Insane - Who Are You To Judge? (Gripping Psychological Thriller)

Chapter 73 - Harry

"Babe," Harry calls as he slams the door shut. He doesn't get a response. "Babe," he repeats.

"I'm out here," a tiny little voice replies. Harry follows the source and finds Martha lying on one of the deck chairs in the garden.

Harry sighs, "What are you doing out here?"

Removing her sunglasses, Martha shrugs. "It's summer – I wanted to enjoy the sun."

"But the sun has set. It set half an hour ago."

Martha throws herself up, growling as she does. Her tone holds a type of attitude that you would usually find in a teenager. "Yes, I know that, thank you, Harry. I just wanted to sit out here for a while. I didn't realise that was a problem." She marches back into the kitchen, nudging his shoulder as she passes.

"Oh Jesus," Harry mutters to himself through gritted teeth as he clenches his fists. His voice isn't in the conversation, it seems tired and uninterested. Like it's on autopilot. "No, of course it isn't a problem. I was just asking, I didn't mean to offend you."

As she slides her robe on, Martha shakes her head, held high in the air. "Oh, you didn't offend me. I'm not a sensitive little child, Harry."

Sighing, he says, "That's great, I'm glad we got that cleared up. Now, why don't you tell me how your day was?"

"Oh well, the normal. Work, work, blah, blah, work, work, blah." She pours herself a glass of wine and offers Harry one. He declines. "It was odd today though, actually. When I got my morning coffee I bumped into this woman by accident and I swear she looked so familiar. It has been eating away at me all day, I just can't place her. She was drop-dead gorgeous. Dark blue eyes, gorgeous long dark hair..."

Harry stares at her blankly. "Are you expecting me to tell you who she is?"

Downing the glass of wine, she lets out an exaggerated sigh. "I'm sorry, Harry. You asked me about my day – I told you about my day. You really can't decide what you want from me, can you?" She disregards him, waving her hand and walking into the lounge. "Honestly, I have had it up to here with your nonsense."

"Oh, and you can cook for yourself tonight," she calls.

A few seconds later, Harry's phone vibrates in his pocket. He pulls it out and it is not who he's expecting.

"James, hey," Harry greets as he smashes the green button. "What's up?"

"I figured it out." James's voice resembles that of an overenthusiastic seven-year-old.

"You figured what out?"

"I figured out what the poem means."

When he doesn't elaborate, Harry encourages him. "Okay...and?"

"So, the pigs are us, the wolf is GR and I've decided that the house is the case. As in the Goldilocks case. The entire poem is about GR blowing the case up, right?"

"Right..." Harry agrees hesitantly.

"And the last verse is about the pigs, us, thinking we built the house, the case, to be really strong, but it's not because the wolf, GR, can find a way in."

"Mate, where are you going with this?" Harry asks.

"The part of the house that is weak are the foundations. The foundations of the house...the foundations of the case. We have to strip the case right back to its foundations to find where we went wrong."

Harry can't help but laugh at James's tone. "And what would the foundations of the case be?"

"The victims!" James exclaims like it is the punchline to a joke he has built up.

"The victims?" Harry repeats, confused and having trouble following James's train of thought.

"Yes, the victims! The foundations of a house are what starts the building off. The thing that starts a case is the victims. Think about it, there couldn't be a case without victims."

After he has caught up with James's thought process, he nods. "Okay, I'm with you. That makes sense. So, we need to look into the victims. What do we need to know about them specifically?"

Harry hears James shrug. "I've spent my entire evening getting to this point – I'm all out of detective juice for today. Tomorrow we'll go over every single aspect of them, their lives and their deaths. Okay? Oh, one sec—" James muffles his end of the phone and Harry can hear him speaking with someone. He turns his attention back to Harry. "Mate, I've got to go – dinner's on the table."

"Oh no, please don't," Harry pleads. "I just got home and Martha is in an absolutely foul mood. You aren't going to leave me to deal with that, are you? Where's the friendship?"

James laughs. "Come on, Harry. You're a big boy, you can handle a testy wife."

Harry moans a little while longer, but James quickly gets bored and ends the conversation. Harry is left to ponder James's theory. The more he thinks about it, the more sense it starts to make.