Chimney Sweep (incomplete)

1.

The Chimney sweep let himself out of the backdoor and closed it gently. In the house, Tracy’s body lay on the floor in the front room, one bare leg in the hearth and the other wrapped around the leg of the coffee table in a way that indicated it was broken in numerous places. Soot covered the carpet around her body and sooty glove marks covered her crushed throat.

Three years earlier in Croydon, the Chimney sweep, who was at that time employed as a management accountant, was cycling to work. It was a crisp autumn morning, cold but sunny. He knew the route well and prided himself on getting to work quicker than he used to do in his car. It was about a twenty minute ride on his bike through the congested streets of Croydon. He wasn’t a reckless cyclist, unless you consider not wearing a helmet, reckless. He indulged in the normal amount of undertaking, as allowed in the Highway Code when approaching junctions. However what did annoy him was the practice of car drivers overtaking cyclists and then pulling tight into the gutter to prevent them from undertaking them. When this happened, he usually made a point of overtaking them on the outside or leaning his bike over the pavement and foot pushing his way through the narrow gap in the gutter. He realised car drivers didn’t like this, but it was only when a women in a Mercedes took particular annoyance to him doing this, that he paid the price.

The lady in question was Gail, she was a marketing manager in central London and had to drive through Croydon some days either to get to work, or to get home. On this particular crisp October morning she was talking to her personal assistant on her mobile phone, as always, the traffic was terrible. It didn’t help, she thought, that this lanky git on a bike kept undertaking her on the main road. She was in a long queue quite a way from the traffic lights and the git had done it twice now already. The traffic ahead of her moved off, so she put her foot down and overtook the idiot, then pulled close to the gutter to stop him undertaking her again.

She looked in the rear view mirror smiling with satisfaction. That was why she didn’t see the traffic ahead had stopped. Looking back to the road ahead she suddenly panicked and realising too late she slammed on her brakes, in her impatience to get past the cyclist and stop him undertaking her again she now found she was going too fast in her heavy 4x4 to stop, she clipped the curb and hit the car in front. A talcon powered air bag explored in her face.

The chimney sweep on the bike, or rather, the accountant as he was then, tried to break, but the cycle slammed into the side of her car and when it reached the point where car and the curb crossed, his front wheel wedged in and he was thrown over the handlebars. The marketing manager was livid, she flapped the air bag out of the way, jumped out of the car and started screaming at the cyclist. When she got to him she realised how bad the accident was. The chimney sweep, as he now become in an instance, had sustained a life changing head injury and although he did not know it, he was going to spend the next three months in Croydon Hospital.

During this time a strange misfire developed and grew in his mind, at first, although the disturbing thoughts occupied his mind with regular occurrence, he found he could control them, even rid himself of them, but while they disturbed him, they also fascinated him. What disturbed him even more though, was that the thoughts also turned him on.

When he eventually returned to work, he found it difficult to concentrate and over the following months, he was off sick more than he was in work. After several reviews with his managers, which always resulted in warnings, he was let go by the accountancy firm he had worked for for eleven years. This was even though he had previously had an exemplary record. People at work talked about how he changed since his accident, shaking their heads and agreeing that it was such a shame.

The Chimney sweep had then drifted from place to place, and job to job for years, always a loner, never really fitting in, he found solace in his vices, the drink and the drugs that released him from his conscience, the conscience that plagued him about his thoughts. His accidental thoughts, on which day, a demon had been sucked into the gash and the fracture of his skull, and whom he would never be free from again because the incompetent doctors had stitched his head up and locked the evil presence in there for all time.

2.

It was two days before someone raised the alarm, Tracy had taken the Friday afternoon off to get the chimney swept and it was when she didn’t return to work on Monday that one of her colleagues dropped by to see if she was alright. The police arrived twenty minutes later, which was early evening on the cold foggy September Monday. When he arrived, the Detective looked solemnly at the victim. Another one he thought, he instructed the cordon to be set up and the enquiries began.

The Chimney sweep had already moved on by the time Tracy’s body was found, he had many trades in mind, the next, he thought would involve using a chisel. What would that be he thought as he casually eyed up the van in the second hand commercial vehicle centre.
“Can I help you, sir,” asked a salesman.
“Yes, I’m looking for a reasonably priced van, mine just gave up the ghost.”
“What trade are you in sir?” Enquired the salesman.
“DIY” Replied the Chimney sweep.
“Oh, very good, I’ve got a nice one over here,” said the salesman leading the Chimney sweep over to the back of the vehicle lot.

