Acid Lullaby (32 page)

Max coughed violently and uncontrollably. He fell to the floor of the library and came to rest on his hands and knees, hacking mucus onto the wooden floorboards. The movement in his throat made him heave and he spewed muscimol-laced vomit, feeling its strange heat rolling down across his face. The room span in every direction. Max hauled himself to his tape recorder and threw it against the wall. The voice abruptly crashed to a halt.

Max slowly began to relax into the light show. He needed air.

Dexter had driven with Adam Miller to Thetford Forest. She found his company and enthusiasm engaging: a pleasant relief from the scowling anxiety of Underwood and Mark Willis. It had been a straightforward journey taking only twenty minutes up the A11. Dexter had been impressed that Miller had taken a genuinely enthusiastic but not unhealthy interest in the progress of the investigation.

‘It’s weird,’ he observed. ‘The guy has gone to a lot of trouble. I mean, injecting people with Amanita extracts. It must mean something important to him.’

‘That’s something I wanted to ask you,’ Dexter said as they turned onto the B1105 at Elveden under the dark canopy of Corsican pine trees. ‘Does it take a great deal of knowledge to do what he’s done? Is it difficult to identify these things in the wild and know how to treat them?’

‘You’re wondering if this guy’s a mycologist like me?’ Miller seemed amused at the idea.

‘It’s called clutching at straws,’ Dexter replied without emotion. She meant it.

‘It’s hard to say. Judging from what you’ve told me and from what I’ve read in the toxicology profiles, the guy is clearly pretty smart and fairly well-informed. Is he a professional though? I doubt it. The sort of information that he’d need is easily accessible. There are hundreds of internet sites and books he could look up. There’s a huge amount of detail available on the Amanita Muscaria, for example.’

‘The red and white one? Why?’

‘It has a long history. It’s readily recognizable. It makes you hallucinate and if you treat it properly it won’t kill you.’

‘Have you ever taken one?’

‘Are you going to arrest me?’

‘Not unless you refuse to answer my questions.’

Miller smiled. ‘I took one once: a few years ago in Amsterdam. It wasn’t a pleasant experience.’

‘Why?’

‘The hallucinogens affect different people in different ways. Your mood and outlook can affect the way your body treats the experience.’

‘Not my cup of tea at all,’ Dexter frowned. ‘I’d never put that shit inside me.’

‘Very wise.’

‘What about the other one,’ Dexter asked, ‘the Death Cap?’

Miller thought for a second. ‘That’s a little trickier. There’s plenty of literature on them but they are very easy to mistake in the wild. It’s what makes them so dangerous. The killer would need to be fairly clued up about them.’

Dexter pulled up in a layby. ‘Here we go, according to your map. Site one is along that footpath.’

‘Can I ask what we’re looking for exactly?’ Miller asked, ‘I mean, I can take you to the various locations where the university had recorded samples of these Amanitas but there’s no guarantee that you’ll find any. It’s early in May. Most of them won’t appear till later in the summer. And as I told you, it’s quite conceivable that your guy harvested the things last November and has been storing them in a freezer. The toxins are pretty stable over time.’

‘True enough.’ Dexter opened the car boot and took out an evidence collection kit. ‘But if we do find that some of the sites have been interfered with we might be able to turn something up: discarded litter with a fingerprint, shoe impression on the soil, dead body.’

‘Bloody hell.’ Miller looked at Thetford Forest with sudden trepidation.

‘If we do find anything significant, I’ll call a forensic team in anyway. Don’t worry, I’ll hold your hand.’

Miller seemed surprised. ‘You didn’t strike me as the type.’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ Dexter asked.

‘I’m just joking.’

The first site was on the edge of Wangford Warren. Miller pointed out a cluster of silver birch trees amongst the Corsican pines. He checked his notes.

‘Okay. University research student found Amanita
Muscaria at the base of the central birch.’ He walked forward and checked the surrounding area. ‘Sorry, Inspector, there’s nothing here.’ Miller extended his search pattern around the immediate area and found nothing. Whilst he was mushroom hunting Dexter looked for signs of human interference. She too drew a blank.

‘The second site’s about a mile north east,’ Miller announced when he returned. ‘You happy to walk?’

‘Of course.’ Dexter was slightly affronted at the question.

