6
Irvine went back to her desk and shuffled through her file again. She focused on what little information she had on Butler, but it was insubstantial and led nowhere, no matter how many times she went over it. The guy was a ghost.
She went back through the file one last time from the start. After ten minutes she came across the handwritten sheet of notes she had made when trying to get her head around the case earlier in the week. One line jumped out at her:
Suzie Murray – is she lying + does she know the dealer?
It wasn’t so much the content of the note, but the thought process that it triggered: about working girls and where they lived. She picked up her desk phone and called the Stewart Street police station.
‘Stewart Street,’ a male voice answered.
‘Superintendent Pope, please,’ Irvine said.
‘Who’s this?’
‘DC Irvine with CID.’
‘Hold on.’
She did. A minute stretched to two, stretched to three.
‘Pope,’ a voice said.
‘Sir, it’s DC Irvine from Pitt Street.’
‘I know. What’s this about?’
‘We spoke earlier this week. About a murder inquiry.’
The line went quiet. Irvine heard Pope breathing but he said nothing.
‘Sir?’
‘Is this about the prozzies?’
‘That’s correct, sir.’
‘You wanted information on other girls, that kind of thing. Connected to your stiff.’
‘Yes.’
She heard the sound of papers shuffled on a desk.
‘Two names and an address,’ Pope said after a little more shuffling.
Irvine wrote down the names he gave her and the address of a flat in the east end of the city, not far from where Russell Hall’s body had been found. She wanted to ask how long Pope had been sitting on the information, bit her tongue instead and thanked him. He hung up without replying.
She thought about going over to the address on her own. Remembered the last time she had done that and put her hand against the bruised part of her face. Decided to find Armstrong and go over together.
Armstrong was still in with Moore. Warren was nowhere to be seen. She stuck her head around the door.
‘Kenny,’ she said.
He turned, slightly startled. She held up the piece of paper with the names and addresses on it.
‘I got an address for other girls that Joanna Lewski and Suzie Murray worked with.’
Armstrong frowned.
‘From the Super at Stewart Street. I called him before, remember?’
‘He called you back now?’ Armstrong asked, looking at his watch.
‘No. I called to chase him.’
Armstrong turned from her to look at Moore, who said nothing.
‘Okay,’ Armstrong said. ‘I need to be in on the call with the FBI in an hour. Then we’ll get over there.’
Irvine stared at the back of his head after he turned to Moore. She went back to her desk and looked at her computer monitor as the screensaver came on. Someone had been on to her computer and changed it to a topless shot of some Z-list female celebrity.
She found it kind of funny. Wasn’t sure why.
Strange days.