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so that my toes were already numb. The cigarette was doing me no favours, so I stubbed it out when it
was half smoked, carried the butt back into the car with me and saw Woodley’s nose wrinkle when I
stuffed it into the ashtray. I felt a curl of nausea in my gut and I rubbed my eyes hard and Woodley
said, ‘Are you all right, boss?’
‘Yeah. Why do you ask?’
He went silent, small shake of his head. He looked nervous. He had his phone in his hand and he
started to polish the screen with his sleeve. I felt like I should give him some sort of advice, but it
was difficult to think what to say.
‘It’s not a normal life this, having this job. You’re outside society.’
I wasn’t saying it well. I wanted him to understand what I meant, but he wasn’t looking at me, and
the motion of his hand polishing the phone continued, round and round.
‘Some cases make you grow up fast.’ As soon as I said it, I thought it sounded patronising, but he
didn’t seem to care.
‘Have you ever worked on something that’s remained unsolved?’ he asked me.
‘This case will be solved,’ I said. ‘We’re close now. I swear it.’
‘I know,’ he said. ‘I just wondered.’
I thought about it. There were always things that you never got to the bottom of in cases. A dog
walker who was never identified, a random white car supposed to have been at a scene, which
nobody ever confessed to driving past. That was normal, though sometimes it drove police officers
mad, seeking answers that they never got. They couldn’t let it go. I’d seen that happen once or twice,
but I’d never worked on anything where we hadn’t got our perpetrator, and I didn’t want this to be the
one. Not with a young boy’s life in the balance. Not with the worst of crimes a possibility.
‘Not yet,’ I said.
‘Do you think she’ll cough?’ Woodley asked.
‘A woman like Nicola Forbes won’t hand us a confession on a plate. We’ve got our work cut out.’
We moved on cautiously through the mist and found the cottage half a mile further along the lane.
Above us you could sense the weight of huge trees looming, although only their lower branches were
visible as suggestions of their might.
We parked beside a red Volkswagen Golf in front of a wooden fence that was warped and green
grey with lichen. I knew from the car’s registration that it belonged to Nicky Forbes.
We approached the cottage through a white wooden gate, and up a short garden path paved in
uneven stone. Wet leaves were banked against the threshold and the path was lined with rose bushes,
pruned back to their bare bones. The cottage was pretty, cream painted with a silvery thatched roof
and small windows set into thick walls. It wasn’t a large place. I guessed it had maybe three
bedrooms, one bathroom. Some of the curtains were drawn upstairs, but through a window beside the
door I could see into a compact sitting room. The furnishings were plain and tidy. There were books
lining the walls and an open fireplace. Yesterday’s papers were open on the coffee table.
As far as I could see, there were no outbuildings at all, but with the mist reducing visibility
severely, it was hard to tell.
I pulled hard on the doorbell and we heard it clanging inside.