Someone behind me clears their throat. ‘We’ve got CCTV from every camera within two miles.’
The voice is Gareth Quinn’s. You know the look. Sharp suit and blunt razor. Acting DS, while Jill Murphy’s on maternity leave, and determined to make every minute of it count. I find him irritating, personally, but he’s not stupid and that look of his is useful when you need someone who doesn’t look too much like a copper. It won’t surprise you to learn he gets called ‘GQ’ by the station wags, a name he affects – a little too theatrically – to despise. I hear him come up behind me.
‘The canal is to the east of the estate here,’ he says, ‘so you have to go over one of these two bridges to get out, and neither have cameras. But there is a camera on the Woodstock Road going north here,’ pointing at a red pin, ‘and one here on the ring-road roundabout. If he wanted to get away quickly, he’d have gone that way, rather than south through the city.’
I look at the map, at the expanse of open land stretching to the west: three hundred acres uncultivated for a thousand years, and even in this weather, half underwater. It’s no more than five minutes from the Canal Manor estate, but you’d have to cross the railway line to get there.
‘What about Port Meadow – are there any cameras on the level crossing? I don’t remember ever seeing any.’
Quinn shakes his head. ‘No, and in any case the crossing’s been closed for the last two months while they build a new footbridge and re-lay part of the line. The work’s being done after hours, and there was a whole crew there last night. The old footbridge has been closed off prior to demolition, so no one could have got across to Port Meadow that way.’
‘So if that’s a non-starter, what are the other options?’
Quinn points at a green pin. ‘Given we found the tights here, the suspect’s most likely route would seem to be Birch Drive and then up to the ring road, like I said. It also tallies with where that old biddy says she saw Daisy.’
He steps back and tucks his pen behind his ear. It’s a tic of his, and I spot a couple of the lads at the back do the same – they’re taking the piss, but there’s no malice in it. He’s one of them, but he’s also a DS now, at least for the time being, and that makes him fair game. ‘We’ve been through the footage on all the cameras on that route,’ he continues, ‘but we can’t find sod all. There wasn’t much traffic at that time of night, and the drivers we’ve spoken to so far have all checked out. There’s one or two we haven’t managed to track down yet, but none of them are men alone in cars. And there’s definitely no one on foot with a small child or carrying anything that could remotely be a small child. Which means one of two things: either that old buzzard on the close didn’t see what she thought she saw – ’
‘ – or Daisy is still on the Canal Manor estate.’
I can’t be the only one who thinks, in that moment, of Shannon Matthews, hidden by her mother to scam money from sympathy, while the police moved heaven and earth to find a girl who was never missing in the first place. And didn’t one of the neighbours say the Masons were short of cash? But that’s as long as the thought lasts. Not just because the Masons aren’t that stupid, but because, even if they are, the timing just doesn’t add up.
I take a deep breath. ‘OK, let’s step up the search along the towpath and anywhere else on the estate a body could have been hidden. But discreetly, please. As far as the press is concerned, this is still a missing person, not a murder. OK, that’s it for now. Reconvene at six unless there’s a new development.’
*
‘I think we’ve found who it was, sir.’
It’s 3.00 p.m., and I’m in my office, on the point of leaving for the estate, and fresh – if that’s the word – from a royal bollocking from the Superintendent about what happened at the press conference. The person at the door is Anna Phillips, on secondment from the software start-up on the business park, who are ticking the box on local community involvement by helping to pitchfork us flat-footed plods into the twenty-first century. She, by contrast, wears very high heels. And a very short skirt. She’s a great hit in the station, which will come as no surprise at all. Alex had her hair cropped like hers when we first met – it made her look mischievous. Playful. All the things she’s lost, these last few months. I’ve done a double-take a couple of times since Anna arrived, but then I see her smile and know I’m mistaken. I can’t remember the last time I saw my wife smile.
‘Sorry – I’m not with you. Who what was?’
If I’m a bit sharp it’s because I still have words like ‘incompetence’ and ‘consequences’ reddening my ears. And because I can’t find my car keys. But she seems unfazed.
‘The leak. Gareth – DS Quinn – asked me to see if I could find out where it came from.’
I look up. So it’s ‘Gareth’, is it? She’s gone slightly red, and I wonder if he’s told her he’s got a girlfriend. It wouldn’t be the first time he’d developed convenient amnesia on that one.
‘And?’
She comes round to my side of the desk and logs on to the web. Then she types in an address and steps back, allowing me to see. It’s a Facebook page. The most recent post is the still from the video of Daisy we released to the press. That doesn’t bother me – the more people who share that the better. But what does bother me is everything else. Shots of uniforms on doorsteps. Several of Challow’s team going into the Mason house. One of me, snatching a fag, which isn’t going to go down that well with the Super either. Judging by the angles, the pictures have all been taken from inside one of the houses on the close. And when Anna scrolls down there’s a post logged seven hours ago saying that the police have found a pair of bloodstained green tights, which they think are the ones Daisy was wearing when she disappeared.
‘The page belongs to Toby Webster,’ she says, answering before I ask.
‘Who?’
‘Fiona Webster’s son. The neighbour DC Everett interviewed this morning. I think she asked her about the tights. That must be where he got it from. He’s fifteen.’
As if that explains it. Which I suppose, at one level, it does.
‘It wouldn’t have taken much for that reporter to find this,’ she continues. ‘In fact, I’m surprised more of them didn’t.’
Which is code for ‘I think you owe your team an apology’. Which I clearly do.
‘And there’s something else – ’
The phone rings again and I pick it up. It’s Challow.
‘You wanted a rush done on those tights?’
‘And?’
‘It’s not hers. The blood. No match to the DNA on the toothbrush.’
‘You’re sure – it can’t possibly be Daisy Mason’s?’
‘DNA doesn’t lie. But you know that.’
‘Fuck.’
But he’s already put the phone down. Anna is staring at me, an odd look on her face. If she’s that exercised by swearing she’s not going to last long here.
‘I’ve been looking at the photos again,’ she begins. ‘The ones at the party.’
‘Sorry, I have to go. I’m already late.’
‘No, wait – it’ll only take a minute.’
She bends again to the PC and opens up the file of images from the shared server. She selects three of the pictures, then opens a still of Daisy from the video and lines it up carefully next to the others.
‘It took me a while to spot it, but once you do, it’s really obvious.’
Obvious to her, perhaps, but not to me. She’s looking at me expectantly but I just shrug.
She picks up a pen and points. ‘These three on the right are the only ones of the party that have Daisy in them. At least all we have so far. But none of them are very clear – she’s either got her back to us or she’s partially hidden behind someone else. But there’s one thing we definitely can see.’
‘Which is?’