed, immediately. 'Oh – just your clothes, that's all,' she replied, feeling relieved.

He looked down at his clothing and nodded. 'Oh yes, I see what you mean.' He turned towards the pay desk; 'sorry, must go I'm afraid.'

Instinctively, rather than with any thought behind the action, she grabbed him by the sleeve. When he turned she did not know quite what to say. 'Err...where exactly are you going?'

The man stared at her, obviously stunned by the question. 'Home...why?'

'Where is that?'

'I live on Bentley Moor,' he looked at her, quizzingly, 'why do you ask?'

'Well...I was wondering, could you give me a lift? You see, I've had a row with my boyfriend and he's carted off without me. Normally I'd get a taxi, but he's got my purse in the car.' She stared at him, trying successfully to look helpless.

'Where do you wish to go?' he asked.

'Where do you come off the motorway?' she replied, non-commitedly.

'Bolton.'

'Oh that would be fine.' As she spoke she saw two, uniformed policemen walk into the concourse from the car park. Immediately a man in civilian clothes went up to them began talking and seconds later produced a photograph from his pocket. The uniformed officers nodded and entered the shop.

Sheena put her arm through that of the man. 'Well,' she said quietly, turning him towards the exit. 'Thanks very much.'

Stupefied, and wondering why God was always so very kind to him, David Benson walked with her towards the pay desk.

*

She was still linking him as they reached the Rover. The central locking system clunked, noisily as he turned the key and without hesitation Sheena opened the passenger door and climbed inside. As she did so she heard a muffled noise from the back of the car.

'What's that?' she asked turning round in her seat.

For a moment, Benson, who was stood in the rain removing his jacket, did not reply, then. 'Oh! something's fallen over in the boot, I'll just fix it.' He leant forward, feeling under the dashboard for the boot catch release before switching on the radio.

When he opened the boot cover, Mary immediately tried to kick out at him. Her efforts were in vain however as, trussed-up as she was, she had no leverage with either her hands or legs. It was simple for Benson to subdue her; he bent down and hit her hard, in the face – twice. On the second occasion he heard her jaw break. Mary remained quiet for the rest of the journey.

*

The telephone rang on Downer's desk and both he and Hoagan reached for it, simultaneously. She stopped herself and nodded to the inspector who smiled with understanding as he brought the handset to his ear.

'Downer, SB.'

Hoagan stared at her colleague as though he was wearing angels' wings and when his face distorted into a scowl she could restrain herself no longer. 'What's the matter?' she demanded. 'What's going on, have they got the bitch, have they got her?'

'Excuse me a moment,' he placed a hand over the mouthpiece and looked at her, gravely. 'They've her lost her I'm afraid, ma'am.'

'Lost her!' Hoagan's voice changed pitch at the top of the rant. 'How the fuck have they lost her?'

'Seems she went inside the concourse and simply vanished off the face of the earth. They've sealed the whole place off now; no one's being allowed to leave the service station.' He looked at her, expectantly. 'Have you any message for them, ma'am?'

Hoagan stared at him, contemptuously, displacing her anger and frustration onto her subordinate almost as though he were the leader of the ill-fated intercept team. 'Have they got Fleetwood covered, in case she turns up there?' she asked.

Downer asked the question then nodded. 'Yes,' he confirmed.

Hoagan lit another cigarette, her fifth in the past hour. 'What about the presbytery?'

Downer spoke briefly to the MI5 man again. 'It's in the process of being surrounded. If the occupants know anything we'll be told.'

*

Five minutes later she was back in her office, frenziedly thumbing through the Force Manual of Guidance until she found the section she was looking for. At last she came to a chapter headed 'Authorising Protocols'; briefly, she skim-read the section she wanted before grunting to herself, incoherently, and reaching for the telephone.

*

Sheena reclined the seat and relaxed. She had decided that, under the circumstances, it would suit her convenience to stay the night at her unwitting rescuer's house. She moved her legs forward ensuring that the skirt remained trapped between the seat and her thighs.

'I'm sorry,' she began, 'I don't think I've got your name.'

'David,' he responded, 'Dave Benson.' He frowned; normally he never gave his full name. Then it occurred to him that, up until that point, he had not even thought of his strange passenger as a potential victim. For some reason he still did not, somehow she had not come across as the kind of woman he normally preyed upon. Then he realised why, she was too interested in him. Just as Joanne had been, she too he had not really enjoyed.

'Listen, David, I'm going home to Ireland tomorrow. I wondered if it was at all possible for you to put me up at your place, just for the night?' Benson looked at her, she was pouting her lips like a helpless schoolgirl, overdosing, he decided, on the seduction routine. 'I have no cash with me,' she continued, 'but I'm sure we could come to some arrangement.'

Benson shrugged. 'Okay,' he replied, 'on one condition, you can make dinner; I've some jobs to do before I eat.'

*

'Here we are then,' Benson unlocked the front door and Sheena followed him into the hallway. He took her through into the kitchen, very quickly showing her where the food and utensils were kept.

'Fine,' she said, rolling up her sleeves, 'what do you fancy?'

'There's some steak in the fridge, we could have that. Right now I've got to put something away – outside.'

'Do you mind if I use the phone first?' she asked. 'There are people who need to know I'm okay.'

Benson nodded; the woman was quite safe with him that night. He already had his victim in the car and later he would spend some time with the Hoagan girl, in the safety of the soundproofed outhouse. Tomorrow the Irishwoman would be free to go wherever she pleased, in fact, the earlier the better. He had to start training the girl for, this time; he had no intentions of allowing a slave to die on him. She was his property now and would remain so perhaps for years!

14

'We know where she is!' Downer's voice rang harshly in her ear, his excitement barely contained.

'Mary?' Hoagan shouted into the telephone.

Too late, Downer realised his error. 'No, sorry, ma'am, O'Malley.'

'Oh...'

Downer could hear the disappointment screaming in Hoagan's voice and he screwed up his face with regret. 'She's rung through to her fisher friends in Fleetwood; Five had a bug on the number and traced it to source.'

'So, where is she?'

'At a remote, former farmhouse, somewhere on Bentley Moor.'

'How did she get there?'

'God knows, but that's where she rang from.'

'Who owns the spot?'

'The guy who owns it now has only just moved in, so he's not on the local voters list. But, according to the telephone company, the subscriber's name is one, David Douglas Benson.'

'Benson?

'Yes, ma'am.'

Hoagan was thoughtful. 'That name sounds familiar. Have we got anything on him?'

'Difficult to say and without a date-of-birth we can't run a proper check through CRO's.'

'I'm certain I've heard that name before.' Hoagan was quiet for a moment. 'The O'Malley woman, she didn't say anything about Mary when she spoke to Fleetwood?'

'Negative.'

'What are Five doing about Sheena?'

'They can't really go in; if Mary's there it could put her life at risk. They'll let you know what they've decided when they have everybody in place.'

'How long will that take?'

'At least an hour, probably longer, Benson's spot is well out in the sticks.'

Hoagan put down the phone. 'Benson,' she said the name aloud to herself, 'David Benson.' Something was stirring in her memory, something she had a very bad feeling about. She lifted the telephone handset and keyed in an outside number. It rang out half a dozen times before she was connected but when, at last, the party came on the line she had the voice she wanted but not the person.

'Hello – this is John Hawthwaite; sorry I'm not available to speak to you right now but if you care to leave a message after the___'

Hoagan slammed the handset back on the cradle. She had completely forgotten Hawthwaite was on his way to the States! In her present state of mind, she considered, it was hardly surprising. Hastily she dialled the operator, the civilian answered immediately. 'Get me Manchester Constabulary will you? It's urgent!'

'Certainly, miss, I'll ring you straight back.'

Seconds later the phone warbled, angrily.

'Manchester Constabulary, can I help you?'

'Yes, Detective Superintendent Hoagan here, Cumberland and Westmorland Police. I wish to talk to the detective who investigated the Whalley Range gas explosion. The one they found the Lakes' serial murderer had been killed in.'

The Manchester operator cleared her throat, as though what she about to say was going to be difficult. 'I'm sorry, miss, you want Mr. Morris, I'm afraid he's died.'

'Died?' exclaimed Hoagan, as though astounded at the man's appalling lack of consideration. 'What do you mean died?' she screamed at the civilian, unreasonably. 'How old was he for God's sake?'

The operator was well trained to deal with awkward and angry callers, in her job a vital prerequisite. 'I don't know but he was killed in a road traffic accident, miss.'

Hoagan shook her head disbelievingly. All she wanted was some quick information. No doubt she could find it herself by poring over the files her own force would have a complete set of. But that meant time, time she could put to much better use.

'Who was his boss?'

'DCI Jeffries, but he's ill at the moment, out on sick leave.'

Hoagan was becoming increasingly frustrated. 'Thank you.' she slammed the phone down. She was fairly certain all the information she required would be accessible from the CID mainframe computer. The trick, however, was to pull the data she sought on Benson from the appropriate folder, in the least amount of time and that would very much depend on how the data had been filed.

A minute later she entered the now deserted computer complex. After keying in her own, unique ID, she was granted access to the homicide CID files. Firstly, she entered the 'RECENTLY CLOSED' section, then keyed in the name Raymond Elvis White. Hoagan thankful his name was somewhat unusual and that she could still remember it.

Thirty seconds later the file index on the suspected serial killer flashed onto the screen. Hoagan scanned down the list of subjects, coming eventually to 'EMPLOYER'. She highlighted the appropriate index number, pressed 'Enter' and within seconds was kicking the desk leg in frustration. She had found herself reading about a company called Harrison's Super Sports.

Quickly she returned to the main index, this time highlighting the witnesses section. Cursing under her breath for not thinking clearly in the first place, she entered 'FIND' followed by the name – David Douglas Benson. Then, once again, pressed – 'ENTER'.

*

Major Barry Johnson looked across the bleak, moorland landscape towards the distant farmhouse. It was raining hard and at that altitude the strong winds were buffeting the heavy Range Rover as though it were a toy.

Johnson turned to his colleague, Peter Goodright. 'I'm going to have to talk to London, Peter; this latest contact throws open a whole new can of worms. I mean, the HQ database has absolutely fuck all on this guy. God knows, maybe he's a sleeper or something and if he is then how many others can he lead us to!'

'You reckon he's with the republican terrorists then?'

Johnson nodded. 'Seems likely, quite clearly the service station was a prearranged rendezvous point. We know from Sheena's conversation with Fleetwood she definitely suspected we were on to her.'

