No Trace (36 page)

‘No, I know now who you mean. She’s a friend of the man I meant. Can you remember anything she said?’

The man pondered. ‘Yes, I do . . . She said she was doing research. She was interested in portrayals of a lost child. She said she’d seen a reference to the Fuseli but not found an illustration, and she asked if she might take a photograph for her records.’ His look became anxious.‘My goodness, I wondered if it might be hers, but it’s not yours, is it? The lost child?’

‘Not mine, no. I’m with the police.We’re trying to trace the movements of the man who died, and we thought he might have come here. And you’re quite positive about the date she came? It couldn’t have been yesterday or Monday of this week?’

‘No, it was definitely before I went away. I’m absolutely certain of that.’

Kathy thanked him, took a note of his name and made her way back out into the square. The lawyers had abandoned their tennis on the Fields, returned to work perhaps behind the Tudor archway of Lincoln’s Inn, or in the Royal Courts of Justice a couple of blocks to the south, beyond the little pub where Brock had met the CPS solicitor. Kathy wondered if Jugular Jack had ever practised here, thrashing his opponents in both law and tennis courts. She forced her mind back to what she had just learned, and took out her own diary, checking the dates again. The guide in the Picture Room had been a credible witness. If what he’d told her was true, Poppy Wilkes had been researching the theme of the missing child at least three days before Tracey disappeared.

• • •

Sir Jack Beaufort sat immobile, staring at the four photographs on the table. The anger had gone, leaving him seized by a terrible stillness.

‘It’s an awful thing,’ he murmured at last, ‘to become an unreliable witness. It renders you . . . infantile.’ He made an effort and roused himself. ‘Was he stalking me or her, do you suppose?’

Brock didn’t answer, and Beaufort went on. ‘This first one is as I told you. I met the girl by chance in the square, we recognised each other and said hello.’

‘You appear to be giving her something.’

‘I believe she showed me her watch and told me the time. I’d forgotten that.’

‘Did Betty Zielinski see you?’

The judge stared into the distance. ‘Yes, you’re right. Unreliable again. She was there, feeding her birds. She shouted something at us, I don’t know what exactly, and the girl took fright and ran off home.’

‘Home? You knew where she lived?’

‘Yes. Reg Gilbey had told me. As I said, I’d heard of her father.’

‘What about the second picture?’

‘In the gallery. I had lunch in the restaurant there one day after a sitting with Gilbey. I can tell you the date . . .’ He took his time assembling a double-hinged pair of spectacles on his nose and peered at his diary.‘Thursday the ninth of this month.’

‘Three days before Tracey disappeared.’

‘If you say so. Tait sent over a complimentary bottle of wine, which I accepted. He wanted something, of course— to show me some new pieces in the gallery and hopefully persuade me to invest in them. So I let him take me around, and we met Dodworth, who just glared and looked suitably tortured. Tait saw that he wasn’t getting anywhere, so he suggested I’d be interested in something another of his artists was completing in the workshops. We went through and there was no one there, just this extraordinarily lifelike sculpture of a naked child—Tracey Rudd. The artist was a woman—Wilkes, I think, is her name.We were examining it when Tait’s secretary came in and said he had a call from New York or somewhere, and he asked me to take a seat and wait for him to return. I continued to look at the sculpture. It was quite uncanny, extremely disturbing in its realism, and, alone in that room, I found it impossible to resist touching it. There was a soft down of blonde hair on the skin of the arms, I recall. God knows how she did it. Anyway, that’s what I’m doing in that photograph there, the naked child kneeling on the table. It’s a statue, not the real thing, though you couldn’t tell.’

‘Poppy Wilkes’s statues are always at the wrong scale,’ Brock objected, ‘very large or very small.’

‘Not this one. That’s what made it so unnerving. It was the little girl, exactly true to life. Tait jokingly called it “pornographic realism”, and he was right. You felt intrusive, even unclean, just looking at it, so I left the damn thing alone and went and sat down as Tait had suggested. Then the most extraordinary thing happened. The child herself appeared in the doorway. I found I had to look back at the statue just to make sure it was still there. The girl was wearing a sort of dressing gown, as you see there, and she was hesitant, as if she had to do something and felt awkward about it. I said hello, and she suddenly rushed forward, hopped on my knee and planted a kiss on my cheek. I was dumbfounded. Then she jumped down again and rushed away. I hadn’t the faintest idea what it was all about. I never understood it until now.Wylie must have put her up to it somehow.’

