Forty Two

                                Forty-Two Part 1.



                                                                1.

‘Twenty Down, begins with an S.’ ‘Mark the Sailor is Creepy Crawly.’

         ‘Look Dad I’m no good at these cryptic puzzles, the quick crossword’s my limit.’

All these years later, when I think back, I wish I’d paid more attention to my father’s hobbies. It might have saved us some time and perhaps one of the girls’ lives.



I’m Inspector Mayberry of Manton police force, what I’m about to tell you does seem far-fetched, because it was. I still shudder and an icy tentacle seems to creep down my spine, when I think of what happened.

         Mary Hopkins was well known to the local police. She plied her trade down Market Street, near the docks. Plenty of clientele coming and going, on and off the ships. I was a young constable then and the streets and lanes of the red light district were my beat

         One rainy November night when the wind was gusting up from the seafront and not a night to be out for neither man nor beast, I was patrolling along Chandlers Lane, which crossed Market Street. This was a favourite haunt with the ladies of the night.

I wasn’t expecting to see many girls out in the street as the rain was now coming down in torrents.

          I saw a blond woman was running towards me. Tottering on impossible high-heeled shoes and wearing a tartan mini skirt. The only protection from the weather, a plastic see through hooded anorak, over a skimpy top.

         It was June McMillan one of the regular prostitutes, who on seeing me usually made off in the opposite direction.

         

                                                                  2.

‘Oh officer I’m glad to see you.’ She said. Then collapsed into my arms sobbing.

She was hysterical as she clung to me. ‘Please don’t leave me, I’m so frightened.’

         I could get no further sense out of her, so pulled her into a shop entrance out of the rain

         ‘Calm down and tell me what it is.’ All she could do was point up towards Market Street

I radioed for back up and soon a patrol car pulled up

         Reg Wilkins and Tom Stanners were in the car; both gave me a funny look and a wink when they saw who was holding me in a tight embrace.

         ‘What have we here Jack?’ The name I always got at the station.

But they quickly changed when they saw my expression

         ‘I don’t know yet but something has put the frighteners up her.’ I said.

‘Let’s get in the back of the car out of this storm.’

         June had no qualms about getting in the car, she was clearly frightened

‘June try and calm down and then perhaps we can help you.’

         ‘Up Market Street, where it bends into the jetty.’ She blurted out. Then smothered her head into my chest and flung her arms around me.

         Reg Wilkins put the siren on and we sped off up the lane towards Market Street.

I knew the spot June had described and we were soon there.

         ‘I’m not getting out this car.’ June screamed. ‘I’m not, I’m not.’



                                                                   

                                                        3.

‘It’s all right June you can stay here; the two officers will take a look.’ I assured her.

Reg and Tom were none to happy considering the weather and gave me a backward look as they clambered out. They disappeared from view for a minute as they entered the jetty leading off Market Street. But Reg was soon back, running towards the car.

‘Jack you’ve got to see this, Tom’s radioing for help, although I think it’s past that.’

         ‘Don’t leave me, please don’t leave me.’ June was becoming hysterical again.

‘Reg will stay with you, I’ll be back in a minute.’

As I got out the car I had to prise the woman’s arms off my neck. She immediately got hold of Reg, who shook his head and said. ‘No wonder she’s scared.’

         Back outside the rain continued to pound off the cobbles stones, I wondered what Reg meant as I made my way along the jetty.

Tom was knelt down over what looked like a bundle of rags. He stood up when he saw me.

         ‘Jack for all the years I’ve been in the force, this is the worst I have seen.’

Looking down the first thing I recognised was the face of Mary Hopkins, one of the regulars; but there would be no more appearances at the court for soliciting, her heart had been ripped out and the blood was running down the gutter.

No wonder June McMillan was frightened out of her wits, what maniac had done this?’

         Two cars and a black van pulled up. Inspector Bill Daracott and Sergeant Stevie Barnes got out the first car, followed by the SOCO team, who after the inspector had examined the body, erected a blue tent round it.

         

                                                               

                                                                    4.

Daracott had been on the Manton force for twenty years, hard bitten, he’d seen many murders, but I saw him shudder as he looked down on poor Mary Hopkins.

         ‘Mayberry what do you know about this?’

I told him of the events leading up to the grim discovery.

Just then one of the forensics team came up to him. ‘I think you should see this sir.’

Daracott turned back towards the body. ‘My God, what sick bastard has done this?’

The forensics officer had opened the dead woman’s lips, which had been stuck together with a type of putty. At least five black beetles came crawling out of the scarlet slash of a mouth.

