CHAPTER ONE

It was 10.00 p m and Inspector Rafferty was thankful to finally be going home. The week before Christmas was not the best time of year from a policeman's point of view; Essex, in common with the rest of England’s densely-populated southern counties, had too many criminals with shopping lists of luxury items and a matching reluctance to pay for them. The combination had made his day long and tiring.

So he was inclined to snap when Constable Timothy Smales burst into his office, crashing the door back against the wall just as he was putting his coat on and melodramatically exclaimed, 'It's gone, sir. Vanished. Lilley says—'

'Can't you open a door without smashing it off its hinges, man?' Rafferty demanded. 'What's the matter with you?'

Crestfallen, Smales said, 'Sorry, sir.'

'What's gone, anyway?' Rafferty asked.

'I thought you'd have heard by now, sir.' Smales's fallen crest was now on the rise again and he came forward excitedly. 'A body was reported hanging in Dedman Wood. Only, as I said, when Lilley got there it had vanished, so—'

Rafferty was dismissive. 'Is that all?' Timothy Smales's schoolboy enthusiasm for corpses killed his small stock of common sense and he made a mental note to put the young constable down for a few more post-mortems as a cure for the condition. 'Hardly reason to take the paint off my wall. It's another hoax, man. Have you forgotten it's the school holidays? Last week it was armed robberies — this week it's corpses. With a bit of luck, by next week, the bored local teenagers will be tormenting the fire brigade instead of us.'

Smales flushed but continued doggedly. 'It wasn't a kid that reported it, sir. It was a woman. According to Beard, a posh-sounding woman. Very adamant, she was. And she was there waiting for Lilley. Said she almost burned his ears off when he finally got to the scene. And another thing, Lilley said there were definite indications that a body had been hanging where she said.'

Rafferty, still keen to get home and put his feet up, wasn't easily moved from his opinion that the call had been a hoax. The world was full of attention-seekers who had forgotten to take their medication; a posh voice and a bossy manner didn't make his conclusions any less likely. Still, he reminded himself, callers intent on wasting police time didn't usually hang around for the police to arrive.

'Lilley said there were what looked like rope marks on one of the more sturdy boughs,' Smales went on. 'And the grass was flattened directly underneath it. A small tuft of rope was still clinging to the bough itself.'

'Could have been made by children with a tyre swing.' Rafferty still felt their witness would turn out to be less impressive in the flesh. But maybe he ought to look into it a little more deeply. Resignedly, he removed his coat and indicated that Smales should continue.

'Constable Beard said the woman who reported it told him she was a magistrate from Burleigh.' Burleigh was in the north of the county, while Elmhurst was in the south, near the coast. 'A Mrs ffinch-Robinson. I can believe the magistrate bit and all, because Lilley said that when he got there and the body had gone, she didn't half give him a ticking off. Seemed to think he should have got there sooner. Anyway, she said she'd be in to make a formal statement. She hadn't been drinking, either,' Smales added. 'Lilley made sure to smell her breath.'

Rafferty frowned. ffinch-Robinson. The name rang a bell. And from what Smales said she sounded both sane and sober. But if so, and she was telling the truth, what the devil had become of the body? If the cadaver was a suicide, as seemed likely, what reason would a third party have for removing it?

Having come up with no answers, he said, 'I want to see Lilley the second he gets back. And warn him he'd better make sure he can read his writing, because I shall want to know exactly what this Mrs ffinch-Robinson said to him. I'll need chapter and verse, because, by the sound of her, nothing but another corpse will satisfy her.' Pity we can't provide her with one, he muttered to himself.

Mrs ffinch-Robinson arrived at Elmhurst police station ten minutes later and was shown into Rafferty's office. She proved not only entirely sober and respectable, but less than understanding of the slow police response.

Rafferty did his best to soothe her ruffled magistrate's feathers. 'It's nearly Christmas, Mrs ffinch-Robinson. A very busy time for us and—'

'I understand that, Inspector. But I would have thought a report of a man's body hanging in the woods would take precedence over public house brawls.'

'Normally it would, of course. Unfortunately all the uniformed officers were out or otherwise engaged when your call came through. All I can say is that an officer was despatched in response to your call as soon as possible.'

Thankfully, Mrs ffinch-Robinson didn't pursue the complaint. But she had another that was equally sensitive. 'I suggest you speak to the young officer who finally arrived in response to my call, Inspector. I found his manner offensive. He not only had the effrontery to smell my breath as though he believed me to be drunk.' Briefly, Rafferty closed his eyes, surprised at Lilley's clumsiness; it was more the behaviour he had come to expect from young Smales. 'But he also warned me of the penalties for wasting police time — hardly conducive to good police-public relations, you must agree.'

As he gazed at Mrs ffinch-Robinson, perched, with all her ruffled magisterial dignity in his visitor's chair, Rafferty wished he hadn't sent Sergeant Dafyd Llewellyn out to soothe the latest victim of Elmhurst's Christmas-shopping criminal fraternity. He could do with his diplomatic skills here. He marvelled at Lilley's nerve. Pity his judgement wasn't so hot, because, from the top of her rather stylish Lincoln green, deerstalker hat, to her no-time-to-waste French pleated hair, through to her firmly corseted figure and practically shod feet in their brilliantly burnished tan boots, Mrs ffinch-Robinson proclaimed authority, sobriety and a total lack of hysteria. Her voice, as crisp as a Cox's Orange Pippin, was clear, precise, and as demanding of a policeman's respect as the rest of her. Hardly surprising, of course. As she had been at pains to explain, she was a magistrate.

Rafferty, earlier inclined to scoff at tales of vanishing cadavers, didn't doubt that she was telling the truth about the missing body. Apart from anything else, her statement hadn't varied by as much as a word from that taken down by Lilley. She had told them she was staying with her daughter and had taken the daughter's dog for a walk. It had been the dog who had led her to the corpse. All that was simple enough. But what she had to tell him next was more worrying and did little to reassure him that the next few days would be anything but difficult.

'I didn't say anything to that young officer,' she told Rafferty, 'as he didn't exactly inspire confidence that one would be believed, but I'm certain the corpse was that of a chap called Maurice Smith.'

Rafferty frowned as another bell rang. Now why did he recognise the name?

Mrs ffinch-Robinson's intelligent grey gaze noted his dilemma. 'His was something of a cause-célèbre about ten years ago. Maurice Smith was charged with raping four young girls. The case was dismissed on a legal technicality on the first day of the trial.' Her firmly chiselled nostrils quivered her disdain for such legal bumbling. 'One of his victims killed herself when Smith was released. As you can imagine, the victims' families were outraged and made various threats against Smith.'

Rafferty nodded. Details of the case were slowly coming back. He seemed to remember that, of the families that Mrs ffinch-Robinson mentioned, one had done more than threaten. The father had waylaid Smith and given him one hell of a beating, receiving a prison sentence for his pains. 'Excuse me, Mrs ffinch-Robinson, but how did you recognise him? After all, it's ten years since—'

Mrs ffinch-Robinson interrupted him. 'Smith used to live in Burleigh which is where I sit on the bench and he had come up before me in the Magistrates' Court on several occasions in his teens. His front teeth protruded quite dreadfully. Extraordinary the parents didn't get them seen to, though, of course, the mother was one of those spiritless women you could advise till you were blue in the face. Anyway, the teeth of the corpse were exactly the same. That's why I recognised him. He'd changed very little in other respects, too. There is no doubt in my mind that it was Smith. None at all.'

Reluctant to seem to doubt her, Rafferty had, nevertheless, to question her further. 'Pardon me, but I thought you said he had a hood over his head when you found him, Mrs ffinch-Robinson?'

Although she looked a little put out that he had detected a flaw in her statement, she answered promptly enough. 'So he did. I didn't touch anything, if that's what you're implying. I didn't have to as the wind must have got under the hood and it was half off. Naturally, I shone my torch on his face. You should be grateful I did, Inspector.' The Cox's Orange Pippin in her voice became crisper than ever. 'At least you know the body's identity, even if it has gone missing.' She gave him a stern, magisterial, smile. 'Now all you have to do is find it.' She paused before adding, 'and his murderer, of course.'

After Mrs ffinch-Robinson left, Rafferty checked Smith's history. A colleague at Burleigh, as long on the job as himself, was able to confirm all that Mrs ffinch-Robinson had said and more and it was a pensive Rafferty who called Llewellyn in on his return and explained what had happened in his absence.

'You believe her?' Llewellyn asked.

With a wry smile, Rafferty nodded. 'I think we can take it that Mrs ffinch-Robinson wasn't hallucinating. She's a magistrate, no less, and the type to take Harrods trips, not LDS ones.'

'No chance it might be a suicide? After the shock of finding a body, even magistrates can get their facts wrong. It was dark, remember.'

'No chance at all I should think,' Rafferty told him. ‘And she had a torch.’ Of course, Llewellyn hadn't met Mrs ffinch-Robinson, he reminded himself. 'According to the witness, the body not only had that hood over his head, but his hands were also bound behind his back. No, I'm convinced she was telling the plain, unvarnished truth.'

He wished he could say otherwise. Mrs ffinch-Robinson would make a wonderful showing in the witness box —confident, firm, and not to be swayed by the defence counsel's tricks. But first, as she had mentioned, they had not only to find the body, they had also to catch the murderer — without him, their star turn would remain off-stage, probably giving the producer hell from the wings.

After speaking to his Burleigh colleague, Rafferty had done some more digging and now he filled Llewellyn in on the rest. 'Smith moved from Burleigh to Rawston after the aborted rape trial. From there, after a new neighbour recognised him, he moved here, where, I gather, he's lived for two years. If this missing cadaver does turn out to be Maurice Smith, I very much fear someone's been acting as judge, jury and Albert Pierrepoint, the old hangman.'

Was there anything more worrying to a policeman than the public taking the law into its own hands, Rafferty mused. Yet, at the same time, he was aware of a degree of sympathy with such action. Particularly in cases like Smith's, where justice was not only not done, but seen not to be done.

Becoming aware of Llewellyn's expectant gaze, he straightened his shoulders, firmed up his spine, and said, 'First, we'd better check that he is missing. Send Smales round to his home, Dafyd. Here's the address. And for God's sake, tell him to be discreet. Smith's living under the name of Martin Smithson. Tell Smales to make sure he asks for him under that name. When you've done that, I want you to contact Smith's family. Find out when they last saw him or heard from him. I'm sure I don't need to tell you to be discreet. As for me and Lilley, we're going to Dedman Wood to take a look at the scene.'

Llewellyn nodded and departed. Rafferty opened his door and shouted for Lilley and when the young officer appeared, told him, 'We're going out to Dedman Woods. I want to have a look for myself.'

It was now getting on for 11 o'clock and Rafferty, cheated of his early night, was in just the right mood for issuing Mrs ffinch-Robinson's advised rebuke. After he had shrugged into his coat, he said tersely, 'And next time an obviously sober citizen like Mrs ffinch-Robinson reports finding a body, please try not to get their back up. Apart from anything else, it offends against Superintendent Bradley's favourite pet project: “Politeness in Interaction with Members of the Public.”' Rafferty always made sure to mention it whenever one of the younger officers offended against the programme. He felt he had to do his bit to keep it alive, especially as the super had tried to smother it after finally sussing the PIMP acronym that Rafferty had gladly suggested for the programme. 'You know how fond of it he is. You wouldn't like him to get to hear of your doings, I'm sure.'

