‘You’re a tiny bit fragrant.’ Murray grinned as Sarah opened her mouth to object, before rolling her eyes good-naturedly and heading for the bathroom.
Murray was finishing a call when Sarah emerged. He put his mobile in his pocket and took out the two plates from the oven, where they had been keeping warm.
‘I don’t suppose you feel up to a shopping trip, do you?’
Sarah’s face pinched, her lips tightening, even as she tried to be supportive. ‘It’ll be busy.’
Murray generally avoided shops between Christmas and New Year, and judging from the adverts on TV, the sales were already in full swing. ‘Yes.’
‘Do you mind if I stay here?’ She saw Murray’s face and lifted her chin. ‘I don’t need babysitting, if that’s what you’re thinking. I’m not going to top myself.’
Murray tried not to react to the casual reminder of all the times she had indeed attempted suicide. ‘I wasn’t thinking that.’ But he had been. Of course he had been. ‘I’ll do it another time.’
‘What do you need?’
‘Sean from High Tech Crime emailed. The handset used for the 999 call reporting Tom Johnson’s suicide was bought at Fones4All in Brighton.’
‘Do you think they’ll have a record of who bought it?’
‘That’s what I’m hoping.’
‘Go!’ Sarah waved a fully loaded fork in the air. ‘Just think: you could have this all wrapped up before CID even know it’s happened.’
Murray laughed, although the same thought had crossed his mind. Not that he could make an arrest, of course, but he could line everything up, and then … Then what? Look into another cold case? Interfere with someone else’s investigation?
When Murray’s thirty years had been up, he hadn’t been ready to retire. He hadn’t been ready to leave his police family, to step away from the satisfaction that comes from doing a job that makes a difference. But he couldn’t stay for ever. At some point he would have to step down, and was he really going to wait until he was old or infirm before he did so? Until he was too decrepit to enjoy the last few years of his life?
Murray looked at Sarah and, in that instant, he knew exactly what he was going to do once the Johnson case was concluded. He was going to retire. Properly, this time.
Sarah had good days and bad days. Murray didn’t want to miss any more of the good ones.
‘Are you sure you’ll be okay?’
‘I’ll be okay.’
‘I’ll ring you every half-hour.’
‘Go.’
Murray went.
In the mobile phone shop, a giant sign suspended from the ceiling advertised the latest Bluetooth speaker, and shoppers pored over stands, perplexed looks on their faces as they tried to establish the differences between models. Murray walked straight through the middle of the shop and stood next to a rack displaying the latest – and most expensive – iPhone, knowing this to be the most effective way of summoning assistance. Sure enough, within seconds a lad barely old enough to leave school appeared at his side. His pale blue suit was too wide at the shoulders, the trousers creasing into shallow folds above his trainers. His shiny gold name badge read ‘Dylan’.
‘Nice, aren’t they?’ He nodded towards the iPhone stand. ‘Five-point-five-inch screen, wireless charging, OLED display, fully waterproof.’
Murray was momentarily distracted by the only feature that mattered to someone who had twice let his – far less expensive, but nevertheless vital – phone fall out of his back pocket into the loo. He made himself focus, showing Dylan his police ID.
‘Could I speak to the manager, please?’
‘That’s me.’
Murray turned his ‘oh!’ of surprise into one of enthusiasm. ‘Great! Right. Well, I’m investigating a purchase made in this store at some point prior to the eighteenth of May 2016.’ He looked up, where two prominent cameras pointed at the queue of customers. Another two cameras focused on the entrance to the shop. ‘How long do you retain CCTV footage?’
‘Three months. Some of your lot came in a couple of weeks ago, with a load of stolen phones. We could prove they were taken from here, but they were nicked six months ago so there was no CCTV.’
‘Pity. Can you trace this purchase on the tills, to see how the suspect paid?’
Dylan did little to conceal his lack of enthusiasm for this task. ‘We’re very busy.’ He looked at the tills. ‘It’s the Christmas holidays,’ he added, as if this might be news to Murray.
Murray leaned forward, doing his best impression of a TV cop. ‘It’s in connection with a murder enquiry. You find me this transaction, Dylan, and we could crack the whole case.’
Dylan’s eyes widened. He straightened his tightly knotted tie, glancing around as though there was a risk the murderer might be standing right beside them. ‘You’d better come through to my office.’
Dylan’s ‘office’ was a cupboard into which someone had shoehorned an Ikea desk and a broken swivel chair, its back leaning drunkenly to one side. Several certificates for employee of the month were pinned to a noticeboard above the computer.
Dylan magnanimously offered Murray the chair, perching on a stock box half the height, and reached to enter his password on a grubby keyboard. Murray politely looked away. On the wall was a photograph of six men and two women, all smartly dressed and grinning enthusiastically for the camera. Dylan was second from the left, wearing the same light blue suit he had on today. The cardboard mount read ‘Fones4All Manager Course 2017’.
‘What’s the IMEI?’
Murray read out the fifteen-digit serial code that Sean had given to him.
‘Cash.’ With one word, Dylan brought Murray’s investigation to a devastating halt. He looked anxiously at Murray. ‘Does that mean we can’t catch the perp?’
Murray allowed himself a wry smile at the youngster’s jargon, gleaned directly from American cop shows. He shrugged. ‘Not this way, I’m afraid.’
Dylan looked as though he’d been dealt a personal blow. He sighed, then stared at Murray, his mouth slightly open as something occurred to him. ‘Unless …’ He turned back to the screen and tapped deftly on the keyboard, then reached for the mouse and scrolled through the screen. Murray watched, his mind on Sean, and whether there was anything else the tech team could do to trace the transaction. Without the identity of the caller, he had little to go on.
‘Yes!’ Dylan gave an entirely unselfconscious air punch, then swiped his open palm through the air towards Murray. ‘Go us!’ he prompted, and Murray raised his own and high-fived Fones4All’s most enthusiastic manager.
‘Loyalty card,’ Dylan explained, grinning so wildly Murray could see his fillings. ‘Every manager is judged on how many sign-ups they get in store each month – the winner gets a Samsung Galaxy S8. I’ve won three times because I give the prize to the person in my team who flogged the most loyalty cards.’
‘That’s nice of you.’
‘Shit phones, Samsungs. Anyway, my team are competitive, right? Don’t let anyone walk away without signing up. And your perp’ – he jabbed at the screen – ‘was no exception.’
‘We’ve got a name?’
‘And an address.’ Dylan presented the information with the flourish of a magician confident of applause.
‘So, who is it?’ Murray leaned forward to read the screen. Dylan got there first.
‘Anna Johnson.’
He must have misheard. Anna Johnson?
Murray read the details for himself: Anna Johnson, Oak View, Cleveland Avenue, Eastbourne.
‘Is that our murderer, then?’
Murray opened his mouth, about to say that no, that wasn’t their man, that was the victim’s daughter; but however helpful Dylan had been, he was still a member of the public and as such would need to be kept in the dark a little longer.
‘Could you print this off for me? You’ve been very helpful.’ He made a mental note to write to Dylan’s boss when all this was over. Perhaps they’d send him something other than a Samsung Galaxy S8.
The printout seemed to burn in his pocket as he made his way, faster this time, through the shopping centre and out towards The Lanes.
Anna Johnson?