She had, nevertheless, accepted the role of chaperon and learned the gentle touch technique.
Behind it lay the urgent requirement for information, the gentle prod, encouragement, we're all girls together and all men are bastards, and so on. You made notes afterwards, once you'd milked them and sent them off to Victim Support. It was a job and you'd heard it all before. You were a copper. The freezing process began on day one. Donna Fitzgerald was on the wind-down of her shift when the duty sergeant caught her. She was adjusting her heavy belt kit – extendable metal asp, quick-cuffs, CS spray, torch and radio – non-digital for Sheerham didn’t run to the upgraded 390Mhz and the Tetra network – and was making her slow way to the locker room when she caught sight of his scrawny features, recognized the look in his sly eyes and felt a sinking sensation in her stomach. The prospect of a DVD and a few vods after a Chinese diminished as his footsteps on the corridor floor grew louder.
“Got one that's right up your street, Donna.”
She pulled a face. “Skipper, I'm on my way home.”
He smiled gleefully, enjoying himself. “You mean you were, lass. We're stretched. Another woman has been attacked. It sounds like the same guy.”
She’d already heard. The news had been all over the radio. Twenty-four hours earlier a woman named Carol Sapolsky had been knifed in what appeared to be a seemingly random attack. The police were still looking for a motive and some return from a hastily arranged appeal for information from the public.
She brushed some creases from the leg of her uniform and noticed the front of her body armour was streaked with cigarette ash. She fiddled with her regulation clip-on tie and tried to swallow from a dry mouth.
The sergeant read her thoughts. “Get rid of all that armour and grab yourself a cup of refreshing tea which you can drink on the way. Don’t want you frightening her to death, do we? Not before you get some details. Get down to the North Mid as quickly as possible and get me something before they start. Make sure you don’t catch MRSA or something.”
Once the medical examination began the police would have to wait. In the case of assault by a stranger the trail went cold quickly. It was called the golden hour. An hour could make all the difference. Donna hitched her belt and threw him a tight-lipped look that pleased him no end. He watched her arse all the way out until a door swung shut and cut the view. lain-clothed.
The incident room was makeshift, an old changing room. All the junk had been cleared and the steel lockers were restricting the corridor outside. In their place were VDUs, telephones, desks, and portable screens covered with photographs and maps of the SOCs.
When Detective Superintendent Baxter walked in the chatter stopped. He was an overweight man in dark suit and tie. Spectacles enlarged his brown eyes.
“OK, everyone, thanks for getting here so quickly. It's appreciated.
I know it's Christmas and sixteen-hour days are not an attractive proposition, but think of the overtime. For those of you who don't know, I'm the super. My name's Tony Baxter.” He sounded fine but self-assurance and the keen attention he received from the locals, left his credentials in little doubt. He went on, “This is DI Rick Cole. He'll be SIO on this. Chas Walker is exhibits officer. Peter Wood has come from the Yard to help out. David Carter is from Tottenham. Get this sorted quickly and you can all go home. I'm transferring PC Donna Fitzgerald for the duration. She's going to be chaperon. She's got the hard bit, the victims.”
Chas Walker asked, “So where's Donna now?” He was uneasy.
She'd have a direct line to Billingham, spilling their trade secrets.
Baxter understood DC Walker's concern. Uniform and plain clothes didn't mix. Usually it was no more than healthy competition but the excommissioner's policies had fuelled the friction and blown it out of proportion. CID, particularly in the MET, was fighting for survival.
Baxter answered, “She's at the hospital. She's been there most of the night while you lot were getting your beauty sleep. Now, you've all heard what happened to the latest. Elizabeth Rayner, twenty-eight, single, by all accounts a nice professional woman, on her way home from her health club… DI Cole will brief you. I want progress reports every day at nine and six. And I mean progress.” He turned to Cole.
“I'll leave it to you.”
The others recognized an intimacy between them, something more than the job.
