somebody recognised her that day. Maybe they questioned her

about it.’

‘If they did, she never told me.’

I look at the other girls, and then I hide their pictures and details away and try to forget about them for the moment, focusing only on Rachel. Everything comes back to her and, more importantly, back to that day. If somebody did approach her, it could have

been Father Julian, or Bruce or Sidney Alderman. The grudge

Sidney Alderman had against Father Julian for sleeping with his wife makes him a likely candidate. Could be Sidney knew a lot

more about Julian than the priest ever expected. Could be Sidney knew other women who got pregnant too.

‘When you were going to Father Julian’s church,’ I say, ‘back

in the beginning, do you remember any other women who were

pregnant?’

‘Umm … no, not that I can think of.’

‘Anybody with a really young child?’

‘Umm, yeah, there was one. There’s Fiona Chandler.’

‘Was she married?’

‘No. She used to be, but her husband left her before the baby

was born. It was an awful thing to do. She never spoke about

him, and she married again a few years later.’

‘Tell me about her husbands.’

“I don’t know anything about the first one. Like I said, she

never spoke of him. Her second husband, Alec, he was very nice.

But one day ten years ago he just got up and collapsed on the

floor. It was a heart attack. She never married again, it was very sad. Well, still is very sad. Why — why are you asking me this?’

I don’t answer. I give her a few seconds, and she gets there

by herself.

‘Oh my God,’ she gasps. ‘Are you, are you saying that… that Stewart, that he got Fiona pregnant too? Was it his baby?’

“It’s possible.’

‘Oh no, oh no.’ She starts to cry.

“I need to get hold of her.’

‘You … you don’t understand,’ she says. ‘You have no idea.’

‘What are you talking about?’

Her sobs start to grow louder. ‘You … oh my God,’ she

says, and it’s all she can say over and over as the words intermix with tears and sobs. In the end she barely manages to compose

herself enough to carry on. ‘You need to know something,’ she

says. “I don’t even know how to say it, but … but you need to know.’

‘Tell me.’

And she does, and suddenly I understand everything.

It comes back to Henry Martins. I asked Patricia Tyler four weeks ago if she knew the name, and she didn’t. If only she had, if only she’d known the name of Fiona Chandler’s husband, the one who

left her, then most of this could have been avoided. There was never any reason to suspect a link between the dead girl and the man who owned the coffin she was dumped into. Nothing links

the others—it was just a matter of putting girls into the ground and using the coffins of those who had just died, making the digging easier. I’ve spent those four weeks making death and making

misery, but now things are going to change. Henry Martins was

Fiona Chandler’s first husband. He left her when Father Julian got her pregnant. He moved into a different world from her, he met another woman, he fell in love with a woman who wouldn’t cheat on him, and he had a family. Twenty something years later I stood by his grave and watched his coffin get pulled from the dirt.

‘Hey, hey, you can’t come in here!’

The answers have come crashing down on me and the white

noise is back. There are images and words screaming from every corner of my mind, and this is the way it sometimes gets when

an investigation is coming to a close, the way it gets when the adrenaline is rushing and the high that comes is only an arrest away. Only this time my hands are shaking and I feel like a fool, so the high may not arrive.

I’ve just broken a dozen road rules getting here. The rain is

pouring down, hitting the roof with the sound of land mines. I push my way into the hallway. If Henry Martins hadn’t found out about his wife’s affair, if he hadn’t left her and had raised the boy as his own, then none of this would be happening. The girls, the priest, the Alderman family, even good old Henry himself— they’d probably all still be alive. For the briefest of moments I wonder if there would be other ripple effects if those people were still around, whether one of them could have crossed paths with my wife or

with Quentin James two years ago and delayed one of them for the ten seconds it would have taken to prevent the accident.

‘Hey, you deaf? You can’t come in here.’

‘Where is he?’ I ask.

‘What?’

‘Maybe you’re the one who’s deaf. Where the fuck is he?’

“He’s gone, man.’

I push Studly against the wall. He’s added a couple of piercings to the collection since I last saw him. I feel like pushing him right through the wall and strangling the skinny little bastard, but the anger I feel isn’t towards him, it’s towards myself for having been so easily deceived. It’s towards David for being the one to have deceived me. A month ago his pain was so raw, so unbearable, so believable. How the hell did I fall for such an act? Even as a cop I would have missed it. As did the other cops who spoke to him.

‘Gone? Where?’

‘He moved out. A few days ago. And he owes me rent.’

I let Studly go. He pushes himself off the hallway wall and

puffs his chest out, trying to look a lot tougher than he is, trying to look as though he let me start manhandling him.

‘Where’d he go?’

‘How the fuck would I know?’ he asks, sounding tougher now

that I’ve let him go.

I shove him into the wall again, and make my way down to

David’s bedroom. Last time I was here the place looked like a

bomb had gone off. The furniture is still here, but everything else has gone.

‘He told me to keep it,’ Studly says, ‘but bro, that stuff ain’t worth shit.’

‘He ever bring other women here?’

‘No. He’s never been with anybody since — well, since Rachel

went missing.’

‘She’s not missing any more.’

‘Yeah, he told me.’

I look around the bedroom but there’s nothing here to help.

I tip the bed up. I search through bedside drawers. I pull the corner of the carpet away on the chance this hidey-hole is more genetic than I first thought, but there’s nothing there.

‘Dude, you’re destroying the place.’

‘You sure he’s not seeing anybody else?’

Studly shrugs. ‘Man, I’m not his mother.’

‘Well, hopefully she’ll know more than you.’

‘I doubt it. He hasn’t spoken to her since Rachel went missing.

Far as I can tell, he hates her. Man, really fucking hates her.’

‘I wonder why’ I say, but I already know.

‘Yeah,’ he says, trying to sound as if he knows too, but he has no idea. Nobody could.

‘When did he go?’

‘I told you, man, a few days ago.’

‘When exactly? Tuesday? Wednesday? Thursday?’

‘I don’t know’

‘You don’t know?’

‘Man, I don’t even know what today is.’

I push past him again and start going through the rest of the

house.

‘Hey, man, you can’t go through everything.’

“Then tell me where he is.’

“I don’t know’

‘He’s your friend, right?’

‘He owes me rent.’

Then you owe him nothing. Take a guess. Where do you think

he’s going?’

‘I remember him saying something about meeting a woman.

He had a date. But it was a weird date. I remember that.’

‘Jesus, if it was weird enough to stick out, why the hell can’t you remember the details?’

“I was, man, you know … I was kind of, well, in a different

state.’

‘You were stoned.’

‘Best as I remember, yeah.’

‘You get her name?’

‘Nah. Maybe. I don’t know.’

‘Could it have been Deborah?’