Lazy Bones (31 page)

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was quieter than the screech and the smash of the music that would be fil ing his bedroom.

When they got back to Becke House, Thorne fil ed Kitson and Brigstocke in on how things had gone in Colchester. They conferred about progress on the other flank of the operation.

The Southern kil ing had plenty in common with those that had gone before: the cause of death; the layout of the murder scene; the wreath ordered in person from an out-of-hours floristry service - this time delivered as far as the hotel-room doorway, then hurriedly dropped after one look at the state of its recipient.

But there were plenty of differences too. There were new avenues which had to be explored...

Southern had been released from prison more than ten years previously. He hadn't been selected in the same way as the previous victims, and he was certainly approached differently.

Unlike Remfry or Welch, he had a whole life that had to be sifted through if they were going to find out just how the Miler had made himself part of it. Interviews, running into many hundreds, were stil being conducted with anyote who had contact with Southern: the people he worked with; the friends he drank with; the members of the gym he worked out at; the girlfriend he'd recently broken up with...

These people who had been part of his new life, would, for the most part, have had no idea that Howard Southern had once served time in prison. Even if he'd told any of them - and with some people it might have gained him kudos, or a round of drinks - chances are he wouldn't have told them what for.

Unfortunately for him, someone had found out exactly what Howard Southern had once done, and had kil ed him for it.

In his Office, Thorne went through his mail. As always, it was mostly junk. Pointless memos, press releases, crime s{atistics, new initiative outlines. He glanced through the monthly Police Federation newsletter, at a story about a local force recording themselves

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vhistling the theme tunes to a host of wel -known police TV shows. These recordings were being broadcast in some of the rougher estates and shopping centres in an effort to deter street criminals.

When Thorne had finished laughing, he checked his messages. There'd already been a cal from Joanne Lesser to say that she'd start checking the records the fol owing morning, and that some files had apparently been moved from County Hal to a new storage facility on an industrial estate just outside Chelmsford. The next one was from Chris Barratt at Kentish Town. There was nothing from Eve...

Thorne picked up the phone, wondering at the sharp twinge of disappointment he felt. He marvel ed, as he dial ed, at his seemingly endless capacity for indecision, for fucking about...

'About bloody time too,' he said.

'Calm down,' Barratt said. 'We haven't got him yet.'But we know

exactly who he is. We'l pul him first thing tomorrow morning.' 'How did you find him?'

'Are you listening? This is funny as fuck...'

'Go on...'

'He'd got rid of the stereo, right? Probably shifted it the same day,

got himself off his tits on the proceeds. Then, he has a problem...' 'Which is?'

'Your taste in music.'

'Eh?'

'The poor sod's had to make himself a bit conspicuous in the end. We got the nod eventual y because by al accounts he's spent the last four weeks trying to get rid of your bloody CD

col ection.'

'What?' Thorne's relief was al but cancel ed out by his outrage... By now, Barratt was making no attempt to hide his enjoyment. 'Couldn't pay anybody to take 'em off his hands, by al accounts. Been dragging them round every market and second-hand place in London...'

'Enjoy yourself, Chris. As long as I get them al back.'

'Listen, if I was you, when you do get them back, why don't you

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stick a few by the window, where people can see them. You know, as a deterrent...'

'I'm not listening. Just cal me when you've nicked him, al right?' 'Fine...'

'And I'l want five minutes.'

'No problem. I'm here al day...'

'Not with you, smartarse. With him...'

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TWENTY

He'd seen comedians on TV talking about how women could hold a hundred thoughts in their heads at one time and iuggle an assortment of tasks, while men were incapable of doing even two things at once. Wanking and maneuvering a mouge was about as much as a man could manage.

Even though he knew it was nonsense, he stil found the joke funny. Even as he sat working and planning the next kil ing...

Multi-tasking was something of a speciality, had to be, and even though the slightly more social y unacceptable stuff he did was the more exciting, he actual y enjoyed the day job too. He took pride in what he did. Of course, he couldn't have done the other things without it.

The next kil ing...

