*
Amanda dumped the cardboard box onto her desk and slid all other paperwork into a hastily opened drawer, which she closed with a snap. She unpacked the files from Donald Grace's office and stacked them on either side of her desk. With a fresh pad in front of her, she wrote the heading 'suicide or murder?' and underlined it twice.
Tapping the pen to her lips, she leant back in her chair and allowed her attention to drift outside. From the window next to her desk she had a clear view of the courtyard and busy main road beyond. The courtyard was a grey concrete square with red brick flower beds that had once contained flowers but was now hard packed dirt with cigarette packs and beer cans for decoration. In the centre stood a large oak tree that, despite the lack of care, flourished. It was obstinate and unmovable.
Amanda often stared out at the tree as she ran through her paperwork, prepared statements for court or circled jobs in the local papers. Jobs she would never apply for, of course, but it kept her sane. She watched the tree flow through the seasons. Bursting into fresh, eager buds, mellowing into a darker, relaxed green, settling into the yellow and brown before shedding all leaves in late autumn to recuperate in winter before it started all over again. At the moment it was grey and leafless and restful.
Looking out at the tree often gave her inspiration. Or maybe it was a welcome distraction.
Pulling the first file from the stack, she laid it open and prepared to make notes on anything that may raise suspicion. She poured over file after file hoping that something would leap out at her, but it soon became obvious that she didn't know what she was looking for, if indeed evidence existed in the financial reports of the dozens of stock holdings.
Each report listed reams of numbers beside innocuous titles. Most of the figures ended in brackets. Negative amounts, she discovered. The portfolios were losing money, but not a huge amount, and compared to the size of the investments, hardly a worry. The summary at the beginning of each report, signed by Grace, explained short term difficulties and the strength of the Asian Tiger and Russian Bear. Soft-soaping blurb to make the portfolio owners relax about the state of their financial affairs.
Reaching for the box, she examined the rest of the items claimed from Grace's drawer. Used post-it notes with names and numbers and a scrapbook. The receptionist had been helpful with the removal of property, looking over Amanda as she went through Grace's effects, signing her name as witness to the box-full of papers. A thorough investigation may unearth reasons for murder. A warrant for the search of his home, or seizure of the computers so that they could be ripped apart by the tech department. But Amanda would need to prove that there was reason for the man-hours and resources to be committed. If she could not convince her immediate superior, Detective Sergeant Kirkwood, that Grace had been murdered, then she had no chance of requisitioning tech to further her hazy theory.
Unfortunately, nothing seemed to make sense. There were no connections to be made. Not even wild leaps of intuition that could be supported. It seemed Grace was a business orientated man, as his desk drawer held little personal effects. He was not married, no dependants, no social life to speak of, and his out of office hours seemed to involve dining with clients or time spent alone at home.
A notebook at the back of the drawer, beneath sachets of sugar and parking tickets, had the name 'Valentine Trust' scored deeply in the pages, as if Grace was frustrated or angry, and gripped the pen hard whilst he wrote the name. Amanda noted the name and circled it with an arrow towards the label 'Financial Crimes Unit'.
The only unusual item Amanda found odd was a flyer for a Conservative MP by-election from 2002. A council member called Peter Masters was running for a Cambridgeshire borough with a manifesto that pitched him as a male equivalent of Margaret Thatcher. That the flyer would be kept all these years was a wonder. The manifesto photograph had been disfigured with devil horns and a trident beard doodled onto his face, with scars and an arrow through his head drawn in with different coloured pens. Perhaps he had known Peter Masters. School friend?
Taking a fresh approach, Amanda scribbled ideas and thoughts in a free form pattern on a new piece of paper. Drawing bubbles around major ideas, lines with stylised arrows looping around the page, linking idea to idea. She had the vague notion of something, an inkling that tugged away at her thoughts, but she needed to make sense of it before she pitched the concept to Kirkwood.
The vague jigsaw of events seemed unrelated, but she suspected there was more to the suicide than Monday morning blues. There was something that kept niggling at her. She looked out at the tree and let her mind walk through imaginary scenarios. She lay the reports to one side, ripped out the sheet of ideas and placed it on top of the pile. Then she turned on the computer and began to write up her report.
Detectives drifted in and out of the open plan offices as shifts changed. The noise levels dipped and peaked, but Amanda tuned out any distractions. At one point the serial killer task force rushed from the offices, grabbing coats as they bundled through the door. Amanda glanced up, watching the men and women rush from the office, and then returned to her work.
Officers passed by her desk, someone even shouted out her name, but she was concentrating so hard that the world did not exist beyond the sixteen inch pale screen before her.
She stretched out after what seemed like hours at the keyboard and reached for her coffee. The last mouthfuls were cold and sweet, but she gulped them down anyway. An idea was taking shape. If only she could grasp that elusive thread that seemed to weave itself through the events. If only - -
A podgy hand slammed down hard on the desk, pinning a familiar leaflet beneath sausage fingers. DC Moore beamed down at her, his hand placed on a photocopy of the infamous lonely hearts advert.
'Are you trawling for more dates amongst that lot?' Moore laughed, peering round the disinterested office for appreciation to his finely honed wit.
'Very good, Mo-mo. The donuts are over there. Now if you don't mind, I'm a little busy.'
'Busy. Yeah, so I heard. On the trail of the teenage shoplifter? What next - the mystery of the lollipop sign thief?'
Amanda, more annoyed at the break in her concentration than any attempt to humiliate her, turned to Moore.
'The "Hot Date wanted" adverts were a real scream about, oh, four months ago. If you're so keen on disturbing a woman go and jack off on some webcam. Just leave me in peace.'
'You got a smart mouth,' Moore snarled, mouthing the word 'bitch'.
'Look, we can do this one of two ways. You can stand there and look dumb, or you can go and play catch-up with the Yardie troubles. Just leave me be, huh.'
Moore rose up slowly, scratched at his belly and opened his mouth as if to speak. Instead, he yawned loudly, turned and left. Amanda scowled, returning to her report when another shadow passed by her desk.
'Oh for crying out loud,' she muttered. But instead of Moore, DS Kirkwood crabbed along the aisle and sat at the desk opposite.
'Someone giving you hassle?' he asked, flicking open a newspaper and settling into the chair.
'No.'
'You have anything for me there?' Kirkwood asked, nodding towards the box of files.
'Scotch mist, perhaps,' Amanda said. 'But there may be something here I'll want to run past you.'
'Fine, come to me when you're ready.' Kirkwood shrugged and turned back to his paper.
Amanda continued her research into the death of Donald Grace, dissecting his life from the scant documents in the cardboard box. She made three separate mind maps to bring her theories together, and before she knew it the offices were deserted and it was dark outside, the gnarled branches of the oak tree barely visible in the courtyard.