The pathologist's reports, as McLennan had been expecting, made for very macabre reading.
Finch had been quite right about the killings. They were very far from subtle although, as much as he hated to admit to it, they also had a certain black, disturbing panache about them. McLennan ran his eye down the text, noting repeated use of the word 'exsanguination' and wondering, as he did so, why it was necessary to be so verbose.
There were a few tentative notes on the murder weapon or weapons, but depressingly little. It had been ascertained that all the cuts had been made with a double-bladed knife, but the length of the blade could not be determined as almost all the wounds were slashes rather than stabs, and the one exception – in the case of the poor bugger who'd been pinned to the table by his hand – wasn't nearly deep enough.
McLennan read downward, his mood heading in a similar direction to his eyes, and found the report on the woman.
There were faint marks on her chin, hinting that her neck had been broken barehanded, and with considerable force, too. He thought about this for a moment, cringed, and dispelled the mental image at once. There was also a cryptic note about a slight abrasion on her cheek, with a very nervous suggestion that she may have been killed outside and then dumped in the warehouse with the others.
Time of death was consistent for all five of the deceased; somewhere around midnight. They'd all died together, give or take a few minutes.
"Coffee, sir" said a voice, and a hand placed a paper cup down on the desk. McLennan twitched mightily and glanced up from the report; he hadn't even heard the sergeant enter the room.
"Thanks," he said, sipping at it gratefully. Wherever Finch had got the coffee, it was a great deal more palatable than anything that had ever issued forth from any machine at New Scotland Yard. "So," he continued. "Any news?"
"We've identified the girl," Finch told him, producing a wedge of papers and riffling through them. "Patricia Rose Garnet, aged twenty-two, worked in reprographics for a production company called Magnavision, and lived in Kentish Town with her parents." Finch stopped, and McLennan saw a bitter grimace pass across his face like cloud-shadow. "I've sent a couple of uniforms down there to tell them. We're going to need a formal identification."
"Not easy," said McLennan, shaking his head soberly. It was one of a few aspects of his job that he'd never quite come to terms with, and he'd had the unlovely task of informing relatives once or twice himself when he'd been in blue. He shuddered, picked himself free of these clinging memories and flapped a hand.
"What about the others?"
"Right, yes," Finch breathed, and turned over a page. "Forensics only just came back on the prints, but you won't be too surprised to hear that they're all villains."
"You're right, I'm not. Names?" grunted McLennan, turning to his computer and logging into the criminal records database.
"Tazmir Demirkan," Finch recited, "Wayne Grant, Nicholas Tresham and Andrew Bates." Finch shuffled the papers and set them down, moving behind the inspector's shoulder to study the screen. Several pages scrolled past before McLennan sighed heavily and removed his finger from the Arrow Down key.
"Okay, message understood," he said, with a sprinkling of irony. "This lot have been in and out like yoyos. That isn't an astoundingly helpful discovery, Sergeant."
"No, sir," said Finch, quietly, "but this is: we've got five bodies, but there were six sets of fresh prints in there. We've got ourselves a suspect." With this, he laid a sheaf of paper down in front of McLennan and then backed away to allow him time to study it.
"Roger Wright," McLennan said, mostly to himself. "Armed robbery, breaking and entering, handling stolen goods, assault, passing forged cheques, couple of drug charges...naughty boy." He sat back and laced his fingers across his stomach. "And you say he was there?"
"Not only that," Finch told him, "I cross-referenced Wright before I came in here. He's been hanging about with that lot for years."
"Right," said McLennan, getting up, beginning to pace the room, lost in thought. "This is all beginning to make sense. Thank God for that," he added, somewhat more subtly. He made an idle circuit of the desk, stared out of the window for a moment and then turned back to Finch, but what he saw there gave him pause.
Finch's expression was profoundly, seriously troubled. He'd shoved his hands into his pockets, hunched his shoulders and was staring at Wright's file as if he were looking for meaning in the Dead Sea Scrolls. McLennan watched him carefully for a while before speaking up.
"Something wrong?" Finch jerked his head up, as if a bubble had just popped in his face.
