Lynn waited, held her breath. She had talked him into letting her have back her jeans, complaining of the excessive cold. He had loosened the chain that held her cuffs a little at nightfall, sufficient for her to be able to draw her arms up against her back. Nevertheless, she was stiff, sore; the side on which she had mostly lain was numb.
She heard Michael moving and realized he was looking down at her to see if she were awake. Tense, when his finger touched her cheek she managed not to react. For several minutes he stood there, bending forward, stroking her face. When she thought she could endure it no longer, he went away.
The caravan door clicked shut and she heard the key turning in the lock. Nothing now that she could do but wait. Continue waiting. Any attempt she had made the previous evening to engage Michael in conversation had come to nothing. Just, now and then, that recognizable smile-you think I’m going to fall for that? Think I don’t know what you’re doing?
Somewhere, Lynn knew, they would be looking for her. Resnick and others-officers that she had never met and would never know-using everything at their disposal, searching, following every clue. But what were they? What were the clues? She had come so close that last evening to telling Resnick Michael’s name. Instead, she had put down the phone. Put off the moment. Why? As long as she lived, she might never know. Not that that need be so very long a time.
Resnick was in King’s Lynn within the hour, motorcycle escort all the way, headlights and sirens. Sharon Garnett’s sergeant greeted him with a strong handshake, a quiet, “Anything we can do to help you land the bastard,” as Resnick walked past. They sat in a small low-ceilinged room with a view out over wet cobbled streets. Quite close, a church bell was insistently ringing. “I wish they’d give over with that bastard thing,” the sergeant remarked. Sharon looked towards Resnick, waiting for a signal to play the tape.
Though he was expecting it, Lynn’s voice made him start and he missed the first few words.
… I have to tell you that I’m all right. I mean, I’ve been given something to eat and drink and so far nothing bad has happened to me. I’m being well looked after, I suppose. I’m not in any pain. The reason … She hesitated. … the reason I’m here is that … Another hesitation, longer. Some movement of the microphone. Crackling … the reason … Without a break, the man’s voice, close to anger, interrupting. She’s here because she thought she could outsmart me, that’s the way of it. Outwit me. Use me, that too. Get inside my defenses. And she’s got to learn, you’ve got to learn, like I told you, that’s one thing you can’t none of you do. Another pause, short, and then, And that includes you, Mr. Resnick, that includes you.
“That’s it?” Resnick said. “That’s all?”
Sharon nodded. “We played it right through, both sides.”
“Nothing about a ransom, then,” the sergeant said. “Not like last time.”
“That was a game,” Resnick said.
“Nasty bloody sort of a game.”
“His kind. But it’s gone beyond that now. He knows that.”
Sharon Garnett looked at him. “You know who he is, don’t you?”
“We’ve got a good idea.”
“How come?”
“Staring us in the face,” Resnick said. “More or less.”
A fresh-faced PC knocked on the door and waited for the word to come in. “Inspector Resnick? Call for you. Shall I put it through here?”
It was a short journey from the stationery warehouse to where Michael Best lived in a rented house on the outskirts of Ruddington, south of the city. A short street of anonymous, flat-fronted buildings that stopped abruptly at the entrance to a field. Curtains twitched as the two cars slowed to a halt outside number five; the front door opposite opened and a man and woman came out to stand on their path and gawp. A word or two from Kevin Naylor sent them, reluctantly, back inside.
Millington was in no mood for niceties. He gave the nod to Divine, who grinned and sent the sledgehammer crashing against the front door, through wood and glass, and with a second swing they were inside.
The upper part of the house seemed hardly to have been used, a few boxes, mainly empty, a broken stiff-backed chair which someone had made an unsuccessful attempt to mend. Balls of dust fluffed around their feet where they walked. The bathroom was downstairs at the back, a converted scullery with black spots of damp high on the walls; toothbrush, toothpaste, shaving things were missing. In the kitchen the cupboards contained mostly tinned food-Baxter’s pea and ham soup, HP baked beans, seven tins of sardines. A nub end of bread at the back of a chipped enamel breadbin, going green.
In the small front room a framed photograph of Michael Best and an older woman, enough like him to be his mother, hung above the tiled mantelpiece. She with her head half-turned towards him, Michael looking slightly bashful, self-conscious, the woman’s pride clear in her eyes.
Shelved in the alcove behind the one armchair, Michael Best’s library of books on running a smallholding, horticulture, tips for the independent businessman, the commercial growing and marketing of flowers. There were a pocket guide to Byzantine Art, a selected poems of Andrew Marvel, two paperbacks by Thomas Clancy. Beside a handy guide to hyacinths and gladioli was a copy of Killing for Company, the story of Dennis Nilsen.
“So what?” Millington said when Divine flourished it with something close to triumph. “I’ve got a copy of that at home myself.”
Divine redeemed himself by finding the letters, hand written, either copies or unsent.
Dear Patrick
It was good to hear from you and to know that you are well. Things have moved on a little here and it looks as though my plans for setting up on my own should see fruition by this summer, autumn at the latest. I have been looking in the area around King’s Lynn, which as you know is where my mother originally comes from, and think I may have found something …
Dear Mother,
I’m so glad the flowers arrived safely, and the card, and that you say they made a nice display. I only wish I could have been with you, but as you know, I’m virtually holding down two jobs what with all the traveling and trying to make sure I don’t lose the chance to …
Dear Mr. Charteris
I am writing to you with considerable regret concerning your decision not to grant in full the loan we recently discussed. I had hoped that during our meeting I had been able to convince you …
Dear Lynn,
I hope this letter from someone who is as yet a complete stranger …
At the bottom drawer, underneath the letters, there was an application form for the Open University Science Foundation course, filled in but never sent. There were OS maps of Norfolk and Lincolnshire, with locations marked in blue-black biro, some of them circled in red; creased and well-used, a Little Chef motorists’ map for 1993. In an envelope there were color photographs of a woman taken indoors using flash, bright spots reflecting back from the center of bewildered eyes.
“Any ideas?” Divine said, holding them up.
“Susan Rogel, I wouldn’t mind betting,” Millington said. “Let’s get Siddons down here to be sure. Meantime, get through to the boss, arrange for copies of these maps to be faxed across. I hope to Christ we find the right place and in time.”
Lynn could hear a dog barking, quite far off; the same note, almost, it seemed, without interruption. She had heard Michael singing earlier, close by, the sound of hammering, ten minutes at most and then it had stopped. Her bladder was starting to burn. What she prayed for was the sound of approaching cars. A key turned in the lock and Michael came in.