A Song for the Dying

20

Wee Free padlocked the gate shut behind us.

Alice tugged at my sleeve, her voice low as the dogs prowled silently around us. ‘It’s like something out of a horror movie…’

The junkyard was a dark maze of partially crushed cars, stacked into monolithic blocks; mounds of scrap metal; and a sagging Cheops of washing machines, cookers, and fridge freezers.

A shipping container sat in the middle, surrounded by these towering piles, ‘THE CHAPEL’ painted in chipped white on the side. It was bolted onto a ramshackle collection of two caravans, an ancient Oldcastle Transportation Company bus — sitting on six flat tyres — and the boxy bit off the back of a Transit van. All stitched together with more sheets of rusting corrugated metal. Strings of multi-coloured fairy lights hung in drooping lines, marking out a two-storey-high crucifix, looming over everything. Twinkling red and yellow, with all the festive welcome of an infected wound.

Home sweet home.

Wee Free wrenched open a wooden door set into the container’s wall, and lurched inside, the cleaver screeching along the rust-streaked metal.

Fire and Brimstone squeezed past him, feet scrabbling on the linoleum, and Wee Free looked back over his shoulder at me, top lip curled, showing off those little white teeth. Now he wasn’t shouting any more, his voice was quiet. Well-spoken. Bordering on posh. ‘You’ll have had your tea.’

Babs slipped Thatcher through a couple of Velcro straps fixed to the front of her stab-proof vest, the gun nestling against her stomach. ‘Actually, I wouldn’t mind a coffee if-’

‘We’re fine.’ I ignored the glower that got me. ‘We need to talk to you about Jessica.’

Wee Free’s back stiffened for a moment. Then he grunted, took a swig from his bottle of whisky and marched away down the hall.

Inside, the shipping container’s walls were hung with striped wallpaper, slowly fading to a uniform filthy grey, darkened by patches of mould. A saggy brown sofa squatted in the middle of a Turkish rug — surrounded by drifts of paperbacks, newspapers, and beer cans — facing a small TV propped up on a stack of tyres. More books lined the walls, some in bookcases, but most just piled up in heaps.

The coppery smell of raw meat filled the place, so thick I could taste it.

Wee Free prowled straight past the sofa, towards the back of the container where a light bulb dangled from a cord above a wooden table covered in sheets of newsprint. The paper was clarted in blood. A large chunk of meat — about the size of a small child — sat on a crumpled patch of dark red. Whatever it was, there was no skin on it, just thick veins of white fat. He took another swig of whisky, then slammed the cleaver into the meat, hacking a chunk off the end.

Fire and Brimstone padded around his bare feet, eyes on the table, mouths open.

The container’s metal floor was a patchwork of rust and scuffed paint. It rang every time my crowbar-walking stick clanged against it, like the toll of a funeral bell.

Alice clasped her hands in front of her. ‘Your home’s very … distinctive.’

Wee Free gave her a tombstone smile. Drew the cleaver’s edge along the chunk of raw meat, carving off a thin slice. ‘What’s your name, girl?’

‘Dr Alice McDonald. This is Ash Henderson, and that’s Officer Crawford.’

He took the slice of meat and tossed it over the edge of the table.

The dogs scrambled forwards, jaws snapping, one of them grabbing it just as it slapped against the metal floor, leaving the other to lick up the smear of blood it left behind.

Wee Free transferred the cleaver to his left hand, and stuck the right one out. The smile died. ‘William McFee.’

Alice looked down at the blood-smeared fingers — scarlet and brown, flecked with clots of black. Swallowed. Shook his hand.

Then he offered it to me.

The palm was sticky, the fingers cold and slick, leaving smears of red on my skin. He squeezed, making my knuckles groan. I squeezed back. Kept my teeth gritted and my face dead till he let go and moved on to Babs.

I adopted the Standard Police Officer’s Bad News Pose: feet shoulder-width apart, hands behind my back. ‘Mr McFee, we have reason to believe your daughter, Jessica, has been-’

‘She’s a whore.’ His mouth turned down. ‘Fornicating with that Godless … Dundonian.’ The cleaver battered down into the meat again. ‘Dishonouring her father in his twilight years. Turning her back on the Lord.’ He bared his teeth at the bottle, daring it to contradict him. ‘Bitch is no daughter of mine.’

