by Celina Grace
They both regarded the laptop screen. The main picture was of an adorable little boy, his cheeky smile framed by a mop of blonde ringlets.
“You’d never think it was the same person,” said Olbeck sadly.
“Nathan Vertz is his real name,” said Kate. She traced a finger along the screen. “Born in London…got the part of Toby Butterkin when he was eight. God, that’s young. Hmm…hmm…one of the stars of the highly successful franchise… blah, blah…career declined in adulthood…drink and drug dependency…” She looked at Olbeck. “We need to run a check on his name.”
“Right. We will. Tomorrow.”
Kate paused, halfway to the door.
“What about now?”
“Kate,” said Olbeck. “It’s almost midnight. It can wait until tomorrow morning.”
Kate looked as though she were about to argue. Then she sagged a little.
“Okay. You’re right. It’s just…”
She let the sentence trail away. Olbeck got up, stretching.
“Jay will be all right, you know,” he said, gently. “They’ll treat him just as they would anyone else.”
“That’s what worries me.”
Olbeck found his coat and pulled it on, wrapping his scarf around his neck.
“He’ll be fine,” he repeated. “You can go and see him in the morning. He might even be released before then.”
“I know,” said Kate. She cleared her throat. “Thanks, Mark. Thanks for being here tonight. And we found our guy. Imagine that.”
“You did,” said Olbeck. “God, imagine if we’d both been out of the room. He was only a bit character—we could have missed him.”
“Well, you picked the DVD,” said Kate, with a tired smile. “It must have been fate.”
She saw him to the front door. He gave her an awkward hug and said goodbye.
“Try and get some sleep.”
Kate nodded. Just as he was turning away, she spoke.
“There’s something wrong with this case, Mark.”
He turned back, surprised.
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t know,” said Kate, rather helplessly. “We’re missing something, I’m sure of it. Something big. I’ve never known a case where—oh, I don’t know. Where I know something is hidden but all I can see is the surface. Like the river.”
“In the picture?” said Olbeck, puzzled.
“Yes. No. I don’t know exactly what I’m trying to say.”
“That makes two of us.”
“It’s just…I have a feeling we’re missing something, something important.” Kate hesitated. She tried to recall where it was she’d felt this most strongly before, but the memory eluded her. “I can’t explain it.”
“Tell Anderton. Go and see him tomorrow and tell him.”
“Tell him what? I don’t know what it is myself. Besides—” Kate swallowed, remembering the scene of the afternoon. “He hates me at the moment.”
“No, he doesn’t.” Olbeck yawned. “Listen, I’ve got to go. Like I said, try and get some sleep. It’ll all seem better in the morning.”
Chapter Fourteen
Kate had hoped that she’d be woken the next morning by the sound of the doorbell. She wanted to open it to find a dishevelled Jay standing on the doorstep, having been released without charge.
She was disappointed.
It was a beautiful sunny morning, warm for late autumn, but she showered and dressed feeling like a grey cloud was hanging over her. The excitement of last night’s discovery had ebbed away and now she was dreading seeing Anderton, dreading hearing what had happened with Jay. She wanted to go back to bed, pull the covers over her head and sleep until this nightmare was over. Instead, she squared her shoulders, smoothed back her hair and headed out the door.
Olbeck was already at his desk, looking bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. He waved as he saw Kate come through the door.
“Wait ‘til you see this.”
Kate slung her coat on the back of her chair.
“I have to go and check on Jay first.”
“I’ve done that. Told him you’d be down to see him.”
“Oh, thank you,” said Kate, absurdly near tears due to Olbeck’s kindness. “I’ll go right now.”
As it turned out, Jay was asleep in his cell when arrived. She looked through the viewing hatch at her little brother, curled on the uncomfortable bed under the one inadequate grey blanket. He had one hand under his cheek. Kate remembered how he used to sleep like that as a child.
“You want me to wake him up?” asked the PC who was on guard duty.
