Tennison

Chapter fifteen

The tall grey-bricked Victorian terraced house occupied by the squatters was close to the Regent’s Canal, where the body of Eddie Phillips had been found. The building, with its sash windows and black wrought-iron fencing, was the same shape and size as all the others in the street. The only things that marked it out from its neighbours were the cracked, peeling paintwork and the unwashed windows. Two rake-thin young white males were sitting outside it on the grimy steps leading up to the front porch and smoking cigarettes. One had bright, red-dyed hair like David Bowie, and was wearing skintight flared trousers with patches and embroidered flowers, and a floral shirt with frills. The other pasty-faced kid had frizzy hair, and his skintight cat suit, worn with high wedged boots, made him look as if he had just left the stage of the musical Hair. Two young girls came out and sat with the boys, sharing the cigarettes. Their hair was braided and one girl had flowers either side of her head. They were equally pale-faced, with heavy dark mascara and black liner round their eyes. Their floating long dresses had layers of beads and their wrists were covered in cheap bangles. Both girls had filthy bare feet. Two small children in dirty vests, and one in a sodden towelling nappy, were playing with coloured marbles on the pavement.

Blasting out from an open window on the top floor was the Jimi Hendrix song ‘All Along The Watchtower’, and it was obvious some of the youngsters were stoned. They laughed as Bradfield, followed by Gibbs then Jane, headed up the steps to the front door. When Bradfield showed his warrant card they applauded and started making grunting noises like a pig. He wasn’t in the mood for their bad attitude and lack of respect.

‘Unless you all want to be nicked and your kids taken into care I suggest you shut up, behave and answer my questions, starting with... Is Terry O’Duncie in?’

No one said anything.

‘You might also know him as Big Daddy? So, last time I’ll ask... Is he in the house?’

A child no older than six spoke up and said that Terry was in bed sleeping and his mother pulled him towards her and told him to shut up.

‘Out of the mouths of babes,’ Bradfield said and laughed as he pulled out two photographs from his inside jacket pocket then held them up for the group to see. One was of Julie Ann and the other of Eddie Phillips.

‘Any of you ever seen these two kids here?’

They all looked at each other and shrugged their shoulders. The young boy was about to say something, but his mother tugged at his arm and he said nothing. Their attitude annoyed Bradfield even more, especially as they hadn’t made a real effort to look at the photographs. He flung them down on the lap of the David Bowie lookalike and ordered two of the uniform officers accompanying them to round everyone up and contain them in the front room of the house. He told the group that he would be searching the premises for some time so they could all take a good look at the photographs to see if they helped jog their memories.

The hallway had bare floorboards and the rooms leading off it had nailed-up makeshift curtains made from tatty old bits of sheets and other badly stitched-together materials. Threadbare mattresses, stained sleeping bags and broken furniture littered every room; beer and Coke cans lay in corners and takeaway cartons of rotting food spewed out of old plastic bags. Jane shuddered and gagged slightly as she saw a plate of rancid food crawling with maggots. Gibbs laughed and said they’d be good for fishing. She could see he and Bradfield had become hardened to searching disgusting slums. The smell of incense from smouldering joss sticks permeated the air, but still failed to disguise the heavy scent of marijuana.

In one room a young girl with silk flowers pinned to her long blonde hair was sitting cross-legged peeling potatoes, the multitude of bracelets on her arms jangling as the peel fell onto the soggy newspaper between her legs. She looked no older than sixteen, had eyes like a panda’s and wore a pretty torn floral smock which made her appear innocent.

‘Looking for Terry O’Duncie. Which room is he in?’ Gibbs asked, showing her his warrant card.

‘I don’t know,’ she replied nonchalantly as she sliced a potato into quarters and dropped it into a plastic bowl of water by her side.

Gibbs had another set of photographs which he held in front of her. She continued peeling a potato and said in a very upper-class voice that she didn’t know who had stayed at the squat previously as she’d only been there a couple of days.

