Chapter 12 Chapter Eleven

The icy raindrops hit Moreau's face.She stepped to the top of the front steps, the rain surrounded and devoured her, the wind tugged at the hem of her dress like a child.Hearing Bannerman yelling on the phone, she smiled. "Turn that thing off! Turn it off, listen to me!" The phone was inches away from her ear, but she could still hear a woman's voice, speaking slowly and sounding off drugs, "Follow the route." Bannerman was yelling, "Turn that fucking thing off!" Cursing is not his usual style, and his eagerness to come here is the temptation of the huge sum of money, the unknown amount, the unimaginable source, and the infinite possibilities.

"Turn around, right away." The drivers of these armored vans have received psychological training. In the face of yelling and threats, they can remain indifferent, keep calm, and go straight to the designated destination.She could hear the gentle voice of the GPS lady giving directions, the screeching sound of the wipers on the windshield, and the monosyllable answer from the driver: No, yes, here, not here. "Moreau? Moreau!" Bannerman was yelling at her. She tried to hang up, explaining later that she couldn't find a signal, but that only made him call again, louder demanding directions that the driver hadn't even wanted to follow.

"Here I am, Inspector." "Okay, we're coming, it's slow, but we're coming." Looking out from the steps, Moreau wondered about Sarah Errol.Younger than her, living here alone, living in the same place all the time, it's weird.She is so familiar with this house that she can no longer see it, these stones, flowers, steps, walls, are replaced by her accumulated life memories, those trivial things, small decorative patterns and images, There were no identifiable reasons, all noted in forensic details.Moreau saw a black shoe.Stamping hard.That's all the police got from those shoe prints, black suede.The soles looked like sneakers, with deep cleats and no heels.Two pairs of shoes that are almost the same size.

"Go up, turn here!" She raised her phone a little further away from her cheek. It was only 4:30, but it was already dark.With no streetlights this high up in the hills, every light in the house was on, supplemented by bright white spotlights brought in from the science labs.Beyond 20 feet from the bottom of the steps, there was an impenetrable darkness. Her cell phone beeps and another call comes in, from an unknown number, and she tells Bannerman, "I have another call coming in." She switches to answer. "Hello?" The voice was very soft, like a girl, "Hi, is this Alex Morrow?"

Not from a co-worker, but no one else should know the number, "Yes." "Hello, um, my name is Val McLeary and I'm a forensic psychologist. Daniel McGrath gave me your phone number." Morrow lowered his jaw and lowered his voice, "Did Danny give you that number?" She wondered how he knew his work phone number, it wasn't listed in any contacts anywhere, Brian Didn't even know the number. "Yes," the woman hesitated for a moment, feeling as if the timing of the call was wrong, "I'm sorry, are you not at the London Road Police Station now?"

Turns out he didn't, the call was diverted from the office phone. "Sorry, sorry, no, I've already—you're calling from my work phone, using call forwarding." "Okay," the woman said patiently, "Is there a more suitable time for me to call back?" Moreau looked at the road below. There were no lights on the boulevard. "No, I'm afraid not." "Well, I hope this call didn't bother you. It's about John McGrath. Is he your nephew?" She was waiting for the answer, but Morrow kept his eyes on the boulevard, "Yes."

"Well, I'm doing a risk assessment on behalf of the court and I was wondering if I could get a little background from you." "risk assessment?" "It is to use John's past to determine the possibility of him committing crimes in the future." "He'll do it again." The other party was speechless for a while, and paused, "Okay, is it possible for us to meet and talk?" She sounded sweet and reasonable, and Moreau didn't mind talking about her background without scrutiny or explanation, but then Danny would know and he would interpret her behavior as favoritism or concern.

"I do not want to." The really responsible thing to do is to come clean to John.She had seen what happened to him from a distance, from madman to madman, knew the chaos of his growth, and she had done nothing about it.She saw him once, when she was in college, outside a pub, in the summertime, bundled up in a pram and left outside by himself, looking pathetic.He was wearing sandals, and his toes were dirty.He didn't know her, but she could take him, anyone could.She stood in the corner, watching the stroller until the mother came out.She thought about stealing him while she was standing there, but she had no money, nowhere to go, and his mother was violent.

A yellow light appeared at the end of the boulevard. "I have to go." "Is it possible to see you?" "You know I'm a cop, no one knows my background, I don't have to get involved—" "If you want, I can come to visit, and you are welcome to come to my office." The lights were getting closer and closer, and the armored vehicle slowed down at the fork in the road, went up the slope, turned, climbed the steep ramp, and the lights pierced through the thick blackness. "No need." She hung up both lines. Watching the armored vehicle slow down and stop in front of him, Morrow felt as guilty as a female student who was caught smoking, with an embarrassed smile on his face.

