Annie woke early on Wednesday morning, and when she opened her curtains she was happy to see that the sun was shining again and the sky was robin’s-egg blue. She managed twenty minutes of meditation and a short yoga session – ten salutes to the sun, cobra, locust and peacock – then she dressed in her new white cotton slacks, red short-sleeve top and light denim jacket and went down to the restaurant for breakfast with Banks, her wavy brown hair still damp from the shower.
The meditation and yoga hadn’t made her feel as calm as she had hoped, and she couldn’t help feeling anxious and tense about meeting Banks again, especially after the way he had phoned and so casually put her off late the previous evening.
Their last meeting had gone well enough, but nothing had been resolved and Annie still felt as if she were bursting with questions and insecurities.
The stories in the morning paper upset her, too, brought back too many bad memories. Because the reporter was trying to link Banks’s fire with his brother’s murder, they had also raked up all the stuff about Phil Keane and his hapless policewoman girlfriend. Where they had got it all from in the first place, she didn’t know, but there’s always a leak somewhere.
Banks didn’t look in too bad a shape, Annie thought, when she saw him already sitting at a cloth-covered table drinking coffee. In fact, he looked a lot more like his old self than he had in ages. All he really needed now was a decent haircut and a few more good nights’ sleep to get rid of the bags under his eyes. And maybe some fresh clothes. The pallor had all but gone, and there was a certain edgines back in his body language instead of that infuriating languor. There was also a brightness in his dark blue eyes that she hadn’t seen in a long time. Perhaps, she thought, his brother’s death had made him realize how lucky he was. Or more likely it had just given him something he cared about, a sense of purpose. For there was no denying that he was on the case, officially or not.
She sat down opposite him and noticed that he smelled just a little of original Old Spice. It was a smell she liked, something she remembered from their intimate time together. It had taken her a while to throw out the anti-perspirant stick he had left in her bathroom cabinet, but she had done so eventually, along with the razor, shaving cream and toothbrush.
“So what were you up to last night that you couldn’t meet up with me then?” Annie asked.
“Social duties,” said Banks.
“Pull the other one.”
“I went see Corinne,” he said.
“How is she?”
“She’s suffering plenty,” said Banks. “I don’t know about you,” he went on, “but whenever I’m having breakfast in a hotel, it has to be the bacon and eggs. Don’t know why. I’d never have that at home.”
“It’s because you don’t have to cook it yourself and wash the dishes after,” said Annie.
“And because I never have time to sit around and eat it.”
“How are things going?”
“Not so bad, considering,” said Banks. “My dad’s just worn down by the whole thing, but my mother’s acting strange.”
“Strange how?”
“As if it’s just another family event, like the anniversary party. She’s already talking about sandwiches for the funeral tea.”
“Might not be a bad idea,” said Annie. “The postmortem’s over. Given cause of death, I shouldn’t imagine they’ll be holding on to the body for too long. I’m really sorry about your brother, Alan. I know Dave Brooke will do his best. He’s a good copper.”
A waitress came over and Banks ordered the full English. Annie ordered a cheese-and-mushroom omelette and felt a twinge of guilt – her first morning she’d had only a continental, and the next two days muesli – but if you didn’t treat yourself once in a while, what was the point?
“Anyway,” Banks asked, “how are things progressing up north?”
Annie ran her hand over her hair. “I’ve only been in touch over the phone but they seem to be moving along nicely. Mostly it’s forensics on the tire tracks and fingerprints we found at your cottage and on the door of Jennifer’s car. We’ve also got people asking around, you know – did anyone see anything, that sort of thing. But we don’t expect much to come from that. It was late and in a remote place. Anyway, Winsome’s on the case, and I know I can trust her.”
“What about Templeton and Rickerd?”
“They’re on it, too. You know as well as I do, DC Rickerd’s a born office manager. And Kev might be a bit of an arsehole, but he’s got good instincts. He’s off on a bit of a tangent, and it’s not a bad idea to give him some space. Anyway, it’s in good hands. I’m hoping to get back up there today, if only for a flying visit to bring everything up to speed. The telephone has its limitations.”
“Indeed it does.”
“What about you?” Annie asked. “What have you been up to?”
“Me? Apart from keeping my parents company, and Corinne, nothing much, really,” said Banks. “I doubt that I’ve discovered anything you’d be interested in hearing.”
“Try me. What is it you usually say to witnesses or suspects? ‘Let me be the judge of that?’ ”
“Touché,” said Banks. “Okay. I’ve found out that Gareth Lambert is back from self-imposed exile in Spain and that one evening a couple of months ago he had drinks with Roy. That mean anything to you?”
