‘OK,’ she explained to Jack, ‘they have officers on the way to stand guard. Just in case Betty gets enough courage to come back to water the plants again.’
They stepped out onto the apartment’s landing. Jack pulled the front door shut, and pushed it to ensure it was locked again. ‘Watering the plants,’ he mused as they started down the stairs. ‘How? She was there when we arrived. The watering can was in the bathroom, along with the remains of most of the plants. And she’d obviously not met the calamari when we got there.’
The rain had got even heavier outside. Gwen buttoned her jacket, and Jack pulled his damaged coat over his shoulders like a cloak. They hurried back down the side road, the only people on foot in the whole area.
Jack took the driver’s seat this time. Gwen’s mobile was ringing as they climbed into the SUV. She slotted it into the speaker attachment by the passenger seat.
Toshiko’s calm voice filled the car from sixteen stereo speakers. ‘Do you fancy a drive out into the countryside?’
‘In this weather, what could be nicer? Why do you suggest that?’
‘Because I got an interesting match on that artefact in Wildman’s neck, Jack. I did a cubic search that gave a ninety per cent correlation-’
‘Cubic?’ puzzled Jack. ‘What does that mean?’
‘Q.B.I.C.’ Toshiko’s tone of voice revealed how pleased she was to explain. ‘Query By Image Content. It’s content-based visual information retrieval, really good for fast multi-resolution image search-’
‘Very impressive, Tosh,’ said Jack indulgently. ‘Try again. What does that
‘Oh, I see.’ Toshiko sounded more abashed now. ‘Well, the thing in Wildman’s neck matches another one. And that was found in the corpse of a soldier at the Caregan Barracks. Sergeant Anthony Bee. He was shot dead in an attempted armed robbery recently at the barracks itself. I was just going out there to interview the senior officer.’
‘OK. Taking Owen, too?’
‘He’ll have to stay here at the Hub. Still decontaminating.’
‘We’ll meet you at Caregan, Tosh. Thanks.’
Jack moved to disconnect the phone, but Gwen reached out and put her hand on his arm. ‘Hang on a moment, Jack.’ It was intended as casual gesture of polite restraint, but when her fingers touched the bare skin of his arm she noticed that his wound was less raw, and surrounded by new, pink skin. The whole thing was now only the size of a ten pence piece.
‘Don’t worry,’ he said softly. ‘Stings a little. Stings a
‘Can’t hear you,’ said Toshiko over the phone.
‘Nothing to worry about, Tosh.’ Jack had raised his voice again. ‘Bring me a clean shirt, will ya? I got a bit of a scratch, and this one’s ripped.’
Gwen smiled at him. ‘If you’re OK, then I think I’d like to check on Betty Jenkins. Let her know that the police are on their way, and to stay away from Wildman’s apartment. She’s probably cowering under the duvet in her own place.’ She spoke slightly louder so that Toshiko would hear her. ‘Tosh? Can you tell me which apartment in this block Betty Jenkins is in?’
‘Hang on.’ They waited, imagining Toshiko initiating a search on her computer. ‘There you go, I’m sending it through to you now.’
The small display screen in front of Jack flickered into life. It showed an aerial view of Splott, which zoomed in to a street-level image. This changed into a schematic of the apartment block, and finally a wireframe image of the building with one of the apartments picked out in red. ‘Elizabeth Mary Jenkins, flat number four.’
‘See you at the barracks, Tosh,’ said Jack. ‘Thanks.’ He disconnected the phone, and handed it back to Gwen. ‘I should drive you round to the apartment block. No point running through the streets in this rain again.’
‘And the curtain-twitchers?’ asked Gwen.
‘They’ll have plenty to look at once the police arrive.’ He started the engine, and steered off into the rain. The SUV’s lights flared on the wet roadway. ‘How is it you get to check up on the good-looking blonde with legs all the way up to her ears?’
‘You’re not her type,’ Gwen admonished him as the car drew up by the apartment block. ‘I’ll see you back down here. See if you can get the direction-finder programmed for Caregan Barracks. I promise not to take too long with Betty.’
It was a short dash across the pavement to the door of the apartment building. Gwen wasn’t sure what the first thing she’d say to Betty would be, or how she’d persuade the terrified woman to let her back in to the building. As it turned out, she didn’t need to use the buzzer, because another resident was just leaving. He was distracted in a fumbling attempt to put up his golf umbrella before he stepped out into the downpour, so Gwen was able to catch the front door before it locked in the closed position.
On the first landing, Gwen rapped the brass door knocker of number four. There was a long pause, so she rapped again more firmly.
‘All right,’ said a petulant voice from the other side. ‘Keep your hair on.’
The door opened a crack, and a wrinkled face peered out past the security chain. The mouth puckered in censure. ‘I don’t want any groceries,’ said the face. ‘I’ve got someone from the Social who gets mine in for me, you know.’
It was the old woman who had let them in, and then looked so disapprovingly at them as they’d dripped on her clean linoleum.
‘Is Ms Jenkins in?’ Gwen was aware that she’d inadvertently raised her voice.
‘I’m Miss Jenkins,’ retorted the woman. ‘And I’m not deaf.’
‘No, I mean Betty Jenkins.’ Gwen offered the old woman her most winning smile, the one she used to try out on suspicious witnesses during door-to-door inquiries. ‘Is your daughter in?’
The old woman breathed out sharply in irritation. ‘I told you. I’m Betty Jenkins. Miss Betty Jenkins. I don’t have a daughter. Who are you?’
It was apparent that this was the real Betty Jenkins. Not a scared mid-thirties blonde, but a somewhat scary spinster in her mid eighties, determined to guard her privacy.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Gwen. She took a step back from the door to reassure the woman. ‘I’ve made a mistake. I’m sorry to have disturbed you Miss Jenkins.’
‘I should think so,’ said the old lady, closing the door. ‘All gone to hell these days.’
The SUV’s engine was still running. Jack was drumming his fingers on the steering wheel when Gwen got back into the passenger seat. ‘How’s the good-looking blonde?’
‘The experience has aged her,’ said Gwen. She told him about the real Betty Jenkins in flat four. ‘Should have noticed,’ she concluded. ‘Strange that she wore that big blue coat while she was in Wildman’s flat. If she lived in the flat downstairs, why would she need to put a coat on to go up and water his plants?’
‘Because she doesn’t live downstairs,’ agreed Jack. ‘Any way we can trace where she went?’
‘Not a chance. Streets are empty in this rain. House-to-house would be a long shot, on the off-chance anyone saw which way she went. And that’ll only give us a general direction. No CCTV round here, so she’s impossible to track.’
‘All right.’ Jack had reached a firm decision. He revved the engine. ‘Let’s go with what we know. I’ve told the direction-finder we want to go to Caregan Barracks.’
‘Make a legal U-turn,’ the machine told him in its prim schoolmistress tones. ‘And then a slight left turn in…’ It paused thoughtfully. ‘… seventeen miles.’
Jack reached into the back and passed an RAC road map to Gwen. ‘I don’t think Tosh got all the glitches outta this thing yet.’ He slammed the SUV into gear, swerved it around in the street, and put his foot down, oblivious to the twitching of curtains all along the street.
FIFTEEN