'So, what are you going to recommend to London?'

'Let things take their course, let her think she lost us on the M61. Sheena can return to Ireland, whichever which way. That, in itself, will produce valuable intel.

His colleague nodded. 'What about the policewoman's daughter, the girl they may have abducted?'

Johnson shrugged. 'I'm afraid we have to take the broader perspective, Peter. The question we always have to ask in this game is – how can the national interest best be served, sending in the cavalry now, or letting, David Benson run for a wee while longer?'

'In the expectation of uncovering a new, hitherto unknown cell or even cells?'

'Exactly!'

'So the girl is expendable.'

The major looked at his colleague as though he had just asked him how to go to the toilet. 'Oh yes – yes, Peter, please don't be in any doubt about that!'

*

Downer steamed into Hoagan's office. 'We've just had a signal from Five, Kate!'

Hoagan had changed; the smart business suit and court shoes had gone. Now she wore sweater, jeans and trainers and with her face freshly washed, the Special branch man even failed to notice she had been crying.

'Yes?' she said, matter-of-factly.

He looked both grave and annoyed. 'They're not prepared to go in, Kate.' The sarcasm dripping from Hoagan's reaction amazed him.

'How very surprising.'

Downer stared at her in open-mouthed disbelief. Her calm, cynicism, at such a crisis point in her life was difficult for him to cope with. 'You expected that?'

'Hoagan smiled wearily. 'Of course, Roger, we're dealing with MI5. You forget, like you I had loose dealings with them for three years when I had your job. Everything but everything is geared to what they lovingly and subjectively term – the 'national interest'. Mary's plight is not even an agenda item to them, not when viewed against the interests of the State.'

Downer leaned against a filing cabinet, trying to bring his thoughts together. 'Good God,' he muttered. 'What a bloody job, making decisions like that!' He looked admiringly at Hoagan. He had expected to have a screaming, ranting female on his hands when he broke the news. Instead he was looking at someone whose eyes were made of steel, who seemed to know exactly what she was doing and how she was going to do it.

'What do you plan doing now, ma'am?'

Hoagan zipped up her ski jacket and collected a small bag from her desk. As she moved towards the door she briefly fixed his eyes with her own. 'You don't want to know, Roger, really you don't.' Then she disappeared into the corridor.

*

The helicopter was warming up on the helipad, just over one hundred yards from the main building. Hoagan opened the passenger side door to find Trevarrick running through some of the ritual pre-flight checks. He stared at her, blankly, as she climbed aboard.

'Kate?' he shouted.

Hoagan made herself comfortable, put on the spare headset and clipped in her seat belt. 'My, you're bright this evening, Bill.' She deliberately tried to make herself sound as sarcastic as possible.

'What's cooking? I've been dragged away from a good evening out for this,' he moaned.

'We're going to Bentley Moor, Bill.' She gave him an Ordnance Survey map of the area, taken from the force library. On it, clearly marked in black ink, was a cross. She pointed to it with her finger. 'X marks the spot, as they say.'

Trevarrick shook his head. 'Who's authorised this?'

'I have,' said Hoagan.

'But you're only a superintendent, flights out of this force area have to be authorised by the ACC at least.'

Hoagan shook her head. 'I have my authorisation here, Bill.' She produced the Smith and Wesson and placed it in his groin. 'Now then, unless you want to end up needing psychotherapy, every time you hear 'Ravel's Bolero', I suggest you accept the authorisation I've shown you as being valid.'

'Shit! You're not serious, Kate, have you fallen out of your tree?' Hoagan cocked the revolver. Trevarrick nodded, anxiously, small, shiny beads of sweat already beginning to form on his forehead. 'Listen, Kate,' he was sounding desperate now, deadly serious. 'Whatever's gone on between us in the past doesn't matter. I mean, I'd really love to take you wherever you want to go, but I haven't got a flight plan filed for such a trip. What you want to do is strictly illegal and very, very dangerous.'

Roughly, Hoagan pushed the revolver further into his groin, making him wince. 'Don't take the piss, Bill, climb to five hundred feet, tell Wharton Radar who we are and that we're going to Bentley Moor on Instrument Flight Rules. By the way, how's your long-suffering mother?'

Trevarrick grimaced then shrugged his shoulders, pragmatically. How the hell he had expected to fool Hoagan so easily, after the hours he had spent boasting to her about everything he knew about flying, he really did not know.

*

The lights of the huge concrete conurbation that was Greater Manchester, loomed bright orange ahead and on the starboard side of the aircraft. Trevarrick was busy talking to Manchester ATC, gaining their permission to enter their TMA or controlled airspace.

When he had finished he turned to her. 'You heard that?'

Hoagan nodded, smiling grimly. Manchester had passed on a message from Cumberland and Westmorland Constabulary. They wanted Trevarrick to ring in as soon as he landed.

'Interesting,' observed the Cornishman, 'they never said a word about unauthorised flights.'

'Not exactly good publicity, for the force, Bill,' observed Hoagan. 'You know, one of our choppers is missing and all that. Hi-jacked by a senior police officer! No doubt they will have plenty to say to me when we get back though.'

'What's your plan when you get there?' Trevarrick was more relaxed now. For the past thirty minutes, as they had flown south, Hoagan had given him the full story. Now he understood why she had suddenly flipped.

'You're going to drop me within a few hundred yards of the target.'

'They might hear us coming, then what?'

'Which way's the wind blowing?'

'Thirty knots average – from the south west, why?'

'Then you'll put me down on the north side; between the television transmitter and the farmhouse. The lights on the transmitter should be an ideal navigation aid.'

'How do you know you've got the right address, Kate? You said this guy, Benson, or whatever he's called, moved house after the so-called murderer he employed was killed.'

'Simple, directory enquiries; the name of the former farmhouse he lives in is actually marked on the map I've given you.'

Trevarrick nodded, understandingly; he had always had a sneaking admiration for the maverick policewoman and had felt angry with himself when he had thrown their relationship away so casually.

The weather further south was beginning to clear. Overhead, large, starry patches could now be seen through ever-increasing gaps in the cloud and intermittently, a three-quarter moon shed a silvery glow on the treeless hills they were now rapidly approaching. Hoagan smiled, cynically; at least something was going right for a change.

*

Benson took his empty plate to the dishwasher. 'You cook a good meal, Sheena.'

His guest smiled. 'Thank you, I've had plenty of practice, living on my own.'

'I'll show you to your room now, if you wish.'

Sheena eased herself out of her chair. 'Sure.'

She followed him up the ancient, creaking wooden stairs onto the small, square landing. Benson opened the first door on the right and signalled for her to enter. The room smelt of fresh paint, it was effectively but inexpensively furnished with a pine dresser, bed and wardrobe. A wall bracket, in the far corner of the room, supported a small, portable, colour television.

She turned and smiled at her host. 'Thank you, it's great.'

Benson moved towards the door. 'I've got to go and see to something right now, but I'll be back later.'

She moved across to the open-curtained window and stared at the bleak, moonlit, moorland landscape. Despite the double-glazing the wind could still be heard howling outside, she shivered involuntarily. She was about to draw the curtains when she spotted Benson, bent almost double against the gale, making his way towards one of the outbuildings. As she watched, the navigation lights of a light aircraft came into view, low over one of the distant moorland tops. Drawing the curtains quickly, she shivered again, pleased that she was not abroad herself on such a foul night.

She switched on the television before climbing onto the bed to relax then felt inside her handbag; smiling happily when she found the small revolver Dermot had given her before she left Ireland.

*

As the bedroom curtains closed the major put down the binoculars and shook his head. 'That wasn't Sheena O'Malley at the window, she was a blonde.'

'Maybe his wife,' observed his colleague. 'We know O'Malley's definitely in there; she's been heard using the farmhouse telephone.'

'The local police have checked the voters list for the owner's previous address,' said Johnson, 'he wasn't married when he lived there.'

'Girlfriend then?' put in Goodright.

'I suppose so,' Johnson spoke disinterestedly; it had been a long day and he was tired.

The commander of the West Lancashire Armed Response Unit arrived at the window. The MI5 man lowered it, immediately feeling the icy blast of the wind.

'You wanted to see me, sir?'

'Yes, new orders, you can pull your men out, inspector.'

The policeman looked baffled. 'Sorry?'

The major addressed him as though he were mentally impaired, speaking unnecessarily clearly and slowly. 'You – can – take – your – men – home; it's been decided that this is now a surveillance only mission.'

'But___'

'No buts, inspector, thanks for turning out.' The electric motor that drove the mechanism began to whine and the window started closing.

The inspector opened the door, his face red, angry. 'On whose authority are we to abort?'

'On mine, inspector,' Johnson pulled the door out of the policeman's hand, slammed it shut and locked it. He watched, mildly amused as the commander disappeared, swearing into the night. 'Bloody simple-minded plods!' he muttered under his breath. 'If only life were as uncomplicated as they would have us all make it.'

*

Trevarrick landed the helicopter on the north side of a small hill some half a mile from the former farmhouse. Hoagan immediately unbuckled her belt and reached for the bag she had brought with her. She produced two miniature two-way radios, switching both on before giving one to Trevarrick.

'Have you decided whether you're staying or going?' she asked.

As the motor noise began to fade, he removed his helmet. 'I'm staying, Kate. How could I not help Mary?' He unbuckled his belt. 'In fact I'm coming with you.'

Hoagan held up a restraining hand and began shaking her head. 'No-way, you stay here, what I've got to do now I've been trained for. You'll only get in the way!'

Trevarrick looked surprised and hurt. He was not used to the dominant female in the workplace.

She smiled, grimly. 'Sorry to pop your ego, Bill, I can assure you that was not the intention. I may want you and your machine down there, sharpish, later; but here's where you stay for now.' She held up her two-way radio. 'When I do want you, I'll give you a shout on this.'

'Where's the send button?' he asked.

She showed him. 'Now it'll probably take me about twenty minutes or so to get there; if you don't hear from me in half an hour, call out the cavalry.'

'What cavalry?' he sounded confused.

Hoagan smiled, grimly and handed him her mobile phone. 'Just dial nine-nine-nine, Bill.'

Trevarrick nodded then looked slightly anxious. 'What happens if you come a cropper? I mean, how do I prove that you coerced me into this flight?'

Hoagan smiled. 'Don't worry, Bill, there's a note on my desk addressed to the chief constable. Apart from numerous other things it clearly states I threatened to blow your cock off if you refused.'

