The police responded to the investigation’s urgency by drafting in as many officers as it took to man the phones and make up the door-knock teams. The process, however, was still a slow one. Every woman’s story had to be confirmed and every alibi checked. Waiting was an inevitable part of any investigation, but Liz had always found it deeply frustrating. Taut-wired, and with her metabolism geared up for action, she paced the windy sea front, waiting for news.
Mackay, meanwhile, was in the village hall with Steve Goss and the police team, making personal calls to the heads of all the major civilian and military establishments in East Anglia that might possibly constitute Islamic Terror Syndicate targets. There were a huge number of these, from police dog-handling schools and local Territorial Army halls to full-scale regimental HQs and American air bases. In the case of the latter, Mackay suggested, perimeter patrols were to be doubled and vulnerable approach roads closed off from use by the public. Elsewhere, the Home Office was upgrading the security status of all government establishments.
At midday Judith Spratt rang her to request a call-back, and Liz returned to the shelter of the public phone box on the sea front, with whose every scratched obscenity and faded graffiti-scrawl she was now wearily familiar.
Out of the fifty-one women on the police check-list, she learned, twenty-eight had been interviewed and cleared as having verifiable alibis for the night of the murder, five were black, and so clearly not the target, and seven were “of a body size not compatible with existing subject-data.”
That left eleven of the women uninterviewed, of whom five lived alone, and six lived in multi-person households. Nine had been out all morning, and were uncontactable by mobile phone, one had not returned from a party in Runcorn twelve hours earlier, and one was on the way to a hospital visit in Chertsey.
“The Runcorn one,” said Liz.
“Stephanie Patch, nineteen. Catering apprentice employed by the Crown and Thistle Hotel, Warrington. Lives at home, again in Warrington. We’ve spoken to the mother, who says that she was working at the hotel on the night of the murder and returned home before midnight.”
“What was Stephanie doing in Paris?”
“Pop concert,” said Judith. “The Foo Fighters. She went with a friend from work.”
“Does that check out?”
“The Foo Fighters were playing at the Palais de Bercy on the night in question, yes.”
“Has anyone spoken to the friend?”
“She apparently went to the same party in Runcorn and hasn’t come home either. Stephanie’s mother thinks they’ve stayed away because one or both of them has gone out and got a tattoo, which they were apparently threatening to do. She told the police that her daughter has a total of fourteen ear-piercings. And can’t drive.”
“Which rather rules her out. What about the hospital one?”
“Lavinia Phelps, twenty-nine. Picture-frame restorer employed by the National Trust, lives at Stockbridge in Hampshire. Visiting her married sister who lives in Surrey and gave birth last night.”
“Have the police spoken to her?”
“No, they’ve spoken to Mr. Phelps, who owns an antique shop in Stockbridge. Lavinia’s taken the car, a VW Passat estate, but her phone’s switched off. Surrey police are waiting for her at the hospital in Chertsey.”
“That’ll be a nice surprise for her. Any of the others look even faintly possible?”
“There’s an art student from Bath. Sally Madden, twenty-six, single. Lives in a studio flat in a multi-occupancy building in the South Stoke area. Holds a driving licence, but according to her downstairs neighbour doesn’t own a car.”
“What was she doing in Paris?”
“We don’t know. She’s been out all morning.”
“She sounds like a possible.”
“I agree. Somerset police have their tactical firearms group standing by.”
“Any word on the rest?”
“Five of them announced to other household members that they were going Christmas shopping. That’s all we have at the moment.”
“Thanks, Jude. Call me when you have more.”
“Will do.”
At 12:30, following a call from Steve Goss, Liz made her way to the village hall, where an air of unhurried urgency prevailed. More chairs and tables had been set up, and a half-dozen computer screens cast their pale glow over the intent faces of officers that Liz didn’t recognise. There was muted but dense phone chatter as Goss, in shirt sleeves, beckoned her over.
“Small garage outside a place called Hawfield, north of King’s Lynn.”
“Go on.”
“Just after six p.m. on the evening before the shooting at the Fairmile Café, a young woman pays with two fifty-pound notes for a full tank of unleaded fuel, plus several litres which she takes away in a plastic screw-top container. The assistant particularly remembers her spilling fuel on her hands and coat-he remembers a green skiing or hiking-type jacket-presumably while filling the container. He makes some friendly remark to her about this but she blanks him and hands him the notes as if she hasn’t heard him and he wonders if perhaps she’s deaf. She also buys-get this-an A to Z of Norfolk.”
“That’s her. It’s got to be her. Any CCTV?”
“No, which is presumably why she chose the place. But the guy has good recall of her appearance. Early twenties, wide-set eyes, mid-brown hair held in some sort of elastic band. Quite attractive, he says, and with what he describes as a ‘mid-posh accent.’ ”
“Has the garage still got the fifty-pound notes?”
“No. Banked them a couple of days ago. But Whitten’s got an Identifit artist on the case. He and the garage guy are putting a portrait together right now.”
“When can we see it?”
“We’ll have it on our screens within the hour.”
“She’s right under our noses, Steve. I can practically smell her.”
“Yeah, me too, petrol and all. That A to Z suggests that whatever the hell she’s up to-it’s right here. Has London come up with anything?”
“They’re down to a dozen or so possibles. No sighting of the Astra, I assume?”
“No, and I wouldn’t hold your breath on that either. We’ve circulated the details and hopefully the reg number’s taped to every squad car dashboard in the country, but… well, you need a hell of a lot of luck with cars. We usually only find them once they’re dumped.”
“Can we recirculate to the Norfolk force? So that every single policeman or -woman in the county is looking for that black Astra as a matter of absolute priority?”
“Sure.”
“And have spotters in unmarked cars lying up on the approach roads to the American air bases.”
“Mr. Mackay’s already suggested that, and Whitten’s on to it.”
Liz looked around her. “Where is Mackay?”
“He told Whitten he was driving down to Lakenheath, to liaise with the station commander there.”
“OK,” said Liz. Good of him to keep me in the picture, she thought.
“I’ve heard they do a very nice hamburger down at those bases,” said Goss.
Liz glanced at her watch. “Would you settle for a ploughman’s at the Trafalgar?”
“Reckon so,” he nodded.
36
They saw two police cars on the way back from Norwich. They were waiting in line at the intersection of the A1067 and the ring road when an unmarked red Rover with a tall antenna swept past southbound at close to the speed limit. The intent features of the driver and front-seat passenger and the closely controlled driving style had the unmistakable smack of officialdom about them, and she felt a sick thump of fear.
“Go!” said Faraj, who she guessed had not recognised the Rover for what it was. “What is it?”