'Who were you staying with?'
'Lots of people.'
'But who was looking after you?'
'Adrian and Pru.'
Tina nodded. Adrian and Prudence Lovejoy were Charlie's short-term foster carers after the fire at the Grant residence. The next few questions could be delicate. Tina glanced at Hank Williams, who nodded almost imperceptibly.
'Charlie, tell me about the fire.'
Charlie frowned, his forehead scrunching up as he did so.
'What happened, Charlie?'
'The house burnt,' Charlie said. His expression was vacant, as if recalling something that had happened to someone else.
'Where were you, Charlie?'
'Downstairs. I felt sleepy.'
'Then what happened?'
'Firemen came and squirted water all over the house.'
'And then?'
'Then I got taken away, to hospital,' Charlie said matter-of-factly.
Morton hit mute on the video.
'Did anyone else have a chill run down their spine?' Morton asked those in the Incident Room.
'It was weird, boss, almost cold – detached even,' Ayala replied.
'That was my take it on it. He was totally dispassionate. What do you think, Jenkins?'
The psychologist was deep in thought, 'Huh? Oh. Right. He could be in shock. Trauma like that can easily cause post-traumatic stress. He appears to be in a dissociative state. He's not properly feeling the trauma of seeing his foster family burn. I'd like to get him in for a session.'
'It's not going to happen, Doc. Not without parental consent.' Morton flicked the volume back up as Tina took the watch out from her bag. All eyes turned back to the big screen.
'Charlie,' Tina held up the Keppler Oechslan watch, 'do you know what this is?'
She watched his eyes for a glint of recognition.
'A watch?' he offered tentatively, as if afraid he was being tricked.
'Who owns the watch, Charlie?'
'The police.'
'Why do you say that?'
'It says so on the bag.'
Tina glanced at the evidence bag; 'Police' was indeed printed across the bag.
'So it isn't yours then, Charlie?'
'No.'
'OK, Charlie, that's everything then. Thank you for coming in today.'
Hank led Charlie from the frame, and Morton killed the projector.
'What do we make of that then, lads?'
'Could be he's forgotten the watch. God knows when he was separated from it. He's only twelve, and he's been in the system for most of that time. Stolen, sold, or lost. Take your pick,' Ayala offered.
'Maybe. But it's not an easy watch to pass on. Very distinctive,' Morton said slowly. 'It's also a big jump going from lost or stolen to ending up on another dead child. It's not exactly likely that a second kid found or bought it, then decided to wear it, and then got murdered. That stretches plausibility.'
'Where do we go from here?' Ayala said. 'We've got an unknown dead kid, with a watch which we know was bought by a gentleman, since deceased. The heir apparent to the watch doesn't recognise it, so it has to have been moved on while he was pretty young.'
'He doesn't appear to recognise it,' Jenkins interrupted. 'Memory is fallible, and he's been through a great deal of stress. He could be suppressing memory of the watch.'
'Even so. How did our watch get from the kid to the dead body? Whether Charlie remembers it or not, he should have it. It was his granddad's gift to his father, and it went with Charlie as far as the Grant residence. They were paying to insure it when they died last year. It didn't have long to go AWOL,' Morton thought aloud.
'Could the dead kid be related to the Grants?' said Ayala, his voice wavering between octaves.
'Doubtful. Probate records show they left everything to Charlie. He was with them seven years, and they have no other family,' Morton said, his lips pursed. He had to be careful not to phrase his rebuttal too strongly. Ayala had been responsible for the grunt work that led them to the dead end in Cleaver Square, and he'd take any implied insult personally.
'Our research hasn't turned anything up. Charlie doesn't look anything like the facial reconstruction we've been handing out. If we could get a sample of Charlie's DNA, it would make this so much easier. It might be Charlie has a twin brother,' Ayala said.
'That seems unlikely, Bertram. We'd have seen some sort of documentation,' Jenkins quipped wryly. Morton silenced him with a glare. The group sat awkwardly in silence for a moment, none willing to volunteer an idea lest it be shot down in flames.
