Written in Blood Read online

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  ‘Why are we meeting down here?’ Sara asked as Drake negotiated through the village of Llithfaen towards Nant Gwrtheyrn, a collection of refurbished terraced properties abandoned a century earlier but now a thriving wedding and conference centre.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  The three peaks of Yr Eifl loomed in front of the car. Drake recalled walking with his father to the middle peak and enjoying the view down towards Aberystwyth over Cardigan Bay and then up the Menai Strait. An Iron Age hill fort clung to the third of the three peaks, the first nearest the sea and inaccessible, its summit home to an electricity substation.

  Holly Thatcher, the barrister who had slipped her business card into Drake’s suit the previous evening, had insisted they meet at Nant Gwrtheyrn, a few miles from Portmeirion. As Drake negotiated the narrow switchback road down into the valley in low gears and slow speed, he guessed the place’s privacy appealed to her.

  Sara looked out of the windscreen, enjoying the view. Drake focused all his attention on making certain he was driving carefully.

  ‘I never knew this was here,’ Sara said. ‘It’s so beautiful.’

  Drake parked. To his right were two terraces of refurbished properties with a square of recently mown grass in front. The sheer valley sides rose behind the houses, giving the place a warm stillness. Dark Welsh slate covered the roof of the single-storey café, and floor-to-ceiling windows curtained the building. Sara followed Drake inside and he cast his gaze around looking for Holly Thatcher without success.

  ‘Let’s see if she’s outside,’ Drake said.

  They toured around the wide decking that skirted the exterior but found no one they recognised. The azure sea glistened, the thinning clouds giving way to a crisp blue sky. It was the reason tourists flocked to the Llŷn Peninsula.

  ‘Maybe we should wait inside,’ Sara said.

  Drake nodded, and they retraced their steps. In a far corner, Drake heard snippets of conversation from Welsh learners occasionally struggling to find the right word with an encouraging tutor. He ordered a double shot Americano, and a latte for Sara.

  They found a table by the window and sat down.

  ‘I hope this isn’t a wild goose chase.’

  ‘Did Holly Thatcher tell you what she wants to discuss?’ Sara asked.

  ‘It was all a bit James Bond and then she gave me a sort of secret agent type look.’

  Their drinks arrived, and Drake took his first sip, thinking the coffee was strong, just as he liked it, when Holly Thatcher breezed in. She made straight to their table.

  ‘I’m sorry to keep you waiting. I wanted to be sure nobody from chambers was going to be here.’

  ‘Isn’t this a bit cloak and dagger?’ Drake said.

  ‘You won’t believe what it’s like.’

  Thatcher ordered a cappuccino from a waitress before sitting down opposite Drake and Sara. ‘I love this place,’ she said. ‘I came here to do a course learning Welsh. My boyfriend is from Cardiff and he’s a Welsh speaker.’

  ‘What did you want to see us about?’ Drake said.

  Thatcher drew her chair nearer to the table and lowered her voice. ‘I suppose you’ve been told that everything in chambers is hunky-dory.’

  ‘I have spoken with Michael Kennedy and Justin Selston, as you know.’

  The waitress arrived with Thatcher’s drink and she said nothing until the young girl was well out of earshot. ‘I’m leaving soon. I’m starting in a new chambers in Cardiff. And I cannot wait. The atmosphere at the moment is poisonous.’

  Drake wouldn’t have to cajole Thatcher for more details.

  ‘Nicholas Wixley was the most obnoxious man I have ever met. A brilliant mind, a great barrister, but as a person he had few, if any, redeeming features. He was manipulative and devious with wandering hands.’

  ‘Did he ever…?’ Sara said.

  Thatcher shook her head. ‘I never allowed myself to be in the same room as him unaccompanied. I heard from some of the other young barristers that he would come onto them. And I mean really come onto them, all the time.’

  ‘Didn’t the other members of chambers do something about Wixley?’ Sara struck an exasperated tone.

  Thatcher sipped on her coffee. ‘Julia Griffiths, the head of chambers, is an unprincipled woman with no moral scruples.’