Jane followed Bradfield as he checked out the kitchen. It was full of used pans and plates piled in a big sink full of greasy water and broken mugs. A large, filthy-looking disconnected old cooker had a Calor gas stove from a VW camper van on top of it and a big pot of vegetable stew was bubbling away. The windows had newspaper stuck over the broken glass and a bedraggled cat was up on the draining board scavenging for food and licking dirty plates. The numerous open black bin bags stank of rotting food. Jane had been disgusted with the mess left in the station kitchen by the officers but this was far beyond anything she had ever come across, and to think that the squatters were cooking for and feeding the young children, never mind themselves, was shocking. She held her breath as she gave a cursory glance around. Through the cracked window in the back door she could see even more open bags of rubbish left to rot, and presumed there were no dustmen collecting from the house. She couldn’t wait to get out of the foul kitchen. She took a deep breath: if her mother knew where she was and what she was doing she would have heart failure.

The Jimi Hendrix song continued at a deafening level, and having no luck downstairs the team headed up to the first-floor landing. The stairs were strewn with cigarette butts and empty cans of beer. Wine bottles on every other step held different-coloured candles; wax had dripped down the sides of the bottles and onto the stairs.

Posters and prints were pinned up on the yellowing, damp-stained landing walls. The floor was covered with a heavily soiled fitted carpet, which appeared to have once been dark blue and good-quality shagpile. Jane pushed open a bedroom door and undid the wooden shutters of the large double bay window to let in the light. She saw that the walls had been painted bright blue and were patterned with white stars and yellow moons and sprinkled with glitter. Sleeping bags and tatty blankets were strewn over the floor along with tin plates and ashtrays overflowing with cigarette stubs and old marijuana roaches. The smell in the room was a mixture of stale sweat and damp and the heady incense gave off a sickening flowery perfume. Candles of every shape and size stood in pools of hardened wax and a lit amber-coloured cone candle flickered in one corner.

Bradfield stared in disgust. ‘Christ, how many kids are dossing down here? It must be a bloody fire hazard with all these candles.’

Jane bent down to pick up a plastic bag and look inside but Gibbs pulled her hand back. He took a pen out of his pocket to flick the top of the bag open and it was full of used hypodermic needles.

‘You prick your hand on one of those and the next thing you know is you’ll be really sick with hepatitis.’

‘What’s that?’ she asked.

‘You need to read General Orders more often: there was a warning about it. You can get hepatitis from an infected person’s blood, semen, or other bodily fluids, and it will badly damage your liver. The stupid bastards are sharing and reusing the same needles. If you see any of them with yellow, jaundiced-looking faces, sure bet is they’ve got it.’

A relieved Jane thanked him for his timely intervention. In reality she was so taken aback by the squalor she was unsure what she should or should not be doing.

Bradfield had seen enough and eager to get his hands on O’Duncie headed out into the corridor to go up to the next floor. Jane checked out a bathroom: the smell was worse than that of the decomposing body at the mortuary. She retched as she saw that the toilet was filled with unflushed faeces and urine, and the bath full of vomit. From the rust-stained taps and filthy washbasin it was obvious the water had been turned off for some time.

Jane went onto the landing as DS Gibbs came out of another bedroom and jerked his thumb back towards the room. ‘Two more teenagers out for the count in there. Looks like they were making clothes or something — lot of cut-up material and sewing stuff. I told ’em to get dressed and go down to the front room with the others.’

The music was still blaring from the room on the top floor, though the song was now Hendrix’s ‘Voodoo Child’ and the volume had been turned up slightly.

‘That’s my favourite of all his hits — the guitar licks are just unbelievable. He could even play the thing with his teeth, you know,’ Gibbs said and started to do a bit of air guitar, making Jane smile. She was getting to like him more and more: he was quite a character.

They both heard a short shrill whistle and looked up to see DCI Bradfield leaning over the balcony crooking his finger for them to come up to the top floor. As they joined him Jane noticed the carpet was much cleaner and the landing window had old red drapes like theatre curtains still hanging on the original rail. Bradfield told them he had checked out two of the three rooms and found them empty. When the first Hendrix song had stopped he had heard a male and female voice in the room at the end of the corridor.

Bradfield crossed to the closed door. It was fitted with a Yale lock, but it didn’t look like a professional job. He turned to Gibbs. ‘Come on, stuff this softly-softly approach. Do your Bruce Lee bit and kick the door in, Spence.’