Brock let the silence hang for a moment, remembering Sundeep Mehta’s joke about the man who met a frog in the street. ‘Why didn’t you mention this before when I asked you?’

Beaufort sighed. ‘Embarrassed, I suppose. How could I explain it, without sounding guilty? Impossible not to say either too much or too little. I opted for too little.’

‘As you say, Sir Jack—an unreliable witness. So what about this last photograph?’

The judge screwed his nose in disgust at the image of the man and the child on the bed. ‘I have no idea how he did that, but it certainly isn’t me. That’s all I can tell you.’ He gave a sudden start, then a shiver.

‘Are you cold?’ Brock asked, although the room was quite warm.

‘No . . . I just had that feeling, you know, of someone walking over my grave. I’ve been rather naive, haven’t I? I assumed just now that Wylie was behind all this, but perhaps he wasn’t, at least, not on his own.’

‘Abbott, do you mean?’

‘No, I was thinking of someone else—Fergus Tait. Perhaps it was he who persuaded that child to come in to see me after he left for his alleged phone call.’

‘Why would he do that?’

‘I don’t know—to persuade me to buy his damned artworks, I suppose. I’ve heard his business is in financial trouble. Perhaps Wylie suggested that I might be interested in the girl.’

Brock looked sceptical. ‘Is there anything else you can tell us?’

‘No, I can’t think of anything else. You don’t believe me, do you? Am I a suspect?’

‘I’d like you to provide a DNA sample and fingerprints,’ Brock said, and switched off the tape. Then he leaned forward and said softly, ‘Give me the name of your friend, Sir Jack. The one you paid eight hundred pounds to protect. I need corroboration, otherwise I’ll have no choice but to go on with this.’

‘Sorry.’ The judge looked bleak. ‘Can’t do that, I’m afraid.’

27

‘Y
ou think he’s been set up?’ Bren spoke to Brock at his side, the two of them standing at the window looking down on the street where Sir Jack Beaufort was getting into the car that had just pulled up for him.

‘Yes, but that doesn’t mean he’s innocent. I think Wylie knew there was a kernel of truth in what he was saying about Beaufort —enough to stop the judge making a fuss when Wylie tried to blackmail him. I don’t know. He certainly seems genuinely afraid of Beaufort now.’

‘We could have another go at Wylie.’

‘I don’t think he’ll give us much more. No word on his emails?’

‘Not yet. They expect a decision soon.’ Bren checked his watch. ‘But that isn’t going to help us find Rudd’s killer. Fifteen hours have gone by, and we still don’t have a lead. I’ve got a meeting with squad leaders shortly, and we’re going to have to make a decision about where to put our resources.’

‘What’s your thinking?’

‘The three killings—Zielinski, Dodworth and Rudd— are connected.’

‘Agreed.’

‘But the killer isn’t necessarily Tracey’s abductor. That’s most likely Wylie and Abbott.’

‘Go on.’

‘I think we’ve been mesmerised by the square for too long. I think we should be looking much further afield. I think we’ve got a serial killer attracted to Northcote Square by the publicity of Tracey’s abduction.’

Brock nodded. ‘Makes sense.’ But he didn’t sound convinced.

‘I had some help,’ Bren confessed. ‘I spoke to our profiler. He’s very excited by Rudd’s murder and he’s working flat out on a new profile—he hopes to be able to talk to us later this afternoon. The serial killer from outside is his idea. He thinks he could be coming from anywhere, maybe Europe or the States. Well, we know Rudd’s publicity and website have turned this into an international spectacle.’

The phone on the desk behind them rang and Brock turned to pick it up. The operator said, ‘I’ve got DS Kolla on line two, sir.Will you take it?’