‘Have you heard of the Inside Man?’

Wee Free stared at me for a beat, then carved off another slice. Only he didn’t toss this one to the dogs, he bit it in half. Chewed. Knocked back another swig of whisky. ‘Then it’s God’s judgement. He’s punished her for her sins. He punishes us all, in time.’

Something wet brushed my right hand and I flinched — couldn’t help it. One of the Alsatians was right beside me, sniffing my stained fingers. No idea if this one was Fire or Brimstone, but it was massive. Its wedge-shaped head moving back and forth, muscles rolling beneath the broad hairy back as it shifted from side to side. Ears forward.

‘The bitch deserved to die.’ He turned the cleaver, pressed the blade against his chest — in amongst the other scars — and drew it slowly from left to right. Nothing happened for a heartbeat, then blood welled up along the line, spilled over the edge of the cut and trickled down his skin. A sigh shuddered free from his lips.

Alice opened her mouth an inch, then shut it again. Looked at me. Then back at the line of scarlet dripping its way down his chest. ‘Actually, she’s not dead, well probably not, I mean she might be, but the other women abducted by the Inside Man were kept for at least three days before they were dumped, so there’s every reason to believe she’s still alive-’

‘She’s not dead? How can she not be dead? Of course she’s dead, it’s God’s judgement.’

The Alsatian’s tongue rasped against the back of my hand, warm and slippery. Tasting me…

Stay perfectly still.

Alice cleared her throat. ‘Well, she might be, but there’s a very real chance she’s still-’

‘You saying she’s beyond God’s judgement? That what you’re saying?’ He carved off another slice, the knuckles of his hand white around the cleaver’s handle. Voice low and cold. ‘You saying she’s above God?’

‘I didn’t-’

‘No one’s above God. No one!’ The cleaver slammed into the meat.

Alice squeaked and backed up a pace.

The dog stopped licking my hand and growled, hackles rising, teeth bared.

Babs put a hand on Thatcher’s stock. ‘Easy now.’

I inched away from the Alsatian. ‘All right, let’s all calm down. Dr McDonald didn’t say anything about God, she just said-’

‘No one’s above God’s judgement. NO ONE!’

Growling, snarling.

Babs pulled Thatcher out and pointed her at Wee Free’s face. ‘Time to put the knife down, Mr McFee.’

I nodded. ‘Let’s all just calm down, OK? We can talk about it.’

Babs clicked off the safety catch. ‘No need to get uncool. We’re cool, aren’t we, Mr McFee? Cool?’

‘“Hold not thy peace, O God of my praise; for the mouth of the wicked and the mouth of the deceitful are opened against me: they have spoken against me with a lying tongue.”’ Getting louder with every word.

‘That’s not cool, Mr McFee. That’s another way of saying, “Shoot me in the face, please.”’

He snatched a sheet of newsprint from the table. The front page of the Telegraph was half obscured with blood, the headline: ‘SERIAL KILLER STRIKES AGAIN’ above a big photo of an SOC tent in the scrubland behind Blackwall Hill, inset with a camera-phone snap of Claire Young at some sort of Christmas do. Wide smile, shiny green party hat perched at a jaunty angle, snowman earrings with lights in them. ‘“They compassed me about also with words of hatred; and fought against me without a cause. For my love they are my adversaries: but I give myself unto prayer.”’

The dog took a step closer, saliva dripping onto the metal floor. The other one emerged from beneath the table.

I tightened my grip on the crowbar. ‘Come on, Mr McFee, put the knife down.’

‘Be cool, Mr McFee, do the sensible thing.’

He padded out from behind the table. Threw the paper at his feet. ‘“And they have rewarded me evil for good, and hatred for my love. Set thou a wicked man over him: and let Satan stand at his right hand.”’ Wee Free’s face was swollen and flushed, the sinews in his neck sticking out like cables, the cleaver snaking back and forth — glittering in the light of the bare bulb.

