Gone

35

It took less than an hour for Caffery to get the guilty parties assembled. Both of the MCIU’s briefing rooms were in use so he held the meeting at a desk in the open-plan HOLMES computer room, all the computer inputters trying to get on with their jobs around him. He seated the crime-scene manager and the guy who had driven the Costellos to the house in Peasedown at a low coffee-table towards the edge of the room where the HOLMES girls had their lunch and coffee breaks. DC Prody was there too – at a nearby desk, half listening, half leafing through some paperwork. Paperwork from the jacker case, not from the Kitson review file. Caffery had already checked.

‘Would Martha’s parents think you’d done a thorough job?’ The first person whose wings Caffery really wanted to pin was the crime-scene manager, a thin guy who bore more than a passing resemblance to Barack Obama. His hair was cut short and neat, which made him look too distinguished for this profession, as if he should be a high-level corporate lawyer or a doctor. He’d been the one who’d taken the car into the forensics ‘surgery’ in Southmeads and combed it for the jacker’s DNA. ‘Would they? Hmm? Think you’d been thorough? Would they see the job you did on the Costellos’ Audi and say, “There’s a fine job. We’ve got confidence in this force. They’re pulling out all the stops”?’

The CSM looked back at Caffery stonily. ‘The car was done. From top to bottom. I’ve already told you.’

‘So tell me this. Where’s the “bottom” of a car? Where is the legal bottom of a car in your head? The door sills? The exhaust pipe?’

‘It was checked. There was no tracker on it when it came into my surgery.’

‘Let me tell you a story.’ Caffery sat back in his chair, twirling a pencil in his fingers. He was being an arse, he knew, a showman, but he was furious with the guy and wanted to make a spectacle of him. ‘Back in London when I was on the Murder Squad – the Area Major Investigation Team, as they called it in those days – I knew a forensics guy. He was quite high up. I won’t repeat his name, because if I did you might have heard of him. Now, some muppet in Peckham had offed his wife. We didn’t know where the body was but it was sort of clear what had happened – she was missing, he was found trying to hang himself from a tree out on Peckham Rye, and the walls in their flat were covered with blood, including some handprints. Now, both Mr and Mrs Muppet had form, drugs stuff, so their dabs were on file – you can see where I’m going with this, can’t you?’

‘Not really.’

‘I figured I’d get the fingerprints from the wall, match them to the missus and then even if the body never turned up we’d at least have the makings of a case to pass to the CPS. So the flat’s been photographed, et cetera, and now my forensics guy’s got a free rein. He can do whatever it takes to get a nice print off the wall. Some of the prints are up high – still don’t know how they got there, if maybe the husband was lifting her up or what, but somehow the poor unfortunate woman got her hands up almost eight feet in the air. Well, as you know, the science boys are supposed to carry tread-plates – but on this occasion my man’s left them somewhere, or used them all up, or whatever. So, he sees this pine chest, with a TV on top of it, about a foot away from the prints he wants. He pulls it out of the corner, stands on it, gets the dabs off the wall and pushes the chest back. Bingo – they belong to Mrs Muppet. Except two days later a relative’s clearing up the flat and notices a nasty smell coming from – you guessed it – the trunk. When it’s opened the wife’s body’s in there, and on the carpet under it is blood, with a mark, in blood, where the trunk’s been pulled out and pushed back. When we go back to the forensics guy what does he do?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘He shrugs and says, “Oh – I thought it was a bit heavy when I pulled it out.” I thought it was a bit heavy!’

‘What’s your point?’

‘My point is that there are some people in your profession – and of course I wouldn’t make assumptions about you – but some people who are so tunnel-visioned they fail to spot the glaringly bloody obvious. Kick aside the sodding great confession note just to get to the blood spatter on the wall.’

The CSM pursed his lips, gave him that slightly superior look again. ‘The car was checked, Mr Caffery. It came into the morning’s surgery and went straight to the top of the list – you’d put an express order on it. We cleaned it top to tail. Everything. There was nothing under it – not a thing.’

‘Were you personally overseeing the surgery?’

‘Don’t try to nail me on that. I don’t personally supervise every job that gets done.’

‘So you didn’t see it happen?’

‘I’m telling you it was done thoroughly.’

‘And I’m telling you it wasn’t. You didn’t check it. At least have the grace to admit it.’

