Stalker

Chapter Twelve

‘You spend too much time locked in your room with all those computers,’ Elsie Flint said as she and Derek sat down to eat. ‘That’s what puts you in a bad mood. It’s not healthy. Why don’t you go down the pub like normal men? That’s what your father did.’

He glanced at her, saw her jaw set in a grim expression and hated her when she was like this.

‘And look where that got you,’ he returned, and immediately regretted it. She looked crest-fallen, her usual hard-bitten determination replaced by vulnerability. She could change in a second and it stung now as it always did. ‘I’m fine, Mum. I’ve just had a few difficult days.’

‘Doing what?’ she asked, an edge of criticism creeping back into her voice.

‘There have been some incidents on premises where I’ve fitted CCTV. It’s nothing for you to worry about but Paul was no help.’

‘Paul?’ she asked, eyeing him carefully.

‘Yes, my apprentice. I had to let him go.’

‘Oh. They change so often I can’t keep up. What did that one do or not do?’

‘It’s a long story, I’ve dealt with it,’ he said, and changed the subject. ‘Nice bit of lamb. Not too well done.’

‘Good. At least I’ve done something right.’

Half an hour later, Derek sat at his workstation with his bedroom door bolted, continuing where he’d left off before dinner. Beads of perspiration had gathered on his forehead and his mouth was dry, not from anything his mother had said but because of the crisis that seemed to be unfolding in his business. Three break-ins in as many weeks to properties where he’d fitted the CCTV and where the footage from the cameras was of no help in solving the crimes. It was unprecedented and the clients were furious. He relied on word of mouth recommendation and business was dropping off. The stress of it was taking its toll.

The incidents had all happened when he’d been away from his monitors – at work or asleep – so, unlike the Williams (and others he’d helped), he hadn’t been there to send a warning email alerting them to what was happening. While these break-ins weren’t the most serious of crimes – no one had been physically hurt – to have your property broken into was disturbing and traumatic for the owners. Surely there must be something – a shadow, someone or something out of place, an irregularity that could give a clue to what had happened or even help catch those responsible? That was, after all, why these people had fitted CCTV in the first place.

Sandra was already at work in The Mermaid but he didn’t linger there now. Much as he liked her, he wasn’t in the mood; his thoughts were full of more pressing matters. As satisfied as he could be that all was well with the other clients he monitored, he returned to the footage of the premises that had been broken into, going through them again sometimes for the fourth or fifth time. Exactly what he was looking for, he couldn’t say, but he was now concentrating on the edges of the images, searching the peripheries for anything he might have previously missed as he had done with the nightclub stabbing. But as he continued examining the footage – peering down side passages, into hedges and shrubberies, through people’s windows where the camera angle allowed and enlarging the images until he could even see the food on their plates – nothing new appeared.

Suddenly he started as a large eye appeared on the screen, a pop-up advertisement with a camera lens at the centre of the eye in place of the pupil. Beneath the image were the words ‘Watching You’.

‘Bloody advertisements!’ he cursed.

He clicked on the small white cross in the corner of the box to close it but the image perversely remained, obliterating most of the screen and making further work impossible.

‘How the fuck did that get in!’ He ran the most advanced security software, which updated automatically and was supposed to keep out this sort of thing: malicious spyware, viruses, hackers and pop-up adverts. He knew search engines were often to blame for pop-ups; they were becoming increasingly clever at placing tracking ‘cookies’ on computers, which not even advanced spyware immediately recognized. A cookie had probably identified his business from the surveillance equipment he’d viewed online and now he was being targeted as part of the company’s advertising campaign.

There was no company name showing on the advert yet but doubtless that would follow soon. He clicked again on the corner of the box but the eye remained staring out at him. Watching You.

‘Fuck. Watching you too, mate!’ he said aloud. Did firms really believe this type of aggressive advertising would win them new business? He certainly wouldn’t be buying from them ever – when he found out who they were.

Unable to remove the pop-up by clicking on its close box, he now clicked on the cross in the corner of the screen to close the whole page, but that was frozen too. ‘Damn!’ he said, stamping his foot, and tried again. A standard software message appeared – End task: this programme is not responding.

