‘Settling down and starting a family could also have been what made him stop offending,’ Blake pointed out.
‘Especially if he never meant to kill,’ said Grace, ‘and the shock of it brought him to his senses.’
‘He has juvenile drug offences, but no record of violence against women,’ said Carolyn. ‘He’s never come to police notice as a kerb-crawler and no pornography was found in his house or business premises or on his computers. And, apart from a few tricky financial patches in his business, that’s it. A model citizen.’
‘If he’s our man,’ said Blake, ‘then you’d expect him to make sure he kept his nose clean.’
‘That’s true,’ said Grace. ‘You wouldn’t want to open the door to an unnecessary police investigation, would you?’
‘So, what are we looking for from the rape complainants?’ asked Blake.
‘Well, firstly, all the usual things,’ said Grace. ‘An identification, any distinguishing marks, more detail on his MO, anything on the car he used, victimology. But there’s also one other aspect we haven’t discussed, something I think could be really important. Heather Bowyer’s clothes were retained as evidence, but one of her shoes is missing. According to the senior investigating officer’s notes, it was assumed that it came off during the attack and the search team then missed it.’
‘How do you miss a shoe at a murder scene?’ asked Blake.
‘I thought it was rather unlikely,’ agreed Grace, hoping he’d be prepared to take her theory seriously. ‘The notes conveniently suggest that maybe some random person picked it up and took it away or that it had been lost earlier when Heather’s killer was transporting her to Cliff Gardens.’
Carolyn looked puzzled. ‘How does this link to the rapes?’
‘Three of the women who made a complaint of rape mentioned losing a shoe.’
‘That’s a bit more than coincidence,’ said Blake.
‘Maybe he took one away in order to slow his victim down,’ said Carolyn. ‘Gave himself an opportunity to escape before she was able to find help.’
‘Could be,’ agreed Grace. ‘Heather’s shoe was a pink sling-back with a high heel. I’d like to know what style the other missing shoes were.’
‘He may have singled out women in high heels because it would be more difficult for them to run fast,’ said Carolyn.
‘That’s also possible.’ In spite of herself, Grace was impressed by the constable’s clear thinking.
‘What did investigating officers at the time make of the missing shoes?’ asked Blake.
‘Nothing. It looks as though it was only recorded either in passing or because the woman in question insisted. Reading between the lines, the officers thought they were all drunk or dozy or both.’
‘Essex girls,’ said Carolyn.
Grace smiled. ‘Afraid so.’
‘ “Why does an Essex girl wear knickers?” ’ asked Carolyn. ‘ “To keep her ankles warm.” “What do Essex girls use for protection during sex?” “Bus shelters.” “What’s the difference between an Essex girl and the Titanic?” “You know how many men went down on the Titanic.” I heard them all when I was growing up. Can you imagine trying to report that you’d been raped on a Saturday night in Southend twenty-five years ago?’
‘I haven’t heard the punchline to that one,’ said Blake.
‘Precisely,’ said Carolyn grimly.
‘So you can imagine how it would play out if one of these women had dared to suggest that their attacker might have had a thing about shoes,’ said Grace.
‘Aha!’ exclaimed Blake. ‘So that’s why you’ve taken to wearing high heels. You think our man has a shoe fetish!’
‘Yes,’ she admitted. ‘I wanted to see if either Reece or Larry Nixon betrayed any kind of involuntary reaction.’
‘And did they?’
‘No,’ she said. ‘Reece was either oblivious or studiously not looking, and although I did catch Larry looking at them, I couldn’t read anything into it.’
‘Any other similarities about the shoes?’ he asked. ‘Colour, left or right shoe?’
‘No detail was recorded in the statements,’ said Grace. ‘But I’m hoping the complainants might remember.’
‘Say Reece did take a shoe from each of the women he raped because that was his fetish object,’ said Blake, ‘he’d have wanted to keep them, wouldn’t he?’
‘They’d certainly be precious to him,’ she agreed.
