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Barney Thomson & The Westminster Christmas Massacre - Episode 4by Douglas Lindsay - 09:44 on 04 December 2009The story so far: Renegade barbershop legend, Barney Thomson, has given the Prime Minister hair from the very top drawer, and the PM is cutting a swathe through the mundane politics of the United Kingdom. Meanwhile a serial killer has been unleashed on the Palace of Westminster, and as our story continues, police are investigating his latest brutal act of savagery.
0123hrs London, England
The killer Trelawny had turned his hand to the Lords.
It was a gruesome scene. Four bodies in one room, each brutally murdered. Blood on the walls and on the carpet and on the desks and the furniture and the lampshades. One of the Lords had been decapitated, his head kicked into a corner. Another disemboweled, his entrails left in a trail across the floor. The third had been bound to a chair, eyelids sliced off, mouth taped, and his wrists slit, so that he’d slowly bled to death while being forced to survey the apocalyptic scene before him. The fourth had just died of old age.
So, in fact, only three of them had been brutally murdered.
The two police officers stood at the door to the small meeting room and watched as the SOCO’s picked their way through the carnage. It was impossible for them to move without getting blood on their white cat suits.
‘Tell me if you’re going to throw up,’ said DCI Frankenstein to his latest sidekick DS Hewitt.
Hewitt shook his head. ‘I grew up playing violent computer games and watching sick serial killer movies. I’m immune to all this stuff.’
Frankenstein gave him a sideways glance.
‘Youth of today?’ he said.
‘Exactamundo.’
Frankenstein started to turn away, stopped, wanted to make himself look at the scene for a while longer. Burn it into his head.
‘Who called it in?’
Hewitt gestured backwards with his head, aimed at no one in particular.
‘The wife of one of these old fellas. Started phoning people when he hadn’t returned home by ten o’clock. Apparently he was usually asleep in his supper by then. One of the guards came looking, found this.’
Frankenstein looked over his shoulder.
‘Where’s the guard?’
‘Oh, think they took him off for counselling and stuff.’
‘Already?’
‘Like, studies in the US have shown that the quicker you get counselling, the less likely you are to be psychologically harmed by this kind of thing. Apparently in New York these days, the police patrol with a counsellor in every car. Like, their mission statement is to get to a victim or witness of crime and ask them if they feel disrespected within ten minutes of the crime taking place.’
Frankenstein surveyed the scene behind him, a bustle of shocked workers, police officers, more forensics.
‘One in three cars also carries a documentary crew,’ said Hewitt.
Frankenstein turned back to the Room of Death.
‘Do we know when this lot are due to go into Christmas recess?’ he asked.
‘I’ll check. Like I doubt they work up until the afternoon of the 24th.’
‘Ain’t that the truth,’ muttered Frankenstein, wishing he had a job that allowed him to only work eight or nine weeks of the year.
0759hrs London, England
The PM petulantly pushed the newspapers off the desk. Here he was, suddenly at the peak of his career, and the media were barely taking any notice of him.
‘What do I have to do?’ he said, looking at Prime Ministerial aide Bleacher, Barney Thomson, diary secretary Lucy, and cabinet secretary Blaine. ‘I’m busting my balls here. I’ve ordered more troops to Afghanistan, I’m crushing the other guy in my iron fist, I opened up a can of whoop-ass at PMQs, I told the Prime Minister of Pakistan how to run his country, and I’ve got the best hair of my life. What else can I do? Yet what do we get today? More Tiger flippin’ Woods. Banks, banks, banks. The Mail says forty thousand a family, the Telegraph, five and a half. Hah! Seems I‘m not the only one can’t do maths. And now these bloody murders and everyone’s going to be peeing in their pants about that.’
They were all staring at him, waiting for the invitation to speak.
‘Well?’ said the PM. ‘What about me?’
Another pause.
‘People say, where’s our Obama? Well, don’t they see? I’m their Obama. It’s me. I could be leader for twenty years, I can cement our place as a world leader.’
There was another extended pause around the room. None of them gawped at the PM in quite the manner that his words demanded. They were all quite used to his self-obsession; even Barney Thomson, who had only been there three days.
‘Prime Minister,’ said Blaine drily, ‘we lead the world in pregnant teenagers, binge drinking teenagers, divorce, cocaine addiction and litter. If you’d like to be the Prime Minister who cements that, I salute you, but I just came in to remind you that there’s an emergency cabinet meeting to discuss the crisis at 0900hrs.’
He turned to leave.
‘What crisis?’ barked the PM, scowling.
‘The murders,’ said Blaine. ‘At Westminster,’ he added, in case the PM might have thought he meant Midsomer.
Blaine left the room, with the PM watching him go as if Blaine was the one who was on another planet. Lucy was looking as if she wanted to talk, so he turned his perplexed gaze upon her.
‘The meeting with the US Ambassador has been pushed to 11, but we’re still on for lunch with the Chairman of the Royal Bank of Scotland at 12.30.’
He gave her a look to suggest continued bemusement, then she departed.
Barney watched the two of them go with envy, wishing that it would be so straightforward for him. Prime Minister, your hair is fine, I’ll see you in a month...
The PM looked from Bleacher to Barney with stupefaction. ‘Is it just me?’ he said.
He sighed heavily, and slumped down into his seat. Behind him, Mrs Thatcher looked sternly down, thinking that no cabinet secretary had ever spoken to her like that. At least, not so that they escaped with their testicles intact.
