Depth of Despair (3 page)

‘I reckon the estate manager would be the best bet. The owner is well over ninety and absolutely loopy fruit. That means—’

‘Thanks, Clara, I know what that means.’

‘The secretary told me there are no direct descendants and when the old lady pops her clogs—’

‘I know what that means too.’

‘—the estate will pass to another branch of the family. Apparently, it’s of great concern to the anglers. They’re worried a new owner might want to fish the tarn and the club would lose the rights. There are only two seasons left on the lease. They’re praying the old lady stays alive long enough for them to renew.’

‘Thanks, Clara,’ Mike said. ‘I’m off now. I’ll pop in the library on my way home; see what I can find out about the area.’

Nash called at the off-licence first and selected a couple of bottles of his favourite wine. Back at his flat the meal he’d left in the slow cooker would be ready when he was. He uncorked one of the
bottles and took a leisurely shower. He settled down to read the library book written by a local historian. He was disturbed by the phone. It was Clara to confirm the search party had been organized for the morning. ‘Good, you can pick me up en route.’

‘I assume from that you’re about to open a bottle of wine?’

‘Wrong, I’ve already opened it.’

Clara groaned in mock despair. ‘How did you go on with your research?’

‘I was right about Cauldmoor. It does have an evil reputation. I’ll tell you the details tomorrow.’ He laughed wickedly, ‘When we’re there and you can soak up the atmosphere.’

‘Thanks a bundle. Just don’t soak up too much atmosphere tonight and don’t give yourself nightmares either.’

‘No, Mother,’ he mocked.

Despite Clara’s warnings, by the time he’d finished reading, the first bottle was almost empty. Without conscious thought he’d opened the second. By the time he was ready for bed that too was half empty. He tried to remember whether or not he’d taken his tablets. To be on the safe side he took two, washing them down with the last few drops of wine in his glass. Nash was in bed by eleven o’clock. In the early hours he began to dream.

He lay trembling, knew he’d been dreaming. A nightmare so realistic that the horror remained until morning.

Nash stared out from the bothy as daylight crept reluctantly over the tarn. A stiff breeze was blowing, ruffling the surface of the water into white-capped wavelets. Nash shivered, not from cold but from the sense of foreboding that had dogged him since his first visit.

Mironova came out to join him and passed him a mug. He nodded his thanks and continued to watch as members of the search party made their way down Misery Near and crossed The Grieving Stones towards Lamentation Tarn.

‘What’s wrong, Mike?’

‘Wrong,’ he said with an effort. ‘How do you mean?’

‘You look as if you’ve had little more than five minutes sleep,’ she smiled. ‘If things were different I’d suspect you’d been
shagging
all night, but you’ve hardly spoken a word since I picked you up, and now you’re here you’ve spent all your time staring into the distance. It doesn’t take a genius to work out something’s wrong. Is it a hangover?’

He told her what he’d learned of the history of Cauldmoor.

‘There was a settlement here in Saxon times but the inhabitants were massacred. The piece I read described how the Vikings slaughtered them. The men were killed first. Then the women and children were raped and murdered. In the middle of it the long hut caught fire and everyone perished. The rumour is this place is haunted. None of the locals will venture near.’

‘That explains a lot,’ Clara said. ‘I mean what Wardle told me. This place is beautiful so how come it isn’t the most popular picnic spot in the area? How come nobody’s built here? You’d have buyers queuing up, normally.’

‘Agreed, then to cap it off I had a bloody awful dream.’

‘I’m not surprised, having read that lot. I hope this was a one-off and that you’re not starting to have nightmares again. You haven’t got Stella at home to watch over you.’

‘It worries me too. I wish I knew how to stop them but I’m scared to talk to the medics. The last thing I need is them saying I’m not fit. I’ve been there once and I don’t want to go back.’

‘If it’s starting to affect your health you might think differently.’

Pearce joined them on the veranda. ‘Everyone’s here, Mike. Do you want a word before we start?’

‘I’d better. Gather them round the front.’

