Fellows went silent, chewing at his lower lip before he returned to the photo wall, to the graphs and memos. He stared at the photographs of the vehicles in which the dead women had been found. A Lincoln Continental, a Chrysler Le Baron, a Saab, a Mercedes, an Eldorado Cadillac — the latter the burned-out wreck where Helen Murphy had been found. Then he looked over the charts of the locations. Beverly Center on Melrose, Shopping Mall Van Nuys, West Hollywood, Santa Monica Boulevard, Century City and lastly the Santa Monica shopping centre. He stood for at least three minutes, his eyes roaming the photographs, the locations. There had to be a link between them, a pattern beyond the method of the murder itself. He needed to know as near as possible the times of, one, when Helen Murphy was killed, two, when the attack on the woman in the Van Nuys shopping mall occurred — the one they had wrongly presumed was Helen Murphy — and, three, Holly’s murder. The three were of interest because Holly’s was the last, the failed murder attempt would have been between the last two.
‘How close are these, time wise?’ Fellows flicked his hand to Helen Murphy and Holly.
Bean crossed to the information section and looked up. ‘The reported attack on the woman in the Van Nuys shopping mall was on the same day Hastings was killed. This woman, Helen Murphy, was, as close as we can get from the labs, murdered about three days before we found her.’
Fellows nodded. ‘But they can’t be exactly sure, can they? I mean, it could be a day either side. Her body was pretty high, wasn’t it? Already decomposing?’
Bean nodded and then checked the information on Holly. Fellows had taken a small black leather diary from his pocket and was flipping through it, licking his fingers as he pushed the small pages over. ‘And, Lieutenant, Holly was killed on what date?’
Bean looked at Rooney. ‘Fifteenth of this month.’
Fellows pursed his lips. ‘You got dates for all the others? See if it’s always around the same time. I know some of them are four to six years old, but I’d like to get a calendar made up. Would you do that for me?’
Bean nodded. Fellows turned to Rooney and gave a glum smile. ‘I’m sorry, but that’s about it for today. It’s not much because I need more time, and I’ll hopefully come up with something else. I expect you’ve already come to the same conclusions yourselves. Basically, a lot of what I do in the end is simply common sense.’
He picked up his briefcase. ‘You’re not going, are you?’ Rooney asked anxiously. ‘I mean, all the team is coming in today to talk this over—’
Fellows snapped his case shut. ‘I’m sure you can repeat everything, and I have a game of golf waiting. If you just keep me informed of any new developments, I’ll get back to you.’
‘What did you think of him?’ asked Bean when Fellows had gone.
‘I take back everything I said. How’s that for starters?’
Bean grinned. ‘Odd character, wasn’t he?’
‘Big ears.’ Rooney sighed. ‘We’re almost back at the starting gate, aren’t we? From what he’s said, we’re off by a long way with Murphy’s husband. Nobody’s found the fucker anyway.’
He flicked at the blind on his office window. ‘You know, way back I was on a case, a missing kid — long time ago — but we’d all given up, we just had nothing. You remember that woman I saw that night when we went to the Indian?’
Bean raised an eyebrow.
‘Well, she was on the same case, a little girl missing. She found her body at the school. She was such a cute little kid, and...’ Rooney sighed, seeing the little girl’s face again. ‘Anyway, Lorraine — that was her name, didn’t I tell you about her?’
‘Drunk on duty, right?’
‘This was before she became a lush, years before, and she was a good cop, dedicated — well, as much as a woman can be. Anyway, she wouldn’t let go, she was so sure it was this janitor, but we had nothing on him. He even had a strong alibi for the afternoon the girl went missing. We’d all scrapped him as a suspect — she was even warned off from visiting the school and his place. Did it in her own time. She just wouldn’t back off him. And we had not one shred of evidence, it was just her intuition...’
Bean yawned and looked at his watch, he could hear all the men starting to arrive outside, and he wondered where the story was leading. Rooney too seemed uncertain, still flicking at the blind with his fat stubby finger. ‘She broke him down, I don’t know how, none of us did. She brought him back into the station for maybe the tenth time, questioned him over and over, and meanwhile there was the Captain going ape-shit, saying we’d be accused of harassment. Then she walked out, and she had this look on her face like some prize fighter. She lifted up her fist, said he’d admitted it, that he’d just broken down and admitted killing the little girl...’
Bean wasn’t listening, his attention on the doorway as he looked at the men that passed. ‘Everyone’s gathered. You want to go in?’
Rooney hitched up his pants. ‘Maybe we try again with Hastings’s wife, maybe we’ve been going too softly-softly, maybe he wasn’t such a good, upright, honest citizen. And we start trying to trace that missing witness again. We don’t back off, but keep on going — okay?’
Bean sighed. ‘You know, even if we do find her maybe all she knows is what she told us and that won’t help.’
Rooney jabbed at him with his finger. ‘Wrong. She never said where he picked her up from. She probably knows a hell of a lot more than she let on. Now, let’s get fucking cracking before the entire Sunday’s up the spout. We got to trace that bitch and all leave is cancelled as from now...’
The cab drew up outside a narrow, three-storey house facing the ocean that didn’t look much but, Lorraine knew, would have to be worth outside three million dollars. Mike Page was certainly doing a lot better for himself nowadays. The cab driver, who had been watching the clock, now turned to face Lorraine. ‘You want to drive around some more or are you getting out?’
‘Drive around a while longer.’
He sighed. ‘Okay. Anything you want, lady, this is your ride.’
They did another tour of Santa Monica, then returned and parked in exactly the same place as before.
‘This is it, lady. I got an account customer I need to pick up, so, if you don’t mind...’
He was lying, she knew, he just wanted her out of his cab, probably because it was Sunday and he wanted to get home. She paid the fare, and stepped out. Hardly had the cab door shut behind her before he drove off. She felt marooned, afraid to walk the few yards to Mike’s front door, yet unable to turn and walk away. She stood there, frozen.
‘Lorraine?’ The voice was unmistakable. It was Mike. She turned and shaded her eyes. He was wearing an open neck shirt, white slacks and flip-flops. A big dog with long scruffy hair padded beside him. Her heart was thudding and she knew she must be flushed a bright red and her whole body broke out in a sweat. Mike had a deep sun-tan and his teeth gleamed; his dark brown eyes had lines at the side, crow’s feet, but apart from that he didn’t seem much older than when she had last seen him.
‘Hi!’ He stood about a foot away from her. ‘I wasn’t expecting you until later.’
‘I got a taxi.’
He smiled, reached for her bag and she let him take it.
‘I got something for the girls, I don’t want you to think I’m staying over...’
He took her elbow, about to draw her towards the house, then he stopped. ‘They’re out swimming but they won’t be long, so we can have a chat, catch up.’
She followed him towards the front door, but he went down some steps to enter the house through large french windows which opened onto a verandah.