“Not unless it’s relevant.”
“Sarah Hadley.”
“He told you that?”
“Yes.”
“And you believe him?”
“I do.”
Drury’s eyes move around the office, focusing on his desk, the back of his chair, the windowsill, but his mind is elsewhere. Perhaps he’s contemplating his own infidelity or trying to remember a time when people didn’t disappoint him.
“I don’t know how many people I’ll have left by tomorrow,” he says. “People want to get home for Christmas. My budget is blown and I can’t pay them overtime.”
“What about the search?”
“We’re going over old ground. I’m scaling it down.”
Voices interrupt him, the sound of a commotion. He turns back to the window. A crowd has gathered on the footpath outside. TV cameras, reporters and photographers: encircling Hayden McBain. He’s wearing a blue blazer and has combed his hair.
“My sister is dead and they have the nerve to arrest me,” he yells, pointing at the station. “They locked me up. They threatened me. They told me to shut up. Well, I won’t stay quiet. I’m going to sue these bastards for wrongful arrest, personal injury and emotional suffering. I’m going to sue them for destroying my good name.”
Drury rests his forehead against the glass, leaving an oily mark.
“Look at that toe-rag,” he mutters. “He’s got himself an agent, some Max Clifford type who’s flogging his story to the highest bidder. He should have been charged.”
“It would have made things worse.”
“He’s profiteering. There should be laws.”
Another interruption. Dave Casey this time.
“You’re going to want to see this, boss. Sky News just posted new pictures of Natasha McBain on their website. They’re saying they were taken on the night before she disappeared.”
Casey types the webpage address on the desktop computer. The page loads with photographs beneath a headline: “Natasha’s Last Dance.”
The images are poor quality, taken on a mobile phone, but the subject is instantly recognizable. Natasha McBain is wearing a short summer frock and appears to be dancing. Spinning. The movement causes the dress to lift from her hips.
She has an audience of men, although I can’t see their faces. They’re sitting on benches or standing around her, watching her dance.
These are the last images ever taken of tragic teenager Natasha McBain, who disappeared three years ago with her best friend Piper Hadley. The photographs were taken only hours before Natasha went
missing from a summer festival in Bingham, Oxfordshire, on August 30, 2008.
Natasha’s body was discovered last week in a frozen lake half a mile away from her home.
“I want the originals,” orders Drury. “I want to know who took them.”
Fifteen minutes later a call is patched through to the deputy director of news at the cable channel. Nathan Porter has a Brummie accent full of chummy bonhomie. He’s on speakerphone.
“How can I help, Detective Chief Inspector?”
“You have photographs of Natasha McBain. Where did they come from?”
“A member of the public provided them.”
“I need a name and contact address.”
“Our source wished to remain anonymous.”
Drury tries hard to control his temper. “This is not WikiLeaks, Mr. Porter. This is a murder investigation.”
“Sky News has an obligation to protect our journalistic sources. In a free society…”
Drury picks up the phone unit and pretends to bash it against the desk. Porter is still talking.
“… media independence is an important pillar of democracy…”
Any goodwill that existed between the two men has gone.
“Let’s be serious, Mr. Porter, you’re not protecting democracy, you’re protecting the killer of a teenage girl.”
“Steady on,” says the news editor. “I think you’re exaggerating the situation. All we’ve done is find a good story.”
“That’s all this is to you, a good story. A girl is dead. Another is missing. You have fifteen minutes to provide police with the identity of your source. If you fail to do so, I will call another media conference. I’m sure Mr. and Mrs. Hadley would appreciate the opportunity to comment on a news organization that withholds important evidence that could help find their daughter.”
There is a long pause. Some silences have their own grammar and syntax.
The news editor speaks first. “Please hold the line. I’m seeking advice from our lawyers.”
“The clock is ticking,” says Drury.
We wait, listening to a promotion for Christmas programs on Sky Premier.
Five minutes later, Porter returns.
“There seems to have been a misunderstanding,” he says, apologizing for the delay. “Crossed wires.”
“How so?”
“We always intended to hand over the photographs. We certainly didn’t want to impede or hinder your investigations. Perhaps, in return for our help, you might consider making the Hadleys available for an exclusive interview.”
“That’s not possible,” says Drury.
“Perhaps you would agree to be interviewed.”
“You don’t want that, Mr. Porter.”
“Why not?”
“I might say something you’d regret.”
“I see.”
“Who gave you the photographs?”
“A man called the newsroom and offered us the images. He called himself John Smith-clearly a fake name. He wanted cash. We paid him five hundred pounds.”
“Just like that?”
“Our security cameras took footage of him when he came to collect the money. Give me an email address, I’ll send you the grab.”
“What about the photographs of Natasha?”
“They were taken on a mobile. He gave us four stills, which seem to run in a sequence, possibly taken from a video. I’m sending the email now.”
Moments later the computer chimes. Drury has mail.
“Thank you for your co-operation, Mr. Porter.”
“Always a pleasure to assist, DCI.”
Drury hangs up and clicks on the inbox. The attachment opens in a new window; a video file. Loading. The security footage shows a man entering a revolving door and crossing a foyer. He’s wearing a hoodie pulled up over a baseball cap. Baggy jeans. Hands in his pockets. He talks to a receptionist and refuses to be photographed for a visitor’s pass. Instead, he waits in the foyer until a female journalist appears in a mid-length skirt. He studies her, checking out her calves. The exchange takes place. He turns for the door.
“There!” says Drury.
The footage pauses. The man who called himself John Smith has glanced up at the CCTV camera, revealing his face for just a fraction of a second.
“Shit!” says Drury, grabbing his coat from the back of his chair. He opens his door and yells across the incident room. “Blake, Casey, Middleton… with me.”
37
Blackbird Leys is one of the largest council estates in Europe, dating back to the fifties when urban planners thought the way to solve inner-city deprivation was to move the inner poor from the tenements and rundown neighborhoods to greenfield sites on the fringes of town. Out of sight, out of mind.
Instead, this utopian idea produced a cement and breeze-block badlands, as bleak as anything Dickens described, full of drug dens, illegal factories, brothels, squats, second-hand car yards, chop-shops and convenience stores with metal grates over the windows.
This isn’t tourist Oxford or mortarboard-and-gown Oxford. It’s where the “townies” live-the cleaners, maids, factory workers, delivery drivers and tradesmen who keep the city running; as well as the employed and the unemployable, the working class and the underclass.
The local landmarks are twin towers: Windrush and Evenlode; fifteen-story monuments to function that would be improved immeasurably by a wrecking ball or twenty pounds of Semtex.
The service entrance of Windrush smells of disemboweled bin bags, disinfectant and cat piss. I watch as a dozen officers in body armor climb the stairs. Another four of them use the lift and look like astronauts on their way to the command module.