The Charnel House in Copperfield Street Read online

  ‘Finished?’ Regina said.

  ‘Oh, yes! You’re right, there’s nothing much down here, is there?’

  ‘No.’

  He climbed the steps first, and then waited in the hallway while she locked the basement door.

  ‘Have your children been affected by anything?’

  ‘I don’t think so. Although Briar has an imaginary friend called Henry who she talks to.’

  ‘Have you asked her about him?’

  ‘Yes, but she won’t tell me anything.’

  ‘And you don’t find that strange?’

  ‘Of course, but what would you have me do – beat her until she confesses?’

  ‘Probably not.’

  He followed her through the rest of the house – the dining room where she identified the cold spot, but he didn’t feel any change in temperature; the living room where Stanley Humblin was reading while five-year-old Nellie and three-year-old Briar played quietly on the carpeted floor; upstairs to the four bedrooms and family bathroom; and then into the attic that had been converted into a studio.

  There was a fitted shelving unit at the end of the attic that followed the shape of the angled roof and contained dozens of books, and odds and ends; the floor had been covered in antique-looking hard-wood laminate; there were easels; a rack containing blank canvases; an old wooden desk; a leather chair; a sofa packed full of different coloured cushions; an old threadbare rug; and a trolley full of paints, brushes and rags.

  ‘This is my little sanctuary,’ Regina said. ‘This is where I come for peace and quiet, and to paint and write.’

  ‘Oh! What do you paint and write?’

  She opened up a large black leather artist’s portfolio case sitting on top of the desk and stood to the side. ‘Take a look for yourself.’

  He turned over each sheet of cartridge paper in turn. They were fine, detailed and beautiful paintings of flowers, herbs, birds, people, her daughters, her husband, buildings, animals – anything that seemed to take her fancy. Some were in watercolour, others in oils, acrylic, or a mixture of both. She’d also written the details of her observation in an elaborate calligraphy.

  ‘You’re very talented,’ he said. Not that he had any knowledge of what was good or bad in an artistic sense, but he knew what he liked, and according to the people who did know about such things – beauty was always in the eye of the beholder.

  ‘Do you sell your paintings?’

  ‘Yes. And before you ask, they sell for between three hundred and a thousand pounds.’

  ‘I’m not surprised. Have you exhibited?’

  ‘In local art and craft shops; the Library; those types of places, but not in a gallery.’

  ‘You should.’

  He thought he’d come to the end of the paintings, but then the tips of his fingers caught the edge of the leather by mistake. He lifted it. There seemed to be a second – hidden section – to the portfolio. In this section were more paintings, but these weren’t the same. Not the same by any measure of similarity. In fact, he wondered if they were even by Regina Humblin, or someone completely different. He glanced at her and said, ‘What are these?’

  ‘Oh! You weren’t meant to see those.’

  He could understand why. Each one had been drawn using black ink. A crimson liquid had also been applied to represent blood. The subject matter was anything but beautiful. It was dark, evil and disgusting. In each piece of artwork there was a chained naked woman being mutilated, dismembered or tortured by a man who had his back to the viewer.

  ‘Is that you in the pictures?’

  ‘Yes, I think so.’

  ‘What about the man?’

  ‘I don’t know who he is.’

  Maybe Stanley was right, maybe it wasn’t the house, maybe it was all about Regina Humblin. The mysterious paintings suggested she was someone with a split personality. Of course, he was only a student of the human psyche. To gain a better understanding, he’d need to speak to an expert.

  He took out his phone. ‘Do you mind if I take photographs of these pictures?’

  ‘No, I suppose that will be all right.’

  He took a photograph of each of the thirty paintings.

  ‘I know what you’re thinking,’ she said.

  ‘You can hardly blame me. These paintings don’t put you in a very good light, Regina.’

  ‘I know. That’s why you weren’t meant to see them.’

  ‘Why would you paint something like this?’

