Legacy

By Keith Hargreaves

A killer runs amok in Englands heartland

Shattering lives as he goes about his terrible business

With his dying breath he gives a clue to a secret beyond imagining.

Two friends, Jack Jarrett and Steven Jackson, united by pain and grief

and a man who went missing 95 years before!

What is the connection and how many more will die?

A mystery that echoes from the cauldron of Flanders in the Great War to the streets of England today.

A series of unexplained disappearances and a terrible truth.

Will Jack and Steve be able to unlock the riddle and stop the killings?

Or will the seed sown in the nightmare of the trenches continue its bloody harvest?

LEGACY will leave the reader breathless as it races from towards its shocking conclusion.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse UK
• Release date: Dec 3, 2010
• ISBN: 9781467892599

Keith Hargreaves

Keith Hargreaves has lived and that living drips from every page of his heart stopping debut. A rich concoction filled with beauty, menace and savagery and a writing style that will leave the reader contemplating phrases long after the final page. An actor, traveller and educator amongst many things Keith has waited twenty years before publishing his first novel Legacy. Lets hope its not another twenty before the next one!

Book preview

1915 

The boy sat on his haunches with his trouser leg hitched up exposing the bare, jutting ankle. He cast his gaze from left to right, all the while gnawing at the tattered nails on his fingers. He had seen the prize some twenty minutes earlier; then the moon had been full and the smashed wall lit by its glow but now the shadows crept from the east, shrouding his view.

The body was situated at least twenty feet in front of him and to the left across the track that led to the farm. It was wearing a field uniform of a dark colour which had been rendered even darker by the stain of blood that had poured from its shattered skull and it lay spread-eagled on the rubble. A toy discarded by a feckless child. The remains of the head sat crazily on the shoulder, the one eye staring, shocked and the extended limbs straining against the torso. The pitted farm road was slick and muddied with puddles of unknown depth and behind the wall a crater still smouldered and hissed.

The boy looked to the sky and watched the cloud snuff out the last light as the fires danced on the horizon. He eased himself to a standing position and stepped out of the hiding place, listening intently.

The sounds did not change.

The relentless crump, the crack of a rifle as a sniper played the line and a mewling from beyond the wire in the distance; but these sounds had all been there before. He avoided the puddles and was soon by the body; it was barely cool despite the cold of the night. He reached under the stiffening corpse and grasped the webbing of the uniform and then, bracing his legs against the fallen bricks, he rolled the dead weight until its chest was against the stones.

He looked up again and checked the road. It was clear and quiet and unusually still, as if a breath was being held. He returned to his task, urgent now, opening the small canvas knapsack that hung round his shoulder and neck and taking out a bundle of cloth that he deftly unrolled. The knife within was sharp and dry and clean. His breath became hotter as he cut the trouser leg of the corpse from the hip to the knee and across the buttock to the base of the spine. The blade ploughed through the thick material as if through gossamer. Replacing the knife he ripped at the trousers, his hands now slick with mud. The textile held and then tore exposing the pale skin within. The boy reached into his sack once more and took out a roll of newspaper and two pieces of sacking string, placing them onto the back of the torso.

He re-gripped the knife and, with a sawing movement, cut into the now cold flesh. His breaths came in pants.

Suddenly the moonlight burst from the sky.

The boy stopped still, sinking into the corpse, his face bloodied and matted with sweat and earth. Nothing stirred; even the distant sounds of battle seemed to pause as the horror of their trade was revealed by the fluorescent glow. The moon slipped behind the veil once more and the hiatus was forgotten.

The work began again.

Chapter 1 

Wednesday 7:30 am

The alarm clock woke Jarrett at the normal time. He opened his eyes and stared at the ceiling of the spare bedroom of number 22 Worthington Street, Ashley, Bucks. With a deep yawn he wiped his eyes with the corners of his knuckles and stretched long and hard before swinging his legs out from under the duvet and standing up. He looked up and caught sight of himself in the full-length mirror. He looked closely at the jowly, familiar face with its dark rings under the eyes, hinting at the sleep that had come hard the night before. A wry smile tickled his lips as he straightened his posture and pulled his stomach in. ‘Not bad. Not bad at all,’ he said to himself padding to the bathroom. In the room next door Andrea Lane stirred; crossing her legs and keeping her eyes firmly closed she uttered one word.

Tea.