Gibbs took three paces back then two quick steps forward and, raising his right foot, kicked hard on the Yale causing the door to fly open and the lock to splinter away from the frame.

‘What the fuck do you think you’re doing?’ a deep voice said from inside the inky dark room.

As the natural light from the hallway filtered in they could make out a naked black man lying on top of a young white girl with blonde hair braided in two long plaits.

‘Police, stay where you are,’ Gibbs shouted above the music as he ran over and pulled the curtains open letting the light flood in.

They all recognized O’Duncie from his mug shot, even though his face was contorted with rage. He rolled off the woman and stood up. She screamed and instantly pulled the orange bed throw over her naked body.

O’Duncie in the flesh was a very handsome, broad-shouldered man with a well-defined muscular body and collar-length wavy Afro hair tied with a multicoloured bandana, Jimi Hendrix style. A heavy silver neck chain attached to a black studded cross hung from his neck and his wrists and fingers were covered in silver bangles and gold rings.

‘Sit down on the bed now,’ Bradfield shouted as Jane blushed at the sight of his naked body.

‘It’s not true what they say: my dick’s bigger than that,’ Gibbs said in a demeaning way.

‘Get the fuck outta here!’ O’Duncie shouted.

‘I hope you’re talking to the teenager,’ Bradfield said, nodding at the girl lying on the red-velvet-framed bed. She was terrified and pulling on some underwear and a kimono under the bed throw.

Bradfield went over and turned the stereo off. It had two large speakers and seemed expensive and new. He could see a power cable extension lead that went up through an open hatch into the loft and he suspected O’Duncie was stealing the neighbours’ electricity.

Jane looked round the room. The ceiling was black with stuck-on gold stars, the walls painted in psychedelic colours and adorned with pictures of rock stars like Jimi Hendrix, The Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple. Sheepskin rugs were scattered over the floor; crimson and blue silk throws hung from a pole at each end of the bed so that it looked like a sheikh’s tent. There was an array of expensive candles stuck in various gilt candle-holders more suited to a church and a wooden cross was fixed to the wall above the bed’s headboard.

Bradfield whispered to Jane to take the terrified teenager downstairs and find out how old she was and if she knew anything that could help them. Jane nodded and told the girl to come with her, but she also suspected Bradfield didn’t want her to be present while he and DS Gibbs spoke with Terrence O’Duncie.

‘You can put some clothes on, O’Duncie, or be taken to the nick stark bollock naked. Either way I don’t care because you are in fuckin’ big trouble.’

‘What ya want to arrest me for? I ain’t done nothing wrong,’ he said in an angry tone whilst pulling on some underpants.

Bradfield paid him no attention and started to look around. There was a large wardrobe in one corner, which he opened. The display of velvet trousers, floral shirts, silk scarves, leather shoes and platform boots was astonishing and a drawer was filled with gold and silver bracelets, rings and watches.

‘Well, isn’t this paradise in a shithole,’ Bradfield said as he threw O’Duncie a shirt and velvet trousers to put on.

‘It’s all paid for and legit — the receipts are in the bedside-cabinet drawer. I know every piece of jewellery there so don’t go nicking none,’ he said with a smirk.

Gibbs opened the drawer, pulled out a handful of receipts and held them up for Bradfield to see.

‘All thanks to drugs money, no doubt,’ Bradfield remarked.

‘No, the kids pay me rent.’

‘Don’t play games, your sister’s dropped you right in it, so just get dressed and behave yourself,’ Gibbs said.

‘My sister’s a mental case. We don’t get on so she’d say anything to fuck me up.’

Bradfield continued going through the wardrobe and there was no sign of any drugs. He started to pick up the pairs of boots one by one and tip them upside down when suddenly a small bag of marijuana fell out. He grabbed it and waved it at O’Duncie.

‘I don’t know anything about that,’ he said arrogantly.

Bradfield laughed, picked up another boot, shook it and this time two bags of marijuana and some heroin wraps fell out.

‘That’s not mine — you bastards brought it here to fit me up cos I’m black.’

‘If I wanted to fit you up, Terry, I’d have brought more drugs and some LSD tabs with me.’

