Woodpecker

Chapter 13/ John 3 / 2 x 3 x 5 Days Left

He still visited them from time to time, feeling an obligation to them beyond the duty of his job. He never told them about their daughter's visits to him. It would have been too upsetting for them. Carrying such a loss, they might have wondered why they couldn't have been so blessed as to see their beautiful girl sitting in front of them again. John told no one about this burden and blessing. She was a talisman of a responsibility that couldn't be shared.

Fiona always appeared like this at the point John made a breakthrough in a case. Looking at him with that expression. Well John, when are you going to solve my case? This is what she is saying with that look. His eyes flit down to his copy of the page Barrie had found in the dead man's flat. They had a name now, and he expected that today they would learn a great deal more about him. Understanding the victim, who they were, what they did, what circles they moved in, and what secrets they held, was usually the key to finding out what had happened and at whose hand. This one discovery, missed on the first fingertip search of the flat, presented so many new doors to open. He looks up again at Fiona. "Well, what do you think?" he says.

She doesn't answer of course. She just keeps looking at him the same way. In the mornings, his vision has become a little blurred and soft at the edges, and for a moment she looks truly ghostly. He tries to ignore the certain knowledge that the fog is more than just tiredness. It will clear by 9am, but still it makes it difficult for him to read. He carries on speaking out loud to the girl. Maybe she can hear him even if she doesn't respond. He has always sensed that she can. That something more than the silence exists in the space between them. Nothing odd about that he thinks. Isn't religion simply a one-way conversation between the living and the dead?

"What are we to make of this? This message in a book with it's odd reply. To my friend Joshua Matheson. Our meetings together are always something I look forward to. S. Is S, Stuart Levitsky? I guess we'll find that out today, eh?" The girl just looks on filling the room with her quiet unease. Looking up at her helps Geering to focus his eyes which are starting to clear in the middle field of vision as the morning light grows.

"I always loved watching you play our game! Josh. What game and why write the reply here, where it might never be seen? Had he just borrowed the book? And who watches someone playing their game? Its such strange phraseology" he looks at Fiona again, "You don't know either, eh?"

"And look at this strange half-finished border with its doodled circles and ticks," he holds the page up so that she can see. "No, I've never seen anything like that either Fiona. What does it mean? Does it mean anything? Doodle or code?" He waits a moment for an answer that he knows full well won't come. "Not in a talking mood today then?" he says.

He returns his focus to the page and tots up the number of words. Shaking his head and still looking down at the desk he asks, "How can one page with twenty-five words on it hold so many questions, eh?" But when he looks up Fiona Scott is gone, leaving him alone in the room now filled with sunshine and an entirely different atmosphere of quiet unease.

******

Geering stands facing a large heavy door in the corridor of the university mathematics department. The air is thick with the smell of professional cleaning products that can never fully conceal the odours of centuries. He can hear the faint murmur of conversation and suddenly feels like he is about to intrude on someone's day. Perhaps deliver news devastating to the person on the other side. Perhaps come face to face with a killer. You never know. He stands tall and gathers his confidence. He must project an air of relaxed authority when he walks in. Make sure that everyone knows that he is in charge. He concentrates hard to engage the nerves and muscles in his body, which have been sending shots through his limbs without warning all morning. This he wants to conceal.