It was a call to arms. Jarrett brushed his teeth and quickly relocated himself to the kitchen where, with swift deft movements, he took two bone china tea cups from the overhead cupboard and turned on the kettle which had been left full the night before. Teabags taken from a tin of Twinings Old English Breakfast tea were placed in each cup and five minutes later, Jack and Andrea were sitting up, both wearing sunglasses, in their king size double bed, as the morning sun crashed through their east facing window.

These sunglasses are a great idea, Jack opened.

Mmm.Wonderful. I don’t have to look at you. Andrea replied. Did you sleep alright?

Eventually. It’s not so much the sleeping, it’s the waking. I think I’m beginning to fear going to sleep, because I know that I’ll wake and then once I have woken I know I won’t get back to sleep. I’m so sorry, I don’t want to sleep in separate beds, but until I can work out what’s going on I think it’ll be best, certainly during the week anyway, Jack replied, whilst looking out over the top of his teacup.

At the end of the bed, the open countryside spilled into the room. Jack was counting the number of cows in the field in the far distance, whilst giving a measured response to Andrea’s questions. His sleep had been disrupted for the last two or three weeks by a series of more and more intricate and upsetting dreams. They came in waves, a series of vignettes, and they left him feeling very confused and not a little anxious, yet on waking he recalled little or nothing of them. He couldn’t get a handle on what they meant and he didn’t recognize any of the characters in them; worse still his wakefulness was beginning to impact on his relationship with the first woman he had cared to attempt to share his life with since the death of his wife.

Look, I don’t mind. Of course I miss you being in bed with me. I lie awake here, thinking of you in the other room and wonder if you’re lying awake thinking of me in this room. I then think how stupid it is. We are both in this relationship to be with each other, and here we are. We can’t even sleep in the same bed. Mad. It’s probably just a phase of some sort; perhaps with you working less in the evenings your mind is less engaged at night, and therefore wakes you before you are ready to wake up, Andrea ventured.

Four years earlier, when his wife, Beth, had died as the result of the deadly combination of an unusually icy road for November, the local council’s inability to treat roads when required and perhaps one more gin and tonic than had been wise, Jarrett had thrown himself into the anaesthetic cocoon of work for months before coming up for air. The job enabled him to be away from the area and the growing sore that festered, waiting for his return and attention. He had been a road manager for touring bands for nearly fifteen years when Beth died. Before her death he had only taken on UK based tours and had succeeded in creating and sustaining a company that was respected by promoters and artists alike for delivering exactly what was required with the minimum of fuss and maximum panache. JJ Stagecraft became the first point of call for several promoters when planning tours for both incoming artists and UK bands and singers.

Jarrett was a traditionalist and his views were appreciated; he only worked for artists who played their own instruments and discreetly turned away those that he knew didn’t. He recognised his own snobbery and in a small way it amused him; not as much, however, as it had amused Beth during a discussion about whether he should take on a major tour with an American singer who, it was well known, could neither sing or dance, but who had other assets which she used to full effect in all her videos. He didn’t do the tour in the end but before he had made his decision Beth had run him ragged with accusations of being past it and a boring old fart.

After her death Jarrett had taken anything on, UK or European, he didn’t care, the bigger the better, the longer the better; he would have taken on the large breasted teenage American girl but her star had faded and she was already selling stories to the press of her eating habits and pharmaceutical preferences.

He stayed on the road for seventeen months following Beth’s funeral and they were, to his mind, some of the best and worst months of his life. Each day he awoke empty and gorged himself on work to rid his body of the gnawing hunger that threatened to overwhelm him. Beth had tamed him, or so she had believed, but it had been less adversarial than that; Jarrett had given himself to her, subsumed himself to her; he had inextricably linked his future to hers and then that future was gone. His last goodbye was a partial sight of her face in a morgue where the mortician refused to let him even touch her for fear that he would pull back the shroud and expose the full, bloody reality of car meets tree at 65 mph.

Then he came home; he left JJ Stagecraft in the hands of his most trusted colleague, Steve Jackson, and then shut the front door and confronted the pain that had been waiting for him. It was another three months before he contacted Steve again to tell him that he was ready to work again but only hands on, one on one work with artists who just needed one roadie and no fuss. He had slowly got back into the swing of things but never venturing far.

He placed his cup on the cluttered bedside table.

Yeah, maybe. I just wish that when I wake up I didn’t wake you up, and we could still sleep together, and neither of us would worry so much, Jack replied, still focusing on the cows in the middle distance.

I’m not worried. Really. You silly thing, just because we sleep in separate rooms occasionally. It doesn’t mean that anything else has changed about our relationship, she countered, her tea hot hand slowly moving towards him under the duvet.

