Blood Harvest

69

‘OK, THEN, THIS IS WHAT WE KNOW.’ DETECTIVE CHIEF Superintendent Rushton stopped and cleared his throat. He had to look at the top of Alice’s head, her eyes were staring down at a stray cornflake on the kitchen table.
‘Joe was definitely still in King George’s at the interval,’ continued Rushton, ‘which took place from three fifteen to three forty-five. The front-of-house manager was quite definite about timings. Joe was bought an ice cream and more than one little lad remembers seeing him in the toilet queue. What we can’t be certain of is whether he was still in the theatre for the second half.’
‘Who the hell was sitting next to him?’ said Gareth. He hadn’t stopped moving since he and Harry had walked through the door. He paced the floor, he rocked back and forth on his heels, he wandered from room to room, shouting his thoughts out to whoever might be listening. Alice, in sharp contrast, had barely moved in three hours. Her face seemed to be getting paler and smaller by the minute.
Harry looked at his watch – almost eight o’clock. He pulled his phone from his pocket and checked the screen. No messages.
‘Well, that’s the thing,’ said DI Neasden. ‘The kids didn’t have allocated seats, they all swapped round at the interval. One or two of the little ones got scared of the baddie up on stage and went to sit next to the teachers. The theatre wasn’t completely full, so there were empty seats. No one we’ve spoken to can definitely remember seeing Joe during the second half. We’ve checked with the event stewards; there were three of them on duty and none of them remember seeing a young lad wandering round by himself.’
‘The school didn’t know for certain he was missing until they got all the kids back on the coaches and did a head count,’ said Rushton. ‘This was at ten to five. The staff went back into the theatre to search, and gave up after another thirty minutes. We were notified at twenty-five past five.’
‘He could have been gone two hours by then,’ said Gareth, pushing his way past DI Neasden to get to the sink. He ran himself a glass of water, raised it to his lips and put it down again. He turned as the kitchen door opened and Tom came in. The boy stood in the doorway, looking from one adult to the next. No one seemed to know what to say to him. Then Jenny Pickup appeared behind him, paler and more dishevelled than usual, with Millie in her arms.
‘Come on, Tom, love,’ she said. ‘Let’s leave everyone to talk. Shall we play on the computer?’
Tom opened his mouth as if to say something, but his bottom lip began to tremble. He turned and ran from the room, just as Millie started squealing to get to her mother. Alice stood and held out her arms. She took her daughter and dropped down into her seat again, as though the effort of standing was just too much.
‘I’ll stay with Tom,’ muttered Jenny.
‘Thanks,’ said Gareth. ‘I’ll come through in a sec. They should probably be in bed.’
Harry checked the screen of his mobile again as Jenny slipped out of the room.
‘OK then,’ said Rushton. ‘Next thing we did was have a look at the CCTV footage. Not the easiest of tasks; it’s a big building. As well as the pantomime, they had a conference in the Northgate Suite and the café-bar was as busy as you’d expect a few days before Christmas.’
‘And?’ said Gareth, pouring the water down the sink.
Rushton shook his head. ‘The cameras in the foyer didn’t pick up anything. Of course there were a lot of people milling around in the interval and it’s not impossible he slipped out behind someone else, but the school had a member of staff standing by the doors to prevent exactly that. She’s adamant no child went past her and she seems pretty reliable.’
‘What about other doors?’ asked Harry.
‘Including the staff entrance and the fire doors, there are nine exits from the building,’ answered Rushton, ‘some covered by cameras, some not. We did pick up one image that we want you to have a look at. Have you got it, Andy?’
Detective Constable Andy Jeffries, who looked more like a teenage hoody than a member of the Lancashire Constabulary, had his laptop ready on the kitchen table. He pressed two keys and then turned the screen to face Alice. Gareth approached the table and leaned over the back of his wife’s chair. Harry moved closer. They watched as a clip of CCTV footage started playing. They were looking at one of the corridors in King George’s Hall. Two members of staff walked towards the camera and, as they disappeared from view an adult and child came on screen, walking out of shot. The adult was wearing a baseball cap, trousers and a thick quilted jacket. The child was similarly dressed in an oversized baseball cap and a large, blue plastic raincoat. They walked to the doors, the adult with one arm around the child, and then disappeared outside.
