"Do you think this is a..."
I couldn't bring myself to finish that sentence. Hildegard looked serious, and her next words were not exactly the reassurance I was expecting from her.
"I don't know, mate."
"This can't be serious!"
She spoke calmly, almost mechanically, as if her brain was working at a different pace than her mouth. It felt like she was talking to herself.
"I've seen hundreds, maybe thousands of these over the years. Most of the time, it's nothing. Someone is bored? Sometimes they have an agenda, something that is masked under the threat. Some people want fame, some are out to make a quick buck. Yes, all these can have serious consequences, but I normally wouldn't jump on murder as my first guess."
"Do you think it could be something else?"
"I don't know. Honestly. This could be anything. Right now, we only have one message, one letter, a few paragraphs. It's too early to make any theories."
"So what, we just ignore it?"
"No. We do the only thing we can do right now: we bring it to the police. They will have more resources and information than we do. Maybe they also received one? Maybe they are monitoring something which relates to this?"
"I think the detectives are gone for the day. It's Friday evening, we'll probably find them at the pub by now."
"I agree. And I think we can wait until tomorrow. I know the new lead detective is working tomorrow, so we can pay him a visit. What better way to introduce ourselves?"
"Do you think they'll take us seriously?"
"I sure hope so. But this is a question for tomorrow. Now, it's time to get some rest and enjoy the evening. Should we meet shortly before ten in front of the police station?"
"Yeah, sounds good."
We finished gathering our things and left together, walking downhill in the direction of the pier. Hildegard was quiet, and I did not want to interrupt her thoughts. At Old Steine, we said our goodbyes and went our separate ways. I had plans to go to the movies with a friend, so I made a short stop at home to drop my stuff and freshen up, and around thirty minutes later I was arriving at the Marina. Every time I went there, I couldn’t help but think about my first case in Brighton. All that quickly went away once the trailers started filling out the big screen.
The next morning, that postcard came back into my mind, and the one thing about it that grabbed my attention from the start: BN1 1HH. By now I was used to seeing the letters BN everywhere, as these letters indicated that the address was in the Brighton and Hove area. The main ones, within the city limits, were BN1, BN2 and BN3, but there were areas which went all the way through the fourties, such as BN41. The second part, that one was for a specific address, one that matched the initials of Hildegard. I opened a maps website and typed it in, and in my mind something spectacular would come up, something that would match Hildegard’s big personality and presence. But the result on the screen quickly deflated me.
It was a small area, almost inside the south lanes, with a couple of restaurants and pubs, a few residential flats, but nothing too exciting. I myself walked through this bit of town a few times, never even looking away from my phone. I could not imagine that this would be the scenario of something so gruesome, which made me think that we might have been overreacting about this. Hildegard seemed to have had the same idea to look it up, but a different outlook, and we discussed it when we met for a coffee close to the police station, before going in. I was eager to discuss it, so I started talking as soon as I saw her.
“I checked the postcode, it was a dead end! Probably the most boring place in Brighton!”
“Yes, I checked it as well this morning. But I’m not sure I would agree with you about being a dead end, or even calling it boring. I think it raises some questions, and that always makes things interesting. Don’t you agree?”
“Questions? Well, yeah, I suppose. Why would they choose such an understated place? There’s nothing special in that area.”
“Think outside the box a little bit. Right now, we know nothing about this person. Who they are, what do they look like, how old they are, if they even live in Brighton... But also, what do they want to achieve here? Are they trying to make a joke? Are they looking for fame? Do they actually have any intention of harming someone?”
“The message does not answer any of this.”
“Not directly, no. But it raises possibilities.”
“Such as?”
“They chose a postcode that has my initials, and they sent the message to me, not the police. The police receive, I don’t know, hundreds of these? It could have easily gone unnoticed if they received it. With me, this is different. There is a big chance this would be noticed, that something would be done about it. There is a ‘why’ behind there. The message said something about starting with me, something about me being the number one. What makes me the number one? Is the potential victim someone I know, someone close to me?”