Oh I see. You make me sleep in the other room in order to conserve your strength, so that you can pillage me to your heart’s content upon waking, Jack teased. He stopped looking at the middle-distance and rolled to face Andrea. He never ceased to wonder about how his outlook had changed from the moment he had met her. He examined her face; large liquid eyes, almond shaped and deep brown in colour, strong cheekbones, with a snub nose and full, luscious lips; he preferred her at this time of day with no make-up on, when her beauty, which she vehemently denied, was plain to see. He leant over and stroked the side of her face, gently massaging the puffiness round one eye, kneading the sleep away as now his other hand began to explore her smooth legs.

I’ve got to brush my teeth!

Do it after, when you shower!

After what? Mr Presumptuous.

After this, Jack replied, slowing stroking the top of her legs whilst placing her hand between his own.

Oh. I see, Andrea giggled, before conceding, if you insist.

They fell together, all kisses and caresses, both oblivious to the black cloud that blotted the sun from the room.

7.50 am

The flat behind Ashley market square smelt of sweat; sweat and fear.

Maarten Wouters opened his eyes, stretched his arm out of bed, reached over to the radio on the crowded bedside table and turned it on. Sound leapt out of the cheap Panasonic as the DJ of the moment treated his listeners to his sunshine soaked mediocrity. The sudden noise ramped up the pressure in Wouters’ already pounding head and for a brief moment a wave of queasiness rippled through him. He lay there and let it pass, mouth open, head back on the pillow facing the ceiling. Then he waited, waited for the chattering to start. It always started quietly, almost a whisper; you wouldn’t notice it unless you were listening and Maarten was listening.

He had been listening for some time now.

At first they hadn’t known he was there but more recently they had begun to converse. They had begun to tell him things, things that he had known but he hadn’t understood.

He threw back the bedclothes and gingerly put his feet onto the bare floorboards. The landlord of his rented flat had marketed it as an upmarket loft style property with bare boards and white walls. The reality was somewhat different. The floors and walls were bare because the minimum had been done to the property to make it rentable and the spaciousness of a loft conversion did not translate to this one bedroom box above a charity shop. Maarten recalled thinking that the swinging of a cat would only have been possible if the cat had been limbless. He had chuckled at the thought of the swinging; bloody and wet, occasionally slapping against one of the white walls, perhaps misting the letting agent’s haughty face with its spray.

The first footsteps were always tentative in the morning, a combination of the roaring rheumatoid arthritis which burrowed into his joints and the tenderness of the cuts he had made to the soles of his feet the previous evening. Last night had been no different and the brown overlapping stains on the sheets of the bed were testament to his industry with the Stanley blade he kept on the table. He made his way to the tiny bathroom and proceeded to urinate away a slight tumescence which, although always there first thing in the morning, soon faded never to return during his waking hours as the voices clamoured and the Flunitrazepam swung into effect.

He had been taking the drug for a while now ever since coming across it in a club. Someone had spiked his drink with the intention of robbing him; he had felt the effects and despite the debilitating nature of the symptoms had enjoyed the rush, but he had also noted the extra interest being paid him by a leather jacketed man who had been sitting at the bar when he had ordered his drinks. Maarten then played up the narcosis and exited the club via a side door he knew opened into an alley running alongside the dive to a dead end of vagrants, boxes and dumpsters. Leather jacket had followed sensing a soft target, not knowing that predator and prey had already swapped roles, he hadn’t even felt the second less effective blow as the brick pounded his skull from behind. Maarten left him unconscious, bleeding and broke, and smiled his way back into the club. He took two more of the tablets he had found in a bottle in the man’s pocket. After an anxious ten minutes the benzodiazepine took effect. This was the first of a lifetime of cobweb memoried nights.

Maarten had discovered his drug of choice and he had chosen Rohypnol; this was a different high to the marijuana and cocaine that he was used to taking and, even better, he found that he slept and when he slept everything quietened down. One of the supposed side effects was increased sexual appetite but even after he started to inject the highly potent alcohol/Rohypnol solution known as Darkene, the effect on his penis was negligible. He had pondered adding Viagra to the cocktail but had eventually settled for the exquisite spice of denial; wallowing in the desire as it tore at his insides whilst his penis hung sallow and unresponsive to the needs of its owner.

Ablutions finished Maarten entered the very small six foot square kitchen which contained a cooker and a half size fridge, two overhead cupboards and a sideboard above two further cupboards upon which there sat a kettle and two tins, one with instant coffee and the other sugar, both lids sticky with their contents. Two stools stood either side of a badly affixed breakfast bar and he slumped on one of them as he reached over and flicked the switch on the kettle.