“No, don’t,” said Kate, quickly. She looked at her brother with tenderness. “Let him sleep. He needs it. Just tell him I was here when he wakes up.”
“All okay?” asked Olbeck when she got back to the office.
Kate shrugged. “Let’s not talk about it. Thanks for going down before.”
“It’s nothing. You’re welcome.”
“What have you got on Nathan Vertz? Has he got a record?”
Olbeck rolled his chair back from his desk for emphasis.
“Ooh, yes he has.”
Kate felt a welcome pulse of excitement, something to distract her from the thought of Jay locked in a cell downstairs. “Really?”
“Yup. See here.”
He handed over some print outs. Kate read through the first one and her eyebrows rose.
“Domestic violence. I see.”
Olbeck was grinning. “Read on. See exactly what he was accused of.”
Kate did so. Then she whistled, slowly.
“Attempted strangulation. My God.”
“His first wife. Well, his only wife, but she divorced him, unsurprisingly.”
Kate read on. “He did six months for that. That wasn’t on the Wikipedia page.”
“Well, that was clearly written by a fan. Anyway, it’s not the only time he’s been violent. He was arrested for assaulting a member of the paparazzi before the domestic violence charge.”
“Back when he was still famous,” mused Kate. “How the mighty have fallen. It’s sad, really.”
“I’ll reserve my sympathy for someone who really needs it,” said Olbeck. “Anyway, I’ve brought Anderton up to speed.”
Kate couldn’t help the drop of her stomach but she managed to hide it at the sound of his name.
“Good,” she said. “Let’s go and talk to Mr Vertz.”
Nathan Vertz lived in Arbuthon Green in a terraced house, one of many on a down-at-heel street. Black bin bags were piled in the street outside every house—it was clearly the day when the dustbin collectors were expected—and several bags had burst or been torn open, scattering rubbish along the street. Kate and Olbeck paused outside the gate of Number 22. The curtains were drawn at all of the visible windows.
“God, when you think about the money he must have had…” said Olbeck, making a face of disgust. He kicked at a soggy newspaper that had wrapped itself around his shoe.
“I know,” said Kate. “I think he actually went bankrupt. Come on, let’s get him out of bed.”
She rang the doorbell repeatedly. When it wasn’t answered, she knocked. After a full five minutes, the door opened slowly and Nathan Vertz stood there in the doorway, blinking in the sunlight. A waft of old cigarette smoke and body odour made Kate want to wrinkle up her nose.
“I’m Detective Sergeant Kate Redman, and this is Detective Sergeant Olbeck,” she said, snapping her card in his face. He recoiled slightly, shaking his head. “We’d like to talk to you about the murder of Elodie Duncan.”
His eyes widened. For a second, Kate was convinced he was going to run—forward between them or backwards into the house—she could see that change of stance, the minute quiver as the impulse flooded his muscles. She tensed, almost as instinctively, ready to chase. She could feel Olbeck do the same. The moment was over and gone in a moment; Nathan Vertz clearly mastered his sudden impulse and some kind of energy went out of him, an almost im
perceptible change in his posture. He sighed.
“You’d better come in,” he said quietly.
The interior of the house was a surprise. Given the area’s general sense of squalor and Nathan Vertz’s own grubby appearance, Kate was expecting dirt, frowst, filthy carpets, stale smelling rooms and piles of clutter. Instead, they found rooms that wouldn’t have looked out of place in an interiors magazine. The walls were white, the floorboards sanded back and polished. The furniture was old but very well made, some of it clearly valuable. Dotted here and there on the dust-free surfaces were small sculptures, well-framed artwork, a crystal bowl of beautiful autumnal flowers that lit up the corner of the room.
With the backdrop of all this beauty and order, Nathan Vertz presented a strange contrast. His uncut hair fell in greasy spikes on his forehead, although, if she looked closely, Kate could still see the natural curl that had given him the mop of blonde ringlets in the photograph of him as a child.