‘Maybe that was another reason for the fire,’ said Carolyn. ‘He wanted to take his precious trophies with him, couldn’t bear anyone else to touch them.’
Grace nodded agreement. Pleased yet again by the young woman’s insight, she was ready to retract her earlier misgivings about Carolyn’s ability to fit into the team. ‘I asked Wendy to look out for women’s shoes,’ she said, ‘hoping that Kirsty’s wardrobe would reveal tastes that might suggest she’d gone along with her husband’s fantasies – which might also explain why he stopped his attacks – but there was nothing.’
‘Their bedroom was destroyed in the fire, though, wasn’t it?’ asked Blake.
‘Yes,’ said Grace. ‘But while most high heels are made of plastic, some contain metal, which would be more likely to survive a fire. All Wendy found was Kirsty’s gardening boots by the back door.’
‘Perhaps he hid them elsewhere,’ Blake suggested.
‘Be nice to find them,’ said Carolyn. ‘That would wrap this case up perfectly.’
Grace smiled, relieved that they had accepted the evidence of the missing shoes as a valid line of enquiry. ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘and if we do, there’s every chance we’d also retrieve DNA belonging to the women who wore them. That would be pretty much a slam-dunk.’
20
The square sitting room in Monica Bowyer’s post-war terraced house in Chelmsford was suffocatingly hot. Her son Simon had left work early to join them, alerted by his mother that, for the first time in twenty-five years, the police seemed to have real news. Grace had visited twice before and knew not to sit directly opposite the glass-fronted cabinet that held silver-framed photographs of both Heather and Monica’s late husband, who had died never knowing who was responsible for his daughter’s death. Heather had not been naturally beautiful, but had worked out how to make the best of herself through attention to her hair and make-up, and, while never the one pushing herself to the centre of any group shots, she appeared to enjoy life. In among the photographs were a pair of baby shoes, a diminutive school cup and the certificate the teenager had earned on her hairdressing course. Not much to show for a life cut short.
Grace thought of her own younger sister, Alison, who was coming to stay that night on a rare visit. Grace hadn’t yet made up the spare bed or shopped for an evening meal, but any consideration of such chores felt like a luxury when set against the poignancy of Monica’s shrine to her daughter.
‘You’ll remember that I explained how we were running a search for familial DNA that would match DNA retrieved from the scene?’ Grace began.
Monica and Simon both nodded solemnly, not taking their eyes off her face.
‘Well, we received results this morning that show a partial match.’
‘You’ve caught him?’ exclaimed Simon, jumping to his feet.
‘Not exactly.’ It was unbearable to disappoint them. Grace knew that, this time, they had allowed themselves to believe there would be real progress. ‘The individual is not a match to the full DNA profile on the weapon, but can be matched to partial DNA found on another item recovered from the scene. It’s not enough to say for sure that this man ever came into contact with Heather.’
‘So what are you saying?’ asked Simon, sitting back down.
Monica said nothing. She remained perfectly still, apart from repeatedly rubbing her hands together.
‘What we do know is that the familial search has narrowed down our field of suspects to a very few individuals. We believe we’ve found the man we’re looking for, but we need to make furt
her enquiries to confirm it. We’ll be releasing a statement to the media to that effect later today.’
‘What further enquiries?’ asked Simon. ‘What else can there possibly be left to find out now?’
‘We think there’s a strong possibility that the man who killed Heather had previously attacked other women. We’re going to be speaking to them.’
‘But you’ve got him locked up, right?’
Grace took a deep breath and shook her head. ‘Our suspect is dead. There’ll have to be an inquest, but we believe that he committed suicide the same day we approached him for a DNA sample.’
‘How could you let that happen?’ demanded Simon. ‘We’ve waited years for this, and you let him get away!’
‘We had dozens of potential matches to investigate and at that point there was nothing to indicate that he ought to be of particular interest to us. But I’m very sorry. I realise how crushing this must be for you.’
Simon stared at her with a mixture of confusion and hostility, unable to find the words to express his frustration.