Bradfield threw the boot back in the wardrobe and as it hit the floor there was a strange-sounding thud. He bent down and rapped his knuckles on the plywood which produced the same sound, but when he knocked on the opposite side, by the drawers, the sound was hollow. He noticed that the wardrobe floor had a wooden slat divide held down by a screw at each end.

‘Got a screwdriver anywhere?’ he asked O’Duncie who said nothing but looked nervous for the first time as he pulled on the purple velvet trousers and zipped up the fly.

Bradfield lifted his right foot and slammed it down hard on the plywood causing it to splinter in half.

‘Sorry, that was an accident,’ he said as he ripped the broken pieces of wood away to discover a compartment filled with a pile of different-denomination banknotes. Some had elastic bands round them: there were ones, fives, tenners and some new twenties held together in a bank wrap. There was also a bag of coins and a medium-sized bag of what was obviously heroin.

Bradfield smiled. ‘Well, sunshine, I’d say that lot equates to dealing and a long prison sentence with your previous drugs convictions.’

‘Listen to me, cos I don’t know nothin’ about that lot; the last person who was here must have left it.’

‘Well, you’d better hope we don’t find your prints on the heroin bag or any of the notes then. You really have to wise up and start helping us, and I might just put a good word in for you with the judge.’

O’Duncie started to sweat as he buttoned up his shirt. Spencer Gibbs, using a clean handkerchief, began to carefully gather up the money and drugs, putting them into a pillowcase. He reckoned the notes amounted to roughly two and a half to three thousand pounds.

‘Ain’t you supposed to count it in front of me?’ O’Duncie asked.

‘So you’re now saying this is your money, are you?’ Gibbs remarked.

O’Duncie realized he’d messed up and knew his prints would be found so he admitted the money and drugs were his.

‘We’ll count it at the nick. You’re being arrested for possession and supplying drugs as well as—’

O’Duncie interrupted Bradfield. ‘You can have a cut of the dough.’ He turned to Gibbs. ‘Split it between you both.’

Gibbs stared hard, which seemed to encourage O’Duncie.

‘Come on, man, I know how to keep my mouth shut, like I never saw you find it, right? I dunno even how much is there, right, you with me? I mean help me out here, last time I got raided drug squad prick got away with a grand, so I know how it works.’

Gibbs reacted fast, his fist smacking into O’Duncie’s face. O’Duncie howled as he fell backwards onto the bed and blood spurted from his nose.

‘We’re not drug squad or bent!’ Gibbs shouted.

‘Jesus Christ, man, you fuckin’ busted my nose.’ He looked at Bradfield. ‘You saw what he did, he hit me.’

‘I saw you trip up when you tried to escape arrest. Now shut up, wipe your nose and finish getting dressed.’

O’Duncie grabbed a corner of the sheet and wiped his nose before pulling on a pair of black Cuban-heeled boots and lastly an ankle-length brown-suede trench coat. Gibbs then put the handcuffs on and led him downstairs.

As O’Duncie was led out to the police car Jane could see how swollen and bloody his nose was, but she didn’t dare ask what happened, she was just relieved that she wasn’t in the bedroom when it did. Bradfield spoke with Jane who informed him that the young girl who’d been in bed with O’Duncie was adamant she was eighteen.

‘I think she’s lying, and she’s given me a stupid name, Flower Summer, so do we take her in?’

‘No grounds. She may be full of bullshit, not to mention drugs, but we can check her description and see if she’s been reported missing by her parents. When we get back to the station inform Social Services about the squat and that there may be underage girls and runaways dossing down here.’

O’Duncie sat in subdued silence the entire way back to the station. Gibbs was handcuffed to him on one side and Bradfield sat on the other having told Jane to sit in the front of the patrol car. O’Duncie wore some kind of musk oil which permeated the car and Bradfield opened a window.

At the station Gibbs and Jane took O’Duncie to the custody area to be booked in. He was asked if he wanted to make a phone call but declined stating that it was pointless as he’d been ‘done up like a kipper’ and quipped that he couldn’t afford a solicitor as they had all his money.

Just before they were to interrogate O’Duncie, DS Gibbs received a phone call that took the wind out of him. He caught Bradfield about to head into his office.

