In the Twinkling of an Eye (9781311593672)

by Ellis, Tim

  ‘Maybe I will. Once I’ve finished with it, you can use it. It’ll be like a family heirloom passed down from father to daughter.’

  ‘Something to remember you by?’

  ‘Exactly.’

  Chapter Sixteen

  Stick pressed the buzzer on the intercom outside Country Mile Catering on Drury Lane in Hunsdon.

  ‘Uh huh?’

  ‘DI Blake and . . .’

  ‘Again?’

  ‘Hello Jessica. We’d like you to . . . ‘

  The door clicked open and they went inside.

  Jessica Curry was sitting at the reception desk, but there was another woman barring their way like the Colossus of Rhodes.

  ‘I’m Lulu Lawson. My mother and I own this business. What do you want? You two have already cost us money in cancelled orders.’ Lulu was colossal in both height and weight, and of an indeterminate age somewhere between twenty and forty years old. She wore a pair of tight-fitting stretch black leggings, and a purple stretch top that appeared to be at least two sizes too small and revealed every curve and crease of her ample torso.

  Xena wondered if Lulu had a black belt in sumo wrestling. ‘We’re here to talk briefly to Jessica.’

  ‘You do know she’s ill?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And that she’s not to be put under any stress?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Lulu squared up to Xena. ‘You have five minutes, and then I’ll be throwing the pair of you out.’

  Stick moved between them. ‘Five minutes will be fine.’

  Lulu let them past. ‘I’ll be staying right here. Five minutes.’ She stared at the jumbo watch on her right wrist. ‘Your time starts now.’

  Stick walked over to where Jessica was sitting and showed her the card with the eight pictures of white vans on it. ‘We’re trying to narrow down what type of van you saw.’

  ‘I hardly even noticed it.’

  ‘I know, but we thought we’d try anyway.’

  ‘That’s one minute gone,’ Lulu said. ‘Four minutes left.’

  ‘We’re the police,’ Xena said. ‘We have a . . .’

  ‘. . . A warrant?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Then you have nothing. This is private property. I know my rights. Three minutes thirty seconds remaining.’

  ‘Take a look at the pictures, Jessica,’ Stick continued. ‘Now, close your eyes. In your mind’s eye, go back to the time you saw the white van. You’re driving home from here on your scooter doing forty miles an hour, and you reach Malting’s Lane. On the left you see Clarice walking towards her home, and then you notice an old white van on your right. It has rust at the bottom of the door, large light blue writing on the side, dirty wheels and it’s indicating to turn right . . .’

  ‘Yes, I see it.’ She opened her eyes and said, ‘Flooring.’

  Stick’s brow wrinkled. ‘I’m sorry.’

  She pointed to the Ford Transit. ‘That was the van – I recognise the bumper and those ridges at the side of the light, and “Flooring” was one of the words on the side of the van.’

  ‘Brilliant,’ Stick said and smiled. ‘Well done, Jessica.’

  ‘Right, your time’s up,’ Lulu said.

  Xena’s lip curled up. ‘We’ve finished anyway, so you can put your stopwatch away.’

  They headed for the door.

  ‘Thanks, Jessica,’ Xena called over her shoulder, as Lulu shepherded them out.

  ‘And don’t come back if you know what’s good for you,’ Lulu said, just before she shut the door.

  ‘Fucking bitch,’ Xena mumbled.

  Stick grinned. ‘Another satisfied customer.’

  ‘I could have taken her.’

  ‘Not in your present condition.’

  ‘That’s the only thing that saved her.’

  ‘Well, now we know it was an old Ford Transit,’ Stick said. ‘And we also know it had the word “Flooring” written on the side.’

  ‘Great.’

  ‘You don’t sound overjoyed by this new development.’

  ‘Explain to me again how it’ll help us?’

  ‘Well . . . when we get back to the station I’ll . . .’

  ‘There are fifty million Ford Transits out there.’

  ‘But they don’t all have “Flooring” on the side in large light blue lettering.’