Nash looked at the assembled officers. ‘You understand the problem we’ve got. The victims have been in the water so long identification will be next to impossible unless we get really lucky. We need anything that might help us, might give us some idea as
to who these young women were, where they came from, how they came to this desolate spot and were killed. What you’re looking for is anything that doesn’t belong here. Anything. No matter how insignificant or irrelevant it might seem. Anything that might have been left by the victims or whoever murdered them.’

The search took all morning and into the afternoon. The team was split into two sections. One, led by Pearce, quartered the slopes of Misery Near before moving on to The Grieving Stones. The other concentrated on the area immediately surrounding the tarn. The teams moved slowly, inching their way with painstaking care from the far distance towards the bothy.

Nash stood watching as the operation drew to a close. He felt a sense of disappointment. He’d hoped the day would have produced some result. He’d no idea why he expected this, a hunch, sixth sense, whatever. A weak autumn sun filtered down the valley providing light but no warmth. The wind had stiffened and swung to blow cold from the north. ‘Make a note, Clara. Sometime this week we ought to interview house owners on the road between here and Bishop’s Cross. I know there’s only a handful, and I realize it’s long odds against them remembering strange vehicles but we must still do it. Whoever killed those girls had to use that road to get here.’

The teams gathered in front of the bothy. Nash could sense their dejection. Their leader, a sergeant from Netherdale, reported the failure then excused himself. He disappeared to answer a call of nature. He returned a couple of minutes later; his despondent air gone, signalling to Nash and Mironova.

They followed as he led them round the building and pointed along the back wall. The bothy had been sited by digging a cleft out of the hill where it sloped down to the tarn. Where the hillside met the building a protective wall of heavy, ancient railway sleepers had been sunk into the ground to prevent a landslip pushing the bothy into the tarn.

The sergeant marched to the far end of the building and pointed. They could just make out something protruding slightly from between the sleepers. Only the tip of the object was visible. ‘I was about to er… water my horse,’ the sergeant said. ‘I looked down and saw this. It was wedged between the sleepers and the
building. I bent down and pulled it out a bit, then I thought I’d better call you.’

Nash donned his gloves and began to ease the object from its hiding place. He gazed at it in complete, speechless amazement. He looked at Mironova, who seemed equally dumbfounded. The ‘object’ was about twelve inches tall. Two bright, beady eyes stared back at Nash from alongside a black-tipped muzzle. The rest of the body was bright blue. Nash was staring at a particularly handsome teddy bear.

‘How did that get here?’ Mironova exclaimed.

‘Put it in an evidence bag. It may have no relevance but we ought to follow it up,’ he passed the toy to Mironova. ‘Thanks, Sergeant.

‘I want that bear forensically examined. Then I want it checked by an expert. I have a feeling that bear can tell us a lot.’

When they returned to Helmsdale, Pearce called through Nash’s office door, ‘Mexican Pete’s on the phone, and he sounds agitated.’

‘I’ve completed my preliminary examination. My report will be with you in a couple of days. I’ve sent samples off for analysis and most of what the bodies have to tell us will be as a result of those tests. However, I did discover one significant fact during my
examination
of skeleton B. I had occasion to move the pelvic bone and I noticed a minute bone on the table below it. A very tiny bone.’

‘A piece that had broken off the skeleton?’ Nash asked.

‘No, you misunderstand me. I didn’t say it’s a piece of bone. It’s a tiny bone. Complete, but in miniature.’

‘I’m sorry. I fail to see the point.’

‘It’s a foetal bone. It didn’t belong to skeleton B at all. Or rather it did and it didn’t. The bone came from a developing foetus. Skeleton B was pregnant.’

That evening Nash finished the red wine and followed it with a couple of scotches. He realized he was drinking too much but he also knew the reason. It was the thought of what those young girls might have endured before they were thrown like garbage into the icy water. Pratt had forbidden further expense for the divers to search the remainder of Lamentation Tarn but Mike believed there were still more horrors below those dark waters. He shuddered as
a fresh thought came to him. If the Tarn hadn’t yielded all its secrets what more were there? Not only there but in neighbouring Desolation Tarn? Nash tried to push the thoughts away but they refused to leave. He almost forgot his medication and had to get out of bed to retrieve the tablets from the kitchen. He returned to bed for what would be another unsettled night’s sleep.

