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“Not really. It certainly doesn’t prove he’s the killer.”
“He’s telling us what happened to the people in Batley is going to happen to me.”
“No he isn’t,” replied Gardener. “To be perfectly honest, he’s asking you to solve a puzzle, which is a long way from saying he killed the people in Batley. Just look at the opening sentence: ‘If you cross the man in black there are consequences, a price to be paid. If you need any further proof, check out what happened in Batley’. Nowhere does it say he actually committed the crime.”
Vincent took the email that Reilly handed back to him, reading through what Gardener had pointed out. “But he’s threatening to kill me, and he says he’s following me.”
“You were in the chemist yesterday, talking to the owner, John Oldham?”
“Yes.”
“Did you recognize anyone that resembled Steven Cooper?”
Vincent thought about the answer. “Not really.”
“Not really,” repeated Reilly. “You either did or you didn’t. How old was Steve Cooper back in 1982?”
“I have no idea. Maybe late twenties, early thirties.”
“Which would now make him late sixties or early seventies. Did you see anyone in the chemist near to that age?”
After a pause, he sheepishly replied he hadn’t.
“And knowing what we know about the crime scenes in Batley, Mr Baines, I doubt very much a man of that age could have carried them out with such precision.”
Gardener also knew from the CCTV footage that the man they wanted was nowhere near the age Steven Cooper would be.
“So you’re not going to take this threat to my life seriously?”
“Not with the little that you have to go on, no. But if it makes you feel any better, we will check the details of the case and the records on Steven Cooper and find out what happened to him after the trial, and any subsequent prison sentence.”
Vincent picked up his email and left the room with an unhappy expression.
Reilly turned to Gardener. “No mention of a photo there.”
He knew that piece of information had not been released to the press.
“Precisely,” said Gardener.
Chapter Thirty-one
Chris Rydell glanced out the kitchen window, across the fields. It was warm and clear, and he could see for miles. The colours were startling: blue, red, yellow, and green. When and if anything happened, he would really miss the place.
All within the house was peaceful. His houseguest had not yet risen. After he’d made a coffee, he opened the cupboard and brought down a fresh packet of biscuits: fig rolls. He didn’t mind them. They were supposed to be good for you. Not that it mattered now.
He counted thirteen fig biscuits in the packet. Seeing as he was the only one in the kitchen, he took three, and placed the rest in the biscuit tin.
He collected his snack and strolled into his study, reflecting on his night’s work. Things had been pretty easy, only eight drops within the LS postcode. Once all the medical supplies had been checked and his trailer loaded, he’d started around ten. He was finished for two, back home for three.
He’d spent a further hour in the study, where some local news had caught his attention. He was in bed at four, and up at seven. For many years now, he’d needed little more than three hours’ sleep a night. That disturbed him because it was an odd number, but he couldn’t do anything about it: he had a thing about numbers.
In the study he placed the tea and biscuits on the desk, logged on, and re-read the article that had caught his attention in the early hours. It had concerned the murders of the two local people in Batley. True crime was a topic he’d been interested in since he was a teenager. Over the years he’d been fascinated to learn about people, and what made them tick.
Most of the stories concerning the Batley murders contained little or no information. The material presented was littered with questions, ending with the usual statement that the police were continuing with their investigations. Not that he could help them because he hadn’t worked that postcode on the night in question.
Before switching off, however, he’d spotted a blog by a local man called Vincent Baines, who claimed he knew the identity of the killer. The email pointed to incidents in the past, suggesting that what had happened in Batley within the last twenty-four hours had also happened at some point in history.
Rydell realized that the blogger was a private detective because he then published one of his own successes, something about a missing jug. He’d pasted the clues he’d been sent, for the world – and presumably the killer – to see, before informing everyone that he would be visiting the police to let them know what was going on.
