Fatal Crossing Read online

  Some kind soul had tried to cheer up the office with a bouquet of fake pink roses, but their efforts had had pretty much the opposite effect. Right now Nora couldn’t think of anything more depressing than the neon-lit room, which was the first stop for relatives, friends and families who had the misfortune to know someone in prison.

  An angular woman with a blond perm and a pinched fox-like face got up from her desk and went to the counter as Nora entered. The woman took a quick look at her.

  ‘Prison visit service? You usually come on Wednesdays,’ she said in a sullen voice.

  Nora shook her head. ‘No, my name is Sand. I’m here to speak to Mr Hix — eh, sorry, I mean Mr Hickley,’ she said, producing her paperwork again.

  The woman frowned and sat down behind her computer with a sigh, which more than hinted that Nora couldn’t be more of a nuisance if she spent the rest of her life trying.

  She typed on the keyboard with two fingers and hit the keys so hard that every single click made a loud noise.

  ‘Hmm. Miss Sand. Yes, I’ve found you,’ she sneered and glared at a colleague who appeared to be on the phone to his mother or girlfriend while drinking Pepsi Max.

  The woman got up reluctantly for the second time while Nora passed the documents though a small slot in the thick glass window enclosing the counter. Nora was thus able to read from the woman's name badge that she was being served by M. Foggsey. Nora wondered if anyone had ever dared call the surly jobsworth ‘foxy’ to her face. She guessed not.

  Mrs Foggsey took the papers with another sigh and passed a dogeared, marbled notebook with stiff, lined paper out to Nora. ‘You sign in here. And I’ll need to see some ID.’

  This was one of the occasions where a press card would most likely only make the situation worse, so Nora took out her driver's licence from her purse.

  Foxy completed a form using carbon paper, which produced three copies of Nora's personal details. One white, one yellow and one blue.

  ‘What do you need that for?’

  ‘Procedure,’ was all Mrs Foxy said.

  ‘But I would like to know what use you make of the information, and where it ends up.’

  Foxy shrugged. ‘The archive would be my guess. I think a copy goes to the Home Office.’

  ‘Does that mean I can submit a Freedom of Information request to find out, say, who has visited William Hickley during the time he has been in prison?’

  ‘In theory, yes. But in reality I think you’d get a resounding no. Such information is private and confidential.’

  Nora was about to sigh when the Pepsi Max guy rang off and got involved in the conversation: ‘Besides, there would be nothing to see. No one comes to see that freak Hix. Only that detective with the weird eyes, and he hasn’t been here for years. Then there's his mum and his sour-faced sister.’

  Foxy shot him a withering look. ‘Jameson, you’re speaking out of turn.’

  She turned to Nora again. ‘Are you carrying any sharp objects?’

  Nora shook her head.

  ‘You can leave your bag in the lockers over there,’ she explained and pointed to a poster with educational drawings and large red crosses over various items indicating what you could and could not bring into a prison. It looked like a very sad and far too adult version of Pictionary.

  Visitors were not even allowed to bring teddy bears, and Nora couldn’t help thinking that it was exceptionally heartless that young children, who came to visit their father in prison, wouldn’t be allowed to bring in a soft toy.

  Foxy had read her mind. ‘You would be amazed if you knew how often people try to hide drugs in soft toys. Eventually it was easier to put a stop to it. One less place to search,’ she said.

  With a sigh, Nora realised that her Dictaphone would have to stay in her handbag, exactly as Spencer had predicted. The same applied to her pencils and pens, which made her notepad somewhat superfluous. Her mobile, obviously, wasn’t welcome either.

  Nora found an empty locker, deposited her bag and entered a four-digit code.

  Foxy ushered her through a metal detector, which reacted to her necklace, so Nora had to hand it over at the counter and complete another form. She was given a receipt, which she stuffed into a pocket in her skirt, and went through the scanner again. This time without any beeping.

  ‘All we need now is to pat you down,’ Foxy said with feigned jolliness and checked what felt like every single cranny of Nora's body without discovering the folded picture she had hidden in her bra.