It was down to Morton, ever the conciliator, to break the silence: 'We'd need permission from the guardian for DNA anyway, and that Mrs Lattimer didn't strike me as the co-operative sort.'
'We could at least ask,' Ayala said.
'True enough, Ayala. No harm asking.'
***
'Absolutely not,' Brenda Lattimer's reply gave no room for doubt. It was clear she wouldn't budge. Smoke emanated from Mrs Lattimer's cigarette, her third since arriving at the station.
'Mrs Lattimer, it isn't going to hurt Charlie in any way. All we need is a cheek swab. Or a comb he uses. Or his toothbrush.
'I said no. Charlie's one of my charges, ain't he? I can't be giving away his DNA. You want it, get a court order.' Mrs Lattimer walked off, leaving Morton standing outside New Scotland Yard with Tina Vaughn.
'Any bright ideas?' Morton asked, not expecting a response.
'Actually,' Tina replied, 'I do. The kid had a can of coke during our interview. It's probably still in the bin. If we're quick, and a bit lucky, then we'll have our DNA sample. It's a bit clichéd but who's to argue if it works?'
'Tina, I could kiss you!'
CHAPTER 19: RUNNING IN CIRCLES
Before the team assembled for the morning briefing, Morton and Tina met in his office. Every few moments, Morton checked his email again. There was still no word from DNA. A long-since-cold bagel lay next to Morton's laptop.
'David. You know if the Travelodge gets too much, there's always room at mine,' Tina said.
Morton barely heard her; he was too busy concentrating on the New Message notification that had popped up on his screen. He snatched at his mouse, and then clicked to open the email.
'Damn!'
'No match?'
'No match, zero alleles in common. Well, there goes the sibling theory. Joe Bloggs and Charlie Matthews are not blood relations,' Morton said.
'Give yourself a break, David, we'll get there.' Tina laid a hand on her boss's knee.
Morton glanced down, mentally deciding whether or not to remove her hand. In the time it took him to decide, Tina noticed his apprehension and withdrew her hand.
'Who the hell is this kid? We've run down all the leads, and there's absolutely nothing tying him to a missing child. How does a child disappear and not one person bother to try and find him? Not a teacher, a social worker, a parent or even a friend.'
'I don't know. The kid could have never been in the system. You know, a Fritzl-style case. The kid gets born at home, never registered with the authorities. Then killed by the parent and dumped.' Tina referred to an infamous Austrian case in which a woman had been held captive by her father for twenty-four years, giving birth to seven children in a dark basement.
'Maybe, but there's no sign of abuse or malnutrition. We don't even know how he died; no bone breaks, no evidence of foul play in the toxicology report.'
'That doesn't mean much. You could stab someone without hitting a bone if you were lucky. He could have bled out. He could have frozen to death. He could have been smothered. We only had limited tissue samples to work with.'
'All valid points, but that still leaves us with an unknown victim, an unknown assailant and no obvious leads.'
'We'll get there. You haven't let us down yet, Chief.'
***
Ayala tried not to stare when his boss walked into the meeting. Morton looked terrible. His eyes were bloodshot with deep bags
hanging underneath them, and those shoes with that suit... what was the boss thinking?
'We're back to square one, people,' Morton began the morning briefing. 'We've got ourselves a dead kid in the park with a watch. We traced the watch through to the purchaser to the recipient of the watch, and from there to his heir: Charles 'Charlie' Matthews. The child who inherited the watch has no knowledge of it. Simply put, we've run down all the major leads. If our Joe Bloggs Junior isn't Charles Matthews, then who the hell is he?'
Silence ensued, every member of his team avoiding eye contact.
'I can't prove it, but there's something just plain off here. How did the watch leave Charles Matthews' possession? There are no indications it was sold, and no crime reports. If someone had stolen a watch worth over fifty grand from me, I'd be damn sure to report it.'
'But Chief, if he was young when the parents died it could have gone AWOL while he was in the system and too young to remember it. Just because the Grants had it insured doesn't mean they physically retained possession of it. Even at black market prices, it would have made a few bob.'