‘Your shoes are not ideal for this terrain,’ Miller explained, pointing at Dexter’s smart black leather shoes.

‘They’ll do fine. You just try and keep up.’ Dexter was rather enjoying herself. The air was clean and the woods didn’t scare her in the daylight.

The second location was around the base of a beech tree, just south of Brandon Park. Dexter pointed out a semi-circular fungus with a red-brown cap attached to the bark.

‘What’s that?’

Miller knelt to inspect it, ‘Nothing very exciting. It’s called Tinder Fungus. Ganoderma Applantum. It grows all year round. There’s more over there.’ He pointed to another larger example at the base of a pine tree.

‘Any sign of the two we’re after?’ Dexter asked.

Miller shook his head. ‘Have a seat, I’ll do a quick circuit. Amanita Muscaria was recorded here three years ago.’

Dexter sat down on a tree stump and watched Miller wander between the trees, his eyes exploring their bases and surrounding undergrowth. She closed her eyes, feeling the exhaustion draining from her brain. Dexter wondered if she would drop dead when it reached her heart or whether it would just get pumped around her system and drag her down even further.

‘There’s a condom over here!’ Miller called. ‘It looks older than me.’

Dexter rose and walked over. She bagged the offending item and labelled it.

The next two hours passed quickly but without success. They found some litter at a site near Santon Downham and
a beer can west of Thetford Warren. Dexter collected all the items and placed them into evidence bags. She would arrange for all the items to be fingerprinted. However, she was beginning to sense failure.

The final site that Miller had selected was in the north-east corner of the forest near the village of Weeding.

Miller had lost none of his enthusiasm. He pointed out a clump of tall plants with yellowish flowers.

‘See those?’ he asked.

‘The weeds?’

‘They’re not weeds. It’s called Wood Spurge or Euphorbia Amygdaloides. My daughter calls it Wood Spew. She says it’s the colour of sick.’

‘How old is she?’ Dexter asked.

‘Eight.’

Dexter suddenly wanted to change the subject but Miller had produced a photograph from his back pocket.

‘Cute, isn’t she?’

Dexter had to admit that she was: blonde curly hair and wide brown eyes.

‘I didn’t think you were married,’ she said. ‘You don’t wear a ring.’

‘Separated. Her mother lives in the USA. California. I keep trying to get an academic post over there. I could get to see Isabella more often. My current situation is a long way from ideal.’

‘Isabella’s a nice name,’ Dexter conceded.
So
was
Zoe,
she
told
herself.
Zoe
would
have
been
eight
in
three
weeks’
time.

‘She’s “Izzy” really or “Dizzy”. She hates being called Isabella.’

Miller knelt at the foot of a small group of silver birch trees. Dexter looked out beyond the trees to the open fenland that bordered the forest. To her left, she saw the B1112 stretching round towards Feltwell and Hockwold cum Witton, to her right she could see the tiny clustered villages of Yaxford and Methwold.

‘It’s growing on me, this place,’ she said to Miller.

‘Like a fungus?’

‘I used to think it was bleak, but it’s peaceful I suppose. It takes time to learn to appreciate open space.’

‘Too cold for me, I’m a sunshine boy.’ Miller leaned in closer to consider a clump of material at the base of a birch tree. ‘Hey! Come here!’

Dexter turned and walked over. ‘What is it?’

Miller pointed at three white rings on the ground. ‘Amanita Phalloides has a white volva that encases the base of each mushroom.’ He opened his equipment box and removed a small trowel. He scraped away some of the dirt. ‘Typically, most of the volva is underground. There you go.’ He had excavated one of the samples. It looked harmless enough: a pale, white bulb coated in brown dirt.

‘Is it definitely one of the two we’re after?’ Dexter peered at it.

‘I’d say so. The stalk and cap have been cut off. Can you see? There’s a clean incision been made across the base of each stalk.’

Miller found a bottle of hydrochloric acid from his equipment box and dropped a small amount on to the remains of one of the mushrooms. ‘Remember the Maixner Test?’

‘The test for amatoxins,’ Dexter nodded. ‘It should go blue, right?’

Two minutes later it did. Dexter suddenly felt a twinge of excitement. ‘Okay. How sure are you that these are the right mushrooms?’

‘Eighty per cent sure that they are Amanita Phalloides, but there’s no way of being sure until I’ve analysed samples in the laboratory.’