The car doesn't look like anything special on the surface, it's just a small black van with a camera on top.The difference is inside.The back door opens to another door, a safe with a timed lock.The safe was welded to the floor of the car, and the robbers had to cut the car in half if they wanted to remove it.The vehicles are used to transport seized drugs and huge sums of cash, and even driver training is expensive. The driver pulled the handbrake, and the car came to a sudden stop as if startled.Bannerman opened the passenger door, climbed out, and slammed the door shut, fuming.He stomped towards her like she didn't know he was angry.He stopped at the bottom of the steps, cursing the driver under his breath.

"The nasty driver took me to neighboring Glenawah." Moreau didn't care at all, "I understand." "Where?" "A corpse?" "No, money." Typical of Bannerman, he'd climb over a dead woman in order to head straight for something that would bring him glory.Even if the money had nothing to do with drugs, he would still be a bright spot on the front page of the Strathclyde Regional Police newsletter.The newsletter is read by the bosses, who are the only readers of the paper.They felt the paper kept them in touch with their subordinates, and Bannerman was happy to have his name on it. The driver got out of the car carefully, wearing a safety mask and gloves, and scanned the surroundings to make sure there were no robbers.Seeing his earnest expression, Morrow guessed that he was just trained, and felt sorry for him.He looked at them standing on the steps, hesitating, seeing that Bannerman was still there, he was unwilling to go over. Moreau waved to him impatiently.She couldn't get out of here and go back to the office until her responsibility for the money was settled.He approached slowly and stopped about 10 feet away.Bannerman glared, as if challenging him to take a step closer. It was a waste of time, the atmosphere was tense, the lawyer was waiting for her at the police station, and she needed to review some preliminary reports before going home.A moment of malice surged through her: she wanted to lead them past Sarah Errol's body without warning.But she refrained. "You should go around the back. They're moving bodies. It's a horrible place. There's a kitchen door. They came in through the kitchen window." "What, go around the back, because the body is there?" Bannerman stepped up a step. "I can take it, I know it's bad—" "No, you will disturb the scene, the money is in the kitchen." She looked over his head, "driver, you, what's your name?" He told her, but his voice was muffled by the safety mask, and Morrow wasn't listening anyway, she was just being polite to her subordinates. "Well," she said, "well, you go around the back and look at the money, and I want you to take it as it is, on the board." "Go around here?" The side of the house was dark now, and he seemed reluctant to go. "Yes, follow it around to the back, where the lights are on, and you'll see the open door." He walked away, wading through the long, wet grass, and disappeared behind a tree. Bannerman looked up at her and said in a tone that sounded intimate, "How are you, are you okay?" Morrow feigned confusion and said, "It's all right, yes." "Is it too much for you?" He nodded toward the house. "No, no, I'm fine, although I do feel it," she stroked her belly, walked down the steps, and stood beside him, "I need a big sleep in tomorrow." Bannerman laughed dryly, "Aha, I think I like your pregnancy better, hormones make you more mature and tender." He patted her on the back in a way he had never dared before. She had changed, she knew, but it wasn't a chemical change, the fact that she was about to have twins was enough to change her life forever.He knew that Gerald was dead, and he seemed to think that she was now willing to talk about affection, to be touched, to receive special allowances.Trying to keep herself from saying something stupid, she turned her face and looked at the open door. "The police officers were indifferent to the tragedy at the scene." She said calmly. "how so?" She sighed towards the house, "Big house, no relatives crying for her, a huge amount of unidentified cash was found in the kitchen. Her face was destroyed." "They'll change their minds and we'll find some pictures of her as a child." "Boss, they already have jokes about her." "I heard it too, about her legs." Moreau didn't know how to tell him that the reason those people had no sympathy was because the dead woman's genitals were exposed.They're old-fashioned, sympathetic to women in high-waisted panties with their knees together, and the slightest hint of female promiscuity negates their sympathy.Moreau tried not to think about it, and carefully buttoned the collar of his shirt all the way to his neck. "Engagement crisis," he said aloud, "many of them are just paid for." She snorted vaguely.Bannerman wasn't really post-observation criticism, he was just repeating angry conversations he'd had with his golf buddies.These people have a right to be paid what they deserve, but the problem actually goes deeper, with an increasingly stubborn lack of commitment and professionalism that has become a badge of honor, something they brag about to one another. The driver reappeared at the side of the house.He had taken off his helmet, revealing a big chubby baby face, "Boss, we need a few more cars. Too many." Morrow saw the car he was driving, there should be enough space to hold the pile of money, "No, you can fit it." "No." He raised a hand and closed his eyes resolutely. "According to regulations, the maximum carrying capacity of a car at any one time cannot exceed 75,000 pounds. According to my calculations, we need 9 cars." Bannerman glanced at Moreau, and both couldn't help