One week after the last visit, one hour after selling herself to the last man, she had found herself in the hostel, with Bob Robertson on the phone organising an appointment for her at a detox centre and a place to stay for the night. He had even given up his bed that night for her and slept in with the vagrants. She never forgot his generosity, his willingness to trust a person who could not trust in return. As she sat in his office, she knew she would never let him down. The hostel had been important to him, it would be to her. She switched on the computer, noting the password written on a scrap of paper.
The hostel had benefactors, local businessmen who assisted with their time and their money. She needed to contact them, let them know that the hostel was to continue and she would be running it in Bob’s memory.
Apart from the usual files dealing with income and expenditure, she found the phone numbers of the businessmen that she needed to contact. She called them; they’d be available within the next day or so.
Now firmly in control, Katrina looked further into the programmes on the office computer. It was clear that Bob had surfed the internet on a regular basis, some of the sites inappropriate, although she ignored those.
One site interested her, a site that dealt with mathematics, though she didn’t understand what it said. There was a notebook in the top left-hand drawer of the desk that she sat at. She opened it. The formulas on the computer screen and in the notebook showed similarities.
***
Larry Hill made contact with the neighbourhood government job centre; a pleasant woman in her late twenties attended to him. ‘There’s no record of anyone matching that description,’ she had said after Larry had passed on all that he knew about Big Greg. Larry found it strange that a man, clearly noticeable due to his height, could appear and disappear at will. At the hostel they had only known him by a nickname, and even the records Katrina Ireland had shown him confirmed that he always signed in as Big Greg.
‘It would help if I had a photo,’ the young lady said. Larry had to admit that he was enjoying his time talking to her. There had been another row at home again, the third in as many days, the subject, the same: his long hours at work, his beer consumption, his expanding girth when he was on a strict wife-enforced diet. Larry knew that she was right on all three counts, but he was a police officer, not a child, and sometimes he needed to let off steam, drink more than he should, and if that included a pub lunch and a few laughs, then so be it. He realised, though, that he should have kept the comments to himself. He had walked out of the house that morning angry, but as usual with him and his wife, their collective anger was short-lived.
He’d phoned her up after two hours to apologise, and said that he’d be home at a reasonable hour that night. The only problem, he knew too well, was the reasonable time promise. Now he had a man who needed to be found, even if it was only to clear him of the charge of murder: a man that officially did not exist.
He’d wanted to stay chatting to the young lady, but she was busy, as was he. She had a warm office but where he was heading was out on the street, checking all the haunts where the homeless congregated, it was not.
***
There wasn’t anything that Isaac Cook disliked more than paperwork, and it always snowballed whenever there was a murder. He knew that he was lucky to have Bridget Halloran in the department, a dab hand on the computer, a paperwork administrator par excellence. He was aware that she could take the majority off him in the early stages of a murder enquiry, but once the missing pieces of the jigsaw started to be found, then he’d be taking a lot of it back.
He’d tried to get someone to assist Bridget, but the woman was stubborn, wanting to be the Mother Hen, not only of him, but of the office, and whereas some had come to help, most had not been suitable anyway. Only one had shown promise, and he’d soon left to take up a better position with Fraud. Not that Isaac could blame him, as the man was more qualified than the job required. And besides, Isaac had to admit that he preferred a tight, cohesive team.
He knew that with Larry Hill, Wendy Gladstone, and Bridget Halloran the bases would be covered, and none of the three would ever let him down. They were also totally loyal. He still remembered when he had been ejected from his position as the SIO as a result of the escalating murders in the Charlotte Hamilton case and the commissioner’s attempt to bring in his man, Caddick. Though he hadn’t lasted long, Isaac had seen some in the department sucking up to the new man, but his three key members had been professional, polite to him, but never sycophantic, even when their jobs were on the line.
Isaac knew that if it only remained at the one murder, then he’d manage with the paperwork, but experience told him there was more to the case than the murder of one man.
Isaac wasn’t sure what would be relevant, but he knew that everyone has skeletons in the cupboard. What if Robertson had been killed because of those skeletons? It was a question worth considering, but first the department needed to find the primary witness and possible suspect, Big Greg.
Larry had spent further time with Katrina Ireland, Wendy had asked those sleeping rough close to the hostel, and
