The Keeper. Luke Delaney

got nothing to do with it and he can’t help us find her any more than he already has. We both know she hasn’t run away, not without her bag and phone.’

      ‘We’re not all addicted to handbags,’ Sally reprimanded him, holding out her arms to indicate the absence of a bag.

      ‘Phone?’ Sean asked, indicating the mobile clutched in Sally’s guilty hand.

      ‘OK,’ Sally conceded. ‘So what happened?’

      ‘I don’t know yet,’ Sean answered. ‘He either did her in the hallway by the front door and took her body away in her own car, or he took her alive.’

      ‘He?’ Sally challenged. ‘You sound like you already know him.’ Sean merely shrugged in reply. ‘So what next?’ she continued.

      ‘I need you to get hold of Roddis. Have him examine the house properly, concentrating on the hallway, front door, etc. The scene, if it is one, has been well and truly trampled, but you never know your luck. And make sure her car details are circulated if they haven’t been already, then get them marked for forensic preservation – that won’t have been done yet, you can put your mortgage on it.’

      ‘I’ll see to it,’ Sally assured him while following his eyeline across the street to the house he was staring at. ‘Something I should know?’

      ‘A twitching curtain,’ Sean told her. ‘When we first pulled up, someone was watching us. The question is, why?’ He started walking towards the house, offering no explanation. Sally followed.

      Sean used the doorbell this time and waited impatiently – he already knew someone was at home. There was no glass in the front door, just a spyhole. Clearly the occupier preferred security to natural light. Sean noticed the pristine Neighbourhood Watch sticker attached to the inside of the front-room window. He went to press the doorbell again, but delayed when he felt a presence on the other side of the wooden barrier. They listened as at least two good, heavy deadbolts were withdrawn. Not many people used security like that when they were at home and awake.

      The door fell back into the warm house revealing an elderly man in his late sixties or early seventies. He was still quite tall, about Sean’s height, and he held his back straight military-style, although Sean doubted he’d ever actually been a soldier. He wore smart grey trousers and a brown cardigan over a blue shirt that contrasted with the reddening skin pulled over his bony, angular face. His hair was grey and wavy, but still had traces of the blond that had only recently deserted him. He knew who they were but asked them anyway: ‘Who are you and what do you want?’

      Sean had already formed a dislike to him. Sally had no opinion; to her he was one more face, one more witness to be spoken to, assessed and categorized before she could escape to the solitude of her own home, away from prying eyes and stupid questions about how she was coping.

      Holding up his warrant card for the wannabe soldier, Sean announced: ‘DI Corrigan and this is my colleague DS Jones. We’re making some local inquiries about a missing person. Mind if we ask you a couple of questions?’

      ‘Do I know this missing person?’

      ‘I don’t know,’ Sean answered. ‘Do you? Louise Russell, she lives across the road, number twenty-two?’ Sean didn’t let him answer. ‘Do you mind if we come inside? This inquiry’s at a sensitive stage, you understand.’

      The man stepped aside reluctantly. ‘Fine, but this won’t take too long, will it?’

      ‘No.’ Sean passed by him into the neat and orderly house, immediately looking around, his eyes studying every detail. ‘Sorry, I didn’t catch your name,’ Sean prompted as Sally entered the hallway, making a little too much of checking her watch.

      ‘Levy,’ the man answered. ‘Douglas Levy.’ Sean’s eyes turned from scanning the house to surveying the occupier, dissecting him layer by layer. Was this the man responsible for Louise Russell’s disappearance? Had he watched her every day from behind his twitching curtain, fantasized about her, about having her, taking her, doing things to her that no woman would ever let him do to them? Had he masturbated while thinking about her, did he take himself in hand while he watched her from the window, ejaculating embarrassingly into his own hand, too overcome by his excitement to fetch tissues from the bathroom before he started? And then, after months, maybe even years, had he decided he needed more? Maybe just to touch her once, maybe a kiss, an innocent kiss on the cheek, something to add spice to his fantasies and masturbating. Had he gone too far, touched her in the wrong place, tried to kiss her too hard until she started to scream and fight, and he panicked, hit her, hit her hard and all the time the excitement rising in his groin, the material of his underpants tightening uncomfortably around his swelling penis and then she was unconscious and he was inside her, grunting and rutting like a pig until all too quickly it was over and then he had to kill her, he didn’t want to, but he had to, to stop her telling everyone what he had done, his hands closing around her throat, her eyes bulging, the whites turning red as a thousand unseen capillaries ruptured. Sean found himself studying Levy’s hands for scratch marks. There were none, but Sean knew he was at least partly right about him.

      ‘Do you live alone, Mr Levy?’ Sean asked.

      ‘I don’t see what that’s got to do with anything,’ Levy responded, indignant.

      ‘No,’ Sean agreed, his question unwittingly answered. ‘I see you’re a member of the local Neighbourhood Watch.’

      ‘Actually, Inspector, I’m the coordinator of the Neighbourhood Watch. You can check with the local police if you don’t believe me.’

      ‘Why wouldn’t I believe you?’ said Sean, enjoying the discomfort creeping over Levy’s features.

      Sally looked on, disinterested and excluded, already convinced Levy was a waste of time as a witness or a suspect.

      ‘As coordinator of the Neighbourhood Watch, you no doubt keep an eye on things, look out for strangers in the street, keep a watch on your neighbours’ houses when they’re at work and you’re at home alone … I’m sorry,’ Sean finished with an insincere smile, ‘I’ve made an assumption you’re retired.’

      ‘I am,’ Levy told him, straightening his back as if he was proud of his retired status, although Sean could tell it was killing him, knowing that he’d passed his usefulness sell-by-date.

      ‘And did you?’ Sean asked.

      ‘Did I what?’ Levy was struggling to keep up with the conversation, his pink face growing redder with anger and frustration.

      ‘See anything or anyone in the street the last few days that made you suspicious?’

      ‘I don’t spend all my time looking out of the window,’ Levy protested.

      ‘But when you hear something, like a car coming or going, you do,’ Sean suggested.

      Levy grew more flustered. ‘Sometimes … maybe … I don’t know, not really.’

      ‘But you heard us arrive earlier and you watched us through the window. So you like to keep an eye on the comings and goings of the street, yes?’

      ‘What’s the point of all of this?’ Levy snapped. ‘I know nothing about the woman across the street’s disappearance. I didn’t hear anything and I didn’t see anything.’

      Sean studied him in silence for as long as he felt Levy could stand. ‘OK,’ he said finally. ‘Just one more thing. Did anyone ever arrive at the Russells’ house after Mr Russell had left for work but before Mrs Russell set off?’

      ‘Not that I noticed.’ Levy answered with his eyes closed as if he could somehow block Sean out of his consciousness.

      ‘Did they ever argue or fight that you know of?’ Sean continued.

      ‘No,’ Levy insisted. ‘They’re a decent, quiet couple who keep themselves to themselves. Now please, I’m very busy and I think I’ve helped you as much as I can so—’