“No.”
“They’re old pals,” Banks said. “Known one another for years. No doubt they were mixed up in all sorts of criminal enterprises before the arms deal put the wind up them. Up Roy, at least. Lambert we’re not so sure about. Anyway, it’s a bit too much of a coincidence for my liking, two old crooks reunited and one of them dead.”
“I suppose you got all this from Burgess, didn’t you? That man’s a walking disaster area.”
“Dirty Dick has his good points, but I don’t know why you should think I got any of it from him.”
“I can’t imagine where else, that’s all.”
The waitress delivered their breakfasts. Banks asked for more coffee, Annie for tea.
“Anyway,” Banks said, when the waitress had gone. “DI Brooke’s got everything I found: the mobile, the CD and USB drive, even the digital photos I’d printed from the CD. Everything.”
Annie’s eyes narrowed. “But you kept copies.”
“It’s not illegal. I didn’t withhold or tamper with anything.”
“Goddammit, Alan, you broke into a murder victim’s house, you went through his stuff, you used his mobile phone, you found and copied personal information. Don’t tell me you haven’t tampered.”
Banks rested his knife and fork at the sides of his plate. “In the first place, I didn’t know he was a murder victim at the time. He was simply missing and had been gone for less than twenty-four hours. What would we have done if a call like that came in? If he’d been a child or a teenager, then perhaps we might just have set the wheels in motion. But a healthy man in his late forties? Come on, Annie, you know as well as I do what would happen. Nothing. And he was my brother. Family. I think that gave me a right to enter his home. What is it that really upsets you?”
“It’s that you keep going off all on your own like some kind of maverick,” she said. “You don’t tell anyone what’s going on. You think you’re the only one who can work it all out. You think you can handle everything on your own, but you can’t. For God’s sake, Alan, you nearly got killed.”
When one of the nearby diners looked over, Annie realized she’d let her voice get too loud. The thing was, it had come out spontaneously. She hadn’t known what she was going to say when Banks asked her what her problem was because she hadn’t really known. Perhaps the stories in the newspaper had stirred it all up, but now she did know. It went back to Phil Keane and the way Banks had suspected him but said nothing, gone and tried to build his own case against Phil on the quiet.
When she thought about it, though, she realized that it went even farther back than the Phil Keane case. Banks had been just the same when he went off looking for Chief Constable Riddle’s wayward daughter. Emily, and he’d held back so much information from Annie during that case that her hands had been tied. At one point she had even suspected him of being sexually involved with the girl’s mother, if not the girl herself. That was what happened when you held things back; the truth got warped and twisted in people’s minds. Lacking the facts, they made up stories based on fancy, like the stories in the tabloids.
Now she’d said it, though, she felt embarrassed, and she sneaked a look at Banks as she took a bite of her omelette. He was eating his breakfast again quite placidly. The waitress came with more coffee and tea. Annie thanked her.
“Listen to us,” said Banks, “bickering over breakfast like an old married couple.”
“We’re not bickering,” said Annie. “It takes two to bicker. Aren’t you going to respond?”
“What can I say? I’m glad you got it off your chest.”
“Simple as that, is it?”
Banks looked at her directly, his eyes clear and bright. “It’s a start. If we’re going to go on working together, we have to get one or two things sorted.”
“On whose terms?”
“That’s not the point. I’m not going to change my ways. Nor are you.”
“Then maybe we shouldn’t go on working together.”
“Up to you.”
“Not entirely. What do you want?”
“I want to carry on working with you. Believe it or not, I like you, and I think you’re damn good at your job.”
Annie felt absurdly pleased at the compliment, but she hoped it didn’t show in her face. “But you’re still going to leave me in the dark half the time?”
“I don’t deliberately hide things from you. If I had told you all my suspicions about Phil Keane as soon as I had them – and God knows I tried to hint – you’d have thrown me out on my ear, accused me of being jealous – which you did anyway – and never talked to me again. All I had to go on was a feeling, at first, some sense that all wasn’t what it seemed with him.”
“But I might not have had to run into a burning house and drag you out.”
“So it’s that, is it?”
“No, it’s not even that, when you come right down to it.” Annie paused. “If you really want to know, it’s the way you treated me afterward.”
“What do you mean?”
“Nothing.” But Annie had gone too far now to hold back. She put her knife and fork down.
“Come on, Annie,” said Banks. “Let’s clear the air. See if we can’t come up with a chance of working this out.”