‘Need a word, guv — it’s urgent — before we have a go at him.’

‘Listen, Spence, I don’t want to waste any more time. What for Chrissake is so important?’

‘I just got a call from Manchester CID — I’d sent a telex asking them to check all the aliases I had for the name Josh against drug dealers and anyone known as Big Daddy.’

There was an instant look of concern on Bradfield’s face as he glared at Gibbs who licked his lips and continued.

‘A Joshua Richards was arrested in Moss Side two weeks ago for GBH. He’s six foot five, built like a stallion and well known locally as Big Daddy, not just because of his size: he has six kids all by different women. He’s also a big-time drug dealer who runs between Manchester and London.’

‘So Richards was probably supplying Julie Ann.’

‘Yes, and probably Terry O’Duncie, but not for the last two weeks.’

‘What?’

‘Richards didn’t get bail from the Manchester Court as they found a fuckin’ Kalashnikov in the boot of his car along with LSD tabs. It means he’s in the clear for Julie Ann’s and Eddie’s murders—’

‘And Terry isn’t Big Daddy.’ Bradfield sighed shaking his head, and then shrugged before continuing.

‘Richards is in the clear, and so by the looks of it is Dwayne Clark, so the positive side is Terry O’Duncie is now our strongest and most likely suspect for murder... so let’s go and put the pressure on him.’

The custody sergeant took O’Duncie up to Bradfield’s office for an interview, but kept his hands cuffed just in case he played up, though he seemed reasonably relaxed and asked if he could have a coffee.

Bradfield was standing by his office window looking out onto Lower Clapton Road as Gibbs waited for the sergeant to leave the room. O’Duncie was sipping a beaker of coffee, his eyes flicking from one officer to the other.

‘You gonna take these cuffs off me?’ He raised his handcuffed wrists, and Gibbs got the nod from Bradfield to unlock them.

‘You’re bang to rights for the drugs, but I want you to tell me what you know about these two kids,’ Bradfield said as he dropped Julie Ann’s and Eddie Phillips’ photographs in front of O’Duncie who looked at them briefly.

‘Who are they?’

‘Don’t play games, we know your sister Anjali sent them to Dwayne Clark’s address and he brought them to meet you at Primrose Hill.’

‘My sister is a fuckin’ nutter. If she has put me in trouble then I am not gonna take it. The bitch is just wanting money, she’s a hypochondriac, sick in the head, so whatever she’s told you will be a pack of lies cos I wouldn’t give her any cash. I dunno a Dwayne or how many kids hang out at the house, they come and go all the time... maybe I seen these two, but I dunno for sure. You should ask the others.’

‘We did but it seems they have dodgy memories like you, so start thinking hard, Terry, because these two were murdered and I reckon you were involved.’

‘On my life I dunno anything about any murders. I wasn’t even at the squat when they were killed.’

Bradfield and Gibbs looked at each other with a wry smile and Gibbs leaned forward close to O’Duncie.

‘For someone who wears all the flash gear and tries to look and act the part of a big man you’re actually pretty dumb. Neither me nor the guv mentioned when the murders happened. With Dwayne Clark, were you?’

‘I told ya I dunno him.’

‘Dwayne’s the sidekick of Joshua Richards, a drug dealer also known as Big Daddy,’ Gibbs said.

O’Duncie looked nervous, especially at the mention of Richards.

‘Never heard of a Joshua or Big Daddy, but I think the guy Dwayne might have stayed at the squat a while back. I helped him off drugs and I heard he’d turned his life round and started a legit window-cleaning business.’

Gibbs was going to press the matter but Bradfield raised his hand indicating not to bother. The fact O’Duncie knew Dwayne gave him a connection to Big Daddy and he decided to scare O’Duncie with a few lies.

‘You didn’t know we nicked Dwayne, did you? How else do you think we knew about the Primrose Hill address and where the drugs and cash were hidden?’

O’Duncie didn’t answer but Bradfield could see the look on his face was a mixture of anger and uncertainty.

‘Dwayne reckoned you got Julie Ann up the duff and she tried to get money off you for an abortion but you told her to fuck off.’

