The Blood Detective by Dan Waddell Read Free Book Online Page A

put there intentionally.’
    ‘What was the number?’
     
    ‘1879’
    ‘1879,’ Nigel said thoughtfully.
    ‘Is that enough for you to go on?’ Foster asked.
    Nigel grimaced. ‘Yes, but it won’t be quick. A lot of people will have been born, married or died in 1879 m central and west London.’
    ‘How long will that take?’
    ‘A day. But then you have to order the certificates and wait for them to be copied and posted.’
    ‘Can’t we just go to the local register offices?’
    ‘That reference is a General Register Office index number, not a local office one. It would be of no help there. If this is a reference to a birth, marriage or death certificate, then it was discovered through the central index.’
    ‘Who handles that?’ Foster asked.
    ‘The General Register Office in Southport.’
    ‘Southport? What the hell is it doing there?’
    ‘London isn’t the centre of the universe, sir,’
    Heather said.
    ‘It is when you work for the Metropolitan Police.’
    There was a pause while Foster thought. Nigel
    watched him earnestly. The DCI drummed his right finger on the table.
    ‘Heather, get on the phone to headquarters. Get them to ask Merseyside Police to send a couple of officers to the GRO.’ He turned to Nigel. ‘What do they need to do?’
    ‘Commandeer a couple of staff to pull the full
    certificates - once you’ve identified the ones you need — and pass the information on to you as quickly as possible.’
    ‘Got that, Heather?’ Foster asked.
    She went upstairs to make her call. Both men
    watched her go.
    ‘How busy are you at the moment?’ Foster said.
    ‘Relatively.’
    ‘Well, can I hire you and your staff to hunt down these references for me?’
    Nigel’s cheeks flushed. ‘There’s a problem with my staff.’
    ‘What?’
    ‘I don’t have one. Not at the moment. I…’
     
    Foster held his hand up to stop him. ‘Don’t worry, Mr Barnes. I’ll get you some help. They’ll be with you first thing. What time does this records centre let people in?’
    ‘Nine a.m.’
    ‘They’ll be waiting for the doors to open.’
    Nigel experienced a feeling denied him for some time: excitement. For the first time in months, he couldn’t wait to start a day’s work.

6
    It was after ten p.m. when Foster returned to his terraced house on a quiet, unspectacular street in Acton, too late to even think of going to the pub. He parked and then switched the engine off, but not the electrics so he could continue listening to the music.
    He didn’t know the song; it was piped through the stereo via his personal music player, a small metallic gadget no bigger than a matchbox. There were more than a thousand tracks on it, few of which he knew.
    One of the guys at the station had downloaded them for him a few months before. You didn’t have to build your own record collection these days, merely annex a friend’s or even a complete stranger’s off the Net. He couldn’t remember what had happened to the boxes of vinyl he assembled as a teenager. His first single? ‘Indiana Wants Me’, R. Dean Taylor.
    The simple fact that the protagonist was on the lam infuriated his father, which is probably why he treasured it so. God knows where the record was now.
    He made a mental note to download it.
    The car was warm, the lights on the dash illuminated against the dark. He felt cocooned, as if he could recline the seat and sleep for hours. But, when the song finished, he turned the volume down to a murmur, picked up his mobile and called Khan to tell him to meet Heather at the FRC the next morning.
    Khan did not sound too enamoured at the prospect but Foster was beyond caring.
    He climbed from the car, walked up the small
    paved path to his front door and unlocked it, flicking on the lights in the hall. He was relieved to see and smell that Aga, his Polish cleaner, had been that morning. He thumbed through some mail, found nothing interesting and added it to a growing pile of similar letters, then hung