  At long last it was over and Nora walked through a door on the other side of the scanner, which took her to a car park where a prison van was waiting for her.

  The driver — who looked like Vladimir Putin's poor relation — flashed her a grin.

  ‘Jump in the back, sweetheart. No room in the front for civilians, I’m afraid.’

  Nora sat down on one of the bolted-down plastic seats and tried to ignore the stench of sweat and urine.

  The drive lasted only a few minutes before the van pulled up in front of a drab grey building. The driver nodded in the direction of something that looked like an iron-clad door. ‘Your stop. This is as far as we go, darling,’ he said, winking at Nora in a way that made her flesh crawl.

  She went through the door and found herself in a pastel green hall at the start of a long corridor. A prison officer was ready to receive her. He had piggy eyes and a smirk, which more than suggested that he enjoyed his job. For all the wrong reasons, Nora thought.

  He stuck out his hand. Nora shook it and felt a lump of clammy flesh between her fingers.

  ‘My name is Jimmy Archer,’ he said, and ran his eyes up and down her body. It required considerable strength to ignore him.

  ‘Are you from the legal team?’ he said, making conversation as he walked her down the long empty corridor. Nora could hear how the clicking of her heels against the worn linoleum echoed against the bare walls.

  She mumbled something that could be taken as an affirmation or a denial, depending on what the prison officer preferred.

  ‘We tend not to chain him up any more. Old age seems to have mellowed him. But we’ve restrained him today, just to be on the safe side,’ he reassured her.

  Nora followed him.

  ‘We don’t see many women in here. Under normal circumstances,’ Jimmy Archer chatted on.

  At the end of the long corridor, he took out a bunch of keys, unlocked and opened a door with a theatrical gesture, as if holding open the door for a woman in a restaurant.

  She had been expecting a kind of counter like the ones she had seen in American movies. Armoured glass separating the inmate and the visitor who had to watch each other like fish in separate aquariums and speak on old-fashioned telephones in order to communicate.

  Instead there was a battered steel table and two chairs. Everything was bolted to the worn linoleum floor.

  Bill Hix was already sitting on one of the chairs. His forearms were chained to the armrests, but that wasn’t the first thing she noticed. What really caught her attention were his piercing eyes, which scrutinised her from under his long fringe. His black eyes resembled two shiny buttons on a soft toy, but when he winked at her with one eye, slowly and deliberately, and flashed a smile, the hairs stood up right under her bun.

  ‘Nice,’ he said in a voice that was deeper than she had been expecting. It sounded rusty, as if he didn’t speak very much, and had forgotten to clear his throat.

  Nora tried making her face as blank as possible and gave Hickley a measured nod before she sat down opposite him. She desperately missed her pad and pencil. Something to occupy her eyes and hands so she could escape his stare and avoid the intimacy of the table where his face was so close that she could easily reach out and touch him.

  The prison officer drew an imaginary line across the table and looked at Nora. ‘If you keep on this side, he can’t touch you. Do you understand?’

  Nora nodded mutely.

  He gestured to the door with his thumb. �
�I’ll be sitting right outside. Any trouble with our friend Bill here, you just call me,’ he said before leaving the room with a last, lingering look at Nora.

  Hickley didn’t even deign to acknowledge him, but kept his eyes pinned on Nora. She forced herself to look back at him.

  ‘Right, Mr Hickley. Do you know why I’m here?’

  He ignored her question.

  ‘You have a fine bone structure. Very fine. The high cheekbones work well. It's just a question of photographing you in the right light,’ he said with a face like a horse trader at a market.

  Nora pretended to also ignore his words.

  ‘Mr Hickley, I don’t know if you have had an opportunity to discuss with your lawyer what —’

  ‘Have you ever been a model?’

  ‘Mr Hickley. I’m a journalist, and —’

  ‘Bill.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Call me Bill. I won’t talk to anyone who insists on calling me by my surname. This conversation is over, if you don’t.’

