Reaper, page 20
‘I haven’t got anywhere to keep him. You know that.’
‘Well, he wasn’t kept anywhere in particular before, so it’s not like he’s not used to it.’
‘And how would I afford to feed him?’
‘There’s some food in the boot.’
So much for her not trying to take him home.
‘You sound like you want me to have him, Meredith.’
‘You’re good with him, Max, and it’s clear he likes you. He’s had a hell of a time. He needs someone he knows.’ He knew full well it was an offer he couldn’t refuse. ‘Anyway, you can use him as a guard dog, help keep you safe.’
Max snorted. ‘Meredith, he’s a shit guard dog. The last two people who owned him died. His track record ain’t that great.’
54: Reaper
‘Reaper Meets His Maker’.
The banner headline splashes across the New Zealand Herald website.
His eyes flick down the screen.
‘Two Men Found Dead in Albert Park’.
A photograph of police staff in front of the large tent protecting the crime scene graces the page.
He reads on: ‘Police will not confirm the identity of the deceased but did state that one of them was a person of interest in the Reaper case.’
A broad grin breaks across his face.
He clicks through other news sites, and again and again he gets top billing.
‘Death to Death’.
‘Reaper Cut Down’.
‘Reaper Bites the Dust’.
All are crowing the news: the Reaper is dead.
They are buying it, hook line and sinker. It could not have worked better if he’d tried. He sits in the front window, looking down on the street as the rat race flows past below.
And that rain. That beautiful, beautiful rain, washing away evidence before they got their tent up and protected the scene. That rain that continues now, refreshing, cleansing the streets.
God bless the rain.
His untimely demise is not the only news trending.
‘Mayor Lifts Curfew. State of Emergency Over’.
‘Auckland City Freed’.
The accompanying photographs are jubilant. Perfect, utterly perfect. The hero worship continues. They can’t get enough. He can do no wrong.
55: Max
It felt like a lifetime since he’d taken a dog for a walk, and as Ace trotted along, stopping to sniff every interesting smell, every rubbish bin, every tree, he remembered how much of a pleasure it was to be at the behest of such a creature. He’d been back in the city centre a matter of moments, but he’d already set out on his rounds to check up on his people. Old habits died hard. Except this time he had the dog. The ultimate in icebreakers.
The game had changed in the last twenty-four hours. The threat was gone, the city felt less tense – although there was a residual unease, like it wasn’t quite ready to forget. Or was that just him?
So it was quieter out than he’d expected – not just the general populace taking their time to drift back to the centre of town, but there were also fewer rough sleepers, his community. Word on the street from those who were there was some had departed by choice, and some been cleared out of the CBD last night in the name of their own safety, and it didn’t look like they were coming back anytime soon. The sweeping out the mayor had promised looked to have happened, and the displacements were likely to be permanent.
Ace started pulling at the lead, dragging him in the direction of a familiar face. Fido. His face erupted in a toothless smile at the sight of the dog.
‘Bro, good to see you, man. I thought you were in clink.’
Max laughed. There was no way to hide secrets in the world of the homeless. Keeping the gossip alive was one of the favourite ways to fill a day on the streets. Everyone wanted to know your business, and unless you were very careful and discreet, did know your business. In a weird way it was how they showed they cared, even if they were just fellow bums on the street.
‘Yeah, well, they realised the error of their ways and let me out.’
‘Hey, at least you got a feed, a bed and a hot shower.’
‘The food was average at best, the shower wasn’t that hot, and I had to watch my arse.’
Fido let rip a belly laugh that proved infectious, then rubbed Ace’s ears and gave him some hearty pats.
‘You heard about Artie? You heard that he killed that Reaper fucker.’
‘Yeah, I did.’
‘He sure took one for the team – gave it up for all of us, God bless his soul.’
‘Fucking sad though.’ Max may not have held a great deal of affection for Artie, but he respected him. The man had been the only one to step up when he’d put out the plea for information. No one deserved to die like that.
‘He must have fought back like a fiend. Reaper didn’t see that one coming.’ Fido looked up at Max and gave him a wink. ‘Artie cheated death.’ Again, the laugh erupted as Fido cracked up at his own joke.
‘I hear that he was stabbed – that they were both stabbed,’ Max said.
‘Yeah. Real up-close and personal. None of that poison shit that he did to the others.’
The violence of the killing was certainly an escalation. But judging by the thought and care the Reaper had put into the other murders, Max was not really surprised that he had come along armed and prepared. But was Artie his target? Or did he just happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time? And if the latter was the case there was something that was puzzling him.
‘Can you tell me something? Artie – did he usually carry?’
‘Carry?’
‘Did he usually carry a knife?’ Max asked.
Fido pondered that for a moment. ‘Nah, I don’t think he did. Well nothing big anyway, just the little sort of pocket thing that would barely cause a scratch.’
‘Well he killed the bastard, so he must have done a hell of a lot more than give him a little scratch.’
‘Judging by the fucking blood, hell yeah.’
