Chapter 4
Julian sat just inside the park railings, propped up against a tree facing South. He had a book open in his lap but seldom glanced down. There was a stretch of grass ten yards or so to his right separating him from the path that formed the boundary of the main field, where the bodies had been found. To his left and down the hill in front of him was Clarissa’s house. There were no trees or bushes between him and the front door, so it was in clear view.
He stayed there all day. At first, he wore a sweater but it was still September and became warm from eleven in the morning. At noon he stripped off his sweater but left his shirt on for the rest of the day. There were a few young men and women dotted around him in the afternoon who stripped down to shorts and tops or swimsuits and the odd topless girl sunbathed discreetly behind a tree. No one stayed very long in the centre of the field.
The day after his vigil, Julian was sitting in the same place before eight in the morning. Clarissa’s husband left the house to go to work soon after. The cleaner was due to arrive at about nine and Clarissa would be in bed until then. As soon as Mark walked off down the road and around the corner, Julian left the park and walked down the hill to Clarissa’s front gate. A number of people walked past him on their way to the station and work but did not turn their heads.
Now that Mark had left, the front door was secured only with a Yale type lock. When Julian reached the door, he bent down as a postman would — as though to put something into her letterbox. Then he pushed a credit card hard between the door and its jam. The door was as old as the house, so the fit in the frame was not perfect. The door eased open quietly and he stepped inside. He closed the door carefully behind him with only the slightest of clicks. In the hall, there was a table and on the table, a box. After one or two minutes shuffling, he found his piece. He left the pages on the table and looked up at the staircase in front of him.
Three times he paused on the way up when a stair tread creaked but there was no sound from above. At the top, he walked along the landing towards the front of the house. Her bedroom was the large one — front left from outside. He stood in front of the door and his hand touched the handle, then he lent forward and pressed his ear against a panel. There was no sound.
Downstairs he picked up his typescript and was at the street door when he turned back and walked through the first door on his right. It was a detached house with rooms on either side of the hallway but the one he was now in was the smallest — it was her study. She could often be seen from outside sitting at her desk and looking out on to the park.
On her desk, there was a pad; the first page was blank. He picked up a pen but put it down again without writing anything. A moment later he had joined the throng hurrying to the station. But, before he reached the corner, he turned back on himself and walked home.
Back home he spread his typescript over his desk. The margins were full of inked notes — many more than on his first piece. He started to turn over the pages but, before reaching the end of the story, he gave up, walked over to the window and opened it wide. He took several deep breaths and then lay down on his bed. His sleep was agitated and then he rolled off the bed on to the floor.
He woke later at twilight with an arm pinned underneath him. He stirred and then hauled himself up and propped himself against the bed. His left arm hung uselessly by his side until he massaged it. After a while he exercised it by bending it and swinging it up and down.
He sat for a while still on the floor then he glanced towards the open window. Howling sirens outside drew him to the window, where he blinked every second or so as the twirling beam from a police car struck his eyes. Then the noise stopped but the bright flicker of blue light continued to flash across the back wall of his room. He stood watching until it was quite dark. A continuous flow of men and women ebbed and flowed in and out of a house a few doors down the street on the opposite side of the road. Throughout the time he stood at the window, there had been no ambulance arriving only uniformed officers and plain-clothes detectives in police cars.
Then, without switching on a light, he dressed in a short waist-length coat over his shirt and jeans below, put some money in his pocket and left.
Julian arrived at his parents’ house on the eve of Yom Kippur. His mother shepherded him to the table and his father’s eyes sparkled. Later they went to the synagogue together. Julian followed his father exactly: he wore his kippah as soon as they left the house; he clutched his talloth around him and murmured before they entered the synagogue; and he stood and sat and prayed quietly in tune with the rest of the congregation. They attended services three times: before and after and for most of the day during Yom Kippur.
Later, at home, they broke their fast as a family. The first time Julian had joined them for the event since leaving for university. It wasn’t until much later that his parents allowed themselves to ask their son about his life. Inevitably his father asked him to come back and live in their home. After they had gone to bed, he left without disturbing them.
Back in his flat, the next morning Julian started the third story. It took him no more than two days to complete it and print it out. He used Sugden and named the victim Annie. Then he sat and read and re-read and reprinted the piece all day. Piles of paper built up around his desk. He pushed the paper into the only grate with a patent chimney but did not set it alight.
When it was dark, he made the ten-minute journey to and then from the Downing house and placed the new piece in her letterbox. He was away for less than half an hour and, when he got back, he burnt the scrap paper in the grate. Then he played some Mozart on his CD player and lay on his bed. He was not interrupted, as he had so often been, by the woman across the hall, complaining about the volume level of his system.
The next day after he had delivered his story Julian phoned. A man’s voice answered. He asked for Clarissa and there was silence. He spoke his name and the man told him the police needed to speak to him about the murders. He rang off.
As soon as he had put the phone down, he gathered up a few things and put them in a bag. Then he went to the window and looked out. Opposite there was some movement in a flat that had been empty for some time.