He sat down on the nearest sofa, an old but sturdy leather Chesterfield, rather like Kate’s own. She felt a secret pride that her own furniture was similar to this man’s lovingly collected antiques.
Vertz looked down at the floor. He was sitting slumped, his hands dangling over his knees.
“We’re enquiring about the death of Elodie Duncan, Mr Vertz,” said Olbeck. “I believe you knew her?”
Vertz said nothing.
“Mr Vertz?”
“I knew her,” said Vertz, heavily. “How well, I’m not sure. We went on a few dates.”
“Can you elaborate?”
“What do you want me to say?”
“We want you to tell us the truth, Mr Vertz. When you say you went on a few dates, does that mean you were Elodie Duncan’s partner? Her boyfriend?”
Vertz was silent.
“Mr Vertz?”
He shook his head.
Olbeck glanced at Kate.
“Mr Vertz,” she said sharply. “Obstructing police in the course of their enquiries is a crime. Do you wish to continue this conversation down at the police station?”
Vertz said nothing for a moment. Kate breathed in sharply, ready to start giving the words of the caution. Then he spoke.
“I don’t care.” He wasn’t looking at the officers but staring at the wall, slumped against the side of the sofa. “I don’t care about anything anymore.”
Kate and Olbeck exchanged glances. Then they got to their feet.
“We’re continuing this conversation back at the station, sir. I suggest you come with us right away.”
Vertz was silent on the drive back to the station. Olbeck sat next to him in the back seat. Kate drove, trying not to wrinkle her nose as the man’s stale smell permeated the air of the car’s interior. Kate looked at him in the rear view mirror. He was staring down at the floor.
She couldn’t work him out. He was clearly depressed, but there was something else, something underneath the surface that was making her uneasy. There it was again, that sixth sense, that feeling that she was missing something. Undercurrent: that was the word she was looking for.
She let Olbeck take him to one of the interview rooms, one of the less-pleasant ones on the ground floor. Then she ran down to the holding cells.
Jay had been released. Kate had expected to feel jubilant at the news—that must mean that they hadn’t found any more evidence with which to hold him, or God forbid, to charge him. But instead, she felt worry begin to gnaw at her, cramping her stomach. Her brother was young. He was struggling over the death of his friend; he’d just been through the trauma of an arrest and a night’s imprisonment, not to mention the intimidating questioning session he would have gone through with Anderton and Jerry. Would he be all right? She tried to call him, his mobile going straight to voicemail. Then she called her mother—same thing. Eventually, Kate managed to get through to Courtney, who said she’d keep trying until she got through to him. Kate thanked her, told her she loved her, and hung up, running frantically up the stairs to the interview room before smoothing her hair down, trying to get her breath back and opening the door.
Chapter Fifteen
“DS Redman has entered the room,” said Olbeck, also giving the time.
Kate sat down opposite Nathan Vertz. He gave her a dull look, almost bovine in its weariness, before resuming his apparent examination of the table-top.
“Mr Vertz, you have been seen with Elodie Duncan on more than one occasion.” Olbeck was clearly still referring to the suspect as a ‘Mister.’ How soon this changed would depend on the responses he was given. Kate was less patient and often dispensed with the title in the first few moments.
Olbeck continued.
“Several witnesses have confirmed that you were with Elodie on the night that she died. I will ask you again: did you have anything to do with her death?”
“No.”
“Can you confirm the time and place you last saw Elodie on the night of the eighth of November?”
“No comment.”
“What do you think happened?”
There was a flicker on Vertz’s set face. “I don’t know.”
Olbeck sat back in his seat, clearly suppressing his irritation. He looked over at Kate, giving her tacit permission to take over.
Kate sat up, pulled her shirt sleeves down straight over her wrists and put her shoulders back.
“Are you musical, Mr Vertz?”
This was clearly not the question he’d been expecting. He gave her a glance of surprise, the first sign of animation she’d seen.
“I was, once.” He pushed the hair out of his eyes with the back of his hand. “I was a good singer, once.”