laughing. "But," he continued sadly, "we don't have nine cars that we can call yet, so we need to ship them in batches, unload them and come back." Seeing their smiles, he misunderstood, "Yes, too Too much, drug money, right?" Morrow frowned to hold back a laugh, and called Detective Wilder into the house. "You fix that," she said to Bannerman, "make sure nothing moves—" "—I knew that until the picture was taken, Morrow." Bannerman grinned. Wilder came out the front door, looking anxiously at Bannerman and Morrow, who were giggling together on the steps. "Wilder," Moreau said as he nodded to Bannerman, "how about driving us on the road?" Moreau said goodbye to Bannerman, and Wilder hopped briskly down the steps to the car, and Morrow followed him into the car, buckling up his seat belt.Bannerman and the driver were climbing the steps to the front door as they drove past it. "Good luck," Wilder murmured softly. Moreau thanked him for saying this, which eased her feelings for him, knowing that she had never liked him very much.His skin was light brown, almost as dark as his hair, a little too dark even for a policeman; and he never said anything funny.She suspected that he, like Harris, was at the center of the pack of aggressive donkeys, but she had no real reason to think so, other than the fact that she didn't like him in the first place. He carefully steered the car around the body truck and drove down the steep slope of the tarmac drive. The glare of car headlights licked the trees along the tree-lined road, and the bushes on both sides appeared and disappeared.The houses on the side of the road receded as the car advanced, and the lights inside the houses made the road look like an airstrip.When they were almost at the end of the avenue, they saw a woman in a raincoat walking along the side of the road, her head bowed, the thin strap of her handbag slung across her shoulder.She looked up at the headlights, and Wilder smacked his lips and pulled over to a stop in front of her.Moreau saw her inch-long hair, brown mixed with frenzied gray, the shoulders of her raincoat warped by the wind and rain, the faux fur peeling off the straps of her handbag. The headlights bleached her face, and she looked up at the car, eyes narrowed, and walked toward the window. Kay looked in the car window and opened her mouth to speak, but she smiled and opened her mouth wide in genuine joy.Morrow held his breath: Kay Murray, nothing has changed. Moreau opened the car door, stepped out, and slammed the door again. "God Almighty," Kay said, "you still look like 12." "Kay," Moreau tried to touch her face, "Kay." "What are you doing here?" "I work in the police department." "No way!" "yes." "I hate cops. What's going on?" "I stumbled." They had spent their youth together, wandering the streets together, and Moreau often thought of her and wondered how she was doing now.However, one is either in Kay's life or out of touch with her, and she's not the type to catch up over a cup of coffee when nothing goes wrong.She's the one you watch bands with, chase boys, do silly stuff with. They grinned and looked at each other, and Wilder suddenly started the engine for no reason, and Kay squinted at him, "Ah, he, that bastard!" face, Kay went on, "talked to me this morning like I was the fucking Mrs. Mop." "Where did you two meet?" "On the way, near a house I was cleaning, where I used to work," she pointed to Glenawah up the hill. "I said I'd come up and see if there was anything missing." "Really?" Moreau said gratefully, as if Kay was doing her a favour. "Can you wait until tomorrow? I'll be back after ten tomorrow." "Then I can see you again," Kay nodded, hiccupping with joy, looking at Morrow's stomach. "How many months is it?" "Five months." "Very big!" "twin." "Nightmare." Kai smiled. Mo Luo also smiled, "What about you, do you have a baby?" "Four." She smiled softly, "Four teenage bastards make me feel like I'm living in hell." "I've been thinking about you recently. I heard about your John. I'm so crazy." "He's not my John—" Kay interrupted her, "Yes, he is." "No, no, it has nothing to do with me." "Hey, he belongs to your family. If it belongs to your family, it belongs to your family." Kai raised his head and looked at the brightly lit house on the road, hesitating, "Where—er—what's the situation there?" Moreau shouldn't have said anything, but she knew and trusted Kay. "Disfigured." She pointed to her face. "Sarah?" "Yes." Kai's brow furrowed suddenly, and she looked down, "Holy God." "You know her?" "yes." "What kind of person is she?" Kay still bowed her head. "It's friendly and quiet," she smiled slightly. "Her mother is crazy, like a brush." Moreau saw a pea-sized teardrop on Kay's face, and she thought it was rain until she saw another.It dawned on her that Kai didn't just know the woman, they might even be friends.She reached out and put her hand on Kay's shoulder, as if trying to catch her mistake, "I'm sorry." Embarrassed, Kay walked away from Moreau and said with his head down, "No, it's okay, it's not—" "I didn't expect you to be very close." Kai turned around guiltily, "It's not what you think, I just... love to cry, it's really sad that the girl died." She turned away, plodding, leaning against a tree, and Moreau watched her go away. "See you tomorrow?" "Yes." Kay replied loudly. Under the warm streetlight, Kay stretched a hand behind his head and scratched his long neck with a curled index finger.Moreau held her breath, the pose so familiar, like her own, only from a different time, a softer one; there were many angry young girls with faults and uncertainties Future, but it feels so warm. It dawned on Morrow: Kay was right, Sarah Errol wasn't just a smashed jigsaw puzzle, she was a young girl, and she died. This is sad.