The First Cut

“All right today, love?” the woman asked. “You look a bit peaky.”

“Not enough sleep, that’s all,” he mumbled.

“Well, you take good care of yourself, you never know what germs is going round these days.”

“I’m all right,” he said, a little testily. “Just tired, that’s all.” Then he paid for his tobacco and left without even glancing at Sue, who bent over the newspaper and magazine section as before. She picked up the local paper and the Independent. When she took them over to the counter to pay, the woman clucked her tongue and said, “I don’t know what’s the matter with him. Show a bit of polite interest and he damn near bites your head off. Some people can’t even be bothered to be civil these days.”

“Maybe he’s worried about something,” Sue suggested.

The woman sighed. “Aye,” she said. “We’ve all got plenty to worry about, haven’t we, what with nuclear war and pollution all over t’place. But I still manage to find a smile and a good morning for my customers.” She went on, almost to herself, as she counted out Sue’s change, “Not like Greg Eastcote, that isn’t. Usually such a pleasant chap.” Then she shrugged. “Ah, well, maybe he is just tired. I could do with a bit of a lie-down myself.”

“I’m sure that’s it,” said Sue, folding the newspapers under her arm and walking over to the door. “He’s just tired.”

“Aye. No rest for the wicked, is there, love? Bye now.”

As Sue walked along the street, Eastcote’s van passed her by and took the same route out of town as it had before. Another delivery. Whether he would be back later or would be staying out overnight, she had no idea. She could imagine, though, that he would be loath to leave his cottage empty for very long. In fact, if she were in his shoes, she would make sure she was back before dark. After all, he didn’t know that she had broken in during daylight.

She wondered what he had made of the extra lock of hair. Did he know it was hers? Surely he must suspect? Or perhaps he thought he was being haunted, that the supernatural was responsible for the sudden appearance of a seventh lock? Like the seventh daughter of a seventh son was supposed to be powerful in magic. One thing she did know: he had seen her, as one would notice any stranger in the street, but he didn’t know who she was. Maybe when he got over the shock, he would start to think clearly again and count the times he’d glimpsed her from the corner of his eye; perhaps he would co

Sue walked by the river toward town. The good weather seemed to have made a return. It was a beautiful day, with plenty of that intense blue sky you sometimes get at the seaside, and just enough plump white clouds drifting over to give a sense of depth and perspective. Beyond the greenish shallows, the sea reflected the sky’s bright ultramarine. Sue stood on the swing bridge and looked around at the harbor. It was like another world to her now, after so long spent in the other, dingier part of town.

The tide was well out, and some of the light boats rested almost on their sides, with their masts at forty-five-degree angles to the slick mud. To Sue’s left, beyond the high harbor wall, stood the buildings of St. A

People walked by, carefree and smiling: a courting couple, the man with his arm so low around the girl that it was practically in the back pocket of her tight jeans; two elderly ladies overdressed in checked tweeds and lace-up shoes, one carrying a walking stick; a pregnant woman, glowing with health, her husband walking proudly beside her.

All this normality, Sue thought. All these ordinary people going about their business, enjoying themselves, eating ice-cream cones and bouncing garish beachballs in the street, and they have no idea about the monster walking among them.

They have no idea that Greg Eastcote murdered six women and maimed one, that he slashed at their sexual organs with a sharp, bone-handled knife, and just to make sure they were dead, he strangled them. When he’d done that, when he’d finished his crude surgery, he carefully cut off a single lock of hair from each bruised and bleeding body, took it home with him, tied it up in a pink ribbon and placed it neatly in his sideboard drawer. Six of them all in a row. Seven now.

According to the press clippings that Sue had saved, he hadn’t raped any of his victims. Clearly he was incapable of that, and the rage he felt toward women for causing his condition partly explained his actions. But only partly. There was an enormous chasm between his motives and his deeds that nobody could fathom. In a vision, the Dark One had appeared to him in a perversion of the Caedmon story and told him to sing his own song. And so he had. Only his accompanying instrument wasn’t a lute, it was a knife, and the tune it played was death.

Sue wanted to jump up on the bridge rail and shout all this out to the complacent holidaymakers heading for the beach or the amusement arcades. They would shove their coins into slots, listen to the bingo caller, or sit on the beach in the sun on striped deck chairs, newspapers shielding their faces, edging back every so often as the tide came in closer. Then, late in the afternoon, they would go to one of the many fish and chip restaurants and eat.

None of them knew about the man with the oily smell of fish on his fingers-probably the last thing his victims smelled-the Ancient Mariner eyes and the raspy voice. She wanted to tell them all about Greg Eastcote and the atrocities he had committed against women, all about the blood, the pain, the utter degradation and humiliation, and the way she had been imperfectly sewn back together again. All the king’s horses and all the king’s men…That man there, the balding one with the crying toddler in his arms, she wanted to assure him that she was here to restore the balance. But she wasn’t crazy; she knew she couldn’t say anything. Instead she just watched them passing back and forth over the bridge for a while, wondering whether they were truly i

She soon found a place on Baxtergate. Three bored-looking punks with green-and-yellow hair sat in the lounge playing the jukebox, but through a corridor by the side of the bar, separated from the lounge by swing doors, was a much quieter room, all dark varnished panels, hard chairs and benches. Sue realized that not only hadn’t she looked at the papers yet, she hadn’t even eaten since her meager and greasy breakfast at Mrs. Cummings’s. The tea was so bad at Rose’s that she hadn’t felt inclined to find out what the food was like. All the pub served was cold snacks, so she ordered a crab sandwich and a half of lager and lime.

When she had eaten, she sat back with her drink and lit a cigarette, turning to the local paper first to see if there was any news of Keith. A brief report told her that police were continuing their inquiries into the suspicious death of Jack Grimley and the “brutal assault” on a young Australian tourist, who was still in critical condition at St. Mary’s Hospital, Scarborough. Apparently, Keith had not yet regained consciousness.

Then, under the heading HAVE YOU SEEN THIS GIRL? she suddenly noticed an artist’s impression of her. She hadn’t spotted it at first because it looked nothing like her. Perhaps there was a faint resemblance to Martha Browne, but even that would be pushing it a bit. The shape of the head was all wrong, far too round, and the eyes were too close together, the lips too thick. Still, it was enough to make her pulse race. It meant they were on the right track and they were getting closer. All the caption said was that police were anxious to talk to this girl, who had been seen with the Australian in Hinderwell, as she “may have been the last person to see him before the attack.”