  ‘I have to.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘It’s as if I’m being compelled to paint them. Sometimes, I come up here to draw a flower, a bird, or something else and then, it’s as if I blackout. When I wake up and become aware of my surroundings again, I find I’ve painted another picture – it’s this house. There’s something terribly wrong with this house.’

  ‘Others might say it’s you.’

  ‘I know, but it’s not. Please, don’t go away thinking you’ve found the answer – I’m not the answer. I know my husband doesn’t believe me, but you have to. You’re my last chance to find out what’s happening, Inspector Quigg.’

  He stared into her eyes and said, ‘I’m trained not to jump to conclusions, to keep an open mind, and to consider all the possible scenarios. I’ll go away and do some research and see what I can find out. Do you have a copy of the title deeds?’

  She shook her head. ‘No, sorry. We do have the conveyance deed, which describes the land and boundaries. There’s also an architect’s drawing attached, which shows the house and those boundaries. I obtained a photocopy of that in case you needed it.’

  ‘That’s a start.’

  ‘It’s downstairs. I’ll give it to you before you go.’

  ‘Thank you. Do you know the history of the house?’

  ‘No. All we know is what I’ve already told you. We have no idea who owned the house before the old couple who died here.’

  ‘Then I think I have everything I need for today.’

  ‘When will I hear from you again?’

  ‘Once I’ve completed my research, which hopefully won’t take too long, because I do have some assistants.’

  He followed her down the stairs, along the hallway and out through the open front door. ‘I’ll be in contact, Regina.’

  As he made his way back to Southwark train station, he thought about 66 Copperfield Street. Was it Regina? Did she suffer from a split personality? Or was it something or someone in the house? Or maybe a combination of all three? It was strange that he hadn’t experienced anything while he’d been in the house. Was it all in her head, as her husband thought? Those dark pictures were certainly not normal. Why did she draw pictures of women being mutilated and tortured? And who did the man represent? Of course, he was aware that some people did create artwork like that, but Regina’s paintings were something else entirely.

  Chapter Two

  Monday, November 6

  ‘Morning, ‘Spector Quigg. How’re you? I heard you was nearly a naked sacrifice in Bethnal Green! I would have paid good money to see that.’

  Mandy – the trainee clerical assistant – invited herself in and sat in one of the two dark-grey plastic chairs in front of his desk. She’d changed her hair again. Previously, it had portrayed the white and red English flag, but now it was braided in all the colours of the rainbow. Instead of the usual gold in her piercings, she’d swapped the jewellery to match the braided colours. She wore an oversized dark-red sleeveless t-shirt that revealed everything there was to reveal, which included her black lace bra that barely held in her over-ripe melons; a black taffeta skirt that had difficulty covering the cheeks of her backside; a red lace thong; black tights with more holes than nylon; and scuffed black Doc Martin boots.

  ‘Good money! Is there such a thing?’

  ‘I suppose there must be. I mean, you got good and bad beers, melons and no melons, hot sex and boring sex . . . I guess everything has gotta have an opposite.’

  ‘S
o, you’re saying that money can be good or bad?’

  ‘If you say so, ‘Spector.’

  ‘Well, to answer your original question, yes I was nearly a naked sacrifice in Bethnal Green. But to be honest, I don’t remember much about it, because the witchdoctor gave me an hallucinogenic drug.’

  ‘Where you see weird things?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘Me and my Wayne tried one of them once.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘Well, as you say, if you don’t remember nowt, what’s the point?’

  ‘Exactly. No point at all. By the way, you look good enough to spread on two slices of crispy toast this morning.’

  ‘Are you trying to hit on me, ‘Spector Quigg?’

  ‘Absolutely not.’

  ‘Cos I wouldn’t be against a quick one in the stock room, if you had a mind.’

  ‘Far too early in the morning for me, Mandy. But thanks for thinking of me.’

  ‘No problem, ‘Spector. If you change your mind, you know where I hang out.’

