“You’ll need this,” Lightman said, and lifted a dark-gray kit bag from the floor. “And despite the time constraints, I’d take him a coffee. He’s not going to be that happy at having his day off interrupted.”
“OK. Just…a filter coffee? Not a latte or something?”
Lightman laughed. “God, no. Have you not had one of his rants on coffee menus yet?”
“No, but I’m sure it’ll be great.” She put the kit bag onto her shoulder. “OK. Anything else? Do you know what it’s about yet?”
Lightman shook his head. “Local sergeant will hand over to the chief at the scene. You’ll both get a rundown, though if it’s not recent, there won’t be much so far.”
Hanson nodded and tried not to smile. You shouldn’t smile at news of a murder, even if it had been ages ago. But the truth was, she was delighted.
* * *
—
HANSON WAS WOUND up like it was exam-results day. She gabbled at Jonah about the kit bag and coffee, and then without pausing for breath asked about the remains. Jonah found it somewhere between sweet and irritating.
“Ben said they might not be recent,” she said.
“I’d wait until forensics gave an opinion,” he replied, taking a long gulp of coffee. “Most people—including me—don’t have a clue what age bones are.”
Having sweated and chilled, he was cold even in the suit he had tugged on in the public toilets at Godshill. Cold, and drifting around his own thoughts of thirty years ago. He had to interrupt her to ask her to turn the heater on. The Fiat veered while she turned the dial, and then steadied.
“Sorry,” she said.
“I’m just grateful you’re driving,” he said with a slight smile. “The coffee was a good call, by the way. You’ve given me at least a couple of hours of not being in a really bad mood.”
“Hmm. A couple of hours. So I’ve either got to find you a Starbucks before then or get out of the way?”
“Pretty much,” Jonah agreed.
Brinken Wood was suddenly on them. There was a cluster of squad cars and uniforms in the shingle car park. He found it impossible not to remember this place as it had been back then. The car park had all been bark and mud, but it had been just as overrun by police. The haircuts different; the faces somehow the same.
Jonah levered himself out of the car once they’d pulled up, taking the coffee cup with him. He felt like he’d gone back in time. So many months had been spent here, searching endlessly.
He approached the sergeant. “DCI Sheens. This is DC Hanson.”
Hanson had been the same rank as the sergeant two weeks ago. But to train as a detective, you had to take what amounted to a demotion, and become a detective constable. He remembered not being sure who was more important when it had happened to him, and wondered if Hanson felt the same.
There was sweat along the sergeant’s hairline. His eyes were over-wide and his smile brief and agitated. His police constable, a stocky twentysomething, seemed calmer.
Jonah addressed his question somewhere between the two of them: “Who found the remains?”
The sergeant answered. “A GP out camping with his family. Well, his daughter, but he called it in.”
“How old’s the daughter?”
“Nine,” the constable said. “Seems fine, though. It’s the father who’s taking it hard.”
“They’re still here?”
“We’ve kept them at their campsite. It’s not within view of the remains.”
Jonah nodded, and let the sergeant lead the way, though he knew where he was going. It was where seven kids had bedded down thirty years ago, but only six of them had got up in the morning.
* * *
—
DR. MARTIN MILLER was sitting apart from his family. The doctor’s wife was watching the boy play on an iPad. The girl was kicking up dust around the edge of the camp.
It was the mother Jonah approached.
“DCI Sheens.” He smiled at her. He’d had to learn how to smile when his mind was full of complicated, dark thoughts like crazed glass between him and the world. “Would you mind if I talk to your daughter for a few minutes?”
“Jessie!” It was a call from the father. His voice was high-pitched and irritable. “Stop kicking like that. You’re making a mess.”
The girl was halfway upset and halfway rebellious. She scuffed over to her mother and Jonah, sat down quickly, and looked up at him, her knees near her chin.
The mother slid an arm round her in a brief hug. “You don’t mind talking to the police, do you, Jessie?” she asked her daughter.
Jessie shook her head.
“We don’t need to ask much,” Jonah said steadily. “Just a few details about what you found.”
“Sure.”
“She doesn’t know anything,” her slightly older brother interrupted scathingly. The disdain of older siblings had always seemed uniquely intense to Jonah.
He glanced over at the boy, who was now watching them both a little sullenly. He thought about asking him to move away, but decided to let him be.
He crouched close to Jessie. “So, a few questions for you.”
The girl gave him another wary look, and then her gaze wandered away and she picked up a pebble, threw it off to the side, repeated it with another.
“Jessie, for goodness’ sake!” The father again. Much closer. “Stop throwing things, and look at the policeman when he’s talking to you. This is important.”
Jonah tried to smile up at the doctor. “It’s OK, don’t worry.”
“Jessie!”
Jonah might as well not have spoken.
The girl gave her father a truculent look, and then did her best to look up at Jonah through her straight brown fringe. Jonah tried not to become irritated at the father’s interruptions, which had nothing to do with helping the police, he thought, and everything to do with control.
“Are you an inspector?” Jessie asked quietly.
Jonah grinned. “I am. Detective chief inspector, in fact.”
Jessie’s eyes were still a little wary. “So you’re in charge?”
“Yes.” She seemed happy enough with that, so he went on. “Could you tell me what you were doing when you found the bones?”
Jessie glanced at her father, and then said quietly, “Hiding.”