Page 68 of Watching You
‘We need to see that body,’ Baarda said.
‘Any word on where Karl might be?’ Salter asked.
‘Apparently he was last here the same day, and he hasn’t been back since that anyone’s noticed.’
‘Thank you, constable,’ Salter said. ‘Well, that’s convenient. His father dies, he packs a bag, no one to look after any more. What do you think?’
Baarda walked up to get a closer look at Karl in the photo. ‘I think he killed his father because he had no intent of ever coming back here. And that means he’s either left the country because he doesn’t want to get caught for the things he’s already done, or he’s got something else in store and doesn’t want to be interrupted before he can do it.’
‘I agree,’ Salter said. ‘I’ll have a scenes of crime unit go through everything. What’s your priority?’
‘Getting an up-to-date photo of his face. DVLA will have one or maybe the passport office if there’s nothing here. See if we can find his mobile number and get a trace on it. I want Nate Carlisle inspecting Mr Smith’s body for signs of foul play. Also a number plate, see if we can figure out where his car is, and a ports alert throughout the UK.’
‘On it,’ Salter said. ‘And the carer mentioned something about his mother, who’s deceased. The carer thought Karl used to talk to her, even argue with her sometimes. He sounds delusional.’
‘Let’s see what else we can find,’ Baarda said, heading for the staircase and taking care to touch as little as possible on the way.
The bathroom door was wide open.
‘No toothbrush or toothpaste there,’ he noted. ‘Karl is definitely taking a trip.’
Next was Karl’s room, bed unmade, drawers open. Baarda moved on. Next door was a bedroom with no bed in it, anda single wardrobe with a few pairs of trousers and a couple of shirts. At the far end of the upstairs hallway was one last bedroom. Baarda pushed open the door and immediately covered his nose and mouth with his hand.
Everything was yellow, from the wallpaper to the sheets and curtains, to the stained mirror.
‘It’s like a pub taproom from the 1970s,’ Baarda said. ‘It must have been hard to move on when they were able to smell this room every day.’ He walked to a dusty pile of paperwork on the rickety bedside table, picked up a letter and opened it up, reading it from top to bottom before turning to Salter.
‘What is it?’ she asked.
‘It’s the end of a complaints process,’ Baarda said quietly. ‘The board at St Columba hospital concluded that there had been no negligence or mistreatment of Barbara Smith, and that everything possible had been done to attempt to save her life. They were notifying Karl that his complaint against the hospital would not be upheld and they suggested that if he felt the need to take it further, he should get independent legal advice. They’ve also asked that he stay away from the hospital unless he had a legitimate medical reason for being there, and that any further contact should be made only through lawyers. Sounds like he was causing them something of a problem.’
‘So maybe that’s what he was doing there,’ Salter said. ‘It was a vendetta, and he was collecting victims along the way.’
‘We should go straight to St Columba’s. I want to speak with whoever handled this complaint and I want immediate access to the files. I’ll call Connie and Midnight from the car. If Karl Smith isn’t there already, I’m sure whatever he has planned involves someone from the hospital. We just need to figure out who.’
Chapter 45
19 June
‘Midnight? You still there?’ Connie asked.
‘Give me a minute,’ Midnight said. ‘The electronic file is vast. I’m using AI to strip out anything that looks procedural and get me to the bones of it. Is Baarda not with you?’
‘He’s at St Columba’s which we’ve made a temporary command centre until we can locate the suspect. We’re lucky the hospital gave us access to the complaint file at all. Their first response was that it was privileged and we could only get it by court order or – get this – with Karl Smith’s consent.’
‘So how did you get it?’ Midnight was tapping keys furiously as she spoke.
‘I let Superintendent Overbeck handle it. She knows all sorts of people, and they tend to be deeply afraid of her, which is questionable ethically but useful when it really matters. I suspect she called in a favour with a member of the hospital board.’
‘Okay, well this is what the superintendent got you. I’ll summarise. Karl Smith lodged a complaint following the death of his mother during surgery. She was taken to St Columba’s byambulance having collapsed. Paramedics confirmed that she’d had a coronary event. Long section of medical history here. Okay, she was operated on and efforts were made to save her but her heart muscle and arteries had suffered severe damage. Attempts were made to revive her, but there was literally no route for repair of the heart muscle. A full review of her medical history was undertaken and a postmortem was performed.’
‘What did that find?’ Connie asked.
‘Hold on, let me take a look. That’s in a separate folder. Here we go. Postmortem undertaken by Dr Ailsa Lambert.’
Connie sighed. ‘She was Nate Carlisle’s predecessor. I met her,’ she said. ‘Wonderful woman.’
‘I can tell – the notes are incredibly thorough. The conclusion was that not only had it been the original heart attack that killed Barbara Smith, but that there would have been literally nothing surgery could have achieved. In spite of that, the surgical team clearly tried for a sustained period to find a way forward.’
