The Jackdaw

‘Because this story is the biggest thing out there. It’s fucking huge.’

‘Bigger than the terrorist attack in LA?’

‘If it doesn’t happen on our shores the readers soon lose interest – you know that. This Your View thing could run and run. We need to make this story ours. This story needs to belong to The World.’ Dempsey stopped and turned to him. He felt her resolve weakening. ‘The LA story will be dead news in a couple of days. I still have my contacts at the Yard. We could get the inside track. People are already talking about this guy as being some kind of avenging angel. We could even run our own public polls – “Do you agree with what the Your View Killer is doing or not?” It’s a winner, Sue. I’m telling you, this is gonna be big. Remember no one believed me when I started digging up the dirt on our celebrity paedophile friends. Look how big that story got. Surely I’m still owed a few favours.’

‘I have to admit that was good work,’ Dempsey agreed.

‘It was better than good,’ Jackson argued. ‘The cops didn’t have a clue what was going on – didn’t believe what the parents of the children were telling them until I blew the lid off the whole ring.’ His expression of self-congratulation suddenly faded to something more serious, as if he was recalling a sad moment from his own life. ‘I saved a lot of kids from suffering the same fate as the ones those bastards had already got their hands on.’

‘Yes you did,’ Dempsey admitted. ‘It was good work all around. All right, Geoff. All right, but no funny business. Keep it clean or it might be a journalist this madman comes after next.’

‘And exclusivity,’ he almost talked over her. ‘I get exclusivity. No other journos on the story. Just me.’

‘Thinking ahead, Geoff?’

‘I just want what’s best for the paper.’

‘Of course you do,’ she answered. ‘That’s what we all want. OK. You have your exclusivity, but you better bring home the meat.’

‘When have I ever not?’ he asked with a broadening smile.

‘Don’t ask,’ she told him and began walk away before turning back to him. ‘I noticed you still haven’t written the paperback about the celebrity paedophile ring. You usually turn the paperback around in a few weeks – strike while the iron is hot and all that bollocks.’

‘Not this time,’ he answered. ‘As much as I’d like to expose those slimy bastard celebs for everything they are, some things are still sacred. I wouldn’t write about abused kids for money. Not my style.’

‘Not going soft on me, are you, Geoff?’ Dempsey smiled and turned on her heels before he could answer.

Jackson made his way back to his desk whistling a happy little tune and wondering whether he should call his publishers now, whet their appetites, or wait until things had really brewed up. Until it was the only thing anyone was talking about.

Sean and Donnelly pulled up on the south side of Barnes Bridge in southwest London. The Marine Policing Unit had found a body floating in the Thames underneath the bridge, trapped by the whirlpool created by the current trying to find a way around. They climbed from their car and made their way to the small gathering of both uniformed and CID officers next to the bridge watching the police launch still trying to recover the forlorn body from behind the sanctuary of a small taped-off area of the pavement. Sean and Donnelly flashed their warrant cards to the uniformed officer guarding the small cordon and headed for the two men in suits.

Sean offered his hand. ‘DI Corrigan – Special Investigations Unit.’ Donnelly followed suit.

‘DS Rob Evans,’ the older, shorter, stockier man offered, speaking in a mild Yorkshire accent.

‘DC Nathan Mead,’ the young, lean, tall one introduced himself in his London accent.

Evans looked back down at the launch struggling in the swell of the river below. The stiff body, arms stretched to the side, face down, swirled in the dark brown water of the Thames by the bridge foundation as another train crashed over above.

‘They’re still struggling to get the poor bastard out,’ he explained. ‘Every time they almost have him they nearly get smashed against the side of the bridge, but the current’s calming down now. They should be able to get a hook into him soon.’ Sean and Donnelly just nodded as they watched the grim spectacle. Bodies fished from the Thames were always tough to deal with – the cold of the water intensifying rigor mortis, while the marine life also took a quick toll.

‘Reckon he’s your man, do you?’ Evans asked.

‘Could be,’ Sean answered. ‘He looks to be suited and booted. Can’t be too many men in suits floating in the Thames today.’

