All in all, things are progressing nicely and if he plays his cards right, later on he might be able to snatch a glimpse of the grieving DS Cooper – that would certainly make his evening.
Chapter 49
Bradford
Gus spent an uncomfortable half hour filling Alice in on what he’d discovered. Initially he’d been inclined to lie to her, but on reflection, he realised she’d access the files anyway, so he may as well tell her the truth. Perhaps Hopkins’s pornographic masturbatory tastes were best heard coming from him – although he’d give anything for someone else to have that responsibility. Alice hadn’t reacted and that worried Gus. Tears – even a few – would be acceptable – and probably beneficial. Keeping it all inside wouldn’t do her any good at all, conveniently ignoring the fact that Alice’s reactions were exactly the way he coped with the hard things. The only difference was he had his running to release the tension – Alice didn’t.
‘Got something.’ Compo jumped to his feet, nearly being yanked backwards by his headphones which he’d forgotten to remove.
Smothering the sigh of relief at being able to focus on something else, Gus turned to Compo. ‘Go on then. What you got?’
‘Well, somebody with quite a bit of expertise managed to gain access to the server that ran the security cameras and block them off from around half ten last night until when it was discovered at around half two this morning and an engineer reset it then.’
‘So, that means we have no footage of our guy getting in?’
‘Nope, we don’t, but’ – he grinned, bopping his hips from side to side in a macabre dance – ‘we have something else.’
Alice moved closer to Compo. Despite the pallor which made her dark eyes more pronounced and her general appearance more fragile, her tone was sharp. ‘Spit it out, Comps! Can’t be arsed with your dramatics today. Just accept it as read, that we’re all suitably amazed by your genius and just tell us what the fuck you’ve found.’
Gus bit his lip at the wounded animal look Compo directed to Alice and noted that he edged away from her, no doubt recollecting her recently acquired habit of prodding or slapping him on the shoulder when he dilly dallied.
‘So, I then went on to work out which people entered the Lister Mills complex last night.’ Compo pressed a button and a list appeared on the large whiteboard at the front of the room.
While Gus and Alice studied the list, Compo continued talking. ‘I double checked this with the residents’ names. It shows that everyone to enter or leave the building between 5 p.m. and 2 a.m. the next morning were residents – no maintenance men, no cleaners, no visitors with a visitor’s code – nobody, but residents.’
Alice frowned. ‘Why between those hours?’
‘Well, I looked at the security footage and realised that there was nowhere to hide except for the car park, but it was patrolled regularly every twenty minutes – until – the night security guard dozed off at around tennish – he admitted it to Taffy – I just wanted to see who was in the building overnight.’
‘So – our killer lives there?’ That didn’t feel right to Gus. He’d anticipated the killer entering and leaving the building in a clandestine manner. Why would he risk exposing himself to scrutiny by the police by choosing a target in his own building? Of course, they still had no evidence to support the fact that the home invader random strangler was the same as the home invader pregnant women strangler, even so, if Hopkins’s killer was only responsible for his and Smedley’s murders, it just seemed wrong. A glance at Alice’s frowning face, told him that she was thinking along a similar line.
Before either of them could voice their thoughts, Compo began bouncing on the soles of his feet, a sure sign that he had something else important to impart. ‘Not necessarily.’
He pointed at the screen, grinning widely. ‘Didn’t you notice the incongruent comings and goings?’
Incongruent? Gus looked back at the list, shaking his head, as Alice slapped her palm on the table and tutted. ‘Comps?’ Gus nodded at Alice whose pallor had been replaced by an annoyed flush.
Getting the message, Compo hurriedly highlighted the three relevant parts and then waited with an expectant look on his face. After a few seconds of silence, realising that even the highlights hadn’t clarified his findings enough for Alice and Gus, he sighed. ‘Jez Hopkins entered the complex into the garage at 20:35. He accessed the lift from the garage to his floor at 20:37. And entered his flat at 20:38.’
Gus frowned at first, then grinning, clicked his fingers. ‘You’re bloody brilliant, Compo.’ He turned to Alice. ‘So how the hell is Hopkins then registered as entering the complex again at 21:45?’
Alice shook her head. ‘Maybe he went out and came back in again. He is allowed to, you know?’
Ignoring Alice’s tetchiness, Gus turned to Compo. ‘Did he go out again?’
Compo, smile really wide now, shook his head. ‘He didn’t … but his killer came in using his access code.’ Milking the situation, Compo paused for dramatic effect. ‘Which means one of two things. Either Hopkins shared his code…’
He looked at Alice who shook her head. ‘No, Jez was careful about stuff like that after getting caught up with that killer a few years ago. He was verging on paranoid about his personal safety. Despite me being a copper, he wouldn’t divulge his personal access code