Lilley's blond complexion went a little paler and he shook his head. It was well known that Bradley threw himself into a towering rage whenever anyone breached his Politeness Programme, though few realised the reason why.

As, by now, Lilley was staring at his boots, he didn't notice Rafferty's lips twitch. 'Sorry, sir. Won't happen again, sir.'

'See that it doesn't. Admittedly, you're not likely to have too many truly disappearing cadavers in your career. But if you treat important witnesses like Mrs ffinch-Robinson in such a cavalier fashion, your career's likely to be short. Remember that.'

Rebuke over, Rafferty shut his door behind them, hiding the tiny smile as he did so. Even at the end of a long day that promised to wipe the smile off his face, the PIMP episode had the power to amuse. Several months ago, he had got away with supplying the apt acronym for "Long-Pockets" Bradley's latest attempt to enhance his status at Region with the immoral, penny-pinching, 'Politeness costs nothing' scam. When Bradley had finally woken up to it, Rafferty had succeeded in convincing him that, not only had his suggestion been made in all innocence, but that Region would be less than impressed if he dropped his wool-over-the-public's-eyes wheeze when he had spent so much time and money on its promotion. So Bradley had been stuck with it.

Warmed by the memory, Rafferty’s step, as he followed Lilley out to the car park, was more jaunty than it had any right to be.

'Maurice Smith's family say they haven't seen him since yesterday evening,' Llewellyn reported, when Rafferty got back to the station after examining the scene. It had been as Lilley had described, even down to the rope tuft. Rafferty nodded glumly, doubts and amusement both, already fading.

'And, as far as they know, he had no travel plans. From what they say, he's something of a loner, and rarely went out or socialised. He had no friends, as far as they're aware. They said they don't see much of him themselves, though I got the impression they don't exactly extend a hearty welcome when he does visit.'

'Understandable,' Rafferty commented. 'He must have put them through hell one way and another. Still,' he continued, uneasily, 'if Mrs ffinch-Robinson is right, and it was Maurice Smith's body she saw, then this case could have some very awkward connotations. If he's been killed by the family of one of his victims, then public sympathy for them will make our job extremely difficult. Nobody will co-operate. Nobody will answer our questions and our chances of catching his killer could be zilch.'

Rafferty, his attitude towards the victim still ambivalent, wasn't sure that wouldn't be the best result. From his understanding of the case, Smith had ruined enough lives; dead, he wouldn't have the chance to ruin more. But, aware that the high-moral ground Welshman would be unlikely to share his opinion, he kept it to himself. Llewellyn believed that, whatever the provocation, no one had the right to take the law into their own hands. Increasingly, these days, Rafferty found his own beliefs wavering. The man, rather than the policeman, thought that ultimately, every human being was responsible for their own survival and that of their family. If parliament and the courts, who were supposed to protect the honest citizen, failed in their responsibility, what was the law-abiding citizen to do? Cower in a corner and let the barbarians do what they liked?

Society had been overwhelmed by crime in recent years; like a flood tide, it poured over their homes, their schools, their neighbourhoods, tainting every aspect of life. The courts issued what he and many other people considered to be futile punishments to the perpetrators, when they punished them at all. Young criminals, in particular, laughed at the law. Without majesty, dignity and a strong right arm, the law deserved to be laughed at for the joke it had become. Lately, he had often thought that the Old Bailey, the Central Criminal Court, and the prime upholder of the law, should be crowned with "Crime Rools OK" graffiti, rather than the bronze Justice statue.

With a tired sigh, he forced such thoughts to the back of his mind and asked how Smales had got on.

'He was unable to get a reply from either Smith or his landlady,' Llewellyn told him. 'And as he was anxious about your warning on discretion, he thought better of asking amongst the neighbours. I told him to return to the station. I hope that's all right?'

'Yes. It's getting late, too late for banging on doors and disturbing people. We'll go ourselves in the morning. For the moment, I want to keep this low-key. I know Mrs ffinch-Robinson was convinced the corpse was Smith's, but it's possible she made a mistake. Time enough to turn up the volume if Smith has vanished.'

In spite of his forced optimism, Rafferty wished he could get out of his mind the conviction that the Mrs ffinch-Robinsons of this world were pretty well infallible. Such thoughts were, he felt sure, guaranteed to give him a sleepless night.

CHAPTER TWO

On Friday morning Rafferty and Llewellyn drove to Maurice Smith's flat. He lived in an Edwardian terraced house, a once-family home that had seen better days and had long been converted to separate dwellings. Smith's home was on the first floor, above the landlady, Mrs Penny's, flat. There was an unlocked outside door, and, inside this, the two flats each had their own doors with letterboxes and secondary bells. Rafferty noticed that Smith's door had a spyhole, an amateur effort which he had probably made himself.

After getting no answer from Smith, Rafferty tried the landlady's bell. But there was no answer there either and he suggested they have a look round the back.

A six-foot double wooden gate concealed concrete hard-standing. Rafferty frowned as he saw the lock on the gate had been forced. 'Looks very recent,' he observed as he examined the bright wood around the lock. As well as the broken gate lock, when they walked up the back path they found a few threads of navy cotton clinging to the fire escape. According to Mrs ffinch-Robinson, the corpse she had found had been wearing a navy and maroon tracksuit. After he drew Llewellyn's attention to the threads Rafferty sealed them in a plastic bag without further comment.

He was beginning to feel he should have posted an officer in Dedman Wood last night to secure the scene. But it was too late for that now and he consoled himself with the thought that there could be few enough people choosing to walk in the woods after dark, particularly in the depths of winter. Anyway, on the way out this morning, he had instructed Lilley to stand guard duty at the scene and with such a belated effort he had to be content. After all, with no corpse, they couldn't be sure they had a murder on their hands and, until they were sure, he didn't want to alert the press by putting a uniform at the scene.

They found nothing else and came back to the front of the property. Mrs Penny had still not returned, but, determined to get some answers, Rafferty decided they would wait. There was a baker's on the corner and he sent Llewellyn over to get coffee, which they drank sitting in the car.

The baker's had a three-tiered wedding cake in the window. It turned Rafferty's mind to other things than Smith. Llewellyn had been strongly courting Rafferty's second cousin, Maureen, since the previous April, and, from various remarks that Llewellyn had made, Rafferty had got the impression that an announcement was imminent. But several months had gone by and no announcement had been made. Now, glancing at Llewellyn he asked, 'So, how's the love life? Popped the question yet?'

Beside him, Llewellyn stiffened. 'We have only known one another for a little over six months, you know. Matrimony is too important a step to rush into.'

'And faint hearts never won fair lady,' Rafferty reminded him. 'What's the matter? Getting cold feet?'

Llewellyn said nothing and Rafferty, who would himself like nothing more than a spot of connubial bliss, commented tartly, 'If I know you, you'll be saying the same in six years. You do love each other, I take it?' They'd certainly looked moony-eyed enough to Rafferty on the occasions he'd seen them together.

Llewellyn forced a 'yes' out.

'There you are, then.'

Of course, the Welshman couldn't help being the way he was, Rafferty reminded himself. His background as a Welsh Methodist minister's only son was hardly guaranteed to turn him into a young Lochinvar. What Llewellyn needed was an agony uncle, he decided. Or a boot up the backside. Or both.

He plumped for the gentle approach. 'So, what seems to be the problem?' he asked, in his best bedside manner. 'You've got heaps in common, you love each other fit to bust. What else is holding you up?'

Llewellyn hesitated, then confided, 'I want her to go up to Wales with me to meet my mother. Just a short visit, over a weekend.'

'And Maureen won't go, I take it?'

Llewellyn nodded glumly. 'She said she has no intention of being paraded around my home village like a prize cow.'

Rafferty spluttered into his coffee and muttered to himself, 'That sounds like Maureen.' He thought for a moment, then said brightly, 'So, if the prize cow won't go to the cattle show, what you've got to do is hold the show down here and let Daisy parade only for the prospective purchaser rather than the non-spending gawpers.'

'I wish you wouldn't keep referring to her as—'

Rafferty held up his hand. 'All right. Sorry. It's a good idea, though, isn't it? Isn't it?' he repeated, when Llewellyn failed to respond.

'It would be if it didn't have several drawbacks, which was the reason I didn't suggest it. For one, my flat's too small. Of course my mother could stay with Maureen's mother, but— '

'Exactly – but.'

Maureen's mother was a difficult woman. No, Rafferty thought, scrub that. She was bloody impossible; all airs and graces and condescension; starched tablecloths and starched pillows cases. Starched knickers, too, probably. 'Your mother wouldn't stay in a hotel, I suppose?'

'I wouldn't ask it of her. Hotels can be lonely places. And she's lived a very quiet life.' He glanced quickly at Rafferty. 'You'll probably find this amusing, but she still hasn't got a television set.'

Rafferty didn't find it funny at all. In a sudden burst of generosity, he found himself saying, 'She could stay with Ma. She's got plenty of room.'

Rafferty, always convinced his ideas were excellent until events proved otherwise, pushed this one with his usual enthusiasm. Ignoring the doubtful look in Llewellyn's eye, he said, 'It's the perfect solution, Daff. They're both widows, both alone, it'd be welcome company for both of them. At least let me put it to Ma.'

Llewellyn's old-fashioned look made Rafferty re-examine his initial enthusiasm. Perhaps volunteering ma and her best spare room wasn't such an inspired notion, after all? If Llewellyn's childhood had been even half as dreary as Rafferty suspected, his mother must be a dour old biddy, as narrow in outlook as his ma was broad.

But he realised he had talked Llewellyn into it when the Welshman suddenly asked, 'You're sure Mrs Rafferty won't mind?'

'Sure I'm sure.' Rafferty swallowed hard and added, 'she'll love it.'

Rafferty's Ma had taken even more of a proprietary interest in the romance than Rafferty and was well on the way to persuading Llewellyn to convert to Catholicism. Rafferty consoled himself with the thought that it would only be for a week or so. Just while Mrs Llewellyn looked 'Daisy' over. He'd have to ensure he made that clear. 'I'll ask her tonight,' he told Llewellyn. 'And then you can sort the details out between yourselves.'

It seemed Llewellyn, too, had a few reservations, for he said quickly, 'Perhaps it would be best to make the invitation for after Christmas? I'm sure your mother will be far too busy to want to entertain strangers then.'

'Good idea.' Christmas at ma's house was normally riotous. Not suitable for an old-fashioned Methodist matron, who was likely to be long on sin and short on forgiveness. Not suitable at all.

Though, the more Rafferty thought about it, the more he realised there were few periods in the year when the visit wouldn't turn out to be an unmitigated disaster. Why don't I keep my big mouth shut? he asked morosely. It'll all end in tears, I know it will. Probably mine.

He pushed his gloomy conclusions aside as he saw a comfortably built woman in her seventies walking towards them, a well-filled shopping trolley pushed before her. 'Want to bet that's Smith's landlady?'

Not being a betting man, Llewellyn didn't take him up on his offer. But Rafferty's guess was borne out when she stopped at the front door and pulled out a key.

They got out of the car. Rafferty, careful not to startle her, took his warrant card from his pocket and softly called her name. As she turned, he held the card up and slowly approached.

