Deity didb-3

by Steven Dunne

  ‘And trace any uploads to an actual physical address,’ continued Cooper.

  Brook narrowed his eyes. ‘I’m not sure what you just said but I’m sensing bad news.’

  ‘While you were in hospital we traced the first upload,’ said Charlton.

  ‘Elsie Shaw. An eighty-year-old widow who lives in Robincroft Road, Allestree,’ announced Cooper, gesturing at a blue pin in the map of Derby. ‘She had Broadband fitted so she could Skype her grandchildren in Canada. Unfortunately she didn’t secure her router.’

  ‘In English, please,’ said Brook.

  ‘With wireless technology, anybody with a modern laptop and a little knowledge can piggyback somebody else’s system,’ explained Noble.

  ‘Especially if they don’t need a password,’ added Cooper.

  ‘So the first Deity broadcast was uploaded to Deity from her address,’ said Brook slowly.

  ‘Right,’ said Noble.

  ‘But being wireless it could have been done from a house in the next street or even a car parked outside,’ added Cooper.

  ‘You went round there?’

  ‘In numbers,’ smiled Noble. ‘Poor old girl got quite a shock seeing six of our finest banging on her door.’

  ‘And how many of these unsecured routers are there?’

  ‘In Derby?’ said Cooper. ‘Hundreds, I would think. People don’t take internet security seriously enough.’

  ‘So Deity can pick and choose where to access the site,’ nodded Brook.

  ‘I thought we had all their laptops anyway?’ said Morton.

  ‘Doesn’t mean they don’t have another,’ said Noble.

  ‘Did we look at Thomson’s laptop yet?’ asked Brook.

  Cooper nodded. ‘Same as the others. Professionally wiped.’

  ‘On the plus side we do have the fruits of the Watson house,’ said Noble, indicating the photocopies of Adele’s diary and notebook on the array. ‘Her computer was wiped like the others but there’s some pretty strong stuff about Adam Rifkind and her father in the diary, as well as other things she wants to get off her chest. No direct clue to her whereabouts, but as to her intentions, there’s this on the last page of her diary.’ Noble held up the copy of the page containing just three words. time to die.

  ‘That’s a line from Blade Runner,’ said Gadd.

  ‘It is,’ said Noble. ‘And there’s a poster of the film on Russell Thomson’s bedroom wall. Another connection between Adele and Russell.’

  ‘It doesn’t mean they’re intent on suicide,’ said Brook.

  ‘All part of messing with our heads,’ Charlton said heavily. ‘Let’s hope. Any prints?’

  ‘Her father’s, obviously. And another set that match all the other prints taken from Adele’s bedroom. Without her here for a match, we’re assuming they’re hers. We’re also ESDA testing the surface below the missing pages. See if we can read what was on them from the indentations.’

  ‘What about this website?’ said Charlton, pointing at the screen. ‘Can we close it down?’

  ‘The host server’s in this country, so yes, we can start the ball rolling,’ said Cooper.

  ‘The question is, do we want to?’ said Brook. ‘Like it or not, this site is our direct line to Adele Watson and the other students. It’s their mouthpiece. Ordinarily I would want to cut off their supply of publicity and maybe drive them into the open. However, she — they — have been very clever unloading the broadcasts to YouTube. .’

  ‘So they can continue reaching their audience even if we close their site,’ Charlton finished. ‘You’re right, keep it open. What was this boyfriend’s reaction to the site?’

  ‘Rifkind? He didn’t even know it existed until we told him,’ said Cooper.

  ‘And do we believe him?’

  ‘I think so,’ said Brook. ‘He can’t be so stupid as to set up a website with his own credit card knowing it was going to be used like this. He’s getting nothing out of this except our scrutiny of his dubious sexual behaviour. Adele Watson played it beautifully. She gave him to us on a plate.’

  ‘You seem very sure this girl’s the ringleader, Inspector,’ said Charlton.

  ‘That’s because she’s the smartest, sir. She’s thoughtful and reflective, she’s a writer and a poet so she’s used to making things up. But she had two things wrong with her life — a boyfriend who used then dumped her, and a father, if you believe her diary, who lusted after her. And what happens after she vanishes? Her father’s been cautioned for obstruction and Rifkind is a suspect in her disappearance. He’s paid for the Deity website with a credit card to which she probably had access, and endorsed passport applications for two of the missing students.’

