Double Fault (19 page)

‘At the tennis club, sir,' she said, wide-eyed with innocence.

‘What the hell was he doing there?'

‘Playing tennis.'

‘That's preposterous!'

She almost choked: she would have expected the old chief constable to have used such a word, but not Mr Modernity here. ‘Why would you think that, sir? He's not a police officer any more. Just Joe Public, who happens to have done us a favour by alerting us so early to Livvie's disappearance. Zac's been coaching him for months, as I've told you. They're good friends.' Perhaps now wasn't the moment to tell him that within two hours Zac and he would be seen playing together. And she certainly hoped Ray would keep his mouth firmly zipped about yesterday's paedophile moment. Ninety-nine per cent of her colleagues would laugh their socks off. Wren would see it as an incident with potential repercussions.

‘I thought you might have suggested some restraint was in order. I was clearly mistaken.' He paused for a few moments, perhaps waiting for a contrite apology, which he did not get. ‘Now, the youth centre skeletons. What progress can you report there?'

‘Very little. We've allocated some staffing to see if our prime suspect may have committed any other murders in towns where he also worked; he himself is dead.' Something started to fizz in her brain. She raised a hand, either to stop him speaking or like a schoolchild asking permission to leave a classroom. ‘Sir, you spoke earlier about police intuition. Can you spare me – I'll get back to you the moment I can.' She didn't wait to hear his permission or otherwise.

She'd more or less instructed the team working on the Ashford skeletons to stand down over the weekend, but wasn't surprised – or in any way displeased – to find several of them at their desks. Madge Stewart, halfway through a huge muffin, was so engrossed in what she was looking at on her computer that she didn't clock Fran's presence until Fran coughed gently.

‘No, don't get up. You're not officially here, are you, Madge, any more than I am. What I want is the pictures of all the kids who disappeared. One of them, at least. Christopher thingy.'

‘Christopher Manton, ma'am?'

‘That's him. The scary one.' She almost tore the photo out of the younger woman's hand. ‘Thanks. Sign this out for me, would you? Thanks. Back as soon as poss …'

‘I want your permission to do something very sensitive, sir,' Fran said, once more in Wren's office. ‘You may not like it, but I think it's necessary.'

He nodded. She was to continue speaking.

She laid the photo of Manton on his desk. ‘Do you recognize this young man, sir?'

‘No. Why should I? Wait a moment, he does look familiar. No, I'm imagining it.' All the same, he lifted it and turned it one way and another again.

‘I'd like your permission to get the boffins to compare this with another photograph, sir.'

Wren froze. ‘Why would you need my permission to do that?'

‘Because it would be one of Sean Murray. To see if they're one and the same person.' She touched the photo. ‘This boy was one of the kids involved in the Ashford youth club project. Christopher Manton. And it matters because if Malcolm Perkins doesn't seem to have killed anyone else, our other suspect is Christopher Manton. The other kids, some of whom were reportedly scared of him, said he was idle, both on the football pitch and on the site before he disappeared – which is what a lot of other people did from there, of course, so I'm not jumping to any conclusions. If he's Sean Murray, then he can't have been a victim, can he? But it's just – just – conceivable that he was the killer. Who somehow or other took on a new identity, got qualifications and joined the Met.' She interrupted herself, speaking slowly: ‘It does seem a big leap, from a fully signed up dosser to someone with three A levels, a degree, a postgraduate qualification … What would change one's motivation so much?'

Wren's face was a study in incomprehension: clearly he'd always been highly motivated.

‘Love? Religion?' she persisted. ‘So he joined the Met and came to us – and then ran away the moment he heard Don Simpson telling him that human remains had been discovered.'

He never had much colour, but now he was ashen. ‘You're saying that Sean Murray could be a mass murderer?'

‘I'd rather say I'd like to eliminate that as a reason for him to disappear off the face of the earth,' she said steadily. And, as it happened, truthfully.

Fingers so tightly interlaced that the knuckles gleamed white against the purpling flesh, he stared at the desk. Then he looked her straight in the eye. ‘Do it. You have my official permission. But if any word of this gets out—' He was about to bluster threats he almost certainly wouldn't be able to fulfil.

