Natural Causes: Episode 49

He reached it out, held the bag up to the light. A cold shiver ran down his spine.

McLean glanced at his watch. The afternoon was getting away from him, and there was a mountain of paperwork on his desk even before he could get to the interesting task of sorting through McReadie’s trophies. “I’m quite busy right now, Mr Carstairs.” “Of course you are, Tony. But even detective inspectors need to eat sometime. I wondered if you might be interested in a touch of supper.

“Say around eight? You can sign the papers then and we’ll sort out the rest for you.

“Esther entrusted me with various personal messages to pass on to you after she died, too.

“It didn’t seem quite appropriate to do so at her funeral. And I can tell you all about Bertie Farquhar if you want, although it’s a rather distasteful subject.”

It was probably the best offer he was going to get, and would beat a carry-out on the way home close to midnight, which was how the evening looked to be shaping up.

And if he could find out a bit more about Farquhar, well, it was almost like work anyway.

“That’s very kind, Jonas.”

“Eight o’clock then?”

“Yes, fine.”

Carstairs reminded him of his address, then hung up, by which time McLean had almost reached the station.

He was still holding the airwave set trying to work out how to turn it off when he pushed in through the front door.

“Well, miracles never cease,” the desk sergeant said. “A detective inspector with an airwave set.”

“It’s not mine, Pete, I borrowed it off a constable.” McLean shook the thing, prodded the buttons on the front, all to no avail.

“How do you turn the damn thing off ?”

Incident

Downstairs, chaos ruled the tiny incident room. The boxes Constable Kydd had wheeled in on her trolley were piled all over the place, some opened, others still taped up.

In the middle of the whirlwind, DC MacBride knelt with a sheaf of papers, leafing through them hopefully.

“Having fun, constable?” McLean looked at his watch. “Actually, shouldn’t you have gone home by now?”

“Thought I’d make an early start on identifying these pieces, sir.”

MacBride held up a clear plastic bag containing a jewel-encrusted gold egg of singular vulgarity.

“Well, I’ve got about an hour to kill. Chuck us one of those sheets and I’ll give you a hand. You had any success yet?”

MacBride pointed to a small pile of items on the desk.

“Those were on Mrs Douglas’s list. And, according to the inventory, they were on the bottom shelf, furthest to the right.

They were all next to each other too. I’m working on the hypothesis McReadie did things methodically. He’s a computer expert, after all.”

“Sounds like a good strategy.”

McLean looked around the boxes, checking their labels with his list.

“So this should be the top shelf, working from the left; his first burglary. Major Ronald Duchesne.”

He opened up the box, looking through the clear plastic bags within and trying to tally them against the items reported stolen.

It was unlikely they’d all be there; McReadie would probably have sold the pieces that didn’t appeal to him, and victims of theft almost always added things to the list of stolen goods.

But the box contained nothing that even partially matched. Having pulled everything out and placed it neatly on the floor around him, McLean was about to put it all back again and start on the next box when he noticed one more bag inside.

He reached it out, held it up to the light. A cold shiver ran down his spine.

On the wall, blown up large and pinned in a circle, were the images of the six items found in the alcoves along with the dead girl’s preserved organs.

Right now he was focusing on the photograph of a single, ornately carved gold cufflink, set with a large ruby. Lying in the bottom of the clear plastic evidence bag was its identical twin.

Chiding

She can’t understand what’s wrong with her. It all started . . . when? She can’t remember.

There was shouting, people running around. She’d been scared, a little sick even.

But then a warm blanket fell over everything, even her mind.

Voices whisper to her, chiding and comforting, pushing her on. Somehow she has walked for miles, but she has no memory of the distance. Only a dull ache in her legs, her back, the pit of her stomach. She is hungry. So hungry.

The smell catches her nose and drags her along as surely as any rope.

She is powerless to resist its call, even though her feet feel like bloody scars on the end of her legs.

There are people around, going about their business.

She feels ashamed to be seen by them, but they ignore her anyway, moving aside as she staggers along. Just another stupid binge drinker.

She is angry with them for assuming that weakness in her. She wants to hit out, to hurt them, to show them up for the petty-minded fools they are.

But the voices calm her, take her anger and bottle it for later.

She doesn’t ask what later means, only walks towards the smell.

Whispering

It’s like a dream. She leaps from one still image to the next without the boring motion in between.

She is in a busy street; she is in a quiet lane; she is standing in front of a large house set back from the road; she is inside.

He sees her standing there, turns towards her. He is old, but youthful in his movements as he walks towards her.

Then his eyes meet hers and something in her dies. There is an arrogance in his posture that awakens her anger once more.

The whispering voices become a tumult, a rage undammed.

Memories hidden for a lifetime blossom like black flowers, rank and rotting.

Old men sweating and thrusting, pain enveloping her. Make it stop. God, please make it stop. But it never does.

On and on, night after night after night. They did things to her.

He did things to her, she is sure of it now, even as she forgets everything else that she ever was.

Something cold and hard and sharp is in her hand now. She has no idea how it got there, no idea where she is, who she is.

But she knows why she came here, and what she has to do.

More tomorrow.