‘No one seen running away from it?’
‘No.’
‘Anything from its registration?’
‘The licence plates are burned beyond recognition, I’m told, sir.’
‘OK, thanks,’ he said. ‘We have our man in custody. It may not be connected. But keep me updated.’
‘I will, sir.’
Grace ended the call and entered the front door of Sussex House, nodding a greeting to the night security man.
‘Hi, Duncan. How’s the running?’
The tall, athletic forty-year-old smiled at him proudly. ‘Completed a half-marathon last weekend. Came fifteenth out of seven hundred.’
‘Brilliant!’
‘Working up for the London marathon this year. Hope I can touch you for some sponsorship – for St Wilfred’s Hospice?’
‘Absolutely!’
Grace walked through to the rear of the building and out of the door, crossing the courtyard. He passed the wheelie bins and the SOCO vehicles which were permanently housed there, then went up the steep incline towards the custody block. As he pressed his key card against the security panel to unlock the door, his phone rang again.
It was Inspector Rob Leet once more.
‘Roy, I thought I’d better call you right away. I know you have the Shoe Man in custody, but we’ve got a unit on site in Sudeley Place, Kemp Town, attending a Grade One.’
This was the highest category of emergency call, requiring immediate attendance. Grace knew Sudeley Place. It was just south of Eastern Road. The tone of Leet’s voice worried him. What the Duty Inspector had to say fuelled that worry further.
‘Apparently a local resident happened to be looking out of her window and saw a woman having a fight with a man over a fridge.’
‘A fridge?’
‘He was in some sort of van – a camper of some kind – she’s not very good on vehicles, couldn’t give us the make. She reckons he hit her, then drove off at high speed.’
‘With her on board?’
‘Yes.’
‘When was this?’
‘About thirty-five minutes ago – just after 6.30 p.m.’
‘He could be anywhere by now. Did she get the registration?’
‘No. But I’m treating this as a possible abduction and I’ve cordoned off that section of pavement. I’ve asked Road Policing to check all camper vans on the move in the vicinity of the city. We’re going to see if we can get anything from CCTV.’
‘OK. Look, I’m not quite sure why you’re telling me this. We have our Shoe Man suspect in custody. I’m about to go and see him.’
‘There’s a reason why I think it could be significant for you, sir.’ Leet hesitated. ‘My officers attending have found a woman’s shoe on the pavement.
‘What kind of a shoe?’
‘Very new, apparently. Black patent leather, with a high heel. The witness saw it fall out of the camper.’
Grace felt a falling sensation deep in the pit of his stomach. His mind was whirling. They had the Shoe Man. At this very moment they were booking John Kerridge into custody.
But he did not like the sound of the burning van.
And he liked the sound of this new incident even less.
99
Saturday 17 January
In the CCTV room of Sussex Remote Monitoring Services, Dunstan Christmas shifted his twenty-stone bulk on the chair, careful not to lift his weight off altogether and trigger the alarm sensor. It was only 7.30 p.m. Shit. Another hour and half to wait before he would be relieved for a five-minute comfort break.
He was not due on nights for another two weeks, but he’d agreed to cover for someone who was sick because he needed the overtime pay. Time wasn’t even crawling by; it felt like it had stopped altogether. Maybe it was even going backwards, like in a sci-fi movie he’d watched recently on Sky. It was going to be a long night.
But thinking about the money he was making cheered him. Mr Starling might be a strange boss, but he paid well. The money here was good; much better than in his previous job, watching X-rayed luggage at Gatwick Airport.
He reached forward, pulled a handful of Doritos out of the giant-size packet in front of him, munched them and washed them down with a swig of Coca-Cola from the two-litre bottle, then belched. As he routinely ran his eyes over all twenty screens, his hand close to the microphone button in case he should happen to spot any intruder, he noticed that No. 17, which had been dead when he had started his shift, was still not showing any images. It was the old Shoreham cement works, where his dad had been a driver.
He pressed the control toggle to change the image on the screen, in case it was just one of the twenty-six CCTV cameras that was on the blink. But the screen remained blank. He picked up the phone and dialled the night engineer.
‘Hi, Ray. It’s Dunstan in Monitor Room 2. I’ve not had any image on screen 17 since I started my shift.’
‘Mr Starling’s instruction,’ the engineer replied. ‘The client hasn’t paid his bill. Over four months now apparently. Mr Starling’s suspended the service. Don’t worry about it.’
‘Right, thanks,’ Dunstan Christmas said. ‘I won’t.’
He ate some more Doritos.
100
Saturday 17 January
A terrible pain, like a vice crushing her head, woke Jessie. For an instant, utterly disoriented, she had no idea where she was.
In Benedict’s room?
She felt all muzzy and queasy. What had happened last night? What had happened at the dinner dance? Had she got drunk?
She felt a crashing jolt. There was a constant whooshing sound beneath her. She could hear the steady blatter of an engine. Was she in a plane?
Her queasiness deepened. She was close to throwing up.
Another jolt, then another. There was a banging sound like a loose door. Fear squirmed through her. Something felt very wrong; something terrible had happened. As she became more conscious, her memory trickled back, reluctantly, as if something was trying to hold it at bay.
She couldn’t move her arms or her legs. Her fear deepened. She was lying face down on something hard and constantly jolting. Her nose was bunged up and she was finding it harder and harder to breathe. She tried, desperately, to breathe in though her mouth, but something was clamped over it and no air would come through. She couldn’t breathe through her nose now either. She tried to cry out but just heard a dull moan and felt her mouth reverberating.
Panicking, juddering, fighting for breath, she sniffed harder. She could not get enough air in through her nose to
