Read Gatecrasher for Free Online Page B

office by that time.  Anyway, we found sod all. There was blood on the wall where Keano says he did him, Jools saw some blood on the steps by the back door, he thinks. But frankly it could have been anything if you ask me. Nothing inside.’
    ‘It wasn’t an empty flat was it though Keith? I mean someone lived there?’
    ‘Oh yeah. Jools had the DVD player away – make it look kosher. But no sign of what we were looking for.’
    ‘And you were thorough?’
    ‘Like I said, much as we could be.’
    ‘Fuck. Which means ‘Not really George.’ Was there an alley onto the street? A way past the house?’
    Slater shook his head. ‘No. Terraced houses. Just the back of the house and the neighbours gardens either side.’
    Gresham looked his subordinate in the eye. ‘He went in that house Slater. He knocked on the door and went right in that house. Whoever lives there knows something that we don’t. And right now I’m not very comfortable with other people knowing more than me about my business.’ Slater was nodding as his boss spoke. ‘Keith, I think I’d like to have a few words with whoever it is lives there. I wonder if you’d arrange something?’
    Slater’s smile almost scared Gresham .

 
10
 
 
    Monday 11am
     
     
    After the initial shock and the effort to keep his composure in front of the policemen Campbell had walked through the flat, stepping over the mess, checking each room carefully before pointing dumbly to the large dust-free pa tch on the TV unit where his DVD player used to be.
    ‘Mmn. Well sometimes they just grab what’s easiest to carry off. No cash taken? Jewellery?’ said DC Samuel.
    Campbell shook his head. The policeman was not being condescending at all but he still felt like a child who’d lost a favourite toy getting a sympathetic word from an adult. ‘ Don’t keep cash about the place, ’ he said and tapped his trouser pocket.  ‘Wallet.’
    Making their way to the kitchen Campbell filled the kettle and pulled three mugs from the drainage board and dropped teabags into them. Scott asked Campbell if the man had been seen anywhere else that night. He shrugged as he struggled to remember.
    ‘Like I said, just in here. I mean, someone said they saw him in here when they came to get a drink but not everybody knew each other. They paid him no attention. Th en we heard the noise. You know.. .’ He winced involuntarily as he heard it again, all too clear in his mind.
    ‘Mm-hm. And no-one remembers letting him in then?’ Scott asked.
    Campbell shook his head silently.
    ‘So I guess he might have come in this way?’ the policeman went on, pointing at the door at the end of the kitchen that led to the garden.
    ‘I guess.’ he replied but he was distracted. ‘Look, you don’t think this has anything to do with…’ he said and gestured with a slight nod at the mess of the break in.
    Scott deferred to the senior man who paused for a moment and then shook his head. ‘Bad coincidence I’d say on the face of it. They took the DVD, made a big bloody mess looking for cash, or just for a laugh. It happens. But a gatecrasher on Saturday night at your party has an accident and then you get burgled Monday morning during work hours? I think it’s a long shot Mr Campbell. I wouldn’t go looking for any conspiracy theories. I’d say you’d had enough worries to be going on with without creating all new ones. Now, mind if we have a peek at the garden?’
    Soon afterward they had found a wallet; thirty pounds in tens, a Blockbuster card, various receipts, a ticket stub from the Chelsea match the Saturday just gone. And a driving licence. It had been in the bushes at the rear of the garden, up against the wall, hidden until a policeman’s toecap had nudged the foliage aside in an almost token gesture at searching.
    DC Samuel peered at the document as if it were some rare and ancient artefact. ‘Anthony Cooper.’ he read the name, enunciating carefully as if this was significant and