‘Who was he?’ Monica spoke for the first time.
‘We’re not going to release his name until we’ve completed our enquiries. When we do, you’ll be the first to know. Again, I’m so sorry that his death has cheated you of the chance to see justice done.’
‘What’s he been doing all this time?’ Monica asked softly.
Grace recalled her encounter with Reece and Kirsty in the yard of his landscape gardening business: a down-to-earth, hard-working, unremarkable couple. They had been understandably cautious in dealing with police officers, but there had been absolutely nothing to set any of Grace’s alarm bells ringing. And yet hours later their house was on fire, a house where evidence of his interest in long-ago crimes lay hidden in the attic, and they were both dead. ‘Just leading an apparently normal life,’ she answered.
Monica nodded, her face a blank.
Simon spoke for them all when he spat out a single word. ‘Bastard!’
‘I’m sorry,’ Grace repeated helplessly.
‘Some guy called Freddie Craig has been calling,’ said Simon. ‘Says he wants to tell our story on his podcast. I told him to get lost.’
‘Just refer anything that like that to our communications director. She can deal with it for you.’
‘That’s not the point,’ he said. ‘What right has he got to talk about Heather like that? He’s even been to her grave. If you can’t nail the guy, then what’s to stop people like him raking it up again and again?’
Grace could only apologise once more and, after some discussion of media tactics should the reaction to the story become overwhelming, was guiltily relieved to leave the house. She looked at her watch. When she’d spoken earlier to Michael Nixon he’d said that he and Anne would both leave work early and make the journey to Colchester to hear in person what new revelations the police had to make about their parents, and she needed to get a move on.
Even though it seemed farcical to worry about banalities like food shopping in the midst of doling out such life-altering news, the fact remained that at some point today she had to get to a supermarket if she wanted to cook something special for her sister’s visit. She knew she’d pass a store on the return journey and double-checked that she’d brought her list of the ingredients she needed.
Twenty minutes later she was thinking how much she hated shopping in unfamiliar supermarkets, especially one this big, where she couldn’t just automatically grab the usual items from the shelves. She was trying to locate a tin of coconut milk when her phone rang. It was Dr Tripathi, who explained that Larry had turned up promptly for his appointment, but that it had not been possible to examine the burns on his hands and arms or take samples for evidence of petrol residue because the burns had become badly infected. Samit had been unwilling to uncover them as Larry had already been running a fever. He said he’d sent him back to the hospital for more effective antibiotics.
‘He seemed fine when Sergeant Langley and I visited him yesterday,’ she said, frowning.
‘With burns an infection can take hold very rapidly,’ Samit said. ‘He did look fairly unwell to me.’
Grace thought uncomfortably of the loss of Larry’s clothes and her failure to oversee a new member of her team. ‘So there’s nothing you can tell me?’
‘I observed two things, neither of which are conclusive.’
‘I’ll take anything I can get.’
Samit laughed. ‘OK, so he has no burns to the palms of his hands and he has a “crow’s-foot” pattern around his eyes – the place where any facial lines remain unaffected by fire or scorching. Both are often characteristic of the kind of flash burns sustained when igniting a flammable liquid such as petrol.’
‘Hang on. You’re saying Larry Nixon might have started the fire?’
‘I’m saying I can’t rule it out. But it’s also possible that being beaten back by a ball of flame when he opened the front door could account for the pattern around his eyes, if not entirely for the lack of general injury to his hands.’
‘But we should consider the possibility that Reece Nixon didn’t set the fire?’
‘You know the adage: “The absence of evidence is not evidence of absence”.’
‘One of the least helpful maxims I know. But tell me what you made of Larry Nixon,’ she said, curious to hear Samit’s opinion.
‘Apart from the pleasant change of having a living person to talk to, you mean?’ He considered his reply. ‘I thought he was plausible.’
‘Plausible?’ she echoed. ‘That doesn’t sound like a ringing endorsement.’