‘What? Eh? If he did say anything, which I doubt, then he’s lying. So I knows both dem kids, no big deal as I didn’t kill ’em and you got no evidence I did,’ O’Duncie said arrogantly.

Bradfield knew he was still unsure about what was or was not the truth and trying to front out his predicament.

‘Eddie Phillips told you we were asking about Julie Ann, and worried he’d grass you up, you had to kill him, didn’t you?’

‘No way. The kid may have been to the house but I never met or spoke to him,’ O’Duncie said firmly.

Bradfield asked who did speak to Eddie and O’Duncie said he’d heard from one of the squatters that, while he was away, Eddie had turned up and nicked some of the squatters’ gear. He said they also told him that Eddie had jacked up some heroin down by the Regent’s Canal, fallen in and drowned. O’Duncie was adamant he didn’t know any more. He fell silent before saying he would like to speak with a solicitor and have his money back, which he’d made from legitimate renting.

Bradfield knew he didn’t have enough to charge him with any murders, but there was no way he was going to let a scumbag like O’Duncie back out on the streets.

‘You’re going nowhere tonight, Terry. You can have a night in the cells on the taxpayer. It will give you plenty of time to think about your situation, and how telling us the truth will be better for you. And remember, you’re bang to rights for the drugs. Question is whether I charge you with straight possession or the more serious possession with intent to supply, but that depends on how helpful you are.’

‘Come on, man, cut me some slack and give me bail. I’ll turn up at court, I won’t do a runner and I’ll even put some of the cash in the police widows’ and orphans’ fund.’

‘You’re not getting bail or the money back at present. Julie Ann nicked a load of money before she was murdered and guess what, it wasn’t on her when we found the body.’

‘Jesus Christ, how many times I gotta say I ain’t killed no one and I don’t know anythin’ about her money.’

‘That’s because she may not have told you she nicked it from her dad. Thing is though, sunshine, she didn’t know the banknotes had sequential serial numbers on them, which means neither did you.’ Bradfield paused to let O’Duncie take in what he’d just said and he could see he was becoming nervous.

‘I’ve already got someone checking through the serial numbers of the notes we found in your bedroom, and I will have them all checked for Julie Ann’s, her father’s and Eddie Phillips’ prints. If there is one dab on any one of them that matches yours, you’re screwed.’

Bradfield could see O’Duncie was thinking hard to come up with a suitable answer.

‘One of the squatters collects cash from the other residents for food and drink and gives it to me and I hid it in the wardrobe. We’re a commune so we share things.’

‘Just like you shared Julie Ann round for sex,’ Gibbs remarked.

‘I want that money back cos I got bills to pay.’

Bradfield leered. ‘More like you’ve got big suppliers you owe money to?’ he said, making a veiled connection to Big Daddy, and paused, but O’Duncie just stared nervously as Bradfield continued. ‘And they ain’t gonna be happy with you if you stiff them, are they? In fact you might end up in the Regent’s Canal as well, so you’d better start talking when we interview you tomorrow.’

Jane had called Social Services and was now sitting in the incident room with the stack of banknotes heaped on the desk. DC Edwards was typing up his report and looked over to her.

‘What are you doing?’

Jane had taken a pair of tweezers from her handbag and was painstakingly lifting one note after another.

‘I’ve got to count all this seized money and I’m worried about leaving my prints on the notes.’

‘If you got bundles in the same denomination just list the serial numbers first.’

‘But I’ve also got to count that big bag of coins.’

‘Rather you than me.’ He turned back to his report.

Kath popped her head round the door.

‘I’m going off duty. Christ, it was a long day and really tedious in court. Two cases were called before mine and they were so drawn out I ended up last on.’

Jane stopped checking the notes. ‘What did he get?’

Kath moved further into the room.

‘Magistrate was impressed that the little shite admitted his guilt and asked for other offences to be taken into consideration. It was in his favour that none of the poor old pensioners whose life savings he stole, and who he scared the life out of, have to give evidence.’

Jane nodded and began to pick up the notes with her tweezers as Kath continued.

‘Then the ponce solicitor asked for a lenient sentence for the nasty thievin’ git and went on about his remorse for what he’d done. My God, Jane, you should have seen how he reacted, blubbered and cried. He’s remanded in custody to appear at the Crown Court for sentencing, but will probably get about two bloody years, and you know what makes me really sick?’