The flat was one of four forming a modern block purpose-built on a spare plot between Victorian houses. The space had been created by German bombs during the war. The squat brick building was dwarfed by substantial properties on either side, many divided as Julian’s was. It had been built at a time when accommodation of any sort was in short supply. Aesthetics had played little part in the building programme then.
While Julian stood there, a young woman walked out of the kitchen into her living room and towards the window. He recognised her as one of the group who went to Clarissa’s evenings.
He was never going to be a DIY man and so Amanda decided to fix her own things. And there it was: a new rack of kitchen knives. She promised herself that she would make use of them. It would be a preparation for when he freed himself and was with her always. She stood back to appreciate her work, much as if it were an Impressionist painting that needed to be viewed from a distance to allow the eye to assemble each brush stroke into a recognisable image. It had been an absorbing hour’s work and she allowed herself a minute of deep concentrated delight.
Just when she knew he was there she couldn’t tell but her body told her to swivel round and stop its absurd admiration. She was sure she had shut the door but there he was, his body firmly set against her only method of escape. There wasn't any doubt in her mind: this was the man the police wanted to question and his presence in her flat was not good news.
To scream or not to scream: Amanda really didn’t know. Creating some sort of ’fuss’ was advised but he looked nervous and she didn’t want to startle him into doing something foolish. Her hand went to her neck and she was pleased that she was wearing a high-necked sweatshirt and a pair of baggy cloth trousers underneath - hardly a sexual come-on. But this man killed; did it really matter what happened first?
He spoke with no preamble, his voice wavering nervously. The outline of his body appeared to shimmer. Amanda wondered which one of them was shivering uncontrollably.
‘I’m not guilty,’ he said.
She understood and she believed him. She really believed him but was that wishful thinking? Was that what happened in these cases: the victim is lulled by a false sense of peace making it easy for the murderer to strike?
‘So why don’t you give yourself up to the police?’ she asked.
‘They won’t believe me. I wrote those stories and they came true.’
‘You haven’t got an alibi?’
‘No, sometimes I have fits and when I wake I remember nothing.’
Amanda felt less reassured now. It was one thing to believe in the man’s denial but another to do so when he had blackouts or whatever they were. She wondered whether she could persuade him to come away from the door.
‘Sit down,’ she said and at the same time walked out of the kitchen into the living room — away from the knives. At the threshold, she paused: the knives would soon be out of reach. Should she go back? But, no, it was impossible: she could never sink a blade into human flesh. She continued walking into the room and sat in the chair nearest the door with her back to him. For a few moments she was rigid with fear wondering whether he would attack her from behind but he walked passed her and sat opposite on the settee. Her little gamble had worked. He was beginning to trust her and now she was nearer the door than he was.
‘So what do you think happened?’ she asked and then sat back and waited for his answer. She tried to give the impression that they were having a normal friendly conversation. She would take her time. She didn’t want him to become suspicious. She could only get to the door if she took him by surprise. At some time she would stand up and offer him coffee, if he stayed in his place she could make it to the door.
‘I don’t think it could have been me. God has forgiven me.’
The contradiction in this didn’t seem to strike him at all. If God had forgiven him, then he must have done something. ‘What do you mean?’ she asked.
‘It doesn’t matter,’ he said. ‘I did nothing. But the stories: they are to blame.’
‘Would you like some coffee?’ she asked.
He hardly seemed to understand what she said. His head lolled and his eyes were cast down. Amanda got to her feet: not fast but not too slow. She hoped it seemed casual. Then she turned away from him and took a step towards the kitchen before dashing to the door.
His agility was impressive and she would have enjoyed the sight of his leap on other occasions. She had hardly got the door open before he was upon her. At first, she felt she might be stronger: he was slim and hardly much taller than herself. She imagined she was heavier but the difference between male and female impressed itself as he forced her aside. Then he caught her hand, twisted her so that her back was against his chest and placed his hand over her mouth. ‘I’m not going to harm you,’ he said as he pushed the door closed with his back.
Once again, Amanda wondered whether all murderers say something like that before they attack their victims but she was still thinking and that was good: all the authorities said it was important.
‘I’ll take my hand away if you promise not to scream,’ he said.
She nodded vigorously and he took his hand from her mouth but kept her tight against him with his other arm. She breathed deeply but kept quiet, nor did she struggle. He let her go and she sat where he had before, while he took her place. Now he was nearer the door.
The entry-phone buzzed. Julian sat up straighter and his body quivered with new tension. Amanda’s prayed that the caller would be persistent. The buzzer sounded again.
‘They’re not going away,’ she said. ‘My car’s outside. Whoever they are, they know I’m home.’ There was no car and Amanda hadn’t felt the need for one until then - she wished now that she had. Then, a third buzz sent a ripple of relaxation and relief along her body. It was true: they were not leaving.
Then it was all over. Julian covered the distance between his seat and the door as quickly then he had done before. Then he was gone. She looked out of the window on to the street and saw him hurry away. She heard her visitor climb the stairs and there she was. Felicity, her saviour, stood at the open door.
‘Who was that rushing out?’ she asked.
Amanda rushed into her arms and sobbed on her shoulder.