‘I bloody know that!’ he cried.

He clicked to end the task and waited but again nothing happened. The whole computer was deadlocked! Anger spilled over as he pressed the caps lock key to see if its light came on. The bloody pop-up had snarled up the whole system. He pressed control-alt-delete to open the windows task manager to try to end the program, but that didn’t work either. Red in the face and furious that he was wasting so much time on this, there was no alternative but to switch off the computer at the plug. It wouldn’t do the machine any good but there was no other choice. He flicked the power switch and watched the advert disappear as all four screens went blank.

Derek waited thirty seconds to make sure all the electricity had gone so the connection with the Internet had been severed, and then rebooted. The screens came back to life with various standard warning messages telling him that the computer hadn’t been shut down properly – which he knew – and did he want to start it in safe mode? No, he didn’t.

More technical information followed as the system configured and finally it was up and running again, the screen savers drifting leisurely across the monitors. Thank goodness. Before logging into his surveillance website, he checked his spyware settings but nothing seemed to have changed, and the last update had only been an hour before so he should have the latest protection. But to be on the safe side – and Derek was always cautious and played safe when it came to surveillance – he went into the computer’s control panel and cleared out all the cookies, temporary Internet files, browsing history, saved passwords and web form information. Only then did he log in to his website and as he expected there was no sign of the pop-up.

He returned to where he’d been checking the footage from the break-ins and continued but still couldn’t find anything of significance. There was no indication in the days leading up to any of the break-ins that anything untoward had happened or was about to happen. Sometimes you could see someone loitering or a new untrustworthy cleaner or shop assistant had been appointed, but that didn’t apply here. He had nothing to work on, no leads, and, with the number of cases growing, he felt he was losing control over his empire. He pressed rewind and began going through the footage again.

A little after 10.30pm Derek heard footsteps on the stairs and then the floorboards on the landing creak as his mother came up to bed. She always switched off the television at half past ten and went to bed straight after, although she never slept well. He often heard her moving around in her room at night and sometimes she went downstairs for a drink. Now, following her usual routine she went first to her bedroom to fetch her nightwear and then took it to the bathroom where she washed and changed. Exactly fifteen minutes later she returned to her room calling ‘goodnight’ as she went.

‘Goodnight, Mum,’ he returned, keeping the irritation from his voice.

His eyes were sore from staring too long at the footage of the break-ins. He admitted defeat for now and closing the file returned all four screens to the images of his clients. He loved spending time with them, which he did as much as possible. They reached out to him with friendship and support in a way real life didn’t. In return for keeping them safe and on track, they gave him (although, apart from the girls at The Mermaid, they didn’t know it) their unfailing company.

As he watched and shared in their daily lives, he felt a warm frisson of belonging to a family in a way he never had with his own family. Even when his parents had been together he couldn’t remember feeling their warmth and being cherished. He particularly enjoyed it when his clients had friends or relatives visit; he felt included in their social circle – a unique feeling, for he and his mother rarely had visitors. Sunday lunches were his favourite; they often stretched for hours, the adults remaining at the table, talking and sipping their wine as the children played nearby. These people loved and cared for each other in a way that was foreign to him and moved him deeply. If they did fall out – which he’d discovered even the closest of families and friends did sometimes – then they always made up. Being with them, embraced by their families, calmed and soothed him so much that he often left the images running while he did other things in his room, reassured that his extended family were just a few steps away.

By midnight, most of the downstairs rooms in his clients’ homes were empty, the occupants having gone to bed. Only the night owls remained up and the few on shift work – doctors, nurses and other healthcare workers who were either about to leave for work or had just returned and were winding down. Mostly the houses were in darkness, the alarms set for night-time and the occasional security light flashing on when a cat or fox walked by. A crescent moon shone between passing clouds. Derek yawned. He needed to get some sleep too. He had to be up early in the morning. He was meeting prospective clients at 8am, a professional couple who had asked him to give them an estimate before they went to work.

Stifling another yawn, he prepared to shut down the system, calmer now from spending quality time with his families. He gave the screens one last glance ready to say goodnight, but then stopped dead.