'We're police officers. You are Mrs Penny?' She nodded and Rafferty introduced himself and Llewellyn. 'I wonder, could we have a word? It's about your lodger.'

'About Ma-Martin?' She studied them anxiously before asking, 'Why? Whatever has he done?'

'He hasn't done anything,' Rafferty hastened to reassure her. At least not lately, he silently amended. 'We just need to speak to him, but as he isn't home ..'

She hesitated, then said, 'You'd better come in.'

`Mrs Penny's living room was homely; comfortable, if over-furnished, with masses of family photographs dotted about. Her face creased in anxiety as, after she had sat them down, she said, 'You're sure he's not in any sort of trouble.'

'No.' Rafferty paused and added, 'that is, not exactly. As I said, we just wanted to speak to him. Actually, one of my officers called round yesterday evening,' Rafferty told her. 'But he could get no reply at either Mr Smithson's flat or yours. Of course, it was rather late.'

In spite of her obvious anxiety about her lodger, Mrs Penny managed a tiny smile. 'Isn't that always the way? Last night was the first evening I've been out in four months. Went to a WRAF's reunion at a local hotel. It was after midnight before I got home. Haven't had such a good time since I don't know when.'

The houses on either side were also multi-occupancy, she told them, but their landlords, unlike her, didn't live on the premises and the tenants were mostly young and tended to come and go. She had been widowed two years earlier, and nowadays, she rarely saw anyone unless she went out and, apart from shopping, that happened seldom. 'But here am I forgetting my manners. Let me make some tea.'

She bustled into the kitchen and was soon plying them with such quantities of tea, home-made sponge cake and biscuits that it wasn't hard to guess the extent of her loneliness.

As she sat down, Rafferty explained that her lodger had been reported missing. He judged that was the safest way to describe the peculiar events of yesterday. 'There are certain – aspects that warrant further investigation.'

Her wide brow creased as she returned to his previous answer. 'But who would report him missing? He has no friends, and although he saw his family on Wednesday evening, that's the first time he's seen them in weeks.' Her warm gaze was sad. 'His mother died some years ago and he doesn't really get on with his step-father and half-brother. From odd things he's said, I gather they don't encourage his visits. I don't know why he bothers. Still, I suppose they're the only family he's got. But, in reality, I'm probably the nearest thing he's got to true friend and family both, and I certainly haven't reported him missing.' She eyed them shrewdly. 'So who has?'

'I'm afraid I can't tell you that, Mrs Penny,' Rafferty replied. 'I can only say again that the person who did so is very respectable, very responsible, and wouldn't make such a report without being pretty sure of the facts.'

Her expression anxious, she told them, 'You know, now you mention it, I haven't heard him at all this morning and he's generally an early riser. Usually, I hear him moving about. Wednesday evening he was pacing up and down as though he had something on his mind; it went on till the early hours. Yesterday evening was the same — at least until I went out. It worried me to leave him all alone when he was so obviously troubled. I had half a mind to stay home after all, but Martin wouldn't hear of it. He wouldn't tell me what was the matter either and I couldn't force him.'

She sighed heavily. 'And now you tell me he's missing. I do hope he hasn't done anything silly.' Her warm brown gaze rested steadily on Rafferty's face. 'You know his real identity, I take it?'

Rafferty nodded, surprised that she should be aware of it and still let Smith remain in her home.

She explained, 'He told me his real identity a couple of months after he moved in. He knew from the Social that I was on the list of those prepared to offer a home to men like him. I suppose he felt he could confide in me.' She sighed again. 'I do wish he'd told me what's been worrying him this last day or two.'

'You weren't concerned when he told you of his background?' Rafferty asked.

'I'm seventy-six, Inspector,' she told him calmly. 'An age I thought unlikely to rouse Maurice's anti-social urges. I felt sorry for him. He was – is,' determinedly she corrected herself, as though unwilling to accept the possibility that her lodger might be dead, 'a pretty sad young man; plain, awkward, lacking any social graces. He desperately needed someone to talk to, someone to take an interest in him. I don't think anyone else ever did. Of course, with most people, his appearance and diffident manner went against him.'

She studied them for a moment, as though weighing them up, before confiding, 'My son had a similar problem to Maurice. My Alan committed suicide when he was twenty-eight because he hated himself so much. No-one seemed able to help him. He served a prison sentence for assaulting one young girl. He had an awful time there and was terrified he would weaken, attack another young girl and get sent back. He was ashamed of what he'd done, but he told me when he got these urges they seemed to take him over.' In her lap, her hands gripped each other tightly. 'I think, in the end, he felt he could no longer cope with all the emotions raging inside him, so — he destroyed himself. He felt it was his only choice. I thought ..' She bit her lip 'I thought I might be able to help Maurice, where I'd failed to help my son, prevent the same thing happening to him as happened to my boy. They can control those sort of sexual compulsions nowadays, can't they? Only – ' she faltered. 'Only nobody seems terribly bothered to do so. I knew Maurice confessed to the police. He expected to be put away, to get help. Only he wasn't and he didn't.' Abruptly, she got up. Rafferty guessed the memories of her son were too painful, too full of self-blame and thoughts of if only for her to wish to dwell on them. 'You'll want the key to his room.'

'Thank you.' Rafferty paused. 'I gather Maurice Smith's been here about two years now?'

She nodded and as she handed over the key, asked, 'You won't disturb things too much? Only he'll be upset if I have to tell him you've been going through his things. He can be very secretive.'

Rafferty reassured her. 'Have you any idea what he was wearing yesterday evening? It would help our enquiries to know.'

She nodded. 'He was wearing a navy and maroon tracksuit.'

Rafferty and Llewellyn exchanged glances.

Mrs Penny hadn't missed the exchange. In a shaky voice, she added, 'He was wearing it when I went up to say goodbye at seven-thirty.' She hurried on as if reluctant to enquire further as to what significance they placed on the tracksuit. He preferred such clothes to shirts and proper trousers. Didn't show the dirt and saved ironing, he said, though I'd have willingly done his laundry for him, and his cleaning, if he'd let me. But, as I said, in many ways he was a very private person and he was wary about getting too close. He didn't like letting anyone in his room; he told me he'd had threats made against him in the past. He always kept his front door on a chain and never released it till he had checked his caller's identity through that spyhole he drilled in his door.' She paused, and, eyes clouding with anxiety, she added, 'The jogging suit should be in his laundry basket. He always went to the laundry on Thursday nights.' Obviously, even without their confirmation, she had concluded for herself that this tracksuit was important, for before turning away, she added, 'I hope you find it.'

So did Rafferty.

Rafferty put the key in the lock and opened the door to Maurice Smith's flat. Though 'flat' was a grand name for what was little more than a large bedsit with cubbyhole kitchen and tiny bathroom. Bathroom was another misnomer, as there was no bath, merely a shower cubicle and a grubby toilet. He wondered why Smith hadn't taken Mrs Penny up on her offer to do his cleaning, because it was obvious he didn't trouble with such chores himself. The place was filthy, with the sour odour of unwashed sheets, discarded food and rarely opened windows.

Rafferty was about to make a derogatory comment on Smith's slovenly housekeeping when a fleeting picture of his own bathroom with its less than sparkling white enamel made him think better of it. But, he persuaded himself, his bathroom did not the man make. Obviously other habits had far more bearing on character. He checked through the laundry basket. Though it had several items of dirty clothing, the navy and maroon tracksuit wasn't amongst them.

With downturned lips, Llewellyn surveyed the room: from its leaning tower of yellowing newspapers, to the unmade bed with its soiled grey sheets, to the mismatched crockery piled in the kitchen sink. 'Tidy chap, wasn't he?' he commented, his words revealing that he not only shared Rafferty's distaste for Smith's sluttish housewifery, but also the growing conviction that Smith was dead.

Rafferty smiled crookedly and advised, 'Just be grateful we remembered our Marigolds,' as he pulled the thin protective gloves from his pocket and put them on. 'And, although this is not yet an official murder investigation, that doesn't mean it mightn't be, soon, so try not to move the dust around too much.'

They didn't know what they might find here, he reasoned. If Smith was dead, as seemed increasingly likely, given the build-up of evidence, it was possible the flat might yield valuable clues to his murderer's identity.

There was a battered sideboard against the far wall, and Rafferty made for it, with the unkind thought that it would do his fussy Virgoan sergeant the world of good to plunge his suit and his sensibilities into the newspaper collection of Grub Street's outpourings that Smith seemed to have amassed. Besides, he added to himself in mitigation before his conscience could chime in, the sideboard seemed the most likely place for Smith to keep anything of a personal nature and was therefore the inspector's prerogative.

Behind him, Llewellyn sneezed as he began to dismantle the pile of newsprint. 'These are all about the court case,' Llewellyn told him shortly, as he held the yellowed Elmhurst Echo of ten years ago at arms' length and began to read from its front page. '"Maurice Smith freed on legal technicality. The Court was in uproar after the Judge's decision to free self-confessed rapist, Maurice Smith. In the public gallery, the crowd were on their feet, shouting, screaming, demanding justice. Outraged, several of the victims' fathers yelled, 'We'll get you, you b —' at the defendant.

'"In the dock, the defendant's face, shocked when the judge declared the evidence inadmissible, now became positively ashen, his body visibly shaking. He looked terrified. As the police bustled twenty-year-old Smith out of the courtroom, several of the crowd managed to get in the odd punch, the odd kick. The police officers didn't appear to try too hard to stop them."'

'Maurice Smith's fifteen minutes of fame,' Rafferty commented when Llewellyn paused. 'Mrs Penny gave us the impression he wanted help, hated himself, yet the fact that he kept that pile of newsprint would seem to indicate that his notoriety had fed a fair-sized ego. Makes you wonder.'

Rafferty eased his back and bent again to his searches. Like the first, the second drawer was stuffed to overflowing with paper. Unsurprisingly, Maurice Smith's correspondents, in the main, seemed to have been the Social. From the timescale of the correspondence it was evident that Smith hadn't had a job since the court case, though, from what Rafferty had since read about him, Smith had seldom held down a job before it either and was apparently inadequate in more ways than the obvious.

Incredibly, or perhaps not so incredibly, given his amassing of newspapers giving details of the case, Smith had also kept the hate mail that had been directed to his original family home. There were about fifty in a bunch, held together by a thick elastic band. Rafferty flicked through them. In the way of such missives, they were unsigned and contained the usual badly spelled bile. They were well-fingered, in some places split along the folds as though Smith had found a masochistic thrill in reading and re-reading the messages of hate he had spawned.

Rafferty put the letters to one side, and was just about to push the drawer back in, when he noticed the corner of another piece of paper poking over the back edge of the wood. Pulling the drawer completely out, he put it on the floor before retrieving the paper. This one differed from the rest, he immediately saw. For one thing, the paper looked new, still crisp, still white.

His heart began to thump as he turned the paper over and saw that someone had taken the trouble to painstakingly cut out letters from a newspaper and stick them down on the sheet. The rest of Smith's hate mail had been either typed or hand written.

'Dafyd,' he called. 'Come and take a look at this.'

Llewellyn abandoned his newspaper scavenging with alacrity and came over.

'"Your identity is known,"' Rafferty read. '"You can hide no longer, your evil deeds will soon be brought to public notice once again. Confess, confess, and admit your crimes. Beg your victims for forgiveness or further action will be taken against you. You have twenty-four hours."' It was unsigned. 'Seems like he was threatened with 'outing',' Rafferty commented.