  ‘I thought Justin Selston was head of chambers?’ Drake said, realising Selston’s status hadn’t been made clear.

  ‘Selston is a strange character. He was so certain he was going to be elevated to the bench he didn’t bother standing for election to be head of chambers. It devastated him when Wixley was appointed. He hosts the annual chambers party at his holiday home on Bank Holiday Monday when everyone is supposed to attend.’

  ‘Was the appointment between Selston and Wixley?’

  Thatcher nodded.

  ‘That must have caused tension between both men?’

  ‘They were hardly friends.’

  Drake continued. ‘So, will Selston be appointed now in Wixley’s place? How does the system work?’

  ‘I have no idea. I suppose the judicial appointment board will make a decision.’

  Drake decided a call to the civil servant in charge might be sensible.

  Sara butted in. ‘What does Michael Kennedy do?’

  Thatcher drew a spoon around the creamy froth caught on the side of her cup. ‘Nicholas Wixley treated him like a piece of shit. Although apparently Wixley had an affair with Pamela, Kennedy’s wife.’ Thatcher continued to stir her coffee. ‘He’s the chief clerk. He runs the place, makes sure all the bills are paid. So, the career of every barrister depends on being on good terms with Kennedy.’

  Thatcher finished her coffee and gave Drake and Sara an unvarnished account of her two years at chambers. It didn’t make for happy listening. ‘There’s one other young barrister I get on with reasonably well but everybody else hates the place. The only reason most are staying is for the money. They don’t see any alternative. God knows how Nicholas Wixley would have treated the barristers from his chambers if they appeared in his court.’ Thatcher shivered. ‘I’m glad I’m out of it. I never thought working as a barrister would have meant such appalling conditions.’

  ‘Is there anybody else you could suggest we talk to?’

  Thatcher gave him a puzzled look. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘From what you say, Nicholas Wixley had enemies.’

  Thatcher nodded energetically.

  ‘Who would have wished him dead?’

  Thatcher whispered. ‘They all did.’

  Chapter 9

  Wednesday 27th March

  8.12 am

  Driving on the A55 Sara listened to Drake’s one-sided conversation as he barked out instructions for Winder and Luned to get a full background check on the convicted alphabet killer, Zavier Cornwell, including identifying his visitors in prison and the prisoners who shared a cell with him. Sara pictured the exasperation on Winder’s face as Drake also insisted he and Luned start searching for possible CCTV footage to trace the red car; the task of discovering where the pink gilet had been sold would be easy by comparison.

  The traffic on the M56 into Manchester slowed to a crawl. Sara was barely out of first gear before she’d had to slow and brake. Commuting into a major city was something she had never done, and based on the progress they were making that morning it was something she didn’t want to experience regularly.

  After their prearranged meeting with Detective Inspector Ramsbottom of the City of Manchester police force they’d visit Britannia Chambers and DCC Wixley. It would be another long day.

  ‘I hope you’ve nothing planned this weekend,’ Drake said.

  ‘As a matter-of-fact, I was going to Ireland with some friends.’

  ‘You’ll have to cancel.’ It sounded like the old-fashioned Drake, brusque, verging on rudeness. ‘I was due to be taking Helen and Megan out on Friday. Sian wasn’t too pleased when I cancelled.’ Drake peered out
of the window, his tone suggesting he didn’t want to discuss it.

  Sara had been looking forward to her long weekend for weeks. She would lose the deposit at the very least and she’d have to call her friends and break the news.

  Another thirty minutes elapsed until they reached the headquarters of the City of Manchester police force: an enormous high-rise building in the suburbs. The car heaved and bumped its way to the second floor of the multistorey car park and Sara slowed to a crawl, worried she might scratch the side panels against the concrete pillars. After parking they found the main reception where Drake spoke to a woman behind a long counter who gave him a brief smile of acknowledgement. After finding the right contact, she spoke briefly into her mouthpiece and then turned to Drake and Sara. ‘Please take a seat. He’ll be with you shortly.’