'Good thinking, Ayala. But that still doesn't explain how it ended up on a dead pre-teen in Hackney Marshes. If you steal or buy something that fancy, and it is obviously expensive, then you don't give it to a kid. Even at scrap prices, that watch is valuable.'
'What if our Joe Bloggs Junior is a pickpocket?' Ayala tried again.
'So you're thinking it was stolen twice? I'm not buying it. I can't prove otherwise, but there's something odd going on here. Ayala, I want you running down anything the social worker knows about Master Matthews. Something about that kid doesn't sit right with me. Vaughn, look into this house fire. Find out what happened and see if it explains the kid's reticence. All clear? Good. Get to it.'
***
The office space Hank Williams occupied courtesy of Children's Services was part of a hot desk system that had been introduced to help curtail the running costs of the services' administration. Rather than allocate every social worker a small cubbyhole-style office, someone in the ivory tower had decided that a pooled space, shared between all local authorities, was the most efficient way to do things. The move had been rather successful; with so many staff out on site visits to their charges, the hot desk system introduced had freed up space for a new computer system to be installed on-site.
'Can I ask an idiotic question?' Ayala led with his favourite interview tactic. Rather than jump in and ask what he wanted to know, he made the interviewee feel secure by implying his own ignorance. Criminals could be arrogant, and arrogance breeds carelessness.
'Sure, if you don't mind an idiotic answer.'
Ayala chuckled appreciatively. 'What does your job involve? I know the basics, but how does the set-up work?'
'It's pretty simple – I'm ultimately responsible for the welfare of the children in my care. I look after around twenty kids at a time. I place them with foster carers, seek adoption where appropriate and follow up on any feedback from schools, foster carers and from your own colleagues. I make sure they're reasonably happy, healthy and get any help they might need, or I try to anyway,' Hank Williams replied.
'And you cover the whole of London?'
'Yep. Pretty much everything central anyway. If it's within an hour on the tube from Marble Arch, I could get assigned it. I work part-time for multiple Local Authorities, so I get to travel quite a bit.'
'Right. So Charles Matthews is one of your twenty?'
'Yep. I took him on a few months ago.'
'How's that been?'
'About average. The kid is a bit quiet. I drove him to the Lattimers from the Lovejoys. The Lovejoys never take them for long. They just provide a safe haven after a trauma. I know Charlie is having a bit of trouble at school. They think he might score highly on the autistic spectrum, or possibly suffer from dyslexia. He's doing brilliantly in maths, but everything involving language skills has him stumped. We're waiting on an educational psychologist to see him, but the waiting times can be a bit insane in the months preceding the exam season.'
'At least he's too young to be doing exams this year,' Ayala smiled, trying to look as sympathetic as possible.
'That is one saving grace. If I'd lost my parents, then my foster parents, I'm sure I'd be struggling too.'
'How'd his biological parents die?'
'Car accident, I think. It's in his file. I can check if you like.'
'Thanks. What would be really handy would be getting a copy of that file,' Ayala said.
'No can do. You want that, you've got to talk to Children's Services Head Office, and they never give out our files unless lawyers get involved.'
'I guessed as much.' Ayala paused to find a business card. 'Thanks for your time, Hank. If you think of anything else then let me know.'
As he turned to walk away, Ayala shrugged. Nothing unexpected, although he had hoped to get a copy of Charlie's complete file.
CHAPTER 20: DALKEITH GROVE
'This was the point of origin,' Lucien Darville, Fire Investigator, indicated a particularly charred spot of flooring in the corner. Ash covered the scene. Metal and burnt wood were strewn all over the house. Where once a Victorian terraced house stood, Dalkeith Grove now had a gaping hole with only the structural husk left. Smoke had licked the adjoining homes, leaving dark stains on walls that were never intended to be exposed to the elements. Plastic coverings and metal pins had been put in place to prevent any structural issues, but gave an impression of post-Blitz London.
'What started the fire?' Tina inquired. She glanced down at the Dictaphone in her hand to make sure a red light was lit to indicate that it was recording.
