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“That is certainly a turnaround from your predecessor’s messages.” Charlie said.
“You convinced me,” Tom said. “You and that young woman in the Students' Union. I was too tied up in having been dragged back from New York and made to do this job. I’d bought in to the whole ‘protect the college’s reputation’ thing. But there’s no point trying to protect the college at the expense of our students.” He sighed. “Sorry, thinking aloud.”
“Where are you getting the staff to patrol the college?” Charlie asked.
“Changing the shift patterns for the existing Campus Services Officers. Except … how do I know I’m not sending the flasher to patrol the campus?” Tom looked worried. “We don’t have enough people to pair them up. I don’t know who I can trust. And another thing. I walked round again last night after I took you to Dilys’s. I’m sure there was someone else there. Between the library entrance and the workshops, where it’s really dark.” He rested his elbows on the desk and put his head in his hands. “Shit, Charlie. I have no idea what I’m doing here.” He massaged the lines on his forehead with long fingers and pushed his dark hair back behind his ears.
“You said the Students' Union had been helpful. Could you pay them to patrol—in pairs? With big torches, and alarms?”
“Yes. Yes we can,” Tom said. “I’ll go over there now.”
Charlie privately resolved that either he, or one of the other of their tiny crew would walk round the campus, and the streets close to it, every evening if they possibly could. But best of all would be to catch the bastard before he hurt someone else.
Tom pushed his chair back, obviously impatient to visit the Students' Union.
“You still have a missing student,” Charlie said. “Kaylan is back, but Rico is still missing.” Tom deflated and put his head back in his hands.
“I told you I shouldn’t be doing this job. I’d forgotten all about them.”
Charlie described how they had been called to Brocklehurst and collected Kaylan from the hospital. Tom lifted his head at Brocklehurst, but when Charlie asked him about it, he shrugged. “It’s one of those arty places, I think. Maybe someone on the staff lives there.”
“Kaylan says he doesn’t remember anything between being in his room here, and walking into the police station in Brocklehurst a week later. When he first went to the police, he said that he thought Rico was dead. But when he talked to us, he said he couldn’t remember.”
“You don’t believe him?”
“I’m a policeman. I don’t believe anything unless I have evidence. Which is why I want to see the personnel files for everyone who works here. And when I’ve gone through those, we’ll start on the students.”
“You can’t.”
“I can if you help me. Or I can get a warrant, which will take time, during which time Rico is still missing, and your students are in danger. What’s it to be?”
“Staff records are confidential. All kinds of private information could be there. Illnesses. Divorce. Disciplinary stuff, I don’t know. How do we know we can trust you after what’s happened?”
Anger rose up in Charlie’s throat like bile. Tom’s eyes were wide across the desk, and Charlie caught them, staring back.
“We are probably the only people you can trust. None of us attacked those women or tried to cover it up. And you know what? Everyone lies to us. Everyone. I’m assuming there will be some truth in your records, which is why I want to see them.”
Tom stood up and began to pace up and down the office, ignoring Charlie. Tom’s hands moved constantly: making fists then banging them together, waving his arms, and pacing, pacing, as his mind worked.
“You can come here,” he said eventually. “Use our computers, right here in this office. No printing, no emailing, no data sticks, just notes. Take it or leave it. But you’ll need a warrant for the students. I might get away with the staff, but no chance with the students.”
He stopped in front of Charlie, looking down, calmer now, eyes softer. He pushed the hair back behind his ears, and a slight flush rose on his cheeks. “I haven’t lied to you, Charlie. But I have had this.” He turned his laptop round to face Charlie again and clicked in the corner. The same pop-up box that Charlie had seen on Eddy’s computer appeared. This time he could read what it said:
Exclusive: Sun, sex and murder! Gay cop’s holiday hook-up ends in murder trial. There was a picture of a slender man in a suit and sunglasses walking into a Spanish court.
“That’s you,” Tom said.
Charlie had been towered over by scarier men than Tom, so he didn’t move.
“I did nothing wrong; I was a witness. I slept with a man, and a few days later he was arrested for murder.” Charlie said. “I don’t know where you got this. It’s also been all over the tabloid press, so I can hardly pretend it didn’t happen. But you tried to pick me up in a gay bar, and offered me dinner, like it was a date. And somehow forgot to mention your wife and children.”
Tom sank onto his haunches in front of Charlie, so it was his turn to look up.
“Charlie, I have children. I’m not ashamed of them. It’s complicated.” As he opened his mouth to continue, the quiet of the college was shattered by a piercing scream, and then another, and the sound of feet pounding along corridors and down stairs.
Charlie looked out of the window. Students were huddled together gesticulating wildly, pointing to the library or possibly the workshops beyond. He ran for the stairs and the courtyard, Tom on his heels. The screams were definitely coming from behind the main building.
“This way,” Tom pulled him through a door off the courtyard and into the main building, along a corridor and then out through a fire door into the cluster of workshops and storage containers. A campus services officer stood by the door to one of the sheds, holding on to the screamer, a middle-aged woman in jeans and a long white shirt.
