* * *
Gislingham knocks at Fawley’s door and waits for the muffled ‘Come’ from inside. The DI is on his feet, coat still on, and clearly only just back. He’s flicking through screens on his phone, frowning, and muttering under his breath.
‘Sorry, boss, do you want me to come back?’
Fawley glances up. ‘No – actually, I need you to fill me in on the Swanns before I go and see Harrison.’
‘Yeah, I saw – it’s all over the news.’
And Harrison must be crapping himself. Not that either of them say so; they don’t need to.
‘The hacks haven’t worked out who the Swanns really are yet but it’s only a matter of time – they can look up the Land Registry just like we did and as soon as they get Swann’s first name and date of birth, bingo.’
Fawley looks grim. ‘And where the press goes, the sofa Sherlocks will soon follow. Can you warn the Swanns? Suggest they might want to stay somewhere else for a few days?’
‘I can’t believe they don’t know already, but yeah, we can do that. I’ll send Ev.’ He gives a wry smile. ‘One way or another she’s had a lot of experience managing cantankerous pensioners.’
Fawley looks up, his face suddenly concerned. ‘How is her dad?’
Gis shrugs. ‘Much the same, as far as I know. It won’t be getting any easier, that’s for sure.’
Fawley nods, and they stand in silence a moment. Then, ‘So what else have you got?’
‘Well, your hunch about the snail mail was spot on: Chloe Sargent spoke to the postie and it turns out the Swanns got a letter about a month ago which was handwritten and had an overseas stamp. Trouble is, a) Mrs S tore it up and threw it away without reading it so we can’t prove she knew who sent it, and b) the postie doesn’t know which country it came from. We put in a call to her solicitor to ask about it, but all we got back was that she “has no recollection” of getting anything like that. Well, there’s a surprise.’
Fawley’s looking at him. ‘I don’t know about you, but there are two reasons why I rip up post without bothering to open it. One – it’s junk; or two – I know who it’s from and I’m not interested.’
Gis nods. ‘Right.’ He takes a step closer. ‘Do you think the same thing could have happened to Rowan? The kid wrote to her as well? The timings would fit.’
‘But there’s still a problem, isn’t there? He could find Rowan through Wikipedia, but how the hell did he find out where the parents lived?’
‘Quite. They’ve changed their name, they’re not in the phone book and they’re not on the public electoral roll either, we checked. And as Hansen found out, it’s really bloody hard to find someone who’s changed their name by deed poll.’
Fawley looks thoughtful. ‘I’ve been wondering about that – whether it would be as hard the other way round?’
Gis is frowning. ‘Not sure what you’re getting at.’
‘I mean, the only name we had to start with was Swann, and we had no reason to go looking for anything else. But if you were looking for Dick Rowan and you already had a suspicion he might have changed his name, how hard would it be to make the connection back to Swann?’
Gis nods. ‘I see what you mean – I’ll get Hansen on it. I doubt he’ll mind that much – he’s halfway to being Baxter’s mini-me. Minus the chocolate habit, obvs.’
Fawley smiles. ‘Cadburys will be gutted.’
His phone beeps.
‘Harrison,’ he says, looking at the screen, his smile evaporating. ‘Asking where I am.’ He drags off his coat and straightens his tie. ‘Wish me luck.’
* * *
Interview with Alison Toms
25 October 2018, 2.15 p.m.
On the call, DC T. Hansen
TH: Thanks for agreeing to talk to me, Ms Toms. I know it’s a long time ago now, but it’s about the Camilla Rowan case.
AT: Well, I’ll do all I can to help but I’m not sure what use I can be – as you say, it’s a very long time ago and I only spoke to her once.
TH: Yes, I have the notes here, it says you saw her with the baby, that they seemed to be ‘bonding well’, and she ‘expressed no interest in having the baby adopted’. So you left it at that?
AT: I had enough on my plate with other cases, as I’m sure you can imagine. All her health indicators were normal, the baby was healthy. I had no reason to think there was any sort of problem. And the medical staff agreed with me.
TH: Of course, no one’s questioning that. It’s something else we wanted to ask you about. You just said you had a lot of other cases on at the time – were those all potential adoptions?
AT: Ah, no – I didn’t mean to confuse you. My job covered much more than that – basically any issue that arose at the hospital. Women with injuries that could have been the result of domestic abuse, for example, or children who might have been mistreated.
TH: I see. So do you happen to remember if you were handling many other adoptions at that time? Sorry – I should explain: one angle that might not have been fully investigated at the time was the possibility that Camilla had her baby adopted informally. Without the internet she’d have found that quite difficult, but we were wondering whether she might have met someone at the hospital?
AT: A baby-broker, you mean? That seems unlikely – people like that don’t tend to hang round maternity wards.
TH: And you weren’t aware of much activity like that at the time – in general, I mean?
AT: No, not at all. To be honest, it was barely on the radar.
TH: Yes, that’s what we thought. But that being the case, is it possible that another mother in the same position could have given Rowan a contact? Another young girl, say, who didn’t feel able to bring up a child on her own?
AT: Ah, I see. Yes, that would make more sense, but I don’t recall I was talking to anyone else about adoption at that time. And Camilla Rowan was only in the hospital for a few hours, remember – that’s not long to make that sort of connection.
TH: We think that she researched the hospital during the pregnancy – she went straight there when she went into labour as if she’d already planned where she was going to go. So she might have been hanging around in the weeks leading up to the birth and met someone that way?
AT: Right, OK. Well, I can look back over my notes for that period, if it would help? See if there were any other adoptions under discussion at the time?
TH: That would be great, thank you. You have my number?
AT: Yes, it’s come up on my phone.
TH: Thank you very much, Ms Toms, you’ve been really helpful.
* * *
Carter gets back to St Aldate’s wet, cold, tired and pissed off. He had to stand most of the way back because the train only had two carriages, so the sight of Chloe Sargent, dry, warm and sitting comfortably, does nothing to improve his mood.
She looks up at him and smiles. The mouth-closed smile of someone who wants to appear friendly but definitely doesn’t want to be too encouraging. ‘Any luck?’
‘No, just a load of bloody CCTV I’ll now go square-eyed staring at.’
‘Don’t knock it – there might be something there. We just got a lead that the vic may have been living abroad.’
His eyes widen. ‘So I could have been right about him being at a hotel?’
And now she’s wishing she hadn’t said anything.
Carter dumps his coat and starts to unwind his scarf, which (as Sargent isn’t alone in noticing) he’s taken to wearing in the same loop knot as Quinn. ‘How about you?’ he says.