He didn't know for certain yet if the next would also be the last, but in a lot of ways it made sense. It would round things off very nicely. This one would be different in many ways of course, more symbolic than the others, but certainly no less enjoyable for it.

A date had yet to be set, but that was the final detail. The victim

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had been selected weeks ago. In fact, he'd pretty much selected himself.

Talk about being in the wrong place at the wrong time...

Thorne thought about the Restorative Justice Conference he'd sat through weeks earlier. He remembered Darren El is and the squeak of his shiny, white training shoes. He pictured the face of the old man who'd been sitting more or less where he was now...

Opposite him, in the Interview Room at Kentish Town station, sat a boy who Thorne knew to be seventeen, but, apart from the unexcited eyes, the rest of him might have belonged to any skinny-arsed fourth-former. Noel Mul en was stealing cars to order while others his age had been nicking pens and pick 'n' mix from Woolworth's. By the time his contemporaries were sneaking into pubs and feeling up girls, Noel had already acquired a decent-sized drugs habit and a growing reputation with the police in North-west London. There was a room that should have had his name on the door, in the young offenders' institute that at one time had welcomed both his elder brothers. "

He stil looked as if his mum should be washing his underpants and pouring the milk on his Rice Krispies...

'Why did you shit in my bed?' Thorne said.

The boy did a pretty good job of looking unutterably bored, but there was a jerkiness to the seemingly casual rol of the head, a tremor at the ends of the fingers. Thorne wondered how long it had been since he'd had a fix. Maybe not since he'd failed to sel Thorne's CDs,

to turn Cash into cash and score with it...

'Come on, Noel . . .'

'What's the fucking point? You going to put in a good word for me,

are you? Speak up for me in court?'

'No chance.'

'So why should I bother talking to you?'

Thorne leaned back and folded his arms. 'Listen, break into places,

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Noel, by al means. It's your job, after al . Break in and trash them a bit if you have to, while you're looking for the decent stuff, the gear that's going to score you the best deal. I can understand that, I real y can.

'Not just the posh places, either. Don't just do the rich bastards who you might, might have a legitimate reason to enjoy turning over. No, why not rob from your own? Dump on your doorstep. Do the ordinary, working idiots who live on your own estate, on the poxy estate that you've already done your best to make that little bit worse than it would have been anyway, by pissing in the lift and leaving dirty needles al over what passes for a playground. Smash your neighbour's door in and see how high a black and white TV can get you. Or some cheap jewel ery. Fuck it, any good stuff, the widescreens and the DVDs, wil have been rented anyway, so who cares? Stupid fuckers aren't insured, that's not your fault, is it...?'

'Jesus, have you finished?'

'Do it and feel nothing. See something and take it, because al that

matters is what you might be able to get for it. Feel fuck al ...' 'You're wasting your..."

'Feel luck al . Then see how you feel when one day one of your mates needs some cash and puts his foot through your mother's window. Size-nine Nikes tramping around your mum's living room, and going through her drawers. And maybe your mate's a little bit wired, a little bit over the edge, and maybe your mother's lying there in bed at the time...'

'It's because you're a copper.'

Thorne stopped, took a breath and waited.

'That's why I took a shit on your bed, al right?'

It made sense. Thorne wasn't so poor a detective that he hadn't considered the possibility that his flat had been targeted. That was the problem with Neighbourhood Watch. You didn't always know which neighbours were watching...

'How did you know?' Thorne asked.

'I didn't, not before I got in there. There was a photo that had fal en

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down behind one of your speakers. You, in your fucking PC Plod outfit...'

Mul en leaned back and folded his arms as Thorne had done. He looked at him, as he might look at a stereo or a VCR, evaluating it, vorking out whether it was worth taking.

'Your hair was darker then,' Mul en said. 'And you weren't such a fat cunt.'

Thorne nodded. He remembered the photo, had wondered where it had gone. It wasn't a picture he was hugely fond of, but stil , Mul en's response when he'd seen it a few weeks earlier had been a bit harsh.

'So, you take one look at an old photo and decide to use my bed as a crapper, that about right?'