‘I’ve dealt with a lot of grieving relatives over the years,’ he said. ‘They usually want to know if their loved one suffered, what kind of death they had. Larry Nixon didn’t ask me a single thing about his brother.’
‘They weren’t close.’
‘There you are, then. I found him very plausible.’
Grace thanked him and ended the call. A woman pushed past, tut-tutting that Grace was blocking her way, to reach for something on a high shelf nearby. Grace moved aside, mulling over Samit’s words. The pathologist was right: everything so far about Larry Nixon had been entirely plausible. But was it too plausible?
She looked, unseeing, at the shopping list in her hand, and then clicked back to the present. Where was the damn coconut milk?
21
Michael and Anne Nixon, sitting side by side, looked up at Grace expectantly as she entered the soft interview room at Colchester Police HQ. They appeared exhausted and bewildered. In the week since their parents’ deaths the cares of the world had been heaped upon their young shoulders, and now she was about to deliver further shattering blows. She was glad she’d asked Blake to sit in on the meeting with her. She’d told him what Samit had said about Larry Nixon’s burns, but Blake hadn’t shared her alarm that they might be looking at the evidence the wrong way. She clung to his confidence as she began to explain to Michael and Anne that it was very likely it was their father who had torched their family home. She then went on carefully to outline his probable motive for doing so.
‘That’s impossible.’ Michael gave a laugh of disbelief. ‘Dad could never have murdered anyone, especially not like that. There’s no way. It has to be a mistake.’
‘I’m very sorry.’
‘No, no, no,’ he said, smiling and shaking his head. ‘It’s just not possible.’ He turned to his sister for affirmation.
‘Michael’s right,’ she said. ‘Dad was totally against violence. Hated any kind of bullying. Mum gave us the odd slap on the leg when we were little, but never Dad. Besides, Mum would never have stuck with him if he’d done something like that. She’d have gone straight to the police.’
‘She might not have known,’ said Grace, aware she’d have to force herself to keep saying the words that would demolish brick by brick every belief they’d ever had in their father. ‘In his attic we found old newspaper cuttings relating to the murder.
And other crimes.’
‘No,’ Anne said decisively. ‘He was the gentlest, sweetest man. You can ask any of the people he worked with. They always said the business suffered because sometimes he was too much of a soft touch.’
‘He phoned his brother Larry and confessed to the murder before setting fire to the house.’
‘He wouldn’t call Larry,’ exclaimed Michael. ‘He wouldn’t give him the time of day!’
Grace turned to Blake, hoping that a second voice would help them to process the information.
‘We checked both their phone records and confirmed that the calls took place between them exactly as Larry Nixon described,’ he said.
‘And, although your father is not a match to the full DNA profile found on the murder weapon,’ said Grace, ‘he is linked to the crime scene by partial DNA on another item found there.’
‘So whose DNA is on the weapon?’ asked Anne. ‘Why aren’t you looking for them?’
‘We believe it to be from a family member who had previously handled the kitchen knife at home.’
‘You mean Larry?’ Michael asked bitterly.
In the brief silence that followed Grace summoned up her last reserve of emotional strength to resume her task. ‘Your mother was already dead before the fire reached her. We’re waiting on tests to see if she was drugged, otherwise it’s likely that she was smothered.’
‘Not by Dad!’ Anne cried. ‘He wouldn’t have hurt a hair of her head.’
‘There’s no other explanation. If it helps, we think it’s likely that your father had a great deal to drink that night.’
Anne stood up abruptly. She was slight and pale, with dark shadows under her eyes, but she thrust her chin up defiantly. ‘I don’t care what you say, you’re wrong. He’d never hurt Mum. And Mum would never let him!’
It took an effort for Grace to remain seated while they vented their outrage.
‘He couldn’t have done that,’ said Michael. ‘He’d never lay a finger on her. Even if he was afraid that he was somehow going to be fitted up for this murder, he still wouldn’t harm her. They always talked things over when they had problems. She’d have made him see sense.’
Wrong Way Home: Sunday Times Crime Book of the Month Page 9