To Catch A Killer

To Catch A Killer (15) The Final Night Walk (Watty Awards 2012)

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I had been plagued with nightmares and splitting headaches since the night of the double murder. Not only did they seem to not be letting up, but they seem to only be getting steadily worse as the days wore on.

The nightmares scared me. They would always start with Mary being murdered much like all the other victims had been. The face of the perpetrator would always be a fuzzy blot, unfortunately. Much like how Mary would always be murdered, the nightmares never failed to end with the scene of a body of an unknown woman in an alley way on a rainy night; it was as though my mind had gone into imagination hyper drive. My dreams were becoming less like snapshots of an old video and more like a clip out of a horror movie that became slightly clearer with every repeat. I knew that if I wanted to keep my sanity intact, I would either have to solve the case or step down and remove myself from it altogether.

Sitting in the station with the computer playing a video footage, I was hardly able to concentrate on the moving figures on screen; the nightmare just kept going through my mind, like a video player stuck on replay. I quickly shook my head to get it out of my head and to get my focus back.

After hours of trawling through the CCTV footage from the Imperial, we noticed something strange. There was a rather elderly porter who appeared on the cameras only twice and on both occasions he went up to the fourth floor. We had been unable to identify him but two of the restaurant staff claimed to have seen him and given him the drink that Mrs Sanders had ordered to bring up to her room. They couldn’t even give an accurate description of him other than the fact that he had glasses, a moustache and that he was a bit old to be a porter at the Imperial.

“I didn’t take too much notice of him, to be honest. It was the end of rush hour and I was about to finish my shift so I wasn’t paying him much attention. I didn’t recognise him but I’ve only been working here for about six months and the Imperial is a huge place so I don’t know everyone.” Was what the barman, who had given our ‘mystery porter’ the drink, said when we questioned him.

As we replayed the snippets of surveillance footage showing the elderly porter, we also noticed that not once was his face facing the camera, and it was not just one camera he evaded, but all of them. This, coupled with the fact that he was only seen within the times of our victim’s death, was astounding.

It was around ten in the morning when Morgan came to tell me that he had been called out for a domestic disturbance complaint.

“Don’t worry about it Morgan.” I said when he apologised. “I’ve got Carter here somewhere so we can afford to lose you for an hour or two. Lord knows we’re not getting very far here anyway.” I looked around for Carter, but couldn't find her. I frowned and turned back to Morgan. “Where are you heading off to anyway?” I asked.

“Weatherly Road sir, house number 229.”

I cursed.

“Turlock!” I yelled as the man walked through the door. “Get your jacket now!” I demanded as I fished my car keys out of my trouser pocket “Morgan I need you to stay here. Turlock and I are going to go deal with your case.”

“Now sir-” He began to protest but I cut him off.

“229 Weatherly Road is Carter's address, and if she’s in trouble I’ll be damned if I stay here and do nothing!” With that, I turned and hurried out of the station with Turlock behind me and we both piled into the car as I peeled out of the station.

I used the sirens to bypass the traffic and we were at Carters house in less than twenty minutes. We were not greeted with the sounds of fighting like we had expected. Instead the house was quiet, deathly quiet. Turlock and I got out of the car cautiously. We walked up to the front door. As we neared the door, only then did the sound of yelling became apparent. Suddenly there was a scream and the dull thud of a body falling to the floor. Pulling out our side-arms, we quickly forced the door open. We burst into the front room, weapons raised and at the ready, to see a sight that would remain with me for the rest of my life.