Mul en grinned, starting to enjoy himself. His teeth were browning

where they met the gums. 'Yeah, more or less...'

'You cocky little strip of piss...'

Thorne's movement, and the scrape of his chair across the rio'or, caused Mul en to jerk back and stiffen, momentarily defensive. He appeared to recover his confidence just as quickly. "

'Look, it was nothing personal.'

'And it won't be personal when I come round there, knock you over and shit in your mouth, fair enough? I'm a copper and you're a burglar. Right, Noel? Clearly there's certain things we have to do. '

Mul en's expression was closer to pity than boredom. 'You're not going to do anything.'

Other than strike a few poses to try to make himself feel better, there was nothing that Thorne could do. He wondered if the old man he'd seen sitting opposite Darren El is had felt as useless. 'Are you sorry, Noel?' 'Am I what?'

'Sorry. Are you sorry?'

'Yeah. I'm sorry I got fucking caught.'

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Thorne's smile was genuine. A certain warped faith had been restored by Mul en's honesty. Perhaps, faced with a few years' hard time, he would learn a trick or two, learn how to turn it on in the same way that Darren El is had. For now, there was something heartening about Mul en's answer. Something reassuring about the fact that he real y and truly didn't give a toss.

There was a moment when Thorne almost liked him.

The moment passed, and for a minute and more, Thorne stared into Mul en's unexcited eyes until the boy jumped up, moved quickly across the room and began banging on the door.

Stone took the cal , held the receiver out towards Hol and. 'For you...'

As Hol and walked across their smal office, Stone put his hand over the receiver. 'She sounds sexy as wel .'

Hol and said nothing and took the phone. He'd pretty much learned to put up with Stone's arrogance, but he stil got impatient with the smirks and the shrugs and the knowing looks that actual y knew fuck al . Mind you, these days, h'e got impatient with a lot of things. 'DC Hol and.'

'This is Joanne Lesser...'

'Oh, hel o, Joanne.' Hol and looked up to see Stone rol ing his eyes and mouthing her name. Hol and casual y stuck up a finger.

'No luck on the actual files yet,' she said. 'I did leave a message yes

terday. About some of them being moved?'

'OK. I didn't see that, but...'

'Don't worry, I'm stil working on it. I found out something else, though.'

'Right...' Hol and picked up a pen, began to doodle as he listened. 'A col eague on the team here reckons that the old index cards, from years back, are al piled up down in our cel ar. I'l try and dig them out, presuming they haven't al gone rotten...'

'Do you think the cards for Mark and Sarah Foley wil be down there?' 'That's why I rang. I don't see why not. There's probably not much 268

information, they're just smal cards, you know? The proper files are probably six inches thick...'

'What's on them?' Hol and glanced up to see Stone staring across at him, interested.

'Usual y just the basic stuff,' Lesser said. 'Case number, DOBs, placement dates and names of carers...'

Hol and stopped doodling, wrote down 'names & dates'. 'That sounds great, Joanne. Real y helpful...'

Tl cal you when I've got the information then, shal I?'

'Can you e-mail it? Probably safer...'

When he thanked her again for her trouble, he could almost hear the blushing.

'Sounded good,' Stone said, after Hol and had hung up.

'Reckons she can get us a list of al the kids' foster parents,' Hol and explained. 'The dates they were placed in care...'

Stone looked thoughtful. 'Is she going to carry on looking for the ful files?'

'Probably no stopping her, but I reckon these names and dates ae as much as we're going to need.'

'Let me know when you get them,' Stone said. Tl give you a hand on it.'

Hol and leaned back, stretched. 'Shouldn't be much to do. I think I can manage it on my own...'

'Please yourself.' Stone looked back to his computer screen, began to type.

Hol and knew that it had been a fairly petty moment of self-assertion. More so, considering that he didn't real y consider it to be a worthwhile line of inquiry in the first place. Thorne had got a bee in his bonnet about it, so Hol and would do what needed doing, but he couldn't help thinking that they were almost certainly wasting their time.

He didn't see how knowing where Mark and Sarah Foley had been twenty-five years ago was going to help them find out where they were now.