went on that list for an altogether more sinister reason. Either they were murdered, or, in rarer instances, held captive against their will. Grisly cases came to light from time to time, in the UK and in just about every other country in the world, of people being held for years, sometimes decades. Sometimes in his worst, darkest moments of despair he imagined Sandy being held chained in a cellar somewhere by a maniac.
He still believed she was alive, whatever the reason for her disappearance. Over the past nine years he had consulted almost more mediums than he could remember. Every time he heard about a medium with a good reputation he would go and see them. Whenever one came to Brighton and performed in public, he would be there in the audience.
And in all this time none of them, not one, had claimed to be in touch with his dead wife, or to have a message from her.
Grace had no unswerving belief in mediums, any more than he had in doctors, or scientists. He possessed an open mind. He believed the dictum of one of his favourite characters in fiction, Sherlock Holmes. ‘When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains,
His thoughts were interrupted by the chirrup of his mobile phone. He looked at the display but the number was withheld – most likely it was a colleague, standard practice among police officers. Answering it he said, ‘Roy Grace.’
‘Yo, old wise man!’ said a familiar voice.
‘Fuck off, I’m busy,’ Grace said with a grin. After three hours trying to make conversation with the miserably silent Dr Frazer Theobald, it was good to hear a friendly voice. Glenn Branson was a Detective Sergeant with whom he was close mates. They had worked together on and off for several years, and he was the first person Grace had recruited onto his Major Incident Team for this murder.
‘Well you can fuck off too, old timer. While you’re lounging around on your second brandy after a long lunch, I’m working my butt off doing your job for you.’
The unpleasant taste of a sardine and tomato sandwich, Grace’s lunch which seemed like an aeon ago, still lingered in his memory. ‘Chance would be a fine thing,’ he said.
‘Saw a well brilliant film last night.
‘I saw it about thirty years ago, when I was in my cradle.’
‘It was made in 1973.’
‘Films take a long time to reach your local picture house, do they?’
‘Very witty. You should see it again – it’s so good. Al Pacino, he’s the man.’
‘Thanks for this valuable piece of information, Glenn,’ he said, stepping out of the awning and out of earshot of the pathologist, a police photographer named Martin Pile, and Dennis Ponds, the senior Sussex Police Public Relations Officer, who had just arrived and was waiting to be briefed by Grace for the press. From his experience, at this stage in a major incident it was best to say very little. The less information the press printed about what had actually been found, the state of the body or body parts and the location, the easier it would be to weed out crank phone calls and time wasters – and to tell when there was a caller with genuine information.
At the same time the police had to recognize the wisdom of maintaining a good working relationship with the media – although in Grace’s case that had been souring fast over the past couple of weeks. He’d been pilloried in today’s news over the death of two suspects, and he’d been savaged last week for admitting in court, during a murder trial, that he had consulted a medium.
‘I’m standing on a hill in the pissing rain. How exactly does this help our enquiry?’
‘It doesn’t; it’s for your education. All you ever watch is crap.’
‘Nothing wrong with
‘Tell me about it, I live with one. But I have some information for you.’
‘Uh huh?’
‘A trainee solicitor – an articled clerk. Just come in.’
‘Well that would be a loss,’ Grace said sarcastically.
‘You know, man, you’re sick.’
‘No, just honest.’
Like most of his police colleagues, Roy Grace disliked the legal profession, criminal lawyers in particular, for whom the law was just a game. Every day police officers risked their lives trying to catch criminals; their lawyers made good livings trying to outwit the law and free them. Sure, Grace knew, innocent people who were arrested had to be protected. But it was still early days in Glenn’s career – he wasn’t long enough in the tooth as a cop yet. He hadn’t experienced enough human scum escaping justice thanks to smart lawyers.
‘Yeah, whatever. She didn’t turn up for work today. One of her friends checked her flat. She’s not there; they’re well worried.’
‘So? When was she last seen?’
‘At work yesterday afternoon. She had an important client meeting this morning and she never showed. Never phoned. Her boss said this isn’t in character. Her name’s Janie Stretton.’
‘I’ve got a list of four other names, Glenn. What makes this one special?’
‘Just a hunch.’
‘Janie Stretton?’
‘Yep.’
‘I’ll add her to the list.’
‘Put her at the top.’
The rain was permeating his suit, and dripping down his face. Grace stepped back into the shelter of the tented awning. ‘We still don’t have a head,’ he said. ‘And I have a feeling we’re not going to find it for a very good reason. We’ve already run a fingerprint test, which is negative. We’re sending off for a priority DNA to Huntingdon labs, but that will be a couple of days.’
‘I’ve found her,’ Glenn Branson said. ‘I’ll put money on it.’
‘Janie Stretton?’ Grace said.
‘Janie Stretton.’
‘She’s probably in bed, shagging some three-grand-an-hour brief.’
‘No, Roy,’ the Detective Sergeant insisted. ‘I think you’re looking at her.’
12
Tom spent the afternoon at the offices of a major new client, Polstar Vodka, shaving his prices – and profit margin – down to the bone to avoid a competitor getting the business. Further handicapped by not having his laptop with him, he left glumly with an order for 50,000 engraved martini glasses and overprinted silver coasters which he had originally been banking on to give him a good profit. Now he would be lucky to even cover his costs. At least it was turnover to show the bank, but he was painfully aware of the old adage, ‘Turnover is vanity, profit is sense.’
With luck it would lead to more profitable business in time, he hoped.
Arriving back at the office shortly before five o’clock, he was relieved to see his laptop up and running again. But at a cost of seven hours of the techie’s expensive time that he could ill afford. Peter Chard’s desk was empty and Simon Wong was on the phone; Maggie was also busy on the phone. Olivia brought him over a pile of letters to sign.
He dealt with them then turned his attention to Chris Webb, who had managed to retrieve some data. He talked him through the system upgrade he had done and the new anti-virus software he had installed – at further expense, of course. But he was still unable to explain where the virus that had wiped the database had come from other than from the disc Tom had found on the train, which he was going to take away to analyse further.
After Chris had left, Tom spent half an hour catching up on his emails. Then out of curiosity he opened his Explorer Web browser, and went to the recent history section, which showed him all the websites he had looked at in the past twenty-four hours. There were a couple of visits to Google, several to ask.co.uk and one to Railtrack