“That’s a change of tune.” This was more difficult than Annie thought it would be, especially given the context – the ersatz hotel restaurant with its trees and potted plants, waitresses carrying trays, the businessmen in their pin-striped suits planning their days, some of them already on their mobiles and PDAs. “It’s just that you seemed to brush me off,” she said, “push me aside as if my feelings didn’t matter. God knows, I felt bad enough about making the mistake I did over Phil. I mean, can you imagine, sharing your bed with a fucking serial killer?” She shook her head. “But you. I’d have expected… I don’t know… support… comfort, maybe. You went to Corinne last night, didn’t you, but you weren’t there for me. I know we have our history and it hasn’t always been easy, but you should have been there for me and you weren’t. I was hurting as much as you, if not more.”
There, she’d said it, said more than enough. Christ, he was staying silent an awfully long time. Say something. Say something.
At last Banks spoke. “You’re right,” he said. “And if it means anything, I’m sorry.”
“Why did you do it? Why did you abandon me? Was it her?”
“Who?”
“Michelle, or whatever her name is.”
Banks looked surprised. “No, it wasn’t Michelle. It’s just that Michelle didn’t have anything to do with what happened, seeing her didn’t make me think about it. She took me away from it, distracted me. It was thinking about it that was doing my head in. I couldn’t remember a thing between answering the door and waking up in the hospital. Still can’t. All I know is what you’ve told me, and the smell of whiskey still gives me panic attacks. Christ, for a while, for weeks, I didn’t even want to get out of bed in the morning, let alone have a serious heart-to-heart about what happened. What’s the point? It’s like these interminable daytime chat programs, people talking on and on about their bloody feelings and problems and it gets them nowhere. It’s just talk, talk, talk, blather, blather, blather.”
“Some people think that might be better than keeping it bottled up inside.”
Banks ran his hand over his hair. “Look, Annie, I feel like I’m crawling out of a deep trough. By all rights, Roy’s murder should have pushed me back in, but it hasn’t. Cut me a little slack here.”
“Maybe you’re fueled by anger?”
“Maybe I am, but at least I’m fueled.”
Annie looked at him for a while over her tea and let his words sink in. Maybe he was right. Maybe it was time to put it all behind them and move on, and maybe part of doing that was allowing Banks some leeway in the investigation of his brother’s murder. After all, it wasn’t as if she could stop him.
“Okay, let’s imagine you were investigating the case,” she said. “Hypothetically, of course. What would your next move be?”
“What’s the official line of inquiry?”
“Basically they’re working their way through Roy’s mobile phone book and his business contacts listed on that smart drive you handed over. Oliver Drummond and William Gilmore, the names I mentioned last night, are DI Brooke’s priorities because their names are on his computer. Chop shop and fraud. Do they sound like enterprises your brother might have been interested in?”
“Probably,” said Banks. “Though I’d say fraud was the more likely of the two. I can’t see Roy in the stolen-car racket. Has Brooke got anywhere with either of them so far?”
“I don’t know,” said Annie. “I haven’t talked to him yet this morning.”
“He should be going after Lambert,” Banks said. “He knows as much as I do, that Roy had taken a photo of Lambert and an unidentified man and hidden it away shortly before he disappeared. That ought to set off a few alarm bells, don’t you think?”
“I’m sure Dave has his reasons. Does Lambert have a record?”
“No.”
“And is his name in the mobile call list or address book?”
“No.”
“There you are, then. Drummond and Gilmore both have form and they appear in the call list.”
“Even so…” said Banks. “What have you been up to?”
“I’ve been pursuing leads of my own in the Jennifer Clewes murder.”
“They’re linked. Roy and Jennifer were lovers.”
“I know that. But they can’t both have been killed by the man with the ponytail. The timing’s way off. Which is why Dave thinks it’s worth looking elsewhere for Roy’s killer. And like I said, both Drummond and Gilmore have criminal records. Brooke also has a man trying to find anyone who knows about Roy’s movements on the day he disappeared. Apparently the mobile isn’t much use there as he only used it once that day. To call his hairdresser.”
“I know that,” said Banks.
“Of course you do. You got to the mobile first. They’ve also enhanced the photo you received. Brooke’s not convinced yet that the man is Roy, but I’d say it seems likely. Anyway, they think it might lead them to the spot where it happened.”
Banks nodded.
“Any idea who Roy went off with yet?” Annie asked.
“I’m not sure, but I think it might have been Gareth Lambert. Roy’s known him for years. I’d still like to know who that other man in the photo is.”
