Don't Leave Me by Clare Curzon

Author:Clare Curzon
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: St. Martin's Publishing Group
Published: 2012-05-31T00:00:00+00:00

Nine

The ransom call came at two thirty.

Winterton had been asleep. In a bewildering nightmare he was soaping himself down in a cast-iron bath while a line of naked men queued beside it. Although he sensed more than saw them, his eyes being fixed on the scummy water, he knew they were strangers. And their bodies were insubstantial, like tattered muslin translucent hangings swaying in a draught.

He was still afraid of them as he groped for the receiver and put it, ice cold, against his ear.

‘Winterton,’ he gasped.

There was silence, not even breathing. Supposing it to be a wrong number, he was about to drop the thing and sit up in bed.

Then came the laughter, low and scornful.

‘How are you feeling now?’ the caller demanded.

It was almost certainly a man, but the words weren’t fully voiced. Something not much more than a whisper, and it terrified him, sounding strangled and demented.

‘Who is this? What do you want?’

‘I am the voice of your absent conscience, Daniel. And what I want is satisfaction.’

Again the weird laughter, then a metallic click as the phone was hung up at the far end.

‘No!’ Winterton shouted. ‘Listen!’ But the line had been cut, leaving only a slow, steady whine.

He sat there, sweating and shivering. The man was playing with him. This was the first little prick of the epee. There would be other calls, because he hadn’t properly started yet. He hadn’t made demands. He hadn’t even referred to what he’d done.

The man knew him, could count on him being here, within reach, at any time of the day or night that the bastard cared to repeat the torment, while he himself was totally in the dark. How long would he draw it out before he stated his intentions, made his specific demands? And what would be happening to Julie while the maniac took his time playing cat and mouse?

The police would have used their intercept line. But the message had been too short. They’d no chance of tracing the caller. He hadn’t sounded the sort of fool who might overlook the 1471 facility. His number would be a withheld one. No; more likely he would have used a public phone box and was already driving away into the night, totally anonymous and undetectable.

Sleep after this was impossible. Winterton made his way downstairs, fearfully turning on lights all the way to the kitchen. Every window was closely curtained, but he had the gruesome sense of a watcher outside following his every move, gloating over his patent horror.

He filled the kettle, forcing his hands not to tremble. Before the water had quite boiled the phone rang again. He lifted the receiver off the kitchen wall. ‘Yes,’ he said into it. He had never before been afraid to give his name.

It was DI Mott, sounding as though he hadn’t been to bed. Perhaps they took it in turns to go nocturnal. Did they work shifts, like uniformed police? Winterton was conscious of despair that it wasn’t Superintendent Yeadings. Not that he could have made any difference.

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