‘You’re not my line manager.’ The CSM pointed a finger at Caffery. ‘I’m not a cop, I don’t work by your rules. I don’t know how you run your debriefs round here, but I don’t have to take it. You’re going to regret talking to me like this.’

‘Maybe. But I doubt it.’ He held out a hand, indicating the door. ‘Please, feel free to leave. Make sure the door doesn’t hit you on the arse as you go.’

‘Funny man. Funny.’ The CSM crossed his arms. ‘That’s OK, thank you. I think I’ll stay. I’m getting to like it here.’

‘Suit yourself. Give the HOLMES girls some entertainment.’ Caffery turned to the surveillance driver who’d taken the Costellos to the first safe-house. He wore a suit, a neat tie, and was sitting forward, his elbows on his knees, staring intently at a point on Caffery’s chest.

‘Well?’ Caffery leaned forward and turned his head sideways to try to meet the guy’s eyes. ‘What about you?’

‘What about me?’

‘Isn’t part of your training to check the car you’re getting into? I thought that was the deal – you never get into a car you haven’t completely checked. Thought it was habit. Instinct – drummed into you.’

‘What can I say? I’m sorry.’

‘Is that it? I’m sorry?’

The driver puffed out a breath and sat back. He opened his hands to indicate the snotty crime-scene manager. ‘You just told him to have the grace to admit it, and I’m admitting it. I didn’t check, only had half my mind switched on, and now I’m sorry. Very sorry.’

Caffery glared at him. There was no answer to that one. The guy was right. And he, Caffery, was the twat: sitting like old Nero in the gladiators’ ring, twirling his damned pencil. Whatever their mistakes, whatever the force’s shortcomings, the point was that the jacker was outsmarting them. And that was scary. ‘Shit.’ He threw the pencil down. ‘This is all going to shit.’

‘Yours maybe.’ The CSM got to his feet. He turned in the direction of the far door. ‘Not mine.’

Caffery twisted round and saw, coming through the room, making her way between the tables, a plump young woman in a black trouser suit. With her sternly straightened blonde hair and orange tan she had the same look as some of the HOLMES indexers. But he didn’t recognize her, and the tentative look on her face said she was new. She was clutching a plastic envelope in one hand.

‘Thank you.’ The CSM stood and took it from her. ‘Stop here for a bit. I’m not going to be long. We can drive back together.’

The girl waited awkwardly next to the low sofas while the CSM sat down and shook the contents of the envelope out on to the table. A dozen photographs fell out and he sorted through them with his fingertip. They all showed a car from different angles: interior, exterior, rear view. It was a black car with champagne interior. The Costellos’ Audi.

‘I think that’s the view you’re after.’ He pulled out a photograph and pushed it across the table to Caffery. It showed the car’s underside, exhaust pipe and floor pan, clearly date-stamped from yesterday: 11:23 a.m. Caffery stared at it for a second or two. He wished he’d taken a paracetamol. It wasn’t just his head any longer: now his bones were aching from sitting outside in the cold with the Walking Man last night. The car in the photo was clean. Completely clean.

The CSM said, ‘Do I get an apology? Or is that too much to ask?’

Caffery picked up the photograph. Held it so tightly the nail on his thumb went white. ‘You brought it over here, didn’t you? The Costellos collected it from here.’

‘They didn’t want to come all the way to the surgery. They’re in Keynsham? Somewhere near it? They decided it was easier to pick it up here. I had it driven over. Thought I was doing you a favour.’

‘You signed it in with my office manager?’

‘Yes.’

‘Who must have signed it out . . .’ Caffery studied the photograph. Somewhere between here and the Costellos’ the car had picked up a tag. Which meant – the hairs went up on his arms – the only time, the only time, it could have picked up something was while it was here, downstairs in the car park. A secured car park that even a pedestrian couldn’t get into. Unless they had an access code.

Caffery raised his sore eyes. He looked at the people in the offices. The warranted officers and the police staff. The auxiliaries. There must be a hundred people who had access to this place. Something else hit him. He remembered thinking the jacker had had the luck of the devil to skirt past the ANPR point. Almost as if he’d known where the cameras were.

‘Boss?’

He rotated his head slowly. Prody was sitting forward, a strange look on his face. He was white. Very white. Almost grey. In his hand he was holding one of the jacker’s letters. The one that had gone to the Bradleys. The one that talked about rearranging Martha’s face. ‘Boss?’ he repeated quietly.

‘Yeah?’ Caffery said distantly. ‘What is it?’

‘Can I have a word with you in private?’