  With superhuman self-control, Nora swallowed her reply and reminded herself that she wasn’t just here for herself, but also for the parents of at least fourteen girls and possibly many more. People with big holes in their hearts who needed an answer.

  ‘Very well, Bill. I’m here to talk about the girls you killed.’

  He shook his head.

  ‘No. No. No. And you were just doing so well, Miss Nora. You said Bill. I was happy. I was prepared to trust you, and then you raise that tiresome subject, about which I know nothing, of course.’

  ‘I find that hard to believe, Mr Hi ... Bill.’

  He gave a light shrug and smirked at her. ‘Let's talk about something else.’

  Nora cleared her throat. The adrenaline in her body surged and ebbed. Fear and rage combined in an explosive mix, which made her want to shake the truth out of the arrogant bastard sitting there mocking her, mocking the girls he had killed.

  ‘Sure, Bill. Let's talk about something else. How about we talk about your travels? Do you like travelling?’

  He flung out his arms to the extent that he could. ‘The opportunities are somewhat limited, of course. But, yes, I travelled extensively with my mother as a child. Tenerife. Costa del Sol. Rhodes.’

  ‘Have you ever been to Denmark?’

  He pretended to search for the answer. He tilted his head, acting as if he were combing through his memories. Nora had seen Bollywood extras deliver more convincing performances.

  ‘Yes. I think I have a couple of times,’ he said when he couldn’t drag it out any longer.

  ‘You went by boat?’

  ‘Yes. Why?’

  ‘Do you remember when you took the ferry to Denmark?’

  ‘No. Not really. Why, is it important?’ he said with feigned indifference.

  Nora noticed that he was starting to squirm on his seat and his chains rattled.

  ‘This conversation is starting to bore me, to be frank,’ he sulked.

  ‘Lulu. Lisbeth.’ She took the plunge.

  Hickley just looked at her, but he grew deathly quiet. He sat very still, as if playing a game of sleeping lions. As if he were scared that a rash movement might give him away.

  Nora let him stew.

  Eventually he exhaled and shrugged. ‘I met loads of girls back then. Don’t forget, I was scouting for models, the girls were throwing themselves at me,’ he said with scorn in his voice. ‘But I can’t claim that those names mean anything to me. Not in the least. Not at all.’

  He was protesting too much. It sounded like a triple denial so she wouldn’t detect his lie. He knew exactly who she was talking about. Nora was just as sure of that as she was that Hix wouldn’t tell her one syllable more than he himself had planned.

  Nora decided to change tack. ‘Do you get any visitors in prison?’

  He sent her an arch look. ‘You mean apart from my lawyer and silly journalists on fishing expeditions?’

  Nora let the silence unfold between them as she held on to the thought that very soon she would be out in the open air again. Free to go wherever she wanted to go. Hix would rot in this place.

  ‘Apart from them, yes,’ she said at last.

  ‘That's none of your business. Anything else?’ he said, making as if to get up. An exercise, which was pointless, given that he was still restrained.

  Slowly and deliberately Nora slipped her hand inside her white shirt and fished out the paper. She half-unfolded it, so that it was clear that there was something on it, but not what.

  She had Hix's undivided attention.

  ‘You like pictures, don’t you?’

  He gulped and nodded.

  ‘Does anyone ever visit you in prison?’

  He gave a light shrug. ‘My mother.’

  ‘And your sister?’

  He nodded.

  ‘No one else?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Pen pals?’

  ‘What's on the picture?’

  Nora unfolded it and held it up to him.

  Hix reached for it instinctively, and his handcuffs rattled before he stopped himself.

  ‘First you tell me who writes to you in prison. Who is playing Bill Hix on your behalf?’

  ‘I’ve no idea what you’re talking about.’

  He didn’t look at her. His eyes followed the unfolded piece of paper.

  Nora made to leave. ‘Right, what a shame, Mr Hickley.’

  ‘Bill,’ he interjected with a furious expression in his eyes.

