A ghostly shadow, p.17
A Ghostly Shadow, page 17
“Get back on to the boys in transport. The professor was arrested in the waiting room, maybe he was waiting for her.”
They hurried on, now heading for the railway station while Jimmy telephoned the transport police again, this time with a description of Iris. Shadow was at least thankful that Iris had a distinctive appearance. About ten minutes later they arrived at the railway station. The sergeant from the transport police was waiting for them.
“No sign of her here, Chief Inspector Shadow, and we’ve started spooling through the CCTV footage of the last hour, but nothing so far.”
Shadow thought back to the contents of Axel’s pockets that the custody sergeant had carefully logged. Amongst the wallet, phone and keys was his train ticket. The destination printed on it was King’s Cross.
“I want any trains to London searched before they leave,” ordered Shadow. The sergeant paused briefly. York was on the east coast mainline with trains between London and Edinburgh every half hour. They were always busy and any delay would completely disrupt the timetable, but he wasn’t about to argue with a chief inspector.
“Yes, sir,” he replied and marched back into the station.
*
Shadow stood on the footbridge over the railway lines below, staring first to the north along the line that stretched up to Edinburgh and then turning one hundred and eighty degrees to the same line that carried you to London in the south. The officers from the transport police on the platform to his right were shaking their heads. She wasn’t on the delayed train. A guard’s whistle pierced the air. He couldn’t hold the trains any longer. The irate passengers had been delayed long enough; there would be a riot. The train for King’s Cross pulled away. Shadow watched it go.
“She has to be here somewhere. There’s no other way for her to leave the city without a car,” he muttered almost to himself.
“What about Nick’s car? She could have got the spare keys?” asked Jimmy.
“No it was still parked on Tanner’s Moat when we passed just now.”
“How about the river?” asked Jimmy. “She could have got hold of a boat somehow.”
In the distance, the brightly coloured balloons were rising in the sky. Some were advertising their sponsors, soft drinks or beer brands. Others had cartoon characters, for children to recognise, and some were the flags of the country their crew were from. One floated into view, that was red at the top, then white, then blue. Suddenly, Shadow knew where Iris was and how she was planning on leaving the city. He turned to Jimmy.
“We need to get after that balloon,” he said.
“Which one, Chief?” asked Jimmy.
“The red, white and blue one.”
“Like the French flag.”
“No, that’s the Dutch flag,” replied Shadow as he hurried down the stairs leading from the bridge.
*
The red, white and blue balloon was easy enough to spot, but following it was not. As Jimmy had mentioned, the traffic through the city was terrible so instead they decided to join the ring road and travel around the city. For a while it felt like they were going in the wrong direction.
“Where is the final destination for the race?” Shadow asked through gritted teeth as he clung on to the edge of his seat. When they had arrested Axel, he had not imagined it would result in him now being involved in a high-speed chase with Jimmy at the wheel.
“Whitby,” replied Jimmy. “The balloons that set off in the daylight are trying to cross the moors and land in an empty caravan park near the abbey.”
“Then put your foot down – we can’t lose her,” ordered Shadow. At Halloween the small fishing town was a mecca for Goths. If Iris began circulating amongst them, he would never find her in Whitby’s narrow winding streets.
The balloon was now floating northwards and heading towards the North Yorkshire Moors. As they left York behind, Jimmy sped towards Malton and then took the turning for Pickering, before heading across the moors and towards Whitby on the coast.
Several marked police cars had joined in the chase on the winding country road. The vast openness of the heather-covered hills stretched out all around them. Shadow put his hand out to steady himself as Jimmy swerved to avoid a sheep who had strayed into their path. Every so often he caught a glimpse of the ruined Whitby Abbey high on the cliff and where Count Dracula supposedly swept in one stormy night. Worryingly that meant they were getting closer to the sea.
“It looks like Iris might get to visit Whitby after all, Chief,” said Jimmy. Shadow scowled at him. His sergeant was enjoying the chase far too much.
