1980

loves dancing no e have seen his face in the stamp on the envelope of the letter he sent and e will not leave this place until he is caught no he is a father of two who works at a pumping station and has a dog no he is a lorry driver called peter who drives a cab with a name beginning with the letter C on the side and he lives in bradford in a big grey house elevated above the street behind wrought iron gates with steps leading up to the front door number six in its street peter will have committed crimes before and is connected to the containerbase at stourton and he will kill for the last time in leeds on Wednesday the tenth of december nineteen eighty a piteous sight confusing me to tears the onedin line finished this is the bradford police dawn has been reported missing since yesterday evening and we wondered if she had gone home no she has not and this is most unusual right we will keep checking and we will let you know as soon as we have any news this is just not like her perhaps it is a hoax a sick joke there are so many e thought e would ring you and have a chat we have no news yet e have got daughters too and e know what it is like then the doorbell and she is gone and we would like you to come up and identify her we will send a car around the colour of the coward on my face his body one mass of twitching muscle grabbing up fistfuls of mud quiet only with mouthfuls of food then barking thunder on dead souls who wished they were deaf and e say it is not usual for one of us to make the journey e am making now but it happens e was down here once before soon after e had left my flesh in death she sent me through these walls and down as far as the pit of judas

Chapter 18

The breakfast is greasy, the conversation cold, the weather both and the radio on:

‘Accusation and counter-accusation fill many of the Sunday papers this morning concerning the suspension of Peter Hunter, an Assistant Chief Constable with the Greater Manchester Police.

‘Under the headline, Hunter: Conspiracy or Coincidence? an editorial in the Observer asks whether Mr Hunter’s suspension is in any way linked to an apparently hostile report he was preparing into the management and practices of the West Yorkshire Police in regard to their handling of the on-going Ripper Inquiry. A report that has now been shelved.

‘However the Mail on Sunday carries quotes from unnamed police sources claiming that the suspension is due to Mr Hunter’s own associations with a prominent local criminal from whom Mr Hunter had accepted lavish hospitality, photographs of which are ‘doing the rounds’ in some of the less salubrious Manchester pubs and clubs.

‘Meanwhile other papers continue to lead with either the hunt for the Yorkshire Ripper or the prospects for the release of the fifty-two hostages being held…’

I swallow my food and get up from the table.

‘Where are you going?’ her mother asks.

‘Preston.’

‘Preston?’ repeats her father.

‘Preston,’ I nod.

Joan doesn’t even look up from the plate before her, greasy and cold.

Preston -

Sunday 28 December 1980:

11:05:02 -

I’m too early -

Much too early.

I don’t need to find St Mary’s, so I park in a multi-storey car park near the station and listen to the radio for a bit longer before I decide to sort out the car, stuffed full of half the office – the unopened post and cards; plus the Christmas presents – the various pens and socks, the diaries and chocolates, the handkerchiefs and tie; then the stuff from the Griffin – the Exegesis and the tapes, Hall’s notes and mine, the boot full of Spunks.

I open the doors and the boot and start shifting stuff about and when I’ve got the porn and the important stuff lying in the boot under a sea of socks and diaries, handkerchiefs and the tie, then I close the boot and get back inside, the unopened post and cards in a pile on the passenger seat, and with a mouth full of chocolate liquors I start going through the envelopes, one by one, the cards and the post, one by one, the official and the personal, one by -

One:

Flat and manila, in slanting black felt-tip pen:

Peter Hunter,

Police Chief,

Manchester.

Flat and manila, in slanting black felt-tip pen:

Photos Do Not Bend.

Flat and manila -

I rip it open and take them out -

Photographs, four of them -

Four photographs of two people in a park:

Piatt Fields Park, in wintertime.

Photographs, black and white -

Black and white photographs of two people in a park by a pond:

A cold grey pond, a dog.

Four black and white photographs of two people in a park -

Two people in a park:

One of them me.

St Mary’s, Church Street, Preston -

12:54:05 .

I’m sitting at a sticky-topped table by the door, the rain outside, the cold inside.

I’ve got a half of bitter in front of me, salt and vinegar crisps spilling here and there, sideways glances from the regulars.

I keep looking at my watch, my new digital watch -

12:56:05 .

Sitting at the sticky-topped table by the door, wondering if he’s here or if he’ll show, wondering if I would if I were him, wondering just who the fuck he is – the fuck I am.

An empty glass in front of me, salt and vinegar stinging my fingers, front-on stares from two men by the dartboard.

I look at my watch -

12:58:03 .

Sat there, damp and cold -

Evil eyes -

I look at -