Page 21 of The Scene of the Crime

He looked around him. ‘This place is something else, all mod cons and top-of-the-range stuff . . . must have cost a bloody fortune.’

‘Just over four million a year ago,’ Jessica told him.

‘How’d you know that?’

‘Looked the address up on Rightmove. It gives you the sales history.’

He whistled. ‘The wine business must be doing well.’ She showed him the photos of the striation marks on the safe. ‘Could be from a jemmy,’ he said. ‘Lots of detail, which is good. Moving the safe won’t be easy, though. It must weigh over 200 kilos.’

‘You’re right. But the big question is, what was inside it?’

‘Cash and jewellery is what you’d normally expect,’ Taff said.

‘Makes me wonder if the intruder already knew it was down here,’ Jessica said as she stood by the bay window and lookedup towards the street. ‘If the assailant had scoped the house out first, they could have seen the safe through the window. Can you please get me some nylon accelerant bags from the van?’

Taff, wondering if he was missing something, took a few good sniffs but couldn’t smell any form of accelerant. Jessica saw his quizzical expression. ‘The safe shelves are lined with carpet. I’m going to remove it and put them in the nylon bags to preserve any drugs residue for testing at the lab.’

‘You think De Klerk was dealing drugs?’

‘I don’t know, but we have to cover every possibility. How’s Diane getting on in the kitchen?’

‘She’s still working on it. Chapman is helping her. Do you want me to video and photograph the rear garden?’

‘Yes, please.’

Taff started to leave, then turned around. ‘There’s a laptop on the kitchen table. I’ll take it for fingerprinting and a digital examination.’

‘Fingerprinting is fine, but if it’s the victim’s, we might need his permission or a warrant to examine it. There’s a technical support section at the lab. We’ll have to ask them to do it as none of us are experienced enough in that field of forensics,’ Jessica added.

Taff left, and Jessica opened the filing cabinet. Looking through the contents, she removed an A4 folder labelled ‘J & M cars’. Inside were the registration and insurance documents for the De Klerks’ vehicles. She removed the registration document for the Range Rover, photographed it and put it in a property bag for DI Chapman. There was another folder labelled ‘passports and travel docs’. Looking inside, she only found Johan De Klerk’s South African passport. Looking at his date of birth, she saw he had just turned thirty-eight. She took a photo of the passport, put it in the bag with the car documents and flicked through the other folders in the cabinet for anything elseof interest. She found a document relating to De Klerk’s Rolex watch, with the make and serial number, which she bagged so the details could be circulated on the stolen property index. Taff returned briefly to give her the nylon bags, and after putting the safe carpets in them, Jessica sat in one of the cinema chairs to make more notes on her iPad.

In the kitchen, Diane was setting up a large digital camera on a tripod, while Chapman was admiring the eight-seater glass dining table and L-shaped sofa with a large TV on the wall. Natural light flowed through the skylights and sliding doors leading onto a stone-paved patio.

‘Hasn’t Taff already done the photography and video in here?’ he asked.

‘Yes, but this is a Faro 3D laser scanner with a high-resolution DSLR. The photos are stitched to the scan using 3D construction software. I can—’

He held his hands up. ‘Slow down . . . I haven’t a clue what you’re talking about.’

‘Sorry, in layman’s terms, it creates the precise measurements of blood spatter patterns for computer analysis. I can then reconstruct the scene and determine the nature and direction of the attack.’

‘Now I get it.’ He looked around. ‘Well, there’s enough blood to fill a bath, so you have plenty to work on.’

‘We used to run bits of string from points at which blood droplets impact to a pre-calculated directional angle converging at the area of origin—’

‘Now I know you’re taking the piss,’ he said, wagging his finger.

‘The string bit is true. But using the Faro is much quicker and more accurate. A 3D reconstruction is also better for a jury to look at, as it allows them to better understand my blood pattern analysis. That said, the blood spatter distribution in here isconfined to the area around the island, making it slightly easier to interpret visually.’

‘Enlighten me.’

‘I will when I’ve photographed and looked closer at the blood patterns.’

* * *

Having finished making notes of her observations in the study, Jessica decided to go upstairs. Standing up, she noticed a crystal tumbler in one of the front cinema seat cup-holders, and then, as she moved closer, saw another tumbler in the seat next to it. Both glasses were hand-engraved with images of what looked like South African wildlife; one was a water buffalo, and the other was a cheetah. She leaned over and sniffed each glass. One smelt different from the other, but she couldn’t tell what had been in them. She took some photos, went out and got some airtight plastic containers from the van, then came back and put the tumblers in them for fingerprint and DNA examination.

Before going to the main bedroom, Jessica quickly checked the others. There were two fully furnished double bedrooms with built-in cupboards and a chest of drawers, which did not appear to have been disturbed. The fourth bedroom, a single room, was only partially decorated. The floor was bare untreated wood, but the walls had safari animal print wallpaper. A cardboard boxed cot and nappy changing cabinet were propped up against the wall, which made Jessica wonder if Michelle De Klerk was pregnant. The thought that she and her unborn child might be dead was disturbing.