‘It won't, sir,' she said curtly, and left the room.

‘S
tart low, finish high! Come on, Mark, take that right hand up higher. Think Excalibur! You're leading a charge!' For the moment, for no matter how short a moment, Zac seemed to have forgotten his pain by concentrating fully on the coaching session.

As for himself, Mark had never worked harder on his backhand. He started low and finished high as if his life depended on it – more, as if Livvie's life depended on it. He wasn't so engaged, however, that he was unaware his presence was causing comment, if not some consternation. News of yesterday's incident had clearly got around. Perhaps it had been a mistake to come here after church, but, as he'd told Fran, it had been Zac's idea. He was glad he'd included the whole family in the prayers of intercession he'd said earlier. Zac and Bethany, who were christening, Christmas and Easter churchgoers – heavens, was Easter only last week? – had arrived a little late and flustered, with young Jack clutching a cuddly dinosaur, of all things, and although they were a different generation from the elderly congregation, they must have felt the glow of sympathy that enfolded them.

Casually Zac called him to the net, as if to demonstrate a bit of technique that he'd missed. ‘Are those guys planning to set up a lynch mob?' he asked, pointing to the centre of his racquet head, but indicating with pointed glance an animated group of young men.

‘You might have to cut me down from the hanging tree,' Mark said, not quite joking.

‘There was some kid over by your car. Tell you what, I'll stroll over as if I'm getting something out of my boot. I'll see what he's up to. And you can work on your serve. Remember what I said about taking the ball as high in the air as you can reach?' He jogged briskly from the court, as if heading for his car, but swerving at the last moment and disappearing from view with a huge bellow of rage. The players stampeded towards the source of the noise. Mark abandoned all pretence of trying to achieve topspin and joined them.

Zac had the junior captain pinned against the side of someone's Chelsea tractor – with luck, the young man's own, since all he would be able to see was his face getting nearer and nearer the paintwork, which was nicely smudged where his sweaty face repeatedly hit it. Any moment now the sweat would be diluted by blood: the thuds of flesh and bone against metal were getting decidedly louder.

‘Hold it, Zac.' Once he'd used that voice to carry across a swarm of hooligans. And here it was again, surprising everyone, not least himself. ‘Zac, stop. It won't bring finding Livvie any closer. Zac, I said stop it.' The poor bugger's rage and terror, all those hours of viciously painful and frustrating waiting needed to be vented somehow, but not like this. ‘Grab him, for Christ's sake!' The tall guys who'd guarded Mark himself the previous day obliged.

Mark had a chance to glance at his Audi. It now wore the legend PEDAPHIL SCUM scratched into the side – it looked like a bunch of keys job.

At last Zac turned sobbing from his target. Mark shoved his way through the melee to gather him up into his arms, as he'd held Dave when Tina had died. If only Fran were here – she'd know what to do or say. Over Zac's shoulder, he projected his voice again. ‘Some of you know there was trouble here yesterday. Some of you may know what it was, and why. Whatever your own feelings about my playing here today, for God's sake consider Zac's. Does he need this sort of shindig? Use your heads, for heaven's sake.'

There was muttering. He'd no idea how things might go. But at last the A team captain, a young man whom Mark had only met a couple of times, since their games were literally leagues apart, caught Mark's eye, as if wanting permission to say something.

He coughed: speechifying was clearly not his thing. ‘Harry Mansfield, sir.'

Expected to smile and nod in acknowledgement, Mark obliged. He tried not to show how tickled he was by the courtesy, which reminded him of Marco, always being far more polite with his
Sirs
and
Ma'ams
than any English boy.

Mansfield cleared his throat again. ‘If Zac wants you here, sir, we want you here. And we don't want little shits like Toby around the place. Mark, I give you my word that that damage will be sorted. I'll talk to Toby's dad about paying. If he doesn't come up with the goods, the club will.' Reddening to the ears, he shoved towards the two men and held out a conciliatory hand.

Someone started to clap. Mark held his breath. Would the pace increase to real applause or continue to sound as if he was being given the bird?