"Sorry. Probably nothing," he said, ruefully. "I've just got a bad feeling about all this. Like we're being strung along."
"Why?" The inspector clapped a hand to the back of his neck and scratched it, puzzled. "It all seems very straightforward to me."
"Maybe too straightforward," said Finch, not a question but a statement, and he ducked his chin as he uttered it. "It was just a feeling. Apologies, sir, didn't mean anything by it. Anyway," he went on, with a visible shake of his head, "there was one other thing. I got the record of the last few calls on Patricia Garnet's mobile."
He passed over another copy, stapled at the corner. McLennan stopped for a moment to wonder what had become of the concept of the paperless office, and quickly concluded that it was yet another symptom of humanity's peculiar yet irrepressible desire to do things the hard way even when a better and cleaner option presented itself. He then blinked, took the printout and glanced down at it while Finch continued to speak.
"There are surprisingly few calls here," he explained, "and only two in the three days leading up to the killings. One incoming, one outgoing. The outgoing call was the last one made on that phone, and guess who that was made to?"
"Do tell," said McLennan, still scanning the text.
"Demirkan," was the answer. McLennan looked up, briefly, but he had nothing but a resigned, lopsided smile on his face as he did so.
"And the incoming?"
"This could be delicate," said Finch, uneasily, indicating the pertinent entry on the log with a short jab of his finger. "It was early the previous afternoon, from a Gordon Deitrich. He's...he was a colleague of hers."
McLennan folded the papers over his hand at that point, his brow crumpling. He looked into Finch's face, searching for a clue there. He struggled heroically for one more second, and then gave up entirely. "Why do I know that name?" he asked.
"He presents kids' programmes, sir," Finch responded, pursing his lips. "He was on Channel 5 a little while ago, if I'm right about that."
"Oh," said McLennan, vaguely. "Yes, I remember," he added. He'd brought the man to mind now; a rather fey, affected fellow who had nevertheless proven very popular with daytime TV watchers of all ages...particularly, for some bizarre reason, college students. McLennan was certain, now, that he'd seen his own young granddaughter watching one of Deitrich's shows at some point or other.
"I see what you mean by delicate," he said, at long last. "But we've got no choice here, we need to have a word with him. Let's go."
He turned to the door, although he halted with his fingers on the handle and swung back round to face Finch, who was still looking deeply introspective. McLennan lowered his voice and chose a few careful words.
"Just out of curiosity," he said, "what exactly is this bad feeling you've got?" Finch finished shrugging his coat on before he replied, giving every indication of a man constructing a mental house of cards in the teeth of a high wind.
"There's not much I can put into words, sir," he said, slowly, "but I get the impression that we're only seeing what someone wants us to see."
McLennan had already opened his mouth to say something in response when he realised that he ought to shut it again. Are you sure you want to pursue this, he asked himself, realising very shortly that the answer was 'no'. He'd been with the Met for over thirty years and, while he admitted that sometimes all a copper had to rely upon was gut instinct, it was also that self-same gut instinct that had got far too many good officers killed.
Even so, he was aware that Finch was a reliable man who didn't deserve a dressing-down for answering a direct question. "I'll bear that in mind," he said, somewhat lamely, and finished opening the door.
Gordon was staring out of the office window when Anne slipped through the door behind him. She waited for two or three seconds before coughing discreetly, at which point he swung around, dispelled the startled look that had set up camp on his face and cracked a genuine smile.
"I must say," Anne observed, sinking into a chair on the far side of the desk, "that it's been quite some time since I saw you smile, sweetheart. I was afraid I'd have to employ drastic measures if I ever wanted to see your teeth again."
"Such as?"
"Mooning you," said Anne, perfectly deadpan. Gordon struggled for a second to maintain the same severity of expression, failed dramatically, and collapsed against the wall while he battled for breath.
"You look better, too," she went on, seemingly oblivious to Gordon's physical distress. Everything sorted now, is it?" Gordon recovered his composure, blushed very gently, and took his own seat.
"I think so," he said, lacing his fingers behind his head and tilting the chair back a few notches. "And you might be happy to hear that I haven't had a drink in a few days now."
