Blind Fury (9 page)

Anna waited, watching as Barolli took the call. He said little, making notes and recording their conversation. When he replaced the phone, he turned to Anna. “Listen to this.”

“I’m all ears,” she said tetchily.

Cameron Welsh didn’t like the fact that Anna had not taken his call, since, as he had said to Barolli, he was attempting to fast-track her career. Barolli had laughed and joked that perhaps Cameron could fast-track
his,
and it appeared to amuse the man, because he went on to discuss his theories at length. He suggested that the murder team should focus their inquiries on companies that delivered into, not out of, London. This was due to the fact that the victims were discovered near motorway service stations that had a drive-over or bridge from one side of the M1 to the other. So their killer, he estimated, would pick up his target from the services
before
the one nearest to where the victim was discovered, not the one closest, which he believed the police were currently focusing on.

Anna was tapping her foot with impatience.

“He said he’d have more details when he’d finished working on his profile of the killer,” Barolli went on, “and would require us to visit again.”

“This is preposterous! As if we haven’t considered that possibility, even more so as we know that Margaret Potts picked up her clients and then returned via—”

Barolli interrupted her. “Yeah, yeah, I know, but we’ve not considered that he picked them up on his way
into
London.”

“Because we’ve concentrated on where the bodies were found, not on the other side of the motorway heading into London.”

“But what if he was delivering into London and picked up the girls then? He could hold them in his vehicle, then dump them when he was leaving. Bodies could have been held by him for days.”

Anna sighed, still not in any way impressed. “Fine, go along with it, and rope in more officers to make further inquiries, but I sincerely believe he is bullshitting us.”

Barolli didn’t, and he went in to talk to Mike Lewis about the phone call. Mike listened and was almost as doubtful as Anna, but Barolli was insistent that, given time, Welsh could bring them something. He informed Lewis that Welsh had requested another opportunity to look over their files.

“Tell you what, Paul, bring up the old files on Cameron Welsh and look at Travis’s connection to him, and then we’ll talk to Langton and see what he thinks we should do.”

Mike Lewis and Barolli went over the arrest and interrogation of Cameron Welsh.

“Jesus, he was a sadistic bastard. No wonder Travis doesn’t like having to confront him. Maybe she’s right. This could all be a ploy done to give him some perverse satisfaction.” Mike sighed.

“I don’t agree. I think he has given us some informative material, and you have to understand that he’s not kept the files—so what if he does know a lot more and is stringing us along?”

Mike was still uncertain but eventually agreed to instigate further inquiries focusing on trucking companies delivering into London on a regular basis.

Due to the massive stack of information that resulted, the team was inundated. Mike had a meeting with Lang-ton, who was as dismissive of Cameron’s input as Anna, until the thought occurred to him that Cameron’s psychobabble about getting into the mind of the killer might also be a cover-up.

“Could Welsh have had an interaction with another prisoner, one who was released and fitted the time frame?” Langton wondered.

“Well, we got a list of prisoners, but according to the governor, Welsh is a real loner and never shared his cell,” Mike pointed out.

“Maybe, but what about when he was held before his trial? It would mean a lot of digging back, but as we’ve still got no identification on two victims, we’re gonna have to get out the spades.”

Anna had not spoken to Langton, but she knew he had been discussing the latest visit to Barfield with Mike Lewis, and when they had the next briefing, she was certain he was going along with the idea that Welsh had information. She sat at her desk listening as Mike told them he wanted a check on all the inmates and prisoners held with Welsh before his trial who could possibly have had a conversation with him.

“We’re grasping at straws here, but we have to look at the possibility that someone may have admitted to Welsh that he was the killer and that he got away with it. This prisoner would have had to be released for the time frame of the murders, so it does at least cut down a lengthy elimination process.”

With the paperwork piling up from the new lines of inquiry, the team was kept busy, and they had yet to identify the two victims. Knowing that Anna was not happy about the focus on Cameron Welsh, Mike asked her to come into his office.

“Listen, I know how you feel about this, Anna, but stay with it. We have to work together.”