“Any leads?”
“Nothing yet, but I’m working on it.” He smiled. “Obviously, I don’t have the manpower to follow up every name in Roy’s life, the way you and DI Brooke do, so I plan to go straight to Lambert, when I can find the slippery bastard. It still surprises me that Brooke hasn’t been there already.”
“I’ve told you why that is,” Annie said. “And his team’s overstretched anyway.” She paused. “Look, I shouldn’t be telling you this, but there was something going on at the Berger-Lennox Centre. Dr. Lukas told me she was helping young eastern European prostitutes who got pregnant – mostly illegal immigrants, she said – to get free abortions on the quiet. She called them ‘late girls.’ Jennifer Clewes found out about it, but instead of blowing the whistle she helped bury some of the paperwork. I don’t think that’s everything Dr. Lukas knows, but it’s a start. And don’t even think of going to see her. She’s on the edge and a visit from a stranger would alienate her completely.”
“Don’t worry,” said Banks. “I’m not altogether stupid. I’ll leave her to you. You don’t believe her story?”
“Most of it,” Annie said. “I think she might be willing to tell me more, but she’ll only do it in her own time, on her own terms.”
“How long has this been going on?”
“About a year.”
“How much money is involved?”
“The center charges between four hundred and a thousand pounds for consultation, termination and postoperative care, depending on how advanced the pregnancy is.”
“So it could add up to quite a tidy sum over time?”
“Yes. But not worth killing over.”
“I suppose not,” said Banks. “Did Roy know about it?”
“Jennifer knew, and I’ll bet she told Roy. The problem is that Dr. Lukas says Jennifer had known about it for a couple of months, but it was only in the last few days that people noticed any difference in her behavior.”
“So perhaps she found out something else?” Banks suggested. “Something we don’t know. How did the girls find Dr. Lukas?”
“That’s what seems a bit vague about it all. She’s from Ukraine. She said she’s known in the community. It’s possible, I suppose. Some of these communities are very close-knit. Word gets around.”
“But you don’t think so?”
“I think she’s holding something back. And I think she’s scared.”
“I’m not surprised,” said Banks. “Two people have been murdered.”
“I think there might be three.”
“Oh?”
“Jennifer mentioned a girl called Carmen Petri – one of the ‘late’ girls – to her close friend Melanie Scott shortly before she was killed. Her ex-boyfriend Victor Parsons was sort of stalking Jennifer. Ironically enough, it’s the first time a stalker’s actually been any practical use to us. He saw Jennifer come out of the center last Monday evening with a young girl who looked pregnant. A man immediately came out of the shadows and the girl went off with him in a car.”
“And you think that girl was this Carmen?”
“Yes. And I think she’s dead, too. The man she went off with was a muscle-bound lump with a ponytail, the one I told you about before, and he sounds remarkably like the man we think shot Jennifer Clewes and broke into your cottage.”
“And followed me back here from Peterborough,” said Banks.
Annie’s eyes widened. “What?”
Banks told her what happened on the motorway the previous day and what measures he had taken to protect his parents.
“Did you get the number?” Annie asked.
“What do you take me for?”
“Give it to me. I’ll trace it.”
“It’s already being done.”
“Burgess?”
Banks said nothing.
Annie sighed. “Give it to me anyway.”
Banks did as she asked.
“I take it you haven’t told Dave Brooke about this yet?”
“I told you. I rang the Peterborough police. It’s their manor. I checked with them again this morning and nothing out of the ordinary happened during the night.”
“Fine,” said Annie. “I’ll tell him myself.”
“Ponytail might well have killed Jennifer and tried to scare me off, but we know he can’t have killed Roy.”
“So there’s someone else involved.”
“Well, if ponytail is the muscle and prostitution is the business, I’d say there’s a pimp somewhere at the top of it all, wouldn’t you?”
“Possibly,” Annie agreed. “Lambert?”
“Maybe.” Banks stood up. “Anyway, we won’t find out the answer by sitting around here, however pleasant it is. Thanks for breakfast, Annie, and for clearing the air.”
“Where are you going?”
Banks smiled. “Well, if I told you that, you’d really be in trouble, wouldn’t you?”
Annie put her hand on Banks’s arm. “I know I can’t stop you,” she said, “but promise me a few things?”
“Go on.”
“Keep in touch, let me know what you find out.”
“Okay. You, too.”
“Stay away from Dr. Lukas. She’ll come around in her own time. You’ll only freak her out.”
“No problem.”
