Allyn Allyn: Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine. Vol. 135, No. 1. Whole No. 821, January 2010

Light dawned behind Carol’s eyes. “A journalist would know. They get access to all kinds of stuff. He could have recognised Tina Chapman from the press photographs at the time. If he has local police contacts, he could have heard that Jonathan Meadows was under suspicion over the hit-and-run.”

Tony scanned the list. “Are any of these journalists?”

DI Cassidy entered the Children for Christmas offices almost at a run, his team at his heels. A trim little woman got to her feet and pointed to her computer screen. “There. Just as it came in.”

The e-mail was short but not sweet. “We’ve got Santa. You’ve got money. We want 20,000 pounds in cash. You’ll hear from us in an hour. No police.”

“I thought I would ignore the bit about no police,” the woman said. “It’s not as if we’re going to be paying the ransom.”

Cassidy admired her forthrightness but had to check she was taking all the possibilities into consideration. “You’re not frightened they might kill Mr. Garrity? Or seriously harm him?”

She gave him a scornful look. “They’re not going to hurt Santa. How do you think that would go down in prison? You of all people should know how sentimental criminals are.”

Carol’s conviction that David Sanders was a serial killer took her no closer to making an arrest. There was a small matter of a complete lack of evidence against Sanders, a feature writer on the Bradfield Evening Sentinel Times. Even the apparent miracles of twenty-first century forensic science couldn’t nail this. Water and fire were notorious destroyers of trace evidence. She’d hoped that close analysis might fit together the cut marks on the tape and wire from the previous killings, but the fire had done too much damage. That meant there was no chance of definitively linking them to any materials still in Sanders’s possession.

There were no reliable witnesses or meaningful CCTV footage. A couple of homeless men had turned up claiming to have seen Tina Chapman go into the canal. But the person pushing her had been wearing a Halloween mask and the sighting had gone nowhere.

The only option left was to cling to Tony’s conviction that the killer would strike again before Christmas. It was always hard to persuade her bosses to mount surveillance operations because they were so costly and because they took so many officers off other cases, but at least this one had a fixed end point.

And so they watched. They watched David Sanders go to work. They watched him drink in the pub with his workmates. They watched him work out at the gym. They watched him do his Christmas shopping. What they didn’t watch him do was abduct and murder anyone.

Then it was Christmas Eve, the last day of authorised surveillance. In spite of the privileges of rank, Carol put herself down for a shift. It was already dark when she slid into the passenger seat of the anonymous car alongside DC Paula McIntyre. “Nothing moving, Chief. He got home about an hour ago, nobody in or out since.”

“The house doesn’t look very festive, does it? No sign of a tree or any lights.”

Paula, who had known her own share of grief, shrugged. “You lose your only child? I don’t expect Christmas is much to celebrate.”

The Sanderses’ four-year-old daughter had drowned during a swimming lesson back in September. The instructor had been dealing with another kid who was having a come-apart when Sanders’s daughter had hit her head on the poolside. By the time anyone noticed, it had been too late. According to a colleague discreetly questioned by Sergeant Devine, it had ripped Sanders apart, though he’d refused to consider any kind of medical intervention.

Before Carol could respond, the garage door opened and Sanders’s SUV crawled down the drive. They let him make it to the end of the street before they pulled out of their parking place and slipped in behind him. It wasn’t hard to stay on the tail of the tall vehicle, and fifteen minutes’ driving brought them to a street of run-down terraced houses on the downtrodden edge of Moorside. On the corner was a brightly lit shop, its windows plastered with ads for cheap alcohol. Sanders pulled up and walked into the shop carrying a sports holdall.

“I think this is it,” Carol breathed. “Let’s go, Paula.”

They sprinted down the street and tried the door of the shop. But something was jamming it. Carol took a couple of steps back, then charged the door, slamming her shoulder into the wooden surround. Something popped and the door crashed open.

Sanders was standing behind the counter, a cricket bat in his hand, dismay on his face. “Police, drop your weapon!” Carol roared as Paula scrambled to the far end of the counter.

“There’s someone here, Chief. Looks like he’s unconscious,” Paula said.

The cricket bat fell to the ground with a clatter. Sanders sank to the floor, head in hands. “This is all your fault,” he said. “You never make the right people pay the price, do you?”

Carol collapsed into Tony’s armchair and demanded a drink. “He didn’t even bother with a denial,” she said. “Being arrested seemed almost to come as a relief.” She closed her eyes for a moment, memory summoning up Sanders’s haggard face.

“It generally does when you’re not dealing with a psychopath,” Tony said.

Carol sighed. “And a very merry bloody Christmas to you, too.”

“You stopped him killing again,” Tony said, handing her a glass of wine. “That’s not an insignificant achievement.”

“I suppose. Jahinder Singh’s family can celebrate the festive season knowing their father’s safe from any further consequences from selling solvents to kids.” Before Carol could say more, her phone rang. “What now?” she muttered. She listened attentively, a slow smile spreading from mouth to eyes. “Thanks for letting me know,” she said, ending the call. “That was Cassidy. Santa’s home free. Two extremely inept kidnappers are banged up, and nobody got hurt.”

Tony raised his glass, his smile matching hers. In their line of work, making the best of a bad job was second nature. This wasn’t exactly a happy ending, but it was closer than they usually managed. He’d settle for that any day.

Copyright © 2010 Val McDermid

My lawyer had the jury in tears — when he got to the part about never having won a case.