'Just for the record, Kate, what would you have done if I had refused?'

She stared at him icily. 'Blown your bloody cock off, of course, what do you think?'

Suddenly feeling ill; Trevarrick paled, he knew there was no way his passenger was joking.

*

Sheena lay on the bed, thinking about the day's excitement. Whilst she had been with her new-found cousin, and the two older priests, the feeling of warmth and belonging had almost overwhelmed her. They had been completely non-judgemental, had not criticised her for the lies she had told, had not asked how she, as an individual, had fitted into the shady underworld of the O'Malley family.

No one apart from Dermot had ever really treated her with such kindness and affection before. She had hardly known her father; for most of her life he had been away either as a terrorist or an unwelcome guest of the UK government. Her mother had not been much better. Sheena knew, along with everyone else in the family, that she had not been faithful to her husband. She had been seeing other men for years before she finally left her father; opting to live with a much younger and less adventurous man in the Six Counties.

That was why she had sought comfort from Dermot. Initially it had been nothing more than a conventional, loving relationship between brother and sister. Things had changed fundamentally one night when Dermot had asked if he could come to her bed. He had been badly beaten by Liam, for not doing something the latter had considered important enough to warrant half-killing his younger brother for. For some time they had wept together, he from the pain of his wounds, she because it hurt her so much see him in such a terrible state. She had tried hard to console the most sensitive of all the male offspring in the family but to no avail. That was when she had resorted to the final gift a woman can give a man and they had remained illicit lovers ever since, even after Dermot married.

Despite the, at times, caring aspect of her own nature, she also knew, deep-down, there was a darker, unbalanced and more sinister side to her personality. She had always known about it, ever since she became old enough to think. Her own mother had recognised it, 'the O'Malley madness', she had called it. It often came with violent mood swings, one minute she could be sweetness and light itself, the next, hating the world so vehemently, so completely and utterly that she wanted to kill everyone in it.

Sheena's mind turned to the future, to her father, to Eric and to Kate 'Bitch' Hoagan. For years she had dreamed of avenging what she considered the assassination of her uncle; to have retribution for the cowardly way in which the hated British policewoman had had brought about his death. Now, however, she was no longer so sure. The picture, once so clear, was beginning to blur around the edges and what only yesterday had seemed straightforward and clear-cut, no longer did so.

She was pleased she had told Eric the real reason for seeking him out. Although her own relationship with the Church had been tenuous since she had reached adulthood, the teachings she had received as a child meant that she had always continued to fear it; had always treated its God-appointed representatives with the utmost respect. Now she had a blood cousin who was one of those representatives and she was at a total loss as to what to do next. Her problem was that everything she had hitherto believed in – revenge and hatred, now seemed to be so hollow and superficial, infantile even.

As for tomorrow...well...now she had shaken off her pursuers she would travel to Fleetwood. Once there she would stay at the house of a sympathiser; that was until her brothers had arranged how she was to return home; but what then? What was she going to say to them? That their father was right, that it really was time to bury old hatchets? Slowly, she began unpacking her travel bag and tried hard to find answers to the many, many questions her visit to England had so unwittingly produced.

*

Benson stared at Mary; although whimpering occasionally like a beaten dog she was still unconscious. She was hurt badly, of that he was now in no doubt. The further beating he had given her, in the boot of the Rover, had aggravated her injuries severely. When he had lifted her out of the boot, to place her in the outhouse, blood had poured from the large, gaping head wound. Her jaw was also at an unusual angle. Even without her other injuries it would be difficult to keep her alive without specialist help, just feeding her, he acknowledged, was going to be a major problem.

He walked to the door, pausing briefly to look back to where she lay on the cold, slate-tiled floor but the only emotion that stirred within him was one of selfish disappointment. Once again he was beginning to feel cheated; the girl belonged to him now; he had stolen her and she had become his property – for life. She had absolutely no right to deny him what was undoubtedly his – her complete and total subservience along with her absolute obedience to his every wish and whim.

After turning out the light, he moved quickly out of the building, stooping into the chill, windswept, moorland night. The woman he had rescued from the service station had not interested him in the beginning, now however, now perhaps, circumstances were changing.

*

Hoagan was finding her planned route much harder going than she had anticipated. Firstly, she had underestimated the body-numbing effect of the biting wind. Although she was wearing a thick pair of jeans, they were already soaked through for, despite the fact it had stopped raining; the long, tufted moorland grasses were still wet from the earlier downpour. On two occasions she had lost her footing and now the effects of her saturated clothing, aggravated by wind chill, had lowered her body temperature dangerously quickly. The problem was that her lower body temperature was also reducing much-needed mobility.

With a good two hundred yards still left to go, she paused for rest, cursing that she had not thought to bring more suitable clothing and footwear. However, the lights of her target were now clearly visible in the near-distance and as she looked she could see movement in the former farmyard. Someone, it seemed, was walking towards the house with a torch.

Gritting her teeth against the pain of fatigue and the biting cold wind, she continued her journey. Stumbling now rather than walking and all the while becoming more and more fatigued as she struggled to keep upright in the treacherously boggy, uncertain, and peaty terrain.

*

The radio telephone warbled annoyingly in the Range Rover and Johnson snatched at the handset, grumpily. 'Yes?' he growled.

When he replaced it, a few moments later, his colleague looked at him, expectantly. 'Sir?'

Johnson took a deep breath and shook his head. 'Seems the Cumbrian woolly-back plods have lost one of their helicopters,' he turned to face his companion. 'They only think it's on its way here, with some fucking woman on board who thinks she's the female equivalent of, Clint Eastwood!'

'Why, sir? I mean, it doesn't make sense.'

'Apparently the woman is Hoagan, the one who's daughter everyone thought the O'Malley girl was targeting.'

'Who may be with Benson and O'Malley?'

'Exactly, but we don't know that for sure. I mean this guy's got no previous for anything except making a lot of money. And anyway, as I said earlier, even if he had there's more important things at risk here than one snotty-nosed schoolgirl!'

Peter Goodright suddenly remembered something. 'Hoagan may be here already, I saw the lights of a low-flying light aircraft earlier. It was circling about two miles to the north, must be about twenty minutes ago. What are you going to do, sir?'

Johnson was thoughtful. 'I don't know, Peter,' he began, shaking his head, 'I really don't know!'

*

Hoagan leant against the back wall of the farmhouse; she was freezing cold and gasping for breath. Clumsily she felt in her jacket pocket for the radio and miniature earpiece.

'Bill?'

There was a hiss of static, then Trevarrick's reassuring West Country burr drawled in her ear. 'Kate? Are you okay?'

'How long have I been gone?'

'Exactly thirty-three minutes, I've been getting worried, trying to raise you. In fact I was about to call in the troops.'

'Sorry, Bill,' she panted, 'took me longer than I thought, it's hell out here. Listen, I'm about to go in now; give me another fifteen before you press the panic button – okay?'

The static came back again before the Cornishman answered, he was hesitant, concerned. 'Are you sure you're doing the right thing, Kate? I mean, why don't I just get the local rent-a-mob to sort it for you?'

Hoagan shook her head. 'Fifteen minutes, Bill – out.'

She removed the earpiece stowing both it and the radio in the inside pocket of her jacket; then, cautiously, moved around the side of the building.

*

Benson knocked lightly on the bedroom door.

Sheena, who had just emerged from the en-suite shower, hastily robed herself in a silk three-quarter dressing gown before telling him to 'enter'. When she turned he was already stood in the doorway, admiring her legs and smiling.

'Everything okay?' he asked.

Sheena nodded, wondering if he had come to collect the rent. She decided that if he had she would pay, he was extremely attractive; his demands were unlikely to be burdensome. If he was only being polite then, well, she was tired and an early night would not be out of order.

'I forgot to ask earlier, did you get through to your friends – on the telephone?'

Sheena nodded. 'Yes, thank you.'

'Ah,' Benson stood in the doorway trying to look natural but feeling awkward. He had to find out what he wanted to know by questioning obliquely. 'Did you tell them you were being well-looked after here?'

Sheena shook her head. 'Never mentioned it.' She thought about what she had said, the statement would sound odd to her host. He was not to know that she never gave away her location when she was in England, that too many listening ears might be interested. 'I wasn't speaking to anyone important,' she continued, 'I had no need to tell them my whereabouts.'

Benson smiled. 'Oh well, at least you got through, that's all right then.' He was still stood in the doorway, shuffling his feet, awkwardly. 'Right,' he said at last, 'I'll bid you goodnight.' He turned and left the room, leaving the door slightly ajar.

Sheena stared after him, momentarily feeling disappointed. He was unquestionably good looking and the fact he appeared to be uninterested in her she took as a snub. She pondered the possibility he may try to sneak back, to watch her undress. The possibility made her smile and not wishing to disappoint him, left the door open.

Leaving the bedroom light on, she slipped out of the dressing gown, allowing it to fall soundlessly at her feet. She turned to look at herself in the full-length mirror on the wardrobe door. Gently she cupped her breasts, stroking them sensually, all the time glancing, intermittently, at the door, searching for the telltale sign of an inquisitive shadow.

At length she bent to retrieve her dressing gown from where it had fallen, then still naked, pulled back the quilt. She was bending over the bed, fluffing up the pillows when she felt a nylon cord suddenly snake around her neck. Immediately and terrifyingly, Sheena now found herself fighting for her life. Her head felt as though a whole orchestral percussion section had taken refuge there, her throat as though it were on fire and as she collapsed onto the bed she became convinced her chest was about to explode.

Benson, his pitiless, unseeing eyes now coal-black, was making demented grunting sounds, he too was naked and as she still struggled wildly for her life he tried to enter her. She fought him, the terrible rage, anger and legendary determination of the O'Malley's now channelled through her into a dark, unfaltering hatred of her attacker and an awesome survival instinct the family had prospered by for generations.

With her left arm she reached across the bed, her fingers frantically searching for her bag. At last, she found it and despite her every instinct screaming that she ought to be defending her throat and beating back her attacker, she persevered with her search of its contents. At last her fingers closed around the object she was seeking and, quickly, she withdrew the gun from the bag.

Twice Benson had attempted penetration, adding to her terror and agony. Twice she fought him off but then, still with a firm grip on the ligature, he nutted her in the face, Sheena's nose exploded, splattering blood over both the writhing bodies, the bedclothes and the recently painted wall. The killer felt his victim's resistance suddenly weaken; he laughed hysterically and head butted her twice more; the Irishwoman instantly lapsing into unconsciousness.