“Ah, I think I see it. So you are saying that your initials are more important than the actual location?”
“I don’t know, at least not with the information we have right now. Could be a possibility, and this is what I am trying to say. Possibilities are slowly being conceived. I can give you another one: is this person writing to alert me about someone else?”
“That sounds very far-fetched!”
“Does it? Imagine the scenario, they find out that a friend is going to do something bad, but they have no way of telling the authorities without putting themselves in danger...”
“I mean, yes, it’s a possibility, I guess.”
“I am not saying it is, or it is not. We cannot build any concrete hypotheses until we have more. But for now, we need to look for clues in what we have. And we are about to get a fresh set of eyes on this, someone who will come with a different perspective. Let’s see what he will think about this. Shall we?”
With that, we left the coffee shop and headed to the police station at John Street. I had been to that building multiple times before, and I knew some of the people working there fairly well. We walked in and headed towards the room from where the lead detective worked. When we arrived there, the room was empty, the detective, who normally works behind the table, was away, so we waited outside. Someone passed by and said something along the lines of ‘detective Debowski will be back in a minute.’ That name sounded familiar to me, but I could not remember at that moment where I heard it before. I might have read it on the news somewhere? I was immersed in my thoughts, trying to decipher where I had heard that name before, when a familiar voice spoke in a loud, friendly, almost joky tone.
“Fancy seeing you here!”
I turned around, expecting that the voice would be addressing Hildegard. To my surprise, I was the one being greeted, and by a smile I’ve seen numerous times before. That was Phillip Debowski, one of my teachers when I was training to be a detective. We used to call him ‘Philski’ in the academy, his subject was related to police procedures and documentation, and even though that could be seen as a boring topic, he made it interesting: He was a funny, laid-back kind of teacher, a bit of a character. Needless to say, he was one of my favourite teachers, and I was only able to say a loud ‘no way!’ before I gave him a big hug. Hildegard seemed amused, but greeted him with a less cheerful and more respectful way – after all, this was likely the first time they met.
“Detective Debowski, very nice to meet you. My name is Helga Hildegard.”
“Of course, the Helga Hildegard. I got word that this one here was working with the best detective in Britain. Makes one proud to be the master, does it not?”
“Thank you for your kind words, detective. You yourself hold an impressive resume as well, with all the good work put in for the Met. Precision and immaculate adherence to procedures, which I find very impressive and not easy to find these days.”
I felt a little starstruck in the middle of two people I admired, like I was in a dream. It felt normal, like that happened every day, probably because I was very familiar with them both already. At the same time, it felt somewhat strange. Suddenly two parallel worlds of mine crossed. Two people I never imagined being in the same room, at the same time, standing in front of me, having a casual chat, exchanging compliments.
That was only accentuated by how different they looked. Hildegard wore bold colours, and that day was not an exception to the rule: a cream, almost egg yolk yellow pantsuit, the usual thick indigo glasses, and metallic grey trainers. He, on the other hand, had a more casual, almost understated look. Jeans, washed out pink t-shirt with no labels, brands, patterns, just plain pink, and white trainers. He was also much younger than her, probably early to mid thirties. He was a bit shorter than average, had a large smile and almost no beard, apart from some light stubble around his moustache and chin, and kind brown eyes. He also wore glasses, but thin round ones with metal frames, which suited his face perfectly. The only thing they had in common was the hair - both very white, although I always suspected he was too young for this to be the natural colour.
Once all the pleasantries were exchanged, Hildegard took out the postcard and showed it to the detective. He read it with a curious face, turned it over, gazed at the picture, turned it back and read it again, but this time spending more time on it. His eyes seemed unfocused, and I had the impression that he was not actually reading the words anymore. This was not surprising to me. As a teacher, Philski was not the kind of person who would speak just for the sake of saying words, especially when it came to something serious. He would take his time, reflect on it, and would only speak when he was sure of what he was saying. I assumed he would also take this approach whilst working. And his next words seemed to prove my point.
