CHAPTER 40

 

Captain Chantal Kawczynski scowled at Mitchell and Lumley and pressed the stop button on the digital recorder. “Do you need to hear that again?” she asked.

“No, Ma’am,” said Mitchell.

“When did the call come in?” asked Lumley.

Three days ago to the Crime Stoppers hotline. The call came from an unregistered cell phone that at the moment is switched off.”

“And why are we only just getting to hear of it now?” asked Lumley.

“You heard the caller. A middle-aged man carrying parcels into a car in the middle of the night in upstate New York. One of the parcels looked like it might be an arm. A description of a car and a plate number. It’s taken time to work through the system.”

“And that car is registered to Dudley Grose?” said Mitchell.

“It’s in his wife’s name,” said the captain. She pushed her black-framed spectacles higher up her nose. “Now you tell me what’s going on. We’ve got Adrian Slater downstairs charged with the murder of Jenny Cameron. And we’re saying that he dismembered the girl and distributed the body parts around the State.”

He did it, ma’am, we’re sure of that.”

That’s as may be, detective, but now we’ve got a call saying that a man who matches the description of the girl’s lecturer was seen acting suspiciously just after she vanished. At the very least we need to check that vehicle. Get a CSU unit out there ASAP.”

“Yes ma’am,” said Mitchell.

“And if it looks like we’ve got the wrong man in custody, you let me know straight away. The last thing we need is a lawsuit.”

“There’s no mistake, ma’am,” said Lumley. “Slater did it. I’d stake my job on it.”

“Detective, you might well be doing just that,” said Kawczynski.