“Mr Fox,” murmured Banbury. The others looked at him. “Oh, it’s just that he had a photograph of a tube station bench on his wall, then it was gone.”
“I thought we’d decided that the two cases weren’t linked,” said May.
“We had,” Bryant reassured him. “Don’t worry. Let’s go on.”
“Can we go back to the motives?” asked Longbright. “According to the interviews, Gloria Taylor’s workmates insist she had no enemies. But maybe she had something on her mind, because she forgot to take home her daughter’s birthday toy on the night she died. Hillingdon had no dodgy connections, either. He was dating the girl Cates, although it now appears she’s been having casual sex with Fontvieille for a while.”
“Wait, how do you know that?” Renfield demanded to know.
“Simple, Jack. I asked her. We still don’t know who Hillingdon drank with on Tuesday night, because most of the Spitalfields bars were rammed to the gills, and none of the staff recall seeing him. Plus, there are about a hundred of them. Cassie Field was positively adored. Nobody has a bad word to say about her.”
“I hate to raise this again,” said Renfield, “but what if the deaths were random?” Everyone groaned. “No, listen to me. Suppose one of the housemates has psychotic episodes and just – lashes out? So, a stranger on the tube is attacked, and Field is literally kicked under a train.”
“Doesn’t work,” said May. “Hillingdon’s death was premeditated, and if you’re assuming it was a housemate, following Cassie Field to Westcombe Park station in order to kill her means someone was waiting for an opportunity to get her alone.”
“Can I just bring in Tony McCarthy?” asked Bryant, as another groan went around the room. “If you remember, the junkie is the only one who can identify Mr Fox. UCH is releasing him at noon today because they need the bed. I want to make sure it’s common knowledge that he’s back on the streets. There’s a strong likelihood that Mr Fox will try to take him out again, and given your spotty track record on surveillance I reckon he’s got a pretty slender chance of survival.”
“Why don’t you just shake the details of Fox’s ID out of McCarthy?” asked Renfield. “I can put the fear of God up him without leaving any marks. Leave me alone in a room with him. He’ll fall apart in minutes.”
“Thank you, Jack, we’re British detectives, not the Stasi. I’ll let you know if we need the electrodes.”
“Just offering, that’s all.”
“Whoever killed Hillingdon took his overcoat and wore it to kill Cassie Field at the station,” said Longbright. “That doesn’t make sense. Dan, did you get anything off it yet?”
“There were no hairs, a few skin flakes, a couple of small oily patches around the collar. I’m expecting the analysis back shortly.”
“So,” said Bryant, “any questions?”
“Yeah, plenty.” Meera folded her arms defiantly. “But are there any answers? I mean, do you think this is over now? That whoever’s been doing this has achieved his – or her – aim and finished?”
“Have you actually been in the same room with us for the last hour?” Bryant snapped. “I’ve told you, these acts are premeditated, but we still don’t know to what end. Until we understand the killer’s psychology, we won’t be able to tell if it’s over. We have to assume it isn’t, and find a way of protecting all the potential victims.”
“Can I remind you that we’ve less than ten hours to wrap everything up?” Meera shot back. “Everything. Your Mr bloody Fox, this subway vampire, the lot. I’ve already been out of a job once this year; I don’t want to be back in the same situation again.”
“Then come up with something useful,” Bimsley suggested.
“We break in,” said Renfield.
“What?” It was Bryant’s turn to stare.
“We break into the house in the square. Just smash a window and storm the place. Put the fear of God up them. We’ve got legal grounds. You reckon somebody there is arrogant enough to think they’ve got away with it – they won’t be expecting a surprise visit.”
“Apart from the fact that Dan already took the house apart looking for evidence, ransacking the students’ rooms while they’re still asleep is not an option I want to consider. First you suggest torture, now burglary. Why don’t we just go out and shoot them all?”
“You come up with a better idea,” muttered Renfield.
“Mr Bryant, you’re sure it’s one of the housemates?” Bimsley asked.
“I know it is.” Bryant smoothed his hand across his desk, which was still littered with playing cards. “The proof is shape-shifting right here in front of me. I can see it – I just can’t identify it.”
“Then we stick to them like napalm for the rest of the morning, until one of them makes a mistake.” Bimsley looked to the others for confirmation. “What difference is it going to make? We can’t do any more here, and it’s our last day. There’s nothing else left to do.”
“Can I just say that in the entire history of the Unit, this has been the most disastrous investigation you lot have ever attempted?” Raymond Land spoke up finally, adding his opinion in the most unhelpful way possible. “It’s like something out of The Muppet Show. I’ve seen better organised water balloon fights. Well, it’s over now. We’re no further on than when we started. We’re finished. Washed up. Dead. We might just as well all go home and do some gardening. On Monday morning we’re going to wake up with no jobs to go to, and this dump will be turned into a Starbucks. It’s the end of my career. Well, thanks a bunch for nothing.”
Everyone booed and threw paper cups at him.
∨ Off the Rails ∧
41
The Trench Effect
DS Longbright was taken by surprise when Georgia Conroy called; she had not been expecting to hear from Pentonville Prison’s former history teacher again. “You told me to call if I remembered anything else,” Conroy explained. “It’s only a little thing…”
“That’s fine,” replied Longbright, searching for a pen. “Right now I’ll be grateful for anything.”
“Well, you know I said Lloyd Lutine wanted me to go with him to visit Abney Park Cemetery?”
“Yes.”
“I thought it was odd at the time, because he’d given me the impression that he’d hated his father. He asked me to accompany him because he’d just discovered where he was buried.”
“How did he find out?”
“I don’t know. Maybe he checked the council records. As I said, I turned him down because it seemed a bit creepy. Then he mentioned something odd. That his father wasn’t supposed to have been buried there. It wasn’t allowed, there had been a mistake, something like that. I’m sorry, it’s not much…”
“No, I’m glad you called.”
Longbright thought it through. If Mr Fox’s father had also been raised in King’s Cross, Abney Park would not have been his local cemetery. But people could be buried more or less wherever they wanted, so why should it not have been allowed? Thanking Georgia Conroy, she rang off and took her notes into Arthur Bryant’s office.
“I know we’re supposed to be concentrating on the Mecklenburgh Square case, but can you spare a minute?”
Arthur peered up at her over the tops of his bifocals. “Is it urgent?”
“You’re doing a jigsaw, Arthur.”
“It helps me to think.” He gave up trying to fit a piece and sat back, turning it over in his fingers. “Queen Victoria’s funeral procession. Two thousand pieces. I wonder how many mourners in the crowd travelled by tube that day to watch it pass? Dan Banbury thinks someone chose to murder Gloria Taylor in the underground system because of the sheer volume of people passing through it. He says it’s difficult to solve a crime in a public place because the site always gets contaminated.”