  After a wait of twenty minutes Drake became restless and Sara expected him to make some critical remark when a man in his mid-fifties, with a tired-looking face, ageing clothes and scuffed shoes approached them. Ramsbottom introduced himself, and Sara and Drake did likewise. ‘Follow me.’ Once they were through security it took them another ten minutes to reach the tenth floor and Ramsbottom’s small, stuffy office.

  He fluttered a hand over two visitor chairs. ‘I understand you want to see the file on the alphabet killer.’

  ‘You were the SIO on the case?’ Drake said.

  ‘For my sins.’ Ramsbottom sighed.

  ‘What can you tell us?’

  Ramsbottom settled back into his chair. His paunch strained at the buttons of his shirt. ‘The first victim had the letter A stencilled onto her chest. Her throat had been cut, and scattered like confetti all around the room were snippets of newspaper articles about the woman. And the letter A had been written in the victim’s blood over one wall. She was a prominent campaigner for LGBT rights. Her girlfriend found her when she came home after working away in London for a couple of days.’

  ‘She was never a suspect?’

  Ramsbottom shook his head. ‘We treated her as a person of interest of course but her alibi panned out. And she was so distressed you could never fake it. The CSIs spent days in the flat, but we didn’t find any DNA we could use to identify the killer. Absolutely zero.’

  ‘Was there any chance of it being a hate crime?’ Sara said.

  Ramsbottom threaded the fingers of both hands together and rested them behind his head. ‘That’s what we thought at the start, love.’

  Sara smarted. She wasn’t his love and if he said it again…

  ‘Inspector.’ Sara emphasised his rank. ‘How far did your investigation get with establishing a possible relationship to homophobic criminality?’

  By the tired look in his eyes Sara guessed Ramsbottom would probably trot out a critique of political correctness. Instead, he moved on.

  ‘Let me tell you about the second murder. Trevor Hopkins was a successful DJ. He got his name in the newspaper all the time about these gigs he ran in nightclubs. He’d go over to the Costa Brava and other places in the Med. He made a fortune, so he helped set up this charity for disadvantaged kids. Too good to be true. He had a penthouse apartment in one of the swanky blocks in Salford.’

  Ramsbottom pulled himself back near the table and laid his hands flat on the desktop. He gave Drake and Sara an inquisitive look as though he’d only just remembered something. ‘Would you like some coffee or something?’

  ‘Thanks,’ Drake said.

  Ramsbottom dictated their choices down the telephone and settled back into his chair.

  ‘Where was I? Trevor Hopkins didn’t stand a chance. He was having a quiet night in and he’d ordered an Indian takeaway. Apparently, he liked red-hot vindaloos. A man whacks the delivery driver and leaves him unconscious by his scooter. He takes Hopkins’ curry up to his apartment and whacks him too: probably using a baseball bat.

  ‘Hopkins is bound and gagged, and the killer slices open the arteries of his arms all the way up to his elbows. Not across the wrists like the self-harmers. It was like something out of a hard-core gangster movie. There was blood everywhere. It must have pumped out of his body. Our man sat there watching Hopkins’ life ebb away.’

  Ramsbottom paused and gathered his thoughts. ‘The letter B was carved into his chest post mortem.’

  ‘Any newspaper cuttings?’ Sara said.

  Ramsbottom nodded. ‘There were copies of Hopkins’ Facebook page scattered over his flat. Pictures of Trevor Hopkins hobnobbing with the great and the good, you know, lots of stupid, grinning inane pictures when people take selfies.’

  ‘It sounds as though you didn’t like Hopkins, Inspector,’ Sara said, measuring her tone.

  Ramsbottom continued unaffected. ‘What can I say? He was a murder victim. Doesn’t matter what I thought of him.’

  ‘When did you become convinced you had a serial killer?’

  A young civilian entered with a tray of steaming mugs. Ramsbottom ladled two teaspoons of sugar into his tea and Drake gave his coffee an inquisitive look. Sara sipped her drink.

  ‘We ran the investigation with an open mind. We were looking for a killer. There was nothing to suggest definitively it was the same until the third.’

  Ramsbottom took a mouthful of his drink. Sara sensed his reluctance to relive the inquiry, which surprised her coming from a detective clearly nearing retirement with a jaded attitude to match.

