The Hanged Man Read online

  The victim was propped up against the front door. His legs were splayed outwards on the floor and there were two large bloodstains on his shirt. A long line of dried blood ran from his mouth to his shirt collar.

  I turned to Gibson, who was standing a few feet behind me and Dan, next to the body of a big black Labrador.

  ‘This isn’t Manning,’ I told him. ‘It’s someone else.’

  Three

  In those few terrible seconds during which the blond man bent down and started to lift the lid of the chest in which he was hiding, Hugh Manning had been so terrified that he’d completely lost control of his bodily functions. Urine had begun streaming into his underpants, and he’d felt his bowels loosen, releasing a small, silent fart. Crouched in the foetal position, he’d reverted to being a baby.

  But the blond man had stopped. Instead, Manning had heard the sound of the front door of the house opening, and a dog barking.

  The killer had cursed, dropped the lid, and run from the room.

  Manning had heard a man whose voice he didn’t recognize say indignantly ‘Who are you?’ then cry out in real fear – probably as he saw the gun the second man had with him. A series of pops had followed, like champagne corks being released, and the man had cried out again, this time in pain.

  After that, for a few seconds everything had been silent. Manning had exhaled, his earlier fear giving way to a sense of hope. He could hear the two men talking quietly downstairs. He hadn’t been able to make out what they were saying but their tone was urgent. Their operation had obviously gone wrong, and it was unlikely they could afford to hang around much longer. Manning had thought about moving his hiding place. The blond man had already searched the cupboard so if he hid in there he was probably safe, whereas if he stayed here he was still at risk. Or maybe he should just wait?

  So that’s what he did. He’d never been the most patient of men so he’d forced himself to stay in the chest by counting the seconds in his head. Only when he’d got to two thousand did he lift the lid and heave himself out.

  The house had been completely silent. Even so, he’d still listened for a long time before creeping to the top of the staircase and peering over the banister.

  Which was when he’d seen the bodies of the man by the door and his dog at the foot of the stairs. He’d never seen a dead body before but, in that typically British way, it was the sight of the dog lying there, its head covered in blood, that had truly shocked him. It was a black Lab, like Caesar, the old family dog he’d had as a kid.

  But he’d got over it fast enough because, as soon as he’d ascertained that the house was empty, he’d begun to formulate a plan.

  And now, four days later, Hugh Manning was very much alive and well and sitting in the living room of a converted barn on the edge of southern Scotland’s picturesque Galloway Forest, over two hundred miles across country. The barn belonged to an old university friend of his with the ridiculous but very memorable name of Harry Pheasant. Harry didn’t know Manning was here, of course. No one did. But he and Harry had visited the place together with another friend of Harry’s a couple of years back, ostensibly for a long weekend of walking and shooting but which had instead degenerated into a lot of drinking and not much else. However, throughout the weekend Harry had made a point of telling Manning that he could come up and use the place whenever he wanted, as long as he put money in the log kitty. He’d even shown him where the spare key was kept. So, right now, Manning was simply taking him at his word, although he had no intention of putting any money in the log kitty. He needed every penny he had.

  The journey there had been long and indirect. Manning had remained in the cottage for the rest of the night along with its owner and the dog, not daring to leave in case his pursuers were still in the vicinity. He’d half expected the man’s wife to turn up at some point, as there were photos of the two of them together dotted around upstairs, but she didn’t. No one did, and he’d spent the night on the floor underneath the spare bed well out of sight (just in case), and slept surprisingly soundly considering his situation, location, and the fact that there were bodies beginning to go off only yards away.

  The next morning he’d woken early and, feeling more confident, had ventured downstairs. The owner’s body was still by the front door. He was a long, thin man in his mid-fifties, his hair grey and beginning to thin, but who, even in death, looked like he’d spent a lot of his life outside. There was less blood than Manning had expected and he was surprised at how little it bothered him to crouch down and go through the man’s pockets until he found both his wallet and car keys. His phone was in there too but Manning left that. He already had a phone.

  This had been the second mistake his pursuers had made – leaving the man’s car keys behind and therefore giving Manning a means of escape. He’d always thought of his employers as almost omnipotent, and he was pleased now to be proved wrong.

  He’d then explored the rest of the house. It hadn’t taken him long to work out that its owner, identified by his driving licence as Max Bradshaw, lived alone. All the photos of him and his wife (and there were a lot of them) were at least ten years old. There were no other photos with kids, or friends, just a couple of the dog. For some reason he wasn’t able to explain, Manning had checked the dog’s collar and found out that his name was Monty.

  He felt sorry for Bradshaw and Monty, and also partly responsible for their deaths, but took some comfort in the fact they’d died together and without, in Bradshaw’s case, having to think about it too much. If there was a God, then Bradshaw would be joining his wife, whom Manning was pretty sure had died: you didn’t keep that many photos of someone who’d run off with the postman. Unfortunately he was also certain there wasn’t a God, otherwise men like his employers wouldn’t exist.

