Prime Suspect (Prime Suspect (Harper)) (28 page)

He strode away and she opened the door. All the men in the room had their backs to her; they were watching Maureen Havers.

“These shots were taken on the day Karen died,” said Havers, pointing to a group of photos on the notice-board. “You can see quite clearly that her nails were short. But these”—she pointed to another group—“these were taken a week before. Look at her hands.”

In the second batch Karen’s nails were long and red. Sergeant Amson turned to Jones. “Get on it, check with her flatmates, see where she got them done!”

While Jones looked up the number, the others crowded around the photos. Still not one man had turned towards Tennison. Jones picked up the phone and started dialling.

Highly embarrassed, Tennison walked to the center of the room. “I won’t harp on, but I want all of you to know that I appreciate you backing me up . . .”

Muddyman hurtled in, shouting, “Suspect’s on the move, guv’nor, with his girlfriend! The lads reckon something’s going down!”

Jones was through to the flat. “Lady Antonia? This is DC Jones from Southampton Row police station. We need to know if Karen used a beauty parlor or hair salon, and if so do you know if she had . . . excuse me . . .” He beckoned frantically to Havers. “What do you call them?”

“Nail extensions.”

Excited, Tennison was getting into top gear. “Right, I reckon this is it, we’ve got him on the run . . .”

Jones slammed the phone down. “Yes! She went to a place in Floral Street, Covent Garden; had an account there!”

Amson, already on the move, pointed at Jones. “Check it out, Daffy! Take Rosper with you, and keep in radio contact!”

Tennison was champing at the bit. “Let’s go! Terry, you’re with me!”

She ran out, Amson on her heels. DC Jones grabbed his jacket, a rather smart double-breasted job, and bellowed to Rosper, “Let’s go!” But he paused a moment beside Maureen Havers and winked. “Good on ya, Maureen! See ya in the bar tonight.”

She watched him leave. “What a bloody prat! Since he got those suede shoes he thinks he’s Don Johnson . . .”

It was suddenly quiet, as it always was before the scream went up. Havers looked at the photographs Karen Howard’s mother had sent, glossy six-by-ten modeling shots. They had only been interested in her nails, but now she looked at the girl’s lovely face. Karen had been a beautiful girl with a freshness to her skin that shone out from the photographs. Her hair was silky, her eyes bright. It was obvious that she had still been an amateur, the poses weren’t quite right, but maybe that was what gave her an air of innocence, of childlike vulnerability.

Havers was not the only police officer, male or female, who felt protective towards such victims, as if it was their responsibility to ensure that they could rest in peace. She brushed her hand across the photograph.

“I think we’ve got him, Karen, love,” she whispered. The dead girls stared sightlessly into the empty room: Karen, Della, Jeannie, Angela, Sharon, Ellen, as if they too were waiting to rest.

11

A
s her patrol car raced through the heavy traffic, Tennison sat next to the driver, listening in on the open channel. Amson was sitting on the edge of the back seat, trying to see where they were going.

DC Oakhill was reporting George Marlow and Moyra Henson’s every move direct to them.

“Suspect leaving taxi now, with Henson. Entering Great Portland Street station. They’ve split up, she’s gone down to the trains and he’s coming out on the north side, over.”

DI Haskons cut in. “I got him! I’m on foot, heading down the Euston Road, outside Capital Radio, repeat, I’m on foot. He’s hailed another bloody taxi, over.”

“I’ll take the woman . . .” Oakhill’s voice faded out.

“We’ll go straight to Euston, see if we can head him off at the pass,” said Tennison.

George Marlow leaned in at the taxi window to speak to the driver, and pointed towards Euston. Then he hopped in the back, but the taxi made a left turn towards Camden Town.

A plain car, driven by DC Caplan, slotted into the traffic behind the cab. His passenger, DI Muddyman, reported, “OK, we’re there. Suspect in black cab, heading for Camden Town. No, right, he’s turned right, towards Euston again. We’ve got him, we’ve got him now, turning right again, back towards the Euston Road, over.”

DC Jones rushed out of the Floral Street beauty salon and stuck his head through the car window to talk to DI Burkin.

“They had her down for a full day on the second of January, the day before that modeling job where she had the long nails. But she didn’t book a manicure, and they don’t do these nails, whatever they’re called. One of the assistants, a Dutch chick, says she recommended a woman in the market.”

