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Baxter frowns. ‘You think Daisy killed her?’
‘Well, would you put it past her?’ says Stillwell. ‘Based on this? I certainly wouldn’t. Think about it: she might have planned it all from the start but with Tierney dead that plan was inruins. The cash, America, the “new life” – it was all slipping away from her.’
‘So what did she do?’ asks Sargent.
‘Well, we know from this that she’d already worked out about getting a fake ID, and the money was right there for the taking too, as long as she could get to it before the authorities wised up. If she played her cards right she could still have it all. But there was one thing in her way: Kate. Kate was never going to let her get off scot-free, not if our guess is right and Tierney told her that night it was Daisy who’d betrayed her. Which leaves Daisy needing a way to deal with Kate pretty damn sharpish. If you ask me, I think she went for Operation Grovel. Claimed it had all been a terrible mistake, that she was so so sorry, and please please please could Kate come to the rescue. I bet she even came up with a useful suggestion about where they could bury the body –’
‘Right,’ says Gis, nodding. ‘Kate wouldn’t have known anything about that area, but Daisy did – the tree, the scold’s bridle, the whole nine yards – it’s all in that journal. That’s why she checked how to find the tree that night andthat’swhy that poor bloody woman had a shelf bracket stuffed in her mouth.’
Not to silence her, living or dead, and not to punish her either. Merely and solely to misdirect us, if the body was ever found. Treating another human being that callously – even one who’s dead, one you never knew – few people are capable of that. But this girl – this girl is one of them.
And it very nearly worked. We very nearly bought it.
‘So they drag the body out to the tree and dig the grave,’ says Ev, ‘with poor long-suffering Kate no doubt doing most of the work –’
‘Exactly,’ says Stillwell. ‘And when it’s done and Kate’s outlived her usefulness, she makes the fatal mistake of turning her back, just for a minute –’
‘Lights out,’ says Gis. ‘Whammo.’
Sargent is frowning. ‘So why not put Kate in the same grave?’
‘It wasn’t deep enough,’ says Gis firmly. ‘And it would have taken far too long to change that.’
‘So where’s the body?’
‘My money’s on Hescombe Mere,’ says Quinn. ‘Doesn’t she say in the journal what a good place it would be to dump a body? And it’s only – what? – fifty yards from the grave? Even Daisy could have lugged a corpse that far.’
And we never searched it. We didn’t think we needed to.
‘Maybe that’s why she switched her backpack for Kate’s holdall?’ says Ev. ‘A backpack full of rocks would have been a lot more practical for weighing a body down. Just saying.’
But Stillwell is frowning. ‘If Daisy knew about the Mere, though, why didn’t they put Tierney in there in the first place? Why go to all the effort of digging a grave? And what about the extra risk? It was only a matter of time before that grave was found – a few weeks, in fact, as we now know.’
There’s a silence.
‘Maybe Daisywantedthe body to be found,’ says Sargent quietly. ‘Maybe she was trying to frame Kate. Maybe that explains the earring. It actuallyisKate’s and it was Daisy who put it there. Specifically for us to find.’
Stillwell’s frown deepens. ‘Killing her wasn’t enough?’
‘No,’ says Gis, his face grave, ‘it wouldn’t be enough – not if she wanted to make sure no one would go looking for her. If Kate was the killer, the Tierney murder was all wrapped up, case closed.’
‘So what about the wacko shelf bracket thing,’ says Ev. ‘Why bother with that if she wanted us to think it was Kate?’
Sargent shrugs. ‘Perhaps it was just for Kate’s benefit – something else to make her think they were on the same side.’
Baxter sits back, he’s clearly not buying any of it. ‘Hold on a minute, if Daisy’s in America and Kate’s in Hescombe bloody Mere, doesn’t it have to be Daisy who dropped off that car? Come on, that doesn’t wash – she’ssixteen–’
‘I know what you mean,’ says Sargent. ‘It’s a bit of a stretch –’
‘But just because she’s too young to drive, doesn’t mean she doesn’t know how to do it,’ says Morris, piping up for the first time. ‘Loads of kids learn to drive in car parks or off-road places before they’re allowed on the road.’
Baxter frowns. ‘We don’t even know if Kate had a car – she didn’t have much money, that’s for sure –’
I’m hesitating and Morris must think I’m sceptical (I’m actually just catching up) because he carries straight on.
‘One, the car was an automatic.’ He’s telling them off on his fingers now. ‘Two, it was late at night, so virtually no traffic, and three, it was only eight miles. I think she could have done it. In those circumstances, I think Daisy could have made a fist of driving that car. Especially if there was enough in it for her.’
And if any kid her age could, she could; safe to say I’ve had that memo. And it might also explain why the car was left as close as Evesham. That one never quite added up. For Gis or for me.