Wuthering Dormice (aka Bike) Part 906 by Angharad Copyright © 2010 Angharad All Rights Reserved.

We spent ages waiting for the police–the manager escorted Mrs Kemp away from me, before I ripped her limb from limb, to discover where her husband was holding Julie. She was still making all sorts of accusations against me for ‘turning her son into a girl’.

When the police did eventually deign to arrive, I was pleased to discover it was the two who’d previously been sent to the house. They took the situation on board very quickly, and Ma Kemp was hauled off to the nick double quick. I followed another copper to the Kemp’s house, as the old lady refused to tell the police where her husband was.

I’d got her all wrong; I’d assumed she was the little woman who fetched and carried for her hulk of a husband. It seems it was the other way round; she was the boss and he did her bidding.

No wonder they took so long to come, they were planning a kidnap–how stupid could I be? He’d only have to induce the teenager out to the car–‘got something for you’ or ‘a peace offering for your foster mother’, and she’d have gone like a lamb to the slaughter.

The police were pounding on the door of the house–once they had a mission, they sprang into action, so I couldn’t fault them there. There was no answer, but his car was there, so they weren’t far away.

While we’d chatted at the supermarket, Julie had described how she used to escape through the bathroom window, because it couldn’t be locked properly, and all you had to do was push it and it would open. She would then clamber up or down the soil pipe–the large pipe which carries away waste from the toilet and bath to the sewer. Others probably call it, a waste pipe.

The police wouldn’t let me near the house, and neighbours were evacuated from the adjacent properties. The door was opened with a battering ram–one of these modern ones–like a horizontal sledge hammer.

Officers poured into the house–then discovered a very nervous man, with his child and he had a very sharp kitchen knife at her throat. He was apparently standing on the landing away from any windows, and a marksman’s aim.

I walked briskly down the road, and started to count the number of houses. I had five garden walls to traverse. Fortunately, with all the excitement at the front of the houses, no one was looking out the back, so I scrambled over a variety of fences and walls before I got to the correct one.

I’d dressed down deliberately, to avoid upsetting the brains behind this mess–Ma Kemp, so I was reasonably dressed for scaling waste pipes–assuming it bore my weight–oh well, as they say in Ireland–‘if it doesn’t da ground will break me fall–so it will.’ It was patio slabs–wonderful.

My shoes were lace up ones without much heel, so I was able to walk up the wall, whilst holding the pipe with my hands–it was dirty and unpainted near the wall–but thank goodness, it wasn’t plastic or this wouldn’t work.

My cycling had suggested I need to lose a little weight, clambering up this pipe reinforced that point somewhat emphatically. I was very warm long before I got to the bathroom window and my arms and legs were shaking with effort. It’s many years since I climbed a tree and I wasn’t very good then–no upper body strength.

I suppose it took three or four very long minutes to ascend to the bathroom window, and holding on with my right arm, I pushed the window. It didn’t open–no, course it didn’t–shit!

I spotted where the catch was and pushed again, my right arm was now in danger of slipping off the pipe–nothing happened with the window. I held on to the pipe with both arms, and determined I’d have one more go before I went down again. Julie was obviously more nimble than I.

I really shoved at the window by the catch and it finally gave and opened about half a centimetre. Sweating profusely–or should that be glowing wet?–I managed to pull the window open and get a foot on the windowsill below it. I moved a couple of shampoo bottles–actually dropped them on the patio–then hauled myself into the window, being as quiet as I could. I stepped almost silently onto the carpeted floor and walked on tip toe to the door.

The door was open enough for me to see them standing about a yard away, facing the stairs. I now had the element of surprise. I admit, if I’d had a gun, I’d have emptied it into Bradley Kemp’s head to stop him stabbing his daughter.

I could hear her whimpering and his hissed threats–someone needed to do something or he’d kill her–he was so nervous, especially without the mastermind to tell him what to do.

I slipped on to the landing behind him and a board creaked under my weight. He spun round and the knife cut into Julie’s neck, drawing a little blood. “Don’t come any closer,” he hissed at me. Then after a moment, he said, “How did you get in?”

“Oh, Bradley, have you forgotten me so soon? If you remember, I’m an angel, we can fly, or in this case, walk through walls. I can save life–as I did with you, or I can take it? What’s it to be?”

“You’re lying! They said at the hospital they’d got my notes mixed up with someone else’s.”

“Bradley–you were dead when I saved you? You had a heart attack at the top of these stairs–you fell down the length of them–I raised you from the dead. Put down the knife and surrender the girl.”

“It’s a boy–despite what you’ve done to him–he’s still my son.”

“I agree, she’s your child, Bradley–so why do you want to hurt her?”

“It’s not her, it’s him–got it?”

“Mummy–help me?” whimpered Julie, the knife seemed tighter against her neck.

“She’s not your mother–where is she?”