“Shit,” Burkin said. “We can’t get the car in there. You leg it, and I’ll meet you in Southampton Street.”

The black taxi weaved its way down a side street and reached the corner of Euston Road. There were two vehicles now between it and Muddyman’s unmarked car.

The cab edged into the solid traffic on the Euston Road. Marlow was out of the door on the far side and had disappeared into a junk furniture store before any of them could blink.

“Shit! This is Muddyman. Marlow’s out of the cab, taxi is empty, repeat, Marlow again on foot. Biker, come in, biker . . .”

Outside the junk shop the cyclist in the skintight Lycra pedal-pushers slowed down and bent to fiddle with his toe-clips. He spoke softly into his radio.

“He’s out, heading along the Euston Road again, on foot, over.”

On the opposite corner, Muddyman was out of the car and following, keeping a good distance from Marlow.

Oakhill came close to losing Moyra Henson in the crowded complex of tunnels and staircases at Baker Street, and had to force the doors open to board the southbound Jubilee line train.

He threaded his way through the carriage to stand by the next set of doors. Henson was staring into space; then she turned and studied her reflection in the dark window, and fished in her handbag for a square doublesided mirror. She licked her lips and threaded her fingers through the front of her hair and shook it out, then folded the mirror and zipped it back into her bag.

She was totally unaware of Oakhill watching her, strap-hanging only a few feet away.

Amson was leaning between the front seats with a map in his hand. “He’s here, could be heading for Euston or King’s Cross, but he’s ducking and diving . . .”

“Hold it, Control’s coming through.” She raised a hand to the earpiece on which she was picking up relayed messages. “He’s jumped on a number seventy-three bus. No, he’s off it, he’s turned in the direction of Battle Bridge Road, behind King’s Cross station . . .”

Amson pointed it out on the map. “That’s here. Doesn’t look like he’s going for a train, but there are lock-ups in the railway arches all along here . . .”

“Come on, you bugger, go for the car, get your bloody car!”

A voice said in her ear, “You’re out of luck, car five-four-seven. Your man’s just gone into a café, he’s sitting talking to the owner. It’s the taxi stopover . . .”

Tennison pursed her lips and tapped her foot regularly against the transmission tunnel of the car. Her ear was aching because she was so uptight at the possibility of missing a radio call that she kept pressing the earpiece harder into her ear.

“What the fuck d’you think he’s doing?”

Amson shrugged. “Could do with a cup of coffee myself.” His fingers drummed against the back of her seat. He was shrugging it off, but like everyone else he was right on the edge, waiting, waiting . . .

Among the crowded little stalls selling jeans and T-shirts, DC Jones found a tiny booth containing only a small white-covered table and two chairs. A sign nailed to the top of the wooden frame announced: “Noo-Nails by Experienced and Qualified Beautician.”

Annette Frisby, the proprietress, was bending over a client’s hand, carefully painting her new nails a violent pink. Jones squashed himself in beside them and showed Annette his identification and a photograph of Karen Howard.

“Have you ever done this girl’s nails?”

She squinted at the photo. “I couldn’t tell you, I do as many as eight a day . . .”

“Look at her again.” He tried to squat down to her level and pointed at the beautiful young face. “She was found murdered, on the fourteenth of January last. Look again, did she ever come to this stall?”

“January? I wouldn’t have been here anyway. My friend takes over when I can’t do it.”

Jones ground his teeth in frustration. “Have you got her name and address?”

The café was too small to contain more than a long bar and a few stools. George Marlow was sitting at the far end, drinking cappuccino.

The only other customer got up and left. Marlow approached the man behind the bar.

“Can I have the keys, Stav?”

Stavros pulled a cardboard box from beneath the bar. “Been away, have you, John? Haven’t seen you for a long time.”

“Yeah. Mum was taken bad.” Marlow held his hand out for the keys. “What’s the damage?”

From across the street it wasn’t possible to see the object that had been passed to George Marlow, but when he opened his wallet Muddyman could see him counting out ten-pound notes.

Moyra Henson had changed tubes twice, doubling back on herself, then she hurried onto a Central line train. Oakhill was certain that she had no idea he was tailing her.

