Luke Delaney - The Toy Taker

‘Why aren’t we allowed downstairs?’ George continued.

‘Because …’ Allen stalled, ‘there are things down there that could be dangerous to young children.’

‘Like what?’ George asked, intrigued and excited.

‘Things,’ Allen answered. ‘Now let’s not talk about it any more.’

‘Why do we have to stay in the bedroom when you’re not there?’ Bailey asked, her voice still bitter. ‘Even during the daytime?’

‘What’s the matter — don’t you like your bedroom?’

‘I do,’ George answered quickly.

‘At home I have my own bedroom,’ Bailey told them.

‘You don’t need a room of your own,’ Allen explained, managing to stay calm, ‘but if you’re good I might let you use the rest of the house when I’m downstairs. But you must never try to come all the way downstairs. Like I said, it could be dangerous for you.’

‘Are there bad people down there?’ George asked.

‘No,’ Allen told him. ‘Just friends. Enough questions for now, please. It’s time to eat. I have to go out later, but not until you’ve had your bath and are tucked up in bed. You’ll be quite safe until I return. Now, let us say the Lord’s Prayer before we eat.’

‘My dad says there’s no such thing as God,’ Bailey mocked him through her glassy eyes.

‘Then that’s just one more thing I have to teach you about,’ he gently scolded her. ‘Now put your hands together and close your eyes: Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven. Gives us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory for ever. Amen . Now eat.’

‘Where are you going?’ George asked. ‘After you put us to bed? Is it a secret?’

‘No, George,’ Allen told him. ‘There are no secrets in this family.’ He took a deep breath before continuing, as if the news he was about to impart was particularly important. ‘I have to go and see someone,’ he explained. ‘Someone who needs us — someone who needs a proper family.’ He smiled as he lifted his knife and fork. ‘Now, eat your lunch.’

Sean sat in the waiting room outside Assistant Commissioner Addis’s office, high up in the tower block that was New Scotland Yard. Despite the ubiquitous grey plastic blinds and low ceilings with fluorescent light strips, the room was as plush as anything Sean had seen in the Police Service. The chair he was sitting on was in fact a low-slung sofa that could have done any office in the City proud, and the carpet underfoot seemed new and clean, even though it was thin and inexpensive. A flat-screen TV hung on the wall opposite, tuned to Sky News. He wondered whether Addis was waiting in his adjoining office until the investigation into the missing children came on the television — as if to emphasize the point he hadn’t yet made.

The thought made him look away, and he began instead to study Addis’s young, attractive secretary as she continually took pieces of paper from one pile, typed something into her computer, then placed the paper on top of a different pile before repeating the process, regularly stopping to answer the phone. She dealt with most of the calls without having to trouble Addis. Not once did she look up at Sean; she hadn’t acknowledged his presence since she’d registered his attendance and asked him to take a seat and wait. He decided Addis must have plucked her out of some obscure post somewhere, no doubt considering her a suitable addition to the other decorations littered about the place: ceremonial silver truncheons, honorary badges from other forces around the world and, of course, Addis’s many promotion and commendation certificates, earned on the backs of hard-working cops who risked their necks everyday on the streets of the metropolis — something Addis had only ever done fleetingly, if at all.

The intercom on the secretary’s desk made a loud buzzing sound and the hairs on the back of his neck stood up. He watched and listened as she pressed the transmit key and spoke. ‘Yes, sir? Of course. I’ll send him straight in.’ Sean was on his feet before she even turned to speak to him. ‘Assistant Commissioner Addis will see you now, Inspector.’ He headed for the closed interconnecting door, pausing at her desk before entering Addis’s office.

‘Do I get a last request?’ he asked her with a wry grin.

She tried not to smile, but couldn’t resist; too young to be without joy.

‘I don’t know why he uses that thing,’ she whispered, looking accusingly at the old-fashioned intercom. ‘He could just use the phone and dial my extension.’

‘Maybe he doesn’t know how to,’ Sean whispered, giving her a wink and making her cover her mouth to hide her broadening smile.

He took the few steps to the door and knocked, looking back at the young secretary as he did so, rolling his eyes when Addis answered. ‘Come, come.’ He pushed the door open and stepped inside, closing the door behind him and taking a seat opposite Addis’s oversized desk without being asked, daring him to challenge him.

‘You wanted to see me?’

‘Of course I wanted to bloody see you,’ Addis barked. ‘So you could explain this latest fucking disaster. It’s not bad enough you’ve already made one unlawful arrest, now you’ve damn near made another. What in God’s name is going on?’

‘McKenzie wasn’t an unlawful arrest,’ Sean reminded him, ‘and nor would the second have been, although in the end it wasn’t necessary.’

‘Inspector, you almost arrested a bloody nursery teacher for nothing. Are you trying to make us look like fools?’

‘She had a link to both families — it was worth checking out.’

‘Was it, bollocks!’ Addis told him. ‘We can’t afford to chase any more wild ideas. For God’s sake, she was just moonlighting as a damn babysitter.’

‘I didn’t tell you that,’ Sean said, his eyes narrowing with suspicion, trying to recall who he’d told, who could know about Hannah Richmond and who would have told Addis before he had a chance to manage the situation — Featherstone? Donnelly? Sally?

‘No you didn’t,’ Addis agreed by way of warning, giving his words time to sink in before speaking again, deliberately calmer now. ‘So what next?’

‘We look for leads, we look for links between the families and we chase them down — that’s all we can do.’

‘We don’t have time to just plod along,’ Addis insisted. ‘We need some ingenuity, some good old-fashioned gut-instinct.’

‘What,’ Sean asked, ‘you think I’m going to suddenly see the offender’s face in my mind, where he lives … works? I’m going to see him standing on a street corner and suddenly say That’s the guy we’ve been looking for? ’ Addis stared at him without speaking, his expression telling Sean everything he needed to know. ‘You do, don’t you? You really think I’m going to simply pluck the man we’re looking for out of thin air?’

‘Isn’t that what you do , Inspector? Isn’t that how you solved the Keller case, the Gibran case and others before, by using your unique insight ?’

‘No, no it isn’t,’ Sean lied more than he knew he was. ‘I looked at the evidence — I pursued leads. I just saw things in the evidence that other people missed. If they’d have looked properly they would have seen too.’

‘And in this case, you don’t see things in the evidence, or can’t?’

‘No,’ Sean admitted. ‘Not yet.’

‘I see.’ Addis leaned back into his comfortable black leather desk chair. ‘Then what do you suggest we do, given that you appear to be well and truly stuck?’