“Turbine room?” MacKenzie suggested. “Turret room?”
“Could have been either of those,” Ryan agreed. “But it doesn’t matter so much now. What matters most is that we needed a direct link between Victor Swann and Martin Henderson. Unfortunately, the sender’s number in each of these messages seems to change on a weekly basis, even though the form and content remains the same.”
“Burner mobile,” Phillips said. “Maybe he’s not quite as thick as we thought.”
“Let’s not jump to conclusions,” Ryan quipped.
“We’ve still got the accounts data,” MacKenzie steered them deftly back to the point. “That should be enough to bring him in for questioning.”
“It is,” Ryan confirmed. “But it would make for a stronger case all round if we could throw more at him. Thanks to the accounts monitoring order that’s been in place since late yesterday afternoon, we could see he used his debit card at a roadside service station thirty-five miles north of here, close to Jedburgh and the Scottish border.”
“Bit late to go for a scenic drive,” Phillips remarked.
“That’s what I thought, which is why I’ve e-mailed a request for all available CCTV footage from the roads between here and there. There may not be much if he took the back roads but I want to know where he went and who he saw last night.”
MacKenzie nodded and tapped her finger against the file she’d brought along with her.
“I’ve pulled together everything I could find on Martin Henderson,” she said. “It makes for interesting reading, especially when you discover that his name isn’t Henderson at all, it’s Jennings.”
“The plot thickens,” Phillips pronounced and took a dramatic slurp of his tea.
“He changed his name legally in 1975 and has been known as Henderson ever since. The work history on the CV he provided to the Gilberts seems to show a man who’s been in steady employment for most of his life, working in various roles to do with estate management.”
“But?”
“Half the employers listed on those records don’t seem to exist and never have; or, if they did, their company records have since vanished from the digital trail. I’ve sent to Companies House for copies of any paper records they might have but that’s going to take time.”
“How about his last employer, before he got the job here at Cragside?”
“It’s listed as some wealthy so-and-so in Ireland,” she replied. “I took the trouble of checking it out and I can tell you, there’s no such place as Longvenney Manor.”
“Henderson lied again, you think?”
“Aye, he sounds like he’s been in the game a while,” Phillips said. “We just have to prove it.”
“There’s the difficulty,” Ryan pushed away from his chair, needing to pace around a bit. “Besides, while fraud is all very interesting, it doesn’t provide any direct link to the deaths of Victor Swann and Alice Chapman.”
“Unless Victor found out about his tall tales and decided to milk him for pocket money,” Phillips suggested.
“It’s supposition,” Ryan said. “Not enough to charge him with anything, especially with no previous. Tell me there’s been some good news on forensics?”
Phillips let out a blustery sigh.
“Faulkner’s been up half the night with his team, poring over the stuff he brought in. They’re still at it now, poor sods. Anyway, the top and bottom of it is, they’ve identified the fibres found beneath Alice Chapman’s nails and it’s a match for black leather, the type you might find on a pair of gloves.”
“We’d need to search Henderson’s cottage but, without being able to prove reasonable grounds for suspicion, we won’t get a warrant.”
“Not like the old days, when you could just barge in,” Phillips complained.
“We’re a police service now, not a force, remember?” Ryan said.
Phillips snorted.
“What about the DNA testing?” Ryan asked.
“They’re trying to match it now but all they’ve been able to get is tiny particles—low copy number DNA. If there was anything else, it was washed away by the storm or else the river.”
“Any match on the DNA database?”
“None so far.”
Ryan leaned back against the kitchen counter and tried to remain objective. The CSIs and forensic specialists were doing all they could, he knew that and he trusted it. It was not their fault that there was no convenient hair follicle or clump of skin to lead them directly to their prime suspect. Instead, all they appeared to have was LCN DNA which was notoriously weak evidence in court. The trace particles were so minute that any decent defence barrister would argue that they could have been transferred when Alice Chapman stood too close to somebody or brushed against them earlier in the day.
It was that easy.
“Let me know when they’ve matched it up, all the same,” he told them. “Individually, it may be flimsy but, collectively, we might be able to put something together that’ll hold up.”
Ryan turned to the next line of enquiry.
“I spoke to Yates this morning, who’s been in contact with the investigator in the FIU. They’ve been scouring their databases to try to follow the money, as it were, but the best they’ve got is a series of large cash transactions reported by car and antique dealerships, that sort of thing. None of the purchases match up on Henderson’s accounts, or at least not on the accounts we’ve been able to find.”
“Surely—?” Phillips began.
But Ryan shook his head.
“If I worked in the FIU, I’d be looking forward to a nice juicy case of fraud, identity and financial. Given his age and apparent means, they might find a nice bit of boiler room fraud thrown in there.”
“Retro,” Phillips commented.
“Sadly, we’re interested in whether the man has gone further than dishonesty offences and has dabbled in murder as well.”
“Can’t you work together with the FIU and pull him in for an interview on their turf, sweat him out a bit?”
They looked among themselves and Ryan snatched up his phone to make the call.
CHAPTER 27
Martin Henderson took his time getting ready, grooming himself until he was fully satisfied with the result. His vanity routine took almost an hour, factoring in the time spent blow-drying what was left of his hair and twenty minutes using his new ultrasonic ‘lifting and firming’ device that was designed to keep jowls at bay.
It wasn’t working.
He had a good mind to make a complaint to the charlatans who’d sold it to him down at the salon in Newcastle.
His routine was interrupted by a knock at the door and a quick glance at the time told him it was almost nine o’clock. He patted his tie and told himself to remain calm, then moved downstairs to answer the door.
But it was not Ryan standing on his doorstep, as he might have expected.
A good-looking woman of diminutive height stood before him, dressed in what he would have described as smart-casual wear, with a blazer over well-cut jeans. Beside her was an older man, also dressed down. They removed their warrant cards and held them out.
“Martin Henderson?”
He squinted at the little plastic cards.