  ‘What if the white van is now a red, blue or black van?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘We made a public appeal for the driver of a white van with blue lettering on the side to make himself known to us.’

  ‘Ah!’

  ‘Exactly. What if the driver is the killer? Crap! We’ve shown him all our cards. We should have kept the white van up our sleeve.’

  ‘Well, I think we should be a bit more optimistic. Maybe we could ask the press for help again tomorrow morning. Even if the van has been painted a different colour, somebody must have seen it before with the light blue lettering on the side, especially if we now tell them it had the word “Flooring” on it.’

  ‘We?’

  ‘I mean you, of course.’

  ‘We’re clutching at straws, but I suppose it’s all we’ve got.’

  ‘Don’t forget, we have the foetal DNA as well.’

  ‘Even if we identify the father from the DNA, do you think he’ll be one of the killers?’

  ‘Probably not.’

  ‘It’s a red herring. At first, when Doc Paine told us about the possibility of foetal DNA and finding out who the father of the baby might be, I was excited. But the more I think about it, the less I’m convinced that it has anything to do with who killed Clarice Kennedy.’

  ‘I was thinking that as well.’

  ‘No you weren’t. You’re just saying that because I did.’

  ‘I have got a brain as well, you know.’

  ‘I have a very hard time believing that, numpty. It would have been helpful if Doc Paine had taken the top of your skull off while we were visiting her emporium and allowed me to peer inside at this so-called brain you say you have.’

  ‘Where to next?’

  ‘The dog kennels.’

  ***

  ‘Police. What is the emergency?’

  It was as quiet as a grave in the courtroom as everyone listened to the digital recording of the 999 call.

  ‘There’s been a murder.’

  ‘And your name is, Sir?’

  ‘Never mind who I am. A woman has been murdered at 24 Somerset Gardens in Hornchurch.’

  The call ended.

  ‘Is that the anonymous 999 call you’ve been referring to?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And you have no idea who the caller is?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I suggest to you Sergeant, that the caller is actually Mrs Naseby’s killer.’

  Foster chose to remain silent.

  ‘Have you heard of Voice Stress Analysis (VSA), Sergeant?’

  ‘Isn’t that a lie detector test?’

  ‘Similar. It records psychophysiological stress responses that are present in the human voice.’

  ‘I’ve heard of it.’

  ‘I had the recording analysed by a . . .’

  Dryden jumped up like a Jack-in-the-Box. ‘My Lord . . . !’

  Judge Calthorpe held a hand up to stop Dryden mid-flow. ‘Mrs Ferguson. I distinctly recall saying earlier that there should be no more surprises.’

  ‘It should hardly be a surprise to my learned colleague, or yourself for that matter, that the defence would want to carry out an exhaustive analysis of the killer’s voice.’

  ‘My Lord!’ Dryden objected again.

  ‘You’re beginning to stretch my patience, Mrs Ferguson. There is absolutely no proof that the anonymous caller is the killer . . .’

  ‘That’s my point exactly, my Lord. Due to the botched investigation by the police, they have charged an innocent man with murder and allowed the real killer to remain at large. The CPS should have challenged every piece of evi
dence, and made sure their case was watertight before permitting a miscarriage of justice to be committed in your lordship’s courtroom. Instead, I’m having to do their work for them. This anonymous caller is key to what happened at 24 Somerset Gardens on the morning of June 15 last year. Instead of exhausting every possible explanation of what might have happened, the police seem to have conveniently ignored a credible suspect, or at the very least, a witness to what actually took place in that bedroom. They chose the easiest available option – Mr Naseby. He was in custody, he was covered in his wife’s blood, he had the murder weapon in his hand, and he said to the Sergeant, “It was my fault”, which incidentally, does not mean: “I did it”. So, my Lord, it’s hardly surprising that the defence would obtain a voice stress analysis . . .’

  As the judge slipped a bony finger under his wig and scratched his scalp, he glared at the CPS barrister. ‘You only have yourself to blame, Mr Dryden. You should have prepared your case better. I don’t take kindly to slipshod methods being used in my courtroom . . .’