  ‘So as a suspect, he’s a bit obvious,’ Charlton commented.

  ‘I’m sure Adele knows that,’ said Brook. ‘She just wants to embarrass him.’

  ‘But the website was created months before they broke up,’ Cooper objected.

  Brook smiled at him. ‘That tells us how long this has been planned and that actually Adele was using Rifkind, not the other way round.’

  ‘Couldn’t somebody else have borrowed his credit card and set this up?’ muttered Charlton.

  Brook shrugged. ‘Who?’

  ‘Is Rifkind married?’

  ‘He is,’ said Noble. ‘His wife is Carly, a twenty-three-year-old former student — of Rifkind’s, I mean. She’s seven months’ pregnant with their first child.’

  ‘He likes ’em young,’ chipped in Cooper.

  ‘Sounds unlikely she’d be up for wrecking her husband’s life,’ said Charlton. ‘Unless she found out about the affair. Hell hath no fury and all that. Somebody should speak to her.’

  ‘Can’t hurt,’ said Brook unenthusiastically.

  ‘Did Rifkind deny endorsing the passport photographs?’ continued Morton.

  ‘No, why would he?’ said Noble. ‘He didn’t do anything wrong.’

  ‘Tell me we got something useful from the college today,’ said Charlton. ‘That was a lot of expensive manpower.’

  Noble smiled weakly at DS Morton who flicked open his notebook. ‘Fern Stretton, Becky Blake’s best friend, got a text from her before she disappeared. The next time you hear my name you’re going to be soooooooooo jealous.’ Morton grinned. ‘That’s ten Os, incidentally.’

  ‘Jealous of what?’ asked Charlton. ‘Becky’s sudden fame? Is that what this is about?’

  Brook smiled his agreement. ‘We can’t discount it.’

  ‘To kids now, in a world of instant celebrity, fame is everything,’ said Noble. ‘You’ve only got to watch some of the drooling vegetables auditioning for X Factor.’

  ‘And even the completely talentless can be king for a day if they get slagged off badly enough and it goes viral,’ agreed Cooper.

  Brook bowed to superior knowledge, if not vocabulary. He was lost when it came to young people and their tastes.

  ‘For the record, Fern texted back but got no reply,’ said Morton. ‘That was the day of the party. Fern says she hasn’t heard from her since and insists to anybody who’ll listen that she’s abroad somewhere. According to Becky’s mobile phone records, that was the last text or phone call she ever made. Kyle Kennedy also used his mobile for the last time on the night of the party. He made a call to Jake McKenzie the night before and sent a text to his mum in Chester on Friday to say he was fine. Then nothing.

  ‘Interestingly, Adele and Russell were even more extreme,’ continued Morton. ‘There was no record of any activity on their phones the day before the party — or since, obviously.’

  ‘They shut up shop on the Thursday?’ said Brook.

  ‘Right. We’re also checking all recent texts and calls for the four of them, against the list of known contacts — but so far we’ve seen nothing untoward.’

  ‘No common number texting or phoning all four?’ asked Cooper.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Strict radio silence,’ said Brook. ‘Clever. Maybe Russell Thomson’s her second
-in-command. It would make sense. He had the DVD and he’s the one with the camcorder.’

  ‘And he arrived in Derby just before the website was set up,’ added Noble.

  ‘Good point. So what next?’ asked Charlton.

  ‘We’ve done all the heavy lifting for now,’ said Noble. ‘A blank on bins and grates around the house. We’ve interviewed most of the students and college staff. We can take a longer look at the parents and maybe re-interview.’

  ‘What about the fields?’ said Brook.

  ‘Fields?’ echoed Charlton.

  ‘If these kids left on foot, which looks likely, they would have taken the path at the back of the house.’ He indicated the large map on the wall. ‘There’s a large area to cover but they could have walked along the path round the back of the college.’

  ‘Or even gone across the fields through the woods,’ said Morton, pointing. ‘The A38 runs past. They could have been picked up from there.’

  Charlton nodded reluctantly. ‘That’s a lot of manpower. Check the A38 cameras first.’

  ‘Maybe they’re hiding in the woods,’ suggested Cooper. ‘Or even dead.’

  ‘Unlikely, Dave,’ said Noble. ‘Kids mess about in there. They would’ve been found by now.’