  ‘Like I said, it's a shame, but I don’t really think there's anything interesting to write about here.’

  She watched as incredulity spread across his face like spilled coffee on a piece of paper.

  ‘You...You...’

  ‘I’m clearly wasting my time,’ she said.

  ‘But you haven’t even asked me about —’ he stuttered in a voice so whiny, it almost became falsetto. He sounded like a spoiled brat.

  Nora watched as he slowly recovered his composure like a man who has walked to the very edge of a cliff as a joke.

  ‘Nice try, Miss Sand,’ he said, and there was approval in his voice, which had dropped a few octaves again. His gaze was flinty, and he nodded slowly and with admiration.

  ‘Yes. You clearly have wasted your time. But nice try. You’re one of the better ones,’ he said, glancing down at his hands still chained to the armrests. ‘As you can see, my current position sadly prevents me from giving you the applause you deserve. You’ll have to imagine that.’

  With those words he turned his head and called for the prison officer. The visit was over. Nora could feel her frustration like red flushes on her cheeks.

  Right before the door opened to reveal Jimmy Archer, Hix looked her straight in the eye and hissed: ‘I’ll get you, you bitch. I always get what I want.’

  Nora could feel panic pulsating right under her skin. There was no way he could touch her, but she felt like she was standing with her nose pressed right up against the glass in a reptile house, watching a rattlesnake ready to strike. Hypnotised by fear, the brain knows that the snake can’t strike through the glass. But it forgets to pass on the message to the body.

  It took all her concentration to get up calmly. To act as if she didn’t care. Her movements became stiff and controlled. Her eyes grew distant and she shut everything out. She heard no sounds.

  X

  It wasn’t until she was back in the corridor that Nora realised that she had forgotten to breathe since leaving Hix. Sod it. She had blown her chance. She had sat opposite him, possibly with the key to everything — so close to unpicking the lock. And then she had lost it all by gambling with too-high stakes.

  The image of Hannelore and Helmuth Neuberg from Munich followed her all the way on her walk of shame back down the grey linoleum corridor. Two ageing parents with a hole in their life the size of a missing daughter.

  Jimmy Archer stuffed a card in her hand just before she got into the prison van, which had been wait
ing for her outside the building. She took a seat and stared at the card in disbelief as the door was shut and the driver drove her back to the administration block. It was a business card with Jimmy Archer's mobile number. The kind you can print yourself from a machine at a railway station. It had a small Playboy Bunny logo in one corner.

  On the back Jimmy Archer had written in a childish hand: ‘Call me. I’ll buy you dinner, gorgeous x.’

  Nora scrunched up the card and stuffed it in her jacket pocket.

  When she returned to the reception, Foxy was on the phone, while her colleague was playing a very advanced form of Tetris on his computer. He paused his game at the sight of her and found the visitors’ log.

  ‘Good visit?’ he asked without interest.

  Nora shrugged, signed the log and her necklace was returned. She retrieved her bag from the locker and had reached the car park when her mobile rang.

  It was Spencer, telling her the car was on its way and would be there in five minutes.

  ‘It was a decent try. Don’t be too hard on yourself—’

  ‘But he didn’t say anything —’

  ‘And that picture of the girls. Good thinking. You almost tripped him up.’

  Nora shook her head as she tried to grasp the implication of what he had just said.

  ‘What? How would you know? Only Hix and I were in the room.’

  ‘Hix and you and the hidden camera right above the notice board. I was in the room next door. We had to be there for your safety. Don’t forget that Hix is a killer. And seeing his body language was useful.’

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me? I thought I was in there all alone.’

  ‘That was the whole point. If you had known, it wouldn’t have been natural.’

  She blurted out the words without thinking. Out of frustration at her failure. Although she knew it wasn’t a reasonable expectation of herself, she had still hoped that she could make a difference.

  ‘Fuck you!’

  Then she pressed Spencer out of her mobile and called a cab to take her to the station. He called her back twice while she waited for the cab to arrive. But she didn’t pick up.