Death Row - Mark Pearson [107]
‘Go, go, go!’ Duncton shouted – like someone off a cheap television drama, Delaney couldn’t help thinking. The lead uniform swung the heavy tubular device into the door and smashed it open. Two of the armed units behind him moved into the house with their semi-automatic weapons raised.
‘Armed police!’ they shouted, moving into covering positions as their colleagues cautiously entered the house behind them.
‘Just stay back, Delaney! This is my collar!’ shouted Duncton as Delaney and Sally reached the house.
‘Yeah, don’t mention it, Duncton. We were just glad to be of assistance, weren’t we, Sally?’
‘Don’t give me that. If you had kept the lines of communication open as you were supposed to do, then maybe we would all have got here a bit sooner.’
‘To be fair to Inspector Delaney—’ Emma Halliday started to say but Duncton cut her off.
‘And you can shut it, sergeant. Given your involvement in all this you’ll be lucky not to be back walking the beat come end of play.’
‘With all due respect, sir: why don’t you go fuck yourself? You silly little man,’ she said with a sweet smile.
Duncton’s face was turning his usual shade of red but before he could respond one of the armed officers came out of the front door.
‘It’s secure, sir.’
‘You’ll keep!’ said Duncton to his sergeant and headed into the house.
The others followed behind him. But there was no hurry: even as Delaney approached the door he could tell that no one was there.
‘He cleared out some time ago, by the looks of it,’ said the armed officer. ‘There’s mail and papers on the hall floor from the last few days and his wardrobe and drawers have been emptied.’
‘Shit!’ said Duncton. ‘Shit, shit, shit!’
Delaney would have laughed at the disappointment written on the angry man’s face, but in fact he felt the polar opposite of amusement. They might know who they were dealing with now, but they had no idea where he was and were no further forward in finding the missing boy.
Truth to tell, Jack Delaney felt sick as he stood in the hallway looking around at the deserted house. Sick to his stomach.
*
Kate held a hand to her stomach and winced a little, breathing heavily. Bob Wilkinson stuck his head around the door and walked in, carrying a cup of tea.
‘Thanks, Bob,’ Kate said. ‘You’re a lifesaver.’
Wilkinson shook his head. ‘I heard that was Jack Delaney.’
‘Still no sign of DI Bennett, I gather?’
‘No. Seems like he’s fallen off the side of the planet. If he was ever on it.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I phoned Doncaster nick. Nobody there has ever head of him.’
*
‘Okay. Calm down, Mary,’ said Jack Delaney into his mobile phone as he stood outside Sally’s car, parked up the street from Father Fitzpatrick’s abandoned house. ‘We’re in Ealing now. So we’re not too far away. I’ll check back at her house.’
He closed the phone and got into the car. ‘Let’s get going.’
‘Something wrong, sir?’ Sally asked as she started the engine and pulled away from the kerb.
‘Gloria had an appointment with Mary today. She never showed up.’
‘And …?’
‘And I don’t know. But I’ve got a bad feeling about this. So put your foot on the floor.’
Delaney leaned forward to flick the siren switch on as they hammered past a bemused-looking Duncton who was coming out of the missing priest’s house.
*
Delaney walked across the room and opened the curtains. Bright daylight spilled into the room. Lighting up the display of photos and maps and newspaper cuttings that covered the facing wall. Sally was stood examining the cuttings. The photo of Delaney in uniform holding the young Gloria in his arms had been circled many times in green ink. She looked at the rest of the material, baffled.
‘What does it all mean, sir?’ she asked.
‘I don’t know,’ Delaney replied, picking up a