Beggars Banquet

Principles of Accounts

It began as a hobby.

But then quite quickly the hobby became a career, and now he was a professional, taking a professional’s care in the details of his craft. True, something had been lost; that was the trouble when a hobby became mere business. But at least he had the consolation of knowing that business was good. He saw himself as a value assessor. He assessed the value of an item, then collected on it, the money being insurance against loss. He had always been good at accounts, economics, business studies. He loved those subjects at school, hardly believing the sheer thrill of balancing books. The sums always came out the same, either side of the thick vertical centre line. He used similar skills now when assessing each item: value of item balanced against risk involved.

Not that he ever damaged an item. It hadn’t been necessary so far. But he was very good at pretending he would damage them. He could reduce tough fathers to pleas and weeping, and all via the telephone. The telephone was his friend – not any one particular telephone, but all phones, spread across the country in a matrix of elegantly anonymous paybooths. He made a point of spending not more than a minute in each phone box he used, timing each call. Single-mindedness was his real strength. Determination of purpose. The sixty-second calls had become his trademark. People knew when they were dealing with the Minute Man.

The media, who had coined the nickname, they too were his friends, stirring up fear, building him into a figure of terror. He rewarded them with increased circulation and viewing figures, while the police held increasingly ineffectual press conferences requesting information, playing tapes they’d made of his voices.

He used several voices, none his own. He hadn’t spoken more than six words to any of his four young items, and even then had disguised his voice. Actually, he’d used more than six words with the last one, the one whose value now sat before him on the table. She had been a talker, a good talker, too. She’d recited stories and anecdotes – even when she couldn’t be sure he was there. Occasionally he’d asked a question, something to help him get the story straight in his mind. She had given him her stories, and now her father had given him all this money.

Tonight, with an open bottle of cheapish Australian Chardo

She blinked a lot. Nervousness, or perhaps the glare of the lights and flashguns. Her hair had been washed, but she wore no make-up, and her face looked pale. She had lost a little weight, her own fault for not eating everything he’d given her.

She’d worked out pretty quickly – they usually did – that the food was laced with tranqs, crushed-up sleeping pills. But like the others, she’d given in and eaten anyway. Sensible, when the only other alternative was force-feeding by rubber tube and plastic fu

She stayed on screen only half a minute, refusing to answer the yelled questions. Now she was replaced by a policeman. A caption appeared along the bottom of the screen: Ch. Supt. Thomas Lancaster. Ah yes, Tom Lancaster. He raised his glass, toasting his adversary, even though the police’s inefficiency was a constant source of irritation to him.

‘… and I must praise Miss Webster’s calm and her bravery,’ Lancaster was saying. ‘After her release, she was able to help us compile this composite photograph of her kidnapper.’

He put down his glass. The photo was onscreen now.

‘The man we’re looking for is five feet seven or eight, stocky, with blue eyes. As you can see, he has a round face, full lips, and thick, slightly curly hair, either black or very dark brown.’

He whooped. He got up and danced. She’d never set eyes on him! He never allowed his items the luxury. He looked at himself in the mirror. He was six feet tall, certainly not stocky. He had brown eyes, short, straight, light-brown hair. Full lips? No. Round face? No. She’d given the police a wholly fictitious account. Tomorrow the photo would be in every newspaper, pi

But why had she done it? What was she playing at? He didn’t like puzzles, didn’t like it when the accounts failed to balance at the bottom. He switched off the TV and put aside his wine. One thing was obvious: she didn’t want him caught. Only two people could be certain her description was a fiction: the item, and the Minute Man. He was still deep in thought when ten o’clock came round. He switched on the TV news again, and was thrown into fresh confusion.

‘There has been an arrest tonight after the latest Minute Man kidnap victim was released.’

Sitting up, he kicked over the wine bottle. It poured out its contents unchecked.

‘A man, believed to be a business acquaintance of Gillian Webster’s father, has been taken to Castle Lane police station for questioning. We now go over live to Castle Lane, where Martin Brockman is waiting to speak to us. Martin, any more details?’

Now the reporter was on the screen, looking cold against a damp night-time street, headlamps flashing past him. He wore a sheepskin coat and had one hand pressed to his ear, holding in place the earphone. He began to speak.

‘All police will say is that a man is being questioned in co

‘Let’s get this right, Martin, you’re saying Mr Webster identified his daughter’s kidnapper?’

‘I don’t think we can go that far just yet, but…’

But he had switched off the television.

‘What’s your game, little Gillian?’ he said quietly. ‘Your game… or your father’s?’ He felt dizzy, confused. There had to be a reason for all of this. The wine was thumping in his head.

‘I hate puzzles!’ he yelled at the blank TV screen. ‘I hate puzzles!’

In Castle Lane police station, Chief Superintendent Tom Lancaster was about to get some sleep. He’d phoned his wife to explain that he wouldn’t be home. He kept a fresh suit, shirt, and tie in the office anyway, and now there was a camp bed there too, with an army-quality sleeping bag. Nothing to the comforts of home, but it would have to do. Tomorrow might be even busier than today. He was comforted to know that the press weren’t going home either. Some had crawled off to hotels and boarding houses, but others were camping out in cars and vans outside the station.

Lancaster slipped off his clothes and into the chilled sleeping bag. He wriggled for a few seconds, getting warm, then reached to the floor, where several bulging files lay. The transcript of Gillian Webster’s conversations with the Minute Man had been typed up. He read through them again. It was one-way traffic. The Minute Man had said only a couple of dozen words, mostly in the form of abrupt questions.

His second victim, Elaine Chatham, had managed a longer utterance from him. She’d asked if she could have a book of crosswords to pass the time. She’d kept on asking until she’d forced from him a gruff confession (in his Geordie accent this time). Three important little words. Tom Lancaster whispered them to himself.

‘ “I hate puzzles”.’