“Fine, but do you mind if I focus on Margaret Potts?” Anna didn’t want to be uncooperative, but she could barely contain her exasperation. “I don’t think we have covered the only identified victim’s background. I want to go back to Emerald Turk, and I still think we should continue trying to trace the guys she used to help her out when she was knocked around.”

“Okay by me, and we’ll keep our heads down trying to come up with a possible connection from inside the prison,” said Mike, knowing that he had to keep working on all the possibilities.

Anna sifted through the previous records of Margaret Potts. On file they had three arrests for prostitution, and backtracking through the court appearances, Anna saw that one of the fines had been paid by a Stanley Potts. They knew she had been married, and that she had two children taken into foster care, but they had never interviewed anyone save Emerald Turk. Anna went over the list of prostitutes who had been arrested alongside Potts and could know more about her, and she checked to see if any of them had ever worked service stations. It was painstaking work, and she knew it could well prove to be not worth the effort.

To track down Stanley Potts took almost the entire afternoon. He had been in Parkhurst Prison when Margaret’s body was discovered and had refused to be interviewed. He had subsequently stayed in numerous hostels and halfway houses, moving around almost as much as Emerald Turk. But at last Anna got a recent address from a probation officer who, although no longer in contact with Stanley, recalled him moving into shared accommodation with two other ex-prisoners.

It was late in the afternoon by the time Anna left the station.

The shared accommodation was a run-down semi-detached in Camden Town. The three-story house had been divided into four flats, and Stanley Potts was listed on the bell at the front door in flat 2. There were other names scribbled beneath his, and it looked as if numerous people had lived or were living in flat 2. When Anna rang the bell, it took a fair while before she heard footsteps. Finally, the door opened a few inches.

“Good afternoon. I am Detective Travis, and I am looking for a Stanley Potts—I believe he lives here?”

“Yes.”

“Is he here now?”

“Yes, it’s me.”

Anna showed him her ID. “I would really appreciate you talking to me, as I am on the team investigating Margaret Potts’s murder.”

“Can’t help you, love. I was in prison and hadn’t seen her for years before that.”

“Yes, I know. This would be just for me to get an insight into her background. You were married?”

“I just told you, I got nothin’ to say. I’d not set eyes on her for years.”

“Could we just talk? I won’t take up much of your time. It’s just that there are a few things you might be able to help me with,” Anna persisted.

“Like what?”

“Well, her friends . . .”

“I don’t know any of them.”

“Please, Mr. Potts, could we do this now, because I don’t want to have to ask you to come into the station.”

The door opened a fraction more, and Anna could get a look at him. The man before her didn’t resemble the mug shot from the files. He was square-faced and unshaven, with thick, gray-flecked curly hair, and it looked as if he had speckles of paint in it, with even more specks over his dirty shirt.

Stanley was about five-eight, solid with a beer belly, and his trousers were held up by a broad leather belt. He had on old worn carpet slippers with no socks, and there were more signs of paint splashes on his dirty trousers.

Anna followed Stanley down a dimly lit hall with bicycles chained up along the wall, alongside an old-fashioned Hoover.

“In ’ere,” he said as he reached a door.

The room was dark, with an old horsehair sofa and chair and a threadbare carpet. On a coffee table were the racing papers, cans of beer, and overflowing ashtrays; stacks of newspapers lay on every available surface. The room smelled of beer, stale tobacco, and curry.

“You want to sit down?” He gestured to the armchair and sat in the center of the sofa. “Not found who done it, then?” he added.

“Sadly, no, we haven’t.”

He lit a cigarette, his fat fingers nicotine-stained and with black nails.

“You were married to Margaret?”

He nodded.

“Can you recall anyone who might be able to help me get to know her?”

“No. The prison governor told me she’d been bumped off. I read about it in the papers as well.” He didn’t sound particularly sad.

“During your time together, surely you must have met some of her friends, or someone she was close to and would have remained friendly with after you separated?” Anna suggested.

“No. What she did was her own business. She was useless. My kids were always filthy, and she never cooked, gave ’em Kentucky Fried Chicken morning, noon, and night. They was out of control—that’s why I kicked her out, then my kids got taken away. Best thing for ’em, ’cause she was no bloody good with them, and I was workin’, so I never knew they weren’t going to school.”