'Outing', the practise originally directed by gay-and-proud-of-it activists at closet homosexuals in high-profile positions in society to force them to admit their sexual identity, had recently taken another turn. It was now used against rapists like Smith, who had got off on legal technicalities, and who were either living under aliases for their own protection, or whose names, to protect the identity of their victims, had never been released to the general public. It was suspected the information about the rapists’ whereabouts was supplied by disgruntled police officers.

Although the more militant elements in women's groups were almost certainly the main proponents of 'outing', they were careful enough to cover their tracks and had never admitted their involvement. Rafferty had often wondered what stopped them, as they would surely welcome the publicity a criminal prosecution would bring to their cause.

There was a Rape Support Group locally. Rafferty knew Mrs Nye, their spokeswoman personally, and he doubted she would be involved in 'outing' rapists or allow any of her members to do so. Still, someone had attempted it.

He pulled an evidence bag from his pocket and carefully slipped the missive inside. In view of the care the writer had taken to hinder handwriting identification, he thought it unlikely they'd find any fingerprints on it, but if Smith didn't turn up soon, he'd get it checked out by the Document Examiner. He hunted for the envelope the 'outing' letter might have come in and eventually found one that looked a possible. It was in the small wicker wastepaper basket. Plain white, with a first-class stamp, someone had taken the trouble to use a stencil set to write Smith's name and address. He checked the postmark; Tuesday morning, so it had presumably arrived some time on Wednesday. The letter had given Smith twenty-four hours to come clean about what he had done — no wonder he had spent that evening and the next pacing his floor; and now he was not only missing but reported dead. Ironic really, Rafferty thought. After all, Smith had already confessed, all those years ago.

Rafferty found another couple of bags, one for the envelope and one for the hate mail, then carried on with the search. He was about to return downstairs to ask Mrs Penny if she had known of the letter or if she could confirm by which post it had arrived, when his mobile phone rang. It was Smales. And if Rafferty had ever heard of the warning to be careful for what you wished as your wish might come true, he had no premonition that he was about to learn the truth of the adage.

CHAPTER THREE

'Sir? You know that body that was hanging in the woods?'

Rafferty, warned by the deliberate drama in Smales' voice, pulled the mobile closer to his ear and said sharply, 'What about it?'

'It's only turned up again, sir. Hanging in Dedman Wood, like before. Lilley is there now, guarding it in case it does another vanishing act.'

Just like a child on Christmas morning, when Santa had brought him exactly what he'd asked for, Smales could hardly contain his excitement. Rafferty smothered a sigh and reminded himself that Smales was still very young, very inexperienced, and looked even younger than his years, traits which caused some of the women officers, who found his boyish ways endearing, to make a bit of a pet of him. Rafferty, in an attempt to compensate for this smothering, found he had frequently to play the stern father role. It didn't come easily.

'Try to remember, Smales, that this cadaver – if it's not just a figment of Lilley's eager-beaver imagination – was somebody's loved one.' Unless it was Smith, of course, Rafferty reminded himself. Smith; unloved and sure to be unlamented by everyone except his landlady. 'If you concentrate on that thought, you'll find it tends to take the edge off the hormones.' Besides, Rafferty told himself, not very convincingly, the body mightn't even be Smith's. Though the chances of two different cadavers hanging in Dedman Wood in the space of twelve hours was pretty slim.

There was an embarrassed throat-clearing at the other end of the phone.

'So what makes you so sure this is the same body? Have you got a confirmed identity?'

'No doubt about it, guv.' Some of the earlier excitement edged its way back into Smales' voice. 'Lilley got Liz Green to take a copy of Smith's mug-shot out to the woods when the warden told him he'd found a body. It's Maurice Smith, all right.'

Rafferty silently congratulated Lilley's initiative. Obviously, he had taken to heart his words of warning and was doing his best to impress. However, he changed his mind as Smales's voice ran breathlessly on, and advised that the body was right by where Mrs ffinch-Robinson's cadaver had vanished.

'Is that so?' Rafferty frowned. 'Lilley was supposed to be guarding the scene of crime,' he snapped. 'So, how come it was the warden, rather than Lilley, who found the body?'

This time Smales wasn't quite so ready to push his opinions and a deathly silence wafted down the airwaves.

'Get a touch of the ghostly ghoulies, did he?' Rafferty asked. 'Sat his sentry-go duties out in his car, I suppose?' Rafferty couldn't altogether blame him as he knew his own imagination would have gone into overdrive in the same situation. His gaze settled on Smith's armchair and narrowed. Was he seeing things, or did one of the stains on the back of the armchair look fresher than the rest?

'..didn't seem likely there'd have been two different bodies hanging in the woods in such a short space of time, sir,' Smales continued to gabble in his ear, repeating his own earlier conclusion. 'Funny thing, though. Lilley told me that last time, the witness claimed the body was bound and had a hood over his head. He has neither this time, though he's still wearing the navy and maroon tracksuit an d—'

Rafferty broke into Smales's rhetoric. 'Tell me, has he any injuries? A stab wound, for instance?'

'Funny you should say that, sir.'

Rafferty smiled at the astonishment in Smales's voice, and guessed his detecting skills had gone up a notch in the young copper's estimation. ‘Just call me Sherlock, son,’ he muttered to himself.

'He's been stabbed high in the back, according to Lilley. Slap bang through the heart.'

Rafferty nodded to himself. Although he had no reason to think Lilley an expert on forensic pathology, it was likely he was right. According to his record, Smith was a small, slight man. He couldn't be sure, of course, but it was his guess that the stain and slit in the armchair were exactly where he'd expect to find them if a man of Smith's height had been sitting in it when stabbed through the heart.

Rafferty, remembering what Mrs Penny had said on the subject, found himself wondering who Smith would have trusted enough to let enter his room? Taking the 'outing' letter in conjunction with the earlier hate mail he had received after the case, he would surely have been even more wary than usual?

Swiftly, he gave his instructions to Smales. He wanted a team sent to Dedman Wood and another to Smith's room. 'You know what to do to get it organised. Sergeant Llewellyn will wait here for the arrival of the second team.'

Rafferty thought it probable that Smith had died in his flat but the sooner they knew for certain the better. He decided to postpone questioning Mrs Penny again. For the moment he felt it was more urgent to confirm the cadaver's identity for himself. Besides, he reasoned, if it was Smith, he'd rather question her further when he broke the news to her. 'Has Dr Dally been contacted?'

'Not yet, sir. Lilley only just called it in.'

'I'll give him the good news myself,' Rafferty decided. 'Off you go.' He told Llewellyn what had happened, drew his attention to the armchair and told him to point it out to the forensic team when they arrived. Then he dialled Sam Dally’s number. Surprisingly, Sam Dally answered immediately the switchboard put him through. 'You're eager, Sam. Got nothing left to cut up?'

'Why?' Dally countered. 'Are you volunteering?'

Rafferty checked his heart. It was still ticking. 'Not yet. I'll get my GP to let you know when I'm ready for the slab.' He paused. 'Got a live one for you.'

'You mean you're letting me kill the customers as well as cut 'em up now? That should keep me in business till I collect my pension.'

'A live dead one,' Rafferty corrected himself. 'A swinger, though I doubt the rope killed him as, according to young Lilley, he was stabbed through the heart, and this is his second stringing up.' Quickly Rafferty explained about the earlier episode. 'The troops are on their way. I just thought I'd ring you myself and give you a chance to fill your flask with a warming nip of something. It's bitter out there.'

'What a thoughtful wee laddie, you are, Rafferty. So, where is it, this swinger?'

Rafferty told him. 'I'll see you there.'

The December morning was raw and overcast, and by the time Rafferty arrived, the uniformed branch had stationed officers with torches at strategic points along the lonely, little used lane. Rafferty turned the last corner and before he doused his headlights they picked out Lilley's fair hair and pale face. The young officer, recognising the car, hurried forward. 'It's Smith, sir, I'm sure of it,' he told Rafferty as Rafferty climbed out of the car.

Rafferty nodded and got into his protective gear as Lilley repeated what Smales had already told him. 'Let's have the mug-shot,' he said. Lilley gave it to him, and, after Rafferty had given his name to the officer recording each arrival, he guided him eagerly along the taped off route.

Like before, when Lilley had accompanied him to the scene and shown where Mrs ffinch-Robinson had found the body, Rafferty saw that no attempt had been made to conceal it deeper in the wood. It hung from one of the lower branches of a sturdy oak tree, swinging to and fro on the end of the noose, the tracksuit rucked up, exposing the skinny, mottled torso.

Rafferty gazed at the body impassively for several moments before he raised the photograph that Lilley had supplied. He switched on his torch and compared the two. As Mrs ffinch-Robinson had claimed, the teeth were certainly the same: prominent, yellow and protruding over the bottom lip, one with a little chip missing. The ears, too, as though designer-constructed to match the teeth, also had a tendency to stick out.

Not a face to inspire love, Rafferty concluded. Nor one likely to incline its owner towards a confident, outgoing nature. With a pang of unexpected sympathy, Rafferty felt that in a society obsessed with good looks such a face was more likely to belong to an introverted misfit; one of society's rejects. Smith had certainly been that, he felt and, as he switched off the torch, he immediately asked himself if he wasn't being too simplistic. There were, after all, few enough beauties in the world of either sex, yet most people, the bat-eared and the goofy included, managed to pair up.

What was it they said? he asked himself. That emotional involvement was the murderer of good police work. They were right, he knew that. Even so, he still couldn't help feeling sorry for the poor little bastard. Of all the corpses he had seen — and he'd seen a few — he felt this one was in many ways the most pitiful. He could sense, just by looking at him, that Maurice Smith's life had contained little, if any joy; restriction and misery and frustration had undoubtedly been his usual companions; no caring family, no girlfriends, not even money to pay prostitutes; an existence, nothing more. Maybe if someone had done something years earlier, straightened his teeth out, had his ears pinned back, loved him, he might never have done what he did.

Rafferty realised he was doing it again — letting his emotions get too strong a grip. He reminded himself that Smith had raped little girls. What excuse could there be for that?

It was eerie in the wood. The trees seemed to loom threateningly and Rafferty told himself not to be ridiculous. The torches gave only a sparse half-light, faintly assisting the grey day, and, above the murmured voices of his colleagues, he could still hear the creaking of the branch under its unaccustomed weight. Although in the gloom, with his own torch switched off, he was unable to make out more than a pale blur where Smith's face was, he could still see it clearly in his mind's eye: the rabbit teeth, the weak chin, the bat ears, the pathetic skinniness of the flesh where the tracksuit top and bottom had parted. He shivered and turned away to let the photographer get on with his work.

Even the usually black-humoured Sam Dally was affected by the scene when he arrived five minutes later. His first comment as he took in the dangling corpse only served to increase the sense of doom and gloom. '”Though every prospect pleases, and only man is vile.”'

'I suppose that's one of Llewellyn's borrowed homilies,' Rafferty said.

Sam nodded. 'Some eighteenth-century bishop, if I remember correctly. Must be a Sixties’ child,' he commented briefly as he studied the corpse, explaining for the benefit of those too young or too slow to appreciate the allusion, 'still swinging.' Nobody laughed.