“I would not immediately dismiss this as ‘just a joke’. But I don’t think we should take it too seriously either. It’s much too vague, there are too many blanks to fill. There’s nothing to do - nothing we can do. I supposed I could increase the patrol over this area - is it a large area? I assume you two checked that already? Yes, that could be an option, but we don’t even know when something would happen. No, the so-called messenger did not give a lot to work with.”
I admit that I was a bit disappointed with his assessment. Maybe the starstruck moment made me expect something different. What he said made sense, but it was not the smoking gun I was expecting. Which is often the case with the truth - it’s probably simpler than one expects. But one question lingered in my mind, and I wanted to at least get this answer.
“Why warn us then? Why tell us that they might do something, and not give us anything to work on?”
Hildegard answered, in her usual room commanding tone.
“That, my friend, is the question at the centre of everything. If something happens, we will know, there and then, the ‘how’. To find the ‘who’, we will need to understand the ‘why’.”
Philski seemed to have moved on from this. He told us not to worry about it too much, that he would keep an eye on the area, and if anything would happen, he would let us know straight away. And then he made it clear that he had more work to do, and if we had nothing else for him, we should make our way out. Hildegard loved honesty, so she looked very pleased with the attitude of the detective, and that continued once we left. Despite the euphoria I felt by meeting my old teacher, the final bit of our interaction left me somewhat deflated, and Hildegard once again came to my rescue.
“Mate, you heard the detective. What can we do now? Not much. The police have many more resources than we do, including surveillance over the area, I presume. Unless we set camp in the street and wait until I don’t know when, we have to accept that we have no other option.”
“But what if someone is harmed? What if someone dies?”
“That’s something we will have to accept. It sucks, but these are the rules of this specific game, and they are set by someone else. Unfortunately, we got dragged into this. So, for now, we wait for their next move. Then we see how we will play.”
“I just feel so powerless.”
“This might be nothing. Go, enjoy your weekend. Get some rest, enjoy a bit of the sun whilst it’s still shining. The summer won’t last forever, that you can be sure of. I will definitely enjoy mine, Jill wants to do some work in the garden today, we might even have a small barbecue.”
“Yes, you are right. I will probably get up to date with my reading, maybe do some sunbathing at queens park and relax this weekend. I will see you Wednesday, when you’re back from London?”
We said our goodbyes and went our separate ways - I took the north route towards Hanover, and she took the south, towards Kemptown. It did not take me too long to get home and, as the weather was nice and sunny, I gathered my things and headed to the park. Once there, with a book in my hand, the whole thing with the postcard, the message, the postcode, it all went to the back of my mind. As they say - out of sight, out of mind.
The weekend was very nice and relaxing, and the week was not a particularly busy one for me, so I had plenty of time to enjoy the last remains of summer. I saw some friends, went to the beach and to the park a few times, even did a hike. As the days passed, the postcard became something of a distant past. I stopped thinking about it almost entirely, and whenever it popped back into my mind, I considered more and more the possibility that this was a hoax, nothing would happen about it.
It was then Thursday, almost two weeks since the retirement party, and I decided to work from home that day because it was the first day back for some kind of football tournament, and the Brighton and Hove Albions would be playing at home, so the town would be packed with fans. The Albion fans are usually nice and civilised, but the city can be a bit busy, with extra traffic, higher demand for bus services… I also wanted a quieter day to do some house chores, like washing my duvet in preparation for the fall. I went to bed early that night, after a nice curry.
It was around a quarter past seven, on the next morning, when I was awakened by a call from Hildegard. At that moment, I thought it was odd for her to call me so early, but I did not think too much about it. I picked up the phone, still a bit sleepy. Her next words woke me up pretty quickly.
“It happened. The messenger made their move. Someone is dead.”
Comments
Post a Comment