Sergeant Barnes had just had an Indian meal and vomited Vindaloo curry over Daracott’s shoes

‘For goodness sake man get a grip of yourself.’  Then he turned back to the senior SOCO officer. ‘Get the body to the morgue and I don’t care if it’s the middle of the night, get Frobisher out his bed.’

Professor Peter Frobisher, the chief police pathologist and Inspector Daracott weren’t exactly big buddies. Daracott called him one of the county set and said his nose was to far up his own backside. So no love lost there, as Daracott had made his way up through the ranks the hard way and had no time for Frobisher’s, as he saw it, highhanded manner.

When Frobisher performed the post mortem, he discovered more, much more than the scene of crime officers. Which would seem obvious, but it was what he found that startled everybody.



                                                   

                                                        5.

When he came to examine Mary Hopkins’s head, he found the skull had  been opened and resutured. To his surprise he discovered the brain missing. the skull cavity filled with honey. In one of Mary’s hands was a bunch of reeds, the kind you find in any fen or marshland. As if this wasn’t strange enough when he cut the clothes from her he found a number 4 tattooed on her right breast and a number 2 tattooed on her left breast. A white feather had been pushed into her genitals.



LaterDaracott sat at his desk, drumming his fingers on Frobisher’s report, who sat opposite him.

‘Alright Frobisher what do you make of this?’

The professor shrugged his shoulders. ‘You’re the detective Daracott.’

‘Look don’t play the smart ass with me, what do you think?’

‘Well my dear boy, rather unusual don’t you think, I’ve never seen anything like it before. The body was dumped in that jetty by some lunatic who obviously had some surgical skills. The beetles now that was a strange one. I’d say the young woman was only dead a day. The insects found in her mouth do not usually appear until there is greater decomposition, so I think they were deliberately put there, thus the plaster or putty sealing the lips. As for the tattoos and white feather, I just don’t know. Although something is nagging at the back of my mind, but I just can’t remember what it is.’

Thus began what would come to be called the 42 Murders, though thankfully not that amount. In fact there were thirteen murders, all prostitutes. The time scale was many years. Daracott and Frobisher had retired and I had moved up the ranks to

                                                       

                                                        6.

inspector. Sergeant Stevie Barnes had moved to another force and Tom Stanners was my detective sergeant. Yes things had changed, but the killer was no nearer to being caught. The murders had stopped two years ago after thirteen deaths in the previous ten years. Had the killer died or was he waiting to strike again?’



My father lived in sheltered accommodation, my mother having died many years ago. I would visit him as often as I could. This particular day I found him settled in his favourite armchair, a glass of malt whisky nearby and a copy of the Times crossword in front of him on the table.

‘ Come in John, will you have a drink with me.’ Before I could answer he poured a large measure into a cut glass crystal glass.

‘Here that will warm you up, oh and by the way do you remember I asked you about that clue in Monday’s paper.

I nodded half listening, crosswords didn’t really interest me, but Dad was adamant.

‘It was that one about the sailor -------‘Mark the Sailor is Creepy Crawly.’

‘Well do you want to know the answer , I could have kicked myself easy really?’

‘Go on then Dad’ I said.

‘Well first part_________Mark----that’s scar and sailor is AB, you know, able bodied seaman.’

‘Put it together SCAR-AB and you get the creepy crawly bit, scarab.’

‘Do you see, it’s a beetle, clever eh?’ ‘ The Ancient Egyptians kept them sacred, part of their religion, funny lot, with their Book Of The Dead and the number 42.’

The hairs stood up on the back of my neck.

                                                                   



                                                                  7.

  ‘What did you say Dad.’

‘Oh nothing it’s been a bit of a hobby of mine since your mother died, I get the books out the library.’

‘Dad this Book Of The Dead have you got a copy.’

‘Don’t tell me your interested in an old man’s pastime. I’ve got the book for another week, read most of it, you can have it, but don’t let it go overdue, can’t afford to pay any fines’

‘No, no, don’t worry Dad I’ll take it back on time.’

That night I turned off my phone and settled down to read The Book Of The Dead.

A British explorer had brought it back from Egypt to England at the end of the nineteenth century. It was in fact a scroll seventy-eight feet long.

I became engrossed as I read of mummification of bodies and the various processes to preserve them. The temple priests and ancient morticians removed the brain of the dead and filled the cavity with spices and honey. The heart though would remain with the body, as it would be the passport to the Field Of Reeds or heaven, after safe transition through the 42 doors. The last room being The Hall Of Judgement. This is where the dead would have their heart weighed against a white feather on the opposite pan of the scales. If the heart and feather were a perfect balance, depending on how many sins were in the heart, the dead would be allowed to enter the 42nd door leading to the Field Of Reeds and the Gods. However if the scale was weighed down by too many sins in the heart, then the dead would be thrust towards the crocodile headed creature in the pit who would devour them. So Heaven or Hell!