"Might be?" echoed Anne, her eyes widening in mock surprise. "There's no 'might be' about that. I'm very proud of you."
Gordon was just attempting a self-effacing reply when the phone rang. He reached out for it, but Anne's reflexes were finely honed and she plucked the receiver up before the first buzz had died away. Tucking it into her shoulder as she greeted the caller, she frowned almost at once and raised a finger at Gordon as she continued to listen.
"Okay, I'll come and get them. Thanks, love," she said, and hung up. Her hand remained, clasping the receiver for a few moments more, and she then cast a narrow, analytical glance at Gordon.
"There're a couple of policemen downstairs," she said, eventually. "They want to talk to you."
Gordon felt his features solidify. It was a reflexive gesture of self-defence, he understood, given that the only other option was to allow his face to slide into the rat-like, hunted look that was lurking a mere breath below his skin. Nevertheless, he was sure that his waxen expression was just as much of a giveaway, if not more.
When Anne had left the room, he sat in a growing miasma of his own sweat for what felt like a year, and then dragged himself up out of his chair and placed his palms flat on the cold window, leaning forward until his breath fogged the glass and he started to hyperventilate.
Think of something, he pleaded with his brain. Anything other than the truth will do. You lie for a living, my friend; surely you can cope with this? He stepped back, calmly and slowly, as the door opened behind him, then folded his hands behind his back and turned around as smoothly as possible, ignoring the rabid jackrabbit in his chest.
Anne shepherded two plainclothes police officers into the room and, in the same efficient movement, pulled the door closed to afford them privacy, although – Gordon noted – not without showing him a heated, worried stare as she did so. He found space to sympathise with her for a second, and then turned his attention to his visitors.
The first was an imposing figure, almost as tall as Gordon himself, with a fine, close crop of steel-grey hair. The younger man, lurking behind the other like a human shadow, was altogether more...dishevelled, he decided, dark and morose, with a lugubrious and persistent air of doom about him.
"Gordon Deitrich?" the first officer said, holding out a hand. Gordon edged around the desk to return the gesture, praying fiercely that his palms weren't as sticky as he sensed them to be. "I'm Chief Inspector McLennan, and this," he cocked his head briefly in indication, "is Detective Sergeant Finch. We're sorry to trouble you."
"No, no," Gordon breathed, feeling a minute tremble in the back of his throat. "No trouble. Won't you both sit down? Would you like some tea?" he babbled, reaching for the intercom. McLennan, however, gave a curt shake of his head.
"No, thank you, sir. I don't anticipate taking up too much of your time."
Gordon returned to the relative shield of his seat behind the desk and squeaked his way down into the well-worn leather chair cushions. He waited, fidgeting microscopically, until the detectives had taken a seat, and then clasped his hands together. He readied a few words in his throat, until a small inner voice counselled him to allow the detectives to speak first.
"I'm afraid I've got some bad news to relay first, Mr. Deitrich," McLennan said, soberly. "Patricia Garnet was murdered several days ago. I understand that you were colleagues, and I'd like to offer my condolences."
React, Gordon ordered himself, furiously. Do something. You might try to look shocked, for a start. He responded to this urgent order with a slack-jawed expression of emotional upheaval although, if he were honest, he loathed the way it made him feel to perform like this. Even so, it appeared to work. McLennan's eyes creased in sympathy before he continued.
"As difficult as this must be for you, Mr. Deitrich," he began, and fiddled with his pen, turning it over in his fingertips, "for the purposes of our investigation, I have to ask you some questions about Ms. Garnet."
It was only now that Gordon felt a tear fill the corner of one eye, and he wiped it away with a delicate fingertip. He realised with a sudden dart of superheated shame that, while this tear was very real, it was mostly born of self-pity and not, as much as he'd have liked, for the death of a woman he'd believed to be a good friend. He drew a shuddering breath and spoke up.
"Please...yes, if there's anything I can do to help..." he said, softly, and then allowed his voice to sink into oblivion.
"Thank you, sir." McLennan turned to Finch, who passed over a sheet of notebook paper and then sat back, hands neatly folded, directing a quiet yet penetrating gaze at Gordon.
