The Iron Swamp (28 page)

I opened the security footage at the point where Hobb wheeled the dirty laundry out of the room. He opened the bin for the guards again, but both men appeared appalled by the smell and neither took more than a cautionary glance. If Kathryn was in league with the killer, her accident looked more convenient than unfortunate. It provided the perfect cover for someone to escape right under the noses of the guards.

I followed Hobb wheeling the bin from camera to camera just as he might on any other day, until he came to the camera on the outer wall.

I'd never noticed that before. Hobb swiped his tablet on the pad. Bent like he was reading instructions on the door, he pressed the keypad, and the door opened to the world outside Kenrey's compound.

That had to be the reason for using the bin. I'd got it all wrong. The killer was not a member of staff at all. They used Hobb to get them in and out.

I was looking in completely the wrong place!

My face close enough to the network screen to almost touch it with my nose, I stuck the camera footage on rewind and watched to see when Hobb could have brought someone in.

My enthusiasm quickly waned. Far from a frequent change of bins, the compound seemed to be almost a closed system. That was the only time Hobb used the door that day.

Two hours later I found that Hobb didn't use the door the previous day either. The worst was the night time footage where it had to be played pretty slowly to discriminate between the movement of the creeping plants on the wall and people using the door. Every five minutes or so my mind wandered and I found myself thinking about Becky, only to have to go back and watch the footage again. I almost convinced myself I could skip the bits where Hobb wasn't at work, but there was always the chance that I would miss a quick entry and exit through the bin door. Finally, half way through the third day before the murder, Hobb wheeled a bin out and brought another one in again. A quick search on the network revealed it to be bin day for the compound.

Irritated, I considered the possibility that he had brought the killer in through another entrance, but unless the schematics were lying to me, there were only two other entrances, the main front and back gates, both of which were heavily guarded. The only other option, if the killer was not a member of staff, was that someone sat in one of those bins for two whole days before climbing out to kill Kenrey.

It was a frustrating paradox. Either the killer was a member of staff, in which case they could get in and out without the help of Hobb, or they weren't a member of staff, meaning they would need Hobb, but were unable to get into the compound.

It was time for a break. If I ever caught a glimpse of that stupid bin door again, it would be when I set light to it. I stood in front of the vending machine, my mind as stagnant as the Bronn Wastes, unable to decide which fifteen cim brown bar to eat. Only a man stepping up behind me provided the necessary trigger to push me into typing the code for a kaero bar.

Unable to put it off any longer, I messaged Becky on the way back to my desk, telling her that Fache was about to be fired, and asking her which of the staff were closest to Hobb.

The message I got back was a single word.
Me
.

I stared at it for a minute or so, struggling to interpret it.

She fit all the criteria
.

She played my friend, but perhaps that was how she used men like Hobb and myself. We were lonely, and she was beautiful. She was still in the kitchens though, after Kenrey's death, which meant she could not have been in that bin. But perhaps that was just another misdirection, like the hole in the wall and Peti's blood. Perhaps I was supposed to assume that the killer escaped the compound via the bins all along. Hobb could have taken her out, hidden the knife and the bloody clothes, and then brought her back inside in new gear and a clean bin.

Becky wasn't a killer. She was sarcastic, funny, rude, and everything that a balanced girl her age should be. There was no sign of the trauma necessary to drive a person to cut someone's throat – but she was kicked out of school.

More confused than I'd been at any point since starting the case, I spent the next hour, maybe more, watching random footage of the day leading up to Kenrey's murder. I wasn't looking for anything in particular, just hoping that something would leap out.

Nothing did. I barely paid attention to most of it, taking more than a moment to register Fache entering the other side of the room, his face mottled crimson, long since departed from rationality.

"You two," I shouted at the two officers nearest me. "That man has been fired. If you would do me the service of escorting him from the premises I would consider it a service."

Far from the reluctant aid of the men who fought off Lisbold, the two men were out of their seats before I finished talking. Fache was marching towards me, so focused in his hatred that he didn't notice them come up either side of him. They were dragging him away before he started struggling. Even as they pinned his arms behind his back, he was staring at me. "You think you've beaten me you piece of dis. You haven't seen the last of me. I'll be back!"

He ceased struggling as the two men waited for the elevator, but there was no appeasement in his eyes. I returned to my network screen as he shouted, "I'll get you, you little freak." Then he and the officers were gone. Everyone on the floor was looking at me so I tried to look as unphased as possible, beads of sweat forming above my hairline.

I hoped that, were he alive, Hobb would be pleased his name was cleared, but perhaps he would have sacrificed that gladly to stop me looking for the real killer, his accomplice.

Whoever wrote his suicide note certainly wouldn't be happy, but I couldn't know whether it was the killer or just another member of staff trying to frame Hobb again.

I was looking at the wrong footage; I needed to be looking at the day of Hobb's death.

I called the compound. Hobb died in a disused corridor with no cameras, so I wouldn't be able to see anyone leave the note, but I could hope that the killer wasn't on shift that day and made a conspicuous appearance. The call went through. "Hello, is that Mr. Lesgech? This is Detective Nidess. I was wondering if you could send me some more footage?"

"Certainly, Detective, what now?" His tone was placating, but dripped with impatience.

"I need the footage from all the cameras the day I conducted my staff interviews and a couple of days thereafter."

There was a pause. "That's not possible, Detective."

I waited a few clicks for him to continue, but he obviously felt this was sufficient explanation. "Why?"

"After Kenrey died, most of the cameras were turned off because there was no one on the premises to merit such a high level of security. We kept them on for a few weeks after, but they'd long been turned off before the dates you want."

My dismay at this news quickly transmuted to anger. To let the killer get away because he was too smart was one thing, but to lose him because some rapacious moron had turned off the cameras was less easily dismissed.