Only now did he relax his grip on the nylon cord, allowing him to open her legs ready to receive him. Quickly he moved down her body, holding himself to ease penetration into her dryness. He was making whimpering sounds now, a hungry dog given access to food for the first time in a week.

Hoagan's first thoughts on entering the bedroom was that Benson was in the process of murdering and raping Mary. In the melee the Irishwoman had lost her wig and both she and her daughter had very similar hair colour. When she saw the bloody condition of Benson's victim something snapped inside her. The rapist and murderer had not heard her enter the bedroom and the savage, double handed blow she gave him, on the side of the head with the butt of the Smith and Wesson, took him completely by surprise. Indeed, such was the force Hoagan used she knocked him sideways, onto the bed, at the side of his victim.

Quickly she moved to Sheena, removing the coil of twine from around her neck. Instantly realising her mistake, she tried to revive the woman by hitting her face with the back of her hand, all the time asking her where Mary was; it was no use, having been starved of oxygen and badly concussed from the terrible blows to her head, Sheena remained comatose.

Hoagan moved around the bed to Benson, he was slowly regaining consciousness and trying to sit up when she got to him. Grabbing a handful of hair she pushed the gun barrel under his nose. 'Where is she you bastard!' she yelled at him.

Benson stared at her dazedly, eyes still only partially focussing from the concussion of the earlier blow.

'Where's Mary?' She shook him now, like a terrier worrying a rabbit. 'Where's my daughter?'

Once again he looked at her through glazed, unseeing eyes and his face dripping with perspiration he appeared more like a drunk in the gutter of a rain-swept alleyway. Realising she was wasting her time she pushed him back onto the bed, then dashed out of the bedroom to begin a frantic search of the house.

Three minutes later she ran up the cellar steps. She had now searched every room in the whole building, Mary was not there! Pausing for breath against the side of one of the kitchen cupboards, something sharp dug into her shoulder. She turned to find a key-rack, on it just one bunch of keys. Carefully, as though the key ring held the secret of some priceless treasure, she took it down. What were the keys for? She had come across no locked rooms during her search of the house. Then she remembered something, something she had seen when still a good quarter mile from the building; the figure of someone struggling against the wind across the ancient farmyard. Hoagan dashed out into the bitterly cold night; the sky had clouded over again and with the moon gone it was so dark she was almost blind.

She came to the outbuilding containing Mary last of all. Tearful and desperate, her fingers now numb with cold, she struggled with the lock until, when she had at last succeeded in opening the outer door, she found her way barred by a secondary one. In her frustration she screamed at the night sky before bringing herself under control. The control she must maintain until she had at last rescued her daughter.

The lock finally succumbed to the correct key and Hoagan found herself falling into the pitch- black room. Automatically, she felt along the wall at her left for the light switch, somehow, miraculously, finding it. Mary was how Benson had left her, lying in the middle of the floor, her bed, cruelly cold, slate tiles. Weeping now, Hoagan ran towards her, immediately raising her head, hugging her to the warmth of her own body. The fifteen-year-old was white through loss of blood and shaking with anxiety and exposure, Hoagan put an ear to her mouth to see if she was breathing. She had left the doors open, allowing the wind to drive them together; the noise making her task impossible. Carefully she felt for the carotid pulse on her neck but her own fingers were too cold and numb for her to tell if one existed.

Panic was beginning to overwhelm her now. Despite her professional training this was no ordinary incident; it involved her own flesh and blood, the person who meant more to her than anyone else on the planet. As she sobbed at her daughter's side she momentarily thought she could be forgiven for panicking. Then she thought again; Mary's life, if Mary was still alive, may well depend on what she did in the next few minutes. Desperately now she tried to pull herself together, wiping her tearstained face on the sleeve of her, even wetter jacket.

Mary moaned and began to shiver violently and for the first time Hoagan noticed the purple at the extremities of her daughter's toes and fingers. She had seen the telltale signs of hypothermia before and quickly she removed her jacket, cursing that in her panic she had not wrapped her in it earlier. Anxiously she looked around the room for more warm clothing. There was nothing, nothing except for a large, wooden box. Hoagan leapt at it, pushing open the lid. She cried with relief at what it contained – blankets, three, large and very, very beautiful – blankets! Having dragged them out of the box she quickly wrapped up the fifteen-year-old until she more resembled an Egyptian Mummy.

'Trevarrick?'

'Go ahead, receiving, Kate.' the Cornishman's unhurried voice once again reassuring.

'Get yourself up here, Bill, fast as you like!'

'Have you found Mary?'

'Affirmative, she's in a bad way though, hypothermia and an injury to her face and the back of her head.'

'Roger, Kate, I'll be with you in five!'

'Make it four,' said Hoagan, 'and, Bill.'

'Yes, Kate?'

Hoagan could already hear the sound of the engine winding up above his voice. 'Get onto Manchester ATC, find out where the nearest casualty hospital is and get a course off them.'

'Roger, out.'

As Hoagan finished speaking she saw movement in the doorway. Instinctively she reached for her gun, now strapped into a shoulder holster. She was too late; the bullet hit her in the left arm, knocking her sideways and onto her back. Benson, armed with Sheena O'Malley's revolver, was standing in the doorway; his arrogant, bloodstained face smiling at her, his eyes brimming over with contempt.

He walked across to where she lay and leered at her. He pointed the handgun at her head, giggling childishly. 'Don't you know who I am, Hoagan?' The laughter came again, terrifying in its primeval simplicity.

Hoagan stared up at him. Had she seen the man somewhere before, or had she only seen the eyes? Eyes that were dark and terrifying, insane with hatred and power. Her arm was beginning to throb now but she hardly noticed the pain. Something was crawling up her spine, something evil with cold fingers of ice that was moving upwards vertebra by vertebra. Something relentless that wanted her and was, it seemed, never prepared to let her go.

She thought back to a night at Wastwater, in April that year, and to a sports shop in Manchester. Then, suddenly, she was also lying on the wet tarmac of a Cumbrian road, sixteen years earlier. Then she was back in the present and staring into the eyes of a madman, a man who, that night, had put down her husband with less forethought than most people would have when killing a fly; a man variously known as Sean Liam O'Malley or The Doctor!

15

'You are Sean O'Malley's son!' Hoagan spoke the words in quiet, almost reverent bewilderment; not wishing to believe it was the truth, not wanting confirmation of something so awesomely terrible.

Benson swayed above her, drunk, euphoric on the stimulus of power and control. 'Of course, Hoagan,' he spat the words contemptuously. 'You didn't really think that all his family would allow you to get away with what you did – did you?'

Hoagan was tired, tired from a long day, from the exertion and fears of the past few hours, from the cold and painful trek across the peat moor. Now she was also in shock from the agony of her wound and what had happened to her daughter. Despite her fatigued and traumatised condition, she knew the only weapon she had against this demented offspring of the man she killed sixteen years before, was time, she must play for time! At that moment she was not sure how it would help but she was short on options for, even as Benson spoke, her beloved daughter was dying next to her!

'You speak of the "family",' she began. 'If the O'Malley's are so important to you, why did you try to kill Sheena O'Malley?'

Benson looked confused. 'I've never touched any of the O'Malley's; I don't even know them, personally.'

'Bullshit,' Hoagan spoke contemptuously, 'who the hell do you think you were strangling and trying to rape when I stopped you earlier?'

Benson shook his head, once again giggling insanely, irrationally. 'You're lying, Hoagan, I know you, you're like all the rest, a liar! As I said I don't even know them, I don't want to know them; they are traitors to the memory of my father. None of them so much as raised a finger to avenge his butchering by you! Not even when Michael, his own brother, was eventually released from jail! But I'm family, true family and I will avenge my father's death!'

He was stood directly over her now; the emotion in his voice signalling to the frantic policewoman that the madman was losing what little self-control he had left. He knelt at her side, the pistol against her neck. 'You took away from me something irreplaceable – my kin! I was going to do the same to you.' He nodded towards where Mary lay moaning. 'Somehow you managed to find me, somehow, within hours of my taking your brat you came to interfere, as you interfered once before, sixteen years ago. Well, Hoagan, your interfering days are over___'

The sound of a helicopter, low overhead, stopped him in mid-sentence and instinctively he looked skywards; it was the one opportunity Hoagan had been waiting for. With her good arm she reached out for the gun.

Benson was on a tight wire, the adrenalin giving him hyper-awareness and with it the edge. He hit her in the face with his free hand, before springing to his feet, the gun shaking now with the rage that pulsed through his body.

'You'll never get away with it, Benson.' Hoagan astonished herself by how cold and matter-of-fact, she sounded. 'The cavalry's here, they're coming to take you away, alive or dead!'

Benson shook his head. 'It doesn't matter, Hoagan – I've nearly fulfilled my raison-detre.' He looked down at her contemptuously. 'Do you know what that means in French, Hoagan? It means my whole reason for being – the very purpose I was put on this earth!'

Hoagan tried to pull herself up into a sitting position. She knew now she was a dead woman, knew it was over. Benson was standing before her as his father had stood over her all those years before. The images she could see were a montage of the now and the then. Intermittent recollections of a lunatic with a machine gun set against a backdrop of flame and smoke and the now, a young man with a pistol, eyes black, iced with hate and totally irrational loathing.

Benson pulled back the hammer, the weapon pointing at her temple. 'Bye bitch, I hope you rot in hell!'

Two explosions rocked the small building. Hoagan stared in disbelief as Benson's face exploded, spattering grey matter and fine slivers of reddened bone against the newly tiled, blue walls. She looked at the open doorway to see a man entering the room; quickly he walked over to the corpse of the killer and after a brief glance at the catastrophic destruction to his target's head, offered Hoagan a hand.

'Are you all right?' The question implied concern but somehow the speaker lacked conviction.

As she stood, Hoagan looked down at her injured arm. 'I think so, who are you?'

The man shook his head. 'Can't really go into that.'

She nodded understandingly. 'Five.'

The man stared at her, impassively.

'Why?' asked Hoagan.

The man looked at his feet awkwardly. 'Good question, call me a sentimentalist.' He looked at Mary, still wrapped in the blankets her mother had found, completely oblivious to what had taken place during the past few minutes.

'Who, apart from Biggles out there knows why you're here?'

Realisation as to the possible implications of the agent's question came immediately. She glanced at his right hand; he was still holding the automatic and had not yet put the safety on.