‘What do you think?’ said Rushton.
‘Let’s see it again,’ said Gareth.
The clip was played again. ‘Impossible to be sure,’ said Gareth, after they’d seen it a third time. ‘Right sort of height for Joe, right build, but we just don’t get any sort of look at his face. What do you think, Al?’
For a second Alice didn’t react. Then she shook her head.
‘We’re going to be running that clip on the news tonight,’ said Rushton. He looked at his watch. ‘In just over an hour. Asking them to come forward. If it was nothing to do with Joe, we can rule them out.’
‘Is that a man with him?’ asked Harry. ‘Woman? Teenager?’
‘Anybody’s guess,’ said Rushton. ‘We’ve got people trying to enhance the image, but when all you’re working with is the back of someone’s head it’s tricky. Of course, these two might have nothing to do with Joe. We’ve got officers talking to all the bus drivers who were working that patch this afternoon. Taxi drivers too, in case the lad managed to sneak some money out. Needless to say, his picture’s been sent to all stations in the area, along with a description.’
Harry put his phone on the table in front of him. ‘What about cameras around the town?’ he said. ‘Don’t we all get caught on camera about a hundred times a day? If that’s true, some of the ones around Blackburn must have picked Joe up.’
‘We’ve got a team going through them all,’ said Rushton. ‘It’ll take a while, as I’m sure you can imagine, but you’re right, some of them will have spotted him.’
‘Can we help?’ said Harry. ‘If it’s a question of manpower. We can sit and look at TV screens.’
‘It’s a good thought,’ said Rushton, ‘but these things need to be done by people not emotionally involved. Your place is here, with the family. Right, where was I?’ He glanced down at his notes. ‘We’ve got officers working their way through Blackburn town centre, asking in all the shops that are still open. They’re all carrying his photo.’
‘Joe wouldn’t just go off with a stranger though,’ said Gareth. ‘If he left King George’s with someone, it would have to be someone he knew.’
‘Quite possibly,’ said Rushton. ‘On the other hand, he is a very young lad. And people can be very convincing. We’ve also been talking to all his classmates. If Joe had any plans, he might have mentioned them to someone. Right, I need to get back to the station now. When the news bulletin goes out, the phones will go bananas.’ He reached out and patted Alice’s shoulder. ‘Keep your spirits up, lass,’ he said, getting to his feet. ‘Someone will have spotted him.’
‘Hold on a second,’ said Harry, pushing back his own chair. ‘What you’re doing in Blackburn looks very thorough, but what about here?’
Rushton was frowning at him. ‘Here?’ he said.
‘Who’s looking here? I’ve seen no sign of a search going on outside. And we still haven’t found this girl Tom’s been talking about.’
‘Blackburn’s twelve miles away, Harry,’ said Rushton. ‘I doubt he ran away from the theatre only to make his way back home on his own.’
‘And you think Joe’s disappearance is just coincidence?’ said Harry. ‘That it’s not connected to what’s going on up here?’
Rushton seemed about to speak and then changed his mind. ‘Word outside, Reverend,’ he muttered, indicating the door to the hall. Harry stood and followed Rushton out of the room. They crossed the hall towards the front door, with Gareth close behind. Rushton opened his mouth to object.
‘Last time I checked, he was my son,’ said Gareth, folding his arms across his chest.
‘Three dead children were found in the garden of this house,’ said Harry. ‘And now another one is missing. This cannot be a normal abduct—’
‘Those children were girls, quite a bit younger than Joe,’ shot back Rushton. He glared at Harry for a second, then seemed to relax. ‘I’ll bring a team up in the morning,’ he said. ‘We’ll get the dogs out, I’ll see if the chopper’s available, we can look for this little girl of Tom’s. But tonight, I have to concentrate my resources on where the chances of finding the lad are greatest. He’s somewhere in Blackburn, I’m sure of it.’