49
THE WOMAN ON THE WALL
I’d assumed he must be some kind of polymath,’ mused Bryant unhappily as they drove, with Raymond Land cautiously following them in his BMW. ‘He’s not. He’s feral and instinctive, the kind of criminal we see so much more of these days. Mind that old lady.’
‘You always want to think they’re twisted geniuses,’ May chided him. ‘You long to pit your wits against someone who hides clues in paintings and evades capture through their knowledge of ancient Greek. Forget it, Arthur; those days have gone.’
‘Russian agents still get poisoned by radioactive pellets in restaurants. Read your daily papers.’
May was forced to admit his old partner had a point. ‘It would be dangerous to underestimate this man,’ he warned. ‘He’s clearly smart enough to use everyone he meets. I bet Toth never realised he was acting as the host to a parasite.’
‘Precisely. Mr Fox has one formidable talent. He absorbs the knowledge of others. He used Toth, and I’m sure we’ll find he used Professor Marshall, the former coroner of the St Pancras Mortuary. That’s how the heads were severed so perfectly. We assumed it was a professional hit because of the clean cuts to the neck. The amputations were performed with surgical precision. I think Mr Fox persuaded the disgraced coroner to teach him how. You heard Giles—the cuts were virtually identical.’
May called Bimsley and Renfield, summoning them to the apartment building. Land’s BMW turned into Margery Street. The council estate had been rebuilt and extended after being bombed during the Second World War. Flat 7 stood on the ground floor, beyond a concrete courtyard.
‘Stay here,’ May told Land. ‘Wait for the others.’
‘You can’t tell me what to do,’ Land complained as they left him alone. ‘I’m your superior officer.’
‘Oh, don’t be ridiculous,’ Bryant called back, ‘that’s just a title, like labelling a tin of peaches “Superior Quality.” It doesn’t mean anything.’
‘We may have to kick the door in,’ warned May. ‘That’ll be a challenge.’
Bryant pushed against the jamb. ‘I doubt either of us has the strength to shift this. The kitchen window is unlocked.’
It was a simple matter to raise the bolt and swing the pane wide, but climbing inside proved trickier. A few minutes later May lowered himself carefully onto the kitchen counter and came around to open the door. ‘There’s no-one here. Where else could he have gone?’ The pair stood on the balcony, looking around.
‘They went out,’ called a girl in a lime-green tracksuit, leaning over the railing. ‘Him and his mate.’
‘How long ago?’
‘Just a few minutes ago. He had to hold the other guy up, he was so pissed.’
‘Did you see where they went?’
‘Through there.’ She leaned further over and pointed down to a recessed door at the bottom of a flight of steps.
‘Why is he keeping Toth alive?’ May wondered as the detectives headed toward the basement.
‘I think I know why, but I hope I’m wrong. They’re going to Black Mary’s Hole. It’s directly underneath Spring House.’
May found a light switch and strip lights flickered on below them. Fourteen stone steps led to a damp cellar that housed the building’s electrical circuit boxes and elevator equipment.
‘Look around,’ said Bryant. ‘There has to be something else down here.’
‘I don’t know what I’m looking for, Arthur.’
‘Oh, you know.’ Bryant waved his hand about with annoying vagueness. ‘The tunnel.’
‘What tunnel?’
‘You don’t listen to a word I say, do you? The Bagnigge River ran beneath the church to Spring Place, where it was capped off. Our Mr Fox was employed at the church as a grave-maintenance person, or whatever Barton called it. Fox used the tunnel underneath, the one leading from the spa, to get back here. Where else could he have taken Mr Toth?’
‘All right,’ May conceded, ‘but what exactly are we hoping to find?’ When Bryant failed to answer, but merely pointed, May slowly turned around. ‘Oh.’
Behind him was a grey steel door studded with rivets the size of mushroom caps. ‘Try it,’ Bryant suggested. ‘There’s no lock that I can see. Put your shoulder to it.’
May did not have to push hard. The door’s hinges were thickly greased, and it swung in easily.
‘Do you have your Valiant on you?’
‘Of course.’ May pulled his cinema usherette’s flashlight from his overcoat and switched it on. ‘Mind your step. There’s a lot of rubble on the floor. Hang onto my coat.’ The pair made their way forward at a cautious pace. The floor was uneven, and followed a gentle upward slope. The tunnel smelled of standing water but was neat and square, cemented with lichen-covered terra-cotta tiles, most of them badly damaged. A channel in the floor indicated the former path of the healing spring. Clearly, nothing but rain had come through here in a very long time.
Bryant grabbed his colleague’s arm and bade him listen. A soft fall of brick suggested movement far ahead.
‘Are you sure you’re up for this?’ May whispered. ‘We could go overland, back to the church. Land can watch this end.’