Nash’s dream ended and he awoke. 

Lulu was ready. Day after day, week after week she’d watched and waited for each opportunity, each moment her captors’ attention was distracted. The process was agonizingly slow and she lived in constant fear of her plan falling apart. This didn’t add to her distress, but that was because her ordeal was already beyond endurable.

At last everything was set. Lulu had the plan, now she had the opportunity. She had the means and above all the motive. Her only concern was if she’d have the resolution. What she intended was a sin and a crime. Lulu pondered this, feeling her resolve weakening. Then she remembered what had been done to her, each sordid and degrading act, and her courage returned. All doubt vanished and her resolve hardened.

As she worked under the relentless supervision of the most sadistic of her guards she was terrified that some last-minute hitch would throw her plan into disarray. Time crawled by until the man signalled to Lulu to start preparing the evening meal. He held up three fingers to signify for how many. Lulu nodded and turned away. She smiled grimly. Perhaps the gesture was an omen. The sign he’d just made denoted victory in Lulu’s country.

The men gathered at the table and Lulu began to serve. She waited in a corner until they’d finished. As they ate, apprehension and agitation grew as the time for her escape bid came closer. There was much conversation as they lingered over the dish. Finally, the leader signalled her to clear and make way for the dessert.

She placed the dishes of aromatic confectionary in front of them,
passed the tiny cups of thick, dark coffee and walked over to the sideboard. She glanced back. They were already tucking into the dessert, one had almost finished. Lulu put out the small glasses to hold the liquor that signalled the end of every meal. She took a bottle from the cupboard and filled their glasses, taking care not to spill any of the precious, colourless liquid.

They called for the drinks and Lulu set them down swiftly on the table. Tradition called for the fiery liquid to be downed in one gulp without the slightest hesitation. All three snatched at the glasses and did this unflinchingly.

Lulu was so petrified she could barely look. Fiery the liquid certainly was, although not as they anticipated. They rose to their feet, hands clutching, scrabbling at their throats with choking, incomprehensible sounds. Gasping, eyes bulging, faces reddening and convulsed. They turned towards Lulu. They realized what they’d drunk. The knowledge came too late.

Like synchronized swimmers they raised themselves on tiptoe as the agony became intolerable, then collapsed to the floor writhing in agony. Lulu stood watching as hope began to replace fear. The tremors of her tormentors lessened and she moved across the room.

Carrying a carving knife from the dresser and without displaying any emotion, she went to each in turn. With a skill born of too much practice she unzipped their trousers and pulled them down. Wielding the knife, clumsily at first but with increasing dexterity she operated on the second and third of her victims. Although they were far beyond speech, unable to cry out, the violent thrashing of their bodies showed Lulu they were not yet insensitive to pain. She smiled angelically and on impulse went through to the kitchen and returned with a lemon. She sliced it in three with the bloodied knife and rubbed, then squeezed the lemon over each wound site in turn. Her smile becoming beatific as she saw the increased agony the astringent liquid produced. As a final gesture, almost an afterthought, Lulu emptied the salt cellar over the wounds then rubbed it in with the sole of her shoe. She
gathered
up the sets of genitals and thrust them into each man’s mouth, taking care that none should get his own.

Removing a bunch of keys from the jacket of one of the dying
men she hurried through to the kitchen and tossed the knife on to the draining board. She ran upstairs to her room and stripped off the blood-soaked clothes. In the bathroom she quickly cleaned herself. Dressed again, she unlocked the back door, opened it and stepped out. Despite the time she’d been held prisoner she’d never seen outside the building and had no idea where she was. The curtains of each room had been kept closed so Lulu could not see out; others could not look in. Shivering in the unaccustomed cold she turned to lock the door. A rickety gate set in the stone wall of the yard screeched, causing her to wince. She peered out into a narrow alley lined with houses identical to the one she’d left.

Lulu felt a moment of panic. She’d escaped her vile prison but had committed three murders. She was free from the nightmare she’d endured for so long but was now faced with an appalling dilemma. Where should she go, what should she do? She didn’t even know what country she was in.