The Renault van was perfect, thought the Chimney sweep, it even had a clasp for a padlock on the rear doors, that was a sign he thought. After a bit of haggling, the Chimney sweep had completed the transaction and was driving away. He drove to the passat that he had stolen 24 hours earlier, which he had well hidden in a wood out of town. It didn’t take him long to transfer all his stuff into the Renault. He sat on the bonnet and looked at his road map, where to now, he thought.

Two weeks later at 4:30 pm on the 10th October 2010 in Luton, Debbie was struggling under the sink in her kitchen in an attempt to replace the taps. Since her husband died three months earlier she had become quite the expert with this type of thing, she had never replaced taps though and was finding it difficult. She had turned off the water and drained some of the water out, the combi boiler meant she didn’t have a water tank to drain, she knew that much. But she was finding undoing the nuts under the taps that secured the copper pipes to the old tap, difficult. She had banged her head on the underside of the stainless steel sink about five times in the last 20 minutes and she was getting frustrated. As she put all her strength into turning the nut the copper pipe started to twist, she was looking the other way though, as she found this was the best position for her to turn it.

The first she knew that the pipe was twisting was when the water inside the pipe started running down her arm. Great, I’ve loosened the nut she thought, looked back and then swore at what she had done, the pipe was completely twisted out of shape. She would have to replace it, nuts, she thought, she was now unsure what to do. She got a bucket even though hardly no water was dripping out of the torn pipe, then she went and sat at the kitchen table and thought about what to do next. A few minutes later, she got her keys, put on her coat and left the house to get the local paper to see if there were any DIY guys advertising at good rates.

Walking to the shop, she noticed a white Renault van parked across the street with “David Gills plumbing and decorating services” written on the side. I wonder, she thought, she walked over and inside there was a tall man, busy chiselling what seemed to be a delicately small wooden statue. Debbie knocked on the window, the man looked up and smiled, then wound down the window.
“Can I help you?” He asked.
“Are you a plumber?” Debbie asked.
“Yes I am, I’m the David Gills on the side of the van.”
“Oh, hello there, look, I don’t know if you can help, but I have just split a pipe trying to fit some new kitchen taps. Have you got time to have a look at it for me or even fit the taps as well?” Asked Debbie
”Well dear, let me come and have a look.” Said the plumber. He got out of his van and opening the back doors, reached inside and pulled out a bag of tools.
“OK” he said.
“Yup, I’m just over here,” said Debbie pointing diagonally across the street.

3.

Jason pulled his Renault van up at 5pm on 10th October 2010 and shone his torch toward the house numbers in the leafy suburban street in Dorking. That’s it, he thought, turning off the engine and getting out, he went to the back of the van and got a bag of tools and then made his way to number 29 Grimley Street. At the door he paused to find the doorbell and rang it. A middle aged women answered after a few minutes.
“Mrs. Dawson?” Asked Jason
“Yes.” She replied.
“Mine name is Jason Hinds, the carpenter, you phoned me on Tuesday, to put up your shelves.”
“Oh, yes, come in.” She said opening the door.
The carpenter followed Mrs Dawson into the house.
“I hate it when it gets dark so early” He said putting his tool bag down.
“I know what you mean” she said, “and it’s so cold.”
“Well then where do you want these shelves?” Asked the carpenter.

Detective Spencer Morgan read the report from his subordinate in his office, the subordinate sat opposite him, he almost sat to attention, you didn’t slouch in Spencer’s office, he was an old school detective, insisting that all his staff wore suits and ties, hair short and shoes clean. It was probably due to the four years he had sent in the military police that made him this way and no-one argued.

“In your report sergeant, you write that the victim was not sexually assaulted and yet she was found naked except for a blouse.”
“Yes sir,” replied the sergeant, “the medical examination found no evidence of any sexual activity.”
“In your opinion is this the same person, who we think killed and raped the other three women?”
“Errrr, I’m not sure sir, there are some similarities and the other three cases did illustrate that the suspect changed their MO, whether on purpose to confuse us or through their psychotic evolution,” replied the sergeant.
Spencer looked up, eyes peering over his reading glasses, he wasn’t impressed with the sergeants assumption that the suspect was psychotic.