‘You’re looking well,’ she said and meant it.
‘It must be those strange food hampers that come through once a month from Marks & Spencer’s. Not a clue who sends them.’
She shrugged. Her lack of contact didn’t mean she didn’t think about him or wasn’t grateful for his willingness to treat a victim damaged by the sociopath about whom she’d sought his help.
‘How is Jemima’s mother?’ she asked.
‘Making progress is all I shall say. Now you’re here for something, and I’m sure you’re busy so do you have time for coffee?’
Kim nodded as he reached for the mugs from the cupboard. They were all emblazoned with the insignia of the local football teams. Bryant got the Albion mug, she got the Wolves mug and Ted took the Aston Villa.
‘So how can I help?’ he asked.
Had Bryant not been with her, Kim knew that Ted would have delicately probed into her life. He would have asked if she’d visited her mother. He would have asked if she was talking to anyone. He would have asked if she had a boyfriend. And she would have tired of saying no.
None of those questions would he ever ask in the presence of someone else. But that wasn’t why she had allowed Bryant to accompany her inside. She was a big girl and had been saying no to Ted for years.
She had allowed her colleague in because there was no reason not to. It was a matter of trust.
‘We have a killer, and I need an idea of what I’m dealing with,’ Kim said.
He nodded as he took his mug and headed out into the garden, which had changed very little since she was a child.
The outside border was like the Chelsea flower show. A sunken fish pond was the star of the show beneath a water-dribbling stone mermaid.
They each took a wooden chair around a circular table. Kim placed her back to the afternoon sun.
‘In this case we actually know who he is – or rather was. His name is Graham Studwick and he was born male, but his mother dressed and treated him as a girl until he was eleven years old. At which point he murdered her.’
Ted showed little surprise. In his years as a psychologist there was little he had not seen.
‘Okay, how about the crimes?’
‘The first one occurred a few years ago. Her face was badly beaten and her mouth and throat filled with dirt. Likely to have been drugged and no evidence of sexual assault.’
‘You mention the first… so there is a second?’
‘The second victim was murdered this week, and she had the same injuries and dirt in the mouth. Also we have a third victim that didn’t die. He was disturbed before completing what looks like a ritual.’
‘You have a witness?’ he asked, sipping his coffee.
‘Without any memory of events,’ Bryant chipped in.
‘You have a history?’
Kim sipped her coffee before answering. ‘All of these girls were involved in exposing his secret when he was six years old. He was held down and taunted before one of them ran away to get help.’
Ted looked off into space and nodded. ‘So he’s never been able to forget the looks on their faces and the things they said. What he recalls is their disgust, which mirrors his own repulsion at himself.’
‘Our witness recalls the phrase one for you and one for me,’ Kim added.
‘Then it’s a game,’ he said emphatically.
‘It’s not much of a—’
‘Either that or some kind of recreation. But I’ll come back to that in a minute. Did either of you hear of the David Reimer case in Canada?’
Kim shook her head, as did Bryant.
‘David Reimer was born in 1965. He and his twin brother underwent routine circumcision surgery at the age of six months. The surgery went wrong and David’s penis was irreparably damaged.’
From the corner of her eye she saw Bryant cross his legs.
‘To cut a long story short the family was referred to a Doctor Money who used them to prove his theory that nurture over nature could define a person’s gender. He believed in a Gender Identity Gate, the point after which a child is locked into an identity as a male or female. He believed it to be between two and a half and three years of age.’
‘What happened?’ Bryant asked.
‘Surgery for gender reassignment was carried out and he was raised as a girl.’
‘Alongside his twin brother?’ Kim asked.
Ted nodded. ‘As the years passed, his natural instincts grew, as did his wish to do normal boy things. Money’s answer to the fears of the parents was to treat him even more like a girl.’
‘Jesus,’ Bryant whispered.
‘Exactly. Just imagine the confusion, the battles in his brain and his body.’
‘What happened?’
‘Eventually his parents told him the truth. The surgery was reversed and he began to live life as a male.’
‘And he lived happily ever after?’ Kim asked, raising one eyebrow.
‘He committed suicide at the age of thirty-eight.’
Bryant sat back in his chair.
‘By that time he couldn’t live in his own head. He didn’t know who or what he was any more.’
‘You said about a game, a re-enactment?’ Kim asked.
‘It sounds like a sacrifice, an offering. He could be trying to recreate episodes from his childhood. Games he played with his mother.’
‘But why all this if he hates her so much?’
‘Because he loves her too and possibly misses what they had together. There would have been times in his childhood that he felt happy. There might also have been times he was humiliated. There’s a great deal of conflict here, especially if he has not been helped in the right way. Bear in mind that he is unlikely to have felt disgust at himself until he saw it in someone else.’
Kim nodded her understanding. ‘We think the girls have marks from being in a high chair, and they are always scrubbed clean.’
‘Tea party,’ Ted offered.
‘Oh shit, he’s treating them like dolls,’ Kim said as the realisation dawned.
Ted nodded. ‘A dolls’ tea party is synonymous with the childhood of a little girl. One for me and one for you. It could be that it was his mother’s favourite game.’
‘He has another. The death has not been fulfilled.’
‘Then you’d better find her quickly – because just like any other game, eventually a child will get bored.’
Kim suddenly had another thought. ‘How likely is he to change his ritual? I mean we have suspicions that there is another girl involved. Would he have two at the same time?’
Ted scrunched up his face and then shook his head. ‘It would be highly unlikely if that’s not what he’s done in the past. This is not escalation, Kim. He’s not growing the crimes with each one. It seems far more likely that he insists on keeping the same routine with them all.’
His answer took her thoughts right back to a girl named Mandy. Someone for whom she suspected they were too late. Forensics were still at Westerley, and it was beginning to look more likely there was something more there to find. If Ted was correct about routine then Mandy could be buried there too.
Bryant sat forwards. ‘Are we definitely looking for a male?’
‘In physicality, probably. In appearance, it’s hard to say. There’s a chance he could present as a woman or a man. He may even switch between the two. Much depends on the help he got early on. Eleven years is a long time and every year of that time is formative.’
Bryant nodded his thanks even though the answer had offered them nothing.
The situation in which they found themselves was certainly unique to Kim.
For once they knew their killer’s name – yet they still had no clue who it was.
Seventy-Eight
‘Okay, guys, let’s get up to speed. I don’t think we have much time.’
Kim’s mind whispered that it was Tracy who was running out of time.
It was six p.m. on a Friday and the station was beginning to thin out. The shift was changing over, and the clerical staff had already said their goodbyes as they headed off for the weekend. Kim’s team should have been doing the same.