Langton suggested that what they were looking at was a massive clean-up by Camorra: all the dead were connected to him, and he had simply got rid of them. Rashid Burry had been found in the same white Range Rover that had been used to transport Carly Ann’s body. They knew Joseph Sickert had needed a safe house and, assisted by Arthur Murphy, he had ended up at the piggery. The Range Rover had been to the same location.
Langton was at full speed. ‘Did Camorra want Gail’s children? He’s a sick perverted bastard. I reckon Sickert saw Rashid and co. turning up at the farm and knew something bad would happen. They took Sickert and the two older children; he presumed Gail and the toddler would follow. The biggest reaction I got from him was over the murder of Gail and Tina. He must have known about it — it was all over the news — so, Sickert takes the kids and goes on the run. Right now, our priority is to find out where he and the children were first taken.’
Langton ran his fingers through his hair. Holding the reins on this case was a nightmare.
‘We know the immigration service is totally screwed, but we do not know how many bodies this man has shipped illegally into the UK. We keep on hearing about his wealth and that it’s cash; we hear he has a fleet of vehicles and houses. He must have money stashed somewhere. He couldn’t bank it, unless he also uses the poor souls he ships in to open up strings of accounts. We are talking about them paying up to five thousand for transportation and God knows how much on top for visas and passports. Maybe these bank accounts are well hidden, but that is another area we need to start digging into.’
Anna felt that this was one of the keys to the whole case, but it was like a loose end dangling, with no one quite catching hold of it.
At this point, a call came in to say that they had found the house in Peckham. It was empty and, according to neighbours, had not been used for some weeks. A team of SOCO officers were ready to break in and begin searching for evidence. Frank Brandon and Harry Blunt left the station to join them.
Grace had little to add to the briefing; she had not been able to gain any further details from the two children held at the Child Protection Unit. Langton asked Anna to take over and, if she got anything, to join them at the Peckham property; he would go over there after interviewing Vernon Kramer.
There was a lot of movement with officers and squad cars moving out; after the initial high, the incident room fell silent. Langton waited for Vernon to be brought in and taken to the holding cells. They had had a bit of an argy bargy with the open prison Governor, who said they could conduct the interview there, but Langton refused. He wanted no prison authorities breathing over his shoulder, no prison officer privy to the interview. Mike Lewis had instructions to cut up rough: to use, not a squad car, but a white prison van. Langton wanted Vernon cuffed.
Vernon Kramer’s photograph had been almost the first up on the incident board, with Arthur Murphy’s beside him. It had a few red arrows linking him to Gail and to Joseph Sickert; he was also linked to Rashid Burry, but a question mark was over his relationship with Camorra. He had given them only a very vague description of Camorra’s house but, even so, he had a red line linking him to the prime target.
Harry Blunt and Frank Brandon had got into a heated argument. The house was, as Harry said, hard to fucking miss, but they had missed it. Now there was a team of SOCO officers, plus two forensic scientists and three assistants, ready to enter the premises. The usual police warning was given, in case there were occupants, then they burst open the front door. It took some hammering, as there were so many bolts and locks; although it looked like wood, it was, in actual fact, a steel security door. There was a similar door at the rear; whoever had been there had obviously left via this back door, as the bolts were not thrown across.
Brandon gave instructions for the SOCO team to be wary, just in case the place was booby-trapped. After the house was deemed safe to enter, Brandon and Harry went inside.
From the outside, it appeared to be an ordinary property — a three-storey house with a double garage and an overgrown front garden — but the inside was something else.
Harry whistled. ‘It’s like one huge brothel, from the old days! Look at the mirrors, and the drapes.’
‘I’m looking, I’m looking,’ Frank muttered. Everywhere hung massive gilt mirrors, reflecting ornate reproduction furniture.
‘So when were you last in a whorehouse this size?’ Harry dug his toe into a once-white carpet, now stained and dirty.
Frank took in the heavy chandelier and the matching wall lights with crystal drops. The wide staircase had a black boy figure at the bottom, holding a glass-flame torch. ‘You buy this gear in a place in Marble Arch. The Arabs love it.’
‘Lotta marble — that’s not cheap,’ Harry said, running his hand over a hall table; it was thick with dust.
‘Well, he flashed his money around, didn’t he?’
Frank looked through a set of double doors into a dining room. A large oval table with gilt legs and fourteen fabric-covered chairs dominated the room, which was hung with yet more elaborate mirrors, above cabinets full of Capo di Monte figures. The lounge was next, with dirty white leather sofas and a massive plasma-screen TV. The kitchen was filled with every possible kind of culinary equipment, all filthy. The once black-and-white tiled floor was greasy and the cooker looked as if it had never been cleaned. The smell was pungent. There were baskets of rotting vegetables; food had been put in the waste disposal unit, but no one had bothered to turn it on. The fridges and deep freezes bulged with yet more food. There was an industrial roll of black bin-liners left on the floor; a few bags had been filled, as if someone was trying to clear up, but had just abandoned the rubbish instead of removing it.
The first-floor bedrooms were equally over-dressed, with drapes and mirrors, and equally filthy. The wardrobes were empty, but grimy sheets were still on the unmade beds. These were removed for tests. They had, thus far, found no indication that anything untoward had been happening. It was, to all intents and purposes, merely the home of someone with pots of money and no taste, who hadn’t been able to hire decent cleaners! Not until they moved up to the next floor, did an all-pervading feeling of something wrong hit everyone.
This floor was also carpeted, but in a deep burgundy; it was threadbare, in some places worn down to the floorboards. The three bedrooms had locks and chains on the outside. The one bathroom for that floor was old-fashioned and filthy. Each room was bare, apart from single beds with dirty sheets. The top floor had another two rooms, again with locks and chains on the doors. Inside were children’s toys and cots, again stained, and an overpowering stench of urine; faeces were growing mould on the floor. There was no bathroom at this level, just washbasins; in one, they found dirty nappies and some children’s nightclothes.
Brandon and Harry returned to the ground floor to check if any papers or documents had been left behind. In a small anteroom by the kitchen was a printing press; acid had been poured over it and the two boxes of papers alongside, which contained stacks of hard-backed passport covers.
Brandon poked around as Harry looked over the printing press. ‘So this is where he forged the documents.’
They found some charred papers in a fireplace, and more in the bins outside.
‘Shit!’ Harry turned over a piece of paper. It was handwritten and burned almost black, with some of the words crossed out, but what was left of it described the availability of a white eight-year-old boy.
They turned when a SOCO officer appeared in the doorway. ‘We’ve opened the cellar.’