“And be careful, Alan. This isn’t a game.”
“Believe me, I know that.” Banks bent forward, kissed her lightly on the cheek, and left. Annie watched him go, then she hurried back up to her room to pack. This morning, after checking in with Brooke, she was going back to Eastvale come hell or high water.
“You wouldn’t believe it. It was like a bloody three-ring circus here the last couple of days,” said Malcolm Farrow as he settled in his armchair with a stiff gin and tonic in his hand. Banks had declined the offer of gin as it was only ten o’clock in the morning, but he accepted the tonic water gratefully. Farrow had looked puzzled but poured it anyway. “As you can see, things have settled down a bit now.”
Banks looked out of Farrow’s window at Roy’s house. The detectives must have finished their search and removed everything they thought pertinent to their investigation, because the place was unguarded.
They would have gone through Roy’s stuff for any evidence related to the crime and also for information about his lifestyle, his habits and his associates that might give them a lead to follow. Banks knew what they would find because he had already made a thorough search himself and handed over everything to Brooke. Now the formalities were done with, the house would be turned over to Roy’s next of kin – his parents.
“I can imagine what it was like,” said Banks. “Look, I’m sorry I didn’t ring you straightaway, but I had to go take care of my parents and I didn’t have your number handy.”
“That’s all right. I was really shocked to hear the news. It’s been all over the papers, and the television. We’ve had reporters around. They’ve gone now the police seem to have moved on.”
“There’s nothing left for them here,” said Banks.
“Anyway, it’s nice of you to remember me and drop by.”
“No problem. Did the police want to talk to you?”
“The police? Oh, yes. They were all over the street.”
“What did you tell them?”
“Just what I told you. It’s all I know.”
“What about the reporters?”
His face reddened. “Sent them packing. Bunch of scavengers.”
“Have you thought any more about that photo I showed you?” asked Banks, slipping the envelope out of his briefcase.
Farrow looked at it again through his reading glasses, which were clipped tightly to his bulbous, purple-veined nose. “Look, I’m not going to have to say anything in court, am I?”
“This is just between you and me,” said Banks. As Farrow squinted at the photos. Banks sipped some tonic water. The fizziness made him burp and he could still taste the bacon and eggs he’d eaten for breakfast.
“Well,” said Farrow, “it certainly could be him. The more I look, the more I see the resemblance. As I said, my eyesight’s not so good on detail, but there are streetlights and the man’s size and the gray hair look about right.” He passed the photo back to Banks. “A bit vague, I know, but it’s the best I can do.”
“I appreciate that.”
“Who is he, anyway? He’s surely not the one who…?”
“I don’t think so,” said Banks. “If it really is him, he’s an old business partner of Roy’s.” Someone Roy would probably open the door to and accompany for a drink or whatever, which was the way it seemed to have happened. Someone he trusted.
Banks thanked Farrow for his help, made his excuses and left.
There were no signs of activity around Roy’s house on Wednesday morning, not even a police seal across the door. Banks used his key to open the door and walked inside. The only sound he could hear was the humming of the refrigerator. There was a deep silence at the core of the house, the silence of Roy’s absence, and it felt heavier now than it had when Banks first arrived.
First he checked the kitchen. The laptop computer he had left on the table there was missing, and he assumed the police had taken it. There was nothing he could do about that right now, but he would have to let Brooke know that he wanted it back when they had finished with it.
Next he went up to look at Roy’s office. Whoever had searched the house had made a neat and tidy job of it. Nothing looked out of place.
Banks went into the entertainment room and flopped on the sofa. He thought about the CD he had found. Roy must have known that he was involved in something dodgy by Wednesday, when he buried the photos of Lambert and friend among the pornographic images. And perhaps he knew that the something dodgy – whether it was prostitution or illegal immigrants, or something else – was fast reaching critical mass. Did Roy know that his life was in danger? Banks doubted it. If Roy was used to skirting the edges of the law and mixing with bad company, as he seemed to be, then he was probably cocky enough to think there was nothing he couldn’t handle. But something had changed all that, and it had happened between Wednesday and Friday evening, or even a couple of days earlier, if Jennifer Clewes’s behavior was anything to go by.
What had Roy’s movements been during those crucial days? Where had he been? Whom had he talked to? If Banks could get the answers to those questions, he thought, then he might be able to answer the riddle of Roy’s death. And Jennifer’s.
