Warhol's Prophecy

OAK LANE, MANNINGHAM PARK, BRADFORD

She stood banging on the roof of the car and shouting.

He spotted her as he drove closer, and it took him a moment or two to realize that the car was empty.

What was the stupid bitch playing at?

She was screaming obscenities at the empty vehicle, reeling from it every now and then, and he could see that she was obviously drunk.

Probably done the rounds tonight. The Perseverance, the Carlisle, and now, he guessed, she was heading towards the International.

Drunk, pathetic, plying her filthy trade for anyone desperate enough to pay her.

He slowed down as he drew closer, and she noticed his car.

In fact she started to walk across towards it.

She was dressed in jeans, a short leather jacket and a blue shirt. Most of the buttons were undone.

He shook his head. They were all the same.

She bent down and smiled drunkenly at him through the passenger side-window, then reached for the door handle.

He made no attempt to stop her. In fact he smiled as she slipped into the seat beside him.

He looked at her for a moment, listening to her drunken babble. To the same sort of thing that they all said: to him and to every other man who paid them for the use of their bodies.

This one was different, somehow.

She was in her mid-twenties but the ravages of working the streets didn’t seem to have affected her the same way it did so many of the others.

This one was even quite pretty – in a cheap kind of way. Her skin was still fresh and taut, her long dark hair lustrous.

He could smell the booze on her breath as she directed him to her flat.

He parked the car and allowed her to climb out, watching as she headed towards the ground-floor bedsit.

As she pushed the key into the lock, still with her back to him, he slid his hand beneath the driver’s seat and pulled out the clawhammer.

He hid it inside his coat, and then followed her inside the flat.

She was prattling on about a drink, but he paid little attention. He hung up his coat, ensuring that the hammer was still concealed inside. Within easy reach.

Arms folded before him, he looked around the tiny bedsit.

The walls were a little discoloured by cigarette smoke and by the central heating. The bedspread could have done with a good wash, but apart from that it was a passable dwelling.

For someone like her.

She sat on the edge of the bed with her back to him and began pulling off her shoes.

He pulled the hammer from his coat and struck.

The shuddering impact seemed to shock her into silence.

Sometimes they screamed, but not this one. She merely tried to rise – even when he struck her again.

The third blow sent her sprawling back across the bed.

The fourth caused her to roll off onto the floor.

He bent down and slid his hands beneath her armpits, lifting her back onto the bed.

Moving quickly, he pulled open her shirt, exposing her breasts. He tugged her jeans down past her hips too, and stood for precious seconds gazing at her.

He shook his head slightly, thinking how cheap she looked.

How many other men had seen her like this?

Blood was already pouring form her head wounds, soaking into the bedspread underneath.

He then hit her again. And again. Occasionally he would flip the hammer, using the claw to gouge into her flesh, watching the welts rise where he raked her body with its twin prongs.

He wasn’t sure if she was dead when he finally stuck the knife into her stomach. He was more transfixed by the fact that her blood looked so red. So vivid. With the others, before her, it had appeared black in the darkness. But now he almost marvelled at its brightness.

He pulled the bedsheets over her, watching the blood soak through the cotton. He could hear gurgling sounds coming from underneath them as she gargled with her own blood.

She was obviously still alive but would be in no state to tell anyone what had happened.

Death would follow fairly quickly. It was what she deserved.

Filthy whore.

He walked out, closing the door carefully behind him.

He would throw the hammer from his car on the way home, having cleaned it carefully of fingerprints.

You could never be too careful.

23 April 1977

The women I killed were filth-bastard prostitutes who were littering the streets. I was just cleaning up the place a bit.

Peter Sutcliffe, ‘The Yorkshire Ripper’

OK, now you’re on your own.

Your self-righteousness has grown . . .

The Ruts