“Linda Lofthouse?”

“Yes. She was on the pill when we found her, like most of them, of course, but obviously not when she was fifteen. Gave it up for adoption in 1967.”

“Did anyone find out what became of the child?”

“It didn’t concern us. We tracked down the father, a kid called Donald Hughes, garage mechanic, and he gave us a couple of ideas as to the sort of life Linda was leading and where she was living it, but he had an alibi, and he had no motive. He’d moved on. Got a proper job, wanted nothing to do with Linda and her hippie lifestyle. That was why they split up in the first place. If she hadn’t been seduced by that corrupt lifestyle, the baby might have grown up with a proper mother and father.”

The child’s identity might be an issue now, Banks thought. A child born in the late sixties would be in his late thirties now, and if he had discovered what had happened to his birth mother… Nick Barber was thirty-eight, but he was the victim. Banks was confusing too many crimes: Lofthouse, Merchant, Barber. He had to get himself in focus. At least the connection between Barber and Lofthouse was something he could check into and not come away looking too much of a fool if he was wrong.

“What was the motive?”

“We never found out. He was a nutcase.”

“That being the technical term for a psychopath back then?”

“It’s what we used to call them,” Bradley said, “but I suppose psychopath or sociopath – I never did know the difference – would be more politically correct.”

“He confessed to the murder?”

“As good as.”

“What do you mean?”

“He didn’t deny it when faced with the evidence.”

“The knife, right?”

“With his fingerprints and Linda Lofthouse’s blood on it.”

“How did this person – what’s his name, by the way?”

“McGarrity. Patrick McGarrity.”

“How did this McGarrity first come to your attention?”

“We found out that the victim was known at various houses around the city where students and dropouts lived and sold drugs. McGarrity frequented these same places, was a drug dealer, in fact, which was what we first arrested him for after a raid.”

“And then DI Chadwick became suspicious?”

“Well, yes. We heard that McGarrity was a bit of a nutcase, and even the people whose houses he frequented were a bit frightened of him. There was a lot of tolerance for weird types back then, especially if they provided people with drugs, which is why I say I’m surprised these things didn’t happen more often. This McGarrity clearly had severe mental problems. Dropped on the head at birth, for all I know. He was older than the rest, for a start, and he also had a criminal record and a history of violence. He had a habit of playing with this flick-knife. It used to make people nervous, which was no doubt the effect he wanted. There was also some talk about him terrorizing a young girl. He was a thoroughly unpleasant character.”

“Did this other young girl come forward?”

“No. It was just something that came up during questioning. McGarrity denied it. We got him on the other charges, and that gave us all we needed.”

“You met him?”

“I sat in on some of the interviews. Look, I don’t know why you want to know all this now. There’s no doubt he did it.”

“I’m not doubting it,” said Banks, “I’m just trying to find a reason for Nick Barber’s murder.”

“Well, it’s got nothing to do with McGarrity.”

“Nick Barber was writing about the Mad Hatters,” Banks went on, “and Vic Greaves was Linda Lofthouse’s cousin.”

“The one that went bonkers?”

“If you care to put it that way, yes,” said Banks.

“How else would you put it? Anyway, I’m afraid I never met them. DI Chadwick did most of the North Riding side of the investigation with a DS Enderby. I do believe they interviewed the band.”

“Yes, I’ve talked to Keith Enderby.”

Bradley sniffed. “Bit of a scruff, and not entirely reliable, in my opinion. Rather more like the types we were dealing with, if you know what I mean?”

“DS Enderby was a hippie?”

“Well, not as such, but he wore his hair a bit long, and on occasion he wore flowered shirts and ties. I even saw him in sandals once.”

“With socks?”

“No.”

“Well, thank the Lord for that,” said Banks.

“Look, I know you’re being sarcastic,” said Bradley with a smug smile. “It’s okay. But the fact that remains is that Enderby was a slacker, and he had no respect for the uniform.”

Banks could have kicked himself for letting the sarcasm out, but Bradley’s holier-than-thou sanctimony was starting to get up his nose. He felt like saying that Enderby had described Bradley as an arse-licker, but he wanted results, not confrontation. Time to hold back and stick to relevant points only, he told himself.

“You say you think this writer was killed because he was working on a story about the Mad Hatters, but do you have any reason for assuming that?” Bradley asked.

“Well,” said Banks, “we do know about the story he was working on, that he mentioned to a girlfriend that it might involve a murder, and we know that Vic Greaves now lives very close to the cottage in which Nick Barber was killed. Unfortunately, all Barber’s notes were missing, along with his mobile and laptop, so we were unable to find out more. That in itself is also suspicious, though, that his personal effects and notes were taken.”

“It’s not very much, though, is it? I imagine robbery’s as common around your patch as it is everywhere these days.”

“We try to keep an open mind,” said Banks. “There could be other possibilities. Did you have any other suspects?”

“Yes. There was a fellow called Rick Hayes. He was the festival promoter. He had the freedom of the backstage area and he couldn’t account for himself during the period we think the girl was killed. He was also left-handed, as was McGarrity.”

“Those were the only two?”

“Yes.”

“So it was the knife that clinched it?”

“We knew we had the right man – you must have had that feeling at times – but we couldn’t prove it at first. We were able to hold him on a drugs charge, and while we were holding him we turned up the murder weapon.”

“How long after you first questioned him?”

“It was October, about two weeks or so.”

“Where was it?”

“In one of the houses.”

“I assume those places were searched as soon as you had McGarrity in custody?”

“Yes.”

“But you didn’t turn up the knife then?”

“You have to understand,” said Bradley, “there were several people living in each of these houses at any one time. They were terribly unsanitary and overcrowded. People slept on the floors and in all kinds of unlikely combinations. There was all sorts of stuff around. We didn’t know what belonged to whom, they were all so casual in their attitudes toward property and ownership.”

“So how did you find out in the end?”

“We just kept on looking. Finally, we found it hidden inside a cushion. A couple of the people who lived there said they’d seen McGarrity with such a knife – it had a tortoiseshell handle – and we were fortunate enough to find his prints on it. He’d wiped the blade, of course, but the lab still found blood and fiber where it joined the handle. The blood matched Linda Lofthouse’s type. Simple as that.”

“Did the knife match the wounds?”

“According to the pathologist, it could have.”

“Only could have?”

“He was in court. You know what those barristers are like. Could have been her blood, could have been the knife. A blade consistent with the kind of blade… blah blah blah. It was enough for the jury.”

“The pathologist didn’t try to match the knife with the wound physically, on the body?”

“He couldn’t. The body had been buried by then, and even if it had been necessary to exhume it, the flesh would have been too decomposed to give an accurate reproduction. You know that.”