Zac pulled away, his face still working. Then he actively man-hugged Mark. The clapping was definitely applause.

Mark blushed. ‘Look, we're still looking for that poor child.' Damn, that slip of the tongue again! ‘Like I said in church this morning, the police need information, any tiny snippet, some scrap of what could be nonsense. Yesterday afternoon those girls came up with what may well be a real gem, though they were almost too embarrassed to mention it. Please, search your memories. I know you're not Golden Oldies, but something might have occurred on Sundays just like this one that might have struck you as odd but without a context meant nothing at all. I've already put the senior investigating officer's contact details on the noticeboard. Please – copy them down and use them, whatever time of night or day anything occurs to you.'

‘There was a rumour about horses,' a woman with a Sloane Ranger voice said.

‘There still is. And we –
the police
– would be more than grateful if you would check any stabling to which you have access. As I told the girls yesterday, it's not grassing someone up. It's literally helping the police with their enquiries. It could be the difference between a life saved and a life lost. Livvie's life saved and Livvie's life lost.' He'd hoped to use that as an exit line, not to resume his coaching session but to go and retrieve his things and head home in the scarred Audi.

‘What about search parties? The villagers helped in that case in North Wales, didn't they?' Sloane Ranger continued. ‘I know most of us are weekenders, but that doesn't mean we can't help.'

It was hardly the spontaneous upsurge of community spirit the police might have hoped for, but it was an offer, and would do poor Zac no harm.

‘Of course it doesn't. But I'm only a club member like yourself. The person to contact is DCI Ray Barlow. He'll know about search teams.'

‘What about that woman who was on TV last night? She looked as if she'd got her head screwed on.'

That's no woman; that's my fiancée
. ‘Detective Chief Superintendent Harman?' Who would welcome an uncoordinated barrage of well-meaning offers like a hole in the head. ‘She's in overall charge of the Kent team, which is working alongside a unit from a national police organization called CEOP. But Ray Barlow's your man. He was the one who came out here yesterday to talk to Flora and Emily. He'll know which of his team is organizing search parties. For Zac's sake, for Livvie's sake, please do all you can.' Another exit line, surely to God.

‘So what would your advice be?' The same woman.

He smiled at her. ‘Get the names of everyone here prepared to make up a search team. Or who can offer other skills.' If only one of them could pilot a chopper with thermal imaging equipment. ‘Do it straight away, and then call Ray. The sooner the better, I promise you.'

He and Zac withdrew to the sidelines. ‘Thanks for saving my bacon, not to mention the poor old motor.'

‘Bastard. Yeah, it was touch and go.'

‘Do you think this lot'll be able to organize themselves?'

‘Dot, the one who spoke: she's a barrister. Saul over there is a brain surgeon. Sadie works as a dinner lady. Alastair's a civil servant.'

‘I'd back Sadie,' Mark said. ‘Look, you should be back home with Bethany and Jack.'

‘Not to mention Ermintrude,' Zac said, with the nearest thing to a smile Mark had seen from him for days.

‘Ermintrude?'

‘The family liaison officer. It's her smile. Always there. Just like the cow's on
Magic Roundabout
. Not that she's a cow in any other sense. Nice woman. Emma Poole. But I shall be so glad to see the back of her.'

‘The moment Livvie's back, you will. No, actually, she may hang on a bit longer to keep the media at bay, of course. But you should be getting back home anyway.' He flicked a look at his watch – Tina's watch. It had stopped. ‘Must be almost lunchtime – don't want to miss your Sunday roast.'

‘Come too. Beth always cooks too much. Likes bubble and squeak the next day.'

‘Zac, I'd love to. But you know that the media are watching your place like hawks. What rubbish would they make of me popping into your house?' He slapped him on the arm. ‘Home, Zac – for Bethany and Jack's sake.'

As he waved him off he couldn't resist drifting towards the knot of players, all, it seemed, talking and gesticulating at once. Of its own accord, his thumb found Ray's phone number. He explained briefly what was going on, was passed to a CEOP man, Sergeant Terry, who was running the search today.