Hector nodded and headed for the north side.
Walter stood as close to the edge as he dared and peered down. There was no wall or fence of any kind on the edge, nothing to stop anyone falling off. About four feet down, all the way round, was a black metal net, narrow gauge, small holes in the netting, sticking out maybe three feet, designed as some kind of safety feature, probably there to stop anything raining down on the unsuspecting public below. Objects like sticks and stones maybe, dropped there by nesting or squabbling gulls, and over time blown towards and over the edge. It was debateable whether that net could catch and hold a human, and certainly not a human determined to go that way.... all the way down.
But for someone to climb down there, and over and beyond the net, and then back into the side of the building, that appeared almost impossible to Walter. Maybe an ultra-strong ultra-fit gymnast might make it, but beyond the net there was precious little in the way of handgrips or footholds, or so it seemed to Walter, and he couldn’t see how anyone could do it.
Walter retreated into the centre of the main roof and said, ‘East and South clear.’
Hector came back, nodding, saying, ‘North and West clear too.’
‘If someone’s gone over the side they’ve got more balls than I have,’ said Walter.
‘Me too, I couldn’t do it.’
Walter scratched his chin.
Hector said, ‘Looks like he’s got away, Guv.’
‘No,’ said Walter. ‘He’s still here. He’s here alright.’
Thirty-Seven
Hector pulled a face and switched his weight from one foot to the other, and said, ‘I’m not with you. I don’t follow. How do you mean?’
‘I think you do, Hector. I only have one question: Why?’
Hector pursed his lips and pulled a grimmer face and looked downcast and shrugged his shoulders and said, ‘How did you know?’
‘I didn’t, not until a moment ago. It’s the old thing, take away all possibilities, and the only one left is the correct one, and that set me thinking.’
‘About what?’
‘It was the fingerprint thing that didn’t fit. There was always something too convenient about it, and just the one too, no other trace of Flanagan ever being in Belinda Cooper’s place, and you were the only one pushing for him to be the guilty party, and it was you who went to Flanagan’s place with Gibbons, and my guess is that while Gibbons kept him talking, you made your way into the kitchen and picked up some small item, a small glass or something, and pocketed it, hoping there might be a print on it, and you got lucky, because there was.’
Hector sniffed and stared Walter’s way.
Walter continued. ‘It isn’t easy to lift a print and then re-lay it in a different location, but with your expertise, and the things we have taught you, you managed to do it pretty well. Nice touch to put it inside the bedside table drawer, by the way; that took things to a whole new level, intimacy wise. And then there was the ID parade that you somehow managed to avoid by fixing up a dental appointment, no doubt at the last minute. You probably told them you had terrible toothache, and you did that because you’d discovered that Corla could and would ID you if she set eyes on you, just as she did this morning on your way here. And you came here to kill her, didn’t you? Well, didn’t you?’
Hector sniffed a cold laugh and didn’t answer.
Walter spoke again.
‘It was a moment ago, when you athletically leapt on that roof, a six foot slim man, leaping up there, and all along we have been looking for a six foot slim man who could look after himself, with dark hair and eyes, just like yours, Hector. And you still haven’t answered my question: Why?’
It looked like he wasn’t going to speak, but he did.
‘Do you remember that Sunday in the Maaz Khan case when I persuaded everyone in to work overtime? It was the day I’d set aside to give my lady, Sweet Georgia Browne, a full weekend’s CPA.’
‘Concentrated Personal Attention,’ said Walter. ‘I remember it well, what of it?’
‘Well, she never forgave me for that, me messing her around, and about ten days later, Heather Holmes, that’s her real name by the way, gave me the elbow.’
‘Is that what this is all about? Being rejected by a woman?’
‘No Guv, not quite. It’s far more complicated than that.’
‘Explain yourself!’
‘She was everything to me. A truly exceptional person. Everyone else by comparison was, well, irrelevant, and afterwards she refused to see me, and changed her phone numbers and email address, and I couldn’t even call her. I really flipped. I never knew you could feel like that, kind of numb. And I was so incredibly angry, I can’t explain it, and then I stopped eating, couldn’t sleep at night, but kept falling asleep at work. It was eating me up, gnawing away at my guts.
And one night I was out getting drunk, and I got talking to this guy who told me all about this good time girl who had a caravan down by the river, and how she’d do anything for fifty quid, and he really did mean anything. I thought that maybe if I went down there somehow it might bring my Heather back.’
’By killing her, you mean? Eleanor?’
Hector nodded. ‘Yeah, that was the deal, I didn’t want anything else, I went tooled up with petrol and matches, my brain was totally scrambled, I wasn’t thinking straight at all.’
‘Go on.’
‘She was a real strange kid, that Ellie Wright.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘As I was doing it, throttling her, do you know what she did?’
‘I can’t imagine. What?’
‘She reached up and kissed me, Guv. Can you believe that? She kissed her killer, as if in thanks, as if she wanted me to
