The Soul Collector

Rog exhaled in relief and opened the door to Pete.

“Jesus, Boney, what do you smell like?” He closed the door and undid the chain, then opened it again.

“Sorry, I got too up close and personal with the deceased.” Pete Satterthwaite headed for the bathroom.

“Where’s Slash?”

“He’s meeting Matt. They’re off to check on Sara’s mother. What have you been up to?”

“Draining the deadly Sara’s deposits. I’m going to hack into the database of the Harley Street clinic where your Oxford corpse worked. You can help me go through the files when I’m in.”

“If you get in,” Pete corrected.

Rog gave him a long-suffering look. “Have you ever known me to fail?”

“I remember you missing a couple of tackles against the Essex Elephants once.”

Pete had stripped to his boxers, his discarded clothes in a garbage bag at his feet. “What do you reckon, Rog? Has Matt got the nerve to pull this off? Without Dave and Karen to help, he’s got a lot on his shoulders.”

Rog stopped typing. “Yeah.” He looked around again. “He’d better. Otherwise we’re up to our necks in dung.”

“Delicately put, Dodger. I’ve never been keen on co-prophagy.”

“What?”

“The eating of ordure,” explained Pete. “Shit-gobbling. Crap-chewing. Excret-”

“I get the picture!” Rog yelled. “Now go and clean yourself up.”

Pete looked at himself in the mirror, a smile on his lips. Then he thought of the ruthless Sara Robbins and got serious at speed.

I’d texted Andy after I left Karen’s place. We were both in baseball caps, with me wearing a false mustache, as well.

“Where are we going, boss?” Andy asked in a low voice.

I looked at him, but he wasn’t being ironic. When I told him our destination, he nodded. It seemed that he had no problem with me running the operation. I was the one who had doubts, but there was no time for them now. I got us each a ticket to Sydenham Hill from a machine. The early train wasn’t full.

“Where did you and Pete go after you got back from Oxford?” I asked as we pulled out.

“Needed a drink. Problem was, we stank. Eventually we found a twenty-four-hour pub next to the meat market at Smithfield. Everyone stinks there.”

I took a sniff. “But you don’t anymore.”

“Good nose, Sherlock. I went back to my place to clean up and change.”

“You what?” I said, raising glances from other travelers. I lowered my voice. “Are you out of your mind? Sara or Karen might have the place under surveillance.”

“Well, they didn’t. Anyway, I took precautions on the way up here. Trust me, nobody was on my tail.”

So much for me being in charge of things.

“Let me see that note you found on the body in Oxford,” I said, my mouth close to his ear.

He opened his bag and handed me an old newspaper. Inside was a plastic bag. I examined the writing, making sure no one else could see what I was looking at. Sorry was the only clearly legible word. The script looked like it could have been Sara’s. But why would she have left a note, never mind a body, in the house she herself had bought? Was she so confident that no one could touch her?

“We’re going to see Mrs. Carlton-Jones, I guess,” Andy said.

“Correct, Watson.”

“Ha. How do you want to handle it?” He was asking me to play general, after all. I wasn’t sure I wanted to do that anymore. The idea that my decisions could lead to my friends being injured, or worse, was getting hard to handle.

He nudged me gently in the ribs. “I trust you, Wellsy. Dave once told me that he was certain you’d nail Sara, even if something happened to him.”

I felt my eyes dampen. Dave had said something similar to me, but I’d laughed it off. I never imagined anything would happen to him. He was our strong man, he’d been through SAS service in Northern Ireland and the first Gulf War, he’d won medals. He was our own local hero and now he was gone. I blinked and looked out into the drizzle that was blurring the shapes of the houses and car breakers’ yards.

I managed to order my thoughts. Leaning close to the American, I told him what I wanted him to do. He showed no surprise and nodded his assent.

When we came out of the station, we separated. I took a detour to Northumberland Crescent to allow Andy to get into position. Then I walked up the quiet road to number 47. There was a small Toyota in the driveway. As I’d expected, Sara’s birth mother was still at home at this early hour. I put my hand under my jacket and grasped the butt of my silenced Glock. There was no sign of a motorbike, though. I was still puzzled about what the rider- presumably my former lover-had been trying to hand Mrs. Carlton-Jones.

Taking off my cap and putting it in a pocket, I looked at the upstairs windows. All the curtains were open. Unless her bedroom was at the back, the occupier was up and about. I went up the paved path, looking into the front room as I approached the door.

I took a deep breath, one hand still on my weapon and the other holding my Crime Writers’ Society ID card. It had been designed in the form of a warrant card. I wondered if any of my fellow novelists had used the card for nefarious purposes. Josh Hinkley, the poor sod, would have been a likely candidate, perhaps to get complimentary services from the knocking-shops near his flat.

I rang the bell. After about a minute, a gray-haired woman appeared behind the small diamond-shaped window in the door. She didn’t seem to have changed much since I’d tried to interview her for my book. I hoped the mustache would prevent her from recognizing me.

“Who is it?” she said, keeping the door closed.

“Detective Chief Inspector Mark Oates,” I replied, holding up my card. “We spoke on the phone a few days ago.”

There was a pause. “I remember, Chief Inspector.” The chain rattled and the door opened.

With my thumb obscuring the Crime Writers’ Society logo, most of the photo, and my name, I kept my card visible long enough for her to register that it was official, but not long enough for her to see the details. She didn’t complain when I put it back in my pocket. People had a worrying tendency to believe that strangers were who they said they were. Then again, Doris Carlton-Jones might know exactly who I was and was luring me into a trap. What if the motorbike rider had been trying to hand her a weapon, and had been back since I pulled Andy off the surveillance? Then again, I could just be getting paranoid after everything that’s happened.

The woman was dressed in a dark blue trouser suit. She led me into the sitting room. “Sit down, Chief Inspector,” she said. “How is Inspector Jansen?”

“He’s well,” I said with a smile. “Hard at work.”

“Undercover,” she said, looking at me seriously. “Which you, presumably, are not, since you carry identification.”

“Just plain clothes,” I said. Mrs. Carlton-Jones didn’t miss much. “I won’t beat about the bush,” I said. “It’s come to our attention that your daughter has returned to London.”

“My daughter?” she said, her eyes wide. “I…My husband and I didn’t have children.”

“I’m aware of that,” I said. “But you did, before you met Mr. Carlton-Jones.”

Now she looked upset. There were beads of sweat on her brow and she started rubbing her hands together. “I…Yes, I did,” she said, looking down.

“Contrary to what you told Inspector Jansen,” I said harshly. “Let’s stop these games, Mrs. Carlton-Jones. It’s in the public domain. We’ve made the connection to Leslie Dunn, the White Devil. His twin sister, your daughter Sara Robbins, is wanted for murder, conspiracy to murder, kidnapping and malicious wounding, as well as fleeing a crime scene. I have a simple question for you.”

“I know what it is,” the elderly woman said, her voice querulous, “and the answer is no, I haven’t seen her.”

I was watching her carefully. She was pretty convincing, but I needed more, and needed to seem authoritative. “Then you’ll have no objection if I search the house.”

She met my gaze. “Shouldn’t you have a warrant for that?”