The interview room was fairly dark. Dark walls, a metal table, two chairs facing one. A camera up by the ceiling, its red light blinking. Carmer sat as if it were a bar stool, not a suspect’s chair: a loose sprawl, a twitching leg, a look that was cheeky but jittery. His clothes were smeared with blood.
Opposite sat Tate and another detective, young and a little too straight. Tate held his shoulders level, hands folded on the file, the cover creased from constant flipping. The younger one fidgeted, worrying the same rough patch on the table’s edge.
“So you’re going to keep quiet?” Tate’s voice was even, dry. “We can sit here a long while. We’re in no rush. We’ve only heard about the most recent victim.”
Carmer’s gaze sharpened a fraction, but he still wore an almost polite smile. His pale grey eyes caught the low light.
Tate went through it dryly, like items on an inventory: details of every episode, the rough places he’d left the children’s remains; if you’ve outed yourself as the Faceless, then live up to it. Carmer leaned back further and his knee began beating a quicker rhythm:
“You’re getting nothing right now. I’m not laying all my cards on the table.”
The camera’s red dot seemed to pull his gaze more than the people opposite. He leaned back further. Under the table, on the dark tiles, a tiny puddle trembled, reflecting the lamp’s faint shiver. The younger detective snapped: his fist hit the metal so hard the glass gave a sharp chink and skated across the tabletop, leaving a wet crescent.
“Are you taking the piss? Is this a game to you?”
Carmer smiled, utterly self-satisfied.
“Enough,” Tate said evenly, throwing his partner a warning look. “We’re not here to put on a show for him.”
The door opened, letting in a strip of warmer light from the corridor. Vincent stood on the threshold. Both detectives rose from their chairs and headed for the door. Tate patted Vincent on the shoulder and whispered, “Good luck.”
Vincent gave a brief nod. Tate and the younger detective stepped out, pulling the door shut. The room grew quieter at once. He walked to the table and sat opposite. Set down a notebook and a pen, looked at Carmer levelly, without expression, and introduced himself. Carmer’s smile widened.
“Oh, I know you. You’re from that Lord lot.”
Vincent kept his silence. There was no parity in it: Carmer was playing; Vincent was studying.
“Let’s talk about the girl you killed in Hyde Park tonight. I want your motive. Her name was Rose Harper. She worked at a bar called ‘Makkeller’. Did you meet there?”
Silence. Carmer’s gaze tightened a fraction. He looked away, then back to Vincent. The pen in the detective’s fingers made a faint scratch across the paper.
“I don’t know her. I was bored, and she was wandering alone through a dark park, so I thought — how convenient. Sometimes life is astonishingly empty, Detective. You don’t need to go hunting for lofty aims and motives.”
Something wrenched hard inside Vincent, but his face stayed calm. The pen rasped again.
“I noticed an unusual ring on her ring finger. Looks like she was engaged. To whom? Not you?”
“No. I told you, I don’t know her!”
Vincent drew photographs from the file: dismembered bodies, children’s heads, hands, ankles, parts that looked like genitals — perhaps they were — and the Faceless’s mark present in almost every shot. It looked like the worst horror film imaginable, only it was real. The sight twisted Carmer’s face, though he tried to act as if he didn’t care.
Vincent tapped the table lightly beside the photographs.
“Violence against children. Killing. Carving marks into their bodies. Dismembering. Leaving parts by the Thames…” he went on. “This isn’t random. It’s ritual. An obsessive pattern. A system. A specific victim selection. A particular modus operandi.”
He kept time with his knuckles, and the rhythm began to grate on Carmer. Carmer flicked a glance at his hand.
Vincent shot him a cold look.
“Don’t you see? I’m telling you you’ve missed on every front. You even botched the symbol.”
Carmer stared at him and said nothing.
Vincent took out another photograph. This time there were no signs or symbols. A woman. An albino. Angelic. Light eyes, a calm smile, hair falling just past her shoulder blades. In the picture she wore glasses and held a microphone; on her ring finger a gold band stood out, set with a red ruby and cubic zirconia.
He set the photo down in front of him. A strange spark lit in Carmer’s eyes.
“Oh, that’s Mary Lord. Journo-whore.”
Vincent felt something in his chest straining to break out, but he held it down by force of will. His face didn’t move.
“Is that it? Nothing else to say?”
“A hypocrite to the core, like all her kind. Her pieces were matches held to a powder keg. They blew everything sky-high. As I recall, she dug up something serious about your lot. Then bang, she vanished. Odd, isn’t it? Why are you asking me about your woman?”
Vincent slid the photograph away.
“Thanks. That’ll do.”
A beat of silence. He fought the anger back down and changed tack, addressing Carmer without the slightest softness.
“I’ve noticed an interesting coincidence. The only witness who could identify the Faceless dies, the news is everywhere, and the next day you show up, shouting, ‘It’s me. I’m the Faceless.’”
Carmer’s face grew wary.
Vincent leaned in. There was no cool detachment left in his eyes now, only an icy anger. His fingers tapped the table again, light and measured.
“What do you stand to gain? I don’t know what kind of mush you’ve got for brains, taking that role on. Twenty-nine child victims. That’s just the number we can see. We both know it may be higher. That’s the sort of tally that’ll have you scared of dropping the soap for the rest of your days.”
Carmer pressed his lips together.
Vincent stood. Then he turned back to Carmer.
“For Rose Harper’s murder you’ll go down regardless and you’ll get life. But in prison, do yourself a favour and don’t go round spinning the yarn that you’re the Faceless if you want to live a little longer. And if you get too keen and keep obstructing the investigations, then you’ll have to try very hard indeed to prove you’re the real Faceless.”
He took a step towards the door.
Carmer swallowed. For the first time, real fear showed on his face.
Vincent’s hand was already on the handle when a voice lashed up behind him.
“Stop! Stop! Stop, you bastard!”
The door slammed. Carmer’s shout rang down the corridor for a second, then dissolved into the station’s general din.
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