He was four or five bodies behind her as she went up the escalator and emerged at Oxford Circus. Keeping well back, he radioed in for back-up, fast; Oxford Street was packed with shoppers and Moyra was moving like the clappers. He stayed on her tail in and out of Richard Shops, then across the road to Saxone, back again to another shoe shop, then on up the street to Next.

His back-up arrived; a plain-clothes WPC to take over the close tail, plus a patrol car. The WPC followed Moyra in and out of shops as far as Wardour Street, where she entered a shopping mall. The driver of the patrol car and the uniformed officer took up their positions near the exits. Oakhill kept about fifty yards back from Henson, while the WPC peered into windows and watched Moyra try on shoes from a few feet away.

The patrol car was parked a good distance from the café and Muddyman, directly across the road, kept the radio contact going, informing Tennison that it looked as though the suspect was on the move again.

“Yeah, he’s buttoning up his raincoat. Shit! He’s sat down again. He’s having another bloody coffee!”

Tennison’s foot was still tapping and she was chain-smoking, building up a real fug in the car.

A message started coming through from Jones. “Would you believe Moyra Henson sometimes works from this booth in Covent Garden, and she was working here in January. An assistant at the Floral Street Health Club told me she directed Karen here. The woman who runs it can’t say if Karen had had her nails done here or not, but she says that when Henson was working here Marlow used to pick her up! Moyra could have done Karen’s nails, and if he saw her, knew her name . . .”

DC Jones was standing in the middle of a breakdancing troupe, battling to make himself heard. The steel girders above the stalls distorted the radio waves.

“How long does this Noo-Nail treatment take?” Tennison’s voice asked.

“The woman said she can do eight a day, so it must take a while.”

“You hear all that?” Tennison asked Amson. He nodded. “That’s how he could have known their names! If the treatment takes a while and he was hanging around . . .

Tennison stubbed out her cigarette. They were both beginning to sweat; it was coming down, they could feel it.

“It’s the two of them, then!”

“Looks like it,” Tennison replied. “Let’s pick Moyra up now, and see if the lads back at base have come up with anything from the cross-check. Della and Moyra both came from Manchester originally, it’s just their ages, Della was a lot younger. Car five-four-seven to base . . .”

“Looks like she’s been lying from day one!”

While Tennison gave the go-ahead for Moyra Henson to be picked up, Muddyman radioed in that Marlow was on the move. Then there was silence, but the crackle of the open channel added to the tension. Everyone was waiting . . .

“He’s moving fast now, turning left out of the café, crossing the road. He’s stopped, he’s on to me, looking over . . .”

Another voice cut in. “I’ve got him! He’s just passed me, walking briskly, crossing the road again. He’s heading for the lock-ups, he’s walking right along Battle Bridge Road to the lock-ups . . .”

The radio controllers nearly deafened Tennison with their cheering, as if Arsenal had scored a winning goal in the Cup Final. Like the men in the street, they were feeding Marlow’s every move to the cars and to the rapidly closing ring of officers in the area. Now they passed on the instructions for the lads to take up their positions . . .

“Yes!” Tennison yelled, and punched Amson’s arm. “He’s going for the goddamned lock-ups, I knew it, I knew it!”

Amson tapped the driver on the shoulder to warn him to be ready. He started the engine.

Tennison was gabbling. “Everyone keep back, just hold your positions, don’t frighten him off . . . Stay put until we get the go . . . Over . . .”

They could only listen, they couldn’t move out, couldn’t see, in case they tipped Marlow off, as the team moved in. Some were dressed as mechanics, bending over broken-down cars, another pedaled past with a ladder, someone else drove a grocery van, but they were moving in, surrounding Marlow. The tension was explosive . . .

George Marlow strolled casually along the street. He passed two open lock-ups where mechanics were at work. Cars in various stages of repair littered the street.

He reached the corner where a road ran at right angles under the railway lines. He paused, looked around, checking carefully to see if he was being followed.

“Hold your positions, no one move,” Tennison instructed. “Let him open up and get inside before you grab him.”

Apparently satisfied that he was in the clear, Marlow walked unhurriedly, swinging the keys around his finger as he went. He approached a lock-up that looked as though it hadn’t been occupied in years. A small access door was set into one of the huge main doors.