The Circle

He shrugged. 'I checked all the evidence bags, and it isn't among them.'

'Was it ever?'

'Pardon?'

'Was the picture of Blacker and the other man ever removed from the bedroom and bagged up?'

Now he looked over her head, as if the strip lighting had a fascination for him. 'I thought it was. Can't be a hundred per cent certain.'

'Didn't it interest you as the senior investigator?'

'I was focusing on the seat of the fire downstairs.'

'The front door?'

'Yes.'

'And when you finished focusing downstairs did you look in the bedroom?'

'Sure, and we collected a lot of stuff, like his sleeping tablets and the clothes he'd been wearing.'

'They were hanging over the chair?'

'Right. You can see them on the video. It was taken before we disturbed anything. You can see the clothes if you want. His wallet. His credit cards.'

'Are we on the same wavelength, Johnny? Just now, all I want to see is that photo.'

'I get you. I'm not being stroppy. I was at my desk at eight this morning.'

Hen had shown up closer to nine thirty. 'Early riser?'

'No. I need the alarm to wake me at six thirty. I fit in my swim before I get here. I've always believed in leading by example.'

She ignored the taunt. 'Is it possible it's still hanging on the wall in what's left of the cottage?'

'I suppose it could be.'

'Then I suggest you retrieve it pretty fast and bring it here.' After he'd gone she turned to Stella. 'What a bullshitter. I asked him earlier if we had it and he told me we did.'

'In fairness, guv, he wasn't quite so categorical as that. You asked him if it was bagged up and he said it must have been.'

'Shifting the blame. He'll come down like a ton of bricks on some hapless scene-of-crime officer. Leading by example. So far, I'm not impressed with our Mr Cherry.' She called across the incident room, over the heads of the civilian staff entering data into computers, 'DC Humphreys.'

A startled face surfaced. 'Ma'am?'

''Guv' will do, thank you. How many of the writers' circle have you contacted about the meeting?'

'All but three. . guv.'

'And who are they — the ones you haven't reached?'

'Zach Beale. He hasn't turned up at work yet. And Naomi and Basil Green. I left a message on their answerphone.'

'Everyone else is signed up?'

'Yes, guv.'

'Chase up the Greens, then. And Zach.'

Another officer called. 'For you, guv.' He held up a phone. 'Forensics.'

Hen put it to her ear. 'You've got results for me?'

'Is this DCI Mallin?'

'It is.'

'Pauline Cooper, forensic odontologist, concerning the remains found in the fire in number seven, Tower Street.'

'Yes?'

'I was asked to compare the teeth of the deceased with the dental records of Miss Amelia Snow.'

'And?'

'As I'm sure you're aware, the skull recovered from the fire was severely burned and disintegrating in places but the jawbones were intact. Teeth withstand intense heat better than any other parts of the body. These were in good enough condition for me to make a comparison. I'm satisfied that we have a match with the records of Miss Snow. The number and positioning of the fillings — and there are eight — and two extractions, are more than sufficient statistically to establish identity beyond reasonable doubt.'

'I can't tell you how grateful I am,' Hen said. 'There wasn't much else to go on.'

Ms Cooper wasn't the chatty sort. It seemed to be a point of pride in the Forensic Science Service that they never revealed satisfaction in work well done, but this was a human being on the end of the line, not a cipher, and she deserved her pat on the back.

But whatever she privately thought, Ms Cooper was unemotional to the end. 'I'll send you the written report shortly and a copy will go to the coroner. Someone else wishes to speak to you now. Hold on and I'll transfer you.'

Hen put her hand over the mouthpiece and said to Stella, 'What did I do to deserve this? Two forensic reports in one call.'

This one announced himself as the gas chromatographist, but for Hen's purposes he was the ash man, the fellow who'd sifted through the remains at the seats of all three fires. He started to explain how he went about separating components of hydrocarbons, but Hen asked him to cut to the chase.

'You want to know if the fires appear to have been started using the same materials?'

'In a nutshell, yes.'

'Fire number one, at the cottage on the Selsey Road, employed a liquid accelerant and saturated rags, and this appears to have been the case with the second and third fires, at the boat house and Tower Street. The agent was gasoline in all three cases, leaded gasoline. So the answer — in a nutshell — is yes.'

'Petrol?'

'Of course it vaporises quickly, but the fact that it was leaded was useful. You have a chance of measuring the lead content. We recovered enough through seepage to make comparisons and there's no doubt all three fires employed a similar grade with a good correspondence of the lead.'

'So we have a serial arsonist?'

'I just report our findings, chief inspector.'

'Okay, and it's up to me to interpret them. We have a serial arsonist.' After she'd thanked him, Hen turned back to Stella. 'You heard my side of it? Let's start getting this mess unscrambled, Stell. The guy on remand, Maurice McDade, has to be released a.s.a.p. and we'll need a magistrate's order. He's the only one of the circle who can't be the arsonist.'

Naomi had arranged to meet Zach in St Martin's tea rooms, a low-beamed seventeenth-century building reached from North Street by way of a passage called the Crooked S. Most patrons came for the tea, coffee and pastries, pricy but prizewinning, and unequalled in the city. Some may have been drawn by the beautiful waitresses, also unequalled. Naomi, however, had picked the place for its dimly lit interior and honeycomb layout, ideal for people not wanting to be observed. She'd chosen a table screened by tall settles and she and Zach sat close to the wall and facing each other. The secrecy suited Zach. He'd told his boss in the record shop that he was down with flu.

'What we've got now,' Naomi said, 'is a classic murder plot.'

'I guess,' Zach said,

'There's no guessing about it. Two deaths and a near death all connected with the circle. You and I are wonderfully placed.'

'I'm not so sure of that.'

'You're not so sure of anything this morning.'

'Wonderfully placed to get murdered.'

He could have been Basil, talking like that. Naomi didn't care for it. 'Get a grip, man. I'm talking about our e- book. Imagination and investigation striding side by side. You've started work, I hope?'

'I put down a few ideas.'

'Not on the website, you haven't.'

'I'm not ready for that yet'

'Work in progress, man. It doesn't have to be perfect. I'll hear these ideas, anyway.'