Jane lost concentration and had to start recounting a bundle.

‘Worst thing is he’ll probably be out in eight months and he’s a nasty vicious little sod. Next time he’ll probably kill someone, he’s that twisted. Villains like Boyle are the scum of the earth, he even gave me this sick gloating smile as if to say he’d got away with it. You mark my words it’s not the last time we’ll hear of Kenneth Boyle.’

‘At least you got him, Kath.’

Yet again Jane made a mistake and had to return to recounting the money.

‘See you tomorrow,’ Kath said and Jane told her she had a day off.

‘Of course, it’s the wedding.’

‘Don’t remind me, it’s sort of crept up on me.’

Kath laughed and let Jane continue her counting whilst she wrote up the result of the Boyle case on a file for the collator PC Donaldson. Jane mentioned that he had gone home at 4 p.m. and Kath left the file on her desk saying she’d give it to Donaldson in the morning.

As Kath left the room Edwards finished his report and took it over to the files ‘IN’ tray.

‘She never stops bloody yakking on — you’d think she was the only person ever to make an arrest. Right, that’s me done and dusted.’ He started to walk out, pausing by Jane’s desk.

‘At the speed you’re going you’ll be here all night. Tarra.’

Jane was really tired and finding it increasingly hard to concentrate, but with a day’s leave coming up she had to finish recording all the serial numbers and then check her list to see if any were sequential, which she reckoned would take at least another couple of hours.

No sooner had Edwards left than DS Gibbs walked in.

‘Guv wants to know if any of the notes run in sequential order.’

Jane sighed. ‘Well, I’m sorry, but I’m on my own and it’s taking a lot of time so...’

‘Don’t get your knickers in a twist, O’Duncie is being kept in custody overnight for further interviews.’

He took out a comb from his pocket and ran it front to back through his hair, making it stand up on end, and then ran his fingers either side of his head.

‘I’ve got quite a way to go, but I’ll finish checking all the notes before I go home.’

‘Finish it tomorrow, but make sure the money is locked away in the property-store safe overnight.’

‘I have the day off tomorrow as it’s my sister’s wedding.’

Gibbs replaced the comb in his pocket, and told her he’d get Kath to finish checking it all in the morning.

‘Are you sure? Only I’m worried DCI Bradfield might disapprove if I go off duty just now.’

‘I’ll sort it out and tell him you got a big day tomorrow. I had to take a week off after my brother got married. Nothin’ to do with the wedding, it was the stag night I had to recover from.’

‘Thank you, I really appreciate it, not that I’m looking forward to the wedding: I’m chief bridesmaid.’

‘Well, better a wedding than a funeral, eh, Jane?’ He walked off playing air guitar and making the sound of the strings playing the wedding march. Jane was quite surprised as it was the first time he had called her by her Christian name.

The property office was closed. Jane knew that Duty Sergeant Harris had a key to the office and the safe, so she would have to get him to open it up for her.

‘What do you want, Tennison?’ Harris snapped as she approached.

Jane explained that she needed the property store opened, the seized money put in the safe and a property-deposit invoice signed.

‘Well, one favour deserves another, so when I’ve done that you can take over on the front desk for an hour while I have my grub.’

She tried to explain that DS Gibbs had said she could go off duty. Harris said that it was busy out on the streets and there was no one to come in and relieve him so she’d better show some willing seeing as he’d allowed her to be attached to the murder team.

Jane knew it was pointless arguing and didn’t want to interrupt Gibbs and Bradfield while they were busy so she did as she was told.

She dealt with two people who came in to report a couple of minor crimes and an elderly woman who’d lost her purse in the street. An hour and a half passed and Sergeant Harris hadn’t returned. Jane suspected he was probably playing snooker, but she couldn’t leave the front desk unmanned.

She’d just sat back down when a civilian courier arrived with the internal mail, which she signed for and then began to sort out into piles.

Jane noticed that an envelope was addressed to her. Opening it she read that there was a place available at the section house, but if she wanted the room she had to reply within forty-eight hours. She immediately started to fill out her personal details on the residents’ form. Knowing that her parents would be upset she was moving out, Jane decided it would be best to tell them after the wedding. She completed the forms and put them in a return envelope addressed to the section house sergeant at Ede House.