“She’s safe, as long as you don’t hurt, Julie. If you do harm her, I’ll make sure you both suffer unimaginable pain. I’ll reverse the healing, Bradley, you’ll remember every stair you hit, while it smashed ribs and vertebrae, and then you’ll remember the pain in your chest. Do you remember that, Bradley? You couldn’t breathe, a tightness–I think it’s starting again, isn’t it. Let her go and put down the knife and I’ll stop the pain, Bradley.”

He was sweating and looking very pale–I had no power to call up a convenient heart attack, or even angina pain, but he had enough imagination to do so himself. He began to look ill.

“Let her go, Bradley, and I’ll save you again. I can do that–I really am an angel. Or I can destroy you and your wife, what’s it to be?”

He was wavering, and sweating even more–he was so scared he was wetting his pants. Just a little more pressure and I had him.

“Losing bodily control are you? It’s happening, Bradley, let Julie go, put the knife down and I’ll save you. I promise I will if you don’t harm her.”

“BOLLOCKS,” he screamed, pulled the knife across Julie’s throat and pushed her spurting body at me.

I screamed, caught her, ducked and kicked him once in the chest, he bounced off the wall into the arms of the coppers who’d been creeping closer and they wrestled him to the ground.

I laid Julie on the bathroom floor and tried to stop the blood flow from her throat–she was frothing as she tried to breathe. I pushed the edges of the wound together and threw in as much light as I could imagine–whilst weeping profusely.

I began to believe she would die–but as the paramedics arrived, she inhaled a deep breath and whimpered, “Mummy.”

Kemp was astonished as were the police–“If any of you ever breathe a word about this to anyone–you will pay dearly for it,” I snarled at them, “Remember what happened to Pharoah’s first born.” Why I said that, I have no idea–but they all gasped and nodded.

“Fuckin’ hell,” said a quiet voice at the back of the group.

“Shurrup–I don’t want my kids to die,” snapped his neighbour.

“Tell your wife unless she deals with the cancer, she has less than six months to live.” I said to Kemp as he shrank away from me in terror. “You could have made this so much easier–now, you’ll spend a long time in prison–I intend to press every charge in the book from dropping litter to high treason.”

I helped Julie to her feet, she was woozy from shock and temporary blood loss, we were both like extras from a slasher movie, covered in wet red stuff, which was going sticky as it began to dry.

The paramedics led us out to an ambulance. “Where’s all the blood from?”

“I think she had a nosebleed, or maybe Kemp did.”

“Must have been some bleed?”

“Oh it was.” I realised he had banged his face when the police arrested him and disarmed him. I hoped he had bashed his nose.

“This is like a major stabbing,” he continued, “neither of you are bleeding now are you?”

We both shook our heads, “No, but you know what blood is like, a little goes a long way–like milk when you spill it.” I was trying to distract him, it wasn’t working.

“You won’t die from spilt milk, madam. Now let’s check you over quickly for wounds–I don’t like my nice clean ambulance swimming in red stuff.”

He quickly examined Julie–“You’re okay, better see your doctor though as soon as you can, and if you experience any symptoms of any sort, go to hospital. If necessary dial 999, okay?”

She nodded.

Then he checked me over–“What are all these grazes on your knuckles?”

“Oh, I must have rubbed against the wall on the way down the stairs.”

“Get them cleaned up and dressed or you’ll get an infection in them. Same goes for you, madam, as for your daughter. If you feel ill, get yourself to A&E.”

“I will, thank you? Can we go home now?”

He opened the ambulance door. Waiting outside was a high ranking copper who was not looking pleased. “I want a word with you, Lady Cameron.”

“Are you arresting me?” I challenged.

“I will if I have to.”

“How is your Ménière’s disease?” I enquired.

“What? What games are you trying to play.”

“Don’t get excited, Chief Inspector, you’ll make yourself ill.”

“Are you threatening me?”

“Of course not, I would like to go home, shower and change my clothes.”

“I want those for forensics.”

“Why?”

“Someone’s throat was cut, wasn’t it?”

“It wasn’t mine, nor hers, you’ve taken the only other person into custody. I think he
had a nasty nose bleed, in the shadows, it can look quite deceptive.”

“You interfered in a police enquiry.”

“I didn’t stop your people doing anything.”

“You could have done.”

“So could the rest of the people in the street, but I don’t see them being asked awkward questions. Now I’m very tired, so is my daughter. You are very welcome to come to the house in an hour’s time, but first I need to wash–this is beginning to smell.”

They let us go providing they drove us home–a policeman drove my car home–no doubt after he checked it over for evidence–of what I don’t know–feathers from my wings, perhaps. As we walked to the police car, there were all sorts of mutterings and avoided eye contacts–I seemed to scare them.

In the shower, the amount of blood washing off me, was like a scene from Psycho, my clothes were bagged up by the police–I didn’t want them anymore anyway, and I suspect Julie felt the same.

Then each of us dressed in bathrobes, sat and waited for the heavy mob to arrive, presumably rubber coshes and thumbscrews aren’t allowed on teenagers any longer?

Oh poo, I’m twenty six.