Once the door had shut Cole said, “Right, let's get on with it. Chas has got his work cut out. Peter you look after the indexes. David, take care of the usual faces and the door-to-door. I want to know about Elizabeth Rayner and the first victim, Carol Sapolsky. I want some common ground. So, boyfriends, ex-boyfriends, workmates, clubs, the business. The uniforms have made a start but now we want it done properly. So far fingertips have produced zilch but they’re still looking at the drains and bins. Priorities? CCTV footage from the streets, boozers, shops and garages. And let’s have a go at the KCs. They’re not going to come forward without a nudge but if we can find them then they will be very helpful. For those of you who don’t know the Square is our local area of disrepute and it goes without saying that the girls are going to be really pissed off seeing us, the KCs even more, and that will work in our favour. They’ll want to help in order to get rid of us. Concentrate on the local hit list. I want every one of them TIED without exception.”
TIED is traced, interviewed and eliminated. KCs are kerb-crawlers. “We’ve already taken seventy calls regarding Miss Sapolsky and these have produced a dozen possibilities. Let’s have every one of them followed up today. Check with Catchem and Guys, see if anyone has a predilection for Stanley knives and women's breasts. Chas, sort out a desk for Donna. All of you please note that she is part of this team for the duration. I don’t want to hear any plod jokes. Questions?” “What about sexist jokes, Guv?” Chas Walker asked and the secondments shared an anxious moment.
“Sexist jokes I can live with,” Cole said and heard a collective sigh of relief.
Cole found Detective Superintendent Baxter in his office, coffee in hand, open BacoFoil on his desk revealing what was left of six rounds of ham and tomato sandwiches. A knife had left a lane of English mustard across one half of the rounds. The other half was only one step deep. Baxter brushed a crumb from his lips, almost embarrassed, and made a half-hearted attempt to wrap the sandwiches. After a moment he pushed them aside, placed his coffee carefully on the desk and said, “Sod it, Rick. Early lunch.”
Cole glanced at his watch. It wasn't yet ten.
Baxter adjusted his spectacles and frowned. “I'm not happy with this. A serial slasher?”
“We’re still one light for a serial and the MO might throw something up. They could be unrelated.”
Baxter made a dismissive noise. “Not much chance of that.” “I know it's early days but I was thinking about a profile.” “A bottle-fed psycho. What else do you want to know? What else will we learn? A history of violence, a strong connection with the area, a loner who finds relationships difficult?” Baxter touched the glass of his spectacles then took them off and began to polish. Without them he looked hollow-eyed and older.
“I was thinking of Geoff Maynard.”
“No,” Baxter said too quickly. He replaced his spectacles. “Not yet. The last thing I want is a psychologist muddying the water. We've got rid of one or, at least, nausea gravidarum has. We don't want another. Let's see what we've got at the end of the day.”
It was well known that Baxter did not have much time for psychologists, even one as eminent as Geoff Maynard. Until its disbandment he had been in charge of HOPE, the Home Office Psychological Experimental Unit at Green Park. As far as Baxter was concerned they were detrimental to an investigation. They narrowed the field, called it tunnel vision, and bits of evidence outside that narrow track were lost. Profiling, the concept of the nineties, had gone the way of the magnifying glass. Paul Britton and the judge who kicked Colin Stagg out of court had seen to that. What was more, much of the work was being duplicated at Catchem and the National Crime Faculty at Bramshill.
After a moment's reflection Baxter said, “But I suppose it wouldn't hurt to find out where he is and what he's up to.”
Baxter didn’t catch the look of mild satisfaction that softened the DI’s eyes.
The fire at Buncefield had been more or less extinguished and the sky was clearing but the smell of smoke hung on like a rerun of bonfire night.
Donna Fitzgerald arrived in civvies: short black skirt, black jacket over white shirt, all of it fitting rather snugly. In the corridor a couple of plods paused to watch her until she turned into the IR then they shared a nod and a knowing smile and a lot of wishful thinking. Cole sat on the edge of Chas Walker's desk, arms crossed. They watched her approach and Walker's eyes lingered too long on various places between neck and hemline. She
