of my head and frightening me into sullen, uncooperative edginess. And they did try—at first every few months, in the school holidays, then every year or so—but I never had anything to tell them, and around the time I left school they finally stopped coming. I felt that this had been an excellent decision, and I could not for the life of me see how reversing it at this stage would serve any useful purpose.
And I suppose, if I’m being honest, it appealed both to my ego and to my sense of the picturesque, the idea of carrying this strange, charged secret through the case unsuspected. I suppose it felt, at the time, like the kind of thing that enigmatic Central Casting maverick would have done. I rang Missing Persons, and they came up with a possible ID almost immediately. Katharine Devlin, aged twelve, four foot nine, slim build, long dark hair, hazel eyes, reported missing from 29 Knocknaree Grove (I remembered that, suddenly: all the streets in the estate called Knocknaree Grove and Close and Place and Lane, everyone’s post constantly going astray) at 10:15 the previous morning, when her mother went to wake her and found her gone. Twelve and up is considered old enough to be a runaway, and she had apparently left the house of her own accord, so Missing Persons had been giving her a day to come home before sending in the troops. They already had the press release typed up, ready to send to the media in time for the evening news. I was disproportionately relieved to have an ID, even a tentative one. Obviously I had known that a little girl—especially a healthy well-groomed little girl, in a place as small as Ireland—can’t turn up dead without someone coming forward to claim her; but a number of things about this case were giving me the willies, and I think a superstitious part of me had believed that this child would remain as nameless as if she had dropped from thin air and that her DNA would turn out to match the blood from my shoes and a variety of other X-Files–type stuff. We got an ID shot from Sophie—a Polaroid, taken from the least disturbing angle, to show to the family—and headed back to the Portakabins.
34
Tana French
Hunt popped out of one of them as we approached, like the little man in old Swiss clocks. “Did you . . . I mean, it is definitely murder, is it? The poor child. Awful.”
“We’re treating it as suspicious,” I said. “What we’ll need to do now is have a quick word with your team. Then we’d like to speak to the person who found the body. The others can go back to work, as long as they stay outside the boundaries of the crime scene. We’ll speak with them later.”
“How will . . . Is there something to show where it—where they shouldn’t be? Tape, and all that.”
“There’s crime-scene tape in place,” I said. “If they stay outside it, they’ll be fine.”
“We’ll need to ask you for the lend of somewhere we can use as an onsite office,” Cassie said, “for the rest of the day and possibly a bit longer. Where would be best?”
“Better use the finds shed,” said Mark, materializing from wherever.
“We’ll need the office, and everywhere else is soupy.” I hadn’t heard the term before, but the view through the Portakabin doors—layers of mud crazed with boot prints, low sagging benches, teetering heaps of farming implements and bicycles and luminous yellow vests that reminded me uncomfortably of my time in uniform—provided a fair explanation.
“As long as it has a table and a few chairs, that’ll be fine,” I said.
“Finds shed,” said Mark, and jerked his head towards a Portakabin.
“What’s up with Damien?” Cassie asked Hunt.
He blinked helplessly, mouth open in a caricature of surprise. “What . . . Damien who?”
“Damien on your team. Earlier you said that Mark and Damien usually do the tours, but Damien wouldn’t be able to show Detective Ryan around. Why’s that?”
“Damien’s one of the ones who found the
And I suppose, if I’m being honest, it appealed both to my ego and to my sense of the picturesque, the idea of carrying this strange, charged secret through the case unsuspected. I suppose it felt, at the time, like the kind of thing that enigmatic Central Casting maverick would have done. I rang Missing Persons, and they came up with a possible ID almost immediately. Katharine Devlin, aged twelve, four foot nine, slim build, long dark hair, hazel eyes, reported missing from 29 Knocknaree Grove (I remembered that, suddenly: all the streets in the estate called Knocknaree Grove and Close and Place and Lane, everyone’s post constantly going astray) at 10:15 the previous morning, when her mother went to wake her and found her gone. Twelve and up is considered old enough to be a runaway, and she had apparently left the house of her own accord, so Missing Persons had been giving her a day to come home before sending in the troops. They already had the press release typed up, ready to send to the media in time for the evening news. I was disproportionately relieved to have an ID, even a tentative one. Obviously I had known that a little girl—especially a healthy well-groomed little girl, in a place as small as Ireland—can’t turn up dead without someone coming forward to claim her; but a number of things about this case were giving me the willies, and I think a superstitious part of me had believed that this child would remain as nameless as if she had dropped from thin air and that her DNA would turn out to match the blood from my shoes and a variety of other X-Files–type stuff. We got an ID shot from Sophie—a Polaroid, taken from the least disturbing angle, to show to the family—and headed back to the Portakabins.
34
Tana French
Hunt popped out of one of them as we approached, like the little man in old Swiss clocks. “Did you . . . I mean, it is definitely murder, is it? The poor child. Awful.”
“We’re treating it as suspicious,” I said. “What we’ll need to do now is have a quick word with your team. Then we’d like to speak to the person who found the body. The others can go back to work, as long as they stay outside the boundaries of the crime scene. We’ll speak with them later.”
“How will . . . Is there something to show where it—where they shouldn’t be? Tape, and all that.”
“There’s crime-scene tape in place,” I said. “If they stay outside it, they’ll be fine.”
“We’ll need to ask you for the lend of somewhere we can use as an onsite office,” Cassie said, “for the rest of the day and possibly a bit longer. Where would be best?”
“Better use the finds shed,” said Mark, materializing from wherever.
“We’ll need the office, and everywhere else is soupy.” I hadn’t heard the term before, but the view through the Portakabin doors—layers of mud crazed with boot prints, low sagging benches, teetering heaps of farming implements and bicycles and luminous yellow vests that reminded me uncomfortably of my time in uniform—provided a fair explanation.
“As long as it has a table and a few chairs, that’ll be fine,” I said.
“Finds shed,” said Mark, and jerked his head towards a Portakabin.
“What’s up with Damien?” Cassie asked Hunt.
He blinked helplessly, mouth open in a caricature of surprise. “What . . . Damien who?”
“Damien on your team. Earlier you said that Mark and Damien usually do the tours, but Damien wouldn’t be able to show Detective Ryan around. Why’s that?”
“Damien’s one of the ones who found the
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