A Game of Proof

the second page as though he wanted to rip the information out of it with his fingers. Offensive information which ought not be there at all.

The others watched him silently. Mike Candor spoke first.

‘Bad news, sir?’

Churchill looked up at the ceiling, ignoring them all.

‘Wonderful,’ he said at last. ‘Don’t these blasted scientists always let you down just when you need them most!’ He thrust the paper at Mike. ‘Here. Read it for yourself.’

Mike read the sheets carefully, and then passed them to Harry. ‘It’s the DNA analysis of those three hair samples — you know, the ones from inside the balaclava; the one left by Karen Whitaker’s attacker; and the ones we took from Simon Newby.’

‘Yes,’ Tracy prompted. ‘And?’

‘Well, the good news is that the hairs in the balaclava match the one left by Whitaker’s attacker with a certainty of several million to one. Which proves that whoever attacked Whitaker wore that hood. The bad news is that neither the Whitaker hair nor the ones in the hood match the sample we took from Simon.’

‘Simon didn’t attack Whitaker?’ Tracy’s voice reflected her surprise. ‘So who did?’

‘Well, there’s the mystery,’ said Harry. ‘We said it wasn’t Gary Harker because we checked that already, but get to this! There were two sets of hairs in the balaclava, not just one!’

‘Two?’

‘Yes. A lot of fair hairs and some brown ones. And the brown ones match the sample we sent them from Gary last year. They’re his! Only it was a fair hair we found on Whitaker’s tape, wasn’t it?’

Tracy nodded. ‘Which meant Gary couldn’t have done it. So we dropped the charges.’

Terry turned to Churchill, who was pacing up and down morosely, his hands in his packets. ‘You never told me there were any brown hairs in that hood, sir.’

‘No, well I didn’t know, did I? All I saw were fair hairs.’

‘So what this does prove,’ Terry continued belligerently. ‘Is that all this about Harker not raping Sharon is a load of cock. He did rape her, after all. Wearing that hood.’

‘Yes, well, it’s a pity you didn’t get a conviction then, isn’t it?’ Churchill scowled.

‘Let me see that,’ said Terry, taking the report from Harry. ‘It seems to me this, together with Mrs Slingsby’s evidence, puts Simon in the clear, doesn’t it? At least as far as Maria Clayton and Karen Whitaker are concerned. He had no connection with either of them.’

‘No,’ Churchill agreed gloomily. ‘There’s more than one villain after all, it seems.’ He thumped the wall, sending several sheets of paper fluttering from the noticeboard. ‘Shit!’

The day was starting well, Terry thought, enjoying his boss’s discomfiture. The mystery was no clearer than before, but his interest in it was beginning to revive.

In his office, Terry put his feet up and thought. Both he and Churchill, it seemed, had been wrong. They had both believed that all these crimes were committed by one person. He had believed that person was Gary, Churchill that it was Simon. But the evidence supported neither of them.

Gary must have raped Sharon — his hairs in the hood, added to all the other evidence, made that more certain than ever. But the reddish fair hairs in the hood suggested that someone else had attacked Karen Whitaker; someone who was neither Simon nor Gary. And the evidence for Gary murdering Maria Clayton was no better than it had ever been. And the idea that Gary had killed Jasmine seemed even more remote; he had no motive, there was no evidence that he’d been anywhere near her that night.

And it seemed neither Gary nor Simon had attacked Helen Steersby

On the other hand there was compelling evidence that Gary had raped Sharon and that Simon had murdered Jasmine. Both were, in a sense, crimes of passion — the assailants well known to their victims, the motive a form of violent vengeance.

Three facts still worried Terry. The fact that Gary and Simon knew each other. The fact that at least one, and possibly two assaults had been committed by neither of them. And the fact that the evidence which proved this had been found in a shed owned by one of them, inside a balaclava hood used by the other.

He puzzled over this for an hour without getting anywhere. Then he remembered his promise to tell Sarah when the DNA results came in. For her, clearly, it would be a kindness, but it was risky, all the same. It was Churchill’s case; for Terry to anticipate him might well be construed as a disciplinary offence.

But there was such a thing as compassion, too. He decided to ring her from home tonight.

‘So he’s out of the frame for all these other cases. You should be pleased.’

‘Because my son’s no longer suspected of being a serial killer? Oh, I am, Terry, I am.’

The ironic edge to Sarah’s voice couldn’t disguise her relief about the DNA results, and the result of his interview with Ann Slingsby. But as usual, her mind was on to the next thing.

‘So if you admit you were wrong about this, maybe you’re wrong about Jasmine, too?’

‘That’s not my case, Sarah.’

‘Well, your DCI Churchill, then. Is he having second thoughts?’

‘Not about that, no. Like me, he thinks we may have been mistaken to see these crimes as part of a series. But he still thinks he has enough evidence to convict Simon for the murder of Jasmine. I imagine he’s treating it as a crime of passion again, just as he did at the beginning.’

‘So the prosecution’s still going ahead?’

‘Yes.’

‘Even though it could have been Gary? You said so yourself, remember?’

‘Yes, well that’s the other piece of bad news, I’m afraid. I’ve checked his alibi for the night of Jasmine’s death and for once it seems to add up. Five witnesses saw him in the private room of the Lighthorseman until after midnight, celebrating his acquittal. I’m sorry, Sarah.’

‘Oh.’ There was a pause. In the lounge, Terry could hear Trude reading to his daughters. ‘But you say Gary’s hair was in the balaclava too,’ Sarah resumed thoughtfully, remembering the night he had attacked her in the shed.

‘Yes. Which is more proof that he raped Sharon, if we needed it.’

There was a silence on the other end of the phone.

‘The jury decided on the evidence presented to them at the time, Terry. Which is less than we know now.’

‘And that’s my fault, is that what you’re saying?’

‘I’m not saying anything. Look, we’re neither of us perfect, but what concerns me is Simon’s defence. You said yourself you didn’t believe he could have killed Jasmine.’

This time, the silence came from Terry’s end. With every second, Sarah’s pain increased.

‘Terry?’

‘What I think I said was, I didn’t believe he was the type to attack a range of women. I’ve been proved right on that. But for a single attack on his girlfriend, perhaps in jealous rage …’

Moments like this, Terry thought, are crueller over the telephone. Her voice came back at him tinny, bitter, distant. ‘I thought you were on my side, Terry.’

‘I’m on the side of the truth. I have to be. That’s my job.’

‘And I’m just Simon’s mother, which makes me blind, I suppose. Look, just because Gary didn’t do it, it doesn’t mean that Simon did. What about David Brodie, Terry? He had a motive — jealousy, because Jasmine was two-timing him with Simon. Dozens of times, it seems.’

‘Have you met him, Sarah? He’s a nurse — clean, house-trained, inoffensive …’

‘So was Dr Crippen, probably.’

‘Yes, but he used poison, not a knife. Jasmine was a big girl, athletic, probably stronger than him …’

‘Jealousy can fire people up,’ said Sarah desperately. ‘What if I told you I had a witness who saw this David Brodie full of anger, stalking off to find Jasmine a few hours before her death?’

‘Then I’d suggest you investigate further,’ said Terry slowly. ‘Tell Churchill, if you’re sure it adds up to something. In the meantime he’s still got the blood on the shoes and the knife, and the semen, and the fact that Simon was the last person to be seen with her before he ran off to Scarborough. He’s dead set on it, Sarah. It’s a strong case to upset with a little bit of incidental jealousy.’