She eyed him carefully. 'Be assured, be very well-assured, enough people.'

Johnson shrugged, resignedly, and holstered the weapon. 'Then I think you'd better get her and yourself to a hospital – quickly.'

Hoagan was in no mood for debate. 'Would you help me?'

The man nodded and lifted the small body from the floor. For a moment he stood there, cradling her child in strong arms, then: 'What's this all about, Hoagan, why are you here?'

She told him, quickly and as they reached the door she put her hand on his arm. 'What happens now?'

He addressed her as though she were five years old. 'We take care of it from here. As far as you and the world are concerned – this evening never happened!'

*

Johnson watched the helicopter rise, vertically into the night sky. At one hundred feet the pilot put the aircraft's nose down then headed north-west at speed. For a moment he watched the navigation lights grow progressively smaller before entering the old farmhouse.

Peter Goodright sat at the kitchen table, looking at some photographs. 'Everything go okay, sir?' he asked.

Johnson took off his coat and joined him, nodding. 'Yes, Peter, no problems.' He poured himself a large measure from the whisky bottle they had commandeered from Benson's cocktail cabinet.

'Did you give her the shot?'

'Yes, sir, she's sleeping like a baby.'

'She didn't regain consciousness?'

Goodright shook his head. 'No, she's in quite a bad way. What happens now?'

Johnson gulped greedily at the spirit. 'We leave her; the effects of the drug will have worn off by morning. She'll wake up with one hell of a headache to find an empty house; thank her lucky stars and get the fuck out of it, with a bit of luck back to Fleetwood.'

Goodright looked confused. 'I thought we were moving in on that lot?'

'London have changed their minds. She's to be allowed to board the trawler and sail for Ireland.'

The younger man helped himself from the bottle. 'So they're all going to be let off, Scot-free?'

Johnson looked at the younger man, sternly. 'I didn't say that, Peter. If she's allowed to go free she's bound to talk about tonight, about her stay high up on the moors of Lancashire with a fucking lunatic. Word has a habit of getting round, the O'Malley's might even send someone over to square the score. They may also talk about it to the wrong people; the Home Office are keen they don't. Law and order has become a crucial political issue. The last thing they need is for the press to get hold of the fact the police blamed the wrong man for the multiple killings the owner of this fine abode indulged in.'

'I'm sorry, sir, I don't follow.'

Johnson told him what Hoagan had said in the outhouse.

'So why let her go, sir?' asked Goodright.

'We have a problem, the trawler men may be sailing with a cache of arms, as well as the O'Malley girl. Therefore, it's important we don't unnerve them by arresting their passenger.'

Goodright repeated his earlier question. 'So what happens now?'

For the first time that evening, Johnson relaxed; he smiled. 'Ever heard of killing two birds with one submarine?'

Goodright nearly choked on his whisky. 'Good God! I'd never have___'

'Yes,' Johnson was thoughtful. 'The Irish Sea is very shallow, not a good place for submarines and trawlers to play together! We've used the method before of course; it has the advantage of removing embarrassments without in any way acknowledging the fact.'

'What makes you think she'll go back the same way, sir? I mean, isn't there a possibility she may think we are on to that route?'

'Doubtful, she knows we've clocked her, but she won't know how. She'll most probably think we've been keeping tabs on the Kent priest. My guess is Benson picked her up on the motorway purely by chance. It was a mutual benefit match. He'd already stolen the Hoagan girl, Sheena was just a bonus.'

'Do we know what the priest's involvement is in all this?' asked Goodright.

'They're being interviewed now, we'll be told later.'

'What about the policewoman?'

'Hoagan?' Johnson laughed. 'Definitely no problem there; she's got her sprog back, if the girl lives. Also her career remains in place. I mean, think about it, who, out of all the players in this messy little business has won the most?'

Goodright shrugged and passed some photographs across the table. 'Found these upstairs, in one of his bedside drawers. There can be no doubt that Hoagan was right about his murderous hobby.'

The major glanced briefly at each of them. They were all of women; mainly young, some whilst they were alive, most after they were dead. The last was of a redhead in her late thirties. She was lying in a wooden box, a box Johnson recognised from the outhouse. She had been strangled and stabbed repeatedly. The MI5 man thought she may have been quite attractive, before Benson had started work on her.

'Yes, we need to have a good search of this place,' he said, looking around the kitchen. 'Anything like this will have to be burnt. Have you brought the stuff in from the car?'

'Yes, sir, it's in one of his wardrobes.'

'Good, with a little prompt from Whitehall the local plods will record another drug associated gangland killing.' He smiled cynically. 'You know, I haven't a clue how we'll cope if they ever legalise heroin.'

Goodright's lack of understanding made him feel awkward, inadequate. He looked at his boss apologetically. 'Why is it necessary to still maintain secrecy, sir? I mean, we could come out of this looking like the good guys.'

Johnson, unusually for him, spoke to his young partner paternally. 'You mean because we rescued a policewoman, a child and a suspect Irish terrorist from a serial killer?' The other man nodded. 'Because of a number of reasons, Peter, not the least of which being the unwanted publicity. Can you imagine what the press would make of a story like this?' Goodright was still obviously confused and he shook his head. 'To use a phrase that our late departed serial killer referred to, earlier this evening,' continued Johnson, 'our raison detre is national security.' He looked at Goodright to ensure the man was following and satisfied that he was, continued. 'A short time ago, I instructed the local armed response team to "bugger off" and leave us to it. They did, leaving us with an armed serial killer who's probably bumped off more people in the last twelve months than the average IRA man does in his whole career. Whose interest were we serving then, Peter?'

'The State's, sir.'

'Yes, "the State's", but surely, "the State is interested in law and order" I hear you say. "Why shouldn't its servants get some glory in helping preserve it by publishing their successes?" Good question, after all the average mainland Brit doesn't give a sod about Irish terrorism, provided it doesn't happen in his own back yard. But they care very, very deeply about serial murder. In fact they're terrified of it; it strikes at the very core of their worst nightmares. So, if we went public now and told the world how absolutely fantastic we've been, taking out one of this country's most evil and terrifying murderers, what sort of comments do you think the Establishment will get from all those players who've been involved?'

Goodright's face was blank. 'Err, not sure, sir.'

'Well I'll tell you, let's say we come clean. Immediately, Hoagan, currently a national heroine, will be sacked; in fact, it's highly likely she would face criminal charges for hi-jacking the force copter. Secondly, the aggrieved police commander of the local licensed shooting club is going to say how bloody irresponsible I was dismissing him the way I did, and therefore, the government, in not going in earlier to rescue Hoagan's daughter. Thirdly, the general public are going to learn that we keep all sorts of tabs on all sorts of people. At the moment they might think we do things like that, but in a so-called "free democracy", as our own is supposed to be, such activities are much better left where they belong, to the imagination of thriller writers and left-wing investigative journalists. Fourthly, and now we're getting really serious, the police will have to admit they ballsed-up; i.e. blamed the wrong man for the earlier murders. Who knows how many women Benson's killed since then?' He threw the photograph of Joanne Kirkby on the table. 'Whoever she was she's new; that photo's taken here, in the outhouse; he's only been here five minutes so she must have been killed after the plods blamed the wrong man!'

Goodright nodded slowly, realisation beginning to dawn.

'And if all that is not enough, Peter, finally we come back, as we always do, to the national interest by asking – who is Sheena? Answer – Sheena is a known member of a family with close links to Irish republican terrorism and the daughter of a convicted terrorist travelling incognito in England. You remember what I told you earlier, about the prime minister's less than honourable reasons for releasing her father?' Goodright nodded. 'So, can you see now, Peter?' Johnson passed him the rest of the photographs. 'Can you see whose interest is best served by keeping stum, by not letting the O'Malleys, and the rest of the world, know that we have been keeping tabs on her?'

'Everyone's, sir,' said Goodright forcefully.

'Exactly! But above all and especially during the current under-the-counter peace talks with the republicans, the status quo! Now then', he tapped the photographs, 'get that wooden crate, put these in it and we'll have a bonfire. Before we leave we must go through this spot with a fine tooth comb and burn anything, absolutely anything, that's even slightly incriminating or will lead the plods to a conclusion incompatible with the one we want them to arrive at!'

'I take it you mean stuff like this as well, sir?' said Goodright lifting up a large glass jar, half-full of clear liquid. He placed it on the table.'

Johnson examined it briefly, at first he couldn't believe what he was seeing, then even he began to feel ill. 'Jesus Christ! The man was sick, really sick!'

'They are what I think they are, aren't they?' asked Goodright, his face also pale.

The senior man ignored the question, instead walking briskly towards the outer door of the kitchen.

Tuesday, September 28, Amsterdam

Michael O'Malley put down the paper and looked into the tear-stained face of his son. 'The press think the boat was pulled down by a submarine then?'

'Yes father,' said Dermot, openly sobbing now, 'the Brits have denied it of course. Also, there's no mention of Sheena on the list of the missing.'

O'Malley frowned at what he considered his son's naivety. 'How very surprising!' He stood up and began pacing the small room, his back hunched. Dermot thought he looked ten years older than when he had last seen him, only a few weeks before in Ireland.

'I knew something like this might happen, knew it. That's why I wanted no more.' He turned to the still blubbering Dermot, venomously displacing his pent up frustration onto him. 'We've sacrificed enough; your uncle died, I lost the two women I've only ever really loved and I threw away my best years confined to four stinking walls. Now it's been the turn of your sister!'

He returned to his seat, trying to bring himself under control. 'Did Sheena manage to find Sean's son?'

Dermot shook his head. 'I don't know, father, she wouldn't say anything over the telephone. She was always frightened the Brits might have been listening. We were to be told when she got back home.'

His father was thoughtful, he lit a cigarette. 'I never really trusted that woman; it was foolish of me to do so now. It must have been her who blew the whistle, wanted us off her back.

'Sorry, father?'

'The Crossley woman, the one who...' Michael noticed his son was not following. 'Oh never mind.'

'What do we do now?' Dermot wiped his eyes; they were red and swollen from days of grief.

'Get one of the boys to pay Crossley a visit.' He stood up again, pacing wildly. 'I must know, how, how they knew!'

'And Hoagan, father?'

'For now, Hoagan's on ice, she's caused us enough trouble. Leave the damned woman alone, she's a jinx to the whole family.'

