‘ Yes?’
‘ The original forensics report suggested that some attempt by Julie’s attacker had been made to clean her up after the assault… but yet the scientists involved had no difficulty in getting enough semen to carry out their analyses…’ murmured Steven, remembering what Carol Bain had told him.
‘ Which suggests that the cleaning had taken place before the rape, not after?’ said Susan.
‘ Which brings us back to earlier sexual activity,’ said Steven. ‘Would it be possible to amplify the ghost bands up and display them on their own?’
‘ The computer can do it. What are you thinking?’
‘ All the males in Julie Summers’ village were DNA fingerprinted at the time of the murder. We could run a second check against the new DNA fingerprint. See if we can find a second match.’
‘ If the boy was her own age he might not have been tested,’ said Susan.
‘ You’re right,’ said Steven. ‘It was probably over-sixteens but it’s worth a try.’
‘ Don’t ask me how long it’s going to take,’ said Susan. ‘I’ll be as quick as I can.’
Later, as Steven lay in bed, thinking about what Susan Givens had come up with, he had to admit that a rendezvous with a secret boyfriend would seem to be the most obvious explanation for the ghost bands on the gel if they really did indicate the presence of a second man’s semen. Julie would have washed afterwards and that would explain the relative difference in amounts. It would also account for the traces of soap found by the forensic lab in the samples taken at the time. Fine, except that he still felt sure that Julie didn’t have a boyfriend. The girl who emerged from the files hadn’t even reached the first, stumbling, fumbling, holding-hands stage of life. But there was something else bothering him, something that he couldn’t quite put his finger on; then he realised what it was. It was a small detail but one he now remembered. The lab had reported the presence of a small quantity of detergent, not soap. He got out of bed and searched through his file on the murder. He felt his pulse rate rise as he found the relevant section. The lab had not only reported the presence of detergent, it had also identified it as one he was familiar with, Virkon.
Steven paused, looking at the name and then moved on to the next paragraph where Ronald Lee had opined that the rapist had made some attempt to clean Julie up after the event. Lee had omitted to note that Virkon was a detergent used in microbiology labs. You wouldn’t find it under the sink in the bathroom or in domestic situation. This fact, which Lee had overlooked — perhaps because he was so familiar with the product himself — had just become highly significant. The chances of Julie Summers having washed herself with Virkon after having sex with some secret boyfriend were, in his estimation, virtually zero.
‘ So where the hell did the Virkon come from?’ he murmured as he got back into bed and turned off the light. His eyelids became heavy before any answer was forthcoming other than the possibility that Lee’s lab had contaminated the samples themselves. After a last check to see that he’d set the alarm on his watch as he planned on having an early start, he fell asleep, thinking that, on past performance, that was entirely possible.
The address he had for Charlotte Little was that of her parents who lived in the seaside town of Cromer on the north coast of Norfolk. Steven wondered about that as he turned off the main road south and slowed down for Norfolk country roads. He could understand her having gone back to her parents with the girls after the trauma of the trial and Little’s conviction but to still be there some eight years later, he found a bit odd. It was of course possible that her former marriage to a child killer had interfered with the formation of new relationships. He remembered the note in the file recording Charlotte’s refusal to appear in a television programme about the experiences of families of convicted offenders. But even at that, he thought she might have moved out into a place of her own. What details there were of the divorce settlement suggested that she had got everything.
Steven had never been to Cromer before but he liked what he saw. He had a soft spot for the English seaside resort and Cromer, on a bright spring day, seemed an excellent example. It even had a pier with a theatre on the end of it. It had beach huts and the traditional big hotel on the front — in this case the Hotel De Paris. He smiled and murmured, ‘Let not ambition mock the sons of weary toil.’
He had coffee and a sandwich in a cafe that afforded him a view of the sea and asked the proprietor where he might find Windsor Gardens.
‘ Along to your left when you leave. Up the hill and it’s the second on the right. Nice bungalows, they are.’
Steven found number 37 and rang the bell. An elderly woman with white hair and a fair complexion with rosy cheeks, which gave her a freshly scrubbed appearance, answered it. A bit like Snow White might look in her sixties, thought Steven.
‘ Mrs Grant? I wonder if I might have a word with your daughter, Charlotte Little?’
‘ Grant,’ replied the woman, her initial smile disappearing. ‘Charlotte Grant. Who are you? What do you want?’
Steven showed her his ID and the woman took the card, simultaneously putting on the spectacles that hung on a gold chain round her neck. She held them there, half on, half off.
‘ Sci-Med Inspectorate,’ she read. ‘What’s that all about? What do you lot want with Charlotte?’
‘ I have to ask her some questions. There’s nothing to be alarmed about, I assure you.’
‘ Charlotte’s not here at the moment. She’s walking the dog with my husband.’
‘ Then she’ll be back soon?’ said Steven hopefully.
‘ A look of resignation appeared on the woman’s face. ‘You’d better come in.’
She led the way through the hall, across the lounge and out into a small sunny conservatory with views across the nearby cliffs to the sea. Steven accepted the offer of tea and stood, admiring the view until the woman returned with a tray.
‘ I do hope you are not going to upset Charlotte. She’s had so much to contend with in life. I sometimes wonder how she’s kept her sanity.’
‘ It can’t have been easy for her,’ agreed Steven.
‘ My daughter is a very intelligent girl, Dr Dunbar, but when it comes to picking men…’
‘ She’s hopeless,’ said the petite woman in her late thirties who had just appeared in the doorway of the conservatory. She was wearing a white roll-neck sweater and jeans tucked in to wellington boots. Her dark hair was cut in a fashion that made Steven think of a pixie.
‘ Hello dear, I didn’t hear you come in,’ said her mother.
‘ Dad’s just coming up the hill. I came on ahead to put the kettle on. I didn’t know you had company.’
Introductions were made and Steven noticed a nervous tic begin to play on Charlotte’s left cheek. ‘I’m afraid I have to ask you a few questions, Mrs L… Ms Grant? I shan’t take up much of your time. Promise.’
‘ About David?’
‘ Indirectly.’
‘ I’ll leave you two on your own,’ said Charlotte’s mother, picking up the tea tray and bustling off.
‘ She’s nice,’ said Steven.
‘ I don’t know what I would have done without her and Dad,’ said Charlotte. ‘They’ve always been there to pick up the pieces.’
‘ You’ve lived with them since the trial?’ said Steven.
‘ Not all of the time,’ replied Charlotte, looking down at the floor as if Steven had hit a raw nerve. ‘I met someone else,’ she said. ‘Let’s just say it didn’t work out and I ended up back here.’
‘ I’m sorry,’ said Steven.
‘ How can I help you?’
‘ It’s about the pornographic material that was found on your ex-husband’s computer when he worked at the hospital in Edinburgh,’ Steven began.
‘ God, that all seems a lifetime ago,’ said Charlotte. ‘He swore he knew nothing at all about it,’ she said. ‘He told me it must have been a student prank and I believed him. He was a liar, a rapist, a murderer and I believed him. In fact, I believed everything he said right up until the time they found his… inside that poor girl and then the game was over. I realised just what a fool I’d been and I was so angry. God, I was so angry.’
‘ I’m sure,’ said Steven, giving her a moment or two to compose herself. ‘I understand you were a legal secretary at the time they found the stuff on your husband’s computer?’ he said.
Charlotte finished blowing her nose and nodded, ‘You have been doing your homework. I worked for a firm called Seymour, Nicholson and Verdi. I was Paul Verdi’s secretary.’
‘ This is going to seem like a very strange question but could any computer material from your office ever
