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‘Theveryfirst time?’
MacCullagh nods.
When I look past her, I’m shocked – and dismayed – to see that Mama has left the room.
Mairéad
I
She questions Kyle North for another two hours, but despite hearing a lot about his interactions with Elissa Mirzoyan – or Gretel, as he calls her – she’s no closer to a confession. Whenever she asks how Elissa ended up in the cellar, he claims ignorance or talks in undecipherable riddles.
Sometimes, as she watches him, she thinks he’s laughing at her, that he’s deep in some mind game only he understands. He denies any knowledge of the YouTube recordings, even though the equipment used to make them was found in his bedroom. The laptop will doubtless yield further footage, yet he maintains ignorance of that, too.
He’s clearly suffering from some kind of psychosis, which means if she doesn’t request a full assessment soon she risks compromising the case. Where there’s an immediate risk to life, she can bypass the normal protocols and continue to question him, but she no longer believes thereisa risk to life – everything points to Elissa having been inside that cellar when the fire was set.
As she spars with Kyle, Mairéad feels the shadow of her grief falling over her. Towards the end of the interview, it’san effort to sit up straight in her chair. But she’s committed herself to this. No way she can bow out now.
After updating her senior officers in advance of the next media briefing, Mairéad instructs DS Halley to drive her back to Meunierfields. Under a darkening sky, in which helicopters buzz like angry wasps, the estate crawls with grim-faced SOCOs.
Changing into a pair of borrowed boots, she finds Paul Deacon, the crime-scene manager she spoke to on the phone.
‘Christ alive,’ Deacon says when he sees her. ‘You look like death warmed up.’ He leads her through the Memory Wood to a clearing untouched by fire. Three mobile lighting towers illuminate it. At the base of a giant yew, easily five hundred years old, a geodesic tent stands beside a huge mound of earth. White-suited officers move around inside.
From the tree’s upper bows hang the sodden shreds of what look like paper lanterns. Had Deacon not pointed them out, Mairéad doubts she’d have spotted them. A SOCO, balanced on the upper rung of an aluminium ladder secured to the trunk, is placing something into an evidence bag. Across the clearing, Mairéad notices a second tent beside a matching pile of excavated earth.
‘What’ve you got?’
‘Four different trees,’ Deacon says. ‘All within a fifty-yard radius of this grove, every one of them strewn with these weird decorations. On each trunk, invisible from the ground, we’ve found a hand-carved name. All of them belong to missing children. This one says Bryony Taylor.’
‘Have you found one for Elissa Mirzoyan?’
‘Not yet.’
‘His Memory Trees,’ Mairéad says. She indicates the officers working inside the tent. ‘What’ve they found?’
‘Nothing so far. We’re down to a depth of seven feet.’
‘Nothing at all?’
‘No remains, no items of interest, zilch. These trees might be memorials, but they don’t appear to be grave markers.’
Mairéad puffs out her cheeks. ‘So what has he done with their bodies?’
‘We’re bringing in dog teams from neighbouring counties. Earlier, I’d have said they’d turn something up no problem. Now, I’m not so sure.’ Deacon screws up his face, watching his team work. ‘What’s your suspect say?’
‘He admits Elissa was in that cellar and that he visited her there. Says he knew the other children, too. But on the question of how they got here, and where they went after, he’s as slippery as an eel.’
‘Sounds like you’ve enough for a conviction.’
‘Plenty, but what I want is to return those kids to their families.’
‘Zero chance you’ll find them alive. Not after this long.’
‘We can ensure they get a proper funeral, Paul. That’s something. And I’m not giving up on Elissa. Not yet.’
She gazes through the trees, in the direction of the burnt-out Gingerbread House. In her pocket is a copy of the letter sent to Lasse Haagensen. All children are special, but Elissa Mirzoyan was so plucky, so damned resourceful, that it’s difficult – even now – to accept she might be dead.
‘Call me,’ she says. ‘Soon as you have anything.’