The Night Stalker (Detective Erika Foster 2)

There was one other picture of Mary, from the ID photo on her bus pass. It had been taken three years previously. Mary stared fearfully into the camera against a stark white background, a rabbit caught in the headlights: limp grey hair, her face creased and lined.

What happened to Mary between 1961 and 2013? thought Simone. And where was George? As far as she could tell, they hadn’t lived happily ever after. From the medical records, she could see that Mary had never married. She had no children or dependents.

From the bed, Mary spluttered. Her sunken mouth slowly opened and closed and her breathing caught for a moment, before settling back into its ragged rhythm.

‘It’s okay, Mary, I’m here,’ said Simone, reaching out and taking her hand. Mary’s arm was thin, the skin loose and covered with dark stain-like bruises, from repeated attempts to find a vein to connect the IV line.

Simone checked the small silver watch pinned to the front of her uniform and saw her shift was coming to an end. She took a hairbrush from the locker beside the bed and began to brush Mary’s hair, first away from her high forehead, then supporting her head so she could reach the rest in long strokes. As the brush moved, the thin silver strands glowed in the sunlight coming through the small window.

As she brushed, Simone wished that Mary could have been her mother, wished she would open her eyes and tell her that she loved her. She’d loved George, Simone could see that in the photo, and she was sure Mary could love her too. A different kind of love, of course. The love a mother has for her daughter.

Simone’s mother’s face flashed across her mind, causing her hands to tremble so badly that she dropped the hairbrush.

‘ONE OF THE WORSE CASES OF CHILD NEGLECT EVER SEEN!’ the newspaper headlines had screamed. Ten-year-old Simone had been found by a neighbour after her mother had gone away on holiday, leaving Simone chained to the bathroom radiator. The neighbour, and the journalist she’d contacted, thought they’d saved Simone’s life, but life in the children’s home had been worse. When her mother had finally returned from holiday, she’d shown up at the home unannounced and the police had been called. Simone’s mother ran before they could arrest her. Later that night she’d jumped off Tower Bridge and drowned in the freezing Thames. Simone liked to think her mother had killed herself out of guilt, but she couldn’t be sure.

Simone picked up the hairbrush and forced her shaking hands to relax. ‘There, you look lovely, Mary,’ she said, stepping back to admire her work. Mary’s thin hair was neat, the silver strands now fanned out on the crisp white pillow. Simone put the hairbrush back in the locker.

‘Now I’m going to read to you,’ said Simone, reaching behind the plastic chair and rummaging in her bag for the local newspaper.

She started with the horoscopes – she knew from the medical notes Mary was a Leo – and then she read out her own. Simone was a Libra. She then turned to the front page and read out the story about the doctor from South London who had been found strangled in his bed. When she’d finished, Simone put the newspaper down on her lap.

‘Mary, I’ve never been able to understand men. I never know what my husband, Stan, is thinking… Stan, it’s short for Stanley. He’s like a closed book. It makes me feel lonely. I’m glad I’ve got you… You understand me, don’t you?’

Mary carried on sleeping. She was far away, back in the sunny park, sitting on the blanket with George, the man who had broken her heart.

12

Erika, Moss and Peterson arrived back at Lewisham Row station just before 6 p.m., and they regrouped in the incident room.

‘So, Gregory Munro seems to elude us,’ said Erika, addressing her officers in front of the whiteboards. ‘His mother thinks he’s a saint; his wife paints him as sexually confused, and tightly wound. We visited his medical practice and ran into two of his patients, who have vastly different opinions of his bedside manner… I also spent half an hour on the phone with his practice manager who, after hearing her boss was dead, went off to Brighton for the day for some bar-hopping in the sun. She’s worked for him for fifteen years, and she had no knowledge of his impending divorce, or that his wife left him three months ago.’

‘He compartmentalises his life, then?’ said Crane.

‘That’s one way of putting it,’ said Erika. ‘We’ve requested details of any feedback or complaints made against him by patients. The practice manager wasn’t too keen, but I mentioned a warrant and she changed her tune. She should have it sent over by tomorrow morning at the latest.’