The television noise was coming from her bedroom upstairs. Kathy tapped on the door and a little voice said, ‘Come in.’
‘I just wanted to say hello, Tracey.’
‘Hello.’ The girl was stretched out on her stomach on the bed and didn’t turn away from the screen, where some children were painting with their fingers on a wall.
‘You are happy here, aren’t you, Tracey?’
‘Oh yes. Aren’t they stupid? They think they’re being like artists but they’re just making a mess. My Daddy’s a real artist, and so am I.’
‘Are you?’
‘Oh yes. Look, I’ll show you.’
She suddenly ducked forward and reached under the bed, pulling out a small canvas. ‘I did this with real brushes. It’s a picture of me with yellow hair.’ She handed it to Kathy.
‘So it is. It’s very good. Betty showed me one just like this.’
‘This is it! I gave it to Betty as a present when I left, but Grandpa got it back for me.’ Tracey suddenly cocked her head. ‘What is that noise? Who are those people?’
‘They’re friends of mine. They want to have a look around the house while we all go for a car ride together. You’d better put your coat back on again, because it’s still cold outside.’
Kathy looked out the window into the street. Across the way, Enid and several other neighbours were standing at their front doors watching the police vehicles arriving, and people in white plastic overalls making their way to the Nolans’ front door. Enid had a phone to her ear, alerting the neighbourhood.
B
y the following morning the physical evidence had become overwhelming. In Len Nolan’s workshop they had found a set of Japanese Iyoroi brand chisels with hollow ground backs. Upon laboratory examination one had been established beyond doubt as the implement which had caused the marks at the various crime scenes. It had traces of blood on the handle which matched Gabe Rudd’s, and his blood had also been found on a pair of gloves in a toolbox in the workshop. Len Nolan’s DNA had been found to match the unknown DNA on the bloodstained shoes found in the bin near Rudd’s house. This was the DNA which the lab had found, on Brock’s prompting, to belong to a close blood relative of Tracey Rudd.
The Nolans responded to these damning facts with a strange mixture of self-justification and denial, Len full of bluster and Bev quietly insistent. Yes, they had hidden Tracey and lied to the police, but no, they were neither criminals nor murderers. Len Nolan freely admitted that the chisel was his, and even showed Brock the little mark which he had branded on the handle in case it was ever stolen. The gloves and shoes were also his, he conceded, and Bev could recall the shops where he’d bought them. Len also acknowledged that he had only one key for his workshop, the one on the key ring they had found in his pocket.
But when it came to linking these things to the murders in Northcote Square, they protested their total innocence. They vehemently denied any involvement and could offer no explanation. When asked about Tracey’s self-portrait, removed presumably from Betty’s house at the time of her murder, Len could only say that he had found it on their doorstep one morning, wrapped in a plastic bag. They hadn’t told Tracey that Betty, or Stan, or her father were dead.
The contrast between willing cooperation in some things, and total denial in others, began to worry Brock and made him wonder if the couple was suffering from some kind of psychological condition. A psychiatrist was brought in to examine them and spoke of obscure cases of dissociative fugue and multiple personality disorder in which couples had been involved, experiencing periods of shared amnesia.
When shown the photograph of the Christmas party, Len agreed that he had been the photographer, and they found the space in their family album from which it had been removed. When they looked at the picture both Len and Bev became wistful. Prompted by Kathy, Bev volunteered that it was the last time they saw their daughter smile. Within a few weeks she would be dragged from the waters of the canal. Kathy pointed to the three people standing behind Jane and her baby, and Bev offered the opinion that all three of them, in their different ways, had contributed to Jane’s despair—Gabe by his neglect, Betty by her mad claims upon her child, and Stan by his morbid preoccupation with death.
‘So you’d say they were responsible for Jane’s death, would you, Bev?’ Kathy suggested, and Bev agreed that she would, apparently without any recognition that she was talking about three murder victims.
‘There’s a lot more work to be done,’ Brock said unhappily, sinking back into the armchair in Commander Sharpe’s office. ‘We’ll have to pick away at every detail to be sure we’ve got it right.’
‘But still,’ Sharpe said, stroking the cover of Brock’s report appreciatively,‘an excellent piece of detective work.’
