Foster plunged his hands deep into his coat pockets.
'No point checking on who in this place has a record,' he dead-panned. 'Bet only the cleaning lady and the lift engineer don't.' He gave his colleague a grim smile. 'Come on. Let's make a quick phone call before we start.'
They went back to the car, where he switched on the heater and the radio. Together they formed a background murmur.
Andy Drinkwater's phone seemed to ring for an age. Eventually he answered, sounding breathless.
'It's Foster.'
'Sir,' Drinkwater exclaimed. 'You heard the news?'
'What news?'
'We've pulled in a suspect. Happened about twenty minutes ago.'
'Who?' He could already sense conflicting emotions: joy that the killer might have been caught before he could strike again; frustration that it was someone else who made the nick.
'Details are still a bit fuzzy. He's called Terry Cable.
He fits the description on the sketch. Apparently, he's previously served time for manslaughter and has a record of using GHB, including once for a date rape, though the charge was withdrawn.'
Bang to rights, then, thought Foster.
'What was your news?' Drinkwater asked.
'We've found the place where the next killing will be. Or, at least, where the next body will be found.
A tower block beside the Westway. Was hoping I could round up some help.'
Drinkwater paused. 'It's all hands to the pump here, sir.'
'Don't worry, Andy. I understand. Keep me updated.'
'Will do.'
The line went dead.
'What?' Heather said, desperate to be in the loop.
'They've pulled someone in. Sounds promising.'
'Yes,' she said, and clapped her hands together once as she spoke.
Foster didn't share her sense of triumph, and he could see she'd noticed.
'You're not certain, are you?' she queried.
Foster shrugged. 'We have a suspect, at least. At last' But no, he thought, I'm not certain. 'Come on,'
he added, turning the engine over. 'Let's get a coffee.
We need all the energy we can get if we're going door-to-door in a tower block.'
The hours had fallen away. A member of staff put his head around the door to ask Nigel politely if he needed anything, and mutter apologetically that the hbrary closed in half an hour. Nigel first had to shake his head to bring himself back into the present, and then checked his watch to make sure the librarian was not joking. He wasn't; it was four thirty exactly.
'Did the detective make any provision for me staying after hours?' he asked.
The assistant shook his head dolefully.
'Don't suppose I can without his arrangement, can I?'
The assistant affirmed that was the case.
Nigel found his phone and called Foster. He told him that the hbrary was to close in thirty minutes.
'How much more have you got to look at?' came the reply.
'I'm on the final day of the trial; they're about to reach a verdict, I think.'
'Well, find that out. But there may be no need to dwell on it too long. Between me, you and the gatepost they've got someone in custody.'
Like Foster, Nigel could not decide whether he felt elated or disappointed.
'But we still need to plough on and dig out what we can,' Foster continued. He paused. 'Tell you what, I'll ask them to let you stay there longer. But they won't have anyone to bring you what you need, so you'll have to make do with what you have. Send me photocopies of anything significant you find out about the trial. But don't pull an all-nighter or anything like that. Chances are, we'll need you tomorrow.'
That was fine with Nigel. He just wanted to reach the end of this newspaper narrative. The thought of leaving it now, albeit only overnight, was agonizing.
The trial had lasted just three days: two for the prosecution to open and present their case, half a day for the defence - defendants were not allowed to give evidence on their own behalf -- and a further half a day for the judge's summation. While the first two days had been given acres of coverage in the two newspapers Nigel was relying on, the third was not; the defence case amounted to little more than a half-hearted plea for innocence from a barrister and a former employer of the accused, who said he was a man of simple yet good character. It merited a few paragraphs only. These were set against a litany of prosecution witnesses, who attested to the accused's drunken, violent nature, and the pages their testimony garnered. If the newspaper was to be believed, there could be only one verdict.
On the evening of the third day the jury retired, reaching a verdict within twenty minutes. The judge, one eye no doubt on the fact that the edition deadlines of the newspapers had passed, delayed until the next morning. Nigel could only wonder what that night was like for the condemned man -- the dragging agony.
The next morning the courtroom was awash with people. Of the two reporters, the News of the World's intoxicated, excitable representative best conveyed the exquisite tension of what happened next.
Every pair of eyes were on the dock. No event took place for what appeared to be an eternity, until the sound of a door opening below and the shuffle of feet on wooden steps indicated Fairbairn was on the way to his assignation with fate. The collective breath of the crowd was audible as the prisoner loped into the view of the galleries. This time, the first occasion during this trial, there were no cries, no declamations. Only silence unbroken. As always his gaze was to his feet, but once did Fairbairn raise his head and look towards the gentlemen of the press crushed into a single gallery. For all the world he looked as if he would speak to us, that the mute would break his silence and offer a sign of the obvious turmoil which raged within that gigantic cold heart. Yet there came only a heavy, baleful stare that communicated little, until his eyes settled back on his boots once more.
The clerk of the court appeared and all attentions were focused on the bench where Mr Justice MacDougall would take his seat for this final act. Breathless silence continued to reign, so much so that a pin could have been heard to drop, but it was broken with a gasp of such volume one would think that it had been rehearsed by the company present. The act that had brought forth this collective sound of wonder was the clerk's placing of the black cap on the bench in front of where the judge would sit. My eyes went to the accused, to gauge his reaction at the sight of that awesome piece of apparel that indicated his terrible end. He was still peering down in front of his body, perhaps contemplating the abyss into which his mortal body would soon be launched.
The judge entered the court, resumed his place and asked the foreman of the jury if a verdict had been reached. The foreman answered in the affirmative and, when asked what that verdict was, replied 'We have agreed that the accused is guilty'.
The clerk asked the customary question whether the man had anything to say before the sentence of death was passed. At last that huge face lifted from its earthly gaze and another gasp issued forth from those around. In a voice low and doleful, barely audible, Fairbairn at last loosed his tongue.
'I never done the thing,' he murmured, and that was all the pitiable creature could muster.
As was usually the case, the execution was fixed three clear Sundays after the sentence had been passed. But there was no sign of interest waning in the story: the next day The Times in a leader pronounced itself pleased with the verdict, and congratulated the prosecution for offering such a compelling case.
Nigel's eye was also caught by another report of a gruesome killing in North Kensington. Under the headline 'Man Slays Family' was a short report of a man named Segar Kellogg, who had slit the throat of his wife, stabbed his son and then smothered his two daughters before turning the knife on himself. The son, the story said, was still alive though in a grave condition. The surname delighted Nigel: he came across it rarely. It was an occupational surname given to slaughtermen in Essex. John killed hogs. When the time came for a name to differentiate him from other Johns, he was named John Killhog. Over the centuries this had become Kellogg. How appropriate, Nigel thought grimly, that a man bearing that name had slaughtered most of his family.
Subsequent articles in the News of the WorldConcentrated on the daily comings and goings of the condemned man. There appeared to be incredulity at the lack of a confession -- Nigel knew it was customary for newspapers and periodicals to print special editions with the repentant ramblings of condemned men and women -- and the
