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her when we had the complaint from the social worker, but I don’t think she said a word. He made all the running on that one. And I think I saw her fetching her kid from playgroup a couple of times. I used to stop for a chat with the mothers at the gate now and again, listen to the gossip, know what I mean? Linda is…was, I mean, quite a good-looking blonde, so you’d notice her in a crowd. She was quite a bit younger than Christie, I reckon. I suppose you could call that intelligence gathering.’
    ‘Fancied her, did you?’ Mower asked cynically and the younger man flushed slightly.
    ‘I didn’t mean that,’ he said.
    ‘No, but did you mean she was fanciable?’ Mower pressed, in spite of the discomfort the question obviously caused Sharif ’s Muslim sensibilities. It was time the ladtoughened up, he thought, as he waited for Hewitt to reply.
    ‘Well, yeah, she could have been,’ Hewitt conceded. He thought again. ‘I did see her once talking to Gerry Foster… He’s got a bit of a rep for playing away, come to think of it.’
    ‘And who’s Gerry Foster?’
    ‘The landlord at the Fox and Hounds. Big bloke with dark hair, a beard. If you want someone who keeps his finger on the pulse up here, Gerry Foster’s your man. He hears it all, I reckon. Much more than I do, as it goes.’
    ‘Well, I might just have a chat with Mr Foster next time I’m up here,’ Mower said. ‘In the meantime keep thinking in case there’s anything else you’ve missed on your intelligence missions. So far it looks as if you’ve been wandering round Staveley with your eyes tight shut for all the intelligence you’ve gathered.’
    ‘Yes, sarge,’ Hewitt mumbled, swallowing his fury. But if Hewitt thought murdered children deserved anything less than his full attention then he was making a huge mistake, Mower thought, and he knew DCI Thackeray would back him up every inch of the way on that.
     
    Late that evening, Michael Thackeray himself was standing by the tall window in the sitting room of the flat he shared with Laura Ackroyd, gazing at the moonlit garden outside. He felt rather than heard Laura come up behind him before she put an arm through his.
    ‘You can’t blame yourself for everything that goes wrong,’ she said quietly.
    ‘Not everything,’ he said. ‘But some things I’m responsible for. There’s no getting away from that.’
    ‘It’s the little boy, isn’t it?’
    ‘The longer he’s missing, the less chance of finding him alive,’ Thackeray said, the fear which haunted him clenching his stomach like a vice.
    ‘Why would the father take him away in the car if he wanted to kill him?’ Laura asked. ‘It doesn’t make sense.’
    ‘He seems to have gone off to school; his sisters hadn’t, for some reason. His school-bag’s not in the house, theirs were still hanging on the kitchen door. Men who kill their families generally don’t like to leave anyone out,’ Thackeray said. ‘It seems to be almost a point of honour – if they go, everyone has to go.’ He shuddered before turning to Laura and kissing her on the cheek, holding her very close for a moment.
    ‘It’s late. Come and eat,’ she said and he followed her into the kitchen where a small table was set for two. But as he turned his attention to the curry she had kept hot in the oven, she could see that he was still preoccupied with work. She watched him pick at his food for a moment before she gave in and turned the conversation reluctantly back in the direction of his thoughts.
    ‘Why haven’t you issued a photograph of Christie?’ she asked. ‘Ted Grant was going bananas for one this morning.’
    ‘We can’t find one,’ Thackeray said. ‘There were a few pictures of the children in the house, including the school picture of Emma and Scott we issued to the Press yesterday. But we can’t find one of the parents.’
    ‘No family albums? I thought everyone kept family albums,’ Laura said, knowing she had strayed onto