Free Kill-Devil and Water by Andrew Pepper Page A

night.’
     
    ‘I don’t want tragedy, I want mystery. That’s how you’re going to sell the story. Readers love things that can’t be explained.’
     
    ‘If you buy me a half-buck of Halnaker’s venison, you can have anything you want.’
     
    ‘What I want,’ Pyke explained, ‘is to use the story as a way of appealing for information about the dead woman.’
     
    ‘Have no fear. A work of art can operate on many different levels.’ Saggers took the charcoal in his hand. ‘Social utility and aesthetic brilliance may seem to be unlikely companions to the uninitiated but in the hands of a master one can feed off the other as easily as a piglet sucking on his mummy’s tit.’ He grinned at his own analogy. ‘Where are readers meant to take their information?’
     
    ‘To me.’ Pyke paused. ‘Or to Fitzroy Tilling at the Whitehall Division of the New Police.’
     
    Saggers looked up from his pad. ‘Is this a police investigation or are you looking into the matter privately?’
     
    ‘A little of both - but that’s strictly off the record. You mention my name anywhere in the piece, and I’ll personally see to it that you don’t receive another scrap of information.’
     
    ‘Don’t worry, I can fudge the issue, make it sound official without mentioning names. Yet another string to my bow, as they say. And I know where my bread is buttered.’
     
    ‘And where your caked is iced.’
     
    ‘Actually I’m not especially partial to cake. I find it fattening.’ He patted his enormous stomach. ‘One last question, sir. You said that the coroner’s inquest had already taken place. What was the verdict?’
     
    ‘Wilful murder.’
     
    Saggers nodded. ‘But there weren’t any newspapermen at the inquest? That’s curious. Usually they’re like jackals feeding off a carcass.’ He rubbed his chin.
     
    ‘The inquest was a closed one. The jurors were warned not to talk about the details of the murder.’
     
    ‘I see I’ve struck a nerve of some sort.’
     
    ‘We found the corpse in a distressed state. We didn’t want to advertise this fact. You know how the macabre tends to attract all kinds of lunatic.’
     
    ‘Macabre, eh?’ Saggers finished off his ale and wiped the froth from his top lip with the sleeve of his coat. ‘Good Lord, sir, you know how to tease a hungry man, don’t you? You leave the tastiest morsels till last and then don’t bat an eyelid when you throw them down on to the plate.’
     
    ‘I don’t want you mentioning it in your story.’
     
    ‘But blood and gore sell newspapers; that’s how you’re going to get a sub-editor to sit up and take notice.’
     
    ‘Look, for the sake of the investigation, there are certain details about the murder that need to be kept from the public.’
     
    He didn’t want news of Mary Edgar’s missing eyeballs to become common knowledge. If the exact manner of her murder was reported, the investigation would become an overnight sensation and Pyke wouldn’t be able to move, or even think, for the howling of journalists looking to make their fortunes from the dead woman’s suffering.
     
    ‘And the more you sensationalise the story, the greater the competition you’ll face,’ he added.
     
    ‘Fine point, sir. I can see that arguing with you is like firing a pea-shooter at a rampaging elephant.’ Saggers made a point of closing his pad. ‘But if we’re going to be working together as a team, I’d appreciate it if you told me what we’re dealing with. I have a very developed imagination, sir, and if I don’t know, I shall be kept awake tonight, mulling over the gruesome possibilities.’
     
    Pyke took a moment to consider Saggers’ request. ‘Her eyeballs were cut out.’ He watched as the colour drained from the journalist’s face.
     
    ‘That’s horrible, awful .’ He shook his head. ‘But it would make a tremendous story.’
     
    ‘I don’t want it mentioned. Is that understood?’
     
    Saggers’ eyelids drooped