I don’t normally behave like that, let me assure you. I needed to see how you handled pressure, whether you were tough enough for this job, whether you’d stand up for yourself.’
‘I always stand up for myself.’
‘I had to see that with my own eyes. And I did. I was impressed. You passed the test. I have every faith you can help us on this case, Ms Vaughan. The stakes are very high. But I think, this year, we can turn the tables on that bastard Santa once and for all.’
‘I’m all for that,’ said Anna. ‘Okay, now I’m seconded to CID, what happens next?’
‘The contents of the box you received have been sent over to forensics. I don’t see what we can do until we get their report. Despite the lies I’ve been feeding you about our forensics team, they’re world-class. They’ll have a full DNA analysis in the next twenty-four hours. We might learn something that points us more decisively in the right direction.’
‘Don’t you have any idea who Santa might be?’
‘He’s like a ghost. He seems to be able to move around the country and leave barely a trace of himself behind. No decent sightings, never a scrap of forensics, nothing. My team at CID are working on theories and hunches and sheer trial and error, trawling through known names in our files and looking for anything that might connect someone we already know to Santa. It’s all starting to feel a bit desperate, to tell you the truth. But we do at least have one suspect whose name we’re keeping in mind.’
‘Can you tell me who it is?’
‘Victor Maxen.’
‘I’ve never heard of him.’
‘There’s no reason why you should. He’s nothing, a petty thief, has been picked up by the law a dozen times since he was a child. There’s no reason CID should be remotely interested in him … except for one thing. There’s a minor police report concerning him dated three weeks before one of the abductions four years ago. Somebody was spotted lurking about outside the house the evening before the abduction took place. A neighbour called the police and the officers who turned up found Victor Maxen and confronted him. There were no grounds to arrest him, he wasn’t in possession of anything, and the worst he’d actually done was hang about where he had no need to be. So the officers told him to bugger off and that’s exactly what he did. Later that night, Santa broke into that same house.’
‘Is that really enough to link Victor Maxen to the Santa case? It could simply be coincidence.’
‘By itself it could. Except that, in the course of our investigation this year, we made a connection that nobody else had made. We found an arrest report from a month prior to when Santa’s very first victim was abducted. Victor Maxen was picked up and charged with conspiracy to commit burglary. The house that police believed he was intending to rob was the house belonging to that first victim. The case never went to court in the end and was dropped. But that’s twice that Maxen has been positively identified as being in the immediate vicinity of Santa’s victims prior to them being attacked. Twice in twelve years. Slim evidence, but even
so …’
‘Have you spoken to Maxen about this?’
‘I’ve got people out looking for him right now. He’s a slippery fish – but we’ll find him and bring him in for questioning sooner or later.’
‘What’s he like? What sort of person is he?’
‘Unremarkable to look at. You’d pass him in the street and not notice. Average height, average build. The thing to remember is how many serial killers fit that same description. Average, unremarkable.’ Townsend shrugged. ‘It’s just one lead we’re following up. Maybe it’s a red herring. But he’s the nearest thing we’ve got to a prime suspect at the moment.’
‘Maybe now that Santa’s taken an interest in me, you might get the breakthrough you’re looking for,’ said Anna.
‘That’s the plan.’ And he shot her a sideways glance and added: ‘God, I really do make it sound like I’m using you as bait. I’m sorry, that’s not the way I want you to feel you’re being treated.’
‘I don’t mind being the bait just so long as you get your hands on that bastard before he clamps his jaws around me.’
‘He won’t touch you, Ms Vaughan. I won’t let that happen. I swear to you. I’m determined to outsmart him this time, to figure out his game before it’s too late. And you’re going to help me. Whatever was in that “present” Santa left for you, there’ll be a meaning in it, a clue as to where we can reach Sharon Steiner. He wants to see if we can make sense of it. That’s how he gets his kicks. God knows why, but that’s how Santa’s twisted mind works. But the main thing is that we beat him, Anna – may I call you Anna?’
‘Of course.’
‘And call me Jim. Losing the formality saves so much effort. Like I was saying, the main thing is that we beat him … that I beat him, me and my team at CID. We have to outthink him, meet his match no matter what insane clues he throws at us, we have to be—’
He broke off, interrupted by the urgent ringing of his phone. He took the call, and almost at once his expression changed.
‘Excellent work, Mike,’ he said, getting to his feet. ‘Take him to interview room 1, I’ll be right there.’
‘A lead?’ Anna asked as Jim hung up the phone and went striding towards the door.
‘Better than that. My people have just hauled in Victor Maxen. He’s downstairs right now.’
‘Would I be permitted to attend the interview?’ Anna said.
‘No,’ Jim sat flatly.
‘I’m not just an idle observer in this business. I’m involved.’
‘I understand that, but I’m bound by regulations. It’s impossible. But we can arrange for you to observe the interview via CCTV from a room we have set up nearby. I’ll send somebody along to take you there.’
‘I appreciate that,’ Anna said, but even as she spoke Jim turned sharply on his heel and marched away, eager to get to the interview room and the prime suspect who awaited him there.
A uniformed officer arrived and led Anna through a labyrinth of corridors until at last he brought her to a small, grey room somewhere in the bowels of the police station. She settled herself in front of a row of CCTV screens, on which she could see various angles of the interview room where Victor Maxen was being held. She leaned forward, bringing her face close to one of the screens, trying to get a better look at him. He was sitting in a chair, his left ankle resting across his right knee, picking idly at one of his shoe laces. He was much slighter than Anna had been expecting, with high cheekbones and narrow, unfriendly eyes. His lips were plump, almost feminine, but the teeth behind them were large and yellow and unevenly spaced. There was nothing appealing in this face. It exuded hostility and betrayal and cruelty – at least, in Anna’s opinion it did. It seemed to her to be the archetypal face of a killer.
But