Shadow spoke into the radio. “We can’t let them get to the coast,” he told the other cars. With his luck there could be a boat waiting to take her to Holland. However, as Jimmy screeched around the next corner, another large building came into view. The strange wedge-shaped construction that was RAF Fylingdales. It was a radar station, part of the US and UK joint early warning system, and it was clear they were not about to let a huge balloon cross their airspace. Two police Land Rovers with their lights flashing came hurtling out of the base and roared ahead of the other police cars.
One of the Land Rovers veered off the road and through a gap in one of the dry-stone walls, to follow the balloon more closely. The driver began to flash its headlights and his colleague leaned out of the window with a megaphone and ordered the balloon to come down immediately. For a moment nothing happened, then very slowly the huge balloon began to descend.
*
Finally, the basket bumped along the ground and came to a stop. Jimmy pulled their car on to the verge, jumped out and with several uniformed officers chased across the moor. Shadow, aware of his recently recovered ankle, followed at a more sedate pace.
All three occupants of the basket had climbed out and were in handcuffs when he arrived. Lucas and the other older crewman looked totally confused by what was happening. Iris had abandoned her Goth-style make-up and jewellery, washed the blue out of her hair and was dressed simply in black jeans and jacket. She looked directly at Shadow with a defiant expression.
“It’s over, Iris. We have your father in custody back in York,” he said. She gave a shrug of what seemed to be resignation as she looked him straight in the eye.
“It was worth it,” she said calmly. Shadow noticed her Australian accent had almost disappeared too. It was as if the whole time she was in York she was playing a part.
*
With Iris safely handcuffed to a female officer and in the back of one of the marked cars, Shadow and Jimmy could enjoy a more relaxed drive back to York. Lucas and the other Dutchman, who turned out to be Lucas’s father, were also still under arrest and had been left with the military police. Neither of them had said much other than that they had known Iris since she was a small girl. Shadow didn’t expect them to be guilty of anything more than being her friends. They had both looked genuinely shocked when they heard Iris was being arrested on suspicion of murder.
The Whitby police had been given the unenviable task of taking care of the abandoned hot air balloon. The sun was setting and as they crossed the remote moorland. In the distance fireworks began bursting through the darkening sky.
“Sorry you’ve missed your big night with Sophie,” said Shadow.
Jimmy smiled good-naturedly. “It’s okay, there will be other years.”
They drove on in silence for a few moments.
“Iris was like a different person when we arrested her,” Jimmy commented.
Shadow nodded. He had been thinking something similar.
“I think she’s been playing the part of Iris, the chilled-out Goth from Down Under, with her black make-up, dreamcatchers and herbal tea.”
“Do you know how they did it?” Jimmy asked.
“I think it started with Iris sending letters to Nick and Drew when she arrived in London. They must have been easy to find as they were still in Oxford and she could have travelled there quite easily to post the envelopes. She succeeded in scaring them out of Oxford but that wasn’t enough. When they decided to make a fresh start in York, she could track them down via their website and she had the perfect opportunity to get close to them when they advertised for an assistant. Because she was ten years younger than Tilly and spoke with a strong Australian accent, Nick and Drew would never have suspected there was any connection between Iris and their old friend. Especially, as she was using her mother’s anglicised name.”
“And the professor arriving here in York, was that part of the plan?”
“I think when he realised what his daughter had in mind, he came to York as quickly as possible and made it seem like a coincidence when he met Professor Maxwell. He probably guessed she would be eager for him to visit the university as a guest lecturer. Iris seems to have inherited her mother’s acting skills, but it was her father’s scientific brain that was needed to commit the murders. Nick and Drew trusted Iris, so when she made Nick a drink after the ghost tour, he never thought it would be laced with the sleeping tablets Drew left in his desk drawer. While he was drowsy, she let her father into the toll house and they hanged him from the ceiling beams in the basement, before using his own car to drive his body to the Knavesmire.”
