The Puppet Show (Washington Poe)

‘Anything else?’

‘Have I passed?’

Flynn smiled. ‘Anything else?’

‘Yes. There’s something missing from the files. A control filter, something the SIO is holding back from the media. What is it?’

‘How did you know?’

‘The Immolation Man might not be a sadist but he’s acting sadistically. There’s no way he leaves the bodies unmolested.’

Flynn pointed at her briefcase on the back seat. ‘There’s another file in there.’

He leaned across and retrieved it. It was stamped ‘Secret’ and someone had written ‘Not to be shared without written permission from DCS Gamble’. Poe didn’t open it.

‘Have you heard of the cutting season, Poe?’

He shook his head. He hadn’t.

‘It was originally coined by the NHS. It refers to the time of year – the summer holidays usually – when young girls, some as young as two months old, are taken out of the UK, ostensibly to visit relatives abroad. What they’re going for is to undergo female genital mutilation. They go in the long summer break so their wounds have a chance of healing before they return.’

Poe knew a little bit about FGM, the abhorrent practice of removing parts of a young girl’s genitals to ensure she can’t experience sexual pleasure. It was believed to keep them faithful and chaste. The reality was that the victims had a lifetime of pain and medical problems. In some cultures, the wounds were still stitched together with thorns.

It dawned on Poe why Flynn was telling him this. ‘He’s castrating them?’

‘Technically no. He cuts off the veg and the meat. Neatly and without anaesthetic.’

‘He’s keeping trophies,’ Poe said. A high percentage of serial murderers kept parts of their victims.

‘Actually, he isn’t. Open the file.’

Poe did and nearly lost his lunch. The first photograph explained why the victim’s screams hadn’t been heard.

He’d been gagged.

The photograph was a close-up picture of Graham Russell’s mouth: it was stuffed with his own genitals. The next few photos showed the penis, testicles and scrotum – which were still attached to each other – after they’d been removed from the mouth. Blackened at the end exposed to the fire, surprisingly pink and undamaged at the other. Poe flipped through the rest of the photographs and found them to be much the same.

And he was supposed to be the fifth victim? As if the stakes hadn’t been high enough already. He crossed his legs.

‘We’ll get him before he gets anywhere near you, Poe.’

CHAPTER EIGHT

Deep in the heart of Hampshire, in the grounds of the old Bramshill Police College, lies Foxley Hall. The college might have seen its last course, but Foxley Hall was still the home of the Serious Crime Analysis Section.

For a unit that tended to avoid attention and work in the shadows, the building itself was surprisingly quirky. It was wider than it was tall, had sloping roofs that almost touched the ground, so it looked like SCAS worked in an abandoned Pizza Hut.

Flynn had spent the night at home. Poe had checked into a hotel.

He’d had a fitful night. His nightmares had returned. When he’d been working, the dead had always stayed with Poe. They messed with his dreams and they interrupted his peace. Being back in Hampshire had reopened old wounds. Despite what he’d done, Peyton Williams hadn’t deserved to die. During the early hearings, Poe had been shown photographs of the injuries Mr Bristow had inflicted upon Williams. Teeth removed with pliers, spiral fractures to all his fingers, the punctured spleen that would eventually kill him. It had been six months before Poe managed to get a full night’s sleep.

And now the nightmares were back. Perhaps they’d never gone away . . .

It was eight o’clock in the morning and Poe had to be escorted into Foxley Hall as if he were an official visitor. The receptionist’s bored look changed to one of sycophancy when she saw her boss. She handed Flynn some mail and looked at Poe rudely.

‘And you are?’ Poe asked, glaring back. He might be wearing jeans and look more mountain man than cop, but she was about to learn that SCAS had a sergeant again.

The receptionist looked like she had no intention of answering unless she was told she had to. That was the problem in areas with high employment: no one took their jobs seriously any more. It was little more than pin money.