In Pursuit of the Proper Sinner

likely that we've got the right ID. Is the name familiar to either of you?”

Maiden shook his head and said, “Cole. Not to me. Nan?”

“I don't know him. And Nicola… Surely she would have talked about him if he was a friend of hers. She would have brought him round to meet us as well. When did she not? That's… It was her way.”

Andy Maiden then spoke perspicaciously, asking a logical question that rose from his years of policing. “Is there any chance that Nick-” He paused and seemed to prepare his wife for the question by laying a hand gently on her thigh. “Could she just have been in the wrong place? Could the boy have been the target? Tommy?” And he looked to Lynley.

“That would have to be a consideration in any other case,” Lynley admitted.

“But not in this case? Why?”

“Have a look at this.” Hanken produced a copy of the handwritten note that had been found on Nicola Maiden's body.

The Maidens read the five words on it-THIS BITCH HAS HAD IT-as Hanken advised them that the original had been found tucked into their daughter's pocket.

Andy Maiden stared long at the note. He shifted the red ball to his left hand and clutched it. “Jesus God. Are you telling us someone went there to kill her? Someone tracked her to kill her? That this wasn't just a case of her meeting up with strangers? A stupid argument breaking out over something? A psychopath killing her and that boy for the thrill of it?”

“It's doubtful,” Hanken said. “But you know the procedure as well as we do, I expect.”

Which was, Lynley knew, his way of saying that as a police officer Andy Maiden would know that every avenue potentially related to the killing of his daughter was going to be explored. He said, “If someone went out to the moor specifically to kill your daughter, we must consider why.”

“But she didn't have enemies,” Nan Maiden declared. “I know that's what you expect every mother to say, but in this case it's the truth. Everyone liked Nicola. She was that kind of person.”

“Not everyone, apparently, Mrs. Maiden,” Hanken said. And he brought forth the copies of the anonymous letters that had also been at the site.

Andy Maiden and his wife read these in silence and without expression. She was the one who finally spoke. As she did so, her husband's gaze remained locked on the letters. And both man and woman sat still, like statues.

“It's impossible,” she said. “Nicola can't have received these. You're making a mistake if you think that she did.”

“Why?”

“Because we never saw them. And if she'd been threatened-by anyone, by anyone- she would have told us at once.”

“If she didn't want to worry you-”

“Please. Believe me. That wasn't how she was. She didn't think like that: about worrying us and such. She thought only about telling the truth. If something had been going wrong in her life, she would have told us. That's how she was. She talked about everything. Everything. Truly.” And with an earnest look at her husband, “Andy?”

With an effort, he took his eyes off the letters. His face, which had appeared bloodless before, was now even more so. He said, “I don't want to think it. But it's the best possible answer if someone actually tracked her… if someone wasn't with her already… if someone didn't just stumble upon her and kill her and the boy for the sick fun of it.”

“What?” Lynley asked.

“SO10,” he said heavily, looking as if the words cost him dearly. “There were so many cases over the years, so many yobs put away. Killers, drug dealers, crime bosses. You name them, I rolled in the muck with them.”

“Andy! No,” his wife protested, apparently understanding where he was heading. “This has nothing to do with you.”

“Someone out on parole, tracking us down, hanging round long enough to get to know our movements-” He turned to her then. “You see how it could have happened, don't you? Someone out for revenge, Nancy, striking at Nick because he knew that to hurt my daughter-my girl-was to kill me in stages… to sentence me to a living death…”

Lynley said, “It's a possibility that we can't rule out, can we? Because if, as you say, your daughter had no enemies, then we're left with the single question: Who had? If you put away someone who's out on parole, Andy, we're going to need the name.”

“Jesus. There were scores.”

“The Yard can pull all your old files in London, but you can help by giving us some direction. If there's a particular investigation that stands out in your memory, you could halve our work by listing the players.”

“I've got my diaries.”

“Diaries?” Hanken asked.

“I once thought-” Maiden shook his head self-derisively. “I thought of writing after retirement. Memoirs. Ego. But the hotel came along, and I never got round to it. I've got the diaries, though. If I have a look through them, perhaps a name… a face…” He seemed to crumple then, as if the weight of responsibility for his daughter's death bore down on him heavily.

“You don't know this for certain,” Nan Maiden said. “Andy. Please. Don't do this to yourself.”

Hanken said, “We'll follow whatever leads turn up. So if-”

“Then follow Julian.” Nan Maiden spoke as if determined to prove that there were other avenues to explore beyond the one that led to her husband's past.

Maiden said, “Nancy. Don't.”

“Julian?” Lynley said.

Julian Britton, Nan told them. He'd just become engaged to Nicola. She wasn't suggesting him as a suspect, but if the police were looking for leads, then they certainly would want to talk to Julian. Nicola had been with him the night before she left for her camping trip. She might have said something to Julian-or done something even-that would result in another possibility for the police to explore in their investigation.

It was a reasonable enough suggestion, Lynley thought. He jotted down Julian's name and address. Nan Maiden supplied the information.

For his part, Hanken brooded. And he said nothing more until he and Lynley had returned to the car. “It may all be a blind, you know.” He switched on the ignition, reversed out of their parking space, and turned the car to face Maiden Hall. There, he let the engine idle while he studied the old limestone structure.

“What?” Lynley asked.

“SO10. This business of someone from his past. It's a bit too convenient, wouldn't you say?”

“Convenient is an odd choice of words to describe a lead and a potential suspect,” Lynley said. “Unless you yourself already suspect…” He looked towards the Hall. “Exactly what is it that you suspect, Peter?”

“D'you know the White Peak?” Hanken asked abruptly. “It runs from Buxton to Ashbourne. From Matlock to Castleton. We've got dales, we've got moors, we've got trails, we've got hills. This”-with a gesture at the environment-“is part of it. So's the road we came in on, for that matter.”

“And?”

Hanken turned in his seat to face Lynley squarely. “And in all this vast amount of space, on last Tuesday night- or Wednesday morning if we want to believe him-Andy Maiden managed to find his daughter's car hidden out of sight behind a stone wall. What would you say the odds are on that?”

Lynley looked to the building, to its windows reflecting the last of the daylight like row upon row of shielded eyes. “Why didn't you tell me?” he asked the other DI.

“I didn't think of it,” Hanken said. “Not till our boy brought up SO 10. Not till our Andy got caught out keeping the truth from his wife.”

“He wanted to spare her as long as he could. What man wouldn't?” Lynley asked.

“A man with nothing on his conscience,” Hanken said.

Showered and changed into the most comfortable elastic-waisted trousers that she possessed, Barbara was