The Phantom of Barker Mill Read online

  Still the favourable side of forty, I was very conscious that I was beginning to feel the years, that my testosterone levels were undoubtedly falling and that to stay in shape I was going to have to work at it.

  My time in the Army had been dominated by fitness training. I had been relatively athletic, so found myself selected to participate in numerous sporting events. The training for such events had been on top of the usual fitness training that all service personnel undergo weekly and going to the gym had become a routine and very regular part of my life. Now that I was no longer in the Army and could avoid such activities if I chose to, I found that I wanted to go more than ever.

  I had read many years ago that the between the age of eighteen and sixty the human body loses fifty percent of its muscle mass. It just wastes away through lack of use, which is why older persons struggle to get off the sofa. It was entirely tenable though to combat the loss by building replacement muscle. How accurate the article was I could not say, but it sounded plausible and I liked the idea of maintaining worthwhile functional muscle purely from a vanity perspective.

  I probably spent between three and five hours in the gym each week and did not feel that I was overdoing it. At this early hour, the gym I frequented was mostly empty but there were some usual faces I saw quite often at this time of the day. I suppose they were mostly people that liked to get their work out done before work. I had never bothered to learn their names despite seeing them most weeks. This was born of the belief that most people want to be left alone in the gym to get on with what they are there for. Having got up early, I thought it unlikely they were there for conversation or social interaction. I offered to spot for people occasionally because it was the polite thing to do but actively avoided talking to the ladies in the gym as I so often saw sweaty guys hitting on them as they rested between sets.

  A little more than an hour later I was walking back through my front door, content in the knowledge that, whatever else the day had in store for me, I had a workout under my belt. The cool autumn air had reduced my body temperature, so I was no longer sweating by the time I got home. At the sound of my return, the dogs had finally hauled themselves out of bed and were now standing at the top of the stairs staring down at me and wagging their tails.

  I went halfway up, leaned and scooped them, plopped them on the floor by my feet at the bottom of the stairs and let them into the garden where they promptly disappeared to chase the neighbour’s cat. Whether the neighbour’s cat was in our garden never seemed to enter their equation.

  I showered and dressed in office casual work clothes, headed back downstairs to feed the dogs and set the kettle to boil because there are few things in life as refreshing as the day’s first cup of tea.

  I was hungry having been out of bed for nearly two hours and had probably burned a thousand calories already. I allowed myself a filling breakfast of pancakes made with chocolate protein powder and topped them with bananas, pecans, blueberries, natural yoghurt and maple syrup. It was a breakfast of champions.

  Suitably satisfied, I clipped leads to the two dogs and took them for a pleasing walk around the village. I live in Finchampstead, which is little more than a collection of houses a few miles outside of Maidstone. It is not far from where my parents settled after Dad left the Royal Navy and ticked enough of my boxes for me to justify paying the price for the country cottage I had bought. Within a two-minute walk, I could find myself in either woodland or vineyards depending on which direction I elected to head. The village had a pub, which I made a point of going to at least once a week since so many village taverns were shutting down due to lack of custom, and a village store which sold everything you could imagine. The village was very green and very quiet, and I liked living there. During my walk, I amused myself by considering my options with Amanda. Amanda was a Police Officer I had met just a few weeks ago. She was also a goddess that I had been instantly enamoured by.

  As I walked, I found myself thinking back to Friday night. Soon after I had returned from the pub that night, there had been a knock at my door. I had wondered at the time if it might be remnants of the Brotherhood of the Dead vampire LARP club, a Live Action Role Play club for people who thought it would be fun to be a vampire. They had become embroiled in The Vampire serial killer case, had their clubhouse burnt to the ground and had since disbanded. I had been responsible for getting several of them arrested and incarcerated, but I dismissed the notion that it might be them at my door as it seemed unlikely that anyone coming to exact retribution would bother knocking first.

  So, I had answered the door and found Amanda there smiling at me. She had on a pair of tall heels, expensive looking to my untrained eye and a long, but elegant coat undone to reveal a cocktail dress inside. She was wearing her hair up which exposed the skin of her delicate neck wonderfully. It was late on a Friday night, we had just solved a case together and stopped a serial killer, so naturally, I assumed she had come to have sex with me. Perhaps the word assumed is wrong, perhaps the term should be hoped, prayed and clung desperately to the belief that she might have come to have sex with me. Amanda Harper is beautiful. Real world beautiful if that makes sense. Her figure is graceful, yet athletic, she is tall and lithe with wonderful flowing blonde hair that I expect many women would kill for. Her teeth are perfect, she has high cheekbones and sparkling blue eyes. I had no idea why she was at my door late on a Friday night, but I was utterly infatuated by her and the alcohol inside me was making me think thoughts I might otherwise quash.

  A moment ticked by and I realised I was just staring at her. A voice from just below my belt yelled, “Battle stations!” Then, thankfully, a dog barked from the kitchen just behind me and I managed to get my thoughts in order.

  ‘Are you going to invite me in?' she asked smiling.

  ‘Of course, Amanda. Come in, please.' She did, stepping lightly over the door frame and into the house. I closed the door behind her.

