Dead Like You

92

Saturday 17 January

Shortly after 2 p.m. Roy Grace drove in through the front entrance of a large, tired-looking apartment block, Mandalay Court, then down an incline at the side, as he had been directed. He was curious to see what Darren Spicer’s tip-off revealed.

As he headed around the rear of the building, his wipers clearing away a few tiny spots of drizzle, he saw a long row of shabby lock-up garages that did not look like they had been used for years. At the far end were three vehicles: Glenn Branson’s unmarked silver Ford Focus, identical to the one Grace had come in; the little blue van, which he presumed belonged to the locksmith; and the white police van, containing two members of the Local Support Team, who had been requested in case they had to break their way in, and had brought a battering ram with them as backup. Not that there were many doors, in Grace’s experience, that could defeat ever-cheery Jack Tunks, whose day job was maintaining the locks at Lewes Prison.

Tunks, in heavy-duty blue overalls, a grimy bag of tools on the ground beside him, was busy inspecting the locks.

Grace climbed out of the car, holding his torch, and greeted his colleague, then nodded towards the last of the garages in the row. ‘This the one?’

‘Yep. No. 17, not very clearly marked.’ Branson double-checked the search warrant that had been signed half an hour ago by a local magistrate. ‘Yep.’

‘Blimey,’ Tunks said. ‘What’s he got in there? The blooming crown jewels?’

‘Does seem a lot of locks,’ Grace agreed.

‘Whoever’s had these put on isn’t messing about. I’ll guarantee the door’s reinforced behind too.’

Grace detected a degree of grudging respect in his voice. The recognition of one professional’s work by another.

While Tunks applied himself to his task, Grace stood rubbing his hands against the cold. ‘What do we know about the owner of this garage?’ he asked Branson.

‘I’m on to it. Got two PCSOs going round the apartment block now so see if anyone knows who the owner is, or at least one of the tenants. Otherwise I’ll see what we can get from the Land Registry online.’

Grace nodded, dabbed a drip from his nose with his handkerchief, then sniffed. He hoped he didn’t have a cold coming – he especially didn’t want to give any infection to Cleo while she was pregnant.

‘You’ve checked this is the only way in?’

The Detective Sergeant, who was wearing a long, cream, belted mackintosh, with epaulettes, and shiny brown leather gloves, made a duh! motion with his head, rocking it from side to side. ‘I know I’m not always the sharpest tack in the box, old-timer, but yeah, I did check.’

Grace grinned, then took a walk around the side to check for himself. It was a long garage, but there was no window or rear door. Returning to Branson, he said, ‘So, what news on the Ari front?’

‘Ever see that film War of the Roses?’

He thought for a moment. ‘Michael Douglas?’

‘You got it. And Kathleen Turner and Danny DeVito. Everything gets smashed up. We’re about there – only worse.’

‘Wish I could give you some advice, mate,’ Grace said.

‘I can give you some,’ Glenn replied. ‘Don’t bother getting married. Just find a woman who hates you and give her your house, your kids and half your income.’

The locksmith announced he was done, and pulled the door back and up a few inches, to show it was now free. ‘Would one of you like to do the honours?’ he said, and stepped away, a tad warily, as if worried a monster was going to leap out.

Branson took a deep breath and pulled the door up. It was much heavier than he had imagined. Tunks was right, it had been reinforced with steel plating.

As the door clanged home on its rollers, sliding parallel with the roof, all of them stared into the interior.

It was empty.

In the shadows they could make out an uneven dark stain towards the far end, which looked like it had been made by a parked vehicle dripping oil. Roy Grace detected a faint, car-park smell of warm vehicle. On the right-hand side of the far end wall was floor-to-ceiling wooden shelving. An old, bald-looking vehicle tyre was propped against the left-hand side. A couple of spanners and an old claw hammer hung from hooks on the wall to their left. But nothing else.

Glenn stared gloomily into the void. ‘Having a laugh on us, is he?’

Grace said nothing as he shone his torch around the walls, then the ceiling.

‘I’ll tear fucking Spicer’s head off!’ Glenn said.

Then they both saw it at the same time, as the beam fell on the two plain, flat strips of plastic on the floor. They strode forward. Grace snapped on a pair of latex gloves, then knelt and picked the up first strip.

It was a vehicle front registration plate, black lettering on a reflective white surface.

He recognized the index instantly. It was the cloned registration on the van which had shot away from the Grand Hotel car park on Thursday afternoon, almost certainly driven by the Shoe Man.

The second plastic strip was the rear plate.

Had they found the Shoe Man’s lair?

Grace walked across to the end wall. On one shelf was a row of grey duct-tape rolls. The rest of the shelves were bare.

Glenn Branson started walking across to the left wall. Grace stopped him. ‘Don’t trample everywhere, mate. Let’s try to retrace our steps, leave it as clean as we can for SOCO – I want to get them in here right away.’

He looked around carefully, thinking. ‘Do you think that’s what Spicer saw? These licence plates?’

‘I don’t think he’s smart enough to have put two and two together from just licence plates. I think he saw something else.’

‘Such as?’

‘He won’t talk unless we give him immunity. I have to say, at least he was smart relocking the door.’

‘I’ll speak to the ACC,’ Grace said, stepping as lightly as he could on the way back out. ‘We need to know what he saw in here. We need to know what might have been here that isn’t here now.’

‘You mean he could have nicked something?’

‘No,’ he replied. ‘I don’t think Spicer nicked what was in here. I think what he probably saw in here was a white van. An engine’s been running in here within the last few hours. If the van’s gone, then where the hell is it? And, more to the point, why’s it gone? Go and talk to him. Twist his arm. Tell him if he wants a crack at that reward, he has to tell us what he saw, otherwise no deal.’

‘He’s scared he’ll get banged up again for breaking and entering.’

Grace looked at his mate. ‘Tell him to lie, to say that the door was open, unlocked. I’m not interested in nicking him for breaking and entering.’

Branson nodded. ‘OK, I’ll go and talk to him. Just had a thought – if you put SOCO in and the Shoe Man returns and sees them, he’ll do a runner. Aren’t we smarter having someone covert watching it? Get Tunks to lock it up again so he doesn’t know we’ve been here?’

‘Assuming he’s not watching us now,’ Grace said.

Branson glanced around, then up, warily. ‘Yeah, assuming that.’

Grace’s first action when he arrived at the Ops Control Room at John Street, twenty minutes later, was to inform his Silver and Bronze Commanders that any white Ford Transit van sighted in the vicinity of Eastern Road, for the rest of the day and night, was to be kept under close observation. Then he put out a broader request to all patrols in the city to keep a vigilant eye on all current model white Ford Transit vans.

Twelve years ago, if he was right, the Shoe Man had used a white van in his attack. It would fit Proudfoot’s theory on his symmetry if he did the same thing again tonight.

Was that the reason those particular pages had been taken from the file, he wondered? The ones relating to an eyewitness report about a woman abducted in a white van? Did they contain vital clues about his behaviour? His MO? The identity of the van?

Something that had been bothering him about the lock-up garage was bothering him even more now. If the Shoe Man had driven the van out of the garage, why had he bothered to lock all four locks? There was nothing in there to steal except two useless licence plates.

That really did not make sense to him.