  ‘Of course. So, any post for me this morning?’

  ‘You bet.’ She went back out to the post trolley, bent right over from the waist and rummaged around in a drawer on the bottom shelf. He tried not to look, but he could have sworn he saw her tonsils at the end of a colonic tunnel. She returned with a handful of letters held together by an elastic band. ‘Here we are, ‘Spector,’ she said, sitting down again. ‘Quite a lot this morning, and you got a postcard from the triples in Canada, as well.’ She slid it out of the handful of envelopes and passed it to him.

  Evie, Ava and Noah were dressed in matching jumpsuits to keep themselves warm, but they were not alone this time. Aryana and her husband were kneeling down in the Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan snow behind them. They were all smiling for a happy family photograph. It made him smile as well, until he turned the card over to discover the message Aryana the psychic had written:

  Don’t gaze upon the Gorgon’s face.

  Beware! Evil walks again.

  The missionary’s daughter is the answer.

  Love from Aryana and her happy family

  XXX

  What did he make of that? The dead are walking again! The dead were dead – they didn’t walk anywhere. Was she referring to his paranormal investigations at 66 Copperfield Street? Or was it something else entirely? There were no Gorgons in the world anymore, they were Greek mythological monsters. The missionary’s daughter was obviously his new partner – DC Jezebel Rummage, but what answer did she have? Well, he guessed time would reveal the inner workings of the universe.

  ‘Made me go all goose-pimply when I read it, ‘Spector.’

  ‘You’re not meant to read people’s mail before they do, Mandy.’

  ‘It was only your mail, and you don’t count as people.’

  ‘That’s reassuring to hear.’

  Mandy stood up. ‘Anyway, I better get my fat arse moving. Don’t want Mrs Morbid taking the post off me again.’

  ‘No, we definitely wouldn’t want that, would we?’

  She clomped out. ‘Later alligator.’

  ‘See you soon, Racoon.’

  She grinned, turned, wiggled the cheeks of her backside at him and carried on with her postal delivery round.

  ‘QUIGG! Chief Superintendent Walter Belmarsh bellowed down the corridor.

  ‘Yes, Chief?’

  ‘Get your arse down here.’

  ‘Coming, Chief.’

  He made his way to the Chief’s office.

  Miss Christie Tinkley was sitting at her desk in a black dress that resembled a second skin and revealed the contours of a perfect body. He ogled the chasm of her cleavage that he knew would lead him directly to the fiery sulphur pits of Hell. Her long blonde hair was combed over to the side and held there with a black ribbon tied in a bow. Around her neck she wore a gold infinity necklace.

  ‘Good morning, Inspector Quigg,’ she said, and licked her cherry-blossom lips.

  She wasn’t saying “Good morning” at all. What she meant was in code. All he had to do was decipher that impenetrable code and untold riches would be his.

  ‘Good morning, Miss Tinkley.’ That’s not what he wanted to say. In fact, he didn’t want to say anything. He wanted to . . .

  ‘Get in here, Quigg. Stop dilly dallying with Miss Tinkley.’

  ‘Yes, Sir.’ He suppressed his lustful desires and walked into the Chief’s office.

  ‘Shut the door.’

  He turned, took a last longing look at Miss Tinkley’s white porcelain neck, curved back and long slender legs, and closed the door.

  ‘Sit.’

  He felt like a performing otter as he sat in one of the easy chairs. ‘Any coffee going this morning, Chief?’

  ‘Do you think this is the canteen you’ve shambled into, Quigg?’

  ‘No, Chief.’

  ‘I’m glad about that, because it’s about as far away from the canteen as it’s possible to get without being transferred to the Arctic to clean up the penguin shit.’

  He guessed he wasn’t going to be offered coffee, so he waited for the Chief to get to the point.

  ‘I’ve had the Commissioner on the telephone.’

  ‘That must have been uncomfortable for you, Sir.’

