Lynley asked.
Stewart shook his head. Sod all appeared useful from that end of things. All the youth offenders recently released were accounted for.
“What are we getting from the door-to-doors at the body sites?” Lynley asked.
Little enough. Stewart had constables reinterviewing everyone in those areas, seeking witnesses to anything at all. They knew the drill: It wasn’t so much the unusual that they were looking for, but the ordinary that, upon reflection, made one stop and think. Since serial killers by their very nature faded into the woodwork, the woodwork itself had to be examined, inch by tedious inch.
He’d directed enquiries to hauling companies as well, Stewart explained, and he’d so far come up with fifty-seven lorry drivers who would have been on Gunnersbury Road on the night when the first victim had been left in Gunnersbury Park. A DC was in the process of contacting them, to see if she could jump-start their memories about any kind of vehicle that might have been parked alongside the brick wall of the park, on the road into London. In the meantime, another DC was in touch with every taxi and minicab service, looking for much the same result. As to the door-to-door, a line of houses stood directly across the road from the park, albeit separated from it by four lanes of traffic and a central reservation. There were hopes of getting something from one of them. One never knew who might have been suffering insomnia and gazing out of the window on the night in question. The same went for Quaker Street, by the way, where a block of flats stood opposite the abandoned warehouse in which the third body had been found.
On the other hand, the multi-story carpark location—site of the second body—was going to be more difficult. The only person who might have seen anything inside it was the attendant on duty that night, but he swore he’d seen nothing between one in the morning and six-twenty, when the body was discovered by a nurse heading to an early shift at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital. That didn’t, of course, mean he hadn’t slept right through the entire circumstance. The carpark in question had no central kiosk at which an attendant sat day and night, but rather an office tucked away deep in the interior of the structure and furnished with a reclining chair and a television set to make the long hours of the night shift seem moderately less so.
“And St. George’s Gardens?” Lynley asked.
That was somewhat more hopeful, Stewart reported. According to Theobald’s Road’s DC who’d canvassed the vicinity, a woman living on the third floor of the building at the junction of Henrietta Mews and Handel Street heard what she thought was the sound of the garden’s gate being opened sometime round three in the morning. She’d thought it was the park warden at first, but upon reflection she’d realised it was far too early for him to be unlocking the gates. By the time she got herself out of bed, swathed in her dressing gown, and in place at her window, she was just in time to see a van driving off. It passed beneath a streetlamp as she watched. It was “large-ish,” as she described it. She thought the colour of the van was red.
“That’s taken it down to a few hundred thousand vans across the city, however,” Stewart added regretfully. He flipped his notebook closed, his report complete.
“We need to get someone on to Swansea, pulling vehicle records anyway,” Barbara Havers said to Lynley.
“That, Constable, is a complete nonstarter, and you ought to know it,” Stewart informed her.
Havers bristled and began to respond.
Lynley cut her off. “John.” He said the DI’s name in a minatory tone. Stewart subsided, but he didn’t look happy to have Havers—lowly DC that she was—offering her opinion.
Stewart said, “Fine. I’ll see to it. I’ll put someone on to the old bat in Handel Street as well. We may be able to jog something else from her memory about what she saw from
Stewart shook his head. Sod all appeared useful from that end of things. All the youth offenders recently released were accounted for.
“What are we getting from the door-to-doors at the body sites?” Lynley asked.
Little enough. Stewart had constables reinterviewing everyone in those areas, seeking witnesses to anything at all. They knew the drill: It wasn’t so much the unusual that they were looking for, but the ordinary that, upon reflection, made one stop and think. Since serial killers by their very nature faded into the woodwork, the woodwork itself had to be examined, inch by tedious inch.
He’d directed enquiries to hauling companies as well, Stewart explained, and he’d so far come up with fifty-seven lorry drivers who would have been on Gunnersbury Road on the night when the first victim had been left in Gunnersbury Park. A DC was in the process of contacting them, to see if she could jump-start their memories about any kind of vehicle that might have been parked alongside the brick wall of the park, on the road into London. In the meantime, another DC was in touch with every taxi and minicab service, looking for much the same result. As to the door-to-door, a line of houses stood directly across the road from the park, albeit separated from it by four lanes of traffic and a central reservation. There were hopes of getting something from one of them. One never knew who might have been suffering insomnia and gazing out of the window on the night in question. The same went for Quaker Street, by the way, where a block of flats stood opposite the abandoned warehouse in which the third body had been found.
On the other hand, the multi-story carpark location—site of the second body—was going to be more difficult. The only person who might have seen anything inside it was the attendant on duty that night, but he swore he’d seen nothing between one in the morning and six-twenty, when the body was discovered by a nurse heading to an early shift at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital. That didn’t, of course, mean he hadn’t slept right through the entire circumstance. The carpark in question had no central kiosk at which an attendant sat day and night, but rather an office tucked away deep in the interior of the structure and furnished with a reclining chair and a television set to make the long hours of the night shift seem moderately less so.
“And St. George’s Gardens?” Lynley asked.
That was somewhat more hopeful, Stewart reported. According to Theobald’s Road’s DC who’d canvassed the vicinity, a woman living on the third floor of the building at the junction of Henrietta Mews and Handel Street heard what she thought was the sound of the garden’s gate being opened sometime round three in the morning. She’d thought it was the park warden at first, but upon reflection she’d realised it was far too early for him to be unlocking the gates. By the time she got herself out of bed, swathed in her dressing gown, and in place at her window, she was just in time to see a van driving off. It passed beneath a streetlamp as she watched. It was “large-ish,” as she described it. She thought the colour of the van was red.
“That’s taken it down to a few hundred thousand vans across the city, however,” Stewart added regretfully. He flipped his notebook closed, his report complete.
“We need to get someone on to Swansea, pulling vehicle records anyway,” Barbara Havers said to Lynley.
“That, Constable, is a complete nonstarter, and you ought to know it,” Stewart informed her.
Havers bristled and began to respond.
Lynley cut her off. “John.” He said the DI’s name in a minatory tone. Stewart subsided, but he didn’t look happy to have Havers—lowly DC that she was—offering her opinion.
Stewart said, “Fine. I’ll see to it. I’ll put someone on to the old bat in Handel Street as well. We may be able to jog something else from her memory about what she saw from
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