The words pulled him up short. Max gave Fido a hard look.
‘What do you mean, judging by the blood? Were you there, Fido? Did you see it happen?’
Fido waved it away with a big gesture. ‘Nah, man, didn’t see it happen, thanks be to God. But I did come across it afterwards. Took a shortcut through the park.’ He shook his head as if reliving the moment. ‘Fucking awful sight to see, man. No one wants to see something like that. Not ever. Said a prayer for them, for their souls, especially for Artie. Blessed them. Blessed the ground they died on.’
‘When was this – what time?’ Max couldn’t hide the urgency in his voice.
‘Would have been about eleven I reckon.’
‘So was it you who called the cops?’ he said.
‘Hell no. I know when to mind my own business – didn’t want to get involved in whatever went down there. That sort of thing just gets you in trouble.’ Fido pointed at Max. ‘You of all people know what it’s like. You tell them something, report something, and next minute they’re pointing the finger at you. Fuck that. I just saw them, prayed and then moved on.’ He looked up, and Max could see the man’s eyes awash with tears. ‘And it’s still burned in my head, man, that image. You don’t want to see people dead like that. It hurts your soul.’
Death, when it was kind, dignified and the result of old age, was hard enough to bear witness to, let alone when it was the result of violence – the ugliness and rawness of it, the cold, hard brutality. He felt for Fido and hated what he had to ask next, but he needed to know.
‘Sorry I have to do this, and I know it’s tough, but can you do me a favour, mate. Can you tell me exactly what you saw?’
Fido nodded his head as he pulled Ace in closer.
‘Well it was just the two of them up there, right next to each other, lying on the ground.’
‘Right next to each other? What kind of position?’
Fido lifted his hands then, held them in front of him, fingertips to fingertips, in a flat line.
‘Like this, head to head. But Artie was face up. Ugh, his eyes were looking at me, man. I had to close them, make it right.’ Max could see him shudder. ‘The other guy, the guy in the big black coat, was on his side, you know like, curled up.’
From what Max had learned from Meredith, one of their frustrations had been that by the time the bodies had been reported in the morning and the SOCOs had got there to cover the scene and protect the evidence, the rain had had plenty of time to damage, dilute or wash it away. He thought back to what Fido had said earlier.
‘You mentioned there was lots of blood?’
‘Oh yeah. I was careful not to stand in it. I’ve seen those programmes on the telly – you know, the CSI stuff. Didn’t want to leave a trail of bloody footprints leading to me, eh. That would have been bad.’
‘Wise thinking. But where was it? Where was the blood?’
‘Well, come to think of it, it was more around the other guy than Artie. I could see some on Artie’s shirt and stuff, but the other guy had like a puddle of it by his head – looked like it came from his neck.’
He must have got there pretty soon after the big event to see pooled blood before the rain washed it away. What else had he seen, was there more?
‘Did you see anyone else out and about? Anyone nearby?’
‘Not that I can remember. I was pretty freaked out by the dead people. You don’t see that every day. My head was a bit scrambled to be honest.’
Max could only imagine.
‘Okay, one last question. Can you remember where the knives were?’
‘Jesus, Max. You’re beginning to sound like the cops, mate.’
‘Sorry. I don’t mean to interrogate you. I just think it might be important and I don’t trust the cops to get it right.’
‘Yeah, I hear ya. Preaching to the choir … Um … they were holding them I guess. They each had one.’ He moved his hands around like he had the knives in his grasp.
‘Were they holding them, or were they just near them?’
‘Holding them I think, like, you know, in their hands.’
Max let that sit, tried to visualise the scene. Fido was right, it must have been truly awful to stumble across. The man’s crumpled face certainly reflected the impact it had had on him. Max felt for him, he truly did. He pulled gently on the lead and Ace looked up, came to his side.
‘Hey, good you’re looking after the dog, mate. Old George really loved him. So did Artie.’
Max leaned down and patted Ace on the shoulders, realised he was getting rather fond of him too.
‘Hey, thanks for telling me all that, Fido. I know it was hard. Appreciate it.’
‘No worries. In a way it’s been kind of good to talk about it. It’s not the sort of thing you can tell anyone. They might not understand or have the stomach for it.’
Max reached down and shook the big man’s hand, then turned and headed up towards K-Road.
Two men dead. One tried to kill the other, the other fought back, hard. He was still getting his head around the concrete reality that Shane McFarlane was the Reaper. It made sense that it would have been him who had done the attacking, and Artie who defended himself to the death. From what he knew of the man he couldn’t think of any situation where Artie would have been the aggressor. So what would have made Artie the target? What would have made McFarlane lure him to that spot, and what would have been important or enticing enough to make Artie go?
As he and Meredith had discussed, the most likely scenario was that McFarlane had realised Artie was the one who gave up Nero as a drug dealer and had lured him to the park to silence him. But why? How was he a risk that needed silencing? Unless the Reaper and Nero were somehow connected, and Artie’s death was some kind of revenge for Nero’s and for the role Artie may have played in it, however small? Max shook his head. It wasn’t making sense of any kind. There must have been a connection somehow, but for the moment it eluded him. But nothing was sitting quite right for him. His gut was giving off red flags and alarm bells, but his brain was yet to interpret the signs and figure it all out.
