were tied behind his back. Not cruelly constricting, not so that the rope cut into his flesh, but taut enough so that he could not free himself. The other end of the rope had been tied to an old-fashioned metal radiator beside him. There was no heat coming from the radiator but he had his warm coat on and his jumper with the picture of a giraffe on it underneath and although he was cold he wasn’t shivering because of that.
He was shivering with fear.
The man sitting in the chair across the room and watching him had flat black lifeless eyes. A small amount of saliva trickled from the corner of his mouth and he slowly raised a hand to wipe it away, the thick veins standing proud from the liver-spotted skin like worms.
The boy would have screamed had he been able to, but a silk scarf had been tied around his head and mouth, forcing his lips and teeth apart and rendering him mute.
He looked down at his feet, one of them still clad in a black and white trainer, the other in a sock that had once been bright red but was now damp with rainwater and spattered with mud. He made a small whimpering sound and closed his eyes as if to dream what was happening away.
The man watched him for a moment longer and then the corners of his mouth moved upwards slightly. It might have been a smile.
The small boy kept his eyes shut, humming in his head to drown out the sound of approaching footsteps.
‘
*
Delaney stood by the doorway, watching as DI Duncton held up the plastic evidence bag with the single trainer in it. Rosemary Woods already had very pale skin but what colour she had leached from her face as she looked at the bag, her green eyes widening with the horror of what it signified.
‘Is it his, Mrs Woods?’ asked Detective Inspector Duncton.
The woman swallowed and nodded, barely able to speak.
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Oh my God.’
She teetered on her heels and Sally Cartwright quickly crossed to take the tall woman’s arm.
‘Oh my God,’ she said again, stumbling backwards to sit back on the sofa.
Her father came in and stood beside Delaney, turning the flat cap in his hands like a guilty schoolboy, his eyes downcast.
His daughter looked up at him, spots of colour returning to her cheeks now. ‘What the hell have you done, Dad?’
Graham Harper looked at her for a moment or two, his eyes wet with grief. He mumbled something inaudible and left the room.
Rosemary Woods looked over at Delaney. ‘He’s dead, isn’t he?’
Delaney shook his head. ‘It’s still very early yet. We’re only talking a matter of hours.’
‘He was on the television this morning.’
‘I’m sorry?’ Delaney asked, puzzled.
‘Peter Garnier.’ She pointed to the television set in the corner. ‘He was on there this morning. I made him change channels. Archie wanted the cartoons and I couldn’t bear to look at that man’s face.’
Delaney nodded sympathetically.
‘He’s taken my son, hasn’t he? That man has got my son.’
‘Peter Garnier is locked up safe and secure in prison,’ said Detective Inspector Duncton.
The woman ignored him. Her stare was fixed on Delaney. ‘Why is he doing this? Why now? Why my boy?’
Delaney shook his head. ‘We don’t know what has happened yet, Mrs Woods. I know you are concerned and you have every right to be feeling the way you do right now. But we have every available person out there looking for your boy. And we will find him. I can promise you that.’
Duncton glared reprovingly at him as Delaney walked out the room, but it had as much effect as throwing a ping-pong ball would have had stopping a determined rhinoceros.
Delaney walked down the hallway to the kitchen that lay at the end of it. It was a kitchen that had been designed sometime in the 1950s and hadn’t been updated since. It was clean if not exactly clutter-free. A butler- style sink with a curtain under it stood beneath a double window looking out onto a long back garden.
Graham Harper was filling a metal kettle from the tap. His hands were shaking as though the weight were too much for him to hold. Maybe that was the case, thought Delaney, as Harper put it rattling onto a small gas stove and lit the ring beneath it: the old man looked as though he was made of skin and bone and air.
‘I need to ask you a few questions,’ Delaney said.
Graham Harper spun round, startled. Delaney worried for a moment that he was going to drop dead of a heart attack because of the way he stared at him. He stood there for a moment or two as if he was really scrutinising him, and then his eyes became mobile, darting left and right as though he’d been suddenly frightened. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘I’m a policeman, remember?’ said Delaney, puzzled at the shift in the old man’s attitude, wondering suddenly if maybe he had dementia issues. ‘We were just down at your allotment.’
The old man looked at him for a moment or two longer and then blinked as if coming out of dream.
‘Yes, of course.’ He opened the cupboard and brought out some tea bags.