  He’d made a cup of tea in Bradshaw’s kitchen while he contemplated his next move. Manning had spent enough time around criminals to work out how both they and the people who hunted them worked. His two pursuers would have been long gone by now. Having committed two murders in separate locations – he knew they would have killed Diana – it would be far too risky to remain in the vicinity given that they knew the police were after him as well.

  The good thing was, the police wouldn’t turn up here and find Bradshaw’s body for a while – it didn’t seem to Manning like the poor guy would be much missed – and this meant that Manning could make use of his car and credit cards for a day or two at least while he came up with a longer-term plan. This was all good of course, but he still needed cash and his passport, both of which were back at the cottage he’d fled the previous day.

  The thought of going back there had scared the crap out of him, just in case he was wrong about Blondie and the gunman, and they were there waiting for him. Once again he’d actually been tempted to pick up the phone and give himself up to the police. He’d even had the mobile in his hand at one point, but he’d finally rejected the idea. He’d come this far and he had to keep going.

  So it had been with a rapidly beating heart that he went back to the cottage later that morning, crossing the same fields he’d sprinted along the previous day, this time keeping close to the hedgerows to avoid detection. He’d watched the house from behind the laurel trees at the bottom of the garden until he was certain it was empty before letting himself in through the back door.

  He’d let out a gasp when he saw what they’d done to Diana. He’d thought that seeing Bradshaw’s body at close quarters would have prepared him for this, but it was so much worse. His wife, the only woman he’d ever loved – or at least only one of four he’d ever loved – had been lying on the bed cut up and dead. Her last moments must have been a living hell, and Manning knew that he was responsible. He wasn’t usually the type of man who felt guilt, but he’d felt it then. Guilt and sadness that he’d lost the last person who cared about him in this world.

  Hurrying across the room, he’d opened the wardrobe doors and removed a panel at the back behind several pairs
of Diana’s shoes to reveal a small electronic safe. He’d typed in the code and pulled out his fake passport, as well as eight grand in sterling and two thousand euros, stuffing the money into his waistband, having neglected to bring a carrier bag. He’d left Diana’s passport in the safe before relocking it and putting everything back in place.

  As he’d walked back out of the room, he’d glanced over at the suicide note on the desk, considering whether to take it with him or not, but deciding to leave it behind, thinking it would probably confuse the police when they turned up here, which would be no bad thing.

  Manning was fully aware that the full resources of the state would now be after him and that they’d also be looking for a fall guy for the Bone Field killings. He’d had absolutely nothing to do with that, and had been as shocked as anyone when the news had broken about what had happened at the isolated farm in mid-Wales. At first he hadn’t even realized that a company linked to his employers (and indirectly to him) owned it. One of his jobs was to keep the properties and businesses his employers owned hidden from the view of the authorities, but there were so many of them and they were in so many places there was no way he could remember them all. It was only when it was announced on TV that the police were having difficulty establishing who owned the farm that it had dawned on him that the murders were probably something to do with his employers. He knew from experience that they were capable of some terrible things, which was why he’d been planning his exit from the business for a long time. Even so, he hadn’t quite appreciated the depths they were prepared to plumb until he’d trawled back through all the paperwork and established the link between the Bone Field, his employers and, most importantly of all, himself.

  Back at Max Bradshaw’s house, he’d fired up the man’s PC and scoured Google Maps. There were a number of large towns and cities within a hundred miles of his location where he could seek shelter. He picked Leeds. He had no ties there and it was big enough to swallow him easily. Using his untraceable mobile, he’d called a Premier Inn in the city, making a booking for that night using Bradshaw’s credit card. He’d then made a second booking at the Ibis in Hull city centre, just to confuse things.

  In the end he’d stayed at neither hotel but had parked Bradshaw’s car in a multi-storey car park in Leeds city centre, found a back-street guesthouse half a mile away, and paid in cash for a two-night stay.

  He’d only stayed for one night before remembering Harry Pheasant’s place and the possibilities it offered. He’d driven up there immediately, stopping only briefly at a lay-by on the A66 near Penrith to rub dirt on both the front and back number plates of Bradshaw’s old Volvo estate in an effort to make it harder to be identified by the ANPR cameras.

  It would have been a real bastard if, by some unfortunate coincidence, Harry had actually been in residence, given how he’d always complained he never got to use the place, but thankfully the house had been empty when he’d turned up and the key was in the same place.

  So here he was now, lying low, bloodied but unbowed, with plenty of provisions and Harry’s ample stock of decent red wine to keep him going, while he pondered his next move.

  The summer sun was high in the sky as he looked out of the window down towards the narrow fast-flowing river at the end of the field opposite. Beside him, leaning against the sofa, was one of the two shotguns Harry kept – a three-shot pump-action Remington. It was loaded and ready to fire, and it made Manning feel safe whenever he looked at it. He knew he couldn’t stay here for ever but for now he’d shaken off both the bad guys and the good, and as he took a sip from his coffee and contemplated his first glass of wine of the evening, for this at least he was grateful.

  Four

  Before we left him, DCI Gibson, the Lincolnshire SIO, said that he’d appreciate our input every step of the way, before emphasizing that this was his case, not ours. He looked pleased to be heading up a double murder case, especially one with a fugitive involved, but I had no doubt he’d be calling for our help pretty quickly.

