The week’s information had been logged on to the computers, cross-referenced in accordance with the latest practices. Local prostitutes had been interviewed about their clients. The clients themselves were varied but anonymous, but were in many cases being quizzed about their activities. Tom Boyd wasn’t the only man to be asked to account for his movements on the night of the fourteenth of November. But the few officers who were working on the night of Saturday the twenty-second of November were out on the streets of Brunton. Apart from DC Gordon Pickering, who was alone in the murder room, manning the phones and trying hard to feel like the man in temporary charge of things. It was ten thirty when the significant phone call came in. Gordon was listening to the sound of the first aggressive drunks of the night being cautioned and put in the cells. It was curious how sound penetrated quite thick walls when all else was quiet in the building. The voice on the phone sounded a little slurred, as if it too might have been drinking.