The voices were very loud today. He looked at his hands as he cupped them to his face and saw the blood.

The blood that was to come.

Chapter 2 

8.05

Jarrett tapped the door with his toothbrush. Breakfast at the market? Hot croissant and espresso before you slide off to work? he asked.

Sounds great, I’ll be out in a minute, she shouted above the cascading water.

He was pulling on his vintage Levi’s as Andrea returned to the bedroom tamping her wet hair with the towel .She looked appreciatively as he bent to accommodate himself.

Nice, she remarked.

You’ve had your share for today, you cheeky mare, Jarrett retorted, a wide grin crossing his face as he relished the comfort and easiness with which they meshed. Maybe later if you buy breakfast, he offered.

Now who’s being cheeky?

They moved downstairs and into the airy front room where the sun streamed in onto a table littered with a combination of music press publications and veterinary journals – their lives scattered and intermingled for all visitors to see. Andrea Lane had been working as a temporary locum to the veterinary practice in the town of Ashley when she first met Jack Jarrett. He had brought in a neighbour’s dog, a stubborn yet deeply lovable Great Dane called Butch, to have its claws clipped and teeth scraped.

The neighbour concerned was eighty-three and subduing the dog was now impossible for her since a recent stroke had rendered her useless at any form of physical activity, never mind wrestling a dog that dwarfed her. The sight of her walking the huge dog caused amusement throughout Ashley as people discussed whether the dog was pulling the motorised scooter or vice versa, and her attempt to fit the poor mutt with saddle bags was greeted with such hilarity that Jack had to tell her it was illegal in order to protect her from becoming purely a figure of fun. Andrea had met both the dog and his owner before so she and Jack had shared a joke and a knowing smile whilst Jack had manfully held on as Andrea clipped and scraped Butch to a sufficient extent to declare him fit.

After their initial meeting both had remarked to themselves that maybe there was someone in Ashley worth seeking out again. A series of nights out became a series of nights in which in turn became days in as they both, slowly and then with more urgency, embarked upon a relationship as meaningful as Andrea had ever had and more fulfilling than Jack ever dared imagine he would have again.

As they both went for their coats the doorbell sounded.

Bugger! Who’s that?

Probably the postman, I’m expecting a package from the States about this tour that Steve’s setting up for The Jayhawks, Jack replied, moving to the door. When he entered the passageway he saw a large silhouette against the stained glass of the front door.

No, I think it’s Steve, he shouted, opening the door and taking in the 6’6" frame of his friend and colleague Steven Jackson, ex-marine and rigger extraordinaire, the current driving force behind JJ Stagecraft. Jack let him in.

Speak of the devil and he shall appear, he said, shutting the door behind him. I was just saying that I was expecting that package from the States.

Got it yesterday. Handy really as there were a couple of things I needed to sort out and yesterday was better than today as they’re flying in this morning, Jackson replied moving easily and quickly through into the lounge; this was a space he had been in many times and he occupied it with a comfort born of habit. He saw Andrea and kissed her on the cheek.

Morning Steve, you’re early. Are you buying breakfast? We are going to have croissants and coffee at the market. Coming? she asked, tightening the belt on her navy blue scrubs and putting on a fawn Boden coat.

Why not? Breakfast with you, Andrea, is something I think about quite often. Do we have to take Shorty with us? he joked.

Now, now. He may be shorter than you but he’s incredibly well put together. If we’re nice to him he may pay, she laughed.

Fair enough, then. Let’s go, Steve replied.

Excuse me! Jack retorted his voice lined with mock anguish, Did you come here for something specific or just to upset our so far excellent morning?

I wanted to ask you something but it’ll wait. Are you ready? We can’t hang around forever you know, he ribbed, winking at an increasingly amused Andrea. She liked Steve and enjoyed his company. She was convinced that his quiet steady manner had not only saved Jack’s business but had also arrested a decline into self loathing and drinking which, although she had never witnessed it, both Jack and Steve had alluded to when the lights were low and the self became the subject for discussion.

Jack held the door open and stepped out after the others into the street and the sunshine.

If any of them had known what was approaching they would have stayed inside, locked the door and then barricaded it, desperately trying to prevent the events that were about to engulf them.