  I told him that we were there in an advisory capacity only to offer what support we could. But this was bullshit. This was my case. It always had been. My whole life, not just my career, hung on bringing down Cem Kalaman and the others responsible not only for the killings of the women at the farm in Wales, but for other murders too, because I knew that Kalaman and his associates had been preying on young women for a long, long time.

  Just over three months earlier the remains of two missing persons had been unearthed in the grounds of a boarding school in Buckinghamshire during excavation work. One was a thirteen-year-old girl called Dana Brennan who’d been abducted from a quiet country road near her house in the summer of 1989. I think she was their first victim.

  The other remains belonged to twenty-one-year-old graduate Kitty Sinn. Kitty’s case had been a cause célèbre. She’d been reported missing in Thailand in August 1990 by her boyfriend, a man called Henry Forbes, and there hadn’t been a single sighting of her alive since then, even though there’d been huge media coverage both in the UK and abroad. For more than a quarter of a century her disappearance had been an enduring mystery, and the mystery had only deepened when her remains were discovered more than six thousand miles away from where she’d last been seen.

  Henry Forbes told me that he knew what had happened to Kitty and who’d killed her, but he too had been killed before he’d named names, and it was my hunt for those names, and for evidence linking them to their crimes, that had led me all the way to that farm in mid-Wales.

  The evidence I’d been looking for may have been destroyed in the flames that had gutted the farm and its surrounding buildings but even so I’d managed to identify the three people I believed had been directly involved in the murders.

  Of the three, the key player was Cem Kalaman, a lifelong career criminal but one with a great deal of clout. He provided the protection, the muscle and the resources to keep the killings a secret. If no one knew the victims were missing, or even who they were, then no one cared.

  The second player was Alastair Sheridan. A hugely successful hedge fund manager with a net worth of some fifty million pounds, he’d spent a year at the same university as Kalaman, although that was the only connection I had between them so far. Alastair was also Kitty Sinn’s first cousin, and had been a direct beneficiary of her death.

  The third and perhaps most interesting of the three was Alastair Sheridan’s sister Lola, a reclusive artist. I say interesting because I couldn’t understand her reasons for being involved. The killers liked to think of themselves as being in some kind of satanic cult, and they even had their own sign, a pentacle with an ‘M’ running through the middle; but, as far as I could make out, the motive for the murders (with the possible exception of Kitty’s) was sexual. Now I’m aware, having been a police officer for over fifteen years, that there are women out there who get their kicks from violently sexually assaulting other women, but their numbers are very few.

  The real problem we had, though, was lack of evidence. Nothing so far linked any of the three to the house in Wales, or indeed to any of the murders I suspected them of. That didn’t mean I wasn’t certain they were the ones responsible. I would have bet my life on it. Dan, I’m pretty sure, would have done too. We had plenty of snippets of information to back up our claims but nothing that would have a chance of standing up in court. Neither Cem Kalaman, Alastair Sheridan or Lola Sheridan was even named as a suspect in the main police inquiry.

  But the point was, I knew. And I’d made a solemn promise to Dana Brennan’s parents that I’d bring her killers to justice, whatever it took. And nothing had changed.

  One way or another I would.

  Five

  The central offices of the National Crime Agency, supposedly the UK’s answer to the FBI, was a dreary-looking block a few hundred metres south of London’s Vauxhall Bridge. After a battle through the inevitable traffic, Dan and I finally arrived back at just after five p.m.

  The boss was w
aiting for us and immediately convened a meeting in her office.

  Sheryl Trinder was a small, wiry, severe-looking black woman who looked like she spent the bulk of her leisure time doing fifty-mile bike rides, which apparently was exactly what she did – not that she spent a great deal of time at leisure. She’d forced her way into her current position through a combination of hard work, sheer force of will, and a nose for being in the right place at the right time, and she was one of those ambitious political types who wouldn’t stop until she got to the top. As such, she was very well organized, hard as nails, and someone who didn’t suffer fools gladly. She wasn’t an especially good detective but then she didn’t necessarily need to be in her position. There were others who could do that for her. People tended to love Sheryl or hate her. Dan was in the latter camp, considering her far too interfering. Having only worked for her for barely a month, I’d yet to make up my mind. But as she glared across her outsized desk at us, a particularly severe expression on her face, I didn’t think I was likely to be ending up going down the love route.

  ‘So,’ she said, drawing out the word like an accusation as Dan finished apprising her of our day so far, ‘what’s happened to Manning?’

  Dan took a deep breath, trying and failing to keep the note of defeat out of his voice. ‘We don’t know, ma’am. Lincolnshire are doing a search of the whole area but so far they haven’t found any trace of him. The second victim is Max Bradshaw, and his car’s missing. We think the killer or killers tracked down Manning to Bradshaw’s house, and Bradshaw must have come in and disturbed them. We think Manning escaped.’

  Sheryl tapped the nib of her pen on the desktop with just a little bit too much force. ‘He’s obviously more resourceful than we thought,’ she said. ‘How long have the victims been dead for?’