The Crime Trade

46

With the worst part of rush hour over, the traffic up to Barnet was less heavy than it had been from the station to Charing Cross hospital, and I turned into Stegs’s road at twenty past seven, focused completely now on the job ahead.

I was the first there, and the street was quiet. I could see lights on in the Jenner household but there was no sign of the two officers keeping watch on the place. I hadn’t been told how they were conducting their surveillance but presumed they were probably camped in one of the houses opposite in order to make themselves as inconspicuous as possible. If they were here on the street, then they were doing their job very well.

I picked up my mobile and dialled Woodham again.

‘We’re just coming into the estate now,’ he told me. ‘ETA one minute. We’re going to park outside and go straight in. I’m sending a marked patrol car round to the next street, just in case he tries to escape out the back, but I’m confident he’ll come quietly.’

‘Let’s hope so,’ I said, and hung up.

One minute later, the lead car containing Woodham drove straight past me, followed by a second unmarked one — a Ford Orion — with a patrol car bringing up the rear. Woodham’s vehicle parked right outside Stegs’s house, and the second car managed to squeeze in behind it; the patrol car found a slot about twenty yards further up. Two more figures, whom I recognized as DC Wrays and WDC Farland — the officers watching the place — appeared from the other end of the street and made their way towards the house.

Exhaling loudly, and wondering what we were about to find out, I got out of my own car and crossed the road, catching up with Woodham and four of the other detectives from the squad as they decamped and started up the drive towards Stegs’s front door. I remembered then that I’d promised to phone Malik when I’d got any news. I asked Woodham if he’d been in contact with him.

‘Not yet,’ he answered as he approached the door, hammering on it with a copper’s authority. ‘He’s not answering at the moment.’

A few seconds later the door opened and Mrs Jenner stood there, looking at us all with some apprehension. She spotted me but gave no obvious sign of recognition. ‘Yes?’ she said with genuine surprise. In the background, a baby started crying. It sounded like the cries were coming from up the stairs.

‘Police, Mrs Jenner,’ said Woodham gruffly, showing his ID. ‘We have a warrant to search these premises. We also have a separate warrant for your husband’s arrest. Would you let us in, please?’

Her face seemed to crack under the strain. ‘What are you talking about? My husband is a police officer.’

Woodham was unmoved. ‘You’ll see that everything’s in order,’ he stated without emotion. With his other hand, he produced the warrant and thrust it under her nose, then stepped inside the door. ‘Where is your husband, Mrs Jenner? Is he upstairs?’

She moved aside to let him in, her face still a mask of shock. ‘No,’ she said, with a hint of desperation. ‘He isn’t here.’

‘We have reason to believe he is,’ said Woodham evenly as he stepped onto the stairs. Two of the other detectives moved into the hallway and started off in the direction of the kitchen.

‘No, honestly, he isn’t. He went out about ten minutes ago. We had an argument when he came home. He hadn’t told me about his suspension, and now I’m kicking him out.’

Woodham, who wasn’t the most diplomatic or tolerant of people, clearly didn’t believe her and carried on up the stairs. ‘Your baby needs you,’ he called down to her, and she pushed past the other detectives on the stairs, her face a picture of humiliation. It looked like, in the life of Mrs Stegs Jenner, things couldn’t get much worse.

The rest of us piled into the house. I opened the door into the sitting room. The lights were on, as was the TV, but the room was otherwise empty.

A few seconds later, there was the sound of heavy footfalls on the stairs, and I came back into the hall to see Woodham reappear looking none too pleased. Mrs Jenner was following him, holding the grizzling baby.

‘I told you he wasn’t here,’ she said.

Woodham glared at Wrays and Farland who’d come in behind me. ‘I thought you were meant to be watching the place,’ he said accusingly.

‘We were,’ said Wrays, sounding not unlike a chastised schoolboy. ‘We must have looked away for a moment and missed him.’

I noticed Farland blushing. Obviously, office romances were all the rage.

‘I’m not a liar, you know,’ continued Mrs Jenner.

Woodham turned to her angrily, in no mood for pussy-footing around. ‘Where the hell do you think he is, then?’

‘I don’t know,’ she snapped, tears in her eyes.

I could understand the DCI’s frustration but I didn’t think he was going about dealing with it the right way. ‘Where’s the most likely place you can think of where he’d go if the two of you had an argument, Mrs Jenner?’ I asked her.

‘The pub probably. That’s where he spends most of his time. There’s one at the end of the estate on Church Hill that he drinks in now and again. The King’s Arms, it’s called. Or otherwise, if he’s on foot, he might take a walk up to his old school. He goes there sometimes when he wants some peace and quiet. It’s just over the back of the houses opposite. There’s an entrance at the bottom of the road.’ Her gaze moved from me to Woodham. ‘What are you arresting him for? He didn’t have anything to do with what happened to Paul, did he? Paul Vokerman?’

‘We can’t discuss it at the moment, I’m afraid,’ Woodham told her. ‘All right: Wrays, Farland, you get up to the pub. John, you and me’ll go up to the school with the uniforms. The rest of you stay here and carry out the search.’

The baby howled loudly and angrily in Woodham’s direction, evidently not happy with this man’s intrusion on to his territory, and Mrs Jenner finally burst into tears.

Woodham didn’t notice. He was already heading for the car, with me following.