After Lance, the photographer, had finished filming the body in situ, a shivering Sam Dally quickly confirmed both stab wound and the extinction of life, and the body was cut down.

He went through his usual checks with even more speed. As Rafferty had remarked, it was a freezing day, the sky heavy and threatening snow, and none were keen to linger longer than necessary; the pathetic cadaver, its flesh having already been exposed to the elements for some time, had such a chilling effect, physically, mentally, emotionally, that Rafferty felt he would never get warm again, never get that sad, plain face out of his mind, and as soon as Sam had finished ministering to the corpse, he relieved him of his flask and took a reviving nip. Strictly against regulations, of course, but now was not the time to worry about such things.

He stared hard at the body and thought about the 'outing' threat. Although the first finding of the body with its macabre hood might be explained by the threat being carried to its ultimate conclusion, it didn't explain its removal and second appearance. He and Lilley had examined the surrounding area the night before, and checked missing persons in case the identification had been wrong. And although the branch had shown signs of damage, with a rope tuft still clinging determinedly to it, the body had certainly gone. Now here it was again; as large as life. Or death.

Rafferty shivered again and turned to Lilley. 'I gather the warden found him?'

Lilley nodded. 'That's him, guv.' He pointed to a middle-aged man sitting in one of the police cars. The warden had a sour face, the disapproval on the countenance set in concrete, as though he felt the whole scene, corpse, bustling coppers and all had been organised solely to discommode him.

Rafferty sighed and tried to make allowances. The man had had a shock after all, he was bound to look a bit grim. Even so, he thought, he still looks a miserable bugg—.

Sam Dally interrupted him before his charitable impulse was totally eroded. 'I'd say he's been dead something like twelve hours, which would fit in with what you told me.'

'Reckon whoever strung him up the second time was hoping to pass it off as a suicide?' Rafferty asked.

‘ Need more than hope to bring it off, seeing as he had a bloody great stab wound in his back.' Sam pulled back the wrist cuffs on the tracksuit exposing weals on both wrists. 'A suicide who ties his own wrists?' he went on. 'You'd have to be one of life's eternal optimists to think you could convince anyone it was a DIY job.

'Almost certainly died from the stab wound,' Sam added, 'as there are no petechiae in the conjunctiva as I'd expect from death by hanging, though confirmation of that will have to wait till I've done the post-mortem. We're a bit slack at the moment. The usual winter rush of customers hasn't materialised; must be waiting to see what Father Christmas brings them, so I'll fit him in straight after lunch.'

Rafferty grimaced. That meant no lunch for him. Post-mortems made his stomach churn enough when it was empty. It had been touch and go at the last autopsy he had attended and he didn't want to risk it again. Sometimes, he suspected Sam deliberately timed the post-mortems on his cases for just after meals. He wouldn't put it past him.

'You said on the phone that this is the second time he's been strung up,' Sam commented.

Rafferty nodded. 'Same body, different tree. The first time, according to the witness, a Mrs ffinch-Robinson, who's a magistrate from Burleigh, no less, and a very reliable witness, it was hanging from that tree, over there.' Rafferty pointed to a venerable oak; huge and gnarled, it looked like it had been around since the beginning of time. 'Only by the time Lilley got here to investigate, the body had gone.'

Rafferty told Sam the corpse's identity and about the 'outing' letter they had found. 'It looks very much as if someone's been playing Judge Jeffreys and Lord High Executioner combined. I don't like it.'

An odd expression danced its way across Sam Dally's face as Rafferty finished his explanation. 'The original crossroads used to run by here,' Sam told him, ominously adding, 'legend has it that this,' he pointed to the gigantic oak, 'was the old Hanging Tree. One of them, anyway — in medieval times they generally put a beam across the branches of two trees and kicked away the ladder when the condemned was aloft.'

Rafferty gazed at the tree with quickened interest. Oak trees always reminded him of elephants; he supposed it was the coarse, scored look of them. This one, even in the gloomy half-light under the branches, looked like the oldest elephant who had ever lived, a real Methuselah of an elephant, all criss-crossed skin, the individual diamond shapes standing out an inch and more from the flesh. It was an easy step to convince himself that it had a matching elephantine memory and, hidden deep in its trunk, it would have stored the name, face and emotions of every one of the hundreds of poor wretches it had helped despatch to the next world.

'Used to string up witches, heretics and other individualists,' Sam continued. 'Though, as I said— ‘

'Witches?' Rafferty interrupted. 'I thought they were always burned?'

'Read your history books, laddie,' Sam advised. 'That was always more of a Scottish custom. It only became popular down here when Scottish Jimmy inherited the English throne in the early seventeenth century. A man with a mighty big fear of witches was old Jimmy One. Last century, by comparison, they were much less obsessed with punishing supposed witches and more into doing the dreaded deed to anyone who struck a Privy Councillor, damaged Westminster Bridge, or impersonated a Chelsea Pensioner. The list of punishments for which you could be hanged in the earlier part of the nineteenth century was long and merciless, I can tell you.'

The latter description was much like Sam Dally, Rafferty reflected, as Sam, who always seemed to get great pleasure out of encouraging others' worst fears, added, 'For once, it looks as if your theory is bang on target. When it comes to your murderer, Lord High Executioner seems about the size of it. For your sake, I hope your killer isn't as determined to rid the country of rapists as James I was to rid it of witches and later monarchs of Chelsea Pensioner impersonators.'

Such a possibility had already occurred to Rafferty, but he hadn't been willing to dwell on it. Now though, hearing it put into words by the far from fanciful Dally, he felt as though an icy hand had gripped his stomach and twisted it. His own unspoken concerns, taken together with Sam's robust observation, forced him to consider the worst case scenario in earnest: what if this killing wasn't simply a one-off act of revenge, but the beginning of a determined campaign? An "outing" campaign with a vengeance. One that didn't stop at threats of exposure and their follow-through.

As Rafferty's guts practised reef knots, the tubby little doctor tortured him further. 'I know this looks like an unimportant little lane, now, but at one time, this was an ideal place to dangle corpses, educationally speaking. Before they built the modern highway across the fields, this was the main thoroughfare; one arm led, ultimately, to London, the opposite one to the port of Harwich, one to Elmhurst and its ancient Priory, the other to Colchester. It was a pretty busy road, too, by the standards of the time, with Walsingham pilgrims; merchants' carts with wool or woven cloth bound for continental markets, even royalty often travelled this way; Henry VIII's blonde bombshell younger sister, Mary, had a home at Woodbridge.'

'What a mine of information you are today, Sam,' Rafferty commented morosely. 'What did you do, swallow an encyclopaedia for breakfast?'

`'Not me; the wife's the one who swears by roughage. She's also the history buff. She's recently joined the Local History Society and she dragged me along to their last outing — said it should interest me as it was my line of country. Their treasurer, who has a rather suspect fascination with the more ghoulish side of history, brought us out this way. Anyway, he told us all the pretty little tales I've just told you; presumably on the principle of give 'em plenty of fascinatingly grisly stuff from the off and they'll stay and pay more subs. Play your cards right, Rafferty, and I might be able to wangle you an invite to their annual Iceni versus the Romans war games.'

'Sounds just my kind of thing,' Rafferty murmured, wishing Sam had taken longer to recover his equilibrium. To his relief, the Coroner's Officer finally gave permission for the body to be moved and the Scenes of Crime team began to wrap it in its protective covering. He stamped his frozen feet in an attempt to encourage some life into them and wished the SOCOs would get a move on.

Never one to waste a captive audience, Dally went on. 'Interesting chap, this treasurer wallah. Did you know that hanging, as an instrument of judicial execution, came to England by way of the Anglo-Saxons?'

By now, numbed in mind and body, Rafferty merely shook his head.

'Who, in turn, got it from their German ancestors. According to this lecturer, hanging became the established punishment for many crimes in the 12th Century when Henry II instituted trial by jury and assize courts. You and I, Rafferty, have both cut down enough suicides to know it's not the swift, painless death most people imagine it to be. Hanging is a very difficult thing to carry out efficiently. It takes precision, expertise and plenty of practise to get all the variables correct; the length of rope, the weight and drop ratio, etc. Get 'em wrong and instead of breaking the bones of the cervical vertebrae, crushing the spinal cord and paralysing the body, the poor wretch slowly strangles to death.'

Rafferty, who always tried to avoid thinking about the more upsetting details of death, made to interrupt, but Sam was well into his stride and not to be put off.

'No, not a pleasant death. Many executions were botched jobs, of course. Some poor souls lingered for ages, slowly strangling to death. Ghastly business. Though, I suppose that was the whole point; make it as ghastly a spectacle as possible and you'll keep far more of the populace on the straight and narrow.' He rubbed his hand round his short neck feelingly and grinned. 'It would certainly have kept me a Simon pure.'

'You were never a Simon pure,' Rafferty told him gruffly.

'How little you know of your sainted man of medicine.' Sam's smile was benign, his tongue anything but, as he continued in the same sadistic vein. 'Sometimes, if the executioner was unusually kind or the family had the wisdom to bribe him well, he'd allow a member of the condemned’s family to pull on the victim's legs to hasten the end. Not very popular with the crowd, that, of course, they'd come to be entertained. Must have got their money’s-worth when the poor blighters were hanged, drawn and quartered.' His smile twisted slightly as he went on. 'I remember this chap told us of one particular execution where—'

'Thank you, Sam.' Rafferty broke in forcefully before Sam launched into some other grisly anecdote. 'I think I've learned all I want to know about hanging for one day.' In his opinion, the sainted man of medicine was as much of a ghoul as the treasurer of the Historical Society. 'Anyway, according to you, this chap almost certainly didn't die by hanging. So—'

'What's that got to do with it?' Sam demanded. 'You were the one who dragged executions into the conversation. And as the murderer seems to share your strange interest in hanging, I merely filled you in from my own extensive knowledge.'

'Very good of you, I'm sure.'

Thankfully, the corpse, now wrapped in his temporary modern winding sheet, was ready for the off. Rafferty spoke to the warden who had found the body, but as he seemed more concerned with sounding off about poachers and could tell them little more than when he'd found the cadaver, after thanking him, Rafferty, who had suffered more than enough lectures for one day, got in his car and bumped his way behind the Coroner's van back down the narrow lane.

It was some time later, with the team briefed and most dismissed to their house-to-house investigations, that Rafferty studied the remaining faces, before handing Hanks the list which he'd obtained from the police at Maurice Smith's old stamping ground of Burleigh.

'These are the names and addresses of Smith's victims and their families. It's ten years old, so there may be divorces, house moves, remarriages. I want you to check out their current whereabouts. But be discreet. When you've confirmed their current addresses come back here. I don't want them questioned yet. Have you got that?' Hanks nodded and left the office.

Rafferty turned his attention to Lilley and Lizzie Green. 'I want you two to go and ask around Smith's present neighbourhood. See if there've been any strangers hanging around, anything, in fact, that's out of the ordinary. His landlady was out that night. She was too upset when I broke the news to her earlier to be able to tell me much, so speak to her as well. She might have remembered something more now she's had a little time to get over the shock of Smith's death.'

He handed over the plastic-enclosed envelope with its stencilled address. 'We know Maurice Smith was sent an 'outing' letter and according to Mrs Penny, Smith's landlady, the postman brought this envelope on the Wednesday morning before he died. She was able to identify the envelope and, as whoever sent it went to the extraordinary trouble of stencilling the address, it seems a likely supposition that it contained the 'outing' letter.'