8.25 am

Everywhere has a rhythm. The city has a pulse that races and surges and a siren’s call that draws the young, the hopeful and the hopeless, its lights and sounds a wild dervish inviting all to the dance. The desert has a different beat, the pump of a different heart that swells with its own flora and fauna, as the parched winds roar across its barren skin influencing all who touch or are touched by it. Each place reflects the rhythms of those creatures that live in and use the habitat and each develop their own idiosyncrasies that conjoin with the others to form the pattern, the signature of that place.

Ashley is no different to anywhere else in this respect; not ripped by baking breath or choked by the millions of souls of the city, it has a natural order and pace which cannot be seen or measured but which exists and can be felt if you are aware of the strands of the fibre.

Maarten Wouters stood, leaning softly against the window frame of an overpriced gift shop that was yet to open and watched as this dance played itself out in front of him. Each role played forever with a commitment and truth missing from all but the best theatre and here it was for Maarten’s edification. He felt it and knew what it meant and he also knew that he would never be part of it. He was, he knew, forever condemned to wander outside the fabric of a community, beyond the pulse of its heart. Maarten knew he would never belong anywhere other than the place he had run from. The crushing certainty of this sent shards of ice into his heart and pulled it down into the maelstrom of his gut as it churned with self-loathing and hatred to the rhythm of the chatter. He watched, despair leaking through him until it dripped into the comforting warmth of madness.

As it did, Ashley carried on, unaware and unknowing as the twine of sanity gently unravelled from Maarten’s mind like silk from a spool. Ashley did not know this man but it would never forget him.

Jim Boniface had been selling vegetables at Ashley market ever since the day his father had first brought him in 1963 as a treat. He had spent the whole day running errands, trimming cauliflowers and generally making his father very proud and when Eric Boniface had eventually succumbed to emphysema it was inevitable that Jim would carry on the family stall at this and other markets in the area. Ashley market was one of the ones he enjoyed more than most. It was clean with warm toilets within fifty yards of the stall, which was a definite plus over some of the more Victorian sites they pitched. At five o’clock in the morning little things become very important. Now, with the stall fully stocked and a warm coffee and sausage roll from the nearby bakery in his hands, Jim was ready for anything the day could throw at him. As he surveyed the market square, as he had for forty years, he knew he would never tire of the vibrancy of market day.

Excuse me, could you give me a hand? a voice called. Jim, shaken from his brief introspection, looked up to see a young woman struggling to erect the metal frame required to protect her small stall from the elements. He put his coffee down and moved round the sagging shelves of his display to help.

In the southernmost corner of the square Elsie Tawn held the lead of the black Labrador tight as she started to move amongst the stalls; things were not, in her opinion, as good as they had been twenty years ago but she still came to the market every Wednesday when she walked the dog. It was what she had always done and she wasn’t going to change despite the evident decline in the quality of not only produce but also customers. It used to be that you met everyone at the market but now they were mainly people she had never seen before who pushed and jostled as they perceived a bargain being sold to someone other than themselves.

There were normally twenty-six different stalls at Ashley market, the only exception being that there were two selling fruit and vegetables. One of these was Jim Boniface’s, which had a prime pitch as a consequence of the number of years he had been coming. The market place stood at the heart of the town which itself straddled the Great Ouse as it snaked its ponderous way to the coast at the Wash. A wide high street, from which the town rippled outward, crossed the river over a stone Saxon bridge and opened out into the square where the stalls were pitched in parallel lines with the main flow of traffic passing to the south of the square and an ancillary road running along the east side. Each side was overlooked by shops and elegant Georgian edifices. On the northern row there was a baker whose family had been in Ashley for at least three decades next to a small jewellers selling mainly overpriced silver and next to that the Help the Aged shop.

This was followed by three similar antique shops whose only sign of independence from each other was the colour of their front doors as the rest of their facades were identically painted. On the western side more antique shops, then a butcher, Wrigglesworths, who claimed to offer nothing but organic meat. This was a falsehood fostered by the owner in order to raise prices and did not prevent him from, on occasion, taking meat from the most dubious and untraceable of sources. The irony of this complicity was not lost on the proprietor, Ken Wrigglesworth, as all and sundry packed his shop even on market day professing to ‘prefer the meat from here because at least you know where it comes from, eh Ken?’. Ken would smile and agree and occasionally criticise the trader on the market just for good measure whilst his knowing assistant would hide his smirk by busily preparing cuts.

The shop directly next to Wrigglesworth’s was a greengrocer who, conversely, took the organic creed seriously and consequently lived a precarious economic existence at the mercy of middle class middle England attitudes and their whims and fancies. If there was an article espousing the