'We found the carcass of a fan heater. The cheap kind you get in catalogues.'
'I know the type; my Mum has one and has it on constantly. It costs a fortune to run.'
'Ha-ha, you should buy her a jumper. See if she gets the hint. Or show her a picture of this place. That ought to scare her enough to unplug it.'
Tina took Darville's advice, and snapped a picture on her phone. It would double up for the investigation file anyway.
'Did the heater malfunction?'
'I don't think so. We had it inspected, and our expert could discern no fault. More likely it was too close to something flammable. Newspapers, magazines or the like.'
'That simple?'
'Yep. Simple but deadly. The house is timber-frame construction. When carbon-heavy material burns, you get carbon monoxide gas. It's lighter than air, so it rises. We found Mrs Grant upstairs in the master bedroom, and Mr Grant in the upstairs office. They would have passed out before they knew what happened, never to awake. Cause of death was obvious before the coroner pronounced; a pink corpse is a sure sign of carbon monoxide poisoning.'
'Where was the kid?'
'Playing in the garage, which probably saved him. There was an internal door to the house, but it was shut. He got taken to the hospital for a once-over that afternoon as I recall, but he wouldn't have suffered any permanent physical damage from the fire. His mental state, on the other hand, could easily have suffered.'
'Why didn't the fire alarm go off? Don't tell me they didn't have one.'
'They had one, but the batteries were dead.'
'Christ, I'd better check mine,' Tina said as images of a lobster-pink family shuffled through her mind; to think that a simple battery failure could kill two people, and irrevocably change the course of a third life.
'You do that. Anything else you need to see here?'
'Nope. Just to make sure, you think this is an accident, right? That's how it's listed on the report.' Tina tapped her vintage shoulder bag, which had a printed copy sticking out of the outside pocket.
'That's my report. Of course I think it was an accident. No sign of foul play here. We looked for it, but most arson involves some sort of accelerant and there was no evidence of that here. Besides, neither of the victims had any known motive to set a fire. The place isn't insured for anything beyond rep
lacement and rebuild costs, and they didn't have any financial difficulties. I'd say there's a 95 per cent chance this was just plain old bad luck. I see at least two or three of these fires every week.'
'Thanks, Lucien,' Tina stared up doe-eyed at the wreckage of the Grant family home, trying to comprehend how two or three families could suffer such a terrible fate week in, week out. It was almost worse than investigating a murder. At least with a murder, there was always someone to take the blame. It was just a matter of catching them.
***
James and Charlie were enjoying a brief respite from the presence of Brenda and Roger Lattimer. It had become an increasingly common occurrence. The downside was the extensive list of chores they'd been left to complete. To get the house clean would take all evening if they didn't speed up, and neither boy wanted to risk the inevitable punishment should they fail to live up to the exacting standards expected of them.
'Pull your socks up, Charlie!' James Lattimer urged Charlie on as they polished the woodwork in the kitchen.
Charlie bent forward, rolled up his trousers and tugged his socks higher up his legs. James burst out laughing as Charlie stretched the socks further towards his knees.
'Not literally, you moron.'
'You moron,' Charlie parroted, copying James' mocking tone.
'How you doing anyway? Tired yet?'
'Fine thanks, mate,' Charlie replied.
James frowned. Charlie always seemed to say exactly the same thing. Always.
'Charlie, are you doing banana gorilla OK?' James fought to keep a straight face as he tested his theory.
'Fine thanks, mate.'
'Do you want to throw my PlayStation out the window while doing the Macarena?'
Recognition flickered in Charlie's eyes at the mention of the games console. 'Sure.'
James grinned. He was right.
CHAPTER 21: KEEP DIGGING
'Kiaran, I know this is unorthodox but we're hitting dead end after dead end. Joe Bloggs Junior is not a match for Charles Matthews. I need to know how Charles' watch came to be on our corpse. What are the odds of exhuming the parents of Charles Matthews to confirm his identity? There's something off about that kid.' Morton paced up and down in his office, using his BlackBerry's hands-free kit to talk.
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