Sunday, October 3

The man walked up the drive of the large house and pressed the bell push; when it rang the house sounded hollow, empty. He waited a few moments, rang again then looked in one of the windows. The room was bare, even the carpets and curtains had been removed. He glanced, briefly through the window of another room, only to find it similar.

The man retreated towards the end of the drive and as he was closing the gate, a local farmer approached on an ageing tractor. He stopped behind the visitor's car. 'Can I help you?' he asked.

The man went over to him. 'Do you know the whereabouts of Mrs. Crossley? Her house appears to be deserted.'

The farmer cut the engine. 'She's left, gone to live with her son, in the south somewhere.'

'Oh, you wouldn't happen to know where would you? I need to get in touch with her.'

'Haven't got a clue mate, bit secretive she was. All I know is she has a grown-up son. Apparently he's very successful, you know, hit the big time, made a lot of money.'

The man thanked him and as the farmer drove off, climbed into his car. He watched the tractor disappear before going back up the drive of the abandoned property. After checking to ensure there was no one about, he opened the side gate and went round the back.

Near a large, wooden garage, were two dustbins. Quickly he emptied both on the ground, rapidly sorting through the rotting mess and stench. Halfway through the second he found something of interest. The paper was covered in ash and he wiped some of it away with the back of his hand. It was a photograph of a man, a woman and a male baby. The adults were standing at a christening font, the child in the woman's arms. The woman he did not recognise but the man was totally familiar; years before he had known him well. In fact, his own cousin had died with him, sixteen years before in a fatal car crash in Cumbria.

The man quickly checked the rest of the debris, then stowed the picture in his inside jacket pocket. After a final look around to ensure he had not been noticed, he left.

Monday October 18

The mortal remains of David Benson's first known victim were finally laid to rest in the grounds of Saint Olaf's Church, Wasdale Head. Said to be the smallest church in England, it is guarded by her highest mountains and lies within a few hundred yards of her deepest lake.

Even after the body had been released by the coroner and Raymond White had been officially declared the girl's murderer, the authorities, encouraged by Kate Hoagan, had delayed burial. This in the vain hope the deceased would eventually be identified, allowing her parents or other family to be notified of the tragedy and therefore given the opportunity of being present at her interment. It had indeed been a vain hope and seven months after she had been found in Wasdale, the girl was duly returned there, with the silent blessing of the local inhabitants and all the many thousands who loved that peaceful and most beautiful of places.

The service had been ecumenical, simple and unpretentious. Hoagan herself was asked to deliver the eulogy, a task she did not relish but nonetheless carried out with characteristic professionalism and perhaps more importantly, feeling. As the policewoman was only too well aware, her own daughter had very nearly become the final victim of the real serial killer.

Hoagan herself was now a national celebrity, at least as far as the press were concerned and the funeral attracted a gathering of media representatives far larger than would normally have been the case. The unnamed girl was old news; Hoagan, conversely, was still hot; especially after the announcement that she was to receive, for her heroic actions on a London street, the Queen's Award for Gallantry.

Wasdale therefore was a scene of intense activity and with a church so small two dozen people were a crowd, the service was relayed by PA to the masses of locals, well-wishers divers and fellwalkers who had gathered to make their own, final tribute, to – 'The orphan of the mere'. So, the pathetic and apparently unloved creature that, months earlier, had been fished from Wastwater, was interred in one of England's most beautiful valleys. Some had said that as her life had perhaps been dominated by pain, loneliness and suffering, Wasdale was too quiet for her; too bleak and inhospitable. Those however who knew this part of Lakeland in general and Wasdale in particular, understood Kate Hoagan's suggestion that she must indeed be buried at this very special place.

St. Olaf's was a shrine to the fellwalker and climber; to all those who loved wild, free places, beauty and peace. Many of her companions, already resting in the graveyard, had been such people themselves and had spent much of their lives on the mountains and high fells; some had also died there. As Hoagan watched the murdered girl's small coffin being gently lowered into the ground, she knew she would never be far from love and decency again. Indeed, perhaps for the very first time, she would be surrounded by it.

*

Hawthwaite nodded approvingly. 'Some story, Kate, sorry I missed the fun.'

Hoagan blew smoke through the half-open car window. Hawthwaite was driving her home after the funeral and this was the first opportunity she had had of speaking confidentially to her old friend since he had returned to work the previous day.

'Believe you me, John, there was no fun involved.'

'How is Mary?'

Hoagan smiled with relief. 'She's fine, fine. It'll take a while for her jaw to fully heal but she'll be okay. It's long-term psychological problems I'm concerned about.'

Hawthwaite nodded, understandingly. Hoagan, more than anyone else he knew, should appreciate that particular factor. 'What about yourself?' He spoke with affection, brotherly.

She glanced down at her arm. 'I'm okay,' she half-raised her elbow, still constrained by a sling.

Hawthwaite sat up in his seat, eyes hungry for details he searched her own. 'What happened, after you got Mary into the helicopter?'

'Trevarrick took us to the nearest casualty hospital – Preston. I stayed with her for the first twenty-four hours. Then, when she was out of danger and they'd fixed me up, I returned,' she smiled, 'to face the music!'

He lit a cigarette. 'Go on,' he said impatiently.

'Well, I must confess, I thought my career was finished, I mean, think about it!' She opened her hands in a gesture of submission. 'I was given the third degree, told in no uncertain fashion that my behaviour had been completely out of order and that Mary and I were expressly forbidden to speak of it to anyone! Not to anyone, close family or even another police officer.'

'Christ!' exclaimed Hawthwaite. 'Sounds more like what used to go on in the former Soviet Union!'

'Then, last Thursday', she continued, 'I was summoned to the presence of The Great Jinn and two, very, Grand Panjandrums.

'Wrigley and who else?'

'Two representatives from the Home Office; needless to say I was expecting excommunication, a public flogging a week in the stocks and cashiering down to the rank of sub-constable!'

Hawthwaite glanced at her. 'What did happen?'

Hoagan snorted. 'They calmly told me all was forgiven.'

'What?' her former deputy was incredulous. 'Why...I mean – how – no...no...I mean – why?'

'Simple,' Hoagan was cynical, 'too embarrassing all round. Think about it, despite an offender profile that was screaming; Benson, Cumbria and Manchester got it completely wrong, John. They wanted the easy option; they blamed the wrong man, allowing the right one to walk free. How many more people could he have killed? How many more people did he kill? Then of course there's Five's position. Had they left Benson to run for a few more weeks, what would have happened?'

Hawthwaite shrugged. 'They'd have followed him I suppose.'

'Exactly, they'd have tailed him in the hope of finding fresh contacts. Eventually they'd have caught him at his old tricks again; abducting some helpless girl; what do Five do then?'

'Realise he was not a terrorist after all and hand the gen they have on him over to the civil authority i.e. – us,' said Hawthwaite. 'But we don't really want it do we? We've got our man already. So, it's just an unwanted embarrassment.'

'Sure,' agreed Hoagan; 'you remember the hype that went with the statement from Manchester about White? "One of this century's most prolific and dangerous serial murderers, killed himself along with God knows how many others because he couldn't live with his guilt. Society can rest easy now that this most dangerous of men is at last out of the picture!" You were the only one at the time who stood up and said "slow down", were we quite sure we had the right man? You were told to back off by everyone, including me.' She looked at him again. 'By the way, thanks for not saying "I told you so".

Hawthwaite shrugged. 'Maybe I wouldn't have been so adamant myself, had I not been so taken by Emmy. I suppose, to a certain extent, I felt protective towards her and her work.'

'Yes, I feel guilty about Emmy; she was so right in so much of her profile, even down to Benson's hair colour, albeit the colour of a wig. I think she was also correct about suggesting his presence at Wastwater on the day the girl was discovered.'

'What makes you say that?'

'Benson was closely involved with all manner of sporting activities, via his chain of retail outlets. I had a discrete but very non-committal word with one of the local diving club members, last week in the pub. Seems they have a special discount arrangement with Harrison's, you know, for bulk purchases. Hawthwaite nodded. 'That dive,' she continued, 'on the fatal Saturday back in April, was a promotional affair for the sport. Anyone interested could turn up on the day and talk to the club members. People could look at kit and ask questions. Whilst they wouldn't be able to dive themselves, it was hoped to give interested newcomers a feel for the excitement of the sport.'

He looked confused. 'Sorry, don't see the connection.'

'It was well publicised throughout the Northwest; not only in newspapers, they put notices in sports shops as well; with a map showing their precise location at the lake!'

Hawthwaite was negotiating a tight, uphill bend, the engine, under-revving began to complain and, hastily, he selected second gear. 'He was a clever bastard!'

'Anyway, there you have it, John; that's why I'm still a detective superintendent and not on the dole!'

'But surely they could have still disciplined you, Kate? I mean, they could have sacked you then screwed you with the Official Secrets Acts. That way your silence would have been guaranteed.'

Hoagan shook her head, smiling sardonically. 'Go through it again, John; this way suits everybody, it's expedient. The brass in Cumbria know me, know that, notwithstanding the Secrets Acts, I'd probably blow the whistle on Five if they axed me. Think of the bloody headlines!

"SPOOKS WOULD HAVE LEFT FIFTEEN-YEAR-OLD TO THE MERCIES OF NOTORIOUS SERIAL KILLER. SENIOR DETECTIVE – HERO OF LONDON KIDNAP ATTEMPT AND TERRORIST SLAYER – SACKED BECAUSE SHE DARED TO SAVE HER OWN DAUGHTER'S LIFE!"

'See what I mean?' she asked.

Hawthwaite was thoughtful. 'Perhaps you were lucky you and Mary weren't taken out at the old farmhouse. It would have been easy for the agent to have made it look as though Benson had killed you both!'

Hoagan threw her cigarette out of the car. 'Too right, and don't think I've not thought about that. I know about the secret talks HMG have been having about a ceasefire with the republicans so, as far the State is concerned, the less anyone knew about what the O'Malley's were up to, is, from the perspective of both sides, for the best. However, I think the spook thought it too risky; I mean, he had Trevarrick to worry about and he obviously thought too many people knew where I'd gone in the force copter. I know I did the right thing though, going down there, I told the chief as much and he couldn't contradict me; he only dripped that I should have cleared it through channels.

'What did you say to that?'

'I told him that even if I could have got hold of anybody, at that time on a Friday evening, it would probably have been too late. Anyway, knowing what a lily-livered, career protectionist bunch they all are it's unlikely they'd have given me permission. Not if it meant going against the wishes of Military Intelligence.' She gritted her teeth, her expression suddenly hardening. 'I was the senior officer on duty, I made the decision and I was prepared to stand and fall by it – but unquestionably, whatever anyone ever says, it was the right one, for Mary.'