"Now," McLennan went on, studying the paper for a second, "we've ascertained that Ms. Garnet received only one incoming call on her mobile phone in the eighteen hours before her death, and this was traced to your phone. I wonder if you can tell me what this call was about?"
Forcing himself not to avert his eyes from the inspector, Gordon decided that he could escape with only a mild variation on the literal truth, and cleared his throat before beginning.
"This is rather embarrassing," he said, not needing to fabricate the flush that sprang to his face at that point, "but we had in fact been making plans for a date. I'd offered to cook dinner at my home, and I was simply confirming the arrangements." Gordon kept his gaze locked with that of the Chief Inspector as he spoke, although a tiny movement out of the very corner of his eye told him that Finch had shifted slightly at this explanation, and was gestating a frown.
"Once again, I'm very sorry for the intrusion, sir, but I must ask – did this date go well?" McLennan inquired, very gently.
"It did. At least, I thought it did," said Gordon, and only now did he allow his head to drop. "But it was getting late in the evening when Tricia said she had a call to make, went out into the hall, came back and then told me she had to leave right away. I'm afraid I didn't hear what the call was about," he added, as an afterthought.
"Thank you, sir," McLennan said, although he wrote in his notebook as he said it, and only glanced back up after he'd dotted several emphatic i's and one full stop. "And then she left your house alone? What time was this?"
"Around eleven-fifteen, I think," said Gordon, mulling it over. "And yes, she left alone. I would have offered her a lift but, as I say...I was given the impression that something had gone wrong during the evening, and at the time I was too put out to suggest it. I wish I had," he said, sorrowfully, and finding that he was completely sincere about this.
McLennan folded the cover of his notebook down and shuffled himself into a more comfortable position in the hard chair.
"I think that's about all for now, Mr. Deitrich," he said, "and thanks for your patience. Unfortunately, I'm going to need to take an official statement from you at some point in the near future, down at Scotland Yard." Here he shuffled some more, and went on. "It wouldn't otherwise be necessary, but it does appear as if you were the last person to see Patricia Garnet alive, and this is a necessary procedure."
"I do understand," said Gordon, as the officers stood, somewhat self-consciously now, and headed for the door. Gordon showed them out, nodding gently, although he swore that as they left he received one last, faint lingering stare from Finch, those deep, murky eyes pinning him in place for a second before the door swung closed again.
Anne had obviously decided to maintain a front of decorum, because it was another few minutes before she slipped back into the office and stood in the middle of the rug, one hand planted on her hip, broadcasting one of the loudest silences that Gordon had ever heard.
He experienced a terrible, compulsive urge to tell her everything that had happened, a drive to confess that was so primitive that he'd almost forgotten its existence. Common sense came to his aid, however, and he closed his mouth as quickly has he'd opened it. Instead, he slumped back down into his seat and prepared himself for a heavily abridged explanation.
Outside the gates, McLennan paused to locate a packet of Polos. While he did so, he glanced behind him to check that he and Finch were in reasonable isolation, and then spoke softly but clearly.
"Got any feelings about this part, Finch?" he asked, sucking thoughtfully on the mint as he watched Finch offer him one tiny shrug, barely more than a twitch.
"Only that I doubt she went to his house for a date. The bloke's gayer than a Christmas tree, if you ask me."
"That's a very dangerous claim, Sergeant," replied McLennan evenly, without feeling the need to reveal that he'd reached much the same conclusion on his own. "We've got to stick to what we can prove, and my hunch here is that we're not going to be able to prove that she didn't do exactly as he described."
"So what do we do now?" Finch asked, just as much of himself as of his Chief Inspector, as he fished his car keys out of his pocket.
"There's only one thing we can do for the time being," McLennan said, his words parenthesised by a sigh. "We'll put out an arrest warrant for Roger Wright. He's the only lead we've got so far. Meanwhile, we need his address because come hell or high water, I'm searching it. Can you get that for me?"
"I'll try, sir."
McLennan took one last, troubled glance at the Magnavision building as they drove away, trying to dispel the unsettling, gut-twisting feeling that it wasn't the last he'd heard of it.