Babs braced her legs. ‘Mr Henderson, Dr McDonald? You might want to back up a bit…’

‘No one is above God’s judgement!’

I smashed the crowbar down on the table top. ‘All right, that’s enough!’

And Fire and Brimstone weren’t just growling any more: they were coming at me.

One second the world was full of fur and teeth and the next: BOOM! The shotgun kicked up in Babs’s hands, spewing out a cloud of smoke. One of the dogs slammed into my chest. We crashed backwards onto the floor, in a tangle of arms and legs, a ton of yowling Alsatian pinning me to the cold metal floor. My ribs burned, the whole right side of my body throbbed. Oh Jesus, she shot me…

Alice screamed.

The other dog leapt, and Thatcher barked again.

The sound was deafening in the container, reverberating back and forth, a sledgehammer battering my skull flat as the animal crashed sideways into the table, yammering and whining.

She bloody shot me!

Alice stumbled over and shoved the Alsatian off my chest. Then grabbed my face. ‘Ash? Oh God, Ash, are you OK?’

This was it: blasted at point-blank range. Bleeding out on the metal floor of the manky, cobbled-together, shanty-town house of a vicious nut-job, in the middle of a junkyard…

Next to me, the dog wriggled then he and the other one were on their paws, scrabbling away, tails between their legs. Whimpering.

‘Ash?’ Alice’s face swam in and out of focus. ‘No, please, come on, you’ll be OK, won’t you, please say you’ll be OK.’ She glared over her shoulder at Babs: ‘You shot him!’

The real pain would kick in any second now, soon as the initial shock faded. All that crap, all those deaths and pain, and this was how it ended. It wasn’t fair. Not like this. Not while Mrs Kerrigan was still breathing…

Wee Free gaped at Babs as she broke Thatcher open and the spent cartridges flew out. She slipped in another pair.

‘You shot my dogs!’

Clack, and the gun was closed again.

Sprawled flat on my back, I checked for the huge gaping hole pumping my life out onto the rusty floor. Fingers trembling against my jacket… Maybe they could get a tourniquet on? Apply pressure, staunch the bleeding, get me to the hospital?

Where was all the blood?

‘Ash? Can you hear me?’

There was no way Babs had missed me at that range, not with a sawn-off.

A gnawing ache clawed its way up and down my side, where the pellets had torn through my flesh, ripping my lung apart like…

Hold on a minute.

How could there be no blood? Not even a drop. Not so much as a hole in my jacket. How the hell…?

Wee Free trembled, spittle flying from his mouth. ‘You shot my dogs! No one shoots my dogs but me!’

Babs brought Thatcher up till she was pointing at Wee Free’s face again. ‘Drop the knife, Mr McFee, or you’ll find out how they feel.’

I batted Alice’s hands away and hauled my way up one of the table’s legs. Struggled to my feet. ‘ARE YOU INSANE? YOU COULD’VE KILLED ME!’

‘Inside voice, eh, Mr Henderson?’

‘You shot me!’

She grinned. ‘Rocksalt and tampons. Not exactly rubber bullets, but good enough at close range. Tell you what though: stings like an utter bastard.’ She waggled the gun at Wee Free. ‘Fancy a go? Or are we cool now?’

He lowered the cleaver. Licked his lips. ‘They… Maybe God’s using this Inside Man to give my little girl a second chance. It’s a test of my faith. I’ll find her and save her for a higher purpose.’ A nod. ‘Yes, that’s it. It’s God’s will.’

Alice stepped in close and wrapped her arms around me, her face pressed into my shoulder. ‘Don’t do that to me.’

Knives and bullets ripped through my ribs as she squeezed. ‘God … please … get off…’

‘Sorry.’ One more squeeze and she let go.

Wee Free placed the knife on the table, next to the meat. Picked up the whisky bottle instead and drank deep, then threw his arms wide. ‘Praise be to God!’

Babs clicked Thatcher’s safety catch back on and tucked her away. ‘There we go. Now we’re all cool again, I’ll have that coffee. Three sugars. And have you got any decent biscuits?’