I really liked Darren. He wasn’t just sharp, he was also blessed with a generous helping of good, old fashioned common sense.
We found the place where our killer had taken shelter just over two hours later. It was a detached bungalow, less than three hundred metres from the abandoned car, and there was a For Sale sign out on the front lawn. When no one answered the doorbell, Walker and Collins, who’d been working that section, called the number on the sign. The estate agent told them the place was empty and agreed to send someone around with keys so they could check it. They’d kept on working their way down the street for the next twenty minutes until the woman showed up and let them in.
Conall and I were a few minutes from there when Walker called him. I waited, wondering if they had something as he listened to her report. “Alright,” he finally said. “Let Mills know too, please. We’ll be there in a few minutes.” He hung up.
“Do they have something?”
“They’ve found the bag,” he told me. “Tucked into the cupboard under the kitchen sink in an empty house. No sign of our man.”
“Any signs of forced entry?”
“Nothing obvious.” I kept pace with him as we turned around and set off back the way we’d come. “We’ll have to see if we can figure out how he got in once we get there.”
“Doesn’t it all seem very peculiar to you?” I asked. “I mean our guy must have scouted out the place in advance as a possible bolt hole, but it’s nowhere near where he left Chris Arnold’s head. And what made him decide to take cover?”
“Are you asking me to guess what goes through the mind of a total nutjob? Who knows? Maybe he heard Shay’s drone, although I very much doubt that. Those little things don’t make much more noise than a wasp buzzing about and didn’t get close to him. Maybe he had a feeling he was being watched, or he’s got some imaginary voice giving him instructions. Compared to kidnapping and murdering people, this kind of dodging about doesn’t seem very high on the ‘odd behaviour’ list. It’s a pity we couldn’t put enough boots on the ground to check everyone moving around once the rush hour got going or we might have been able to catch him leaving.”
Too many possible places and people to watch at once. Had our man had yet another car or van nearby to switch to once the neighbourhood had woken up enough and people began to head off to work? Not even Shay, with his drone, could have effectively tracked so much movement.
We saw Mills and Bryce coming in from the other direction as we all converged on the bungalow. The woman from the estate agency was standing outside. Conall showed her his warrant card as we came up to her.
“Thank you for coming down here to let my people in this morning, Mrs MacCabe.”
“Not at all, Inspector. My firm is always happy to assist the police in any way we can. Your colleagues asked me not to touch anything, and I thought it wiser to wait for you out here.”
“Quite right. I’m afraid we’re going to need to bring a team in to go over the house thoroughly, now that we know our suspect was here. ”
“Of course.” She handed him a business card and a little ring with two keys on it. “If you could have someone drop those keys back into our office for us once you’re done with the place, we’d be very grateful.”
“I’ll make sure to do that. Would it also be possible for you to send me a list of the viewings that have taken place since this house went onto the market?” He handed her a card of his own. “We may wish to check everyone who came to see it.” That request made her pause.
“I’ll look into it,” she promised, “but I’m not sure we can legally supply that information unless you get a warrant to check through our records. I’d be happy to contact them all and ask if they object to us giving you their information if you’d like?”
He just smiled nicely.
“Thank you, but no, please don’t. We’ll see about a warrant if we decide it’s necessary to speak with them ourselves.” He signed the proffered receipt for the keys, and we watched her walk to her car, climb in and drive away.
The front door was ajar, so once we’d all gloved up, he gave it a little push and we went in. Collins beckoned from the end of the hall.
“We’re in the kitchen here, Sir.” Collins had gone back to their car and driven it over here before we’d arrived. Some plastic sheeting from their boot was now spread out on the floor. The bag they’d found was sitting, unzipped, on top of it. “It was open when we found it. We haven’t touched the zipper or the strap, Sir.” They must have lifted it from underneath, in order to avoid the areas most likely to hold fingerprints.
“Any idea of how he got in yet?” Conall asked as he crouched down. It was a blue and black Puma sports bag, an exact match for the one we’d all seen in the footage.
“We think he came in through the rear garden and used the sliding patio doors in the living room.”
“Not locked?”
“Not when we arrived.” Conall pulled a pen out of his pocket and asked me for mine. Using those, he eased the opening wider. Yeah, that was the right scarf and the right jacket. He straightened up again, looking thoughtful.
“Davie and his boys are all tied up, and I