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘Okay,’ said Charlton testily. ‘Get uniform on it.’

  ‘Fingertip?’ asked Noble.

  Charlton glanced at Brook for help in protecting the budget.

  ‘Not without evidence of foul play,’ said Brook. ‘They’re not going to be there, dead or alive, but we need to have looked.’

  Charlton tried to hide his relief. ‘Anything else?’

  ‘What about Jake McKenzie and Wilson Woodrow?’ asked Brook.

  ‘Remind me,’ said Charlton.

  ‘McKenzie was one of the lads in the happy-slapping film,’ replied Noble. ‘He wasn’t in college today. Neither was Wilson Woodrow. We showed the first film to Rifkind. Woodrow was the boy who laid out Kyle Kennedy in the assault. Rifkind confirmed there was some kind of bust-up between all three of them in his lesson the day before the party. Woodrow made some homophobic comments and went for Kennedy, and Jake stepped in. We’ve got addresses.’

  ‘Okay,’ said Charlton. ‘I think we’ve got all we need for the press briefing.’ He eyed Brook’s bandaged head. ‘How are you feeling, Inspector?’

  ‘Actually, not so good.’ Brook groped for a chair and lowered himself gingerly into it.

  Charlton narrowed his eyes. ‘You took a heavy blow. Maybe it’s concussion.’

  ‘I’ll be okay.’

  ‘You’d better sit this one out. That bandage would be a distraction. Get some rest. DS Noble, fancy a bit of the lime-light?’ Noble’s ashen face told its own story but he managed to smile weakly. ‘Good.’ Charlton made to leave.

  ‘Sir?’ said Brook. ‘Can I have a word?’

  ‘I’m listening.’

  ‘In private.’

  Charlton looked at his watch. ‘My office in half an hour,’ he said as he left.

  ‘Are you well enough to hear about Yvette Thomson, sir?’ said Noble sarcastically, brandishing a wad of papers.

  Brook smiled. ‘I’ll try to stay conscious.’

  ‘Bad news, sir. She’s Welsh.’ Brook raised a disapproving eyebrow at Noble. ‘Born 1978 so she’s thirty-three years old, originally from St Asaph in North Wales. It’s near Rhyl, if that helps at all. She was an orphan from the age of nine, when her mother died of an overdose of painkillers in 1987.’

  Brook nodded. ‘An orphan. Of course.’ Noble looked bemused. ‘She seems. . needy,’ Brook explained. ‘How long did she spend there?’

  ‘The next seven years — St Asaph’s School for Boys and Girls — an orphanage in all but name. In 1993 Yvette had a baby — Russell. Her only child. No record of the father. Mother and child stayed at the orphanage until she left in 1994 to move to Chester.’

  ‘She was only fifteen when she gave birth?’

  ‘Older than many,’ said Noble.

  ‘And they didn’t take the baby from her?’

  ‘And do what?’ asked Noble. ‘Put it in an orphanage?’

  Brook conceded with a shrug. ‘It’s still odd. Social Services would normally intervene; maybe put the child up for adoption. Ever married?’

  ‘No. And she seems to have survived on benefits for most of her life. There’s no record of any employment until she’s twenty when she moves and becomes a teaching assistant at a primary school in Whitchurch, in 1998, just over the border in Shropshire. The following year, she moves to Uttoxeter. She’s jobless and again surviving on benefits. In 2003, when Russell was ten, she returned to North Wales where she moved around at regular intervals — hardly a settled life. Six months ago, she and Russell turn up in Derby where Russell was enrolled at Derby College.’

  ‘What about the rumours of bullying?’

  ‘I’m still waiting to hear from some of the schools, but two that responded say Russell wasn’t with them long but he was very impressionable and he was bullied. They stopped short of saying that’s why Russell was taken out of their schools. But reading between the lines. .’

  Brook nodded. ‘No wonder it was hard to hold down a job. Any other employment?’

  ‘Nothing. But she might have done casual work,’ said Noble.

  ‘She mentioned bar work.’

  ‘I spoke to Rifkind. He didn’t know the details about the last move but he’d heard there’d been some kind of cyberbullying.’

  ‘Cyber-bullying?’

  ‘It’s using social network-’

  ‘I know what it is, John. But didn’t Cooper say Russell and the others unsubscribed from Facebook on the day of the party?’

  ‘So?’