I fought off the urge to shout at him. "Firstly, you said most, so I'll have whatever footage there is. Secondly, and I suggest you comply with this as quickly as you are able, I would like a staff timetable for the days after the interview, and most importantly I would like to know of any member of staff who came in either the day of the interview or the day after who wasn't supposed to be there. I'm on my way over to the compound."

"It's nearly T.0, most of the staff will be leaving soon."

"Get them thinking while they wait, or you will have the President to answer to." I hung up on him.

I was angry, scared, desperate – everything that brought out the worst in people – but I knew that either I solved the case or one of my increasing number of enemies would find a way to dispose of me. Not to mention what Clazran might do to Sariah if he thought I was betraying him. But I also felt a rush, almost elation continuing from when those men removed Fache for me. My first feeling of real power, as if I were standing on solid foundations rather than sinking into swamp as fast as I could dig myself out.

The two officers returned as the elevator dinged, minus Fache, and made their way over to me. "All done, sir. The front desk has orders not to let him back into the building."

I swiveled my chair around to look at them properly. "Well done, I am in your debt. If there is ever anything I can do for you, please don't hesitate to ask."

The taller one smiled, bowing his head slightly. "Wouldn't dream of it, sir. Our pleasure."

The other one, grown more outward than upward, looked less amused. "Another one bitten the dust, eh, sir? Wouldn't want to pick a fight with you."

The statement seemed ridiculous when both men towered over me like glider lizards hovering over an insect, but at the same time it wasn't. As long as I caught Kenrey's killer, I was in good standing with the President of The Kaerosh, the third most powerful man in Cos, but all my new authority could be taken from me if someone else caught him first. For the first time I felt Fache's inclination to frame someone and walk away, but it was the same desperation that had destroyed everyone else involved in this case, and I wouldn't fall victim to it.

*

Lesgech was at the gates of the compound. "They're all waiting for you, Detective, and I have transferred the camera footage and the timetable to your tablet."

"Thank you," I said, making no apologies for my rudeness earlier.

We walked together up the dark path at my fastest pace, probably a slow stroll to Lesgech. "Has anyone said anything?"

He looked confused by the question, rubbing his mustache with the top of his index finger. "There have been a few fights breaking out, people accusing each other of things, but nothing of interest to you."

They were all in the main church split off into groups. Several guards were standing around looking about as restful as if I'd threatened to cut their fingers off. The gardener, Mrs. Flias had a black eye, and Mrs. Jason was sitting on one of the benches, smears of makeup running down her cheeks and surrounded by a garrison of girls.

Even with the electric heaters littered around, the tall ceiling and stone floor consumed the energy as fast as it was made, the lines of clear plastic benches appearing like refrigerator trays. My breath was visible in front of my face, and the staff were dressed for a trek through the ice jungle. Watching fifty people or so vibrating as if they were on twenty cups of jaffee was too much. I grabbed Lesgech by the arm. "I asked you to get them ready, not freeze them to death."

He shrugged. "This was the only way we could keep watch over all of them. After the first few fights broke out, I decided it was for the best."

Arguing was pointless and wouldn't make the staff any warmer. "Right," I shouted, echoing the word through the church. It seemed best to get them moving. "I'm going to read out a list of names, and I want the people on the list to stand on one side of the room and everyone else to stand on the other."

I read out the people who were there the day after the interviews when Hobb was last seen alive, and the staff began a slow shift to their specified sides.

"Now I want you to think back to the day after my interviews, when we think Hobb committed suicide, and raise your hand if you came in on that day." Nearly every person on the left side raised their hand. Only one girl, whose floppy brown hair looked almost wooden, did not. No one from the other side raised their hand.

"Excellent, thank you." I walked up to the girl who didn't raise her hand. "Were you sick that day?"

She nodded.

"OK, could you walk over to the other side of the room for me, please?" Like most of the staff, she was beautiful, with thin features and in her late teens or early twenties.

"Did anyone on this side of me see anyone on the other side in work on the day in question?"

Mrs. Jason barely let me finish the question before she was pointing at Mrs. Flias. "She came in. I don't know why, but I told her to go home again."

Flias stepped forward as if she were in the front line of a battalion ready to charge at Mrs. Jason. "That was the followin' day and yu know it you old sack. Been growin' zelias round the back near the ponds, and I forgot to open the grating to stop the soil from gettin' waterlogged. Didn't remember for over a day though, and I was there the day of the interviews. She's tryin' to put Hobb's shoes on me feet."

I silenced Jason with a wave. "Fine, did you come in the front gate?"

"I did."

"Then I can corroborate your story or not from the security–"

Flias turned her vehemence on me. "It's not a
story
y'arrogant little scrotum. It's the truth."

I smiled. "Not until I corroborate it." I walked down the middle of the two groups. "But don't worry, that is now top of my list. Before we move on, is there anyone else that you remember seeing in the compound who shouldn't have been there the day after the interviews?" No one said anything, so I added, "If I find out you knew about a person and kept it to yourself, it won't go well for you."

No one spoke. Perhaps the conflict that broke out between Mrs. Flias and Mrs. Jason had dissuaded people from speaking up, or perhaps the killer was in work that day anyway and could just slip the note on Hobb during their shift.

Mrs. Flias was slightly more promising. She obviously hated the police, was a loner, and her wiry frame could possibly just about fit through the window to Kenrey's room. However, my previous experience of Mrs. Jason led me to believe that the security footage would show Flias to be telling the truth.

I thought about keeping everyone there a bit longer and seeing if anyone cracked in the cold, but I was wearing a thinner coat than usual without a heating element or zeolate to fend off the damp, and if none of them cracked then I certainly would. I dismissed them all to go home, intent on spending the rest of the night watching security footage with what remained of an increasingly flat bottle of Kononber.