Exit wounds, p.23
Exit Wounds, page 23
“Put the wind up you, did we?” Red Beard chuckled.
Adam shrugged.
“Sorry, pal … just a joke.” Red Beard still seemed amused by it but made an effort to get himself together. “Bit spooky out here tonight, eh?”
Adam surveyed them both. Red Beard was somewhere in his mid thirties, shortish and tubby. But the woman, who was a lot younger, not much more than twenty, was rather cute: slim and bright-eyed, with a nice smile, her lush brown hair tied at the back in a fetching bun.
“What can I say …?” Adam slotted his baton and Maglite back into their requisite pouches. “Yes.”
Red Beard offered a gloved hand. “Tony Mulroony. Drive the area car on the East. This is Cassie Winters. You’re the new lad on the West, I’m guessing?”
Adam nodded and shook hands with both of them.
“Do you want to go inside, Cass, love?” Mulroony told his sidekick. “Make us all a coffee?” He glanced at Adam, a mischievous twinkle in his eye. “Don’t worry, pal, I’m not being sexist. Cass is new too … I’m puppy-walking her, so she has to do everything I tell her. No point having a probie and barking yourself, as they say.”
PC Winters rolled her eyes as she stepped up into the caravan.
Adam said nothing. He was still trembling from the fright they’d given him.
“You OK?” Mulroony asked.
Adam shrugged again. “Sorry. It’s my first night. Didn’t know what to expect.”
“Nights can be a shock to the system if you’re not used to them. Who’s your tutor con, anyway? Dave Ellis, is it?”
“Erm, yeah … Dave.”
Mulroony nodded. “Dave usually has the new lads. Good bloke though, eh?”
“Yeah … great.”
Winters stuck her head back outside, focusing on Adam. “You having a coffee too, love?”
“No, I’ve already had one, thanks.”
“Bloody hell, son,” Mulroony said, laughing. “You’ll soon learn never to turn a brew down. Not on nights.” He indicated the open door. “Come on … after you.”
They entered the command post, which felt cramped with all three of them inside.
“Ohhh, yeees!” Mulroony plonked himself down in the chair. “Life doesn’t get cosier than this, eh? Mind you … what a job to pull, sat in here all night. You sneaked your iPad out with you, or your phone … so you can watch a movie?”
Adam had just removed his helmet and didn’t at first realise that he was the one being spoken to; he’d also been stealing crafty looks at PC Winters, who was busying herself around the kettle.
“Sorry, what … iPad?” He shook his head.
“You really are new,” Mulroony said. “Still … I think the East are copping for this job tomorrow. Should free you up to do some proper bobbying.”
Winters handed her tutor his drink, which he relished with smacking lips.
“When you’re back on days, you’ll get all the shoplifters and shit like that,” she said, addressing Adam again. “I did for my first couple of months. They’re easy jobs, but it’ll get you up to speed.”
Adam said nothing, hoping this would prove to be true.
Mulroony loudly slurped his coffee, proclaiming it “Nectar!” before glancing up, looking serious. “You’ve heard the new developments, I take it?”
Adam shrugged.
Mulroony leaned forward. “You know the Serious Crimes Division had this lad, Nick Jessup, in the frame? For the murder, I mean?”
Adam nodded.
“Well, now they’re not so sure. Looks like Woodhatch have misplaced someone after all.”
“Who?” Adam asked.
“Dunno. But, sounds like some loony escaped about two months back, and only now are they admitting to it. They were so sensitive, Woodhatch being the place and all, that they tried to find him on their own. Now they’ve had to put their hands up. Tell you, heads are going to roll. And not just this nut job’s victims.”
“And he’s supposed to have attacked this urban explorer couple?” Adam said.
“Well, someone did, didn’t they? Quite a coincidence if it wasn’t him.”
“Didn’t they search the hospital immediately after the attack?” Winters said, sipping her coffee.
Mulroony shrugged. “Yeah, but I think they were just paying lip service to the old legend. Tomorrow, it’ll be a bit more thorough.”
