Barry Maitland - No Trace

K athy drove slowly down the clogged artery of Kingsland Road in Shoreditch, part of the stream of sullen Monday morning traffic splashing cold puddles over the legs of huddled bus queues. She could hear the howl of a police siren somewhere up ahead, and on the radio she picked up the first news reports of another missing girl, the third child abducted from her home in east London in recent weeks.

She made a turn into Lazarus Street and found herself hemmed between the dark brick walls of warehouses under conversion to offices, studio flats and uncertain investment opportunities. Two small girls burst out of a side alley, school bags bouncing on their shoulders, black faces bright with glee, and Kathy stopped to let them pass.

She was impatient. The call had come half an hour before, cancelling the first scheduled meeting of the new Major Enquiry Team and diverting personnel to Shoreditch, and she felt the anticipation itching inside her at the beginning of a new case. She checked the mirror to make sure the girls were clear of the back of the car and caught her own reflection. Serious eyes, official eyes. This is how you get to look in your thirties when you take your job too seriously, she thought. Her hair, very pale in the gloom of the dark street, fell almost to her eyes, and she remembered that shed booked for a cut that afternoon. Shed have to cancel.

As she moved on she passed the end of a narrow service lane and saw two uniformed police examining a row of dustbins. Ahead she spotted a pulsing blue light at the point where the street opened into a square. The patrol car was parked outside a sandwich shop, Mahmeds Caf, with two cops stooped talking to the driver, leaning against the car roof to ease the weight of their protective vests and loaded belts.

Kathy slowed and called across to them. Hi, DS Kolla, SO1. Northcote Square?

This is it. The man, registering the initials of the Serious Crime Group unit, peered across at her. Better park down here, Sarge. The north ends chocker.

As she rolled forward she saw what he meant, a jam of vehicles blocking the far end of the square. She hadnt been here before,and she had the impression of a rather forbidding place hidden away among the tangle of streets. The square was surrounded by buildings of mixed age and use, mostly in dark red brick, all severe and square-profiled against the grey sky. They overlooked at hickly treed central garden fenced by iron railings. Kathy pulled up beneath a no stopping sign and placed her Metropolitan Police Emergency notice on the dash. One of the uniforms came over to her.

Thats the house, he said, pointing to a building at the other end of the square behind the densest crush of vehicles and people. Originally two storeys high and rather squat and plain, a further two floors of milky white glass had been added. Press have just arrived.

Thanks.

She saw other uniformed men and women door-knocking and talking to staff arriving for work at offices on the east side of the square. Here on the south side, Lazarus Street, was an old industrial building with a sawtooth roof. Like most of the other older buildings in the area it showed signs of conversion. A large section of ground-floor brick wall had been replaced by frameless glass, through which Kathy could make out white linen on restaurant tables. Red neon letters attached to the parapet announced The Pie Factory. Someone had sprayed a graffiti message in looping black letters on the brick wall beside the restaurant window: same old shit.

Kathy crossed to the pavement that snaked around the central gardens, her feet squelching on wet leaves dropped by the brooding trees. Bolted to the railings was a police notice, warning motorists that thieves were active in the area and giving the Crimestoppers 0800 number. A logo identified Hackney Borough Police, the operational command unit for this area of the city. There was scaffolding up on part of West Terrace, which formed this side of the square, and some builders had stopped work to see what was going on. A man with a hard hat was leaning out of a windowless hole on the top floor of one of the buildings under reconstruction, passing observations down to his mates on the pavement below. Spotting Kathy, he paused in his commentary and the others turned to check out the blonde. One gave a desultory whistle and another called, Give us a smile, darling, but the morning was too dull and their hearts werent in it.

There was something of a melee at the top end of West Terrace, where traffic coming to the corner of the square was trying to work its way around stationary vehicles. She saw several cops trying to move people on, and when she reached the place Kathy realised that the problem was a school playground on the other side of the crossing, where small children were arriving with adults, all demanding to know what the police vehicles and press cameras were doing there.

Kathy turned along the north side, Urma Street, past a corner pub called The Daughters of Albion, and worked her way through the crowd standing outside number fifty-three. She showed her ID to a constable with a clipboard at the front door and he recorded her name.

Scene of crime are working on this floor, Sarge. If you take the stairs, I think youll find the others on the next level.

The front door closed behind her. She was in an entrance hall leading to a corridor of open doors. Ahead, a man wearing white nylon overalls was backing out of a room with a video camera held to his eye. To her left, a flight of open-tread timber stairs rose towards the sound of voices. Kathy climbed the stairs and emerged into a large room that took up the whole floor, well lit with windows to both back and front. The building had been gutted, exposing bare brick walls and the underside of timber floor beams overhead from which industrial lamps were suspended. Kathy caught sight of very large grainy images hanging on the walls, of horses heads with huge bulging eyes, like dramatic advertisements for a horror movie.

Kathy had never seen such a response to a crime scene. The place was crowded with police, as if half the Met had been called out. She spotted Brocks cropped white hair and beard among a cluster of large men in dark coats. She went over and he introduced her to a superintendent, Head of Operations, and a DCI, Head of Crime Investigations, both from the Borough Police. Then he drew her aside and said rapidly, I have a few things to sort out here, Kathy, then I want to speak to the father, Gabriel Rudd, over there. He nodded towards a man sitting alone at a circular dining table, staring at a small TV on the table in front of him.Why not go and introduce yourself? Ill be with you in a minute. See if you can find somewhere quiet for us to talk to him.

Kathy paused, struck by the man at the table, a solitary, motionless figure among all the bustle and noise filling the room. He had a startling mop of stark white curls and was wearing a black pinstriped suit without shirt or socks or shoes. The cut of the suit looked expensive. As she drew closer Kathy was surprised to see splashes of colour on its legs. His attention was completely focused on the screen, where a man with an Irish accent, red hair and large round glasses was being interviewed.... A lovely fellow, and amazingly talented. And devoted to his little girl. He must be devastated...

Hello, Mr Rudd? Im Detective Sergeant Kathy Kolla.

He glanced up at her and said softly, Yes, saw you arrive. He nodded back at the screen, which was now showing a view of the square outside and the crush of people at his front door. His face was lean and intelligent, Kathy thought, though very pale and drawn, with dark hollows around the eyes.

Im very sorry about your daughter.

Tracey, he said. Her names Tracey.

Right. Im with the Major Enquiry Team led by DCI Brock ...