  ‘The third was a lawyer. One of these do-gooders who wanted to get his name in the newspaper. He championed every bleeding-heart cause he could in Manchester. He came from a family rich enough to be able to let him indulge his career. He would be on the local radio and local television whenever they wanted somebody to make a clever comment about some minority’s rights being oppressed.’

  ‘How did he die?’ Drake said.

  Ramsbottom took another slug of his drink and wiped the back of his hand over his mouth.

  ‘The killer took nine-inch nails and crucified the man to a piece of chipboard.’ Ramsbottom allowed the enormity of his comments to sink in. ‘Then he sliced open his neck.’ Drake and Sara sat without moving. She forced back a knot of bile, wanting to blot out the image created by Ramsbottom’s description.

  ‘He somehow propped him against a wall and carved the letter C into the man’s chest. It was the only time he used nails and a board.’

  ‘And the fourth?’ Drake said.

  ‘A councillor, again someone who got his name in the newspapers a lot. This time the letter D was carved in his chest. Before I forget, there were other things that linked all the murders. Cornwell left funeral orders of service at each crime scene. Inside each he had written in the victim’s blood the letters of the word “death”. And at each scene he dressed each victim in a pair of Rotherham football club socks. I mean, who supports Rotherham, for Christ’s sake?’

  Nobody said anything for a few chilling seconds.

  ‘Do you think Cornwell had an accomplice?’ Drake asked.

  Sara could see exactly where Drake was heading. Only one man had been convicted of the alphabet killings, so there could be another murderer still out there. ‘We could never prove it, but I always thought that one man couldn’t have done everything,’ Ramsbottom said.

  ‘Did you ever make any progress?’ Drake said.

  Sara hadn’t seen anyone shake their head quite so mournfully.

  ‘You’ve got to understand, Zavier Cornwell is a complete psychopath. I’ve never seen anyone so evil. I had to take a month off work after the case ended. I’ve seen some shit things in my time, but Zavier Cornwell is as bad as they come.’

  Drake sympathised with Ramsbottom. He knew well enough how cases could affect detectives. They dealt with sick, depraved individuals and sometimes it wasn’t easy to switch off and go home to normality. A case, years before, had meant Drake had received counselling and the prospect of being unable to cope with the demands of a case still daunted him.

  Ramsbottom continued. ‘We looked at everything, all his known associates, his f
amily, his friends. And we couldn’t get any leads. I suspected he was in some group of sad weirdos he’d met on the internet. We even thought he was communicating with someone using encrypted messaging. But his phone was clear of any trace of texts.’

  ‘How did you catch him in the end?’

  ‘He got careless. He left a beanie hat in the house of his last victim.’

  ‘Did you manage to get some DNA from a hair sample on the beanie?’

  Ramsbottom nodded as he finished the last of his coffee. ‘We reacted quickly; surveillance of his house was authorised and an armed response unit deployed to break in and arrest him. I conducted the interview. I’m not much of a religious man, but I really did feel he was like the devil. I could sense all this evil coming out of him. Like a hand reaching up to me and slowly squeezing my throat.’

  ‘What did he say in interview?’

  ‘Not a lot. You can listen to the tapes yourself.’ He stood up. ‘You can collect the files from storage. And if it is Cornwell’s accomplice, be very careful.’

  Chapter 10

  Wednesday 27th March

  1.34 pm

  Neatly folded copies of the morning’s Financial Times, Daily Telegraph and The Times sat on a table in reception at Britannia Chambers. Their uncreased appearance suggested nobody had read them. Drake admired the neat precision of the column of magazines nearby, including Investors Chronicle, the Economist and editions of a Sunday supplement several months old.

  ‘What did you make of Detective Inspector Ramsbottom?’ Sara made herself comfortable on a sumptuous leather sofa.

  Drake thought of the hours of work needed to read the papers in the ten boxes they’d manhandled to the car. ‘We’ll have to make the alphabet killer a person of interest.’

  ‘It could be a copycat, of course.’

  Drake drew a hand over the arm of the sofa that matched Sara’s; it felt sticky as though it had recently been cleaned.