Dead Tomorrow

time, Roy,’ DI Mantle said.
    ‘There can’t be that many drugs, or suppliers of them, and not that many end users,’ Grace said. He turned to the researcher, Jacqui Phillips. ‘Can you make a start on that right away? I’ll get you some more helpers, if you need it.’
    Norman Potting cameback into the room. ‘Apologies,’ he said. ‘That was a colleague of my contact in Bucharest, Ian Tilling.’
    Grace signalled for him to continue.
    ‘He is attempting to tail a young Romanian woman–a teenager called Simona Irimia–who, he believes, is in the process of being trafficked, imminently, possibly tonight or tomorrow, to the UK. His colleague has emailed me a set of police photographs of the person he believes to be her–taken when she was arrested for a shoplifting offence two years ago–when she gave her age as twelve. I’m just printing them out now. Can you give me a couple of minutes?’
    ‘Go ahead.’
    Potting went out of the room again.
    ‘If DS Batchelor and DC Boutwood are right in their suspicions of Sir Roger Sirius, we should consider surveillance on him. If we follow him he might lead us to the hospital or clinic,’ DI Mantle said.
    Grace nodded. ‘Yes, excellent point. Do we know what manpower the DIU have available?’
    ‘They have a major op on,’ Mantle replied. ‘So it might be tricky.’
    The Divisional Intelligence Unit was the covert surveillance arm of the CID. They focused mainly on drugs, but increasingly their work involved human trafficking as well.
    Potting returned after a few minutes and distributed several copies of the Romanian police photographs of the front, right and left profiles of Simona around the inquiry team.
    ‘According to Ian Tilling, this girl was collected earlier today from her home by a German woman who was taking her tostart a new life in England. Some life, I’d say. Someone else’s new life, from what it sounds.’
    ‘Pretty girl,’ commented Lizzie Mantle.
    ‘She’ll look less pretty when she’s a canoe,’ said Potting.
    Canoe was crude police jargon for a body during a postmortem after all the internal organs had been removed.
    From an envelope, Grace pulled out several photographs of Marlene Hartmann, taken with a long lens, and passed them around.
    ‘These are also from my LKA friends in Munich. Do you think this might be the woman, Norman?’
    Potting peered at them intently. ‘She’s a looker, Roy!’ he said. ‘Can see why you went to Munich!’
    Ignoring the comment, Grace said tersely, ‘Christmas is coming up fast. In my experience, people tend to want to get business concluded well in advance of the Christmas break. If this girl is coming in tonight, or tomorrow, to be killed for her organs, then I think we can assume that will happen fairly quickly after she gets here. We need more information on this Lynn Beckett woman. We’ve enough, from what Norman’s given us, to get a phone tap sanctioned, in my view.’
    The criterion for obtaining a phone tap order was evidence that a human life was in immediate danger. Grace was confident he could demonstrate that.
    ‘We need a signature from the ACPO and either the Home Secretary or a Secretary of State,’ DI Mantle said.
    The duty Acting Chief Police Officer rotated between the Chief Constable, the Deputy Chief Constable and the two Assistant Chief Constables.
    ‘It’s Alison Vosper this week,’ Grace said. ‘Won’t be a problem. She’s up to speed on everything.’
    ‘How fast can youget a Secretary of State to move?’ Bella Moy asked.
    ‘The system’s speeded up a lot recently. London will take the instruction on a phone call now.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘We should have consent and a tap on her lines live before midnight.’
    ‘This woman and the young girl might already be here now, sir,’ Guy Batchelor said.
    ‘Yes, she might. But I think we should still keep a lookout at ports of entry. Gatwick’s the most likely, but we need to cover Heathrow too–make sure that’s on our radar–and the Channel Tunnel and the ferry ports. I’ll call Bill Warner at Gatwick, get him to watch all incoming flights from Bucharest and other points of departure they might use.’ He was silent for a moment. ‘I’m afraid we’ve got a long night ahead of us. I don’t want another body turning up dead tomorrow.’

96
    Normally, Lynndisliked the winter months, because that meant leaving the office in the dark. But tonight, with Reg Okuma parked just down the street,