As she sealed the envelope and popped it into the internal mail bag Sergeant Harris finally returned.

‘Why’s all that mail on the desk? You’re supposed to put it in the relevant drawer trays.’

‘I was about to but—’

‘Then get on with it before you go off duty,’ he sneered, deliberately trying to antagonize her.

She knew what he was trying to do but smiled. ‘My pleasure, Sergeant. Sadly there’s nothing for you.’

Having dealt with all the mail she returned to the incident room to get her handbag and personal belongings. As she passed Bradfield’s office she could hear him and Gibbs chatting and wondered if there were any further developments, but she had no intention of hanging about to find out. As she picked up her handbag she noticed the open file Kath had left on the desk. She glanced at the mug shot of Kenneth Boyle and suppressed a shudder. There was something about his almost pretty-boy face, with its wide-apart dark hooded eyes and thin mouth that chilled her. No wonder Kath felt so angry about the short sentence: Boyle definitely deserved a lot longer for the stress and fear he’d inflicted. Flicking the file shut, Jane walked out of the office and headed to the bus stop, feeling depressed by the day’s events.

David Bentley tuned the radio to another channel. David Cassidy’s ‘How Can I Be Sure’ filled the van.

‘Turn that Cassidy wanker off,’ John said.

They were at the rented garage and had just finished attaching the advertising logos to the sides of the van: ‘Home Decorating, Painting and Carpentry’, ‘Professionals at Reasonable Prices’ — all of which could be easily peeled off at any time. The back windows were covered with pictures David had cut out from magazines: tins of paint, paper-pasting boards, paintbrushes and ladders. They had earlier purchased two smaller stolen Kango hammer drills for cash from a dealer in Essex and were now loading them into the van, along with the additional equipment needed for the job. John reversed the loaded van into the garage and locked the heavy metal garage door. David was using his walking stick and had not been very helpful due to his lameness, but John had tried to include him as much as possible.

‘We’ll unload the decorating gear in the back yard of the café tomorrow night when we start. Danny will be there to help carry it down to the basement,’ John said, patting the garage door. They walked back towards their estate, and John put his arm around his brother.

‘Don’t look so worried.’

‘It’s gonna be all right isn’t it, John?’

‘Trust me, Dave, we been working on this for weeks, there’ll be no problems.’

David’s stomach tightened as he recalled his father using the same words when they went to the church to steal the lead and he fell off the roof. He was now terrified of heights, scared of ever going back to prison, knowing as a cripple he’d be vulnerable inside.

John started talking about a movie he wanted to see. Theatre of Blood, with Vincent Price and Diana Rigg, which had got rave reviews and was a real British horror movie, but David was not interested. He had a nagging fear in the pit of his stomach and knowing exactly what was going to begin the next night made it worse.

Sitting in her usual seat on the top deck of the bus, Jane put her earpiece in and turned on her pocket radio. By pure coincidence Jimi Hendrix was singing ‘Voodoo Child’. She sighed, remembering the hideous squat they had been to that afternoon and the young kids living rough and taking drugs. She felt pretty certain that Julie Ann and Eddie Phillips had visited or lived there at some time. However, she was uncertain about Terry O’Duncie. For all that she loathed about his existence, he didn’t appear to be a violent person; although he dressed like a pimp, he seemed to be playing at being a tough guy. She felt depressed and turning off the radio thought to herself, What do I know? It saddened her to think how young the girls had been at the squat; even some of the boys looked to be in their teens. She shuddered to think that they could end up like Julie Ann and Eddie, addicted to drugs, turning to prostitution and stealing to pay for their habit. They had nothing to look forward to but a wretched future, so different from her own; she had been raised within a caring family who were always there to love and protect her. Jane forced herself to think of something else. Her mind turned to her sister’s wedding, but this annoyed her as she wasn’t looking forward to it, didn’t relish being a bridesmaid and feared the whole day would be a hideous experience. She turned her radio back on and ironically David Cassidy was singing his hit single ‘How Can I Be Sure’.