‘Come on, Ace,’ he said to the dog as he stopped to examine yet another rubbish bin.
He was going to have to walk until he nutted this one out.
Because it felt like the key to everything.
56: Reaper
He scrolls down the page, and down, and yet further.
There are no new articles, no updates, no press releases, no opinion pieces, no column inches.
He opens up another site and scrolls.
Not a mention.
Another?
Nothing.
The Reaper is yesterday’s news.
This is his plan. The brilliance of his plan. He’s had his fun. Achieved his purpose – the first steps at least. It’s been more thrilling than he ever imagined. They have all been easier to prey upon and manoeuvre than he ever expected.
He tries one more site.
Not a single word.
Have they forgotten him already?
Despite the success of his strategy, the reality eats at him. The bitterness and disappointment at how quickly he has been forgotten starts to taint his feelings of elation.
He checks through social-media hashtags.
#Reaper is no longer trending.
How can they forget so fast?
Yes, as far as they are concerned, the Reaper is dead, but how can his memory, his impact, his art, be sloughed off their collective consciousness so quickly, only to be overtaken by someone cheap celebrity-wannabe clickbait? Where is their appreciation of his power, his substance, his mastery?
He looks out of the window at the nameless masses walking past, living their little lives, on their way to the purgatory of their little jobs. Look at them blissfully unaware. Look at them unappreciative of everything he is doing for this great city, to make it a desirable place to come to, invest in, to expand, to make their pathetic lives better.
The germ of disappointment morphs into an ember of anger, a tightness in his chest, a heat and itchiness that crawls across his skin.
The ungrateful little fuckers.
Look at them down there, swarming like ants to be trodden on, to be crushed.
He inhales deeply, nostrils flaring, teeth gritting.
Something catches his attention in his peripheral vision.
No.
Could it be?
He turns to look.
It is.
It is the thin man.
The thin man with a dog.
The thin man with that dog.
But how?
After all of his careful leading, his manipulating, his planning.
The sight of him fans the flames – of his anger, but also the flames of something else. Is it vengeance?
He laughs, a bitter scoffing laugh.
They will appreciate him again. By God he will make them pay attention.
They will fear him.
They will never forget him again.
57: Max
Max awoke with a start, hands rising to ward off whatever demon sent from hell was touching him – until he realised it wasn’t some demon from his dreams, but an ugly-as-sin dog determined to wake him with licks and head butts. He reached a hand out and gave Ace a big pat on the head and a rub along his side. It had been a fitful night. He wasn’t used to having company of any form in the villa and it felt like his internal alert system triggered and woke him with every movement, every fart, every snort. But despite the lack of sleep, he felt grateful and somewhat relieved to have the mutt there. That was something he hadn’t anticipated, and even acknowledging that this furry creature made him feel somehow safer and less alone left him with emotions he had not felt in a long while.
Somewhere in those between times, between awake, dozing and the nightmares, his mind had consolidated some of the myriad thoughts going through his head. His subconscious had chewed over what wasn’t sitting quite right, articulated it into something that with the murky light of day was starting to make more sense. And the more sense it made, the more he knew he had to trust it, and share it. He reached for his phone. She needed to know.
The cafe had not been receptive to the presence of the dog so they walked with their takeaway coffees until they found a park bench to sit on, opposite the playground. Max saw her hesitate to sit so he leaned down and wiped the dampness off the seat with his sleeve. The rain had stopped but the winter sun was yet to penetrate this inner-city valley. Despite this there was still a hardy family out, enjoying the swings. He shuddered, not just from the chill, but also the memories. The last time he’d been here in Myers Park he’d had the shit kicked out of him by a man who was now dead. His body continued to ache from the consequences of that night and he was still incapable of holding anything in his left hand. Meredith had to carry his coffee while he kept the dog under control on his lead with the right. She sat down and placed the paper cup on the bench between them. The dog settled at his feet.
‘He seems to have taken to you,’ she said.
‘I think we’ve come to an understanding.’
He saw the curl of the smile before it settled back into seriousness. She continued their conversation where it left off.
‘So what are you trying to tell me, Max? You suddenly think that Shane McFarlane wasn’t our man? That the Reaper is still out there somewhere, waiting to strike again?’
‘Well I think he’s out there, but I don’t think he will strike again.’
‘And why exactly is that?’ She didn’t bother to hide her scepticism, but that didn’t concern him too much. In fact he would have been concerned if she wasn’t sceptical. In an odd way they too come to an understanding. He knew she would listen – he knew she would take it all with a grain of salt and question his judgements, but she wouldn’t ignore him. She wouldn’t write off his ideas as the thoughts of some sad ex-detective who needed to feel like he still had a role to play. Despite everything, there was still some small level of trust there, of respect.