  ‘But, my Lord . . .’

  ‘Or being interrupted . . .’

  ‘I apologise, my Lord.’

  ‘You’re putting a man on trial for murder. The least you can do is make sure that he’s guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, and to be honest Mr Dryden, I’m sure that the jury are beginning to have serious doubts about his guilt and your competence. I’ll have no miscarriages of justice being perpetrated in my courtroom, simply because you think it’s good legal practice to be selective with the evidence. The jury need all the facts to be able to determine guilt, or not. Carry on, Mrs Ferguson. But I warn you, you’re sailing very close to the wind.’

  ‘Very kind, my Lord. You’ll be at Cowes Week?’

  ‘Of course, wouldn’t miss it.’

  ‘So, as I was saying,’ Gollum continued, as if the interruption had never occurred. ‘I had the recording analysed by a . . .’

  ‘My Lord,’ Dryden bobbed up again. ‘There are no independent research studies that support the use of VSA as a reliable lie detection technology.’

  ‘Mrs Ferguson?’ the judge said, like a man used to body-swerving difficult questions.

  ‘If my learned colleague would allow me to finish, my Lord. VSA is designed to assist an investigation by establishing the veracity of a subject’s verbal responses, it is not a polygraph technology. Also, there are no known countermeasures for VSA. I had the recording analysed by a forensic psychophysiologist . . .’

  ‘And where is this expert witness?’ Dryden asked.

  ‘In America.’

  ‘My Lord! How can the prosecution question an expert witness who is in America?’

  ‘If I may, my Lord?’ Gollum said. ‘I had a copy of the recording sent to Dr Bertrand Woolf at Harvard University for analysis . . .’ She had the court usher pass copies of the report to Dryden and the judge. ‘That is a report detailing Dr Woolf’s conclusions, and at the back you will find a list of his qualifications, books, articles and academic papers. If required, he will be happy to take the stand via video link . . .’

  The judge raised an eyebrow. ‘To America, Mrs Ferguson?’

  ‘Yes, my Lord. And under the current guidelines, I believe it will come out of the central criminal court budget.’

  ‘I certainly hope that will not be necessary, Mr Dryden. Do we understand each other?’

  ‘Yes, except the prosecution will need time to read and analyse this new evidence, my Lord.’

  ‘Do we understand each other, Mr Dryden?’

  ‘Of course, my Lord.’

  ‘Then, you have until eleven o’clock tomorrow morning. Is that all right with you, Mrs Ferguson?’

  ‘Of course, my Lord.’

  ‘All stand.’

  The judge made his way out.

  ‘Is anybody able to make it tomorrow?’ Professor Adams-Henry asked them.

  Ten hands went up.

  ‘Good. I trust you can all make your way back from whence you came?’ she said. ‘And we’ll meet here tomorrow morning at ten forty-five.’

  Jerry would call Charlie later. He’d understand that she needed to see Naseby’s trial through to the end.

  The students drifted off one by one or in pairs.

  She had decided not to get too friendly with any of the other students again. “Once burned, twice shy,” as the saying went. She switched her phone back on and checked her messages, Bronwyn had called twenty minutes ago. She listened to the message.

  ‘Call me.’

  She smiled. Short and to the point, she thought.

  ***

  The first thing she did was to hack into Hornchurch Police Station computer network and find out what they had on the case, which didn’t take her very long, because they didn’t have very much – the anonymous call, the blood-stained clothes, the murder weapon and the so-called confession.

  From what she could determine, Jerry was right. A parrot with a wooden leg, a glass eye and a lisp could have got Naseby off. It was easy to see that once they realised they’d got their man, the police didn’t pursue any other leads. The problem now – thirteen months after the murder – was that all the other leads had crumpled to dust.