'But I thought Mrs Penny and Smith had separate letterboxes,' said Lilley. 'At least, that's what Smales-'

'They do. But she said she generally waited for the postman.' Milkman, baker and candlestick maker, too, probably, Rafferty added silently to himself as he remembered how, on their first visit, she had continued to press more tea and buns on them in an attempt to extend their stay. 'She told me she took the post for both of them most days and was able to tell us that Smith never received handwritten letters - the hate mail ceased long ago, as we know from the postmarks. All he ever received were bills or official, typed letters from one government department or another. Anyway, on Wednesday, when she took the letter into her flat with her own post, she said she forgot all about it till Smith came in some time after eight that evening.'

Smales grinned. 'That's her story and she's sticking to it, hey, guv? Bet she tried to steam the envelope open.'

'That's what you'd do, is it?' Rafferty enquired dryly. 'What a pity for the investigation that not everyone shares your lack of scruples, Smales. And for your information, an envelope that's been steamed open has a bumpy, bubbly look to it when you reseal it and this one hasn't.'

Thankfully, Smales didn't think to enquire how Rafferty had come by such knowledge and he hurried on before it occurred to him to do so. 'You might also ask Mrs Penny's near neighbours if they know when her back gate was damaged. Mrs Penny herself has no idea and, as it seems likely the damage could be tied to Smith's murder, I'd like to know for sure. Right, that's enough for you to make a start. Off you go.'

Once the room had cleared, Rafferty turned to Llewellyn. 'As for you and me, we're going to see Smith's family.'

In view of what they had already learned concerning their relationship with Smith, even Llewellyn, who abhorred the job of breaking news of death, approached the meeting with little trepidation. He had told Rafferty that he doubted Smith's relatives would be too heartbroken.

It wasn't as if they were even what most people would regard as family proper, as Smith's father and mother had divorced when he was two, his father had disappeared into the wide blue yonder, and his mother had married again when Smith was four, producing a half-brother of the marriage eighteen months later. The mother had died shortly before the rape case had come to court, and now the only 'family' Maurice Smith had left was his stepfather and half-brother.

The Bullocks, father and son, lived in a flat near the bus station, in conditions of squalor only too typical of all-male household; discarded chip wrappings and other takeaway containers sharing the decorative honours with crushed lager cans and choked ashtrays. According to what Llewellyn had discovered during his last conversation with them, neither of them had a job.

The television was on, the over-excited voice of a race commentator screamed at them. Rafferty asked for it to be turned off, and without awaiting permission, pressed the on-off button, and the maniacal voice was thankfully silenced. The son scowled at this interference, but Bullock said nothing, and simply sat back in his well-squashed armchair and awaited developments.

Jes Bullock was a well-built man of fifty-seven and suited his name. His youthful muscles had turned to fat and now overhung his trousers. A thin veneer of politeness covered his natural aggression but it failed to mask the bully beneath. Rafferty took against him on sight; the thick sensual lips, the fingers like pork sausages, the slow, unhurried movements, all spoke of a man with tastes more physical than intellectual. Strangely, when Rafferty broke the news of his stepson's death, he seemed over-anxious to lay claim to a grief Rafferty judged him unlikely to be capable of.

According to Smith's newspaper collection of that time, after the trial Bullock's voice had frequently been raised against his stepson, sprinkled through the anger had been the resentment that he was being blamed for the inadequacies of another man's son, insisting that Smith was 'no blood of mine'. It was obviously a grievance he still felt, but the circumstances and his own claim to the role of grief-stricken stepfather appeared to inhibit his previous free expression of it.

He had little to say when Rafferty told him his stepson had died in less than natural circumstances. It was almost as if, beyond the insincere mouthings of loss, he was keeping a guard on his tongue. Rafferty wondered why he should feel it necessary.

'Mr Bullock, you told my sergeant here that your stepson didn't visit regularly and that you last saw him on the Wednesday before his death.' He paused for Bullock's nod. It was slow in coming. 'I gather you didn't seem very sure of the times involved in your stepson's last visit and I wondered if you'd thought any more about these?'

Jes Bullock licked his plump lips and darted a glance at his son. 'What do you reckon, Kevin?'

Kevin didn't have the winning personality of his father. He was sullen, and, unlike his father, made no attempt to pretend to a grief he didn't feel. Clearly he had resented his half-brother. Although he didn't utter the words, his curled lip said 'good riddance' as clearly as words. Rafferty found this lack of hypocrisy more refreshing than his father's pretence. It was understandable, too. He and his father must have gone through many difficult times because of Smith, who had still been living at home at the time of his arrest. His family would have drawn nearly as much bile as Smith himself. It must have been especially hard on his younger brother who could only have been in his early teens at the time. Such experiences would hardly endear Smith to either man.

Kevin's mouth was a thin, tight line, as though he was reluctant to tell them anything. But finally, he admitted, 'He was here for only half an hour on Wednesday. Left around seven-fifteen. That's the last we saw of him.'

His father gave a quick nod. Rafferty thought he seemed relieved, as though uncertain his son would answer their questions at all, and as he spoke, his voice grew increasingly confident. 'Kevin's right. I remember now. We'd been out since lunchtime, celebrating my birthday and we left the pub when the chippie opened around five.'

Llewellyn broke in to enquire which pub he meant and with an evident reluctance Jes Bullock told them it had been the one on the corner, the Pig and Whistle. 'We'd hired a couple of videos for the evening and Maurice arrived partway through the first one.'

'Yeah,' Kevin chipped in. 'Right when it was getting exciting.'

His father shrugged his meaty shoulders as if to say, what else could you expect? 'He brought my birthday present over.'

Rafferty found it hard to believe that unloved and unloving loner, Maurice Smith, would waste a chunk of his giro on buying such a stepfather birthday presents. However, he made no comment.

Although he chose not to question him further about times at the moment, Rafferty was surprised also that Kevin should be so precise. He would have thought the earlier birthday celebrations likely to render time-keeping uncertain. But, for the moment, he didn't challenge this statement either, but turned to another matter. 'You must remember the hate mail and threats he received after the trial. Were you aware of any more recent threats? Serious threats?'

Kevin shook his head. 'No. Occasionally the lads around the flats here would chase him and rough him up a bit, but that's been going on for ages and was only because he was such a dipstick. Nothing to do with the court case, if that's what you think - nobody around here knows anything about that.' He scowled as he remembered the murder. 'Bloody well will now, though, won't they? Sod Maurice. If we have to bloody move again..'

Rafferty turned to his father. 'What about you, Mr Bullock?'

Jes Bullock shook his heavy head ponderously. 'He never said nothing to me.'

'And you're quite sure you've not seen him since Wednesday evening?'

'That's right.' Kevin glowered, as if challenging them to make something of it. His father chipped in.

'Not one for visiting, wasn't Maurice. We'd see him half-a-dozen times a year, at most. Kept himself to himself.'

'So you definitely didn't see him the next evening? The Thursday?'

'Haven't I just said?' Kevin demanded, the heavy jaw that was so like his father's thrust forward. 'We went out the next night. Up the pub. Maurice wasn't invited.'

'Not a pub man, Maurice wasn't, Inspector,' Jes Bullock informed them cryptically, as if trying to imply that if he had been, he, as his stepfather, would have been the first to extend an invitation.

They left soon after. The Bullocks lived on the second floor, and as they reached the car, Rafferty glanced up to see Jes Bullock watching them from the balcony. As he caught Rafferty's eye, he backed away and re-entered his flat.

Rafferty again had the impression that Jes had something on his mind. And he was willing to bet a month's salary that it wasn't grief. The man reminded him of someone, he realized. He wrinkled his brow, but he couldn't remember who. He was certain it was no one connected with the case and knew it would drive him mad till he remembered.

As they got in the car, he mentioned his suspicions to Llewellyn. 'The Bullocks have every reason to dislike Smith. Every reason to wish him dead. Think they could have done it?'

Llewellyn considered it unlikely. 'Why would they wait till now to kill him? Unlike the families of the victims, or whoever sent that 'outing' letter, they've known where to find him all the time. Besides, if their alibis check out, they were in the public house all evening, presumably with plenty of witnesses.'

Rafferty started the car. 'Maybe they're trusting in their bereaved status and imagine their story won't be checked out.'

However, Llewellyn was right about one thing; they had known where Smith lived and, as far as they had yet discovered, they had less reason to wish to be rid of him now than they'd had ten years ago when the fury over the case was at its height.

'But Jes Bullock's worried about something,' Rafferty insisted. 'I intend to find out what it is. Kevin's information was very precise — too precise for my liking. Get on the radio and get Hanks — no, he's busy — Andrews then — to ask around the flats. Tell him to find out if anyone saw Smith arrive and leave. They said they went to the pub on the Thursday night. Get him to ask the landlord what time the Bullocks' got there that night and if anyone saw Smith pay a second visit to his family on the Thursday night.'

While Llewellyn contacted the station, Rafferty consulted his watch. It was nearly time for the post-mortem. 'We've just got time to grab a sandwich if you want one.' Rafferty's stomach rumbled, but he ignored it; there'd be no lunch for him. 'I hope Sam can narrow the time down, as I've got a feeling time might be very important in this case.'

Sam Dally was waiting for them, freshly scrubbed and gowned and wearing a cherubic smile.

'Lunched well, I trust?' he asked Rafferty. 'Don't want you fainting away from hunger, do we?'

'Get on with it, you old sadist,' Rafferty muttered.

After another even more cherubic smile, Sam did so. He confirmed that Smith had been strung-up after death. He also confirmed that the cause of death was the stab wound to the heart and that he had, in all likelihood, died immediately, thus confirming Rafferty's suspicions that he had not only died in his own flat, but in his own armchair.

Although Smith's armchair had fresh stains, they had been few enough. Sam explained why. 'Unlike incised knife wounds where the edge of the blade makes cutting gashes, stab wounds, where the point of the knife enters the body followed by the rest of the blade, generally cause internal bleeding. The wound has one acute angle cut and one blunt, indicating that the knife used had only one sharp edge.'

Rafferty nodded. This weapon had yet to be found. It hadn't been left at the scene. He was still musing on this some time later as the attendant with the power saw cut through the top of Smith's skull.

Swallowing hard, Rafferty hastily dragged his gaze from Smith's face to his torso. As this had already suffered the usual indignities his gaze didn't linger long. But it was long enough for him to comment, 'He seems to have a lot of bruises.'

'Nothing gets past you, does it, Rafferty?' Sam taunted. 'It's only taken your rapier-like gaze the best part of two hours to notice the blindingly obvious. How does he do it?' he demanded of the room at large.

'It's your fault, Sam.' Rafferty, a firm believer in the notion of attack being the best form of defence, immediately went on the offensive, and under the noise of the saw, murmured, 'You shouldn't have such stunners as assistants. Can't take my eyes off them.'

As each of Sam's female assistants bore a striking resemblance to Eeyore, the only strategy Sam judged necessary was a loud snort. Ignoring this as well as Llewellyn's pained sigh at such blatant political incorrectness, Rafferty asked, 'Reckon someone beat him up before knifing him?'