He thought about what Annie had told him over breakfast, the doctor helping out prostitutes. Had Jennifer Clewes told Roy? Most likely she had. What had his reaction been? Had it anything to do with their deaths? But Banks failed to see how helping out a few unfortunate illegal immigrants could lead to murder. Unless, of course, the people who brought them in were involved and were beginning to feel threatened by something.
Banks also hadn’t forgotten that Burgess had told him Gareth Lambert was a smuggler with a large network of underworld connections. Burgess had also said that Lambert knew the Balkan route like the back of his hand, and now Annie was telling Banks about Eastern European prostitutes using the Berger-Lennox Centre. At least a vague picture was beginning to form in his mind, but he still didn’t know Roy’s place in it, or why he had been killed.
Banks thought back on his chat with Corinne the previous evening. He had found out a lot about his brother through talking to her. Roy loved the Goon Show and Monty Python; he did a hilarious Ministry of Silly Walks impersonation and quite a decent version of the Four Yorkshiremen sketch; New York was still his favorite city, Italy his favorite country; he had recently taken up digital photography and all the photos on his walls were his; he played golf and tennis regularly; he supported Arsenal (typical, Banks thought, who lumped Arsenal in the same category as Manchester United, the best teams money could buy); his favorite color was purple; his favorite food was wild mushroom risotto, his favorite wine Amarone; he loved opera and often took Corinne to Covent Garden (though she admitted that she never quite got opera); and they both enjoyed going to see Hollywood musicals and old foreign films with subtitles – Bergman, Visconti, Renoir, Fellini.
Roy gave money to beggars in the street but complained when he thought he was being overcharged in shops and restaurants. He could be moody, and Corinne had to confess that she never quite knew what was going on in his mind. But she loved him, as she told Banks when her tears flowed for the second time, after the third glass of wine; no matter that she hadn’t known where she stood with him for weeks, no matter that he had left her largely alone to deal with the trauma of her abortion. She had still hoped, somehow, that he would tire of his new conquest and come back to her.
There was only one family photograph in Roy’s entertainment room, and Banks walked over to look at it. It was taken on the promenade at Blackpool, he remembered, in August 1965, and you could see the Blackpool Tower in the background.
There they stood, all four of them, parents on the inside and flanking them Roy, freckled then, his hair a lot fairer than it was when he got older, and Banks at fourteen looking moody and what he supposed passed for cool back then, in his black drain-pipe trousers and polo-neck Beatles jumper. He hadn’t really looked at the photo closely before, but when he did he realized that it must have been taken by Graham Marshall, who had accompanied the Banks family on that holiday only a month or so before he disappeared during his Sunday-morning paper round.
This was the holiday when Banks had fallen for the beautiful Linda, who worked behind the counter at the local coffee bar. She was far too old for him, but he had fallen nonetheless. Then he and Graham had picked up a couple of girls at the Pleasure Beach, Tina and Sharon, and taken them under the pier for a bit of hanky-panky. He didn’t remember having the photograph taken, but that was no surprise. He hardly remembered Roy’s being on that holiday, either. What fourteen-year-old would waste his time hanging around with his nine-year-old brother?
Graham Marshall was dead, another murder victim, and now Roy. Banks looked at his father in an old gray V-necked pullover, shirtsleeves rolled up, cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth, hair swept back with Brylcreem. Then he looked at his mother, hardly a dolly bird, but surprisingly young and pretty, with a full-bodied perm and a summer dress showing off her trim waist, smiling into the camera. What would they find when they explored her insides next week? Banks wondered. Would she survive? And his father, after all this trauma? Banks was beginning to feel as if everyone he came into contact with was cursed, that all his companions became hostages to death, like the wraiths that haunted “Strange Affair.”
Then he told himself to stop being so maudlin. He had solved Graham Marshall’s murder over thirty-five years after it had been committed, his mother would survive the operation, and his father’s heart would go on beating for a long time yet. Roy was dead and Banks would find out who killed him. And that was that.
As Banks was getting ready to head out to try Gareth Lambert again, his mobile rang.
“Alan, it’s Annie.”
“Thought you were on your way home.”
“So did I, but something’s come up.”
Banks gripped the phone tighter. “What?”
“Technical support have worked out where the digital photo on your brother’s mobile was taken.”
“How on earth did they manage that?”
“From the list of abandoned factories,” Annie said. “There were some letters visible on a wall in the background: NGS and IFE. One of the factories listed was Midgeley’s Castings, and one of the older detectives on the team remembered he used to pass by the place on his way to school and they had a sign that read ‘Midgeley’s Castings: Cast for Life.’ The place shut down in 1989 and nobody’s done anything with it since.”
“Where is it?”