What the hell! Screen two: he enlarged the image to full size. It was the house where Mr and Mrs Khumalo and their three children lived, one of his larger properties. Oh no! Please no. Someone was in their back garden. He could make out the outline of a figure in the shrubbery, moving low and cat-like, keeping close to the fence, going from bush to bush. Derek stared in horror, his breath coming fast and shallow. The figure crept along the right-hand side of the lawn, then, breaking cover, ran from the shrubbery and quickly across the patio to the conservatory. Dressed all in black and with a three-holed balaclava covering his head, he appeared to know how to avoid the light sensors. The floodlights concentrated on the conservatory and patio doors didn’t come on.

‘Shit!’ Derek cursed under his breath.

He watched helplessly as the intruder moved one of the wrought iron chairs from the garden table and, placing it at the foot of the drainpipe, shimmied up like a leopard climbing a tree. His stomach churned. Dear God, this couldn’t be happening. Not another one! The bedroom window directly over the conservatory was slightly open. The figure knelt on the toughened glass of the conservatory roof and, sliding his hand into the gap, eased open the window. A second later he was in the bedroom and out of view, the window left open behind him.

Sick with fear, Derek grappled with the keyboard, hands trembling as he pulled it towards him and began to type. He glanced between the images of the house on screen two as on screen three he brought up the Khumalos’ file. He needed to know how they wanted to be notified – phone, email or text. They’d opted for phone message – to Mr Khumalo’s phone. Sweating profusely, Derek moved the cursor to the phone icon, entered Mr Khumalo’s number and clicked send. It was his red alert message, the highest of all his warning messages, and only used when there was imminent danger.

The sound of Mr Khumalo’s mobile phone ringing came through the computer, but the call was redirected to voicemail. Oh no! Derek’s message played – his voice disguised with a digital recording: ‘This is a security alert from your surveillance company. Check your monitor, windows and doors immediately. There may be an intruder on the premises. If you see anything suspicious call the police. Do not ignore this message.’

The messaged ended and the phone reset. Hopefully Mr Khumalo had heard his phone ring and was now checking the message.

Derek stared again at screen two, his heart drumming loudly, his palms sweating. What was happening inside their house? What was the intruder doing? He couldn’t see into the bedrooms. Take what you want but don’t harm them, please, he begged. They’re my friends.

Suddenly the figure reappeared at the open window and climbed out. He’d only been inside for a couple of minutes and didn’t seem to be carrying any stolen goods. No bag or rucksack, which might have contained stolen items. Perhaps he’d stuffed smaller items like jewellery into his pockets, Derek hoped, as the alternative – that he’d done them harm – was too awful to contemplate. Or maybe – and please let this be so – he’d been disturbed.

Derek watched, his heart racing, as the figure slid effortlessly down the drainpipe and dropped to the patio. As he landed he must have been caught in the range of one of the light sensors for a floodlight flashed on, but the figure was already away, running back along the edge of the garden and then out through the gate at the rear, presumably as he’d entered. Derek knew that a small paddock lay behind the house where the Khumalos’ daughter kept her pony. At the time Derek had surveyed the property to estimate for the security system he’d pointed out the gate was an easy access point for any would-be intruder, but Mr Khumalo had said his daughter needed to get in and out to tend to her pony, and anyway you couldn’t secure all the grassland beyond, which was true. So Derek had been instructed to fit an additional security light in the paddock, which came on now as the intruder completed his escape.

He remained very still, staring at the image of the back of the house. Had Mr Khumalo listened to his phone message now? Had he, his wife or any of his children been woken by the intruder or the security light flashing on? Or – heaven forbid – was the crime so heinous they would never wake at all?

From memory Derek knew that the main bedroom was at the rear, and he thought the bedroom over the conservatory might be that of the Khumalos’ youngest son, but he couldn’t be sure. If they’d raised the alarm then the police should arrive shortly, but as he watched and waited and the minutes ticked by, no lights came on in the house and the bedroom curtains remained closed. Half an hour later, Derek conceded his message had remained unheard and feared the worst.