of course – that’s what you’re seeing here and in the sleeping bag – and I doubt he’d have got away with his hands completely clean. After all, it looks as if he stabbed her five or six time and twisted the blade.” He gestured to the edge of the copse. “If you look over there, though, by the stream, you can see that little pile of leaves. They’ve got traces of blood on them, too. I reckon that he tried to wipe it off with the leaves first, then he washed his hands in the running water.”
“Get it all collected and sent to the lab,” said Chadwick, turning away. He wasn’t usually sentimental about victims, but he couldn’t get the image of the innocent-looking girl in the bloodstained white dress out of his mind, and he couldn’t help but think of his own daughter. “When did the doctor say he’d get around to the postmortem?”
“He said he’d try for later this afternoon, sir,” said Enderby.
“Good.”
“We’ve interviewed most of the people on security duty,” Enderby added.
“And?”
“Nothing, I’m afraid, sir. They all agree there was so much coming and going, so much pandemonium, that nobody knows who was where when. I’ve a good suspicion most of them were partaking of the same substances as the musicians and guests, too, which doesn’t help their memories much. Lots of people were wandering around in a daze.”
“Hmm,” said Chadwick. “I didn’t think we could expect too much from them. What about the girl?”
“No one admits definitely to seeing her, but we’ve got a couple of cautious maybes.”
“Push a bit harder.”
“Will do, sir.”
Chadwick sighed. “I suppose we’d better arrange to talk to the groups who were backstage at the time, get statements, for what they’re worth.”
“Sir?” said Enderby.
“What?”
“You might find that a bit difficult, sir. I mean… they’ll have all gone home now, and these people… well, they’re not readily accessible.”
“They’re no different from you and me, are they, Enderby? Not royalty or anything?”
“No, sir, more like film stars. But-”
“Well, then? I’ll deal with the two local groups, but as far as the rest are concerned, arrange to have them interviewed. Get someone to help you.”
“Yes, sir,” Enderby replied tightly, and turned away.
“And, Enderby.”
“Sir?”
“I don’t know what the standards are in North Yorkshire, but while you’re working for me I’d prefer it if you got your hair cut.”
Enderby reddened. “Yes, sir.”
“Bit hard on him, weren’t you, sir?” said Bradley, when Enderby had gone.
“He’s a scruff.”
“No, sir. I mean about questioning the groups. He’s right, you know. Some of these pop stars are a bit high and mighty.”
“What would you have me do, Simon? Ignore the fifty or so people who might have seen the victim with her killer because they’re some sort of gods?”
“No, sir.”
“Come on. Let’s head back home. I should be in time for Dr. O’Neill’s postmortem if I’m lucky, and I want you to go to Yorkshire Television and the BBC and have a look at the footage they shot of the festival.”
“What am I looking for, sir?”
“Right now, anything. The girl, anyone she might have been with. Any odd or unusual behavior.” Chadwick paused. “On second thought, don’t worry about that last bit. It’s all bound to be odd and unusual, given the people we’re dealing with.”
Bradley laughed. “Yes, sir.”
“Just use your initiative, laddie. At least you won’t have to watch the doctor open the poor girl up.”
Before they walked away, Chadwick turned back to the bloodstained ground.
“What is it, sir?” Bradley asked.
“Something that’s been bothering me all morning. The sleeping bag.”
“Sleeping bag?”
“Aye. Who did it belong to?”
“Her, I suppose,” said Bradley.
“Perhaps,” Chadwick said. “But why would she carry it into the woods with her? It just seems odd, that’s all.
CHAPTER THREE
It was after midnight when the lights came back on, and the wind was still raging, now lashing torrents of rain against the windows and lichen-stained roofs of Fordham. The coroner’s van had taken the body away, and Dr. Glendenning had said he would try to get the postmortem done the following day, even though it was a Saturday. The SOCOs worked on in the new light just as they had done before, collecting samples, labeling and storing everything carefully. So far, they had discovered nothing of immediate importance. One or two members of the local media had arrived, and the police press officer, David Whitney, was on the scene keeping them back and feeding them titbits of information.
Banks used the newly restored electric light to have a good look around the rest of the cottage, and it didn’t take him very long to realize that any personal items Nick might have had with him were gone except for his clothes, toiletries and a few books. There was no wallet, for example, no mobile, nothing with his name on it. The clothes didn’t tell him much. Nothing fancy, just casual Gap-style shirts, a gray-pinstripe jacket, cargos and Levi’s for the most part. All the toiletries told him was that Nick suffered from, or worried that he might suffer from, heartburn and indigestion, judging by the variety of antacids he had brought with him. Winsome reported that his car was a Renault Megane, and to open it you needed a card, not a key. There wasn’t one in sight, so she had phoned the police garage in Eastvale, who said they would send someone out as soon as possible.
There was nothing relating to the car on the Police National Computer, Winsome added, so she would have to get the details from the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency in Swansea as soon as she could raise someone, which wouldn’t be easy on a weekend. If necessary, they could check the National DNA Database, which held samples of the DNA not only of convicted criminals but of anyone who had been arrested, even if they had been acquitted. The public railed about its attacks on freedom, but the database had come in useful more than once for identifying a body, among other things.
They would find out who Nick was soon enough, but someone was making it difficult for them, and Banks wondered why. Would knowing the victim’s identity point the police quickly in the direction of the killer? Did he need time to make his escape?
It was clear that only one of the two bedrooms had been used. The beds weren’t even made up in the other. From what Banks could see at a cursory glance, it looked as if both sides of the double bed had been slept on, but Nick might have been a restless sleeper. Peter Darby had already photographed the room, and the SOCOs would bag the sheets for testing. There was no sign of condoms in any of the bedside drawers, or anywhere else, for that matter, and nothing at all to show who, or what, the mysterious Nick had been, except for the paperback copy of Ian McEwan’s
According to the Waterstone’s bookmark, Nick had got to page sixty-eight. Banks picked up the book and flipped through it. On the back endpaper, someone had written in faint pencil six uneven rows of figures, some of them circled. He turned to the front and saw the price of the book, ?3.50, also in pencil, but in a different hand, at the top right of the first inside page. A secondhand book, then. Which meant that any number of people might have
