‘Ma’am, you should have turned down there to get to the Emersons’ road,’ Laura interjected.

Keeping her eyes fixed firmly on the road, Kate gently shook her head. ‘We’re not going there yet… I want to see Daisy’s final route again first.’

Kate had walked, driven and jogged this route several times in the last week already, but Laura would understand why she needed to do it again. Heading through the next set of traffic lights towards Portswood, Kate pulled the car hard to the right up Highfield Lane, before turning left onto Abbotts Way, where Georgie Barclay’s house stood. It was such a peaceful road, especially this early on a Saturday morning.

Kate completed a U-turn before pulling up across the road from the Barclay household, but kept the engine running. ‘From Georgie’s statement, we know Daisy headed north out of the door, in the direction of home. But she never made it. Her road is only ten minutes’ walk away, and between here and there, there are plenty of houses with curtain-twitching neighbours, two bus routes, and enough traffic that somebody must have seen what really happened to her. Right?’

Laura nodded. ‘Do you fancy walking the route she was most likely to have taken?’

Kate killed the engine and the two of them stepped out into the light sleet that was now falling. They crossed the road and stopped outside Georgie Barclay’s house.

Kate looked up at the three-bedroom semi-detached. ‘According to Georgie’s statement, Daisy left here at nine fifteen, having told Georgie she was heading straight home. Can you time this?’

Laura pulled out her phone and flicked to the stopwatch app. ‘Okay. Go.’

Kate tried to picture Daisy’s movements a week ago as they headed to the end of the road. It had been a dry and cold night. There were no real signs of activity in any of the properties in the narrow street yet, but the chances are there would have been at least a couple of homes with residents awake when Daisy had passed a week ago. Yet nobody had reported seeing a girl in a purple coat walking alone.

At the end of the road, Kate paused. ‘Do you think she crossed the main road here, or walked to the pedestrian crossing further up?’

Laura considered the question. ‘For me, it would depend on the amount of traffic heading along the main road. If traffic was light, I’d jog across where we are now, but if it was heavy, I’d use the crossing. It’s what – fifty metres away? It all depends how much of a hurry she was in.’

Kate turned and headed to the crossing, waiting for the first car to stop, before making her way to the middle. ‘If you’re a driver who’s just let Daisy across, would you remember it?’

Laura shrugged. ‘Probably not. Unless she did something unusual, like she was crying, or gave me an angry look, I don’t think I’d remember.’

They continued across the road before Kate spoke again. ‘There are two obvious routes to her home from here. If she heads left up to the church, she can walk up Church Lane, before turning right onto Welbeck Avenue, or she heads right, down to Shaftesbury Avenue, and all the way along until she reaches the opposite end of Welbeck Avenue. There’s probably only a minute’s difference in the routes, so which does she take?’

Laura looked left and then right. ‘According to Georgie they regularly used both routes when walking between their homes.’

‘Of course, there is the third option as well: she could have walked down to Portswood Road, and along until she got to Bowden Lane which joins Welbeck Avenue, but that’s a good five minutes or so longer, so I can’t understand why she’d go that way unless she was stalling.’

‘We have no witnesses that identified her on any of the three routes, ma’am.’

Kate sighed. ‘Let’s head up Church Lane, which is the most direct route. What amazes me, is this route is usually littered with students from the university heading to bars and clubs at that time of night, yet nobody has come forward to say they saw Daisy. Hopefully today’s appeal for witnesses on the campus will solve that.’

---

They arrived at Daisy’s house, a three-bedroom semi set back a few metres from the road, behind a small and unloved lawn.

The front door was opened by Daisy’s father, Barry. Dressed in a sleeveless vest, the tattoos that adorned both arms glowed green beneath the rich tan of his skin. His eyes looked tired and sad.

‘Wondered when you’d make an appearance,’ he grizzled, opening the door wider for them to enter and following them into the living room where they found Val glued to the television screen. It took a moment before she realised anyone had entered the room, but as she looked up and recognised Kate, she tensed.

‘You’ve found her?’ Val said, clutching the arms of the chair as if anticipating the blow she was about to receive.

Kate glanced at the screen which was showing the BBC 24-hour news channel and then back at Val, whose eyes looked swollen and tired beneath a layer of heavy makeup. ‘What makes you say that?’

‘It’s been all over the news that there were police at her school last night. The reporter said there were forensic specialists going in and out of the old sports hall. It’s about my Daisy, isn’t it?’

Kate gave her what she hoped was an assured look. ‘Right now, my colleagues are processing the scene to determine exactly what happened.’

‘W-w-what does that mean? Is she dead?’

At times like this, Kate knew it was better not to speculate and just to stick to the facts. ‘The truth is: we don’t know. I know you want answers, but at this time I know as much as you do.’

‘What you doing here, then?’ Barry growled as he joined them, a freshly lit cigarette gripped tightly between his fingers.

Kate was about to answer, when Val suddenly rose from her chair. ‘I’m sure she’s still alive,’ she said, pressing a hand to her wrinkled chest. ‘I feel it in here. My little girl is still out there somewhere.’

Kate respected Val’s need to stay positive. She paused to summon the courage to say the next part. ‘There is something I need to ask you for. In order to determine whether Daisy is connected to the scene at the school, we need a sample of her DNA. This can be anything from a hairbrush, to a toothbrush or a hat she wore. Is there anything you feel comfortable with me collecting this morning to help our enquiries?’

Barry was about to speak, when Val tore from the room. The clump-clump of her footsteps could be heard on the stairs before she quickly returned, thrusting a hairbrush towards Kate. ‘This is hers. You can take it.’

Kate thanked her and deposited it in the evidence bag Laura was holding. ‘I promise you, Mrs Emerson, I will be in touch as soon as I have more news.’

Barry showed them to the door, and when they were back in the cool air, Kate said, ‘I need you to get that back to SSD as soon as you can. Take the car, and then meet me at St Bartholomew’s.’

‘What are you going to do?’

‘I need to clear my head, to get things into perspective. The walk and fresh air will do me good. Tell SSD to process that sample ASAP and compare it to what was generated last night. I want to be called the second they have anything.’