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Authors: Danny King
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through
to his thin lips. “I’m very proud of you, John.”
If
anything, this eclipsed the starchy praise he’d bestowed on me for fixing the telly,
but weirdly I didn’t feel too happy about it this time around.
“I
didn’t push you to these actions, John,” he said when I didn’t answer. “I was
very careful. If anything you pushed me. All I did was show you crossroads and
you chose your own path. You are a hunter, John. Just as I am and my father was
before me. It is in your nature. And it is now up to you to harness these
strengths.”
“Yes
father,” was all I could think to say in the absence of any long distance
telephone lines between us.
“Good.
Well I’m glad we could finally have this little talk,” my father nodded cordially.
“Needless to say, I expect you to exercise due diligence when it comes to the
sport. I’ve not lasted this long by running about like a crazed maniac, so I
think it would be best if we put the Fens Strangler to bed for a few more years,
don’t you?”
I
did indeed. In fact, it was the first thing he’d said in several weeks that I
agreed with, so I took what comfort I could from it and decided not to rush
into any hasty decisions until I knew whereabouts my head was.
Or
moreover, whereabouts it was likely to end up if I made the wrong decision.
ix
My father spoke to me some more over the next few days, educating me as to the
ways of ‘the sport’ and the unGodliness of women in general. They’d gotten us
chucked out of Eden, had brought down kings and had even corrupted the poor old
Reverend, “curse his folly”, costing him a nailed-on bishopry, which is where I
suspected all this had really begun.
My
father, having been abandoned by his own Earthly mother within hours of his
nativity, had been cut from the same cloth as the Reverend, but I myself had no
such complaints about the rib-stealers, making me wonder just how fervent my
father’s beliefs could be that he would assume I’d fall into line right behind
him and grandfather. I mean, respectful obedience was one thing but I couldn’t
help feel he was abusing the privilege.
Naturally,
I tried to look as studious as I could for the sake of appearances and my own
neck, but every sinew of me wanted to honk into a bucket after “our little talks”.
My father and grandfather had killed dozens of women between them. Now they expected
me to carry on this ignoble family tradition. Of course, people with illicit
vices always want everyone else to indulge in the very thing they themselves can’t
stop from doing just to validate their own compunctions. But this wasn’t
pouring a mid-morning sherry or sucking off alter boys after evensong, this was
murder, the most heinous and dastardly crime of all. It wasn’t a sport. It was
never a sport. Not in peace. Not in war. Not in even King’s Lynn, which I could
almost understand. No, I may have been young. I may have helped my father do
some terrible things, but I still knew the difference between right and wrong.
Didn’t I?
Of
course I should have gone to the police. I should have but I didn’t because I
was a coward. I wanted to live and I wanted to carry on doing so for as many
years as possible. Was this selfish of me? Perhaps, but I was young, my life
had only just begun and there was still so much I had yet to do, like see Great
Yarmouth, ride a motorbike, sail in a boat or take a girl out for an evening and
bring her back alive again. I couldn’t turn myself in, not least of all because
my father wasn’t letting me out of his sights just in case some hitherto
untapped sense of morality got the better of me. No, I had to figure this thing
out for myself.
Alas,
I didn’t get the chance. I thought the Fen’s Strangler had been bedded down for
a few years but events conspired to rouse him from his slumber early. They’d
begun a week earlier, outside Fenwold Country Railway Station and had bounced
around the country several times before
to his thin lips. “I’m very proud of you, John.”
If
anything, this eclipsed the starchy praise he’d bestowed on me for fixing the telly,
but weirdly I didn’t feel too happy about it this time around.
“I
didn’t push you to these actions, John,” he said when I didn’t answer. “I was
very careful. If anything you pushed me. All I did was show you crossroads and
you chose your own path. You are a hunter, John. Just as I am and my father was
before me. It is in your nature. And it is now up to you to harness these
strengths.”
“Yes
father,” was all I could think to say in the absence of any long distance
telephone lines between us.
“Good.
Well I’m glad we could finally have this little talk,” my father nodded cordially.
“Needless to say, I expect you to exercise due diligence when it comes to the
sport. I’ve not lasted this long by running about like a crazed maniac, so I
think it would be best if we put the Fens Strangler to bed for a few more years,
don’t you?”
I
did indeed. In fact, it was the first thing he’d said in several weeks that I
agreed with, so I took what comfort I could from it and decided not to rush
into any hasty decisions until I knew whereabouts my head was.
Or
moreover, whereabouts it was likely to end up if I made the wrong decision.
ix
My father spoke to me some more over the next few days, educating me as to the
ways of ‘the sport’ and the unGodliness of women in general. They’d gotten us
chucked out of Eden, had brought down kings and had even corrupted the poor old
Reverend, “curse his folly”, costing him a nailed-on bishopry, which is where I
suspected all this had really begun.
My
father, having been abandoned by his own Earthly mother within hours of his
nativity, had been cut from the same cloth as the Reverend, but I myself had no
such complaints about the rib-stealers, making me wonder just how fervent my
father’s beliefs could be that he would assume I’d fall into line right behind
him and grandfather. I mean, respectful obedience was one thing but I couldn’t
help feel he was abusing the privilege.
Naturally,
I tried to look as studious as I could for the sake of appearances and my own
neck, but every sinew of me wanted to honk into a bucket after “our little talks”.
My father and grandfather had killed dozens of women between them. Now they expected
me to carry on this ignoble family tradition. Of course, people with illicit
vices always want everyone else to indulge in the very thing they themselves can’t
stop from doing just to validate their own compunctions. But this wasn’t
pouring a mid-morning sherry or sucking off alter boys after evensong, this was
murder, the most heinous and dastardly crime of all. It wasn’t a sport. It was
never a sport. Not in peace. Not in war. Not in even King’s Lynn, which I could
almost understand. No, I may have been young. I may have helped my father do
some terrible things, but I still knew the difference between right and wrong.
Didn’t I?
Of
course I should have gone to the police. I should have but I didn’t because I
was a coward. I wanted to live and I wanted to carry on doing so for as many
years as possible. Was this selfish of me? Perhaps, but I was young, my life
had only just begun and there was still so much I had yet to do, like see Great
Yarmouth, ride a motorbike, sail in a boat or take a girl out for an evening and
bring her back alive again. I couldn’t turn myself in, not least of all because
my father wasn’t letting me out of his sights just in case some hitherto
untapped sense of morality got the better of me. No, I had to figure this thing
out for myself.
Alas,
I didn’t get the chance. I thought the Fen’s Strangler had been bedded down for
a few years but events conspired to rouse him from his slumber early. They’d
begun a week earlier, outside Fenwold Country Railway Station and had bounced
around the country several times before
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