  ‘So why would Russell even have a Facebook account if he’d been bullied online?’

  Noble shrugged. ‘I don’t know.’

  Brook sighed. ‘Okay. I’m meeting Terri in the car park in forty minutes. Text me Jake McKenzie’s address, John. I’ll meet you there at eight tomorrow morning. He and this Wilson Woodrow are overdue a visit.’

  Noble picked up a clear plastic bag from the floor. ‘You said you wanted these books of Adele’s. They’ve been processed.’

  ‘Anything?’

  ‘A few handwritten notes in the texts. Nothing jumped out.’

  ‘Okay. What’s that?’ asked Brook, nodding at a second bag.

  ‘Russell Thomson’s computer. We’re so stretched we haven’t assigned a FLO to return it to Miss Thomson yet.’

  Brook picked up the bag. ‘It’s on my way. I’ll take it. Speaking of liaison, you’d better get someone round to Fred Blake’s house in case they don’t know about Becky’s striptease yet. They ought to hear about it from us before they see it on the news.’

  Brook’s mobile vibrated. It was Dr Petty. Noble pointed towards the door and left the office.

  ‘Inspector, I hope you don’t mind me ringing, but you didn’t reply to my email.’

  ‘Your email?’ Brook set down the various bags on a desk and quickly logged on to his internal email account. ‘I’ve not had a lot of time to reply,’ he said, trying to stall. When the screen filled with unopened emails, Brook scanned down the list. He found a day-old reply from Dr Petty to his enquiry about Egypt and opened it.

  Dear Damen,

  Egypt does indeed come under ancient anatomy. And they were one of the first civilisations to embalm their dead. I was on a similar wavelength so I’d already done some digging — no pun intended. There was a tradition of removing the brain through the nostrils when preparing the dead for the afterlife. I can’t find a name for the tool though.

  AnnP

  Her mobile phone number was prominent. ‘Ye-es,’ he said. ‘I’ve read it. Very helpful.’

  ‘It gets better. I’ve looked through three or four websites. Egyptian burial rites changed many times over the centuries but they all agree that to aid preservation of the bodies, all the organs were removed and
placed in a large earthenware jar with a lid, called a canopic jar, and placed at the foot of the embalmed body. The interesting thing is the organs were removed via an incision in the left side, just like McTiernan and Kirk. But here’s the best part. The priests in charge of the procedure would then put the heart back because they believed it contained the soul, which the deceased would need for the afterlife.’

  ‘That is interesting,’ said Brook. ‘Anything else?’

  ‘That’s it for now.’

  Brook put down his pencil, not sure how to end the conversation. ‘I owe you one.’

  ‘Really? I hear Darley’s does good food.’

  ‘I’d like to be put back in charge of The Embalmer case, sir. DS Noble can handle the missing students.’

  ‘Think DS Gadd’s out of her depth?’

  ‘Not at all.’

  ‘Then why?’

  ‘I should’ve thought that was obvious, sir. We’ve got two mutilated bodies and two more missing, probably facing the same fate.’

  ‘Two vagrants who died of alcohol poisoning, Inspector. Occupational hazard.’

  ‘Sir, Phil Ward was taken last night. I saw it happen. He’s the first definite abduction and it’s likely the other three were the same. It’s unlikely these men are just dying around The Embalmer and it’s not a huge stretch to assume he’s hastening their deaths before he cuts them open.’

  ‘There’s still no evidence of that,’ retorted Charlton.

  ‘I’m also worried about escalation. Leopold Street is compromised. If he thinks his supply is being cut off. .’

  ‘You mean he might turn his attention to real people,’ nodded Charlton. ‘It did occur to me.’ His expression softened. ‘You’re right. Assault and abduction is a step up from stealing cadavers.’

  ‘So I’m back on the case?’

  ‘Absolutely not.’

  ‘Sir, these missing students. .’

  ‘. . are no longer just an internet sensation.’ Charlton picked up a pile of newspapers and dropped them on Brook’s lap. ‘The Times, the Telegraph, the Guardian and, needless to say, all the tabloids have picked up the story. I’ve had BBC and ITN reporters ringing the Press Office about this afternoon’s Deity broadcast and likely they’ll be running with it tonight. So you see, it doesn’t matter if these kids are sunbathing in Wembley Stadium, Inspector. Until we find them and put this to bed, this is your priority.’