Lulu steeled herself and walked to the main road. Here she could see more activity. She watched in terror as the headlights of a vehicle came towards her. The car was on the wrong side of the road. Worse still another car was approaching from the opposite direction. Lulu closed her eyes, waiting for the inevitable crashing, rending sound of metal on metal as the two vehicles collided. Nothing happened, her eyes opened again. The cars had passed one another. What stunned her was that both drivers had stuck to the wrong side of the road. Both had been driving on the left.

Smolensk is a bustling city in western Russia, capital of the Smolensk Oblast, or administrative division. It is a beautiful city with a distinguished and heroic history of resistance against
invasion
. The city is dominated by the magnificent Assumption Cathedral and has many other fine buildings. In common with most cities housing a thriving industrial community not all the structures are beautiful; some areas are run down and less than handsome.

One such building was shabby and anonymous in a row of three-storey, equally unattractive ones. Built a long time ago, the building hadn’t aged well. Years of neglect had followed its construction, and it showed.

The house had been quiet all day with none of the usual callers, all male, that visited the place whatever the hour. Two large vans drew up at the front whilst a further two arrived at the rear. No sooner had they halted than a black saloon car with darkened windows stopped in front of the house.

The rear doors of all four vans opened simultaneously. A team of uniformed policemen emerged and formed a cordon around the house, obviously following a well-rehearsed manoeuvre. The
occupant
of the car, a woman of between thirty and thirty-five years of age climbed out immediately the officers were deployed. She spoke to one of her companions, her tone clearly an order. The man spoke into his radio and officers began attacking both entrances with door enforcers. When the doors gave way they poured inside.

The woman lit a cigarette and leaned against the car, watching and waiting. Eventually an officer emerged. He approached her and saluted. He spoke rapidly, nervously. ‘We were too late Commander. Every room is empty. However, it’s obvious what they were used for.’

The woman showed no emotion. She jerked her head and the officer followed her into the house. Larger rooms had been
subdivided
to create smaller units. Each contained only a chair, a bed, a small wardrobe and a mirror. Every bed had an iron frame. Each had a set of chains dangling from the wall behind it. The worst aspect of the brothel was the smell. Every room stank with the unmistakeable sour odours of stale sweat and semen.

After the first floor the woman had seen enough. She pointed towards the stairs. Before climbing back into the car she paused to address the local commander. ‘Stay here,’ she ordered. ‘Make arrangements with the Fire Department. As soon as they get here, torch the building.’

‘You can’t do that,’ he protested.

She looked at him, her face expressionless, but a chill in her eyes. ‘This building is being used for criminal activities. Therefore it is forfeit. I shall pass here in two hours. If it isn’t already burning I shall set the fire myself.’ She turned away, adding, ‘and you will be looking for work.’

She climbed into the car. ‘You know where to go.’

The driver swung the car out into the street. ‘What went wrong?’

‘I’m afraid our friend has been supplementing his income. I worry about what we’ll find.’

‘Do you think there’ll be a backlash?’

The woman shrugged. ‘I don’t know and I don’t care. I’ve been given the task of destroying these bastards. Our actions have been approved by Moscow. Let the criminals complain.’

It was a fifteen-minute drive to their destination. As the car came to a halt at the kerbside the woman said, ‘As I suspected, we are too late.’ She pointed ahead. Lying in the gutter was a human head. It had been severed from the body with great skill. She recognized the head immediately. It was that of a Ukrainian girl who’d escaped from the brothel. She’d been courageous enough to tell the police of the place, how she’d been subjected to three years of enforced prostitution there. Now she was dead. Slaughtered for betraying her captors and as a message to others. She’d been two months away from her fifteenth birthday.

The woman climbed wearily from the car. She glanced up and down the street. It was deserted, much as she’d expected. Nobody would have seen or heard anything. She knew that from bitter experience. ‘Get on to the DNSI’ (Investigation cell duty officer). Order him to send a unit here. Then ring the EKU (Directorate of Criminal Expertise) and tell them I’ll be on my way in shortly.’ She lit a cigarette and continued. ‘Explain what happened. Tell them the man we suspected has given himself away. He was the only one apart from us who knew where the girl was.’

