“Is that your priority?”
The DCI bristles, opening his mouth and closing it again, his lips like thin lines.
“I’m not here to judge anyone,” I say. “I’m reviewing the evidence not the investigation.”
Drury grunts, unconvinced.
The landscape has changed since the girls went missing. The science has improved. Offenders will have grown complacent. People will have forgotten their motive for lying. Lovers give alibis but ex-lovers take them back. I could make these arguments, but I doubt if Drury will listen. He’s protecting his patch and the reputations of his colleagues.
“I’ll probably regret this, Professor, but I’m going to give you full access. Don’t turn this into a witch hunt. What do you need?”
“I want to visit the farmhouse again.”
“Fine.”
“I’ll need the files from the original investigation,” I say. “Statements. Timelines. Phone wheels.”
“You’re talking about more than three thousand statements.”
“I’ll get some help.”
Drury swallows something spiky and hard. “Tell Grievous what you need.”
“I also want to re-interview some of the original witnesses. Talk to the families, filter out some of the biases.”
“You think they lied?”
“People edit out the negatives when they lose someone they love. You heard Alice McBain talk about her daughter. I need to learn everything I can about Natasha and Piper. What sort of girls were they? Were they streetwise, or naive, aggressive or compliant, introverts or extroverts? Did they have boyfriends or ex-boyfriends? Were they sexually promiscuous?”
“You’re suggesting these girls were somehow complicit?”
“I’m saying that some women-even young ones-draw attention to themselves. Some are sexually provocative, deliberately or unwittingly. Others are more self-effacing. I need to know Natasha and Piper as though they were sitting opposite me. By knowing them, I can learn why they were chosen-”
“You think they were chosen?”
“Yes.”
Drury breathes deeply, loosening his shoulders, staring at me.
“I’ve met people like you before, Professor. You study crime scenes and photographs, thinking you can commune with the killer; trying to understand the whys and the wherefores. Me? I don’t care about knowing the bastard. I just want to catch him.”
Two dozen detectives are gathered in a rough circle, sitting on desks and chairs. They share the same kind of intimacy as soldiers and emergency workers-friendships forged in the heat of battle or during long shifts doing dirty and dangerous work. Not elitist or self-anointed, just tight.
Drury calls for their attention.
“Listen up, lads. Some of you may have heard a rumor about the unidentified white female whose body was found after the blizzard. We now have a positive ID. Her name was Natasha McBain.”
The air pressure in the room has suddenly changed, as though someone has opened a distant door letting a cold wind blow through the corridors.
“I am now going to confirm something else,” continues Drury. “The rumors stop now! Nobody-and I repeat, nobody — talks to the media. I’m declaring a total news blackout on this case. Whatever you get asked, the answer is ‘no comment.’ I don’t care if it’s your wife asking the question, you say nothing. Is that understood?”
Nobody interrupts.
“I want to know where Natasha McBain has been for the last three years. Go back over the files. Names. Dates. Places. I want a full list of suspects from the first investigation. Where are they now? What have they been doing?
“We’re going to search the crime scenes again-the farmhouse and the lakes. Uniformed officers and civilian volunteers are being bused in within the hour. The dog squad will try to pick up the scent using Natasha’s clothes. Nobody mentions her name. As far as anyone is concerned we’re still dealing with an unidentified white female.”
A voice from the back: “What about Augie Shaw?”
“He’s going nowhere. Find out if he knew Natasha McBain or Piper Hadley.”
“And the Heymans?”
“Victims in one crime, suspects in another-it’s not the first time.” The DCI looks at Casey. “What about the prints at the farmhouse?”
“We pulled sixty decent samples from the house and have eliminated all but fourteen of them.”
“Augie Shaw?”
“A palm print in the kitchen.”
“Anything upstairs.”
“There’s a partial on the bedroom door.”
“Find out who else has been in the house in the past month. Tradesmen. Friends. Family. What about the semen stains?”
“DNA results will take another two days. The daughter says her parents had separate bedrooms and weren’t sleeping together.”
“Kids don’t know everything. Maybe they were loved up behind her back.”
Another detective speaks. “There were traces of diluted blood on the broken bathroom window and in the kitchen sink. We’ll have to wait for the results.”
Drury looks at another detective. “What about the family finances?”
“A mortgage. Manageable.”
“Good.” Drury slaps a folder against his thigh. “At the behest of the chief constable, we are to welcome back Professor O’Loughlin. He is to be afforded every reasonable assistance but don’t get carried away with his theories. We’re going to solve this case through good, solid detective work, by knocking on doors and interviewing witnesses.”
Point made, Drury doesn’t look at me.
“I’m splitting the task force. DS Casey will continue to run the investigation into the double murder at the farmhouse. I’ll be in charge of the Natasha McBain investigation, but overseeing both.”
He rattles off names, assigning detectives their new roles.
“Let’s do this,” he says, turning and leaving quickly, only letting his mask slip when he reaches the corridor. I see the glaze of uncertainty dulling his eyes like Vaseline smeared on a lens.
Sometimes I wonder why detectives do this work. What pleasure is there in it? Even the satisfaction of solving a case just means another one is waiting. There is never a cessation of hostilities or a negotiated truce, never ultimate victory.
Eventually, the eternal nature of the struggle wears them down-the circle of cause and effect, crime and punishment, guilt and innocence, victims and perpetrators. You don’t stop feeling-you just wish you could.
I was born on Mother’s Day and Mum used to say I was the best Mother’s Day present in the world. She said things like that when other people could hear her, but never when it was just me listening.
We didn’t talk. We competed. We argued. We loved each other. But we hated each other too.
My mother was the world champion at making smiley comments about my hair or my weight or my bra size, slicing and dicing my self-confidence. And she was never happier than when dancing through the tulip fields of the bleeding obvious.
Dad would tell me not to get so bent out of shape, but I was born bent out of shape. I came into the world backwards in a breech birth. Whales breach and so do babies.
Mum is taller than my dad but really skinny. She has these amazing green eyes and eyelashes that look like they’re false but they’re not.
People say she’s beautiful and talk about Dad “punching above his weight” when he married her, but I think he could have done much better. He could have married someone who didn’t care so much about money and what other people thought.
My dad is the nicest person you’ll ever meet. Whenever he’s disappointed in me he has this way of sagging and letting out a long sigh, as if someone has pulled out his plug and he’s crumpling like a bouncy castle at the end of a party. He would die of disappointment rather than raise a finger against me.
Mum used to complain when he spoiled me and Dad always agreed with her before winking at me.