River of Darkness

Madden smiled grimly. 'To a policeman it sounds more like a lead.'

Weiss acknowledged the remark with a lift of his head. He swallowed what remained of his drink.

When his eyes met Madden's again his mood had darkened. 'I find myself in an unusual position, Inspector.'

'Why is that?'

'I have to hope that everything I have said to you is wrong. That this man is not as I imagine him to be.'

'But if he is?'

'Then you should be prepared for the worst. I judge him to be a psychopath, an extreme case. One who has lost touch with reality. He does not see his victims as human beings, but as objects of gratification. Be sure, however, he is not killing at random. Those women meant something to him. Those particular women.

Otherwise he would not have taken such pains to prepare himself, particularly in the case of Melling Lodge. One must assume he saw them earlier, either in their homes or in the neighbourhood, and was struck by some aspect of their appearance. Whatever it was, it brought him back.'

Dr Weiss paused. He seemed to be collecting his thoughts.

'I can offer you only general pointers,' he went on.

'By all means consider them, but don't confuse what I say with established fact. It is likely he lives in a fantasy, and this will make it difficult to predict his actions. Take his return to Highfield, for example. A foolish decision, on the face of it. But in his own world the reasons would have seemed compelling.

Perhaps he wanted a memento of Mrs Fletcher — a piece of her jewellery. A trophy, if you will. It's not unknown in this sort of case.' He looked hard at the inspector. 'I don't say that was the reason, mind you. I seek only to indicate the problem you face in trying to understand his behaviour.'

Madden was struck by the doctor's sombre expression.

'Perhaps you recall my remarks the other evening regarding the sexual instinct. Here is a man in whom it has been crushed, almost extinguished, for years.

This is the river of darkness I spoke of. Now that it has broken free, nothing will check it. Shame, disgust, morality — these are the normal barriers to perversions and acts of sexual desperation. But against the kind of force I see acting through this man they are helpless.

He is driven by compulsion.'

'You're saying he won't stop killing?' Madden nodded.

'We've been afraid of that.'

'No, I'm saying something different.' Weiss shook his head sadly. 'I'm saying he can't stop.'

8

'How could you do it, John? Have you taken leave of your senses? Do you know what will happen if this gets out?' The chief inspector's tone was anguished.

He paced up and down in front of Madden's desk. The door to the adjoining office was firmly shut. 'If Sampson gets even a sniff of this he'll go straight to the newspapers. My God — I can see the headline now!

"Yard Calls In Hun!"'

'Dr Weiss is an Austrian, sir.'

'I doubt the chief superintendent will appreciate the distinction. I can assure you the newspapers won't.'

Sinclair paused in his pacing. He stared down at the inspector. 'Have I said something to amuse you?'

'I'm sorry, sir.' Madden sought to compose his features. 'It's just that we never used to think of them that way.'

'What way?'

'You had to come home on leave to hear people talking about Huns and wanting to hang the Kaiser.

We used to call them Fritz or Jerry. And we didn't want to hang the Kaiser. We wanted to hang the General Staff. First the Staff, then the Commissariat.'

'Never mind who you wanted to hang.' The chief inspector kept a firm grip on his outrage. It didn't escape him that he had never heard Madden talk this way before. 'You had no right to do what you did.

For pity's sake! Why didn't you ask my permission first?'

'Because you wouldn't have given it,' Madden said frankly.

'At least you had that right.'

'You would have had to say no.'

'Ah! Light begins to dawn!' Sinclair's face cleared.

'You didn't need to ask. You already knew what I was thinking.'

'Well, yes, sir.' Madden was finally embarrassed. 'I thought so.'

'Amazing! I never guessed I was so transparent.

Where did you meet this Fritz?'

'At a lecture on psychiatry.'

'Where you just happened to drop in? No, please don't tell me.' The chief inspector's face showed pain.

'I'd rather not know.'

He went to the window and stood with his hands on his hips staring down at the river. After a time he looked over his shoulder. 'Well…?'

'Excuse me, sir, is this a new development?'

Sampson, late and out of breath, slid into his seat beside the deputy assistant commissioner.

'No, Chief Superintendent. But Mr Sinclair has a fresh line of inquiry he wants to follow up.'

'It's just an idea,' Sinclair explained. He and Madden sat across the table. 'But since it involves going back to the War Office I felt I ought to consult Mr Bennett.'

'The chief inspector thinks it's possible this man might have committed offences, even similar crimes, while he was still in uniform.'

'It's the element of repetition that bothers me.'

Sinclair's grey eyes bore a look of blameless innocence.

'Given that he also carried out the assault at Bentham — and I believe he did — then he seems set in a pattern.

But when did it start? There's no peacetime record of crimes like these, but we haven't looked at the war years in detail. And the fact that he arms and equips himself like a soldier makes me wonder if he didn't start then. Abroad, perhaps. In France or Belgium.

We need to ask the military to check their records.'

There was silence in the room. Finally Sampson spoke: 'Who've you been talking to?' he asked.

'Sir?'

'Have you been discussing this case with anyone?'

'No one outside this building.'

Madden was aware that Bennett's eyes were fixed on him. He stared straight ahead over the deputy's shoulder.

'And you thought all this up yourself?'

'It's no more than a long shot, sir. I don't mind admitting we're clutching at straws.'

Bennett cleared his throat. 'So we'd like them to check the provost marshal's files. I see no harm in that. I'll get in touch with the War Office again.

Gentlemen…' He rose from the table.

'Well, that was close,' Sinclair remarked, when they were back in his office. He thumbed tobacco into his pipe. 'For a moment there I thought he had the scent.'

'Sorry to put you in that position, sir.' Madden was feeling remorse. 'He was only guessing.'

'I'm happy to hear it.' The chief inspector struck a match. 'I wouldn't like to think I'd had to do with two mind-readers in one day.'

Having first extinguished the paraffin lamp, Amos Pike opened the double doors at the end of the garden shed and stepped out into the cool night air.

He wore a belted leather jacket over a khaki shirt, grey flannel trousers and boots. A flat woollen cap fitted snugly on his close-cropped head.

He looked about him. He could see no lights burning in any of the cottages. It was after midnight.

He went back into the shed, released the brake on his motorcycle and pushed the machine to the doorway.

There was a slight ramp running down from the floor to the dirt road outside and Pike mounted sidesaddle and freewheeled for a few yards until the vehicle came to rest. He set the brake and returned to the shed to close and padlock the doors.

A long canvas bag filled with a variety of objects was wedged in the sidecar. It had once belonged to an angler who had used it for transporting his tackle.

Pike had bought it at a street market in Brighton, the same day he had stolen the motorcycle from an alleyway behind a pub. One end of the bag was pushed into the front of the sidecar, the other protruded above the rim of the compartment. He checked now to see that it was secure, then lit the carbide lamp which served as a headlight, fiddling with the gas jet until he was satisfied with the size of the flame. Then he climbed into the saddle and kicked the engine into life, cutting the throttle quickly as the loud pop-pop pop noise shattered the silence of the night. Settling himself on the broad leather seat, he released the brake and set the machine in motion.