Kate recalled something about the Butterkins films—hadn’t they been adapted for the stage as well?
“That’s something that you and Elodie had in common,” she said. “She was very talented musically.”
He was looking at her properly now, as if she’d suddenly come into focus.
“She was. She was amazing.”
“Did she ever play for you?”
Vertz actually smiled. Dirty as he was, unsavoury as he was, Kate could suddenly see his appeal for Elodie: the smile made him look eager, boyish, and vulnerable in an attractive way.
“She did, many times.”
Kate contrasted that remark with Vertz’s previous assertion that he and Elodie had been ‘on a few dates.’
“So you did actually spend quite a lot of time together?”
Vertz looked uncomfortable. “I suppose so.”
“Did you ever meet her family?”
“No.”
“Did she ever talk to you about her family at all? Did she mention her relationship with her parents?”
A flash in Vertz’s eyes but he shook his head.
“No.”
“Did you meet Elodie’s friends?”
“No.”
“None of them? Amy Peters?”
“No.”
Kate cleared her throat.
“What about Jason Redman?”
“No.” Vertz was sounding bored.
Kate sat back. It was Olbeck’s turn.
He didn’t disappoint her.
“Elodie Duncan was in possession of a large amount of cocaine, Mr Vertz. Do you know anything about this?”
Vertz didn’t react. “No comment.”
“Did you give it to her?”
“No comment.”
“You have numerous convictions for drug related offences, Nathan.” Ah, there. He’d lost the Mister. Kate was surprised it had taken this long. “Your girlfriend—your dead girlfriend—had drugs in her possession. Are you expecting me to believe there was no connection between these two facts?”
Vertz stared out of the tiny window, set high up in the wall.
“No comment.”
They kept it up for another hour, digging away, trying to find a weak spot. Vertz ignored the questions, or answered negatively, or replied ‘no comment.’ The only time Vertz showed any sign of
animation was when Elodie’s talent for music was highlighted.
Eventually, they had to let him go.
“Bugger,” said Olbeck as they watched Nathan walk away from the station with his head down.
“We should have charged him” said Kate. “Kept him in.” After all, Anderton had done just that to Jay, hadn’t he? How was that fair? “He knows more than he’s saying.”
Olbeck gave her an old-fashioned look. “Well, of course he does. He’s guilty as sin in my opinion.”
“So why didn’t we bloody charge him?” Kate snapped. She turned on her heel and walked back to her desk, pulling out her chair with an irritable tug.
“Temper,” said Olbeck, sitting back down. “And actually, I agree with you. I’m going to update Anderton and see what he wants to do.”
“Fine. Do that.”
Kate reached for the phone as soon as he’d walked away and dialled the coroner’s office.
“Doctor Telling? It’s Kate Redman—fine, thanks. How was your holiday?”
She leant back, tapping a pencil on her jaw. Doctor Telling had a very quiet, measured voice, the sort where you instinctively relaxed listening to it. Kate had always thought that if the pathology thing didn’t work out, the good doctor had an excellent career ahead of her as a voiceover artist for relaxation and meditation tracks.
“Sorry, I didn’t quite catch that—the Arctic? Oh, a cruise. Well that’s sounds…yes. Did Doctor Stanton tell you what we wanted? Oh you have—brilliant. Yes, I’m sorry, we only got one of the samples very recently, today in fact. Sorry—yes, please. No, I’ll wait.”
She held the receiver to her ear as Doctor Telling made rummaging and mouse-clicking noises on the other end of the line. Then that quiet, comforting voice came back on the line.
Kate’s eyebrows rose.
“Seriously? That’s great. Yes, if you could send over the info, we’d be really grateful. Thanks so much.”
Kate put the receiver down, obscurely comforted that Doctor Telling had been somewhere suitably weird for her holiday. She threw her pen over at Olbeck, who had just come back to his desk.
“The DNA results are back. Telling’s sending them over now.”