‘I bloody hope not,’ Evans told him. ‘That’s the trouble with being posted to Wandsworth – we cover the Thames all the way from bloody Barnes to Battersea. We get more floaters than most. At least this one’s still in one piece.’ Sean didn’t answer, watching the launch inching closer and closer to the body until finally one of the crew managed to hook the dead man’s clothing with a grappling pole.

‘About time,’ Evans moaned. ‘We can’t get on the boat here. I’ve told them we’ll meet them down by the local rowing club. There’s a small pier there, or mooring, or whatever you want to call it. Anyway, I’ve said we’ll meet them there once they fished him out. You coming?’ he asked Sean, who barely heard him, transfixed by the macabre scene of the unyielding body being heaved on board the launch by the crew. The man’s head was raised by the rigor mortis in his neck muscles, his eyes and mouth wide open as if staring straight at Sean. ‘I said, are you coming?’ Evans repeated.

Sean snapped out of his reverie and spun to face him. ‘What? Yeah. Sure. We’re coming. Where to?’

Evans rolled his eyes. ‘Just follow us.’

‘Fine,’ Sean answered and followed the other detectives back to the waiting cars. Donnelly spoke first as they pulled away from the kerb.

‘Think it’s our man?’

‘Looks like it. Has to be really, doesn’t it,’ Sean answered.

‘Aye. I reckon so. First thoughts?’

‘To be honest, I’m trying not to have any.’

‘Not like you,’ Donnelly pointed out. ‘You all right?’

‘I’m fine,’ Sean lied, the man’s staring eyes mixing with images of Anna in his troubled mind – a sense of fear and excitement at the thought of being with her day-to-day distracting him from where he needed to be – preventing him from being able to fully immerse himself in the abduction and murder of the man who now lay dead on the floor of a police launch.

‘Well, I don’t suppose he dumped him in the river around here,’ Donnelly offered. ‘Too busy – unless he chucked him off the bridge in the middle of the night.’

‘No,’ Sean dismissed the possibility. ‘Tide brought him here. The Marine Unit might be able to tell us where from.’

‘Aye,’ was all Donnelly replied and they finished the rest of the short journey in silence, parking up and following the Wandsworth detectives to the small pier of the rowing club where the police launch was already moored.

‘We’ll wait here for you,’ Evans told them, standing at the beginning of the pier. ‘Not a lot of room on those things,’ he explained, nodding towards the launch. ‘If he’s not your man you can always kick it back to us, but if it is …’

‘Fair enough,’ Sean agreed and headed off along the short pier.

Donnelly waited until they were out of earshot before speaking quietly. ‘I guess he’s had his fill of floaters.’

‘He could always get a posting to Catford,’ Sean told him before pulling his warrant card from his coat pocket and flashing it to the wary launch crew. ‘DI Corrigan. Special Investigations Unit. I think this body belongs to us.’

‘Come on board,’ the sergeant replied. The three white stripes on his lifejacket singled him out as the boat’s leader. ‘Mind your step though. Deck’s a little slippery. Never ceases to amaze me how much water comes out of a dead body – especially when it’s fully clothed.’ Donnelly rolled his eyes while Sean ignored the comment as they stepped on board.

The river police had already managed to manhandle the body into a black zip-up body-bag, although the victim’s arms still protruded somewhat out to his side. They’d left the bag open for the detectives.

‘Gonna have a hell of a job getting that zipped up,’ the sergeant explained.

‘You’ll manage,’ Sean told him before moving closer to the body and crouching down, the movement of the boat adding to his rising nausea. ‘How long d’you reckon he’s been in the water for?’

‘Hard to say,’ the sergeant replied. ‘A good few hours at least.’

‘Was he dumped close by?’ Sean asked.

The sergeant pulled an expression of indifference. ‘I shouldn’t think so. Tide’s been going out for a good while now. Probably somewhere between Teddington and Richmond.’

‘Great,’ Donnelly complained, aware of the size of area they would now have to consider.

Sean studied the remains of Paul Elkins, the cause of death and exposure to the water making his face appear bloated and grotesque, his eyes bulbous and red – mouth open with a swollen, grey tongue protruding from within. Sean tried not to think of the small marine creatures that would have already found their way into the man’s mouth, making his body their temporary home as well as a food supply. The burn marks and bruising left around his neck by the rope used to kill him left no doubt as to the cause of death, although the mandatory post-mortem would still have to officially confirm it.