Part 28 (2/2)

She didn't say anything, her head bowed.

'Seemed to like horses plenty then, didn't he?'

Nothing.

'You know what changed?'

She shook her head, unable to tear her eyes away from the photo.

'I'm thinking it might go back to the night the stables burned down. Someone they knew died. All the horses died. Must have been traumatic for a kid.'

Lucy nodded silently.

'Maybe he even felt guilty,' he suggested carefully. 'Maybe Danny burned the stables down and Jonas knew about it.'

'Maybe,' she said, to his surprise. Seeing the photo seemed to have knocked all the spirit out of Lucy Holly, all the defence and all the defiance.

'What did he say about it?' It was worth a shot - tricking her into blurting out something by behaving as if his theory was already established fact.

'He never told me. I don't know. I never knew this.'

Her voice was dull. Dead. Marvel was a little concerned, despite himself, at the radical change in Lucy Holly. Her feisty spirit had seemed real, but he saw now that it had been a mere soap-bubble which, once popped, had disappeared so completely that he could not even see where it used to be.

He stood up, feeling oddly guilty that he had done something to her that might be irreparable.

'I've never seen a picture of him as a boy,' she said, still not looking at him.

'Why is that?' Marvel was surprised. Even in his his f.u.c.ked-up relations.h.i.+ps he could remember the mother-bearing-photo-alb.u.m routine as an early step in the courts.h.i.+p dance. f.u.c.ked-up relations.h.i.+ps he could remember the mother-bearing-photo-alb.u.m routine as an early step in the courts.h.i.+p dance.

'I don't know. Can I keep it?'

'I'm afraid I need it.'

But she held on to it in hands that shook just a little.

Marvel stood undecided for a long moment. Lucy Holly stared at the photo in her wasted lap, as if he'd already left.

Jonas looked so happy!

That was Lucy's overwhelming first impression. She had almost not recognized him because of it. His brow, his nose, his lips - all were younger but definite versions of the Jonas she had fallen in love with. But his eyes ... his eyes were completely different. Across the years, ten-year-old Jonas Holly grinned at her - without shyness, without caution.

Without fear.

It was all she could think of.

Nothing bad has happened to him yet.

She had never thought of Jonas as fearful until she'd seen this picture. She might have, if she'd seen others, but there were none to see that she could find. No reminders for her of how he had been as a child.

The photo was a tunnel in time. Danny was taller and bigger than the friend who would eventually tower over him and they held two proud little ponies - no doubt long dead. Lucy could see that this was a snapshot of the boys' whole lives at that moment, plucked from the past and shown to her now: they were at a summer show; they had won; they were happy. That was all that shone from their faces.

Her heart wrenched to see them, so young and so vital together, when now Danny was cold on a slab and Jonas's eyes were sunken with lack of sleep, and his body made too thin by work and fear and the burden of her; it seemed a fate too cruel to befall the two joyous children she held in her trembling hands.

'How could you do this?' she said.

'Hmm?' Marvel bent at the waist to hear her better.

'How could you do this to him?'

'I haven't done anything to him.'

'Look at him,' she said, her voice starting to strengthen once more.

Lucy turned the photo to Marvel and he looked past it to where her eyes had gone dark with anger. Real Real anger this time - not feistiness. anger this time - not feistiness.

'I don't know what you mean,' he said.

'Look at him!' she said again. 'Look how happy he is! And look what you've done to him now! He's a good man trying to do his job and you're just trying to make him look bad because at him!' she said again. 'Look how happy he is! And look what you've done to him now! He's a good man trying to do his job and you're just trying to make him look bad because you you can't catch the killer!' can't catch the killer!'

Lucy got to her unsteady feet as her voice gathered pace. 'Putting him on a doorstep, humiliating him in front of the whole village, implying that he'd cover up for someone who had killed six people! It's just sick! You're sick! You're sick.' sick.'

Sick.

Marvel s.n.a.t.c.hed the photo from her hand, giving her a fright.

'f.u.c.k you!' she hissed at him. you!' she hissed at him.

'f.u.c.k you you!' he spat back, making her flinch. 'If your husband's miserable it's your your fault, not mine! Someone in this s.h.i.+t-hole village has been taking out old people like seal pups, and your yokel husband is hiding something from me. So the last thing I need is some angry cripple telling me how to do my f.u.c.king job.' fault, not mine! Someone in this s.h.i.+t-hole village has been taking out old people like seal pups, and your yokel husband is hiding something from me. So the last thing I need is some angry cripple telling me how to do my f.u.c.king job.'

He walked out and slammed the front door behind him as hard as he could.

Lucy swayed in his wake, breathless with shock, holding the arm of the couch for support - and viewed herself in Marvel's words as if in the brightest mirror. She had seen herself reflected in Jonas's loving eyes for so long that she had forgotten what she really was.

Some angry cripple.

Reynolds sat in the chilly mobile unit and compared Danny Marsh's suicide note with the one Jonas Holly had found pinned to his garden gate.

There was not the slightest resemblance between the two hands. In the suicide note it was rounded and sprawling; in the other it was tight and spiky.

Reynolds was no expert, but they couldn't get the notes to to the expert, Bob Hamilton, until the snow cleared a little. They had emailed a scan so that he could start work but he'd need the originals to make a proper comparison. In the interim, they were all having a good look - although Reynolds didn't need more than a glance to tell him that a match between the two notes was highly unlikely. the expert, Bob Hamilton, until the snow cleared a little. They had emailed a scan so that he could start work but he'd need the originals to make a proper comparison. In the interim, they were all having a good look - although Reynolds didn't need more than a glance to tell him that a match between the two notes was highly unlikely.

He looked up at Marvel with a shrug and a bottom lip that expressed that opinion.

'It's possible the writing in the gate note was disguised,' said Marvel in a tone that invited no dissent. 'Hamilton may well be able to make a match.'

'He'd have to be a magician or an idiot,' dissented Reynolds.

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