The inside of the house had been given a makeover but most of the original features had been left untouched, including the impressive staircase.
Before making their way up to the apartment, Tracy walked over to the mailboxes and used the key from Peter’s key ring to open it. She reached inside and found two letters. Both were utility bills.
Once inside the apartment, Tracy followed the instructions on her envelope and keyed 24691 into the alarm pad and the humming ceased.
The two detectives started in the main bedroom searching the bedside cabinets before stripping off all the covers and checking under the bed and mattress.
Next they went through the contents of the walk-in wardrobes. Every item of clothing had to be checked. Not only the pockets but each sleeve and then turned inside out, just in case.
The rooms did not have any chests of drawers. All the items of underwear were in compartments within the wardrobes, even the shoes were neatly lined up on custom made shelves. Even these needed to be checked to see if anything had been concealed.
There were so many clothes that it took nearly three hours to methodically search everything. They found nothing of interest.
Next the bathroom with its ‘wet area’ shower.
Then they went through to the kitchen. It seemed the occupants ate out a lot as there was very little food in the fridge and freezer or the cupboards.
The milk in the fridge was emptied carefully through a sieve down the sink to check there was nothing concealed and also to stop it going off.
One of the main aims had been to check for kitchen knives and see if any were missing, in case Norman had taken one with him to the hotel. Tracy found a set of six knives. None were missing.
Finally they moved into the front room. This was the main room of the house. It contained a rustic style table with four chairs, a large sofa situated in front of the radiator and facing a large and open fireplace complete with its original mantelpiece, although at some point recently it had all been painted over in a plum colour. Above the mantelpiece was a large mirror with its surround painted in the same shade.
There was a large TV attached to the wall next to the fireplace and a small bookshelf in the corner, half empty. Above the TV there was a shelf high up the wall containing a few ornaments. Each one was carefully taken down and checked. In the opposite corner of the room was a small desk and chair. The top drawer had recent household bills and receipts all neatly filed in order. The second drawer contained items of stationery such as a stapler and ruler. The bottom drawer contained a long legal size envelope. Tracy opened it and as she read the contents, a smile spread across her face. “Got yer,” she muttered to herself.
Once they were satisfied there was nothing else of interest in the apartment, Tracy phoned DCI Andy Stone.
“Hello, sir, it’s Tracy. Will and I have just this minute finished checking the apartment from top to bottom. You’ll never guess what we’ve found… a will leaving everything to Norman and it’s dated just three weeks ago.”
“That’s brilliant work, Tracy. Well done.”
After telling him they hadn’t found anything else of significance, she phoned DI Gold. “Hi, Eden. Just to let you know we’ve found a will from Peter dated from three weeks ago and it leaves everything to Norman. How are you getting on?”
“Hi, Tracy. Yes. We've found a lot of stuff. We should be finished cataloguing it all in about an hour.”
“If it's okay with you, we'll make everything here secure and head back to base and see what we can do there.”
“Sorry Tracy. I need you to come over to meet us and transfer what we’ve found into your vehicle.” There’s some important evidence here and after we finish we’ve got to go and interview Oliver Varney. I don’t want to leave this stuff unattended in the car.”
“Sure. We’ll head over to you and pick it up.”
An hour and ten minutes later, Eden and Carla finished documenting all the items and bagged them up ready to put into Tracy’s vehicle when she and Will arrived.
Eden and Carla had one last look around, even checking the toilets and moving items including the filing cabinet to make sure nothing had been hidden underneath or that it was covering a secret compartment. Once they were satisfied, they unlocked the front door and carried the evidence bags to the boot. Carla sat in the car while Eden went back and turned the alarm on and secured the two door locks just as they had found them.
Five minutes later, Tracy and DS Will Redgrave turned up and all the evidence bags from the art gallery were transferred to their car.
“This stuff can’t be left unattended. You can’t stop anywhere in London with all that evidence in the boot of the car. It wouldn't be safe. You’ll need to ensure your vehicle doors and the boot are locked at all times and don’t stop anywhere until you’re outside London and then one of you must stay with the vehicle while the other goes for food or fuel. We can’t afford for any of this to go missing.”
Eden was aware two years previously a London detective had lost vital evidence when a sneak thief had opened the back seat door when the vehicle stopped at traffic lights and they had taken the evidence bags sitting there. He didn't want the same mistake to happen.
He and Carla went off to interview Oliver Varney. Eden didn’t expect they would get back to Trentbridge until about 7 pm. It had been