“Tomorrow?” Adam asked.
“Yep …” Mulroony finished his drink with a swallow. “It’s all going to kick off first thing in the morning. Massive search team coming. Everything.”
Adam blew out an unsteady breath. “So … who am I looking out for tonight?”
“No clue. Just make sure there’s no one hanging round here who shouldn’t be. If there is, get on the blower.”
Adam nodded, po-faced.
PC Winters giggled. “You’ve really cheered him up, Tony.”
“Sorry, pal …” Mulroony tossed his paper cup in the bin and stood up. “But someone had to tell you, eh? Give Dave Ellis a rocket in the backside for leaving you on your own in a place like this when you’re so new. Anyway … nice brew that, Cass. Ta muchly.” Before he could say more, he looked around the tiny room, curious. “Is it me, or is there a funny smell in here?”
Adam sniffed the air but didn’t detect anything. PC Winters did the same, but looked unsure.
Mulroony wrinkled his nostrils. “Like someone’s been in here who hasn’t washed in a while.”
There was a brief silence while they absorbed this and its possible implications.
“For God’s sake, Tony!” Winters blurted. “Haven’t you scared this lad enough?”
“No, I’m serious …” Mulroony made another show of sniffing. “For a minute, then …?”
Adam shook his head. “I can’t smell anything.”
Winters shrugged. “I thought there was something at first, maybe … but I’ve not got much of a sense of smell anyway. Is it not just the woods? Rotting vegetation, stagnant ponds …?”
But Mulroony had now fixed Adam with a beady gaze. “You didn’t leave this station unmanned for too long, did you?”
Adam felt his face redden. “I was just checking the crime scene.”
“Yeah, but how long did it take you?”
“Couple of minutes.”
“Nothing missing from in here, is there?”
“There’s nothing to take,” Adam said.
A second passed, before Mulroony relaxed. “You’re probably right. Just me being daft.”
“God’s sake, Tony,” Winters chided him again. “If it was this escaped bloke from Woodhatch, he’s not going to still be hanging round here now, is he?”
“Well … if it’s the only place he’s ever known …”
The girl rolled her eyes towards Adam. “Don’t let him bother you, love. Trust me, you’re better off spending your first week of nights here with the badgers than wandering around some town centre, where every dickhead who’s had a drink’ll take a poke at you. Speaking of which …” She looked at him more closely. “You’ve cut your face.”
Adam felt at his cheek, and when his fingertips came away, they were smeared red.
“Fighting your way through those bushes at the back, I’m guessing?” Winters said, directing this at Mulroony in a tone of rebuke.
“It was a joke,” Mulroony said defensively. “And he’s taken it well … which is all part of being a decent bobby, isn’t it, pal?”
Adam forced a smile. He’d never liked being mocked, but he was sure he could get used to it if it was part and parcel of his new job.
“We’re off, anyway,” Mulroony said. “Oh … Sergeant Pennyworth will be popping round to see you.”
“Who’s that?” Adam asked.
“Our section sergeant,” Winters said. “Known as Iron Britches, she’s such a tartar. So … be sure everything’s shipshape.”
“When can I expect her?”
“Can’t help you there, pal.” Mulroony stepped outside, but his voice carried back indoors. “Strictly speaking, it should be your own section sergeant, but Pennyworth’s so bloody officious, she’ll never miss a chance to chuck her weight around. She’ll turn up when she feels like it. So like Cass says, be ready.”
Winters went out next, Adam following her.
Mulroony sniffed the air again as he stood on the road. “You know … it’s faint, but there is a funny smell round here.”
“Give it a rest,” Winters said. “This lad’s got a difficult enough night as it is.”
Adam couldn’t help liking the way she referred to him as “a lad”, even though he was probably older than she was by a good ten years. It gave her an air of strength and confidence, which he’d always found a challenge in women, but which he also admired. He couldn’t be doing with weak-kneed screamers. And she’d called him “love” too, at least twice. He hadn’t missed that, even if she’d meant it as a gesture of comradeship. “And don’t be worried about what Tony’s just said, either,”
Winters added. “Remember, we’re only a radio call away.”
