Page 37 of 36 Hours

When they attended a crime scene, however horrific, the pain had gone. Whatever had been done to their victim was over, and there was nothing they could have done to prevent it. In this case, it appeared to be ongoing, and the only hope they had of stopping it was to do what this sicko wanted.

Bryant pressedPlayon the tape again.

‘Don’t…’

‘Just the first bit,’ he said, listening to the rhythmic sound before the screams.

He cut it off before the screaming started, rewound it and started again.

‘Guv, I’m about to say something really stupid.’

‘That doesn’t normally stop you.’

‘It sounds to me like someone with the hiccups.’

‘Bryant…’

‘I know, but I’m just saying.’

The man was entitled to his opinion, but as the observation made absolutely no sense, she was going to ignore it. Everything this sicko did had some kind of meaning, and she was sure that wasn’t it.

Her thoughts returned to her recent meeting with Eric Lane. On the face of it, he appeared solid, stable, respectable, maybe even a little staid, but she knew from experience that looks could be deceiving. Was he capable of inflicting this level of torture on someone? She really would have liked more time to try and find out, but again she was in a new race against the clock.

‘What’s the next clue?’ she asked, taking out her phone.

‘“This might be a folly. Ramble high b4 you see the blackened hill. Find my next by 9p.m. or…”’

‘Call the clue in to Stace while I contact Mitch.’

He stepped away with the card while she scrolled to the contact number for the forensic technician.

The call rang out and eventually went to voicemail.

No, she did not want to leave a message thank you very much. She wanted to talk to the man and arrange to meet.

The second time of calling she was sent straight to voicemail.

Oh, so that’s how he wanted to play it, was it? Kim thought.

‘All done?’ she asked as Bryant ended his call to Stacey.

He nodded.

‘Great, now where did Stacey say Mitch liked to go for lunch?’

TWENTY-EIGHT

3P.M.

Stacey read the words she’d written down a couple of times before saying them out loud. She was happy to work on the next clue. She’d been searching any geocaching sites she could find in the hope of spotting some reference to the Jester, and she was still coming up blank. Penn had been kind enough to nip out and get some snacks before the supermarket closed.

‘“This might be folly. Ramble high b4 you see the blackened hill.”’

‘Say what now?’ Penn asked.

‘That’s our next clue, along with some crudely extracted teeth and another Dictaphone tape recording the torture.’

Stacey paused as she looked at Frost. ‘You okay?’ she asked. The woman appeared to have lost all colour.