Dead Man's Grip

‘What information do you have? How? I mean, what happened?’

‘I’ll come back to it – that’s the least of our problems. We have a much bigger one. Carly Chase’s twelve-year- old son has gone missing.’

‘Missing? What do you mean?’

‘It sounds like he’s been abducted.’

Grace stared into Branson’s big, round eyes. He felt as if a bolus of cold water had been injected into his stomach. ‘When – when did this happen?’

‘A friend of Carly, called Justin Ellis, should have picked her son up from St Christopher’s School at 11.15 a.m. to take him to a dental appointment – he was having a brace adjusted. Ellis got there at ten past, to discover the boy had been collected twenty minutes earlier by a taxi. But Carly Chase is absolutely adamant she didn’t order a taxi.’

Grace stared at him, absorbing the information, trying to square it with the news he had just had about the licence plates from Duncan Crocker.

‘She seemed in a pretty ramped-up state yesterday. Are you sure she didn’t forget she’d ordered one?’

‘I just came off the phone to her. She didn’t order it, she’s one hundred per cent sure.’

Branson sat down in front of him, folded his arms and went on, ‘One of his teachers at the school got a call that the taxi was outside. She knew he was being picked up, because his mum had already told them that was going to happen. She didn’t think to query it.’

‘Did she see the driver?’

‘Not really, no. He was wearing a baseball cap. But she wasn’t really focused on him. Her concern was that Tyler got into the car safely – and she watched him do that from the school gates.’

‘So they just let their pupils get into taxis without checking with anyone?’ Grace quizzed.

‘They have strict procedures,’ Branson replied. ‘The parents have to have given prior sanction, which Carly Chase had, on a blanket basis. Apparently Tyler was regularly dropped off and picked up by taxis, so no one had any reason to question it today.’

Grace sat in silence for some moments, thinking hard and fast. He looked at his watch. ‘The appointment is for 11.30 a.m.?’

‘Yes.’

‘Has anyone checked with the dentist to see if he’s turned up?’

‘Someone’s on that now. He hadn’t as of a couple of minutes ago.’

‘Where’s the dentist?’

‘In Wilbury Road.’

‘St Christopher’s is a private school, right? On New Church Road?’

Branson nodded.

‘That’s a five-minute drive. Ten, max. He was picked up just before 11 a.m.?

‘That’s right.’

‘Are you on to the taxi companies?’

‘All of them. I’ve got Norman Potting, Nick Nicholl, Bella Moy and Stacey Horobin making calls right now.’

Grace thumped his desk in anger and frustration. ‘Shit, shit, shit! Why wasn’t I told about this dental appointment?’

Branson gave him a helpless look. ‘We guarded her house with the boy and her mother – the boys’ gran – in it all night. And we had a friend of Carly Chase, who was doing the school run, tailed – to make sure he got there safely. We were going to do the same this afternoon when he came out of school. No one said anything about him having an appointment.’

Grace shook his head. ‘She was vulnerable. That meant anyone close to her was vulnerable, too. We should have had someone at the school today.’

‘Hindsight’s easy. Most people wouldn’t get out of bed in the morning if they knew what was going to happen.’

Grace stared at him bleakly. ‘Knowing what was going to happen would make this job a damned sight easier.’ He picked up a pen and began making notes on his pad, his brain going into overdrive. ‘OK, do we have a photograph of this boy?’

‘No. I have a description of him. He’s five foot tall, looks a little like a young Harry Potter – floppy brown hair, oval wire-framed glasses, wearing a school uniform of red blazer, white shirt, red and grey tie, and grey trousers.’

‘Good, that’s fairly distinctive,’ Grace said. ‘We need a photo PDQ.’

‘We’re on to that.’

‘Has anyone spoken to the gran?’

‘She’s at a doctor’s appointment at the Sussex County. I have someone on their way there.’

‘Do we have the make of the taxi? Was it a saloon or an estate car or a people carrier?’

‘I don’t have that yet.’

‘Why not?’

‘Because I haven’t had time. I wanted you to know right away.’

Grace looked up at a map of East and West Sussex on his wall, then at his bookshelf, where he could see a copy of the official Kidnap Manual, which contained all the procedures and protocols for kidnap and abduction. He knew a lot of them by heart, but he would check carefully through it. Before that he had some urgent fast-time actions to carry out. He grabbed the phone off his desk and, as he dialled, he said, ‘Glenn, we need to plot an arc around the school – how far away someone could be in any direction now and in thirty minutes’ time. We’ve got to get the make of vehicle. Is someone going to see the teacher?’

‘Two officers from the Outside Inquiry Team should be at the school now.’

‘We need more officers down at that school immediately, talking to everyone around it, in houses, walking their dogs, cats, goldfish.’

Grace dialled the number for Ops-1 – the Duty Inspector in the Force Control Room, Becky Newman. He gave her a quick summary and asked her who the Force Gold was today. The Gold Commander was normally a Superintendent or Chief Superintendent who would take control of any Critical Incident that happened on his watch.

He was pleased to hear it was Chief Superintendent Graham Barrington, the current Commander of Brighton and Hove, an exceptionally able and intelligent officer. Moments later he was on the line. Grace quickly brought him up to speed. Barrington said he wanted a Detective as Silver and suggested Chief Inspector Trevor Barnes. He quickly reeled off the Bronzes to complete his command team: one a POLSA for searches, then one for Intelligence, one for Investigations and one for Media. In all child abductions or kidnaps, the way the media was handled was crucial.

‘I think because of the gravity we should have an ACC handle the media. ACC Rigg is on call today.’

Grace smirked. He liked the idea of the very slightly arrogant Peter Rigg being given a role down the pecking order, beneath the Chief Superintendent.

‘I think we should make your deputy SIO the Investigations Bronze, as he’ll be up to speed. Who is that?”

‘Glenn Branson.’

‘He’s a DS?’

‘Yes, but he’s good,’ Grace said, turning to his colleague and winking.

‘OK.’

‘I think our very first priority, Graham, is road checks.’

‘Yes, we’ll get them on all major routes. What do you think? Forty-five minutes’ or one hour’s drive away?’

Grace looked at his watch, doing a calculation. It would take time to get cars in place.

‘An hour’s drive, to be safe. Can we scramble Hotel 900.’

Hotel 900 was the call sign for the police helicopter.

‘Right away. Get me a description of the taxi as quickly as possible to give to them. What about utilizing Child Rescue Alert?’

‘Yes, definitely. I’m about to do that,’ Grace said, although he was aware of the deluge of calls his team would receive from this, most of which would be false alarms.

Child Rescue Alert was a recent police initiative, modelled on the US’s