  ‘To what do I owe this pleasure?’ I asked. Was I slurring? Had I drunk that much? I decided that it was just my paranoia making me worry.

  ‘Are you slurring?’ she asked.

  Bugger.

  ‘I have been at the pub with Ben, licking our wounds.’ Best to come clean.

  ‘Oh. If this is an inconvenient time I can come back tomorrow. Or visit you at the office next week.’ she said.

  All hope of naked entwinement evaporated immediately as she was clearly not here to take a ride on Mr. Wriggly. Disappointed, but trying not to show it, I invited her through to the kitchen. ‘Watch the dogs do not claw your legs.' I advised as I opened the kitchen door and they tumbled out. ‘They can get a little over excited.'

  ‘It is so nice to see both together again.’ Amanda said from her crouched position where she was petting them. ‘Dozer seems none the worse for his adventure.’ My dopier dog had ended up in the river while I was battling the serial killing vampire wannabe and had been missing for several days. I had presumed that he was dead until he joyously turned up a few miles downriver and was found by a little old lady.

  ‘His waist is still a little thinner than it was, but the vet assured me that he is in good health and will not suffer any long-term problems for his temporary starvation in the wild.’ I replied.

  Amanda stood up and followed me into the kitchen. ‘Can I offer you a drink?' I asked. I was keen to hear why she was on my doorstep after dark on a Friday night if it was not a social call, yet manners dictated that I play the host before I pressed her for an answer.

  ‘Just a tea please.’ her reply.

  I nodded and set out two mugs while the kettle boiled. I selected an Ironman mug for myself, I felt it set the right tone and dug to the back of the cupboard where the guest mugs were kept finding one with a pink unicorn on it.

  The silence felt like it was stretching out while I was waiting for the tea to brew. ‘To what do I owe the pleasure of your company tonight?' I asked again while stirring the tea bags around. Amanda had been fiddling with her
phone but put it away in her tiny clutch handbag now. She smiled at me as I crossed the room to get milk from the fridge and had to take a short step back to allow me access. Her perfume hit my nose and went directly to my groin as always.

  ‘I have a proposition for you.’ she said plainly.

  That got my attention and instantly I could hear Mr. Wriggly humming Barry White tunes to himself.

  ‘I am looking for a job. I wondered if you wanted a partner?’

  ‘Oh.’ I said a little dumbly.

  Not here for rampant sex then.

  I rallied my disappointment in case it was glaringly obvious that I was and fixed her with a quizzical expression. I hoped it was quizzical anyway. The alcohol was making me a little woozy, so there was a chance my face just looked intellectually challenged. ‘I thought you had a job and wanted to progress in it?'

  ‘I thought so too. However, the last couple of weeks has shown me that there are other opportunities. I think, in fact, that I am fed up being a police officer and would much rather be a private investigator. Like you.' She left that hanging for a moment.

  When it dawned on me that I was holding both cups of tea and not doing anything with them, I managed to engage my brain and pass her one.

  ‘Thank you.' As she took it from me. She sipped it a little, her eyes focused on the cup or perhaps the floor. Then she looked back up and spoke again. ‘So, what do you think?'

  ‘You have caught me a little off guard I’m afraid.’ I wanted to open up and tell her that I was really attracted to her and that I had hoped for her as a different kind of partner. The more sensible part of my brain was arguing with the horny part though and was trying to convince it that if she wanted sex we would already be in bed and that therefore I should stay quiet. Sensible won the day. ‘Have you already quit your job?’ I asked, somewhat deflecting her question.

  ‘No, but I spoke with my career councillor yesterday about my options for advancement and they are less promising than I had hoped. I think I will be quitting no matter what you say.’

  I was trying to work out all the variables. I needed a partner, I had acknowledged that to myself already and here was a trained and experienced police officer applying for the job. Okay, I was a little bit in love with the job applicant, but otherwise, she was ideal for the post. The tussle I was having then was whether I could work with her and forget my attraction or whether having her work with me would, in fact, result in the attraction developing into something mutual.

  Why is being a man so difficult? Or is it just me making hard work of it?

  ‘Tempest?’ Amanda spoke to break my train of thought.

  ‘Sorry?' I answered, making eye contact with her.

  ‘Err, you haven’t spoken for about five minutes and your lips were moving like you were having a conversation with yourself.’ she sipped her tea again. ‘Do you need some time to think?’

  ‘No. Err, sorry. Just having a little internal debate. I guess my answer must be, yes. Yes, please in fact. I need the help. My caseload keeps increasing and I will not be surprised if the recent exposure from The Vampire case results in even more calls for my services.’

  Amanda blew out a breath as if she had been holding it. ‘Well, that's a relief. We need to have a serious discussion about it all, but I feel that now is not the right time.' Amanda put her cup down and stood up straight. ‘I ought to go home. I'm sorry for just dropping by like this, I have been wanting to speak to you about this for days and knew I would not sleep tonight if I didn't get it over with.'