‘Of course.’ Brock punched the button and said,‘Kathy! How are you feeling? Tucked up in bed?’

‘I’m all right. No, I needed some air. Listen, do we know where Poppy is?’

‘She’s in the hospital, isn’t she?’

‘No, she left there this morning, apparently. I’ve phoned The Pie Factory, and they haven’t seen her.’

‘Hang on, I’ll check with Bren.’ But Bren didn’t know and said he’d have to contact the local command unit who were supposed to be looking after her.

‘Is it important, Kathy?’ Brock asked.

‘I think it may be. I’m going to the gallery now just to be sure she isn’t there.Will you let me know if you find her?’

‘Of course. I want to speak to Fergus Tait myself. I’ll meet you there in twenty minutes.’

He rang off and watched Bren’s face grow darker as he spoke to someone on the other phone. He rang off and turned to Brock. ‘There’s been a cock-up. The doctors discharged Poppy Wilkes at midday, and her escort brought her here to be interviewed about last night. She said she was hungry and he took her down to the canteen.While he was at the counter she walked out. No one’s seen her since.’

‘I want her found, Bren. Check taxis, bus routes, the tube station. I’m going to Northcote Square. Send a squad down there as well.’

There were crowds in the square. At the north end a small hill of flowers, bunches in cellophane, was growing against the railings of 53 Urma Street, and tourists were taking pictures of the policeman on duty in the doorway. On West Terrace a smaller group clustered around a forlorn posy of violets tied to the railings outside number fourteen, and then the crowd swelled again towards Lazarus Street and The Pie Factory in the south. There were black T-shirts everywhere, emblazoned with a stark white graphic of Gabriel Rudd’s face, curls rampant, which managed to evoke the iconic images of both Jimi Hendrix and Che Guevara. The mood was of subdued excitement, everyone conscious of the significance of this moment, which would undoubtedly figure in every future art history book.

Kathy eased her way around a TV camera crew unpacking their gear and saw Brock turn the corner into the square, then stop and stare at all the activity. They met up at the gallery entrance, pushing their way through the melee at the door and squeezing into the hall past the crush at the T-shirt counter. They heard Fergus Tait’s voice coming from the side gallery and, looking past the reporters and photographers, saw him presenting a eulogy to Gabriel Rudd, complete with a PowerPoint display projected onto a screen.

They waited for him to finish, and he finally emerged, face flushed and triumphant. He saw the two police, motionless in the seething crowd.

‘Ah, officers, how are you? Can it wait? I’m rather busy at the moment, as you see.’

‘No, I’m afraid it can’t,’ Brock said. ‘Maybe it’d be quieter at the station.’

‘Oh no!’ Tait said in alarm. ‘I have to be here. I simply must.’

‘Let’s talk in your office then, and see where we go from there.’

Tait led the way, closing the door behind them.

‘So how can I help you?’

Brock began by asking him if he had any information that would help them solve Rudd’s murder.

‘Absolutely not. I had no idea about it until I was woken by a phone call from a reporter I know at six this morning, and it’s been absolute bedlam ever since. I haven’t even been able to get away to see poor Poppy in the hospital yet. How is she?’

‘She was discharged at midday, and hasn’t been seen since. We were hoping you might be able to help us find her.’

‘Disappeared! Dear Lord, not another!’

‘There’s no need for alarm at this stage.We just want to speak to her.’

‘Well, I haven’t seen her, but let me ask my staff.’ He rang two internal numbers and drew a blank. ‘No, no one’s seen her here.’

‘We’ll check her room for ourselves, if you don’t mind. What about her family?’

‘I do have a number somewhere . . .’ He flicked through a filofax on his desk. ‘Yes, a brother—home and office numbers. Shall I try them?’

Brock nodded, but again Tait was unsuccessful; the brother hadn’t heard from Poppy in weeks. ‘That about exhausts my sources, I’m afraid, Chief Inspector, so if I can get on now . . .’

‘I’ve got some other questions for you. Sir Jack Beaufort . . .’ Brock paused, catching the sudden wariness that came over Tait, who touched his big satin tie —gold today—and cleared his throat. ‘Yes, what about him?’