‘I agree. However, if we go with Miranda opening the door to him and allowing him access, we may need to think of what sort of ruse he used to get in – police officer, gas or electricity board official? Did she know her killer? That’s the obvious one. Check if any other people in the area had any visits from someone claiming to be from any utilities provider or if they noticed any wandering around the vicinity. Unlikely, but worth a shot anyway.’
Alice added that to the growing list of actions on the board.
‘Well, the bite mark from the biscuit, could be a clear identifier, if we get that circulated to dentists and it might yield some DNA, if we’re lucky.’
A small humming sound came from the professor and everyone turned to look at him. Nodding, like a sage imparting knowledge to his students, Carlton smiled. ‘By all means do that. However, I suspect that the bite is from the victim. I suspect that our killer forced her to take a bite from the biscuit for some reason known only to himself. By all initial observations, he’s been forensically savvy, so it seems unlikely to me that he would make such a basic error. It might save time to ask her dentist first.’ Carlton shrugged. ‘Again, I may be wrong.’
‘Good shout.’ Gus was pleased that Carlton had picked up on that. He would have gone down the official channels of trying to match the bite to the database, but this might save them wasted time and resources. Carlton’s intuitive knack was second to none and was one of the reasons his contributions were so constructive. ‘Compo get on that. If it was the victim who bit into the biscuit, it will save time looking for someone else.’
‘Plus.’ Carlton was speaking almost to himself. His mind clearly working overtime as he narrowed his eyes, lost in his own thoughts. ‘It gives a bit of insight into the killer.’
‘Precisely.’ Gus waited for Carlton to expand, but when he didn’t, Gus looked round. ‘What else?’
‘Previous similar cases – not just locally but nationwide.’ This was from Taffy.
Compo spoke up. ‘I’m running that through HOLMES and a couple of my own programmes. I’ll let you know when anything comes up from that.’
‘Thanks, Comps. If you don’t hit it for all parameters…’
Compo grinned. ‘Yep, I know boss, take the parameters away one by one till we discover something or eliminate all similar cases.’
‘Other things I want researching are the following – where the killer bought those candles. I want to know the supplier, the local places that sold them and branch out from around Bradford to further out. Also check online suppliers and we’re looking for bulk buys of say six or more candles.’
Compo gasped. ‘You think he’s going to kill at least six women, boss?’
‘At this stage we have no idea, but we have to start somewhere.’
Carlton started humming and Gus recognised it as a slightly mangled version of the nursery rhyme that had been placed under Miranda Brookes’ feet. Unsure whether Carlton was just doing it absentmindedly or if there was a point to it, Gus quirked an eyebrow in the psychologist’s direction.
‘Oh, sorry Gus. Just a thought – do we know how many verses there are to that rhyme?’
Gus looked blank, but Compo burst into activity, fingers speeding over his keyboard ‘Here we are – five verses and two extra lines at the end.’
Gus clicked. Carlton was suggesting that perhaps their killer was going to select a victim for each verse of the nursery rhyme. ‘We need to find the significance of that rhyme. Has our killer selected it for personal reasons or because of some underlying meaning attached to the rhyme?’
Alice added that to her list, while Compo offered to do that research. Head to one side, Compo swung his seat away from his desk. ‘You know, there are specialists who claim that artwork is almost as personally identifiable to a specific artist as a fingerprint. It might be worthwhile getting someone in to see if they can match the sketches to a specific artist – or a particular style of art.’
While Gus hated bringing in ‘experts’ because they tended to wax lyrical around their subject, sharing their extensive knowledge rather than just cutting to the chase with a pertinent report, he resigned himself to agreeing. Maybe he’d be able to fob the art geek off with the psychologist geek which would save him time, and more importantly, his sanity.
‘Get on to that, Comps.’ He paused. ‘I want the winch/pulley system thing he used to pull the body into place researched – where is it from, who supplies it, who the hell has bought it recently – and—’
‘If there are any bulk buys of it…’ finished Compo, his eyes wide.
‘Yep, that’s right. Also,’ continued Gus. ‘The sketch paper and the nursery rhyme paper – we need to know where they’re from, how widely distributed they are – narrow it down as tight as you can. It might be these details that will convict our killer once we catch him.’
‘Compo, don’t just check HOLMES for similar crimes, go into newspaper archives – nationally. I want to get ahead of this before—’
‘He strikes again.’ Carlton’s tone held no doubt and for a moment the room fell silent, digesting the import of their early investigations to prevent any more victims.
Leaning on the edge of his desk, Gus turned to Alice. ‘Will you get a team onto that asap?’
Gus’s team were thorough, and he could rely on them. For now, they all had their tasks to do, but he wanted to utter a few words of caution before the briefing ended. ‘Right. Although my first instincts are that we have a serial killer on our hands – or possibly