‘I’ve spent hours locked up with those two over the past days, and I still can’t get inside their heads. I can’t . . .’ he groped for the word, ‘. . . see it.’
‘Oh, come on. Do you have children, Brock? I should know.’
‘A son. He’s in Canada now, I believe.We’ve lost touch.’
‘Well, I have a daughter. She’s intelligent, ambitious and beautiful, and holds down a responsible job in the City. She married a deadbeat who gets up at noon and spends his day between the pub and the betting shop. He hasn’t driven her to suicide yet, but even so there have been many times when I wanted to slit his damn throat. And let me tell you that a million parents and grandparents in the same situation would have paid for my defence. I’m not sure that I followed all the mumbo jumbo in the shrink’s report, but I can understand the Nolans perfectly, and let’s face it, the physical evidence is irrefutable. It’s a great result, Brock. Five murders solved, including Wylie for Aimee Prentice and Lee Hammond, and, best of all, Beaufort’s dead.’
‘Dead?’ Brock sat upright.
‘The committee, not the man. As of midday today the Beaufort Committee was suspended, consigned to limbo, relegated to the outer darkness. Nobody wants to hear about it.’ He paused, clearing his throat in a way that made Brock look up. ‘Which means, unfortunately, that your promotion to super is best left in abeyance at this stage. Much as we appreciate the work of you and your excellent team, we mustn’t appear to be crowing, you understand?’
‘All right,’ Brock said, ‘but my sergeant, Kathy Kolla, is long overdue for a move up to inspector. She passed the exams ages ago. I’d like something to be done about that.’
‘Blockages in our personnel profile,’ Sharpe nodded, as if regretting a medical problem. ‘I’ll see what I can do. She’ll probably have to move to another unit, though.’
‘No.’
‘No? Oh, very well. Leave it with me. There’s another matter. You probably know that at least one well-known reporter has got wind of you interviewing Beaufort at Shoreditch—somebody at the station probably tipped him off. They sniff scandal, Brock, and they’re going to be after you, very soon, and we’d like to avoid that. Sir Jack has had the good sense to go abroad. And I was recently reminded— no, reprimanded—by Human Resources, or whatever they call themselves this week, that I’ve allowed you to accumulate an intolerable amount of untaken leave.’ Sharpe aimed his most piercing look at Brock. ‘Time for a holiday,’ he said firmly.
‘Yes,’ Brock said. ‘I’ve been thinking that myself.’
Sharpe, who had clearly been anticipating resistance, looked surprised. ‘Good. When?’
‘Tomorrow, actually.’
‘Better still! Somewhere far away, I hope?’
‘Australia.’
Sharpe leapt to his feet and shook Brock’s hand as if to seal the matter before Brock could change his mind.
H
e drove down to Battle that evening and spent the night with Suzanne. The house seemed unnaturally still without the children, making Brock feel slightly self-conscious, as if they were starting a new relationship. He saw how much work Suzanne had put into preparing for the trip—new clothes, gifts for her family, the house readied, bags packed, documents assembled, arrangements for the stopover in Singapore, detailed instructions for her assistant on running the shop—while he had done nothing, barely having checked that his passport was current.
The next morning they drove up to London to collect Brock’s things in preparation for their departure that evening. As they went through his house he realised how disorganised it was. Despite his protests, Suzanne helped with the piles of washing, ironing and clearing up, vetting his packing. ‘It’s spring there remember, David,’ she said, and somehow the words brought home to him what a step they were taking.
They broke off for a last English pub lunch at The Bishop’s Mitre in the high street, and as he supped his pint he was aware of Suzanne scrutinising him gravely with her intelligent grey eyes. ‘What’s wrong?’ he asked.
‘You’re still thinking about work, aren’t you?’
‘Yes.’
‘They’re a bit like me, aren’t they, the Nolans?’ she said. ‘Stepping in to protect their grandchildren.You’ve thought of that haven’t you?’
‘Of course.’
‘And you’re still not absolutely sure that they did those murders.’
‘No.’
‘I could, if I had to.’
He looked at her and smiled.‘No, not like that. And the point is, they didn’t have to.’
‘Oh well,’ she put her hand on his, ‘they’ll still be here when we get back, won’t they?’
‘That’s true.’
‘It feels odd, the prospect of seeing Emily again,’ Suzanne said. ‘I mean, I’m very fond of her, and we were close when we were children, but she was the classic older sister, always in charge, always manipulating things to suit herself. It was a relief to get out from under her shadow.We’ll have to watch she doesn’t completely take over when we get there. She’s probably organised every minute.’
When they got back to the house Suzanne decided to lie down for an hour while Brock finished clearing up. There was a pile of documents relating to the case that he planned to drop off at Shoreditch on the way to the airport, and as he gathered them up he came again upon the photograph of Tracey’s first birthday party. It was this that had really convinced him about the Nolans’ guilt. Here was everyone, all the victims, gathered together in a single moment captured by—who else but the murderer? There was a psychological aptness, a completeness about it that had seemed irresistible, crowned by the defiance of that final act of pinning it to the wall of Gabe’s studio.
But what disturbed Brock was how poorly the Nolans had lived up to the vicious bravado of that gesture. Their defence had been naive and unprepared, without cunning or manipulation. That word reminded Brock of Suzanne’s description of her sister, pulling strings in the background. He put the photograph aside and saw another picture beneath it, a print of the Fuseli etching that Kathy had copied to him. In the background were the two figures hanging from the gibbet, and in the foreground the two philosophers, one riding on the back of crouching humanity. Visual clues, if you could only decipher them; the case had been full of them.
When Suzanne saw him later that afternoon she found him keyed-up and distracted, ramming the last of his papers into a briefcase, and she put it down to the imminent journey. She felt the same way herself; things would settle down once they were on the move.
‘Shall I make us a cup of tea?’ she asked.
‘We should go,’ he said. ‘I want to make a call on the way.’
It was growing dark when they loaded the last bag, locked Brock’s house and set off towards Shoreditch where he’d arranged for Kathy to drive them to the airport and bring back his car.
He crossed the river on London Bridge and continued north along Bishopsgate and Shoreditch Street before turning off into a maze of narrow lanes and emerging into Northcote Square. He parked outside the glass doors of The Pie Factory and said, ‘Won’t be a minute.’
Fergus Tait was standing talking to the girls of ‘Gabe’s Team’. They all turned to Brock as he came in.
‘Can I have a word?’ he said.
‘Of course, Chief Inspector,’ Tait beamed through his big glasses.
‘In private.’
‘Follow me.’
The women watched them curiously as Tait led him away to his office.
Tait waved to a seat, eyeing Brock’s clothes, the light windcheater and cotton drills, the polo shirt. ‘You look as if you’re off-duty, Mr Brock.’
‘I’m just leaving on holiday, actually.’
‘Somewhere warm by the look of it.’
‘Yes. I’m on the way to the airport, but I thought I’d stop by. There was something I wanted to tell you.’
‘Can I offer you a drink? I find I always need one before a flight.Whisky?’
‘Thanks.’
Tait poured two glasses and handed one to Brock. ‘Cheers. Is it about the case? Your people have kept me pretty well informed, I think. I must say I was as staggered as everyone else when they told me about the Nolans.’ He shook his head to emphasise his amazement.‘What a shock.’
‘But not bad for business, I suppose?’
Tait grinned. ‘By no means. If I told you what one of these was worth now . . .’ He indicated the puppy cans in the glass case behind him. ‘Well, let’s just say that it’s a good bit more than the price of your holiday, wherever you’re going, first class. But you know, I was talking about this to one of our customers in the restaurant last night, and they pointed out that a few years ago the Nolans would probably have got away with it. It was the science that caught them, was it not? The DNA and the laboratory analysis. No offence to you, of course, Chief Inspector, but police work is science now, isn’t it?’
‘Actually that’s what I came to tell you, that the science was wrong. I don’t believe the Nolans did kill Betty and Stan and Gabe.’
‘What?’ The affable smile vanished from Tait’s face. ‘You’ve got new evidence?’
‘No, not a thing. Just a feeling.’
‘Well . . . I don’t follow.’
‘It’s a matter of interpretation and feel. Art rather than science. The science may say the Nolans are guilty, but the art says they’re not.’
Tait guffawed.‘Oh,come on.What on earth do you mean?’
‘You’re in the art business. Don’t you get presented with work like that? Your head says it should be okay, but you know it doesn’t really feel right.’