“By the river down Battersea way. I’m sorry to be so brutal, Alan, but the tide experts also agree that it’s very likely the area where your brother’s body was dumped in the river, so it’s looking more and more as if it was Roy in foreground of the picture. We’re heading out there now. Want to come?”
“You know I do. What does Brooke have to say?”
“He’s okay with it. Meet us there?”
“Fine.”
Annie gave him an address and directions and Banks hurried out to his car.
“DS Browne?”
“Speaking.”
“This is DC Templeton from Eastvale. How are things down your way?”
“Fine, thanks. Anything new?”
“Maybe,” said Templeton, fingering the plastic bag on the desk in front of him. “I went to talk to Roger Cropley’s wife and found him at home. Says he’s got a summer cold but I didn’t notice any sniffles. Anyway, I think I rattled him a bit more. He seemed a bit nervous when I told him that Paula Chandler, the woman who got away, thought she might be able to recognize her attacker.”
“But that’s not true,” Susan said.
“Cropley doesn’t know that. And I think his wife might know a bit more than she’s letting on, too. Anyway, I’ve got an idea. Did your SOCOs do a thorough trace-evidence search of the victim’s car?”
“I’m sure they did,” said Susan. “But there was no evidence that the killer was ever in the car. He clearly dragged her out and into the bushes.”
“But he’d have to lean in to apply the chloroform.”
“True. What are you getting at?”
“You’ve still got all the collected samples, I assume? Hair? Skin?”
“Of course.”
“And the car?”
“That, too. Look, what’s going on?”
“Can you check if they found any dandruff on the seat back?”
“Dandruff?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll check,” said Susan. “What do you have in mind?”
“I’ve been on the Web, and it all sounds a bit complicated, but as far as I can gather, you can get DNA from dandruff. I mean it is just skin, isn’t it?”
“It won’t do us much good,” said Susan, “unless we have a sample for comparison.”
“Er… well, as a matter of fact, we might have.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’ve got a sample of Cropley’s dandruff. Can I send it down to you?”
“I trust you didn’t ask Mr. Cropley for this?”
Templeton laughed. “No. Believe me, he gave it quite freely, though.”
“That’s not the point,” Susan said. “I’m sure you know as well as I do that you have to get the suspect’s written permission even for a non-intimate sample, unless you’ve detained him for a serious offense and the super gives permission to take one.”
“I know my PACE regulations,” said Templeton. “What I’m saying is that this could confirm my suspicions. If you knew it was him, if we knew it was him, then it would make a difference and we could start to build a real case. He doesn’t have to know about the previous sample. Nobody does except you and me. Right now we’ve got no real grounds to arrest him and demand a sample, but if the sample he gave me matches any of the dandruff found in the car, then we’d know where to look and you can be damn sure we’d come up with something to arrest him for. After that… well, then we’d get an official sample, of course.”
“What if it’s not him?”
“Then he’s off the hook.”
“But there’d be records, paperwork relating to the first test. These things are expensive.”
“I know that, but so what? It needn’t come out. Surely you must know someone at the lab with a bit of discretion? How is anybody going to know?”
“A good defense lawyer would use it as ammunition against our case.”
“Only if he found out. Besides, it wouldn’t matter. By that point we’d have officially matching DNA, which we’d have no trouble getting admitted, all by the book. You can’t argue with that. Christ, I’ll even pay for the test myself if that’s your problem.”
“That’s not the problem. And I doubt you could afford it, anyway. The point is that if it does turn out to be Cropley, the real evidence could be thrown out because of what you’re asking. It’s iffy. No, I don’t like this at all.”
Templetion sighed. He hadn’t realized what a stickler DS Browne was. “Look,” he said, “do you want this guy or not? Maybe it’ll rule him out. I don’t know. But we should at least keep an eye on him. If I’m right – and the DNA would prove that one way or another – he’s done it before and he’ll do it again. What do you think? Wouldn’t you like to know?”
Templeton felt himself tense during the silence that followed.
Finally, Susan Browne said, “Send it down. I’ll talk to my SIO, see what I can do. I’m not promising anything, though.”
“Great,” said Templeton. “It’s already on the way.”
Banks felt more trepidation than he could ever have imagined as he walked with Brooke and Annie over the weeds and stony ground toward the dirty brick factory, its ugly facade covered in Day-Glo graffiti. Was he now going to see the exact spot where his brother had been shot and killed? Little Roy, whom he’d saved from a bully and scarred with a toy sword. He gritted his teeth and felt his neck and arm muscles tense up.
