After visiting Sandy, Tony drove Annie to a Camden back street. They went up to a sixties block of flats via a series of metal walkways and arrived at the second floor, stopping when they came to a door with purple paint peeling off it in strips. There were claw marks at the bottom of the door. They both looked at it and thought cat owner.
Annie knocked.
Seconds later, a young man with a high-coloured face, blond hair and baby-blue eyes came to answer it, clutching a large green-eyed ginger tom.
‘Oh!’ he said, looking at the pair of them.
‘Pete? Pete Jones? Do you remember me?’ asked Annie.
‘Mrs Carter! Oh God, yes. Sorry. Yes. Of course it’s you.’
‘Sorry to bother you on your day off . . .’ she started.
‘No! Not at all. Come in, come in, sorry about the mess . . .’ and Pete Jones, bar manager of the Palermo, stepped back, let them come in, hastily depositing the cat outside on the landing. ‘That’s Benj,’ said Pete. ‘Never get a cat. They’re adorable but they rip everything to shreds. Come in, sit down.’
It was neat inside the flat, and pristine-clean. Annie and Tony sat on a ruby-red fabric sofa and Pete sat down opposite in an armchair, looking flushed and flustered.
‘Can I get you a drink?’ he said. ‘Tea, coffee? Anything?’
‘No thanks.’
‘Pete’s anxious eyes rested on Annie’s face. ‘God, this must be so hard on you, so awful. This whole thing with Dolly. I’m so sorry.’
‘You found her,’ said Annie.
‘I did. Yes.’ Pete made a flapping motion with his hand in front of his eyes, which suddenly reddened. ‘Sorry, sorry. I keep thinking about it, and every time I do, it’s just . . . it’s just so upsetting.’
Annie stared at him in sympathy, thinking he’d had a terrible shock and he didn’t seem like the toughest of types, either. It must have knocked him sideways, finding Dolly like that.
‘Can you talk about it?’ she asked. ‘I know it’s difficult for you, but if there’s anything you know, anything you can tell us that might help catch whoever did this, it would be good.’
‘I know. The police have been round and asked me all about it again, but what can I say?’ Pete swiped a tear away from his eye and shook his head. ‘It was horrible. She usually opens the front entrance before eleven, to let in the bar staff and the cleaners, and I’m always first on the doorstep – we always used to laugh about that. I’m a punctuality freak. So there I was, it was a quarter to eleven, and the doors were still locked.’
‘And that was really unusual,’ said Tony.
‘Yes. Very. I rapped, but there was no reply, so I used the key she’d given me for emergencies and let myself in.’
‘What then?’ asked Annie.
‘God, it was awful. Awful,’ said Pete, and had to stifle a sob.
There was a loud scratching noise from outside the door.
‘That’s just Benj,’ Pete said with a faint, tearful laugh. ‘He’s ruined that fucking door, the little bastard.’
‘Go on with what you were saying,’ said Tony.
‘There’s not much more to say. I let myself in, I went up the stairs and called out to her, asked if she was OK, but there was no answer.’
‘So you went in,’ said Annie.
Pete just nodded, lips compressed, fighting back more tears.
‘Then,’ he said, sighing, trying to compose himself. He passed a hand over his face, and Annie saw that his nails were bitten down to the quick. ‘I tried the handle and it was unlocked. So I went in. And I found her.’ Pete’s face crumpled again as the tears flowed. ‘She was dead,’ he managed to say, and then he just sobbed his heart out.