  ‘That's Okay.' I said slowly. My fantasy woman was leaving, the chance of playing humpy-bumpy tonight now non-existent. ‘I would like the weekend to consider how we proceed, please. I have never run my own business before, never had to consider payroll or expenses or tax for employees and need to do some research. Can we meet on Monday?'

  ‘Of course.’ Amanda said. She scooped up her little clutch purse, tucked it under her left arm and extended her right hand to shake mine. I didn’t want to shake her hand. I wanted to grab it and pull her into a kiss - to tell her how I felt. The voice from my pants was convinced it was what she was waiting for and that I just needed to show her my dominant manly side for her to succumb and be my woman.

  I bet she isn’t wearing any knickers. The voice said.

  Like a chump, I ignored it, shook her hand and watched her walk towards my front door. ‘Why the fancy outfit?' I asked. She looked like she was going to or coming from a cocktail party or event of some kind.

  ‘Oh, I was on a date.' she replied casually as if the answer would not cut me to the bone.

  She was out the door and I was closing it behind her, bidding her a good night as she went. Of course, she had been on a date. She was an attractive woman and ought to be out on dates. Come to think of it, the world would be a topsy-turvy place if women that looked like Amanda were in doing the ironing on a Friday night.

  Since I needed a partner to share the caseload she was an obvious choice. Amanda knew police procedure and was trained for conflict management among other things. She was strong, confident and brave and she did not believe in the paranormal any more than the next sane person. That notwithstanding, I worried that working with her would be a continuous loop of me pretending not to dribble in her direction every time she bent over to pick something up. It was a conundrum, but one I could not currently see a way to avoid. Besides, it seemed abundantly clear that she was not interested in me. I never fooled myself that I was that much of a catch anyway. I looked after my figure as best as I could, but at six feet I was neither short nor tall, my face was as unremarkable as many others and being a great guy does not win first place in the here's-the-key-to-my-knickers contest. Ever.

  By the time I had finished walking the dogs and reflecting on last Friday night, I was wandering back down the path to my house. I had subjected myself to twenty minutes of chastisement over my feelings for Amanda and felt I was ready to employ her and make the best of it.

  An hour later, it was 0906hrs and I was in my office, fresh macchiato from the coffee house across the street cooling on my desk and local paper The Weald Word spread out in front of me. The Weald Word was so called because the area it reported on was known as the Kent Weald. Technically, or perhaps that should be geographically, I believe that Maidstone and in fact Rochester, where I was now sat reading the paper fell outside of the Weald, but the paper was popular enough to be sold throughout most of Kent. Amanda would be with me shortly, so I had too little time to kill to get on with anything worthwhile and reading the local paper seemed as good a pursuit as any other.

  The paper was the one in which my business advert ran and the one that had managed to misspell it in the first place. I had never thanked them for doing so and often wondered what kind of success I would have enjoyed as an ordinary, vanilla private investigator. I doubted I could do that now. I had found my niche, or perhaps it had found me, and I was too well known and being too successful to risk changing tack.

  I sipped at my macchiato and turned to the next page. So far, I had found nothing in the local news to pique my interest but at the top of page three was a photograph of a sinister looking clown. I had never been one for clowns, something about the painted-on smile that seemed suspicious I guess, but this clown did not have a painted-on smile, instead its facial expression said: "I am going to gut you like a fish and wear your liver as a hat." The story below was not really about anything. The picture of the clown had been taken late at night by a woman on her way home. She had spotted the clown when she got off the bus but thought nothing of it. The text claimed that she had dismissed it as someone on their way home from a fancy-dress party. However, as she walked home she spotted it again and then again, which had freaked her out. She had called out to ask him what he wanted and snapped his picture before running the last one hundred yards to her house. The clown had not spoken to her, had not been threatening and had made no attempt to chase her she said. Despite that I could see why she ha
d run - the clown's face was terrifying. The photograph was black and white, so I could not tell what colour its outfit was, but it wore a long-sleeved top with horizontal stripes of at least three colours and large waisted pants held up by braces over his shoulders. The feet were out of shot but I suspected I would not see over-length clown shoes if they had been visible.

  Something about the story bothered me, something about the eyes was familiar. I read on but there was not much more to ingest. The lady that took the picture had not revealed her name and although she gave a description of the height, weight etcetera of the man inside the suit, I was not convinced it would be all that reliable.

  I turned a few more pages but found adverts for local services, local forthcoming events, and a centre spread on the Birling harvest festival that had taken place over the weekend. I sucked down the last of the coffee, dropped the cup into the trash bin next to my desk and before I could consider what to do next, I heard the door at the bottom of the stairs open and someone coming up.

  My office sits above an ageing travel agent's office in Rochester. It is only about twenty-five yards from the cathedral and I picked it up for a song as the chap had never thought to rent it before. The travel agent business had been far busier a few years back before computers and online holiday agents had made it far harder for independent high street firms. My office had once been storage space for the many thousands of brochures he needed to keep, but as the business had dwindled, he needed the space less and less and then needed extra income more and more. I had got lucky and was looking for an office precisely when he was talking to a real estate firm about renting it. I had helped him empty all the old junk out of it and had decorated it myself to encourage the low monthly rental price.