The doors looked forbidding, but they were easily opened, and the three were soon crossing the vast factory floor, footsteps echoing. There was something about abandoned factories, with the gaping holes in their roofs, rusted old machines, drums, pallets and weeds growing through cracks in the walls and floor, that always disturbed Banks. He thought it had something to do with a dream that had scared him when he was young, but he couldn’t remember the details. He also thought it had something to do with the ball-bearing factory across the road from his parents’ house, though it had been in operation during his time there and he had no unpleasant experiences associated with it. There had always been derelict houses, workshops and factories, though, and he had explored most of them with his friends, tracking down imaginary monsters. Whatever the reason, places like that still gave him the shivers, and this one was no exception.
“You do take me to the nicest places, Dave,” said Annie. “This is almost as cheerful as that street in Bow.”
“At least it’s not raining today,” Brooke said.
A rat scuttled out from under a rusted sheet of metal and practically ran over Annie’s feet on its way out. She pulled a face but made no sound. Sunlight lanced through missing sections of roof, illuminating the dust motes the three of them kicked up as they walked. The large windows behind their protective grilles were all broken, and shattered glass was strewn all over the floor, sparkling in the rays of light. Here and there were oily puddles and damp patches from the previous night’s rain.
At the center of the factory floor, almost hidden by rusty machines, Banks saw a wooden chair. On the floor beside it lay snakelike lengths of cord.
“Better stand back,” said Brooke as they approached it. “The SOCOs will be here soon and they won’t appreciate it if we trample all over their scene.”
Banks stood and looked. He thought he could see spots of blood on the cord and splatters on the ground near the chair. For a moment he pictured Roy tied there, felt his terror as he knew he was going to die in this filthy place, then his policeman’s instinct kicked in and he tried to interpret what he was seeing.
“Roy was shot in the head with a twenty-two, like Jennifer Clewes, right?” he said.
“That’s right,” said Brooke.
“And there was no exit wound?”
“No.”
“So where did all the blood come from?”
Banks noticed Brooke exchange a glance with Annie.
“Come on,” said Banks. “I’m not a fool.
“The pathologist found some evidence that he was beaten,” Brooke admitted.
“So they tortured him, the bastards.”
Brooke stared down at his shoes. “It looks that way. But we don’t know for certain that your brother was even here yet. You can’t really tell who it is from the photograph.”
“And just who else do you think it would be?” Banks said. “Anyway, now you’ve got all the blood samples you could possibly need to make a match.”
“I suppose we have,” said Brooke.
“But why torture him?” Banks asked.
“We don’t know,” Annie said. “Obviously to make him tell them something. Or to find out how much he knew about something or how much he’d already told.”
“I don’t think it would have taken long to get Roy to talk,” Banks said. The image of the boy bullying Roy flashed though his mind, Roy crying and holding his stomach in pain. Banks’s intervention. But this time he hadn’t been able to come to the rescue. He hadn’t been there for him. And this time Roy had been killed. Banks could only hope that his parents never found out about the torture. He didn’t blame Annie and Brooke for trying to keep it from him – he’d probably have done the same if it were one of their relatives – but now he had the job of protecting his own mother and father from the truth.
“They didn’t bother tidying up after themselves,” said Annie, pointing to a single shell casing on the floor close to the chair.
“Probably thought no one would ever find the place,” said Brooke.
“Some kids would have found it eventually,” Banks said. “Kids love places like this.”
Pigeons flew in and out through the holes in the roof and walls, perching on the rafters and ruffling their feathers. Their white droppings speckled sections of floor, and even the chair itself. Despite its partial openness to the elements, the factory smelled of small dead animals and stale grease.
“I’ll see if I can get some uniforms to canvass the neighborhood,” Brooke said. “Who knows? Someone might have noticed unusual activity around the place.”
The wind made a mournful sound as it blew through the broken windows, harmonizing strangely with the cooing pigeons. Banks gave a little shiver, despite the warmth of the day. He’d seen all he wanted, the godforsaken place where Roy had spent his last few hours being tortured, then shot. No matter how long he lived, he knew he would never get the image out of his mind. For now, though, he had other things to do. He told Brooke and Annie he was leaving, and neither asked him where he was going. As he was getting in his car, the technical support van turned into the factory yard. They would scrutinize the place where Roy had died, scrape blood, search for fingerprints, fibers, hair, skin, any traces that the murderers had left behind. With any luck, they would turn up enough to secure a conviction, should the police ever find a viable suspect. Banks left them to it.