They stare at the picture. The silence lengthens, but it’s Baxter who eventually voices what they’re all thinking.
‘It could have been him.’
‘OK,’ says Quinn, with the beginnings of a smile. ‘Let’s bring him in.’
* * *
Caleb Morgan’s bedsit is on the lower ground floor of one of the few North Oxford houses still divided into student lets. A nicer address than Ev was expecting, until she remembers who his mother is. The reception she gets, on the other hand, is pretty much exactly what she expected.
‘Oh, just piss off, will you?’ he says, making to close the door. ‘Freya told me all about you harassing her, making me out to be some sort of bloody domestic abuser. I’ve got nothing to say to you.’
Everett takes a step forward. ‘You’re not doing yourself any favours, Caleb. We know it was you.’
‘What? What are you accusing me of now?’ he says acidly. ‘The Rwandan genocide? 9/11? No wait – the grassy knoll – it has to be the grassy knoll.’
She doesn’t rise to it. ‘It’s about that story on Twitter.’
He frowns. ‘What story?’
‘You know exactly which one. The one about Marina.’
‘I have no idea what you’re talking about.’
‘You’re not the only one round here who knows a bit about IT, Caleb. We traced that story all the way back to the original tweet. The account that posted had only been set up earlier that same day. It was in the name “JosephAndrews2018”.’
He gives her a studiously blank look. ‘Means absolutely bloody nothing to me.’
She raises an eyebrow. ‘Yeah, well, that little twist didn’t come from you, did it? It came from Freya.’
His eyes flicker and he looks away.
‘She does English, right? Joseph Andrews – it’s an eighteenth-century novel about a sexual predator. Only this time it’s the other way round. A woman in a position of authority who preys on a much younger man. Just like you and Marina.’ She gives him a disdainful look. ‘I bet you thought we’d be way too thick to work that one out, didn’t you? Just your bad luck one of my colleagues did English too.’
He returns her look, contempt for contempt. ‘Talk about tenuous. If that’s what passes for detection at Thames Valley Police –’
‘It’s not just the name. Whoever set up that account knew what they were doing – they knew how to stay under the radar.’ She shrugs. ‘Child’s play, right? For someone like you?’
He snorts. ‘You people – do you seriously think I want people knowing what she did to me?’
‘No, I don’t think you do. But as you well know, there was no mention of your name – not on that post, not on the subsequent tweets – not anywhere. Just all those coded references to a female member of university staff that anyone with half a brain can work out in five minutes.’
‘So what are you doing about it? Because if you’re looking for a leak, someone in CID is a fuck sight more likely, if you ask me –’
Behind him, somewhere in the flat, there’s a muffled sound. Not much more than a creak, but enough to suggest he’s not alone. Freya, thinks Ev. Freya’s with him.
He starts to close the door. ‘If you’ve got anything else you want to say to me, talk to my lawyers. And for the avoidance of doubt, if my name does get out, now or at any time in the future, you’ll be hearing from them.’
* * *
‘Get your sodding hands off me – how dare you – you’ll be hearing from my bloody lawyer –’
Bringing Cleland in was never going to be pretty, but things take an ugly turn when he flatly refuses to come voluntarily and they have to arrest him. There’s an unseemly scuffle on his doorstep, witnessed with gleeful disbelief by a cluster of students from the college further along the road, and Asante ends up with an elbow in the face.
‘Just as well we came mob-handed,’ says Quinn, as Baxter manhandles Cleland down the drive. A couple of the students are taking pictures now and Cleland shouts abuse at them before being shunted indecorously into the car. ‘Still, look on the bright side. No probs getting his prints and DNA now.’ He holds up a pair of shorts and a grubby white T-shirt, both sealed in evidence bags. ‘Or his dirty washing.’
‘True,’ says Asante, rubbing his jaw. ‘On the other hand, I bet that lawyer of his is seriously arsey.’
* * *
Oxford Mail online
Tuesday 10 July 2018 Last updated at 15:45
BREAKING: Fears grow for safety of Headington woman
By Richard Yates
With no reported sightings of her since she left work on Monday, friends and neighbours of a Headington woman are becoming increasingly concerned that something may have happened to her. Residents of Shrivenham Close have reported intensive house-to-house questioning by officers of Thames Valley Police CID, and the arrival of a forensics team, leading to fears that the woman, who has not yet been named, may have come to harm.
This breaking news story is being updated and more details will be published shortly.
Do you live in Shrivenham Close or have information about this story? Email me at [email protected]
* * *
‘Easy does it, sir.’
The petty humiliations of fingerprinting and DNA samples have done little to improve Hugh Cleland’s mood. But Sergeant Woods can match him, pound for pound, and he’s handled far too many obstreperous drunks to be fazed by a man in magenta trousers. Cleland is still shouting and shoving when Woods clangs the cell door shut and turns to Quinn.
‘He’ll get bored soon enough,’ he says. ‘Give me a call when you want him brought up.’
Quinn smiles. ‘Oh, I’m in no rush. And his brief is at the sodding opera so he’s not going to be popping over any time soon, either.’
More carpet f-bombing from inside the cell.
Quinn’s smile broadens. ‘And in any case, I