“That was why the beams down there had been dusted,” said Jimmy.
Shadow nodded. “The dust on one of the beams had obviously been disturbed, so they wiped down the beams in the basement, but completely forgot about the beams in the other rooms. Nick had the noose tied around his neck but the drop to the floor was too short to break his neck; it strangled him instead. They took him to the Knavesmire to make it look like his death was linked to the ghost walkers, then Axel returned the car to the toll house, used Iris’s cloak, mask and hat to dress up as Dick Turpin and went to The Blue Boar. They needed someone to report seeing him, so Iris was no longer the last person to have seen him alive. The pub was busy and he took his own drink and glass. He couldn’t risk ordering from the bar as they would hear his Swedish accent.”
“What about Drew?”
“In many ways that was easier, although it did take careful planning. Axel stole the saltpetre and made the gunpowder and it wasn’t difficult for Iris to use it to fill some of the sandbags. She planted the cigarette butts and brandy bottle under the sofa, after our visit when she knew some of the other ghost walkers were upset with Drew and Nick. Malcolm Webster was an easy target to try and frame. I think Axel stole the butts of the cigarettes he’d smoked from The Cross Keys ashtrays. He may even have visited his office to check what brandy he drank,” Shadow continued as he recalled Axel sitting outside at the pub and being so close to St William’s College. “The professor worked out the angle to place the glass incense burner and the timing for when the sunlight would hit it. Iris made sure Drew had taken a sleeping pill in his drink, so he was still asleep when the explosion went off.”
“That’s why the place was always so untidy too.”
“Exactly, she needed to make sure the wastepaper basket was always full to start the fire that ignited the sandbags.”
*
Eventually, they arrived back in York and the two detectives went straight to the custody suite where Iris had already been processed and charged. She was waiting in one of the cells.
Shadow barely recognised her as the cheerful young woman he’d met on the morning after they’d found Nick’s body. Her face was pale and drawn, her jaw was set and her eyes flashed fiercely. She spoke as soon as Shadow entered the room.
“They deserved to die. I’d do it all again.”
“They were young. They never meant to hurt Tilly. They made a mistake.”
“A mistake that killed my sister and then killed my mother.”
“They tried to make amends. They left an endowment in her name They were sorry.”
“I bet they are now! They were both cowards, hiding behind each other. They should have been made to pay. An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth – isn’t that what the Bible says, Chief Inspector? Their two lives for Mum’s and Tilly’s.”
Shadow took a step back. The fire in her eyes was disturbing. He’d seen the same look once or twice before, in the faces of murderers who were beyond help or reason. She was visibly shaking as she continued to stare at him. Quietly Shadow left the room. He would speak to her again tomorrow when she had been assessed by the doctor and spoken to her solicitor.
Axel was waiting in the next cell. He looked up when Shadow entered. His face was now pale and tired.
“How is she?” he asked.
“Physically she is fine. A doctor will assess her before she’s interviewed. We have charged her though. She admitted she was guilty,” Shadow explained as Axel dropped his head into his hands. “We won’t be able to interview you until tomorrow either. I’m afraid we are still waiting for a translator.”
“That doesn’t really matter anymore. I was, what’s the expression, buying time,” Axel admitted. “I told her to leave when you began investigating Nick’s death. The gunpowder was already onsite it would have gone off with or without her there, but she insisted on staying. She wanted to be sure Andrew was definitely asleep in his office, but I had a bad feeling. From the day you arrived at the university to investigate the missing saltpetre, I felt things would not go well.”
“But you couldn’t convince Iris that seeking revenge for Tilly and Clara’s death was a mistake?”
Axel shook his head sadly. “No. For the last ten years it has been just the two of us. We have lived in many cities together, but it didn’t matter where we were, her obsession with taking revenge only grew. I hoped if I helped her, she might not get caught, but I failed her. I had to help her. She’s all I have left.”