'How does Benson actually fit into the picture? I take it you believed him, when he said he was Sean O'Malley's son?'

'Too right, no one else on this planet have eyes like the O'Malleys. They are totally evil, I don't think there's any good in any of them!'

Hawthwaite thought she sounded unusually biased and bitter; then he considered her opinions were perhaps understandable. 'So, what had Sheena been doing in the UK?' he asked.

'On both occasions she visited priests. Five will probably know the score but they've not told us, nor will they now.' She looked at him, tapping her nose. 'Those people would refuse to give you the time on a need-to-know basis.'

'How did Five cover up Benson's death?'

'There was an article in the paper, would you believe about a suspect gangland killing high on the Lancashire moors? Apparently, when the police, acting on an anonymous tip-off, searched the victim's property they found it was an Aladdin's Cave of prohibited drugs.'

Hawthwaite nodded with understanding. 'Let me guess, the victim was a guy called Benson!'

Hoagan laughed. 'My you are cute, John!'

'And they're so original!'

Her voice had been shaking with emotion but she relaxed a little now and studied her companion, carefully. 'Anyway, changing the subject, I've got some bad news for you. You remember the DI who was fronting up to the Raymond White fiasco, in Manchester?'

Hawthwaite nodded.

'He's dead.'

'Christ! how?'

'Joyrider, killed both him and his wife instantly.'

Hawthwaite sighed. 'Poor sod, I didn't have too much time for him, as a copper, but I wouldn't have wished that on him.'

'No', she agreed. 'Bad business all round. They're having it rough in that department at the moment. One of Phil Morris's blokes is up for topping his own missus.'

'Who's that then?'

'A DC called, Kirkby, papers have been full of it. Apparently, according to one of the Manchester CID lads, who was up here on a duty visit last week, Kirkby was on the Raymond White case. Used a similar MO to Benson in the hope of making it look like a sex murder; seems he'd been having a few away games and wanted to cancel home matches – permanently!'

'Bastard!' Hawthwaite sounded venomous. 'If there's one thing that I really can't cope with, it's premeditated domestic murder, it really pisses me off. You know – all that trust etc___'

'Delta Oscar Four – receiving Whisky Charlie One – over.'

'Receiving, go ahead over,' said Hawthwaite into his pocket radio.

'Do you have Delta Oscar Two on board? – received over?'

'Affirmative,' said Hawthwaite.

'Message from Delta Oscar One – please ask Delta Oscar Two to contact HQ by landline – message is urgent – received, over?'

'Received – standing by.' Hawthwaite looked quizzingly at Hoagan.

She shrugged. 'Obviously something they don't want the press getting a sniff of but don't ask me, John, just find me a public telephone!'

16

Dublin

Dermot O'Malley, entered the small, cramped room, at the rear of the betting shop. William Dyce, the ageing shop manager, immediately stood, holding out a hand.

'Good mornin' to yer, Dermot, is it a wee bit peeky yer lookin?'

Dermot accepted the hand; shook it managed a half-smile then sat, heavily, in the room's only other chair. 'You have something for me, Bill?'

Dyce opened a drawer in the battered desk and removed an envelope. 'Mrs. Flynn, the new tenant in poor Brendan's flat, brought this in yesterday. She's not had any mail for Brendan for ages but I suppose the post office have now stopped redirecting, it is some time since he was killed. Normally I'd have sent this to his sister, she was his executor you see – but – well this has 'Highly Confidential' written on it. If it's anything nasty,' he paused, 'she's not a well woman...you understand what I mean, Dermot?' He handed the envelope over.

Dermot took it from him. It was made of high quality white paper, post marked Kendal, Cumbria, the address written perfectly in old-fashioned copper plate. As Dyce had indicated, over the address, clearly printed and underlined, were the words 'HIGHLY CONFIDENTIAL'.

Dermot was intrigued, he was about to rip open the flap when something, an instinct perhaps, stopped him. Instead he placed it in his pocket. 'Thanks, Bill. I'll have a look at it when I get back to the office; I'm sure it's nothing important.'

Dyce was mildly disappointed that he was not to be in on the secret of the envelope's contents; but he nodded, vigorously, as his employer made to leave. 'Of course let's hope so, shall we?'

*

The weather in the Lake District had been unusually dry and quiet for the time of year. The trees, although remarkably still well in leaf were, in the autumn sunlight, a kaleidoscope of green, gold, brown, red and an infinite number of shades in between. As Hawthwaite drove Hoagan into the lay-by, on the eastern edge of Coniston Lake, a posse of uniformed police officers, standing under this autumnal splendour, turned to stare at her in anticipation.

Both of them walked to the Ford Sierra, around which was the scene of much frenetic police activity. Hoagan glanced inside the vehicle; slumped over the steering wheel she could see the head of a grey-haired, middle-aged woman. She didn't need the pathologist, who had also just arrived, to tell her the woman was dead.

The local uniformed patrol inspector finished briefing one of his officers before coming over to them. 'Good afternoon, ma'am', then he nodded to Hawthwaite, 'John.'

'What's the craic, Don?' asked Hoagan, eager as always to get to the point.

The inspector looked towards the Sierra. 'Woman's name is, Crossley, Caroline Crossley, it looks as though she's topped herself by overdosing on something. Anyway', he turned back to Hoagan. 'Thought you'd better see this right away, ma'am.' He handed her a white envelope, Hoagan's name was written on it, the copper plate handwriting bold and clear.'

She took it from him, gingerly, inspecting it carefully at first as though it were a letter bomb. Then, with her left arm still difficult to use, she gave it to Hawthwaite who quickly ripped open the flap with a penknife.

The envelope contained an audio cassette and a single sheet of notepaper; Hawthwaite handed the contents back to her. After skim-reading the first few lines, Hoagan began walking back towards his car. Without turning she spoke to both men. 'Thank you inspector; John, will you come with me please?'

Hawthwaite looked blankly at his uniformed colleague, raised his eyebrows then followed.

'This is a note from the deceased, John,' she said, as he joined her in the vehicle. 'In it she says the tape recording will help shed some light on the Lake District serial killings.' She pushed it into the dashboard cassette player and after a brief pause, as the leader was wound on the quietly spoken voice of Caroline Crossley began talking to them from the grave.

*

Detective Chief Superintendent James Parker, the new head of CID, stared unhappily at the cassette on his desk. 'So, give me the gist, Kate.'

'Seems she had a secret affair with Sean O'Malley, in the nineteen sixties; she had his child, lived with him quietly for some months then, when he began to kick the shit out of her, she changed her name to Crossley, used her share of the settlement from her parent's estate, got the hell out of it and came and lived up here!

'The child, a boy called David, was quite reasonable until he got to about seven or eight. Then he started behaving oddly; cruelly to other children, animals, that sort of thing. Apparently his behaviour continued to slowly deteriorate then, when he was twelve, she told him his father had been killed by a policewoman, i.e. – me! She admits now that that was a mistake. Even though the boy hardly knew his father, after she told him he became uncontrollable. By the time he was thirteen she put him into Care!'

Hoagan paused; she was unsure Parker was listening. At her hesitation he looked up from the notes he was making and waved her on.

'The Care home was a Catholic charitable organisation, the brain-child of a philanthropic Italian, and former POW. Would you believe he called it – The Fermani Institute!'

She stopped again, waiting for the penny to drop. Despite his apparent pre-occupation he was only a second behind her. 'F-I, but what does the 'V' stand for?'

'David suffered regular abuse whilst he was there, from a woman.'

'Sexual?'

'Physical – beatings, starvation, confinement to room, victimisation etc; he was already on the edge; his seven years there tipped him over it. He never forgave them and legitimated his future excesses through what happened to him there; hence the use of VFI – Victim of Fermani Institute. He also never forgave women, including his mother; he even changed his name to Benson as a symbolic gesture of disowning her. A woman had killed his father, a father around whom he created an elaborate fantasy. His mother abandoned him and a woman beat the shit out of him in the Care home. Hence the large number of females he attacked and killed in later life.'

'Interesting,' observed Parker, 'if what you say is true perhaps he did have more in common with White than we thought. But what led him to actually start killing in April this year?'

'Don't know, sir; we'll probably never know now.'

'But he was so bright and successful,' said Parker.'

'Yes, miraculously he did well at college, gained first-class honours and went on to start what could have been a brilliant career in the City. By the time he was twenty-five he'd made more money on the stock market than most people dream of making in a lifetime. His future promised to be very, very, bright! But that wasn't his problem, his problem was his past.'

'And his genes,' observed Parker.

Hoagan shrugged. 'A few months ago, he contacted his mother again. He actually told her what he'd been up to, how it was partly her fault and that if she ever shopped him he'd tell the world how cruel she had been to him; not only in abandoning him but in having an affair with someone as evil as O'Malley in the first place. If he was after making her feel guilt ridden then he succeeded. She became severely depressed; her doctor prescribed the anti-depressants that mixed with paracetamol killed her.'

'Why didn't she shop him if she knew he was killing those girls?' asked Parker.

'As I said, guilt, she was riddled with it. Guilt about her relationship with O'Malley, guilt about abandoning her son, guilt about what her son was getting up to and guilt that she had done nothing to stop him.'

'And she had no one to turn to for help, understanding?'

'Yes she had a younger sister, her other sisters were killed when Michael was still on remand for the attempted murder. However, it wasn't her sister she sought help from. She really loathed Sean, seems he'd raped one of the now dead twins. Instead she wrote to O'Malley in prison.'

'Really?' This time Parker actually looked interested.

'But, this is where the story gets messy. In her letter she only mentioned wishing to discuss Sean's child. He actually had two; the other was a product of the rape. In her letter to Michael she didn't specify which child. Michael was only aware of the rape baby, naturally therefore he assumed she meant that one.'

'So what did he do?'

'Michael's solicitor contacted her soon afterwards. They wanted her to verify a copy of a handwritten statement made by the twins in the nineteen-seventies. Then, after Michael was released she was contacted again, this time they wanted to know the whereabouts of the rape child. Of course she didn't know; she only knew where he had been left all those years ago.'

'So what finally tripped her over the edge?' asked Parker.

