Glug after glug

As little Johnny Haig wrestled to stop the 40 gallon steel drum from tipping over too far.

The thick black loop slowly slid into the festering sewer, hidden behind the locked back door in the basement of 79 Gloucester

Road.

As the smoking stews slopped up the rim, the acrid stench of acid stung the air, and the

last of the shapeless fatty goo oozed down into the drain.

See no eyes, no hair and no skin, just a yellowy green layer of ominous grease.

This was all that remained of 33-year-old William Donald McSwan.

And with the manhole cover replaced, Mack was gone.

Being the first of six supposedly perfect murders, although this baby-faced psychopath would soon bloom into one of Britain's most infamous serial killers,

in truth, as a murder virgin, Johnny had badly bungled his first slaying, but somehow, with his deathly cherry popped, he had got away with it.

But as a convicted fraudster, experienced forger and a charming liar, the rest would be textbook.

I had known McSwan for some time, and on seeing his mother and father, I explained that he had gone off to avoid his call-up.

I wrote a number of letters, purporting to be from him, and posted them in Glasgow and Edinburgh,

explaining the various details of the deposition of assets, which included a company, four homes and seven bank accounts,

worth a quarter of a million pounds today.

Last seen on Saturday the 9th of September 1944, as a shy, introverted recluse who hid in the shadows,

Mac would be missed by nobody but his doting parents,

who would swallow an entirely plausible story that their son, a shame-pity criminal,

an absconded parolee, a conscription deserter and a secret homosexual with so much to lose,

would flee the city, leaving his only friend in charge of his affairs.

It seemed logical, so strung along by a sweet little man that Max saw as a sibling,

...