“Yeah, don’t sweat it.” Mulroony zipped up his anorak as he edged off along the road. “We’re covering the whole of the East, and the area car’s got some speed under its bonnet. We can be back here in two or three minutes.”
It was reassuring to know that, Adam decided. But though this place was eerie and lonely, he didn’t anticipate that he’d be calling them. It wasn’t because he didn’t believe the story about the hook-handed killer – even though he didn’t – it was because he was a policeman, not a security guard. And tonight was very important in that regard. It was his first one, so he didn’t want to come over as a weakling. He had to make a good impression.
Particularly on PC Winters, he told himself, as their patrol car pulled away, its tail lights vanishing amid the trees. He was working here now, admittedly on the West rather than the East, but as the two subdivisions abutted each other, he’d no doubt be seeing a lot more of her. He certainly didn’t want her thinking he was the sort of bloke who’d call for help every time anything peculiar happened.
Which was probably why, some ten minutes later, at the sound of three loud metallic clangs – like someone hitting iron with a sledgehammer – from the direction of the hospital, his first reaction was not to get on his radio.
Adam was back inside the command post at the time, trying not to lounge again, when he heard it.
He all but jumped from the caravan, standing rigid on the road.
No further sounds followed, but again this entire stretch of woodland seemed to have fallen into an eerie, listening hush.
He stared towards the distant ruins. The caravan stood west of the hospital by several hundred yards, but Adam was certain that was the direction from which he’d heard the noises. He hadn’t imagined it, so someone was definitely over there. In which case, it might be the correct thing to call for assistance. But suppose Adam managed to collar the miscreant all on his own: how cool would he appear in the eyes of PC Winters …
If nothing else, he knew that he ought to go over there and look.
It couldn’t hurt. And it wasn’t as if he didn’t know his way. About two hundred yards north of here, well beyond the outer cordon, a path diverted from the road and wove through numerous trees and thickets, at some points almost hidden from view it was so deeply overhung by them, finally emerging alongside the hospital buildings. It was little known to outsiders, which meant there was a good chance, if you used it, that some non-local wouldn’t even see you coming.
Adam pondered this, and then went back inside to collect his helmet. When he came out again, he closed the caravan door and walked north, passing the common entryway and, a few dozen yards after that, the outer cordon and POLICE VEHICLES ONLY sign. It was discomforting to be trekking further and further from the crime scene, but Adam’s confidence grew that he was doing the right thing. He wondered how PC Winters would respond when she learned that he’d investigated the spooky old building all by himself.
He resisted the temptation to switch his Maglite on as he stepped off the road and onto the path, even though the ground was now rutted and mulchy and covered with clumps of treacherous fungi, because he didn’t want to announce that he was coming. Thus, for long minutes he worked his way along the looping, meandering route, at times advancing through complete darkness, at others in moonlight again, albeit moonlight reduced to spectral gloom by the tangled vegetation. A more delicate soul would surely have been having second thoughts by now, but not Adam. He was fortunate, he supposed, in that bravery came naturally to him. At least, he assumed it did – he’d rarely ever felt what others called fear. One reason why he’d always thought that he’d make an excellent policeman.
Not that Springburn Special Hospital wouldn’t test that belief.
On the best occasions, these old asylums had never looked good. They might have given themselves genial names as part of the pretence that they were normal medical facilities, but the barred windows would always be a giveaway. Ditto the high walls and the electrical fences encircling their grounds, while the immense soullessness of the buildings themselves, everything so functional, so uniform, added immeasurably to that aura. OK, they weren’t Dracula’s castle. But they were sufficiently bleak to imply that anyone entering here was going to have a cheerless time.
And yes, that was on the best occasions.
Now, in a state of utter ruin, only vaguely visible in the midnight darkness, Springburn Hospital was every inch the horror movie myth.
