Private Oz (Private 7)

“Know it. How did you learn of the murder?”

“I’m at Greta and Brett’s. Stayed over last night. Brett got the call just as he was leaving for HQ.”

“Okay. I’ll be there in fifteen … hopefully.”

It was pretty much a straight run and I was there in twelve, stopped ten yards from the police cordon and walked briskly toward the tape. A constable was guarding the sidewalk. I showed him my ID and I was relieved when he let me through without any arguments. Maybe this liaison with the cops could actually work after all, I thought, as I ducked under the yellow tape and paced over to where the forensics team were poking around.

Brett Thorogood spotted me and waved me over. I saw Mark a few yards away, his back to me. He was talking to a man in lycra.

“Runner found the body,” Thorogood explained, his expression grim.

I followed the DC over to where the victim lay – another woman, about forty, shoulder-length blonde hair. She was dressed in a blood-soaked Dolce & Gabbana dress. The soil under her and around her was discolored. Her face had been mutilated – cigarette burns.

Her dress had been hitched up over her hips, legs splayed. The end of a roll of fifty-dollar bills could just be seen protruding from between her legs. Blood had dried on the insides of her thighs.

“Same MO,” I said unnecessarily. Thorogood just stared at the dead woman.

I turned to see Justine at the tape. The cop who’d let me through was questioning her. I strode over and just as I reached them, he let her under the barrier.

“Same thing as before,” I told her as we walked along the alley. Thorogood had moved to one of the police cars on the street. Justine put a hand to her mouth, but as I went to turn her away, she shook me off. “It’s okay, Craig!” she said sharply. “Not much shocks me anymore.”

I saw Talbot finish up questioning the jogger and decided to leave Justine to it. I walked over to Mark just as another cop escorted the runner toward Wentworth Avenue.

“Oh … how nice!” he said.

“History repeating itself.”

He nodded toward the dead woman. “Doesn’t help that poor thing.”

“Might help us though. What do you have?”

He let out a heavy sigh. “Jogger found her about 5.45. The woman had been stabbed repeatedly in the back. We don’t know if she was raped before …”

“The first victim wasn’t.”

“No.”

“Do we know who she is?”

“Name’s Elspeth Lampard. Address: 44 Wentworth Avenue.”

“That’s just two houses away.” I nodded back toward the main road. “Any idea how long she’s been here?”

“Ten or eleven hours.”

I nodded. “Makes sense. She’d probably have been spotted sooner if she’d been killed earlier. So after … what?… 8 pm?”

Talbot didn’t answer, had started to turn away when he caught sight of Darlene walking toward us with her forensics kit.

“Your turn to poke around,” he said sardonically.

Chapter 38

AS DARLENE SET to work, I left Justine behind, plucked out my iPhone and started toward Wentworth Avenue.

I tapped “Elspeth Lampard Australia” into Google and a couple of weblinks came up. She was the daughter of Norman Ruschent, a wealthy mining entrepreneur in Western Australia. And she’d married well too. Her husband was CFO of Buttress Finance Group – a big, global player. Made a name for himself on the Australian stock exchange in the early nineties, served time in London, a big city firm. They’d met over there.

Personal background: the Lampards had two boys, nine and eleven, both at Cranbrook School. I lifted my eyes from the screen of the iPhone as I passed the end of the alley, emerging onto Wentworth Avenue, saw a policewoman a couple of houses down. She was walking toward a squad car with two young boys. The Lampard kids, I realized … poor little buggers. I felt for them, I’d lost my own mother when I was around their age.