'If you paid more attention to my pearls of wisdom, Rafferty, and less to controlling your lusts and the rumbling of your empty stomach, you'd know contusions can occur post-mortem as well as ante-mortem. And, as you've already said he was moved, not once, but thrice after death; once when he was taken to the woods, once when he was removed from thence and once when he was strung up again, bruising is to be expected. But, rest assured, my rapier-gaze is well ahead of you. I noted each contusion before you even got here.'

Sam gave a happy sigh as he paused to admire his gleaming array of silverware. 'He was probably concealed in the boot of a car each time, so his body would have been thrown around a fair bit, rupturing blood vessels, particularly those areas engorged with post-mortem hypostasis, causing them to ooze blood into the tissues. As you can see,' Sam pointed his blade at the cadaver, 'such contusions look just like bruising to living flesh.'

Sam broke off again to make more comments into the microphone, then continued. 'But, I'll of course test the injury sites for leucocytes — white cells to you — the things that rush to the site of an injury to begin the healing process. An abnormally high number of white cells would indicate some of the damage happened before death. It'll take a bit of time, though, the contusions are quite extensive.'

Rafferty nodded and managed to keep his end up pretty well through the rest of the post-mortem by musing on Sam's conclusions about the bruises. Although, as Sam had remarked, Smith had been transported about sufficiently after death to suffer extensive bruising, he couldn't help but wonder, if some of the bruises had been inflicted before death, who was the most likely person to administer a beating. It didn't take long for Jes Bullock's face to float into his consciousness.

CHAPTER FIVE

It was already getting dark by the time they came out of the mortuary. Rafferty turned the car round and drove towards Habberstone, the busy market town about four miles west of Elmhurst, where ex-Inspector Stubbs had settled on retirement.

Before he did anything else, like interviewing Smith's victims, their families, and Mrs Nye of the Rape Support Group, Rafferty wanted to speak to the inspector who had been in charge of the Smith case. He wanted his opinion of Smith's victims' families, to gain his impression of them as people - and as possible would-be murderers.

His flimsy recollection of the case had been well-bolstered by Smith's newspaper collection. One man interested him greatly - Frank Massey, the father of one of Smith's victims who had beaten Smith up and served a term in jail for it. Of course, that had been before Smith and his family had moved to a secret address, but even after such an event, there were ways and means of finding out someone's whereabouts if you were determined enough or rich enough. Was he the only one amongst the four families capable of vengeful violence? Rafferty wanted to know. Or were others equally as capable, given the opportunity? One of his victims, the young Walker girl, had killed herself when Smith was freed. Her family had even stronger reasons than Massey to still wish Smith dead.

Innocent or guilty, Rafferty was determined to handle them all with kid gloves, and as the law had already failed them once, he was all the more anxious to prove to them and any other doubters, that the law could be efficient, caring, just. It would be bad enough for them having all that emotion stirred up again, but to know that, for the second time in their lives, Maurice Smith was the cause, would, for some of them, be almost too much to bear.

Rafferty took a deep breath. First things first, he reminded himself. Let's get this interview over with before you start worrying about the next ones. God knew, from what he'd learned on the phone when speaking to some of Inspector Stubbs' old colleagues, this one was likely to be difficult enough.

Archie Stubbs was reckoned to be a lonely and bitter man. It was odds on that he'd resent their questions, their prying into his conduct of the Smith case, the implication that if it hadn't been botched the victims and their families would have suffered much less. Certainly, Massey would probably never have tried to extract his own justice; never have gone to jail, lost his job, had his marriage torn apart. The Walker girl would likely still be alive. Uneasily, Rafferty realized he had yet to discover what other tragedies might have sprung from Smith's release. Who amongst them had additional reasons to hate Smith?

Stubbs; Rafferty repeated the name of his next interviewee uneasily to himself. In a way, he had become another of Smith's victims. He had lost his career, been pushed into early retirement from the force, he'd even lost his wife shortly after. Yet, if Stubbs had wanted revenge, he could have extracted it long before this, as easily as the Bullocks; with his contacts he could have found out Smith's whereabouts with little difficulty.

Maybe he had done so, but had, until now, been satisfied to simply keep tabs on the man. Until now, Rafferty repeated to himself and wished he could ignore the fact that an ex-copper like Stubbs would have the knowledge and experience to commit murder and get away with it. That he hadn't done so ten years ago was no reason to discount him as a suspect now.

Rafferty pulled up in front of the grim, grey-painted bungalow that was Stubbs' home. He had only to compare the difference between Stubbs's property and those of his neighbours', to know that the years had done little to diminish Stubbs's bitterness.

Although it was December, the front gardens of the other bungalows in the row were still gay and colourful, the plants obviously chosen specially to withstand winter's blasts. Rafferty, who had recently taken over the care of his mother's garden, which task was beginning to get beyond her, immediately recognised the cheery yellow of the winter jasmine, the equally bright and sunshine flowered witch hazel, the pink and white flowered Viburnums bright against the glossy evergreen leaves of the Mexican Orange Blossom; all defied the chill and proclaimed not only their owners' contentment with their lot, but a certain quiet happiness. Archie Stubbs's garden displayed no such emotion; in his, every season was the same, from fence to wall and back to fence, the rich soil supported only a tough, black tarmac.

Stubbs appeared as uncompromising and as unwelcoming as his home. He was fairly short, certainly at the lower levels of the old height requirements. Short and grey, of face and manner, being monosyllabic to the point of rudeness, and so obviously reluctant to talk to them that Rafferty thought they were going to have to conduct their conversation on the doorstep. But Stubbs as suddenly relented when one of his neighbours, a gnome-like little man of cheery red face and genial air, shouted across to him that it was nice to see he had visitors.

Archie Stubbs scowled and told them, 'You'd best come in, before Happy Harry comes across to join us.'

Although spotlessly clean, the inside of Stubbs's home was a repetition of the outside; drab, grey and depressing. Rafferty and Llewellyn exchanged a glance as, through the partly-open door of the dining room, they both glimpsed the yellowing piles of newspapers stacked on the table. Before Stubbs noticed their interest and shut the door, Rafferty had read the headline on the uppermost, and guessed the rest, too, were about the Smith case.

As they followed Stubbs to the living room and sat down, Rafferty wondered how Stubbs would react if he told him that he and Smith had shared an obsession. His earlier anxieties returned as he realized that, if anything, Stubbs's old colleagues had minimized the extent to which the professional failure had affected him. He knew that Stubbs's wife had died soon after the move from Burleigh; from what he'd learned, she'd never been strong, and the strain of coping with her husband's bitterness had taken its toll. They'd had no children, and even though his colleagues had made an effort to keep in touch, gradually Stubbs had cut off contact with all but one of them.

Rafferty found it easy to understand how, alone in this lonely little grey box, the man's bitterness could fester till it became consuming. Once again, he reminded himself, that, as an ex-copper, Stubbs had the contacts to discover Smith's current whereabouts. Had he done so and brought about what he must consider a belated justice?

In the force, Stubbs had been a thirty-year man, and Rafferty, over twenty years on the force himself, desperately wanted to be able to scratch his name off the suspect list. But this ambition, he now realized, might not be as quickly accomplished as he had hoped. He was wondering how best to continue the interview when Stubbs ended his self-imposed monosyllables with the gruff comment:

'You said on the phone you wanted to speak to me about the Smith case. I wish you'd get on with it and go.'

'Very well.' Rafferty paused, then asked, 'How do you feel about his death?'

'How do I feel?' Stubbs's forehead wrinkled, then he admitted, 'I'd be a liar if I said I wasn't glad. For his victims more than for me. Perhaps, now the bastard's dead, they can finally put the past behind them and make something of their lives.' The words, It's too late for me, were implied by Stubbs's whole demeanour.

Rafferty nodded. 'You mentioned Smith's victims — I wanted to talk to you about them and their families. You must have come to know them all well.' Rafferty had explained over the phone the manner of Smith's death and what had followed, and now he went on, 'Although the stab through the heart caused his death, his stringing-up afterwards had all the hallmarks of a ritual execution, a punishment. Would you say any one of them in particular would be capable of such an act?'

Rafferty's prophecy that few people would be willing to help them catch Smith's killer seemed to be borne out by Stubbs's reaction. He seemed determined to assist them as little as possible, as his answer made clear.

'How should I know? Apart from Frank Massey, I haven't seen any of them for ten years.'

'Ah, yes, Massey.' Rafferty paused. 'I understand you stood as a character witness at his trial?'

Stubbs bristled. 'What of it? Least I could do for him. He wasn't a violent man. I was surprised he had it in him to attack Smith; he was an academic, a man who worked with his mind rather than his body.' Stubbs's face, inclined to broadness, now took on an aspect like a pugnacious bulldog. 'Of course it wasn't surprising that the court ruling at Smith's trial changed all that. It ruined his previous rather naive belief in British justice. He seemed bewildered at first, then that bewilderment turned to rage. For the first time in his life he used his fists instead of his head and look where it got him. If you think he's likely to have had another go at Smith I should forget it. He had a terrible time in prison. He's not likely to want to repeat the experience.'

'Not likely, I grant you,' Rafferty agreed. 'But he may still have decided to risk it. After all, he had two wrongs to right not just one. And, as you say, no one could claim he got justice from the courts.'

'"Revenge is a kind of wild justice,"' Llewellyn quoted softly, adding, 'at least, according to Francis Bacon. Perhaps Mr Massey still feels wild justice is the only kind available to him.'

Stubbs stared at him for a moment and then retorted, 'That's as maybe, but he'd had his try for revenge once. You're barking up the wrong tree if you think he could gird himself up a second time. He's not the same man at all. He wouldn't have it in him.'

'You thought that once before,' Rafferty reminded him, but he didn't pursue the point. For the moment, he was prepared to accept what Stubbs told them. 'Tell me — did you believe Smith was guilty?'

'Damn right I did. He was guilty as hell. Although I was beginning to have doubts we'd get a conviction as proof rested on the evidence of the victims and Smith's confession, I had no doubt at all that he raped those young girls. He even admitted to Thommo and me when we went to see him after the judge acquitted him, that he'd raped another young girl; an attack we knew nothing about and which had never even been reported.

'Oh, I know we shouldn't have gone,' he burst out, as he caught Rafferty's surprised glance. 'Been warned off, hadn't we? But we went just the same. Smith said he'd picked this other young girl up in broad daylight. Wanted us to find her so he could apologise for smashing her violin!'

He shrugged. 'I suppose the parents must have thought she would get over it more quickly without the trauma of a court case. Turns out they were right, doesn't it? Can't blame 'em, I suppose. Smith's other victims were all very young, none older than ten, and Alice Massey was only eight. Smith said this other girl was no older. That was the way he liked them, young and gullible.'

Stubbs rubbed the flat of his hands on the rough material of his trousers as if he felt he could rub away the stain of his own guilt over the case. Rafferty got the impression Stubbs found it as hard to forgive himself for his failure as he found it to forgive Smith for his perversion.

'Even though, in his chambers, the judge accepted Smith's confession as true, he rejected it as evidence because he thought the prosecution would have a hard time proving it hadn't been obtained by oppression. Said something about me and Thommo not saying 'please' and 'thank you' often enough, a la the decrees of PACE. So, that was that.'

