Bradfield spoke as he approached. ‘I know the bastard’s lying — he started bricking it when I asked him about the last time he saw his daughter. They’re a match, are they?’
DS Lawrence looked up slowly; he didn’t need to say anything. Bradfield could see from the look on his face that the fibres didn’t match.
‘Don’t you need to look at them under a proper microscope to be sure?’ he asked with concern.
‘Yes, but I’m ninety-nine per cent certain the fibres from the Bristol are not the same as the ones we found on Julie Ann — the type of weave looks different. It’s a lovely car, 1962 Bristol 407 with beige hide seats in immaculate condition.’
‘Shit, this can’t be right. I know he’s hiding something from me. Could she have got in this car without picking up fibres from it?’
‘Yes, like I just said the seats are leather and if he brought her back here and killed her he may have borrowed, or had access to, another car to dump the body.’
‘Good point. But only he can answer that so I’m going to ratchet it up a notch with him.’
‘If you want to make him sweat then call his bluff, tell him you got a phone number off the doctor’s notepad at the clinic.’
‘But we drew a blank on that.’
‘He’s not to know — just see what he has to say. In the meantime, I want to have a look in her bedroom and the box room as well.’
‘OK, there’s two officers already up there now.’
‘Remember the red fibres were mostly on her socks and in her boots. Well, if she was walking around on a carpet up there then—’
‘I hear you, and I’ll spin the phone number, see what reaction I get.’
They went back into the house and DS Lawrence went up the stairs as Bradfield checked the phone on the hall table, jotting down the number in his notebook.
He was about to return to the living room when DS Lawrence peered over the banisters.
‘I think we may have got lucky up here — the carpet in the box room has red fibres that are much more similar in weave and colour to those on Julie Ann.’
Bradfield hurried up the stairs to join him. DS Lawrence pointed to the screw marks on the box-room door and said they were not very old, and in his opinion a clasp for a padlock had been screwed to the hallway-side door and frame.
‘The tiny splinters in the screw holes are still fresh and the straight-line indents were probably caused by the clasp being forced against the door when it was being kicked from the inside. Have a look at this.’ He stepped into the room followed by Bradfield and pointed to the lower half of the door.
‘A shoe print from the sole of a boot, and scuff marks.’
Bradfield knelt down beside Lawrence to take a closer look. ‘I can see scuff marks, Paul, but not any from boots.’
The room’s thick curtains were already closed, so DS Lawrence flicked off the light, crouched down and shone a torch at an oblique angle onto the door, lighting up the outline of a boot print. He then got out a jar of black powder and a fingerprint brush which he dipped in the powder and began to lightly apply to an area of the door.
‘Add a bit of magic powder and hey presto,’ Lawrence said.
Bradfield was transfixed as the outline of a boot mark and the sole treads slowly and clearly appeared.
‘I thought that only worked on fingerprints.’
‘A little something I discovered recently after a nothing ventured, nothing gained situation. There’s more there, but from memory they look the same size and sole pattern as Julie Ann’s boots, although I can’t confirm that until I do a one-to-one comparison back at the lab. Someone definitely wanted to kick their way out of this room.’
‘There are times when I could kiss you, Paul.’
‘A mere thank-you and a few pints will suffice,’ Lawrence replied.
A smiling Bradfield calmly went back to the living room to confront Mr Collins with the new evidence.
‘Well, it looks like the fibres from your car are not a match to those we found on Julie Ann.’
George Collins said nothing, but the look on his face was a mixture of relief and surprise. Jane was also surprised and felt bad that they had both jumped to conclusions and got it all so terribly wrong.
‘The box room upstairs clearly had a padlock and clasp on it recently — why was that?’
‘I put it on to keep the dog in there when we entertained in order to stop him begging for food at the table. It didn’t work as he just howled for attention, so I took it off and threw it away.’
Bradfield shook his head. ‘That’s another lie, isn’t it, George? A lie to cover up what really happened.’
Mr Collins said nothing but Bradfield was determined to break him.
‘It gets better; for me, that is, not you. You see, the carpet fibres in your box room are the same as the fibres on your daughter’s socks. They probably got there because you made her take her boots off after she kept kicking the door you’d put a padlock on to keep her in.’
Jane felt a surge of elation and paid close attention to Mr Collins. His hands clenched and unclenched, a muscle at the side of his jaw was twitching in agitation.
‘You see, George, we now know that Julie Ann, contrary to what you have stated, did call you. She left an imprint of a phone number she rang from the clinic on a doctor’s notepad. I’ve just checked it against your phone in the hallway and they match.’
Jane knew they had no result from the notepad, and leaned forwards frowning as she watched Mr Collins become even more agitated. Bradfield tapped his notebook and repeated the phone number. He then spoke very quietly.
‘Come on, this is your opportunity to tell me the truth, George. If you and your wife were keeping Julie Ann here to get her off the drugs and you lost your temper with her and lashed out then get it off your chest and tell me.’
‘Oh God, but please, my wife has no knowledge of any of this.’
‘I understand that you don’t want to implicate her, but she didn’t just turn a blind eye, did she? I’m starting to lose my patience. Do you want me to go and wake her up and bring her down here?’
‘No, please no. She was with her sister in Weybridge for the week, she wasn’t at the house — I swear to you she was not here.’
‘Tell me everything, George. It’ll be better for you in the long run.’
Collins took a deep sigh, his hands knotted together and his head bent down as he stared at the carpet.
‘I’m sorry, Julie called my office and they contacted me to say she’d rung. I’d normally have been at work, but I’d taken most of the day off to play in a golf competition. I’d just returned home when they called but I had no contact number for her so I couldn’t call her back.’
‘We have a witness who heard her making a call to you.’
Jane glanced at Bradfield. He appeared totally relaxed leaning back in his chair.
‘Yes, I did speak with her. I’d only been here about half an hour when she rang. She was hysterical and crying, and said she wanted to come home. You have to understand how difficult it was for me.’
‘So what did she say to you?’
‘Well, as usual she was belligerent and asking for money so I put the phone down on her. I was upset — she always made me feel wretched. Then she rang back again a while later reversing the charges from a payphone. She was calmer this time and begged me to help her, repeating over and over that she needed me, and wanted to come home. The truth is I didn’t want to talk to her, but I still loved her and so I relented. I told her she could come home, but she had no money for a bus so I went straight out and picked her up near a hospital in Hackney. She looked terrible, and was shaking and crying.’
‘What time was this?’
‘Erm, she called just after I got home from a game of golf. I’d not played a good round so I didn’t stay on and it would have been perhaps five or five thirty in the afternoon I picked her up.’