“Did you know Emerald Turk?”

“No.”

“Anyone you can think of that might be able to help me?”

“Nope.”

“Do you still keep in touch with your children?”

“No.”

“What about men your wife might have known?”

“She knew a lot, but I wouldn’t call ’em friends. She was a tart,” said Stanley matter-of-factly.

“I am especially interested in men she might have used to help her get her own back on a punter who didn’t pay. A couple of times she was beaten up, so she needed some help—you know, to pay them back.”

Stanley shook his head. The ash from his cigarette drooped to over an inch long. “Listen, love, me and Maggie parted ways and not on friendly terms. I was glad to see the back of her.”

“But you had feelings for her once. You paid a fine when she was in court for prostitution.”

He frowned and sucked in a lungful of smoke, then flicked off the ash onto the carpet. “Maybe I did—don’t remember. That’d be some time ago, and it could’ve been me brother. He might have helped her out, but not me.”

“Your brother?” asked Anna with interest.

“Yeah. He used to have a thing with her.”

“Would he have given your name to the court? It was a five-hundred-pound fine.”

“She probably paid him in kind, if you know what I mean.”

“Do you have his address?”

“No. We don’t get on—it’s obvious why. He’s a bastard, and he never helped me out. I’ve not seen him for more than five or six years.”

“What work does he do?”

“Works for a bailiff company, or he did. Like I said, I’ve not seen him. He was shagging her, though, like every man that come into the house.”

“What’s his name?”

“Eric.”

Anna stood up, eager to get away from the cigarette smoke and the stench of the flat. Stanley looked up at her and then jerked a thumb at a sideboard. It was hard to see anything for old newspapers and used food cartons. He shuffled over to it, throwing papers aside, opening drawers.

“Hang on a minute . . . I was wonderin’, was there anythin’ of value found after she was murdered?”

“Value—like what?”

“She had some nice jewelry. She got me mother’s diamond engagement ring, and by rights I should have it back, unless she sold it. Knowing her, she’d take the pennies off a dead man’s eyes, but it was a nice stone worth a bob or two, and I gave her a gold bracelet that cost me a few quid.”

“There was nothing. She didn’t have her own place when she was killed, but I think she left a suitcase with some contents, so I’ll make inquiries for you.”

Stanley opened a drawer and rooted through it, bringing out a dog-eared brown envelope. “You can have this—I got no use for it. It’s her birth certificate and crap.”

He passed Anna the envelope, but she didn’t open it.

“Thank you for seeing me, Mr. Potts,” she said as sincerely as she could.

In reply, he plonked himself back down on the sofa, not bothering to show her out.

In her car, Anna opened the envelope. There was, as he had said, a tattered birth certificate, along with a few old photographs. Some were stained and creased. There were pictures of Margaret aged about seventeen, others of her holding two small toddlers. There was also a Valentine’s card. Anna was surprised by the scrawled writing and the flowery verse that said how deep their love was. It was signed,
Loving you with all my heart, Stan.

Later that evening, Anna sat eating her supper at her kitchen table, looking at the contents of the envelope, the faded photographs especially. Her kitchen was compact, with a small breakfast bar and a more comfortable high stool than the one she had sat on at Emerald’s. She used her microwave oven more than her new gas one, and her fridge was small, fitted with a freezer compartment on the top. She’d made an omelette with salad and had stuck a list of groceries to the fridge door with a magnet. Her fitted cupboards had mostly tins of tomato soup inside. She was out of milk so had her coffee black.

She finished eating and placed her dirty dishes in the sink, washing them up before returning to look over the photographs. It was hard not to feel saddened by the knowledge of what had happened to these people. In one photograph, a young Stanley Potts stood with his hand resting on his wife’s shoulder. Her face had been scribbled over, perhaps by one of her children. Anna replaced everything in the envelope to take into the incident room the following morning. She was eager to get the team tracing Eric Potts; it was too much of a coincidence that he worked for a bailiff company. Perhaps this was the man to whom Margaret had turned when she needed help. He might also have contact with the ex–police officers. It could be the lead they so badly needed, at last.