The professor began to weep. Shadow left the cell, quietly closing the door behind him.
George was still covering the custody desk. Shadow found him looking at a photo that had been emailed over. It was from the inside cover of one of Axel’s books and showed a much younger professor standing with his arm around a beautiful red-haired woman, who must have been his wife, Clara. Sitting in front of them, smiling for the camera were their two daughters, Tilly just as beautiful as her mother and a much younger Iris, with her father’s blonde hair and braces on her teeth.
“What a waste eh, John.” George, who had two daughters of his own, gave a sigh. Shadow patted his kind-hearted friend on the back before trudging up the stairs to reception. Jimmy was there finishing off a phone call. Sophie was perched on the edge of the desk waiting for him. Shadow noticed she was wearing a sparkly top and high-heeled boots with her jeans and was reminded again that Jimmy’s carefully organised romantic evening had been ruined.
“Hello, Sophie, it’s good to have you back. I’m sorry you had to cancel your plans for tonight,” he said.
“It’s okay, Chief, Jimmy has thought of the perfect way to make it up to me.” Sophie smiled as Jimmy put his phone away.
“Really?”
“Tomorrow we’re going to the animal shelter to get a kitten,” explained Jimmy as he planted a kiss on Sophie’s cheek.
“We’re thinking of calling it Fawkes,” added Sophie with a mischievous grin. Shadow raised an eyebrow at Jimmy, who had the good grace to look a little guilty.
“Well, as long as you don’t expect me to kitten-sit it,” said Shadow.
“Don’t worry, Chief, I think we’ve worked out you’re not really a cat person.” Jimmy laughed.
“Yes,” agreed Sophie. “We’d like you and Fawkes to stay in one piece.”
*
Shadow left the station and began to walk home. It was late now, but there were still a few fireworks blazing in the inky-blue night sky and the air was full of the familiar sulphury burning smell. His thoughts dwelled on the father and daughter they had arrested. The death of her sister and mother had clearly consumed Iris, and Axel seemed almost apologetic when he’d tried to explain his actions to Shadow. The detective wondered what he would have done, if he had been in the professor’s place.
As he passed Bettys he saw Julie serving at one of the tables. Did she have a reason for wanting to change shifts for the rest of the week? He had an uncomfortable feeling it might involve him. For a moment he stood and watched her. He was about to raise his hand to attract her attention, then thought better of it. Perhaps he should consider finding somewhere different for breakfast.
He walked down Petergate and passed a surprisingly sober Malcolm Webster giving a particularly gory account of Guy Fawkes’s execution to a group of enthralled American tourists. Harriet Maxwell was also there, standing at the back of the group. She caught Shadow’s eye and gave him a quick smile and a thumbs up.
“So far so good,” she mouthed across to him.
A little further on, Shadow watched as Steve West led his tour party around the corner on to Goodramgate. He was now wearing his third costume of the week. Judging by his slicked-back hair and flowing black cloak, he had taken inspiration from the Dracula costumes of the waiters at the Duke of York.
As Shadow strolled across Kings Square, he saw Matt West walking arm in arm with Celia. He nodded politely to the couple.
“You’ve got rid of those crutches then, Chief Inspector,” said Matt.
“I see Queen Catherine worked her magic. I told you seeing her was a good omen,” added Celia, with a knowing look.
Shadow attempted a smile in return. “Aren’t the two of you working tonight?” he asked.
“No,” said Matt who was looking much happier and tidier than usual. “Some things are more important than work.”
“We thought we’d spend the evening following the cat trail together instead,” said Celia, waving her map at Shadow, who couldn’t stop himself grimacing.
“You’re not looking to have Catesby back then, Chief Inspector?” Matt asked with a grin.
“No thank you, I’m sure she’s much happier with Celia. I’m probably more of a dog person to be honest.”
“Is that so? Well in that case we’ll wish you goodnight, Chief Inspector,” said Celia raising her eyebrow slightly.