As Adam approached the end of the path, his progress was briefly blocked by a high mesh fence, which ran across in front. It was a safety precaution by the local authority, but no one had bothered maintaining it, and Adam already knew that, at this point, the two sections merely stood against each other and were not fastened. He pushed them apart and slid his body through, before progressing across open ground covered with dead but tussocky grass. As he did, the hospital emerged from the gloom, a silent, towering outline, like a phantom ship breaching the ocean fog.
All he saw of it at first were sheer, weather-worn bricks covered with ivy, and occasional yawning gaps where windows had once been. Some of these, mainly on the lower levels, were still barred, but many of the higher ones were nothing but rotting apertures. If you’d been prepared to climb up there, they’d have granted you easy access. Not that Adam was willing to go that far. He’d distinctly heard something over here, so he felt it his duty to check, but it would be a cursory check only. He wasn’t taking his life in his hands.
He walked forward, and a few yards further on, ducked under a single strip of blue and white incident tape left over from the first search of the premises. Beyond this, he found another path – more overgrown than the one before but veering away between the buildings themselves. Adam followed it, still keeping his Maglite off, primarily because, now that he was out from under the trees and had the moonlight to steer by, he didn’t need it.
Springburn Hospital might only have been closed for nine years, but an awful lot of dereliction had occurred in that time. Desolate brick structures now reared on either side of him, coated with ivy, their pipework hanging loose, more blind gaps where windows had once been. One thing he didn’t see many of were exits and entrances, though with Springburn’s high-security status that was understandable. On this subject, it was noticeable that quite a few of the ground-level windows were not so much barred as heavily grilled; an extra-strength security measure, no doubt, which meant that when everything else had rotted away, these still remained.
Adam’s gaze roved across them as he strolled – before he halted abruptly.
For a split second, he’d thought he’d spotted someone looking out from behind one of those grilles. It was impossible to be sure, but he played it back through his head, and could have sworn that a white face had fleetingly peered out at him.
Adam was unmoved by the story about the hook-handed killer. He knew it was nonsense. But he also knew what he’d just seen. And that no one else should be here.
Realising there was no longer any point in trying to mask his presence, he switched his Maglite on, and waded through thorns until he reached the window in question. It might be at ground level, but the bottom of the frame was almost six feet in the air. Adam was tall, but even he had to stand on tiptoe to shine his light through. The powerful beam split, multiplied by the rusted grille-work, but it still revealed the drab room on the other side. He saw bare walls marked with faded graffiti, exposed floorboards.
And an internal door on the far side of the room – which stood wide open.
He struggled his way back through the thigh-deep vegetation and took the path again, now following it faster, more determinedly. If he was going to get this thing done, best to get it done quickly. He emerged into more open space, on the other side of which, perhaps forty or fifty yards away, the lowering hulks of further silent buildings stood half hidden amid the trees and darkness. Searching this whole place could take all night, but as it was only the building on his left where he thought he’d spotted someone, Adam turned that way first, walking along another path, finally coming to what had once been the building’s main entrance. The two front doors had been boarded closed some time ago, but those boards had been torn away since, and the huge panels of floor-to-ceiling glass behind them smashed, leaving the place wide open.
He entered without hesitation, stepping into a world of rank shadows – and almost immediately thought he heard something again.
He swivelled where he stood, turning full circle.
As his eyes attuned, he saw that he was in a kind of lobby, though it was so dilapidated that few recognisable fixtures or fittings remained. There was space in front of him where a reception desk might once have been situated, but nothing sat there now except a pile of broken, rotted timbers. The wall behind that was bare plaster, still displaying a pattern of squarish pale marks where posters had formerly been attached.
He turned left, shining his Maglite down a long, broad corridor. The torch illuminated eighty or so yards of empty passageway, though almost inevitably, halfway along it there was an abandoned wheelchair. When he turned right, it was the same story, though this second passage was empty and puddled with green-tinted water.