‘No, we’re too close now to risk losing them. I think he’s drugged Toth and has brought him up the tunnel from Spring House because he couldn’t go in through the church. The vicar and Kareshi would have seen them.’ Bryant climbed around a pile of collapsed brickwork and moved ahead. ‘Look.’ He pointed his walking stick toward a bend in the tunnel. There was a faint glow of light beyond it.
‘I don’t like this, Arthur. Mr Fox could be hiding anywhere, lying in wait for us.’
‘I know exactly where he is,’ declared Bryant. ‘He’s in the temple.’
‘You mean the spa room Kareshi showed us beneath the church?’
‘It became a spa room precisely because it had been a temple. There was a painting on the wall, worn and very faded but quite recognisable as Saint Helena. I knew at once it was her, because she was flanked by hunting hounds. Saint Helena is the oldest and most powerful of all the pagan goddesses ever to be worshipped on these shores. Saint Helena—or Nouhelene, who wore stag antlers, and who represented the force of natural regeneration.’ He stopped to catch his breath, leaning against the tiled wall. ‘St Pancras Old Church was founded by the Emperor Constantine’s mother, Saint Helena herself. Over time her name was shortened to Nell, and she was depicted carrying a basket of fruit. And then Nell Gwynne moved into the neighbourhood. Nell and her basket of oranges. It’s where all of this came from, where the whole plan began.’
‘Arthur, you’ve lost me. Let’s get our man first, then you can explain.’ May shone the flashlight ahead. A glossy fat rat fell from the ceiling of the tunnel with a squeak, more alarmed than the detectives. They turned the bend, picking their way over bricks and garbage—others had been here before them—and the light ahead grew stronger.
A pale yellow ellipse revealed the entrance to the temple. The edges of the circular room had been marked with fat stumps of candles. In the centre, blindfolded and gagged, his hands and ankles tied, Xander Toth waited like a terrorist’s prisoner. The man who stood behind him was slight of build, but oddly nondescript in appearance, except that he was wearing a crimson papier-maché fox’s mask, like the ones sometimes worn on Guy Fawkes night. He turned to stare at the detectives as they appeared in the tunnel entrance.
‘Why would you want to do this, Mr Fox?’ called Bryant. ‘Everything else you’ve done has made a sort of sense, but this is sheer madness. You’re being somewhat overly theatrical, if you don’t mind my saying so. Do you mind if I sit down? I’m beat.’
May was looking to his partner for a cue to act, but nobody seemed inclined to make the first move. He could feel the tension rising in the cold damp air.
‘I thought Mr Toth told you about the temple, but I suppose it might have been Mr Kareshi,’ Bryant continued cheerfully. ‘Really, though—a sacrifice? Who do you think you will appease? You learned to steal knowledge from other people, but you really shouldn’t start believing in too much of it, you know. You think it will come to an end and you can start all over again if you shed young Alexander’s blood on this spot? You sold your case rather too well, Mr Toth.’
May had heard Bryant use this technique before, keeping up a soothing level of conversation with his adversary, gently disarming through the simple humanity of a caring voice. Except that Bryant sometimes got carried away and went for the Oscar.
‘But I’m afraid you can’t begin anew, because this is where it ends. We have officers here at the church and at Spring Place, too. All your exits are cut off. So you might as well let Mr Toth go. And it is my duty to arrest you for the murder of Terence Delaney.’
‘I am here at the church from ten in the morning until ten at night.’ Mr Fox’s voice was surprisingly thin and light. ‘I put in twelve-hour shifts. Barton will vouch for me.’
‘I’ll also be taking into account the murders of Adrian Jesson, Richard Standover and Maddox Cavendish.’
The crimson fox mask tilted slightly, regarding Bryant. Then it looked up into the darkness of the stairwell leading from the temple to the church above. Mr Fox seemed to have no fear. He was weighing up his options.
May saw the sharpened silver skewer glitter in his hand, and turned the flashlight directly into his eyes. He knew Mr Fox would expect to be attacked, so instead he kicked out at Xander Toth, knocking the bound man over on his side and slamming Mr Fox against the temple wall—it wasn’t a bad move for a senior.
The skewer swung out but missed its mark. May’s boot kicked again and he managed to trap Mr Fox’s wrist, pinning him in place. Two of the candles were knocked out, then a third. Only one remained alight. The temple was flickering into darkness.
‘Keep back, Arthur,’ May warned as Mr Fox rose to his feet.
Now we’re in trouble, Bryant thought, taking in the scene. We’re all trapped together here. His only way out is through us. He has the only weapon. And he’s insane. My, it’s nice to be back.
‘You’re Arthur St John Bryant,’ Fox said. ‘You still blame yourself for the way your wife Nathalie died. Your partner’s wife is in a mental home. Who are either of you to tell me what to do?’
Bryant was taken aback. How could he have known such things? I’ve underestimated this fellow, he thought. We’re for it now.
But that was before DS Janice Longbright leaned over the stairwell and dropped a sizeable chunk of paving stone on Mr Fox’s head.
In the light of the guttering candles, she bore a striking resemblance to Saint Helena.