'She says on the cassette she was no longer able to live with herself, could no longer cope with the secret she had been keeping from the world all those years. Despite his outrageous behaviour she couldn't bring herself to shop her son, not whilst she was alive. This therefore,' she pointed to the cassette, 'is effectively a deathbed confession. The problem is it came far too late for over twenty people and very nearly, very, very nearly, too late for Mary!'

Parker detected the understandable bitterness and anger in her voice. 'Do you think she's telling us everything then?'

Hoagan shook her head, vigorously. 'How long have I been a police officer, sir?'

He picked up the cassette. 'Has anybody else heard this?'

'No,' lied Hoagan.

'Well, as far as the public are concerned we already have our serial killer, as we know. Her murderous son is also well disposed of by now, courtesy of the agents of the State. Therefore, what do you suggest we do with it?' He gave Hoagan no chance to reply. 'I'll have words with the chief but I think it's going to end up in the CONFIDENTIAL incinerator. I cannot think of any good reason why the world now needs to know what a bastard David Benson really was.'

He gave her a whimsical smile. 'Pity about the cloak and dagger, Hawthwaite was right all along, it's unfortunate we can't tell him.'

Hoagan did her best to look impassive. 'Yes, sir, it's even more annoying when you think he didn't manage the DCI's job.

Parker shrugged. 'Another good reason for not telling him perhaps.'

Quickly she changed the subject. 'And what of Taylor, the mindhunter?'

Parker screwed his face into a frown. 'What of her?'

'Well, let's face it, she was right. I mean what about the ethics of the situation? Is it fair we don't let her know how near the truth she was? This mess could affect her decision making in other cases.'

'Ethics and fairness don't enter the equation, Kate. We hired her for her expertise, as far as the world is concerned, she screwed up. Sorry, she's going to have to live in ignorance.'

Parker suddenly appeared to lose interest; he scanned his desk before picking up a sheaf of papers that he handed to her.

'Read these by tomorrow, Kate, I'll see you at ten, here, to discuss the implications.

'What is it, sir?' she asked, briefly perusing the top of the first page.

Parker held up a dismissive hand. 'It's probably just up your street, Kate. Anyway, the chief's decided you're right for the job; read the overview and we'll talk tomorrow.'

*

'My God,' said Hawthwaite as he drove Hoagan home later. 'What a tangled web we weave! You do realise that by not coming clean, as to the identity of the real killer, we may have put forensic psychology back twenty years!'

His passenger scowled. 'Remember, I've not told you about this; so let's change the subject, I'm sick of hearing about O'Malley and David Benson. How's Emmy, is she keeping well?'

'Oh yes...yes,' he replied, seemingly reluctantly.

Hoagan raised both eyebrows. 'Don't tell me too much, John. In fact, don't say anything at all if you wish.'

'It didn't really work out, Kate. She's a bit too odd and far too intellectual for me.'

Hoagan laughed. 'That's an admission.'

'Yes, eventually we decided our interests were too diverse. I mean, she's no enthusiasm for steam trains for example!'

'Really?' Hoagan was smiling; Hawthwaite spoke as though the woman was a medieval barbarian. 'How very surprising,' she conceded.

'Well it wasn't just that.'

'Oh yes,' Hoagan sounded intrigued.

'No – she has a rather bizarre relationship with classical music, you know.'

Something was stirring in the back of Hoagan's mind and she could hardly bring herself to ask the obvious. 'Err...how do you mean, John?'

'Well, have you heard of a number called Ravel's Bolero?'

Hoagan was nearly choking. 'Yes, yes I believe I have.'

'Well, do you know, she wanted to play the piece at the most unusual times.'

'Really?'

'Yes; then, in the third week, just before I was coming home, she became infatuated with some Russian composer.'

'Who was that then,' asked Hoagan, already about to burst.

'Don't know, Kate, not really into that sort of stuff but his music's very loud; cannons – lots of noise, etc. Yes...she has the most peculiar ideas about when to enjoy music! Anyway,' he changed the subject defensively. 'How's Casey?'

Hoagan became wistful. 'Wonderful, John, absolutely wonderful. She looked at him, her eyes full of laughter. 'He's not really into the classics, thank God!'

Hawthwaite finished lighting a cigarette, suddenly realising that somehow she understood the deeper implications of what he had told her regarding Ravel's Bolero and, for the first time in a long time, they laughed together uncontrollably.

*

The barrister thanked the prison officer and sat down at the plastic-laminated table. Two minutes later, via a separate door, his client was ushered into the room. He joined the brief at the table, grey-faced, anxious, all the while looking at him, expectantly.

'Well?' asked the prisoner, impatiently.

The brief shook his head slowly, staring at his client through grave, serious eyes. 'I'm afraid it's not looking good. Your sister-in-law is convinced you killed your wife and she's going to go for the jugular in court.'

'But everything they have on me is circumstantial,' complained the prisoner. 'Absolutely bloody everything.'

'That's as may be, the fact remains you are the prime suspect, there's no one else in the frame. You're a copper; you don't need a lecture off me about how good a fit you are.'

'Yes, "fit" is right,' shouted Kirkby; 'or rather – fit-up!'

The legal man ignored him. 'I am merely here to advise you,' he stared at his client, fixedly, 'and my best advice to you is to plead diminished responsibility. That way you might just avoid a porridge diet until you're sixty!'

His client buried his head in his hands in despair, before starting to wail, uncontrollably.

Dublin

Michael O'Malley put the photograph on the table and shook his head. 'Caroline always insisted she hated Sean you know; she could never bring herself to tell anyone that, in truth, she was actually infatuated by him.'

'Infatuated?' Liam looked puzzled.

Michael laughed, cynically. 'Men should never try to understand women, Liam and vice-versa. I was always convinced there was something between them, especially in the early days. But I'd never have thought it possible after what Sean did to her sister.'

'Sorry?'

'Doesn't matter, it's a long story from a long, long time ago.'

Patrick sat at the dining table and studied the photograph. 'So,' he said at length, 'that was the child Caroline Crossley spoke of in the letter she wrote while you were still in prison.'

'Yes, it was a closely guarded secret. It would have to have been, for a number of reasons.'

'What happened to him do you think?'

Michael shrugged. 'We'll probably never know now, maybe, like Eric, he's grown up decent, done something useful with his life.'

Liam glanced again at the small article in the English newspaper his father had brought back from Holland. 'As you say, we'll probably never know, not now she's dead.'

Dermot entered the room; his eyes red, face flushed. He held out an envelope to his father. 'It's just arrived, for Sheena, from England.'

Michael took it from him and tore open the flap. The letter inside was brief and he read it quickly. When he had finished, both the brothers looked at him, expectantly

'Well?' asked Dermot.

'It's another letter from your new found cousin. He's anxious to know why Sheena has not arranged the meeting between us. He also says he's concerned about our safety if we go to England. Apparently some men in dark glasses gave him and two other priests a hard time, after Sheena left them.'

'Is that it?' asked Liam.

'No,' Michael's eyes moistened; both the brothers thinking he looked sadder and more despairing and lost than at any time before. 'He says he's concerned about her, about her fixation with Hoagan.'

'What are you going to do, father, I mean about the priest?' asked Dermot.

'I'll meet him over here, where it's safe. Tell him what happened.'

'And Hoagan,' insisted Dermot, 'what are you going to do about her? I mean, it's almost certain she's at the bottom of all this. Sheena was committed to avenging your brother, now Hoagan's probably responsible for the death of our sister!'

Michael looked back to the table, to the crumpled, stained, old photograph. After a moment he shook his head, sadly, picked up the print and began slowly ripping it into pieces, not stopping until his strength eventually failed him.

'We do nothing about Hoagan,' he said at length. 'The woman has brought nothing but grief onto our family.' He looked at his sons with an expression leaving them in no doubt as to his own commitment to what he was saying. 'The name Hoagan will never be mentioned again in this house. Even if we don't physically kill her, we can kill her memory. By so doing we may purge ourselves of the evil luck we have had to bear over the last two decades.'

In turn he looked at them, seeking assurance they understood, that they agreed with his sentiments.'

'Yes, father,' said Patrick, quickly, decisively. 'The Chinese warn that he who seeks revenge should dig two graves.'

Reluctantly Liam nodded. 'I agree with you, enough blood has been shed, mainly our own, enough is enough.'

Michael turned to Dermot; the brother and clandestine lover of Sheena stood with his head bowed. Sensing it was his turn to speak, he looked his father in the eye.

'Agreed, father, enough is enough.'

Michael relaxed and smiled. He patted Dermot on the shoulder. 'Good boy, it is the only decision – if we are to ever live in peace again.'

Dermot nodded, as he did so thinking about what he had learned that day, from Caroline Crossley's letter to Brendan Donoghue. It had been a warning for the unfortunate Donoghue, about the evil of the O'Malleys. But it had gone further, much further. The Crossley woman had also confessed to Donoghue that she had given birth to Sean's child and how that child had grown to be a hater of humanity, especially females. That eventually he had become a mass killer of beautiful young women. How, although the police had blamed the wrong man, her son had still met his death, high up on a windswept moor and due to his involvement in organised crime. That the product of her loins had grown up to be one of the most feared and despised men in England. Crossley had finished with a warning for the hapless Irishman. She had told him to break with the O'Malley's, to hide from them for the rest of his life in order to – protect his life!

Now, as his father poured out drinks for a toast to their future together he smiled, grimly. He had vague memories of the major hunt for a serial killer in the English Lake District earlier that year, but having taken little interest in the case could remember nothing else. Secretly he had decided that with a ceasefire pending, and the subsequent relaxations in security that would inevitably come with it, he would journey to England. There he could research reports in the archives of newspapers and libraries and hopefully discover just what his cousin had done, to whom, where and when? Was Sheena's disappearance somehow connected to the mysterious David Benson? Where had he lived, who had known him? What manner of a man was he?

Surprisingly, Sheena had made a will. Everything she had once owned now belonged to him. He had been a wealthy man before her death, now, with her property and the two hundred and twenty thousand Punt she had had in the bank he was rich. There would be someone in England he could bribe to get at the truth, there always was; someone who, for a price, would look into police files and give him the facts about David Benson, his unknown, killer-cousin.

As he raised his glass, and falsely swore an oath of truce in his sister's name, his thoughts turned to Kate Hoagan and as he thought of her he placed his hand on the other letter, newly concealed in his jacket pocket, the one written in copperplate handwriting on high quality paper. Yes, if Detective Superintendent Kate 'Bitch' Hoagan was in any way connected to the tragic and brutal death of his beloved sister...!
163 ===
