Good Bait (DCI Karen Shields #1)(23)

‘Yes. You ever …?’

‘It’s not like that,’ Cordon said quickly. A little too quickly.

Kiley shook his head. ‘One way or another, it always is.’

Cordon didn’t argue.

Tossing back the rest of his glass, Kiley got, with surprising agility, to his feet. ‘The morning, then.’

‘Yes. Yes, sure.’

Cordon watched him walk across the room, only the slightest limp, the smallest sign of the injury that had ended his footballing career.

The door to the room where Cordon was waiting opened and a man came in, sallow faced, slouch shouldered, the beginnings of a belly, too many hours behind a desk.

‘Trevor Cordon?’

‘Yes.’ Rising.

‘Bob Rowe.’

They shook hands.

‘Maxine Carlin, you’re a relative?’

‘Not exactly.’

‘Jack said related.’

‘Close. You could say we were close.’

Rowe continued to look at him, uncertain.

‘Daughter aside,’ Cordon said, ‘there’s really no one else.’

‘And the daughter?’

Cordon shrugged. ‘Who knows?’

Another moment’s hesitation. ‘Okay, you’d best come through.’

A bank of screens dominated one wall; individual screens at intervals along long rows, staff intent, heads inclined, some images changing – another camera, another angle – others remaining focused on seemingly empty tunnels, empty walls.

Rowe indicated an empty chair and Cordon slid it across.

‘Till we started using this new system,’ Rowe said, ‘storing all the imagery that comes through just wasn’t possible. Fifty, sixty per cent at best. And retrieving what you did have, that wasn’t so easy, either. Things would get lost. But now …’ He clicked once, twice, a third time and, less than a hundred per cent sharp, an image flicked into place. ‘Okay. Finsbury Park station, Piccadilly Line, West Platform, 9.31 in the morning. Tail end of the rush hour. Still busy, as you can see.’

Cordon leaned forward.

‘There she is now, your Maxine, just coming on to the platform, looking round.’

Cordon saw a figure that could indeed be her, three-quarter-length coat, scarf; the face, when she turned, darkened by shadow.

‘Here now, you see, another camera. She’s looking across the track, probably checking her destination. And then she starts to walk away.’

A dozen steps and she was lost to sight, a small surge of passengers moving in behind her, blocking her from view.

‘And this,’ Rowe said, as the angle changed, ‘is where we pick her up again. More or less on her own for what? Twenty, thirty seconds, before other people come into view, result of an announcement, most likely, asking customers to use the full length of the platform. Several people there now, you see, quite close …’

Cordon sees a young couple, both smartly dressed, partly facing: the woman has long, shoulder-length hair that in the picture is bleached almost white; the man bends his head towards her, says something close to her ear that makes her smile. A businessman behind them, middle-aged, striped suit, tie, briefcase, folded newspaper. Financial Times. Cliché. Another man, younger, headphones, laptop under one arm. Several others towards the edges of the frame, moving forward as the train approaches, crowding in, virtually impossible to distinguish one from another.

‘Let me see her face,’ Cordon said.

The image stops, reverses, zooms in, then freezes. The face is pinched, eyes small, dark, uncertain, and Cordon thinks of something trapped, cornered.

‘Move it on, just a fraction.’

For a moment, hardly more, Maxine seems to be looking directly into the camera, head raised, mouth opening as if to speak … Then, as if in slow motion, she turns away, towards the track, the train; a movement, blurred, down across the frame as she falls and she’s gone.

A dark space where she had been standing.

The camera shows a bustle of movement in the wake of her going, the white blur of faces, a mouth opening in a shout or scream, someone pointing. The young woman has buried her face against her partner’s chest and he appears to be stroking her long hair.

‘That’s it?’

‘That’s it.’

Cordon sat back with a slow release of breath. ‘See it again?’

Nothing changed.

In all of three viewings, nothing changed. At the end of each, Maxine Carlin was still dead under the train.

Cordon’s shoulders ached.

‘I looked at the report before you came,’ Rowe said, swivelling in his chair as the screen went blank. ‘Read through the witness statements, fifteen of them. People who were on the platform that morning, when the incident occurred. All of those you’ve just seen. Most, anyway. One or two we couldn’t trace. Some of them claim to have noticed her before it happened. Not many, but a few. Standing worryingly close to the platform edge, one said. Nervous, said another, as if she wasn’t sure where she was going. If this was her train. One thing they all agreed on, those who were close enough to see: the moment before the train arrived she either jumped or fell.’

‘No suggestion that she was pushed?’

‘None.’

‘Not even accidentally? Passengers eager to get on the train. Find space. End of the rush hour, like you said.’