‘Understood.’ She decided to take a chance. ‘I’m going to get a forensic team up here right away. They might come across something we can use.’

‘These have been cut fairly recently,’ said Miller, ‘you can tell from the …’

He paused. Alison Dexter was already on her mobile phone.

DS Harrison returned to New Bolden CID at 3p.m. He needed to focus, to clear his head of emotion and fill it with information. He realized that the only way he could help Sarah Jensen was to find the man who had killed her. The images of the bodies he had discovered in the ditch on Fulford Heath were still hovering at the front of his mind. That was not the way he wanted to remember Sarah.

He had spent the morning clearing her stuff from the shelves of his bathroom, packing her clothes into a suitcase. The smell of her in his flat had been upsetting. It was if she was lingering behind, taunting his failure to protect her and Harrison had felt unable to bear it. Sarah Jensen’s possessions now sat without purpose or warmth in a black bin bag and a suitcase next to the front door of his flat just as her body lay in a metal drawer in the mortuary at Addenbrookes Hospital. The process had not been helpful. The flat felt violated to him and he knew that he would have to move out eventually. Aggression was starting to boil in his veins. Harrison had always believed that the first step away from despair was anger. So he tried to channel his loss into creative fury.

The CID floor was eerily quiet when he arrived. Dexter’s office was deserted and even the seconded uniform officers had disappeared. He hoped that meant there had been progress made in the case during his brief absence. He found Sauerwine working at his desk. The constable looked surprised by his sudden appearance.

‘Hello, sir, I wasn’t expecting you. Sorry for taking your desk.’

Harrison nodded. ‘What have I missed?’

Sauerwine cleared his throat. ‘There have been a few developments. Inspector Dexter called a few minutes ago. She thinks they’ve found a location in Thetford Forest where the murderer might be harvesting the poisonous mushrooms. Suffolk Police are sending a forensic team to the site.’

‘Why aren’t we?’

‘It’s in their patch and our resources are stretched after …’ Sauerwine hesitated, ‘after the discoveries on the Heath.’

‘Anything else?’

‘DI Underwood has gone back to Jack Harvey’s house. I’m not sure why. He didn’t say.’

None of it sounded particularly promising. Harrison pulled up a swivel chair and sat down next to Sauerwine. ‘Fair enough. So what are you working on?’ He gestured at the list of phone numbers scrawled on a piece of paper in front of the detective constable.

‘Forensic reckon the tyre tracks on the Heath were made by a Toyota Land Cruiser: two-point-eight litre engine, long wheelbase model. I’m calling the local dealer network and trying to get hold of any sales and service information.’

Harrison didn’t feel any satisfaction that his hunch about the killer driving an expensive car had proved half-correct. He tried to remain focused. In truth, he had expected something more expensive after his discussion with Farrell at the scene of the attack on Ian Stark: a TVR, a Porsche or a Mercedes.

‘DI Underwood had an idea about looking for owners that have missed scheduled services or MOT appointments in the last three months,’ Sauerwine added, sensing Harrison’s attention was drifting away from him.

It made sense, Harrison thought. Underwood had always been adept at spotting possible logjams in information flows: like a bear waiting at a waterfall for leaping salmon. However, it was a short-cut approach and therefore a risky one. He sensed Sauerwine was struggling.

‘Need a hand?’ he asked.

‘That would be helpful, sir. It’s taking longer than I expected. They’re not being very forthcoming.’

‘Let’s divide the list. You work from the top down, I’ll work from the bottom up. We’ll tell them to photocopy their sales and service records for that model by say five p.m. tonight. Then we’ll send squad cars round to pick up the paperwork and bring it back here. If they give us any grief, tell them we’ll send a team to check the logbook and sales record
of every car on their forecourts. That should get the bastards moving.’

‘Yes, sir.’ Sauerwine paused for a moment, choosing the right words. ‘For what it’s worth, sir, I’m very sorry about DC Jensen. She was a good laugh.’

Harrison couldn’t look the young constable in the eye. Instead, he stared fixedly at the page of numbers in front of him. ‘It’s worth a lot, mate,’ he said eventually. ‘She was. We just have to concentrate on doing our jobs properly. Let’s get hold of this bastard before he can hurt anybody else.’