As the phone calls were made she waited, staring bleakly at the dead girl’s head. She straightened and threw her cigarette into the gutter where it smouldered in a pool of blood. ‘Is the local commander coming?’ she asked. Her driver nodded. ‘The minute he gets here, slap the handcuffs on him, stick him in the back of the car and we’ll set off for the Bolshoi Dom (‘Big House’, St Petersburg Police Headquarters), okay.’

The exhaustive enquiries into members and guests of Bishopton Angling Club had taken several weeks and produced nothing. Nash was on the phone to Tom Pratt. ‘The problem is we’ve no idea what we’re looking for. Two girls were murdered and thrown into that tarn years ago, but apart from that and the fact that one of
them was pregnant we know no more than we did on the first day. Investigating a case with so little evidence is bloody frustrating and we’re still waiting for the final reports from Mexican Pete.’

Mironova entered his office with a visitor. ‘Mike, let me
introduce
you to our local toy expert.’

‘DI Mike Nash,’ Mike shook hands with the frail-looking, middle aged man. ‘I’m pleased to meet you. I assume you’ve come to tell us something about our teddy bear?’

‘Indeed I have, Mr Nash.’ He pushed his glasses back on to the bridge of his nose and took some papers from a document case. ‘And a very interesting bear he is.’

He glanced down at the topmost sheet. ‘I’d a long job searching for this little fellow’s make. The problem is there are so many
mass-produced
bears it’s not easy to keep track of them. This isn’t one of them though. This chap is very special. I thought so when Sergeant Mironova brought him to my shop. I didn’t like to say as much until I was sure of my facts but once I’d checked out the materials used I knew we were dealing with something out of the ordinary.’

‘I thought a teddy bear was just a teddy bear,’ Nash confessed. ‘I didn’t think there was anything different about this one.’

A pained expression crossed the expert’s face. ‘Ever since they were first made,’ he told them severely, ‘there’s been a mystique about teddy bears no other toy can match. Take Steiff bears for example. Steiff is the German manufacturer who invented the bear with jointed limbs. They can fetch really big prices at auction.’ He paused before continuing, ‘As for this one, he is distinctive and unique. I had a clue from both the material and appearance. It was made with special fabrics and threads. Obviously handmade. Above all there was the appearance. It differs from European and American bears. I got the idea he might be Russian so I got in touch with the Vakhtanoff Doll Gallery in Moscow. They’re the foremost experts on dolls and bears. They were able to supply me with the name of the maker,’ he paused triumphantly and added, ‘as well as the name of the bear.’

‘The bear has a name?’ Mironova asked.

‘Indeed he has.’ He was clearly enjoying himself. ‘Allow me to introduce him. This is Mitya. Mitya is a diminutive form of the name Dmitriy. Mitya was made by a lady who has a high
reputation
for quality. She’s been making dolls for three or four years I believe.’

He stopped, although it was clear he had more to tell. ‘The gallery told me she doesn’t produce many so they would try to track the owner of Mitya.’ He paused before delivering his
bombshell
. ‘Within forty-eight hours I had a return phone call. Not from the maker or the Gallery, but from this person.’ He fumbled a piece of paper across the desk. ‘She wanted to know why I was enquiring about that bear. The phone number is that of the EKU, the Directorate of Criminal Expertise, part of the MVD. She said it was similar to the FBI in America.’

When Mironova returned from showing him out Nash was on the phone. ‘Thanks, Professor, that’s all I needed to know. I’ll see you next Friday.’

He put the phone down. ‘Why on earth would the Russian police be interested in that bear?’ she asked.

‘Search me. Perhaps he’s on their bear most-wanted list. I suppose I’ll have to ring them, although it has nothing to do with our two skeletons.’

‘How do you know?’

‘It doesn’t tie in date-wise. Ramirez says the shortest time those skeletons could have been in the water is seven or eight years. This bear is less than five years old.’

‘So you’re discounting the bear?’

‘I didn’t say that. I still want to know how a handmade teddy bear found its way from Russia to one of the most remote parts of North Yorkshire.’ Nash glanced down at the paper. ‘It’s to be hoped Commander Dacic can tell me, because it’s got me baffled.’