Havers said to her, “What’re you on to, then?” The DS had obviously made a stop at Casvelyn of Cornwall on her way to the station. Bea could smell the pasties from across the room, and she didn’t need to look for it to know that Sergeant Havers had a bag of them somewhere on her person.
“Second breakfast?” she asked the sergeant.
“I skipped the first,” Havers replied. “Just a cup of coffee and a glass of juice. I reckoned I owed myself a dip into the more substantial food groups.” She carried her capacious shoulder bag and from this she brought forth the incriminating Cornish delicacy, well wrapped but nonetheless emitting its telltale aroma.
“A few of those and you’ll blow up like a balloon,” Bea told her. “Go easy on them.”
“Will do. But I find it essential to sample the local cuisine, wherever I am.”
“Lucky for you it’s not goat’s head, then.”
Havers hooted, which Bea took as her version of a laugh. “Also felt the need to give a few words of encouragement to our Madlyn Angarrack,” Havers said. “You know the sort of thing: Don’t worry, lass, buck up, tut-tut, tallyho, and all that, keep your pecker pecking, and it’ll all come out in the wash at the end of the day. I found I’m a veritable fountain of clichés.”
“That was good of you. I’m sure she appreciated it.” Bea selected one of the heavier bolt cutters and applied it forcefully to the chock stone’s cable. Nothing but pain shooting up her arm. “That one’s a real nonstarter,” she said.
“Right. Well, she wasn’t overly friendly, but she did accept a wee pat on the shoulder, which was easy enough to give as she was loading up the front window at the time.”
“Hmm. And how did Miss Angarrack take your fond caress?”
“She didn’t debark from the tuna boat yesterday, I’ll give her that. She knew I was up to something.”
“Were you?” Bea suddenly took more notice of Havers.
The DS was smiling wickedly. She was also removing a paper napkin carefully from her shoulder bag. She brought it to Bea’s desk and laid it gently down. “Can’t use it in court, of course,” she said. “But there it is all the same for a comparison, if you’ve the mind for it. Not a regular DNA comparison cause there’s no skin attached. But one of those others. Mitochondrial. I expect we can use it for that if we need to.”
It, Bea saw, as she unfolded the napkin, was a single hair. Quite dark, with a slight curl to it. She looked up at Havers. “You wily thing. From her shoulder, I take it?”
“You’d think they’d have them wear caps or hairnets or something if they’re going to be around food, wouldn’t you?” Havers shuddered dramatically and took an enormous bite of the pasty. “I reckoned I needed to do my bit for hygiene in Casvelyn. And anyway, I thought you might like to have it.”
“No one has ever brought me such a thoughtful gift,” Bea told her. “I may be falling in love with you, Sergeant.”
“Please, Guv,” Havers said, holding up her hand. “You’ll have to get in the queue.”
Bea knew that, as Havers had said, the hair was useless in building a crown case against Madlyn Angarrack, considering how the sergeant had got her hands on it. They could do nothing with it save assure themselves through comparison that the hair they’d already found caught up in Santo Kerne’s equipment was one belonging to his former girlfriend. But it was something, a shot in the arm that they needed. Bea placed it in an envelope and labeled it carefully for Duke Clarence Washoe to peruse in Chepstow.
“I’m reckoning it’s all to do with sex and vengeance,” Bea said when the hair was taken care of. Havers pulled over a chair and joined her, munching the pasty with evident appreciation.
She shoved a wad of it to one side of her mouth and said, “Sex and vengeance? How’ve you got it playing out?”
“I was off and on thinking about it all night, and I kept coming back to the initial betrayal.”