‘We need to decide what line to take with the cabinet,’ said Bleacher, deciding that it was better just to get on with business.
‘In relation to what?’ said the PM.
‘The murders,’ said Bleacher sharply. ‘There’s panic over there, both houses. People are talking about adjourning parliament early, everyone going home.’
‘Well, that’ll not do them much good, will it?’ snapped the PM. ‘If someone is coming after them, he’ll just follow them home. What are they all going to want? An armed guard of five each?’
‘I’ve heard twenty,’ said Bleacher, and the PM snorted.
Barney Thomson sat back, wondering how he had become a fly on the wall to the running - or lack of it - of the country.
‘I’ve heard twenty,’ Bleacher repeated, ‘and I’ve also had it costed. Millions of pounds. You think the public are going to accept that kind of money being spent to protect MPs and Lords? Most of them would probably be prepared to vote for the guy who’s doing the killing. But we can’t just let it go on or else democracy falls.’
‘Don’t be dramatic,’ said the PM. ‘Anyway, what are you suggesting? We can’t let it go on, but we can’t protect them.’
‘I’m saying that we can’t let them go back to their constituencies. It’s much easier to protect them here in London. We sort it out here, the police catch the killer in the next day or two, and then we can move on. And hopefully, no one else gets murdered. Unless it’s someone we’d be happy to see taken out of the way.’
‘All right,’ said the PM. ‘Bloody hell, this is an outrage. I just want to get on with running the damned country, cementing my place in the world order, creating history. Since day one, day bloody one, there’s been this kind of thing.’
‘There has never,’ said Bleacher darkly, ‘been this kind of thing.’
Another heavy and unattractive sigh from the PM, then he looked at Barney, his new advisor.
‘They say you’ve been around death, murder, mayhem and slaughter before. What do you make of it, Barney Thomson?’
Barney snapped from an idyllic daydream, of sitting on a bench on the west coast of Cumbrae, a warm afternoon, the waves washing gently against the rocks.
‘Gosh,’ he said. ‘Well, you’ve possibly got your average serial killer, a bit deranged, just out to have some sadistic fun. Then there’s the possibility that there’s someone faking the sadism. They’re actually cold and calculating, and have a definite purpose. Perhaps revolution. They’re trying to overthrow the government, and rather than doing it by a military coup, their doing it by means of a serial killer coup. Maybe that’s the modern way.’
‘That would be extraordinary,’ said the PM, as Bleacher gave Barney another dark look.
‘However,’ said Barney, ‘most likely you’ve just got some serial killing nutjob, intent on satisfying some sort of depraved bloodlust. Happens all the time.’
The PM looked darkly at the floor, all kinds of possibilities playing in his head at this dark and dangerous time for the state. His eyes fell on the cover of the Daily Star. I’m Never Knobbing Kate Again, Claims Upset Pete.
2146hrs London, England
Barney Thomson sat in the Sherlock Holmes nursing his second pint of cider. He’d had his fish and chips, he’d munched his way through a bag of peanuts. He’d had enough unhealthy food for the night, and the alcohol had started to taste bitter. The PM hadn’t asked him to do anything to his hair today, not even before meeting the American. Barney had trailed around after him, without ever being called into action. Like a substitute that never gets brought on.
The two chairs opposite Barney were pulled out and DCI Frankenstein and DS Hewitt sat down at his table. Barney lifted his glass, not at all surprised.
‘Gentlemen,’ he said.
‘Barney,’ said Frankenstein. ‘This is DS Hewitt. He’s new.’
‘Like, hi and stuff,’ said Hewitt.
‘Like, hi,’ said Barney in return. He looked at Frankenstein and suddenly started to smile. ‘So, he said, ‘what can I do for you? Want me to be your deputy again?’
Frankenstein set his pint down on the table.
‘There have been five murders, and you know what? They made out on the TV that they were pretty gruesome, but a couple of those this morning, gruesome ain’t the word. They were animalistic.’
Hewitt was nodding. ‘Like totally,’ he said, not really adding anything to the conversation.
‘Come to pick my brains?’ asked Barney.
‘Look,’ said Frankenstein, ‘I don’t want to imply that your Hannibal Lectar or anything, but there’s some amount of weird stuff going on here, and you’re as good a person as I know to talk to about it.’
Barney stared into the bottom of his glass. Everywhere he went.
‘So, I’ll level with you,’ said Frankenstein. ‘Yes, I want to pick your brains, and yes, I’ve come to make you my deputy.’
Barney smiled ruefully.
‘Coolio!’ said Hewitt. ‘Like, can you do that?’
Barney sat back in his chair, and spread his hands in a gesture of vanquishment.
‘I’m all yours. Get me a cup of coffee and tell me everything.’
1157hrs London, England
It was a dark and cold night in London, England. The Palace of Westminster was still, bar the five hundred or so extra police and security guards who had been drafted in. All over London MPs and Lords slept uneasily, expecting at any moment to be woken by the killer’s blade.
Trelawny, however, would be quiet that night. Whether it was because of the extra security, or because he had done what he’d come to do, or indeed, as Barney Thomson had suggested, because he was off with his fellow conspirators, discussing how to parley their initial success into regime change, no one knew; for no one can truly know the mind of a serial killer.
Not even, renegade barbershop legend, Barney Thomson.
To be continued: Monday 7th December 2009
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