Cooper stood numbed with surprise, his right hand pushed into his pocket, immobile. His mind had come to a halt, no instincts sprang up to tell him what to do. The last thing he
1 O 1 O
had been expecting was that he would die here, in the poacher’s hut, on a threadbare carpet gritty with soil and fragments of stale food.
Then Diane Fry came into view. She was moving at twice the speed of Sherratt. Her left foot lashed out in a straight-legged sideways kick that impacted with Sherratt’s wrist and knocked the rifle out of his hands towards the wall of the hut. Even before the gun had landed, she regained her footing, shifted her balance and was striking a closed-fist rising blow to his solar plexus. Sherratt folded backwards into the table, then collapsed face down on to the floor and vomited on the carpet. Fry stepped back to avoid the mess.
‘You don’t have to say anything unless you wish to do so, but what you say may be given in evidence,’ she said.
‘Shit,’ said Cooper.
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Fry dug into her pockets and pulled out her kwik-cuft’s and her mobile phone.
‘I suppose 1 could have called in first and waited for the back-up,’ she said. ‘But, like I said, there arc times.’
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15
out where are they, sir?’
‘We don’t know exactly. Somewhere on the Pennine Way, we think.’
‘But that’s two hundred and fifty miles long.’
‘And there are twenty-two of them, apparently,’ said DCI Tailby. ‘And they’ve all got to be interviewed. Paul?’
DI Hitchens wras sitting next to Tailby at the head of the briefing room. He seemed to be moving into a central position again in the Vernon enquiry.
‘The hikers seen on the Eden Valley Trail are all students from Newcastle on a week’s walking holiday. Apparently, they stayed overnight on Saturday at the camping barn at Hathersage, intending to reach the start of the Pennine Way via Barber Booth sometime on Sunday. But nearly four days have elapsed, and we estimate they will be somewhere in West or North Yorkshire by now. The local police are trying to locate them for us.’
Tailby nodded. ‘DI Hitchens is in charge of this line of enquiry. When the students are located, he will travel to Yorkshire to interview them, accompanied by DC Fry.’
There was a faint trickle of comment, quickly hushed. Ben Cooper saw the DI look round and grin at Fry.
‘Mr and Mrs Vernon are coming in today to film their television appeal, which will be broadcast later,’ said Tailby. ‘We are, of course, hopeful of some results from the public.’ He smiled to himself as he said it — a small, self-mocking smile,
‘ o ‘
as he thought of the phone calls that would certainly pour in from the cranks and the eccentrics, the over- zealous and the neurotic, the well-intentioned but mistaken, and the sad, sad cases desperate for a bit of attention. From among the hundreds
there might, though, be one or two calls that would provide
t? ‘ o ‘ r
vital help.
The DCI looked down at his checklist. ‘Have we anything on Daniel Vernon vet? Who’s on that?’
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A burly DC leaning against the side wall raised a hand in acknowledgement.
‘Yes, Weenink?’
‘I checked with his faculty at Exeter University. Vernon is about to start the second year of the political science course. It’s social dialectics this term, apparently. I always thought that was a sort of sexual disease.’ Weenink waited for the expected laughs, smirking as he thrust his hands into his pockets and slouched more casually. ‘Term doesn’t start for another two weeks, but the new intake, the first years, arrive before that to register and find their way about, get fixed up with digs, all that sort of thing.’
‘But Daniel Vernon is a second-year student,’ said Tailby impatiently.
‘He’s a buddy,’ responded Weenink.
‘What?’
‘Some of the established students turn up early to give advice to the newcomers. Some of the kids turn up at university on their own and they’ve never been away from home before. The older ones befriend them. They call them buddies.’
‘You found this out from the faculty?’
‘From the Students’ Union. Vernon checked in there on Saturday morning and worked over the weekend meeting new students. The Union president remembers him being called away sometime Monday night.’
‘And he arrived home on Tuesday? How? Has he a car? Did he use the train?’
Weenink shrugged. ‘Don’t know, sir.’
‘I’d like you to concentrate on pinning his movements down precisely,’ said Tailby. The need to know whether we can eliminate Daniel Vernon from the enquiry. Laura Vernon was seen talking to a young man in the garden at the Mount just before she disappeared on Saturday night. That could just as easily have been Daniel as any boyfriend, unless he has a solid alibi for the period.’ He waited for Weenink to nod his understanding. ‘Meanwhile, as you all know, we have Lee Sherratt in custody, thanks to a bit of initiative last night by DCs Cooper and Fry.’