  ‘Not so much uncomfortable, as unfathomable.’

  ‘I find that hard to believe for a man of your obvious high level of intelligence.’

  ‘He wants you to investigate the deaths of two people who were found in a layby on the Great West Road just before reaching the M4 motorway in Chiswick.’

  ‘Sounds straightforward. Why . . .?’

  The Chief passed him a photograph.

  He stared at the two naked bodies. ‘They have no heads.’

  ‘No wonder the Commissioner wants you on the case. I’m surprised you haven’t solved it already.’

  Quigg looked to see if any more photographs were forthcoming, but there didn’t appear to be. ‘Where are their heads, Sir?’

  ‘My advice is to stop asking stupid questions and get over there with DC Rummage.’

  ‘That’s good advice, Chief.’

  ‘You might also like to take a look at their torsos in the photograph you’re holding in your grubby hand.’

  He scrutinised the picture again. ‘Are those crosses burned into their flesh, Sir?’

  ‘That’s my understanding.’

  ‘So you think there might be a religious element to the deaths?’

  ‘Are you still here, Quigg?’

  ‘Already on my way to Chiswick.’

  ‘Perkins is there waiting for you, so get your arse moving, Quigg. And don’t even glance in Miss Tinkley’s direction on your way out if you want to remain an Inspector.’

  ‘The thought never even entered my head, Chief.’

  ***

  Lucy was back home again. The Druid Council were history; Lancer Communications operatives were all dead; and her father had crawled back into the hole he had climbed out of. She also had an armoury of guns and bullets in the tunnel to defend herself and the others should the need ever arise again. If anyone else came into her house with the idea of harming her or her family, then they’d leave feet first in a body bag.

  Quigg had knocked on her door last night looking for fifty shades of comfort. She was on the pill, but she handed him a condom as she let him in. All she had on were a pair of shorts and a baggy tank top that didn’t hide much . . . Well, nothing really, but then she didn’t have that much to hide.

  ‘What’s this?’ he asked, staring at the square silver packet with the outline of a circle protruding from it lying in the palm of his hand.

  She shut and locked the door. ‘Protection.’

  ‘For you or me?’

  Her eyes narrowed to slits. ‘Are you suggesting that I might have some kind of disease from which you need that type of protection?’

  ‘You’re the one handing out the condoms like smarties.’

  ‘Smarties are for e
ating.’

  He licked his lips. ‘I’m sure they make edible condoms that are environmentally-friendly now.’

  ‘Well, that isn’t one of them.’

  ‘I can’t say I’m not disappointed. So, I guess they’re to protect you from me?’

  ‘Got it in one. They’re the fourth line of my defence against you getting me pregnant.’

  ‘What are the other three?’

  ‘Locking the door, and if you do manage to wriggle your way in – keeping my legs closed, and then the pill.’

  ‘You’ve let me breach the first line of your defence.’

  ‘That’s because I can’t remember the last time I was shagged.’

  ‘So, you’re relying on the last two to keep you baby-free?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I hate wearing condoms. It’s like having a bath with your socks on, or a shower wearing a raincoat, or . . .’

  ‘Nobody’s forcing you to have a bath or shower, if you don’t want to. You could fuck off and leave me alone. I could get a male escort who looks like Brad Pitt and has a . . . ‘

  ‘Just point me in the direction of the bathroom.’

  ‘Why are you here, anyway? What’s wrong with Ruth or Duffy?’

  ‘They keep mentioning the V-word.’

  ‘I don’t see why you’re so against having a vasectomy, Quigg. I mean, it’s not as if you haven’t sown your seed. In fact, you’ve sown more seeds than the Mongol hordes.’

  ‘It’s a man-thing.’

  ‘Well, I should really be chaining myself to railings, throwing Molotov cocktails at the police and standing in solidarity with my persecuted sisters. So, if I am lying down like a traitor and letting you crawl between my legs to have your way with me, then you’re wearing that condom.’