Rafferty understood Stubbs' bitterness only too well. How often had he himself experienced that hollow feeling of despair nowadays all too familiar to crime-wearied policemen? It wasn't that he didn't agree with aspects of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act - he did, many of them were needed, certainly for first-time offenders. But it was a different matter altogether for practised criminals. In their case, it made the pursuit of justice more of a lottery than it should ever be. Naturally, the practised criminals and their lawyers took such advantage of a legal system so weighed in their favour that, to the law-abiding public, it seemed the very service set up to prosecute offenders more often acted as their accomplices.

The trouble, as Rafferty had frequently pointed out when an excess of Jameson's had made him unwisely vocal on the subject, was that so much of the legal process and its administration was in the hands of icy-veined intellectuals, who seemed to think the law was more about arguing legal points that securing justice.

They were so far removed from the mass of the population in their thoughts on the subject that they might as well have been visiting Martians for all the confidence they inspired. And when they were paired with the bleeding heart social workers who thought Johnny could do no wrong, who would never accept that Johnny might just naturally be a nasty, evil little bastard, who liked hurting those weaker than himself, such despair was unsurprising. It's his lack of education, it's his background, he's from a one-parent family, it's because he can't get a job, they cried.

Rafferty, with a pretty basic secondary-modern education, and from a one-parent family himself, knew damn well that often Johnny didn't want a job. Why should he, he reasoned? He got far more rewards from mugging old ladies or selling drugs than he'd ever get filling shelves in the local Sainsbury or working in a Homebase storeroom, which was all his limited education had equipped him for.

It was no wonder ordinary people, coppers included, raged, then despaired. No wonder, either, if some of them took to dispensing their own justice.

Rafferty, suddenly aware that his heart was hammering wildly, took a deep breath and forced himself to calm down. Llewellyn was right, he realised; thinking along those lines just led to frustration, indigestion and coronaries. Worse, it clouded his brain with negative emotions and ruined his judgement.

He forced his mind back to the current problem. 'As you said, the Smith case was thrown out because the judge ruled that his confession was inadmissible. But why did it ever get as far as the Crown Court?'

Stubbs sighed heavily. 'I suppose good old human error was at the root of it. But, in mitigation, you must remember the Smith case was brought at a very difficult time. It was 1986; at the beginning of the year PACE was implemented throughout England and Wales, and by October of the same year the bloody Crown Prosecution Service or as I call it, the Criminals' Pals Society, took over the prosecution of offenders from the police.

'It was change, disruption, difficulties at every turn. As I said, the whole legal process was in a state of flux; endless new rules to remember and bumptious young prosecution briefs getting up everyone's noses. There was no DNA evidence to help us then; it was another year till the courts started to accept such evidence. Not that we had a blood sample. We didn't even have a semen sample. Crafty sod had used rubbers; all we had was Smith's confession and the testimony of the girls.'

Stubbs scowled again as, probably for the thousandth time, he relived his bitter memories. 'I'd worked long and hard on the Smith case — we all had. Most of the team had daughters round that age or younger. And by the time we caught him, we were all exhausted. I,' he paused, then went on, 'I just about cracked up.'

From his rigid posture, Rafferty could see how much it cost him to admit this. He already knew of course. Stubbs's old colleagues had said as much and more.

'But we got the confession out of him before my GP had me hospitalised. As I said, the whole team were exhausted by the time we finally nailed him, and although I had my doubts as to whether his confession might contravene the new PACE rules, the Prosecutor appointed was so young and eager to get her teeth into a rape case that she just charged ahead with it. Got through the Committal Proceedings with no trouble, but then we both know magistrates are often glad to pass the buck upwards to the Crown Courts when it comes to ruling on a point of law, such as admissibility.

'Anyway, I'll tell you plain, we were both humiliated when it got to the Crown Court. Especially Ms Osbourne, the prosecuting counsel. Not too keen on women, old Judge Jordan; hated having them in his court and always gave them a hard time. He called Ms Osbourne into his chambers and told her she wasn't fit to iron his robes.' Stubbs gave a sour grin. 'I only learned about it later. Like most coppers, I'd never been keen on the introduction of the CPS and Ms Osbourne had me convinced I was right. As I said, she was arrogant and flaunted her college education as if she thought we were a bunch of dinosaurs and that experience counted for nothing. It was the only bit of satisfaction I got when I heard that old Jordan had wiped the floor with her.'

The light faded from his eye. 'Still, it was a difficult time to be a policeman.' Rafferty nodded. 'I tell you, if I could have ended my career any other way, I'd have been glad to retire then.'

'But surely, sir,' Llewellyn spoke up, 'the Chief Prosecutor would have overseen—'

'Old Stimpson? Don't make me laugh. He was near retirement himself. He only took the job as a favour to the new Regional Director, he didn't intend to work too hard, I can tell you and he gave a pretty free rein to the young bloods in his traces. Spent as much time on the golf course as he did in his office. Besides, although it was never admitted officially, it was accepted that there would be a fair few balls-ups during the changeover period. And there were.'

Rafferty nodded again. He remembered some of them.

'Not, from my understanding that things are any better today; the CPS is still largely staffed by inexperienced, not so bright graduates. The clever ones mostly go into private Chambers. Can't blame them, I suppose, it's much better paid.

'The CPS still tends to get either the idealistic ones like Ms Osbourne, or the ones who couldn't get accepted in Chambers. Admittedly, this was a completely new service with many jobs to fill, and they perhaps couldn't afford to be too particular if they wanted to get the show on the road.' He directed a sour grin at Rafferty. 'Much like the police force in the seventies, when they accepted anyone who could walk and talk.'

Rafferty flushed. He had joined in the seventies and he wondered whether Stubbs was having a dig at him. However, as Stubbs showed no inclination to dwell on the subject, he decided he wasn't.

'Anyway, they managed to make me the fall guy. I'd made too many waves over too many years, made it obvious too often how I felt about my superiors. I was five years off retirement, I was expendable. Not Ms Osbourne, though. She's gone from strength to strength. I often wondered if she'd been warming old Stimpson's arthritic bones. She's Chief Crown Prosecutor on your manor, now,' he told Rafferty. 'Who'd have thought she'd rise so high from such beginnings?'

Rafferty stared. 'You mean your Ms Osbourne and Elizabeth Probyn are one and the same?' My God, he thought, just managing to bite back the sardonic grin, she must have put her back into the job of keeping that quiet.

Stubbs nodded. 'I've kept tabs on her. Masochistic, I know, but..'

Rafferty said nothing, but he found himself wondering again who else Stubbs had kept tabs on from that time? The name of Maurice Smith came to mind.

'Changed her name when she got married, though she stuck to the Ms bit.' Stubbs gave them another sour grin. 'You ask her about the Smith case and watch her squirm.'

Stubbs stood at his doorway and watched them walk away as though he wanted to be sure they left. Rafferty glanced at Llewellyn as they turned the corner to where they had parked the car. 'You realise we'll have to check his movements, ex-copper or no ex-copper?'

Llewellyn nodded.

'God knows he had motive enough. He had the means to find out Smith's address. If we discover he also had the opportunity...' Rafferty didn't finished the sentence. Llewellyn knew as well as he how difficult it would be to get evidence against an experienced ex-copper. If Stubbs had killed Smith he'd have been well able to cover his tracks. He'd made no attempt to hide his bitterness. He'd seemed almost to flaunt it, challenging them to make a case against him.

'What about the other officers on the case? Thompson, for instance?'

'They'll have to be checked out, too.'

The prospect of investigating fellow officers was a depressing one for both of them and silence fell until they had reached the Elmhurst road and Rafferty stopped at a red light.

'Let's disregard the police suspects for the moment,' he said. 'What if Smith was killed by one of the victims or their parents? It might have taken them this long to track him down, especially as he not only changed his name but also moved twice since he left Burleigh. Hiring an investigator costs money, and, for an ordinary person finding Smith would be like looking for a needle in a haystack.' But not for a policeman, he thought again.

'True,' said Llewellyn. 'But I feel even his victims and their families would surely need some other spur to act after all this time. Heightened emotions don't stay heightened indefinitely; like the passions of love, the passions of hate have a course to run. The first flickers, the growing heat, the all-engulfing flames, the dying embers, and finally cold ashes.'

Astonished by his sergeant's sudden and poetical verbosity, Rafferty felt compelled to remark, 'I'm not sure Stubbs, for one, would agree with you. And even if his emotions had reached the cold ashes stage, he's got all the time in the world to rake them over. And as for the victims and their families, who knows if some new tragedy affected one of them? Something related to the original crime, something they might consider directly attributable to Smith; then the flames of passion might rise from the ashes. Events like rape do tend to bring on other tragedies in a family - sometimes years after the event - look at Frank Massey, for one.'

Tragedies like nervous collapse, and divorce - broken families and broken lives. Rape often cast a long, lingering painful shadow among the victims and their families, as Rafferty knew. Particularly when the victim was a child. Particularly when, as in the Smith case, the physical rape had been followed by judicial rape.

Rafferty squinted at his watch as the car passed under a street lamp. It was after six. No wonder he was hungry; he hadn't eaten since breakfast.

'Get onto the station, will you, Dafyd? Get Beard to make an appointment for tomorrow for us to see Mrs Nye of the Rape Support Group. He's likely to find her at that refuge she founded in St Boniface Road. If any of her group sent that 'outing' letter, she might be willing to drop a hint as to which of her group could be responsible.'

Although the names of the more militant feminists in the Rape Support Group and similar organisations were well known to the police, Rafferty felt he had to tread cautiously, wary of accusations of police harassment. He had no proof that any members of the local RSP were responsible for the 'outing' threats that had occurred recently in the town. But he'd always found Mrs Nye a reasonable woman. He didn't believe she would condone 'outing'. If she harboured any suspicions against her more hot-headed colleagues, he felt he would be able to persuade her to reveal them.

He broke into Llewellyn's transmission. 'Get Beard to make an appointment with Elizabeth Probyn while he's at it. I'd be interested to see what she remembers of the case. Tomorrow's Saturday, so she won't be able to fob us off with excuses about being in court. Oh, and ask him to get me a couple of rolls from the canteen before the lovely Opal goes home.' Llewellyn gave the message and replaced the microphone.

Rafferty had no doubt that fobbing them off would be Elizabeth Probyn's first instinct. She wouldn't enjoy discussing her early, spectacular failure; particularly with him. She was one of those coolly distant prosecutors with whom he could find no common ground. He had little doubt she would find the interview humiliating.

And you, Rafferty? his conscience prodded. What will you find it? Enjoyable? Maybe you'll crow a little? Rub her nose in it, will you?

Rafferty denied it. Unfortunately, his lapsed Catholic conscience, privy to his every thought, word and deed, was well aware that Elizabeth Probyn was not his favourite person. She had subjected him to several humiliations over the years. She must have learned quickly from that early failure, he now surmised, because he'd never had cause to reign her back in a case. On the contrary, unlike Stubbs's experience of her, with him, she seemed to delight in refusing to take on the prosecution of cases for which she felt the police had provided insufficient evidence. Going to take the opportunity to get your own back? his conscience probed again.

'Oh, shut up!' Rafferty growled.

'Sir?' Llewellyn's head jerked towards him, bewilderment evident. Hardly surprising, of course, as the Welshman had been innocently gazing out the window when Rafferty made his outburst.

'Nothing,' Rafferty mumbled. 'I'm just having an internal argument. Take no notice.'

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE