Snarl (7 page)

Chapter Nine

Kate and Olbeck began a preliminary check of the building. The house was beautiful, but the horror of what had happened within it somehow tainted its elegance and charm. Kate, climbing the main staircase, was reminded of too many horror films where the victim climbed unknowingly to their doom. The heavy silk and velvet drapes that hung at every window seemed to bulge unpleasantly, as if concealing someone within their folds, waiting to jump out. The rooms and hallways seemed full of too many shadows, even with the bright sunlight outside. She shook herself mentally and told herself not to be so stupid, but ridiculously, she found herself hurrying to stay close to Olbeck as they moved from room to room.

“Anderton said it’s been searched already, right?” she asked, as they entered what was obviously the master bedroom. It had a four poster bed within it, draped in white linen. The covers were bunched messily at the foot of the bed.

Olbeck nodded absently, as he surveyed the room. An empty mug stood on one of the bedside tables, beside a stack of books. Kate went over to see what they were. No fiction at all; a pile of learned scientific works and what looked like several PHD theses. Kate checked her gloves were intact and picked one up, flicked to the front page, read a few paragraphs in increasing confusion and put it down again.

“See, that looks like English but it can’t be, because I can’t understand one word of it.”

Olbeck grinned. “Well, he’s a boffin, isn’t he? Dorsey, I mean.”

“Was,”
corrected Kate.

The grin fell from Olbeck’s face. “Yes. Was.” He walked over to the matching bedside cabinet on the opposite side of the bed. Here was a top of the range Kindle
, encased in a pink leather case, a half full water glass and a box of tissues. Olbeck opened the cabinet. Shoes, handbags and scarves were thrust in a piled heap within it. He began removing them, piece by piece, placing them neatly on the carpet.

“
Some nice stuff here,” he commented.

Kate took a look and nodded.
“Well, they weren’t exactly short of money, were they? They were loaded, in fact.”

“Yup.” Olbeck sat back on his heels and looked up at Kate. “Was that the reason for the security guard? Or was it because of MedGen?”

“Probably the latter. Don’t you think? Lots of rich people around here and I don’t think many of them have on-site security.”

She held out a hand and pulled Olbeck up onto his feet.

“Thanks. We’ll have to check.”

“There’s another thing,” said Kate as they moved onto the next room. “Mary said the door was locked when she arrived, right?”

“Yes.”

“But she didn’t mention anything about turning off the alarms. She said she knew the codes
, but I’m sure she didn’t say anything about turning off the alarms.”

Olbeck paused in the doorway to the room next to the Dorseys
’ bedroom.

“Yes, I think you’re right. She didn’t mention that, and she would have done, wouldn’t she? I mean, if the alarms weren’t turned off, they would have gone off after a few moments once Mary had entered the hallway, wouldn’t they?”

Kate nodded.

“I would have thought so. So either they weren’t turned on – why? – or they were disabled in some way
, or someone who knew the codes turned them off.”

“I’ll flag that up to Anderton. What else? Should we try and track down the CCTV footage now, leave this search ‘til later?”

Kate was touched that he was still deferring to her opinion, just as he had when they were true equals. She squeezed his arm. “I think we should. Just imagine if we can get a clear look at the perp. We could have this wrapped up by the end of the day.”

Olbeck laughed a cynical laugh. “You know how much I would love to believe that. Let’s go, then.”

 They retraced their steps back to the first room they’d come to, the conservatory at the side of the house. They could still hear the flash and whine of the cameras in the drawing room as the SOCOs continued their work.

“Where would they keep the equipment?” Olbeck
asked, as he stood, hands on hips, and stared up at the ceiling, as if it would give him the answer.

Kate tapped her chin with her finger, thinking.
“We should ask Mary Smith. She might know.”

“Good idea.”

But when they went back to the kitchen, Mary Smith had already left, carted away to the police station by Theo to make a statement. Kate shrugged when they were told by one of the uniforms.

“Well, back to looking.” She looked around the room at the few people remaining. “Does anyone know where the CCTV equipment was kept?”

There were blank looks, shrugs and ‘don’t knows’. One dark-haired officer, who looked as if he was barely out of Hendon, volunteered the information that there were two doors in the corridor outside that might contain what they were looking for. They thanked him and made their way in the direction he’d indicated.

The corridor was tiled in ancient red floor tiles and the walls were scuffed and marked. There was a rack for wellington boots and a coat stand piled with coats and hats. Kate and Olbeck walked to the end of the corridor which terminated in a small room, stacked with cardboard boxes and odds and ends of furniture, clearly used as nothing more than a store room.

“This was probably the servants’ hall, in olden times,” said Kate. “Don’t you think? Just off the kitchen.”

“Probably.” Olbeck glanced around once more and retreated back into the corridor. “How about these doors
, here?”

The first door, when opened, led to a wall cupboard
, but when Olbeck opened the second, he gave a satisfied chuckle. “Here we are. Good for that PC, he was right.”

It was a tiny room, almost a broom cupboard, bare of furniture except for a desk on which stood a bank of blank CCTV screens. Various pieces of equipment were assembled on the top of the desk, all with a suspicious lack of electrical activity.

“Hmm.” Olbeck peered over the back of the desk and then looked at Kate with a wealth of expression on his face.

“It’s turned off at the plug?” asked Kate.

“Got it in one.”

“Okay…”

They looked at each other and then both suddenly laughed.

“What did I say about solving the case by the end of the day?” Kate
giggled.

Olbeck
pushed a hand through his hair. “Oh God, you know you jinxed it as soon as you uttered the words. If you hadn’t said anything, we would have walked in here and found everything working perfectly…”

Kate looked at the blank row of
screens and grew sombre again. “Wait a minute,” she said. “Why the hell
are
they turned off? Why would you run a top-notch security system and not bother to switch it on?”

“Well, that’s easy,” said Olbeck. “Our perp turned it off. I bet he took the tapes
, too.”

“Tapes? Surely it would be digital?”

“Well, yes…I suppose. We’ll have to get Tech to look at it. Get your mate over here, what’s his name, Sam. He’ll soon be able to get hold of anything, if it’s there to be got.”

Kate stood looking at the screens, ru
bbing her finger along her jaw. “The murderer knew this place,” she said. “He must have done. It took us forever to find this little… cupboard. He must have known where to go.”

“Not necessarily,” said Olbeck. “We have no idea about times
, at this point. He could have been here all night, searched the whole house…although—” He stopped for a minute. “You’re right, in a way. It’s a hell of a risk to come all this way, with this many cameras, on the off chance that you
might
be able to disable them.”

“Exactly.”

They both stood looking at the dead equipment in front of them for a moment longer, as if it would suddenly, spontaneously, spring into life again. Then, almost as one, they turned and said, ”Let’s get going, then,” half laughed at their timing, and left the room, Olbeck shutting the door firmly behind him.

Chapter Ten

Stuart was back at the protest the next morning and was unsurprised to see
that neither James or Rosie, or even Angie, had made it. Sleeping off massive hangovers, probably. He introduced himself to the middle-aged lady who was behind the leaflet table, whose name was Jane. It was a cold day, with intermittent spitting rain, and no one came along to question or harangue them. After twenty minutes, Stuart decided that he’d be better off, chasing up his new friends.

Back at his car, he mused
over which direction to take. Almost without hesitation, he decided on the direction of the squat. As he drove there, he was uncomfortably aware of just how much he wanted to see Angie. He reflected on what had happened the night before in some disbelief. He would never have thought that he would go that far, actually sleep with someone he had under observation. He was half proud of himself, half aghast. He wanted to tell someone, just to share the secret; that particular secret amongst all the secrets he was having to keep, but he knew that he couldn’t. Who would he tell, anyway? Anderton? His boss? Aloud, he scoffed, shook his head and dismissed the thought. By the time he parked the car outside the scruffy house, he was firmly back into character.

He wanted to walk straight in but caution made him ring the doorbell and
, when that failed to work, knock on the peeling paint of the front door. After a wait of a few minutes, it was opened by a man – a boy, really – someone who Stuart had never seen before, with curly auburn hair, a half-asleep expression and dressed only in a dirty T-shirt and boxer shorts.

“Is Angie in?”

“What?” said the boy, scratching his neck. Then his expression cleared. “Oh, you’re Mike, aren’t you? Angie said you might be coming.”

Stuart felt a tremor of something: anxiety
, or was it anticipation? “She’s in, then?”

“Yeah. Upstairs.” He said nothing else but stood back to let Stuart into the house.

Stuart climbed the stairs to Angie’s glittering cave. He expected to find her lolling in bed, possibly naked, but she was standing in the middle of the room, dressed in a white vest and black combat trousers, feet in laced up black plimsolls. She looked…
alive
, that was the first word that sprang to mind. To Stuart’s eyes, the air around her shimmered for a moment and the casual cocky grin he was wearing dropped off his face within seconds.

She fixed him with her gaze, her face back to its beautiful blank mask again. Then she smiled and the odd moment of tension was broken.

“Hello, you,” she said, quite casually.

“Hi.” Stuart hesitated for a second, crossed the room and took her into his arms. She returned his kiss briefly but voraciously.

“Were you going out?” he asked, when he could breathe again.

“I was,” said Angie. “It can wait, though.”

This shouldn’t be happening, thought Stuart, even as their clothes fell to the floor. This shouldn’t be happening. I have to stop it. But still he was on the bed with her, under the covers with her, even while he was saying that to himself. I have to stop it, this can’t go on… but then it was useless, the words dropped away and there wasn’t room for any thought at all.

Afterwards, she lay face down with her head turned from him. He ran a hand down her back, marvelling at the perfection of her skin, that whiteness dusted with golden freckles. He thought she’d fallen asleep and was surprised when she spoke.

“Where do you live?”

“London,” Stuart said, briefly. Always stick as closely to the true facts as you can. Angie made an indeterminate noise.
“Have you lived here long?” he asked.

“’Bout six months.” Angie turned her head to look at him and he was struck anew by the perfection of her features.
She could be a model, he thought, opened his mouth to tell her and then firmly shut it again, cringing at the thought. What was the matter with him?

“Where did you live before?”

Angie shrugged with one shoulder. “With a friend.”

She said it in a neutral tone but Stuart was surprised at the sudden spurt of jealousy he felt. Better get over that, and quickly…

“So, when you’re not protesting, what do you do?” he asked, changing the subject

“I’m an artist.”

Inwardly Stuart rolled his eyes. Of course she was. “What kind of art? Paintings, you mean?”

Angie smiled. “All sorts of art. Multi-media
, mostly. Digital and video, and sound combined with physical media.”

“Right,” said Stuart, none the wiser.

Angie’s mouth quirked up at the corner. “This room is one of my works, you know.”

Stuart looked around him. The curtains were shut and the mirror pieces glittered dimly through the half-darkness.

“It’s a piece of work, all right.” He raised an arm slowly and lowered it, watching the infinite tiny reflections in the mirror pieces. Angie rested her head on her arm and watched him, still smiling.

“You know they say that you shouldn’t get between two mirrors,” she said. “It’s bad luck.”

“Why?” asked Stuart, still watching his arm in the mirrors.

Angie rolled onto her back.
“I don’t know. Perhaps because it drags out a piece of your soul.”

“Right,” said Stuart, grinning. “I’ll risk it.”

“Well, you have to have a soul in the first place.”

“Is that right?” asked Stuart. “Are you saying I don’t?”

She shook her head, smiling that closed, secretive smile again. “No, you’re all right,” she said. Then she said, in the same voice, “I don’t have one.”

“One what?”

“A soul.” She rolled to face him. They were eye to eye for a breathless, hushed moment while her words reverberated around the silent room. Then Stuart laughed and Angie laughed and the tension was broken.

“So,” said Stuart, keeping his tone very casual, “How did you get mixed up with all the protests, then?”

Angie kept her eyes fixed on him. She smiled a little. “Mixed up?”

“Yeah. I mean, how did you get into it in the first place?”

Angie’s smile grew wider. “I think you’re labouring under a bit of a misapprehension,” she said and giggled a little. “I’m not part of the protest. I don’t – I’m not into that sort of thing.”

“You’re not?” Stuart could feel the half smile on his face sag into non-existence. “So how come—
”

“I know
James and Rosie? I just do. We have a lot of parties.”

“Oh, right. So protesting’s not really your thing, then?”

Angie rolled onto her back again and yawned. “No. I don’t care enough about it. All I care about is—” She stopped for a moment and brushed away a strand of hair from her face. “I just want to make art. That’s all that really matters to me.”

“Good for you,” Stuart
said automatically, while his mind sifted through this new information. Topmost was the thought, sudden and inescapable, was that if this were true, he had no need of Angie’s company, anymore. He was disconcerted by the sudden jump of anxiety, of grief almost, that that engendered in him.

Get a grip, Stuart. You’re playing a dangerous game
, here.

“I could show you my portfolio
, if you like,” said Angie. The diffidence of her voice touched him.

“I’d like that,” Stuart said. Then, wanting to escape the clamouring voices in his head, telling him to leave, get out of there, try something else, he pulled her closer to him and kissed her.

*

En route to the hospital, Kate felt her phone buzz and jitter. A text from Andrew, asking if she was coming back to his house later. She realised, with a guilty jump of the heart, that she hadn’t spared him a second’s thought since she’d left him that morning. Could it really still be the same day? It felt as though a week had passed since that peaceful breakfast in his conservatory. It was only then that Kate remembered his suggestion that she move in with him. She swallowed, put the phone back in her bag without answering it and turned her mind from the problem.

On arrival at the hospital
, they were directed up to the Intensive Care Unit. There, they found Anderton pacing up and down in the reception area. He raised his eyebrows as they walked towards him, but Kate couldn’t read his expression. Did that mean Madeline Dorsey was still alive?

The smell of the hospital, a nostril-flaring mix
of disinfectant, old sweat and worse, brought Kate back to that time last summer, after the incident. She tried to think of it as
the incident
, not
the time I almost died
; it helped, somehow. It reduced its importance in her mind. She remembered those first confused and pain-filled weeks and then the long, slow process of recovery; endless physiotherapy appointments, counselling sessions, too many afternoons spent on her sofa watching crappy romantic comedies and anything that didn’t involve violence or bloodshed. Too many nights waking up with a sodden pillowcase, coming back to consciousness with a start, clasping her chest and gasping for air. She never dreamed directly about her attacker; instead she was attacked by birds with long sharp beaks, impaled by metal poles, or she fell endlessly towards spiked railings.

“Kate?”

She realised she’d come to a standstill in the middle of the room and blinked, bringing herself back to the present. Anderton and Olbeck were both regarding her with curiosity, tinged with a little concern. She forced a smile. “Just thinking,” she said. “Is there any news?”

Anderton looked sombre.
“Nothing definite. The docs are not holding out much hope, though, from what little I’ve been able to glean.”

Nothing of the ward could be seen through the opaque glass panels of the swing doors. Kate could picture Madeline Dorsey though, flat on her back on a hospital gurney, tubes and pipes and needles festooning her body. Hanging by her fingernails from a precipice, oblivion
in the abyss underneath.
Hold on, Madeline
. Would she drop to join Jack Dorsey, or cling on for her children? Which would it be?

Occasionally
, a harassed-looking doctor or nurse would hurry through the doors or past the windows of the ward. Kate knew her job was stressful, but it didn’t compare to the working conditions of these people. No wonder Andrew had opted for pathology; not for the physically squeamish, true, but you didn’t have to confront the kind of messy human emotions that a doctor to the living would have to deal with on a day to day basis. Thinking of Andrew, she checked her phone, reading his message again. Even as she was contemplating a reply, another text came through from him, repeating his former question. For the first time, Kate was conscious of a surge of annoyance. After a moment, she texted back
sorry, still on case, will be totally shattered so will head to mine. Call you later
. After another moment, she added a kiss to the end of the message and sent it. Then she turned her phone off and put it away.

After another hour’s wait, there was still no news. Anderton began to mutter about getting back to the office. Kate volunteered to
stay.

“Sure?” asked Anderton.

Kate nodded. Olbeck opted to go back with Anderton. As the two men left, they passed a woman in the doorway, a blonde, dressed in a white linen shirt and blue jeans, with long legs that ended in feet tucked into jewelled sandals. Her face was pretty but terribly drawn, her eyes red and her mouth pulled in tight. She was breathing fast, as if she’d been running. Kate watched her walk to the doorway of the ICU and hover, clasping her arms across her body. Then the woman turned, saw Kate watching her and came towards her.

“I don’t know what’s happening,” she said, her voice ragged with panic. “Why won’t somebody tell me what’s happening to Madeline?”

Kate got up immediately. “You know Madeline Dorsey?” she asked.

The woman nodded, a quick bob of the
head as if her neck were stiff. “I’m her sister. Harriet Larsen.” She eyed Kate with confusion. “Who are you?”

Kate introduced herself and Harriet blanched. For a second, Kate was sure she was going to faint and quickly grabbed Harriet’s arm, steering her over to the bank of chairs at the side of the room.

“Thanks,” said Harriet faintly, when she was safely seated. “I’m sorry, I just don’t know what to think – I can hardly take it in. Is it – is it true that Jack’s
dead
?”

Kate hesitated. Then she said, “There’s been no formal identification just yet
, but yes, I’m afraid he is.”

Harriet drew in her breath in a whooping gasp. She put one hand up to her trembling mouth, pearly painted nails pressed against her lips.

“Dead…” she whispered, half to herself. Then she cried, big ragged sobs, dropping her head so her blonde hair fell forward in a long, fair curtain.

Kate sat down next to her and kept a hand on Harriet’s arm. She let her cry for a few minutes and then gave her arm a comforting little squeeze. It was hard, she supposed, to question someone in the depths of extreme emotional torment
, but the truth was that, when someone was emotionally vulnerable, it was sometimes when you could learn some very valuable things. And time, naturally, was always of the essence. She waited for a slight cessation in Harriet’s tears and then, after murmuring a few words of condolence, she said “This must be terribly hard for you, Harriet, I’m so sorry. But if you could talk to me now, tell me about Jack and Madeline, it would really help. We need all the information we can get, if we’re going to catch the person who did this.”