  She checked the CCTV systems for miles around the house – nothing. She hacked into Mrs Naseby’s phone records – wiped clean, and the number had been re-allocated to a snot-nosed teenager with an online gambling addiction. She checked eBay, Facebook, Twitter – nothing. She googled “Heidi Naseby” and found two photographs of her in among all the other Heidi Naseby’s in the English-speaking world. When she followed the links on the pictures, she found that they were posted on someone else’s Facebook page – a Sonya Tucker – from fifteen months ago, only two months before Heidi Naseby was murdered.

  Bronwyn sent her a Personal Message (PM):

  Investigating Heidi Naseby’s death, please PM me back.

  There was no immediate response, and the woman’s current location was the Shetland Islands. Why would anyone want to live there? She wondered what the internet connection was like on a desolate island.

  Next, she tried to trace Heidi Naseby’s credit card records, but they had long since been expunged. It did, however, lead her to the Naseby’s joint bank account from which Heidi Naseby’s name had been removed. With nothing else better to do, she spent over an hour analysing each line of the bank statements going back to April 2013 – two months before the murder had taken place, and took no notice of a regular monthly payment of four hundred pounds to Centurion Glass until it wasn’t there. The payments began in May 2013 and were ongoing.

  Naseby had paid over five thousand pounds to the company so far. She guessed it was for a conservatory, or maybe replacement windows – something along those lines. But when she drilled down and found that the money was paid into an account on the Isle of Man – which she knew was a tax haven – it tweaked her interest. Why would a glass company have an account on the Isle of Man?

  She tried to find out who Centurion Glass were, but as far as she could determine, there was no such UK company registered at Companies House, or advertised on the internet.

  Why was Naseby paying four hundred pounds each month to a non-existent glass company that had a bank account in a tax haven? Of its own volition, her mind began connecting up dots that didn’t exist. Had Naseby paid a professional to kill his wife? If he had, she thought, he should ask for his money back.

  The Tynwald Bank on the Isle of Man wasn’t much help either. The only information they had on their computer system about Centurion Glass was an alphanumeric code broken up into five chunks:

  JM19370/20004MC/14539DG/08070TS/SP00764

  Was it a numbered bank account? If it was, she had no idea which bank it belonged to, or where it was located. Usually, the first nine digits on a deposit slip were the bank’s routing or transit number, and she could find out the name of the bank by logging into RoutingNumbers.org and typing the number in the “Find Bank” search box. The second group of ten d
igits were the unique account number, but she had no idea what this alphanumeric code represented.

  There were no funds in the Tynwald account. The monthly payments had been deposited and then transferred straight out again with no indication as to their intended destination. It was all right saying: “Follow the money”, but what did you do when the money trail stopped?

  Curiouser and curiouser!

  She walked along the street to the cafe and had some lunch. There was a hot-looking immigrant working as a waiter who didn’t speak much English, but had eyes that undressed her one button at a time. One day, she had the idea that he might find his courage. If he did, she might give him what they both wanted. She strung out her coffee, but he didn’t find his courage today, so she walked back to the squat.

  Was the Tynwald account a front for another account in another bank? Was the alphanumeric code the account number?

  She had reached a dead end. The alphanumeric code was the key to unlocking the enigma, but there were no locks to try the key in. None of the banks that had numbered accounts would admit to having an account with that alphanumeric code. Yes, she could try to find out by hacking into the banks through A – Z, but their security was second to none – it would take her forever, and she didn’t have that long.

  What surprised her was that she couldn’t follow the electronic trail. There was always an electronic money trail. The four hundred pounds had to go somewhere, but where? It reminded her of a train journey where the passengers had to disembark onto a bus between stations for whatever reason. Is that what had happened here? Had the electronic journey of the four hundred pounds been interrupted, so that nobody could track it online?

  How interesting. She hadn’t thought about it before, but all it would take was for a courier to walk along the street with the four hundred pounds and transfer it from one bank to another. The trail would recommence, but to the outside world, the four hundred pounds had disappeared. Except, there should be an electronic record of the money being withdrawn or transferred from the account in the Tynwald Bank and deposited into another bank account, but as far as she could ascertain that electronic record didn’t exist, which – as far as she understood – was illegal.