                                                    8.

Professor Frobisher with his classical education had nearly cracked the case all those years ago, but the antagonism between him and Inspector Daracott had pushed it into the background

Now where did I start to look for this depraved psycho?

I decided to try the streets again, bring in some of the girls. June McMillan owed me one. I would go and see her at the mission house; she’d got religious after what happened to Mary Hopkins and the other girls.

She was dishing soup out to the down and outs when I got there.

‘John it’s good to see you, would you like a cuppa.

‘Yes, but first I want to take you back all those years to Mary Hopkins.

‘No John, I’ve tried to put that out my mind, I’ve changed, that life is behind me, don’t make me go back.’

I shook my head. ‘Look June if I told you I might have a chink of light to crack the 42 case, would you help me, for the sake of Mary and all the other poor girls slaughtered by that fiend?’

‘I’m too frightened to go down that road; I’ll never forget that night and what I saw.’

‘June’ I begged her. ‘This may be the only chance of catching the murderer.’ She put her head in her hands.

‘John your right Mary and the girls must be avenged, what do you want to know?’



                                                        9.

.

‘Can you remember anything, now perhaps this is difficult, but anything to do with cults or religions; or any clients who ever spoke of Egyptians?’

‘Egyptians; John are you crazy?’

I was getting nowhere. ‘Alright then June, did any of your clients have strange names or did any of them like to be called something, not to put too fine a point on it, during the sex act.’

‘John you’re scraping the barrel, this is beyond belief.’

‘June your were my last hope, I don’t know where to go from here, I’m hoping I can get some fresh leads.’

June’s head shot up. ‘What did you say?’

I looked at her quizzically

‘I just said I’m hoping I can get some fresh leads.’

‘But that’s it John, I’ve just remembered, there was one guy who liked to be called Imhopen.’

I  grabbed her by the shoulders. ‘June I could kiss you.’

‘Don’t let’s go down that road again John.’

‘Think June where did this man come from.’

‘I don’t know, all I can remember is he always had a bag of books with him.’

‘Books, what sort of books?’

‘I don’t know John; your hurting my arms, all I can tell you is he never wanted sex, just to talk. He said his mother had been a prostitute, because his father had left her and him when he was a baby. His mother had told him he was half Egyptian, his father was a sailor.’ But where was Imhopen. I left June and went back to the station.

                                                          10.



Tom Stanners came into my office. ‘Jack a call has just come in. It’s from a young couple, apparently they bought a house just out of town, and they were clearing out the basement and found a trapdoor in the floor, they think we should come over and take a look at what they’ve found, seemed in a bit of a state.

When Tom and I got there the couple were outside the house.

‘I’m not going back in there.’ said the woman.

  The young man put his arm round his partner. ‘It will be all right, you stay here and I’ll show the officers what we’ve found.’

We made our way to the basement and the young man lifted the trapdoor in the floor.

‘I’ll leave you to it then, this has really frightened my girlfriend.’ He went back outside.

It must have been like the discovery of one of those Egyptian pharaoh’s tombs. When we looked down we could see a chequered carpet and on it an array of ancient artefacts; golden lions and a throne with a sceptre resting on its arms. There were steps and Tom and I soon made our way down. When our eyes became accustomed to the dim light we saw a sarcophagus in one corner of the room. It was covered in what I thought must be hieroglyphics, and it was hinged.

Tom pulled the lid open; no wonder the young woman had been so upset.

Inside dressed in a gold cloak and with a blue and gold-stripped headdress was a partly decomposed body. The smell of the gases coming off the body was horrendous but before Tom shut back the lid I spotted a phial with skull and crossbones etched on the side of it and label with a date on it. I would get this to the lab for analysis. The date though was the same year the killing had stopped.

                                                      11.



We questioned the neighbours and found the house had belonged to Hannah Sharif. She had bought the house from her earnings as a prostitute, but had died years ago, leaving it to her only son, known to the neighbours as Impy

When I checked back and got a copy of his birth certificate I found out his name was Imhopen Sharif, his mother had given him what she thought was an Egyptian sounding name to remind him of his father

I tracked him back to the local hospital where he had been employed as a pathologist’s assistant in the mortuary, so well used to dealing with dead bodies, cutting them up and then suturing them together again.

He had finally after all his nefarious deeds took poison and sent himself through the 42 rooms, with his record the crocodile would be eagerly awaiting him!