‘Jane?’
‘Yes, Dad, Jane, the one I just asked you not to mention to mum. Amanda and I are tracking the person who we think has her, but there is … well, let’s just say I am worried and don’t have time to talk, okay?’
‘Sure thing, son. I won’t take up your time. Go do what you need to do.’ That was my dad. He needed enough information to grasp the gravity of the situation, assess it, and make the right decision. Which, in this case, was to aim for brevity and let me get back to what I was doing.
‘What did you call for anyway?’ I had to ask before I ended the call. He’d been calling me since breakfast according to my phone.
‘Oh, err. I’m not sure I should trouble you with it now. It’s about the Dickens Museum.’
‘Is this about the ghoul?’ I asked, latching onto the only recent story about the museum to have reached my ears.
My father repeated, ‘A ghoul?’
‘Apparently so. I haven’t been engaged to investigate it, but there were a bunch of sightings right before the Dickens Greatest Works Theme Park shut its doors a month ago. I know that’s not the same place, but I figured the two have a lot in common. Why are you asking?’
Dad took a moment to form a response. ‘I spotted something in the paper, a run of coincidences you might say. One of the shareholders went missing a couple of days ago, some things were stolen from the Dickens Museum, and the shareholder who went missing, well, your mum and I saw him in the bank last week and he was yelling blue murder about not getting a loan he needed. Also, I just met the museum curator and I’d bet my left nut he’s hiding something.’
Honestly, if I hadn’t been throwing everything at trying to rescue Jane and catch the Sandman, I would have dropped what I was doing to help him. As it was, I couldn’t spare him the time. ‘Dad, your best bet is to talk with Frank.’ I shot my cuff to check the time. ‘He’ll still be working, I expect. Try calling him at the shop.’
‘I’m standing outside it now,’ he let me know.
I needed to finish the call. ‘Dad, I’ve got to go. I’ll let you know when I get Jane back. Take care of mum and have a good time in Hampshire.’ I knew he would get the information he wanted and hoped that satisfied his curiosity. It wasn’t like I needed to worry about him getting involved in trying to catch the ghoul, mum would never allow it.
Scurrying through Maidstone, my brain was whirling with possibilities that the Sandman case could still have an acceptable conclusion. However, there was no hiding the fact that we were a long way from knowing where to find our quarry.
The Sandman. Valerie’s Pain. Saturday, December 24th 1327hrs
Ramsey Mitchell was having a mixed day. He had Karen Gilbert back and that was cause for celebration. However, the news the police had raided several of his homes came as an unwelcome shock.
It required a change of plans for he would not be able to return to any of his former aliases. Those identities would need to be burned, yet he felt safe where he was. No one knew of his current location and they never would; he’d buried the trail too deep for anyone to follow.
They knew who he was now, he’d seen it on the news, but it didn’t matter. He’d been able to perform glorious works, yet he always knew what he needed to do for his Valerie would not be understood. He had failed her, that was the terrible knowledge he could never unburden himself from.
The penalty for that was to suffer every day with the pain of his crime against her. Karen and the others were part of that penance. Valerie’s pain demanded it. The women were sent to him, that was what he believed.
Valerie’s voice would whisper in his ear, ‘Look how much alike she is to me.’ She demanded they die, so he would sing them gently to sleep, doing as Valerie insisted, but in a gentle, caring way.
The police were an annoyance, but one he could accept. Ramsey’s issue was with Tempest Michaels and the annoying Blue Moon team. Jane Butterworth had no just cause to poke her nose into his business in the first place, and in taking her so he could find his way to Karen, he triggered the rest of them.
That Tempest came to his house last night had been a total shock, but one he played well. Looking back, it filled him with joy to have been so close to being caught only to slip through the hands of his nemesis.
Ha! His nemesis! Ramsey hadn’t thought of Tempest Michaels as such before, but it was fitting. Certainly, no one had ever come closer and now he got to demonstrate to his followers and the world just how superior he was by killing the man and his entire team.
They would walk willingly into his trap in their desperate bid to save their friend. All he needed to do was give them a final nudge.
Tempest. The Blue Moon Office. Saturday, December 24th 1336hrs
I phoned Jagjit from the taxi, three of us guys crammed in the back because Amanda was swift enough to snag the front seat before the rest of us reacted. So far as we were concerned, that meant she had to pay for the fare plus tip.
‘Tempest, where the heck have you been?’ Jagjit babbled excitedly. ‘No, nevermind, it’s not important. You’re never going to believe what we found out.’
It turned out that while
