Chapter 7
The officers who had remained in the main hall went to the security guards by the door and had them call for backup. Police cars arrived within minutes of the pursuit.
The Townsend's had begged the other officer to let them follow in the pursuit of their son, but he refused to let them and asked that they sit until they came back.
The mayor had everyone moved to another room for the arriving officers to take statements from them.
Captain Williams, the detectives, and the officers returned to the main hall. The Townsends looked hopeful until they realised their son was not among them.
'Where is he?' May Townsend screamed.
'He got away.' Captain Williams replied.
'He got away! How?' Bradley Townsend asked, 'You were on his tail how could you have let him escape?' He raised his voice, Captain Williams asked him to calm down, 'Yes we were on his tail, Blake almost had him, but he got away.'
'And did he just disappear, or did she let him get away?'
'Hey!' Fred exclaimed, but Officer Garrett put a hand on his shoulder.
'We chased him all the way to the roof, and he was gone when we got there.' Daphne replied, glaring at Bradley Townsend, and trying her hardest not to say something awful back to him.
'He jumped over the side?' May Townsend asked.
'No, it seems that he didn't jump over the side.' Captain Williams replied.
'Then what the fuck happened to our boy?' Bradley Townsend asked through gritted teeth.
'Mr Townsend, my husband and his colleagues chased that man to the roof, the least you can do is thank them for trying.' Susan Williams said she had been sat at the table behind the Townsends, listening to Bradley Townsend shout at her husband.
'Not to mention, Blake chased him barefoot.' Henderson added.
Bradley Townsend didn't say anything, instead, he grabbed his wife's hand and dragged her away from the team and out the main hall.
Daphne and Fred sat at the table with the captain and the officers, recalling the events that had unfolded.
'How could he have just disappeared?' Henderson asked.
'Dunno.' Jacobs replied.
'I'm going to find out if there is any security footage of the roof, maybe we can see where our guy went.' Captain Williams spoke as she stood from the table. He grabbed his glass of whisky – which one of the waiters had brought them when they returned – downed the last drop of it before putting it back on the table and wandering off to find someone.
'Don't beat yourself up Blake, ya almost had him.' Henderson said.
Daphne smiled a little, she had been quiet since the encounter with the Townsends. And Henderson had made some rather unpleasant comments when the couple had left.
Fred put his hand firmly on Daphne's thigh, squeezing gently and he smiled at her, 'We'll find him.'
Daphne nodded.
'What I wanna know is if you kidnapped a kid why would you bring it somewhere, where you know there is going to be a lot of people?' Jacobs asked.
Daphne had not thought of that. Really all she had been thinking about was how he and the boy vanished on the rooftop.
She didn't have much time to think about it because Captain Williams had returned with the police officer, Officer Dale.
'We can look at the security footage.' Captain Williams said, 'There's something else.'
They all looked up at him, but it was Dale who spoke, 'Some people have reported missing items.'
'Missing items?' Henderson asked.
'Yeah, like wallets and watches, a couple of phones have been taken too.' Dale explained.
Fred put his hand in his pocket and was relieved to find his wallet and both his phone and Daphne's.
'He came here with the kid because it's the perfect opportunity.' Daphne mumbled.
'What's that?' Garrett asked.
'He brought all the other kids too.' Daphne spoke.
'What are you talking about?' Captain Williams asked.
'Just a minute ago, Jacobs asked why he would kidnap a child and then bring the child to a place that he knows is going to be full of people.' Daphne began, Captain Williams just stared at her, so did the others but she knew Fred was catching on, so she continued, 'Because he could create a distraction with one of the kids whilst the others set about pick-pocketing.'
'Oh, Christ.' Jacobs muttered.
Captain Williams turned to Dale, 'I want a list of everything that has been taken.' Dale nodded and returned to the room where the people were, 'I'll go with him.' Jacobs said.
Captain Williams nodded, 'The rest of you, come with me we're gonna have a look at that security footage.'
'There!' Henderson exclaimed, and Garrett paused the video. They looked at the screen which showed the door which leads to the roof was just about to open, 'Play it.' Henderson said, Garrett pressed play and the rest of them watched as the door swung open and The Magic Man came on to the rooftop, the door closed behind him and seconds later it opened again, and Daphne was in the doorway.
