River of Darkness

Billy hastened along the passage to a narrow stairway.

He went up to the floor above where he found two maids' rooms and a bathroom, all empty. At the end of the corridor was a nursery decorated with flowered wallpaper containing two beds. A rocking horse stood by the window. Billy gave the room only a glance and then hurried back downstairs.

'Sir, there's no one up there!' His shout echoed down the empty passageway.

'In here, Constable.'

Madden's voice came from near the end of the corridor. Billy found him in a large room furnished with a double bed. Two paintings hung above the headboard, portraits of young children, a girl and a boy. The inspector stood at the foot of the bed, his gaze fixed on them.

'Sir, they got away!' Billy couldn't hide his elation.

'So they did.' The smile on Madden's lips lingered for only a moment, but the young constable savoured it. 'Come on! We must get back.'

They found Proudfoot in the hall below. He was standing some way from the body, his gaze fastened to it.

'There's no one else down here, sir.' He didn't look up as they hurried down the staircase.

'I take it the lady on the couch is old Mrs Merrick?'

Madden's voice was loud in the flagstoned hall.

Proudfoot seemed to start at the sound. He looked up then. 'Yes, sir. It is.'

'And who is that?' The inspector pointed.

The constable moistened his lips. 'That would be Annie McConnell,' he replied. His voice shook. 'She was once Mrs Merrick's maid, I believe, but now… I don't know… they were more like friends Madden regarded him from the bottom of the staircase. "I have a question for you, Constable. How would you describe young Mrs Merrick?'

'Describe…?' Proudfoot tilted on his feet. His glance had begun to glaze over.

'Her appearance?' The inspector walked over to where he was standing. 'Would you call her good looking?'

The constable swallowed. 'Yes, sir. I would call her good-looking.'

Madden said no more.

Billy, moving closer, got his first clear sight of the body on the floor and couldn't suppress a gasp of dismay. Although the long black skirt and ripped blouse indicated the remains were those of a woman, there was no way of telling from her face, which had been torn to pieces as though by a wild animal. The flap of one cheek hung loose and red. There was an eyeball lodged in it. Her nose had been smashed almost flat and beneath the bloody mess her teeth showed through shredded lips.

Despite the wave of nausea that gripped his stomach the young man forced himself to absorb every detail.

He saw a telephone with the receiver off the hook lying on the floor not far from the body. A table and chair had been upturned.

Madden, meanwhile, stood with head bowed studying the scene. When he turned away finally, Billy expected to see that distanced look in his eyes, that 'other world' gaze by which the inspector appeared to separate himself from all around him. But Madden's glance held only pain and sadness. He put his hand on Billy's shoulder.

'Come away, son,' he said.

Shortly after one o'clock the following day Bennett arrived by car from London. The deputy assistant commissioner was surprised to find the leafy lane leading to Croft Manor empty of both press and rubberneckers. The constable on duty at the gates informed him that the chief inspector had had it cleared.

'He's told the reporters to wait for news in Stonehill, sir. And the villagers have been asked not to congregate.'

The day had dawned grey and misty, as though signalling the arrival of autumn. Bennett, black-coated and black-hatted, paused before the front steps to look about him. He was surprised again — this time because he saw no sign of police activity. Sinclair explained that the gardens had already been searched.

'Madden has the men out in the woods now. They're looking for the dugout.'

The chief inspector met Bennett at the door and escorted him to the morning room, which he had made his headquarters. The deputy took in the other man's pale, unshaven cheeks. He reflected that it was the first time he had ever seen Angus Sinclair with a hair out of place.

'You look exhausted, Chief Inspector. Have you had any sleep?'

'A couple of hours here on the couch, thank you, sir.'

'How about Madden?'

Sinclair merely shrugged.

Bennett wasted no time. He was already undoing the straps of his briefcase as they entered the morning room.

'I've something for you. New pictures of Pike.'

Tozer's collaboration with the police artist had resulted in a pair of sketches, which the Yard's photographic department had begun producing in poster form. In one of them, the face was as Tozer remembered it, complete with heavy moustache. In the other, the artist had reproduced the same features stripped of facial hair. Sinclair took copies of each over to the window to examine them in the light.

'He's caught something in the eyes, hasn't he? But I wonder about the mouth — that can only be a guess.'

'We're getting them out to the newspapers today,'

Bennett told him. 'They should be in tomorrow's editions.'

He waited until Sinclair came back from the window and then sat down in an armchair, indicating to the chief inspector to do the same. 'You wouldn't mind having the press off your neck, I dare say.'

Sinclair's look was answer enough.

'That's what I thought. I'll speak to them before I go back. What's more, I'll tell them all information from now on will come out of the Yard, in London.'

'Thank you, sir.'

'Now fill me in.' Bennett sat back. "I want to know everything. And so does the commissioner. I have to report to him when I get back. And you'll have to come up to London on Wednesday, I'm afraid. It's a command performance. You and I and Sir George as well. We're all summoned to appear.'

Sinclair sat silent for a few moments, ordering his thoughts. Bennett was used to seeing him with his file in front of him. Now he watched as the chief inspector drew from his mind a summary of the situation.

'We have teams of detectives from London and Tunbridge Wells in place. Some of them are going through the house now, dusting for fingerprints and collecting other evidence. We'll shortly be starting the same process as we followed at Highfield, questioning the villagers as to who or what they might have seen in the past few days and weeks. We'll be showing them these new pictures of Pike along with the earlier one.

'Important items of physical evidence are already in our possession, notably a gas mask.'

'By God!' Bennett sat up. 'Pike's, do you mean?'

'We believe so.' Sinclair spoke in a monotone. 'It was found in the drawing-room this morning under a cabinet. Flung there, perhaps. I'll show it to you.'

He rose and went to a table on which a cardboard box rested. He brought the box over to Bennett and took off the lid.

'You can pick it up, sir. The eyepieces have been tested for prints.'

Bennett held up the khaki canvas hood studded with round glassed eyeholes and a rubber nozzle for breathing.

'Normally the nozzle would be attached to a box respirator,' Sinclair explained. 'Either it was pulled free, or else he doesn't bother with one. And you'll see it's torn behind.' He showed Bennett the ripped canvas. 'There's no doubt one of the victims struggled with him. Annie McConnell. The pathologist found traces of skin under her fingernails when he examined the body this morning. She must have marked him. I pray it was on his face.'

'It was her body you found in the hall?'

'It was. From some bloodstains detected on the carpet in the drawing-room it looks as though he may have bayoneted her there, as he did the other two, but failed to kill her outright. When he came down from upstairs — I'm speculating now — we think he found her trying to use the telephone in the hall.'

Bennett winced. 'Is that why he mutilated her body in that way?'