The Sister(150)

‘What’s wrong with you?’ she said.

‘Did you not hear a word I just said?’

‘Yes I did, but I’ve almost finished now, anyway.’ She smiled sweetly at him. ‘The police are withholding quite a lot of information from the press for now.’

‘I don’t know why,’ Miller said. ‘By now he’ll be clean shaven, probably with short hair and dyed another colour as well.’

‘What makes you say that?’ A suspicious look crossed her face. ‘Exactly what is it you do?’

‘I find missing people.’

‘What did you say your name was?’

‘I didn’t!’

‘Okay, Mr I – don’t – want – you to know what my name is!’

He grinned at her. ‘I’ll tell you my name, it’s—’

‘No, no, I prefer you without one. The Man with No Name, like someone from a mystery novel.’

‘Or a Clint Eastwood film?’

She grinned. ‘Before my time.’ Curiosity got the better of her, and she asked, ‘Are you looking for someone right now?’

He hesitated briefly. ‘No, I’m meeting someone. I’m between cases, so to speak.’

She didn’t press him for details. ‘Mmm, I’m interested to know what attracted you to this line of work.’

‘Well, the whole story is a long one, so I’ll just tell you how it began.’

She laughed. ‘This train ride is a long one!’

He explained how he used to stay with his grandfather and how he’d always take a few old copies of True Crime magazine with him, not so much to read, but to study the graphic crime scene photographs.

‘They fascinated me. He’d come and sit next to me, asking questions about the scenes, the evidence. It was like playing Cluedo, but with real lives. We'd investigate the unsolved cases, piecing together everything we could get from what we had in front of us, inventing scenarios, postulating. He used to shoot holes in my wild theories. His ones, of course, were airtight. I learned a lot from him.’ He reminisced, toyed with the idea of telling her about how his grandfather had psychic abilities. Instead, he just said, ‘The old man would have made a great detective.’

‘He sounds fascinating. Do you always find the people you look for? I mean; some people disappear, never to be seen again.’

‘I don’t look for people like that; I only look for people I know I can find.’ He looked out of the window as he spoke, at sheep herded by a dog. He couldn’t see the shepherd, but he knew he was there.

‘I don’t see how you can be selective like that, how can you possibly know?’

‘It’s a waste of time, looking for someone you know won’t be alive when you find them – and how do I know? I just do.’

She looked at him as politely as open disbelief would allow. ‘Oh, come on! You don’t really think you’re going to pass me off with a vague statement like that, do you?’

‘Well, I had hoped I might!’ He allowed her a small grin.

She thought he looked uncomfortable.

‘Look, it’s not something that’s easy to explain, so it’s better not to try at all.’

She looked disappointed, but only for a fleeting moment. She immediately brightened with a new question. ‘Tell me about the people you’ve found then. You must have quite a few stories to tell.’

‘Oh, I don’t think they'd be anywhere near as exciting as some of the ones you must have. Ladies first, you tell me one of yours, then I’ll tell you one of mine.’

‘And they say the age of chivalry is dead!’ She laughed. ‘Okay, where to start? Actually, I’m a freelance reporter. I worked at the News of the World, before going it alone. I didn’t want to have to answer to anyone else anymore. While working at the World – I was there for five years – the police were hunting for this character the press dubbed the Midnight Man, because he always struck around midnight. It had become apparent he was active all over the country. At first, they thought more than one individual was carrying out the crimes, maybe working with others using the same MO to throw the police off the trail.

‘It didn’t take long before they realised it was the work of only one man. Over time, he grew bolder, taking more risks. The crimes had become more and more sexually overt in nature. They realised soon they were going to have a rapist on their hands, maybe even a murderer. Detectives didn’t have any forensics, not a thing. So the police joined forces, pooling information and resources to start an elite task force dedicated to tracking him down. I had some close contacts in the force, so I knew a lot more than the public or even the papers.

‘Anyway, we received this package one day – it was a video cassette – once the editor became aware of its content, she passed it on to the police, but not until after someone made a copy. Anyway, outside of work, I started to collate all the information from previous cases I could get my hands on.

‘I was looking for something to break, but it never did. One night, just for fun, I plotted all the known case locations, onto a map, and guess what I came up with? I had more than six or seven hundred flagged points, extending all over the country. One night I was talking to a friend on the phone, just absently doodling with my pencil. I began drawing lines between the dots…all of a sudden; I said to her, I have to go, as if it was the most significant discovery since radium or whatever.