“Well, yes, he did, but I’m female, and I think he just wants to get his rocks off having me there.”
“Fancies you, does he?”
She was getting angry. “I wouldn’t know what that sick twisted creep felt about me, but I would prefer it if someone else went to talk to him.”
Langton stood up. “I’ll tell you what we’ll do: you go and visit him again and see what he comes up with. If you are unable to deal with it, then we’ll arrange for one of the others to be with him.”
“It’s not a question of me being unable to deal with it. I just feel uncomfortable and would prefer not to be the one to interview him again.”
“You won’t be alone; Barolli will accompany you. I’ve already arranged it with the governor.”
Anna stood up. “So I don’t have an option?”
“Afraid not. Drive up there first thing in the morning. That’s all. Thank you.”
Anna wanted to slam the door of the office, but instead, she walked out with her hands clenched, trying to control her temper. In the incident room, she told Barolli they were on another scheduled visit to Cameron Welsh, and he swore.
“It’s a bloody waste of time, didn’t you tell Langton that?”
“Why don’t you tell him?” Anna snapped, then added that perhaps he shouldn’t, as Langton didn’t like the fact that he hadn’t found the suitcase belonging to Margaret Potts.
Barolli was still bad-tempered when Anna collected him the following morning. He remained silent for a long time, obviously furious at having to take the long journey again and the fact that he had let himself and the team down by not interviewing Emerald Turk well enough. The team still had no result in tracing the ex — police officers who were used by Margaret Potts to get back at the men who had beaten her up. The consensus was that even if they did trace them, they doubted it would progress their case. Langton, however, had insisted they continue in case one of the men picked up by Potts was their killer.
Anna and Barolli arrived at the prison and went through the same lengthy procedure. This time they did not meet with the governor, as he was unavailable. There were four different officers working inside the secure unit, and they were concerned that the three other men held there didn’t like being locked up in their cells to allow Cameron to speak to his visitors.
Welsh was sitting in the same position behind the bars in his cell, with his hair tied back in a ponytail. He was as immaculate as ever and again offered them still or sparkling water. Both refused, keen to get on with it and to leave as soon as possible. Welsh seemed to detect that Anna did not wish to speak to him. She sat, lips pursed, as Barolli passed through the bars a copy of the first file from the pathologist. This contained on-site photographs of the victims and detailed reports from the postmortems.
This time Welsh acknowledged Barolli, smiling and thanking him for the file. He edged his chair around to his desk and sat looking intently at each photograph. He made copious notes, and Anna became impatient, glancing at Barolli, who lifted his eyes to the ceiling. On this occasion, they heard the odd catcall from the other inmates, jeering and shouting abusive remarks about Welsh being a squeeler, but Welsh ignored them, as did Anna and Barolli.
Barolli glanced at his watch. Without looking up, Welsh said quietly that he was sorry for keeping them waiting, but he wished to make a thorough investigation if he was to assist them. He placed to one side the first file and requested the forensic reports. Yet again he spent ages on every page and made many notes. Anna forced herself to calm down and use the time to observe Cameron from her position outside his cell.
First she looked over the hundreds of books, noting that they were all in alphabetical order as well as arranged by size. There were many psychology, forensic, and medical manuals, and numerous volumes of true-life crime, legal textbooks, and court trials. She could see no modern novels, but two shelves contained classics, and these were alongside well-known playwrights — Ibsen, Chekhov, Shakespeare — and some of the book covers appeared to be old, perhaps secondhand, bought online or possibly from specialist journals. She paid attention to the shampoos and lotions, expensive ones, the conditioners and facial creams and suncreams and fake tanning lotions. His toothpaste was a whitener with bleach, and he had an old-fashioned boracic-powder tin. His battery toothbrushes were lined up like soldiers, as were his battery shavers and various aftershave lotions.
Barolli yawned loudly, and Welsh looked up, then returned to his notebook. He picked up a battery sharpener and started sharpening his pencils.
“Your killer is obviously working on long-haul drives for some kind of trucking company. The times of the murders are important. He is a night driver, as it is unlikely that any victim was killed in daylight.”
“We are already covering that line of inquiry,” Anna said sharply.
“Good. I thought you would be. Are you focusing on the tarts who hang out at the motorway service stations?”
“Of course.”
“I hope you’ve put up warning notices. These girls are like wasps — swat them away, but back they come, and I think...” He tapped his whitened teeth with the eraser on the end of his pencil. “I think he’s killed more than these three girls. Oh yes. This man has been busy for a long time.”
“Please pass the files back,” Barolli said.
Cameron reluctantly collected up all the papers and photographs. “I’d like to keep them,” he said.
“I’m afraid that won’t be possible,” Anna told him.
“Pity. I need more time with them.” Welsh handed the files to Barolli, ignoring Anna. “Can’t you get permission from DCS Langton?”
“No.”
“You can go, then. What I will begin working on until your next visit is the routes, and I will have more details for you after that.”
Anna had her hand resting on the bars, waiting as Barolli replaced the files in his briefcase. It was only a fleeting touch as Cameron trailed his fingers across hers, but it sent shock waves through her.
“Sorry,” he said, smiling.
Anna wanted to tell him in no uncertain terms that no way would she be returning to see him! She was even more sure it was a waste of time, since he had told them nothing new or added anything of any value to their case. All it had done was give him the sick pleasure of gloating over the pictures of the victims.
Driving back, Anna and Barolli got into a heated argument, as he felt they had gained useful information.
“Like what?” Anna demanded.
“For one, that there could be other victims, so we check back into cold cases; and second, he was right on the button for checking out long-distance lorry drivers; and third, that they would be working nights.”
Anna angrily retorted that they were, in case he hadn’t noticed, already doing exactly that, and Welsh had given them nothing new whatsoever.
“Okay, but you tell me how he knitted it all together — from what? Newspaper coverage? He may have even watched Crimewatch, but he was, to my mind, quite informative.”
Anna decided not to get into any further arguments with Barolli, who had started to annoy her. She was glad that he slept for the rest of the return journey.
Anna had just finished writing up the report of the meeting when Barbara tapped her on the shoulder to say there was a call for her from Cameron Welsh.
“Let Barolli take it — say I am not available,” she said crossly, but Barbara explained that Cameron had insisted he speak to her directly.