Midnight came and went without leaving so much as a cold kiss behind it and, in due time, gave way to even less civilised hours, which lay heaviest of all on one particular pair of shoulders.
Jason was bored to the edge of catatonia. He'd taken the security job at Magnavision in the first place for the main reason – or, if he were honest with himself, the only reason – that he'd thought it would be a good chance for some quiet, undemanding work without a supervisor hanging over his shoulder every five minutes.
Exactly three hours into his first shift, just two weeks previously, he'd reached the definite conclusion that he'd badly overestimated the benefits of lone working, especially when set against the tedium of having to make the same circuit through an empty building every half an hour for ten hours, with nothing but a surly, wall-eyed Dobermann Pinscher for company.
He'd unclipped the dog's lead for the moment. He knew that this was strictly against the rules, but the animal had been getting more and more restless for the past few minutes and Jason no longer felt like having his shoulder dragged half out of its socket as the dog strained, whining softly, at its tether.
Once the dog had been released, however, it seemed a little unsure as to what to do with its newfound freedom. It dashed ahead of Jason, rounded the next bend in the corridor, and then came clicking back, high-stepping like a Lipizzaner stallion. Its thick stump of a tail twitched hesitantly as it backed away once more, turned, and peered round the corner again.
Jason, not normally a sensitive man, nevertheless felt a cold prickle of sweat on the back of his neck. He'd been taking this same dog on his rounds since he'd started the job, and yet he'd never seen it act in this manner before. It wasn't, he decided, that the animal was afraid. What was, somehow, worse was that it appeared to be dreadfully, morbidly fascinated by something that Jason himself could neither see nor hear.
The dog disappeared round the corner once more. Jason knew that taking the left-hand corridor took him away from his allotted route, but he had a shrewd suspicion that it would be far simpler to allow the dog to satisfy its curiosity than to drag it away from whatever it was that had such a fierce grip on its attention.
The Dobermann, when Jason caught up with it, was standing on its hind legs, pawing at the security door that led out into the rear courtyard. This truncated section of passage was lit by nothing more than a single bulb in an aluminium shade, and the dog's eyes stood out as pinpoint sparkles in the relative gloom. Pulling his ID card off his belt, Jason swiped the touchpad that unlocked the door and, pushing his way past the excitable animal, slipped outside into the frost-torn night air.
The door slammed back as the dog barrelled past his legs, almost knocking him over, and hared out into the circles cast by the sodium lamps on the outer walls. He saw it dart through the last patch of subdued illumination before it was lost to sight behind a storage shed.
It occurred to Jason, rather belatedly, that if there was indeed an intruder in the grounds of the studios, he could expect to face a tongue-lashing for allowing the dog off the lead to attack them, especially in a time and place where criminals had developed a habit of pursuing legal action for any injuries they might incur – even when this happened in the middle of a crime.
Still, he mused, gloomily, too late now. And with this heavily in mind, Jason dragged his heels out over the tarmac courtyard and followed in the dog's wake. He noted as he did so that the animal wasn't barking or snarling; it wasn't making so much as a single solitary sound, in fact. Maybe his luck was in, after all. Maybe it just heard a cat, he added, internally.
He rounded the last bend and fetched up behind the storage shed, and it was at this point that he became partially detached from reality. The Dobermann was sitting on its haunches, quite at peace; chin raised and shining eyes fixed on the figure that stood above it, stroking its silky head with slow sweeps of one leather-gloved hand.
Jason, his expression quite dreamlike, saw the black cloak billow lazily in a slight, meandering night breeze. He studied the back of the figure's head, and the way the sodium bulbs cast smooth yellow highlights on its sleek raven hair. He watched the hand pause, and then halt in its ministrations to the dog as the shade straightened its back and stood up, still without turning around. Lastly, Jason fancied that he heard a soft hiss of indrawn breath as the intruder shook its head, slowly and deliberately, and began to turn.
Without warning, Jason's vision was eclipsed in a violent, suffocating swirl of dark cloth. He didn't even see the fist before it struck home.