Garrett clicked on another video; this one was taken from the camera on the rooftop. He played it lined up with the Magic Man arriving on the roof in the first video, except this one was different.
They watched as the Magic Man – with the bag over his shoulder and the boy in his arms – stepped out onto the rooftop, the camera lost its focus and blurred a little bit then when it refocused the Magic Man was gone and was the boy and the bag too.
Fred and Daphne looked at each other, 'He's just vanished.' Fred spoke.
'Maybe because of the focussing issue, we missed the bit where he escaped?' Garrett suggested and he found another video from a camera on the other side of the roof. He played it and the same thing happened, it lost focus and the Magic Man was gone.
'This is some weird shit right there.' Henderson commented.
'How could he have just…gone?' Daphne asked studying the video.
'Magic?' Garrett asked.
'Seriously?' Henderson asked.
'Yes, I am.' Garrett replied, 'He did that trick with the hoop.'
'That was clearly supposed to happen, obviously, the hoop was rigged to open to a curtain.' Henderson commented.
'But where did the boy come from? And how did he get into the houses and take the children without leaving evidence of a break-in or waking any other family members up?' Garrett asked.
A few hours after the events at City Hall, Garrett took Fred and Daphne back to their building.
'Have a good night guys, don't worry we'll figure this out in the morning.' Garrett reassured.
'Night Garrett.' Daphne said. Garrett nodded before he drove away.
Daphne and Fred walked hand in hand to the doors of the building, they were silent in the elevator ride to their floor.
Fred unlocked the door to their apartment and flicked on the light. Daphne opened the cupboard and pulled out a bottle of whisky, grabbing two glasses from the draining board, she poured whisky into each of them.
She drained her glass before Fred had even picked his up, 'I'm going to bed.' She announced, putting the glass into the sink.
Fred watched her as she walked into the bedroom. He gave her a few minutes to change into her pyjamas, and he took sips of his whisky as they recalled the events of the night.
He grabbed Daphne's notepad that was lying on the kitchen table, picked up the pen that was next to it and quickly noted a few things that they should investigate tomorrow: robberies in the last 4 months, investigate parents.
And then he went to the bedroom.
Daphne was pulling her pyjama t-shirt over her head. She had hung up the dress in the wardrobe and she went to brush her teeth.
Fred changed out of his suit, hanging it up in the wardrobe, he stood in his boxers and grabbed a light grey t-shirt that was lying on his pillow and he pulled it over his head.
Daphne returned to the bedroom and she climbed into the bed, her back turned to Fred. He climbed in next to her, he flicked the light switch, and the room was in darkness.
He wrapped his arm around Daphne's waist and pulled her closer to him, she rolled onto her back and looked at Fred.
'Forget what Townsend said, we chased that guy to the roof and he just vanished, it's not your fault.'
Daphne rolled onto her side moving closer to Fred and she sighed, 'I think this is one of the most confusing cases we've ever experienced.'
Fred smiled, 'Really? You think so?'
Daphne frowned, 'What else was there?'
'Remember that town a few years ago, and the townspeople thought the town was controlled by mole people living underground.' Fred said.
Daphne laughed; she snorted a little as she did.
'It took us over a week to discover someone had poured chemicals into the town's water supply causing the townspeople to hallucinate and it only took one person to create a conspiracy theory.' Fred said smiling.
Daphne was still laughing.
'Or those people who were convinced that a lake monster was kidnapping people. But the people who were going missing were just getting blackout drunk and wandered off into the fields behind the lake and the townspeople had seen a big fish.' Fred recalled another one of their past investigations.
Daphne was laughing so much, tears spilt from her eyes and rolled down her cheeks. She wiped them away, and her laughter settled.
'My point is we've solved hard cases before, we can solve this one too.'
'I hope you're right.' Daphne replied.
'You know I'm right.' Fred pressed his lips to her forehead, 'Get some sleep and when we get to the station tomorrow, we can go over the case with the others and come up with a plan.'
Daphne nodded, 'Thanks, Freddie.'
'What for?' He asked.
'Everything.' She replied.