The atmosphere in the office was subdued. O’Dowd and Thompson were cloistered over the DI’s desk while Beth and Unthank were hard at work. Beth was going over the missing persons’ list and Unthank was looking into Nick Langley’s life.

O’Dowd had decreed that they were to leave a lot of the donkey work to the officers DCI Phinn had seconded to their investigation. The four members of FMIT would collate, examine and work to identify the killer and his two female victims.

Beth’s eyes flicked back and forth between the screen and the printed notes she’d made about the two unidentified victims. It didn’t take her long to find a possible match for Woman 2. Rachel Allen had set off to backpack around Europe four and a half weeks ago. Her parents had reported her missing a fortnight later when they’d heard nothing from her.

According to the report filed by the person who’d taken the parents’ call, she’d set off from Carlisle train station and they’d never heard from her again. A perfunctory check had shown that Rachel had got on the train south only to get off again at Penrith station. The officer had gone so far as to run Rachel’s passport through the various databases. She’d never left the country. A footnote gave the officer’s thoughts; namely that they presumed Rachel had lied to her parents and run away from home.

To Beth’s mind such thinking was lazy. There were other avenues that could have been pursued. Rachel Allen was an attractive young woman; therefore she was in the high-risk category when it came to possible abduction by rapists and murderers. On the other hand, there was no evidence to suggest that she hadn’t just run away from home.

She put in a call to the train station at Penrith to see if they had any CCTV coverage from the day Rachel Allen stepped off the train. With luck, they may see if she met someone.

The person she spoke to was abrupt. When she asked about CCTV footage she got a curt laugh and was told that the camera hadn’t worked for at least six months.

Beth dug further into the file opened on Rachel Allen. When she saw the picture, she felt a mixture of elation and sadness. The face looking back at her from the screen was a happier version of the one Dr Hewson had supplied of Woman 2. While it felt good to make the connection, there was now another family who’d have to be told of their bereavement.

‘Ma’am, I’ve got an ID on Woman 2. She’s Rachel Allen. Twenty-two years old, from Carlisle.’

O’Dowd looked up and gave her a nod. ‘Good work. Have you an address for the next of kin?’ The printer starting with its usual racket made O’Dowd turn her head. ‘That it?’ Beth nodded. ‘Good. Unthank, what have you got on Nick Langley?’

‘There’s nothing of note in his life other than the neighbour we’re getting picked up for fighting with him. His bank accounts are all normal and there’s no indication that either he or his wife were playing away from home. He’s a kitchen fitter and when I spoke to his boss, he was full of praise for both his workmanship and the way he kept customers happy.’

‘What’s the story with the fight?’ This part was news to Beth and she wanted to know more about it.

‘It was a dispute over the hedge at the back of his house. He and his wife were trying to grow it to give themselves some more privacy, when their neighbour started cutting a foot off the top of it. Nick had challenged him and the guy had just kept cutting away. Things got heated and blows were exchanged. A different neighbour dialled treble nine, but by the time someone got there, the fight had all but ended. The responding officers’ reports suggested that Nick had got the better of his opponent. Both of them got a caution and life moved on.’ Unthank shook his head. ‘It happened last year, so it’s more than likely a waste of time speaking to the guy.’

‘Well, we’re going to do it anyway.’ O’Dowd lifted the sheet of paper from the printer and pointed it at Thompson. ‘Go and do the knock. Take Unthank with you.’

‘Ma’am.’ There was reluctance as well as obedience in Thompson’s voice.

It was tough on him to have to go and inform Rachel’s parents of her likely death when he was so emotionally fragile, but Beth saw a certain logic to it. If Thompson was dealing with someone else’s grief, he wouldn’t be able to wallow in his own.

As for Rachel’s next of kin, they wouldn’t get the closure of saying goodbye. Along with the killer’s work, Dr Hewson’s post-mortem had left Rachel in a condition that no parent should see. The formal identification would have to be done from the pictures Dr Hewson had taken of her before starting the post-mortem.

‘See if you can identify that other woman, Beth. Once the plods bring the neighbour in, we’ll see what he has to say for himself.’

Before he left the office, Beth got Unthank to print off the details of the fight. If she was to sit in on an interview, she wanted the relevant knowledge in her head so she could make a contribution, or at the very least, not sit there looking as if she hadn’t a clue what was going on. Although, she’d already heard enough to assume it was a typical domestic argument. When in uniformed response, she’d been called out to many a dispute between neighbours. Whether it was to do with a boundary wall or hedge, or the playing of loud music, there was always a source of irritation that saw neither party willing to compromise.

She turned back to the list of missing people, and scrolled down the database until she was looking at the names of those who’d been reported missing between four and eight months ago. This would be a lot harder than identifying Rachel Allen. Woman 1’s eyes had been removed. Her face had been eaten away, and lacking any tattoos on the scraps of flesh the animals hadn’t eaten, the best she could hope for was to narrow the list of possibilities to an acceptable number of women whose dental records would have to be checked.

First off she listed the missing women whose age was similar to Dr Hewson’s estimate of Woman 1’s. Next she looked at the length of time they’d been missing and eliminated those whose dates were after Woman 1 was estimated to have died.

Beth picked up her phone and dialled the first of four numbers. Her priority now was checking to see if any of the remaining four missing women had turned up. Many of the people reported missing would return home after a few weeks away. Some would have dropped out to cope with a life event; others would have returned to their spouse when they realised their lover wasn’t all they dreamed of. When these scenarios happened, there were only a few who bothered to let the police know.

The person who picked up was a woman, so Beth asked her name. It matched the missing person, and she made a note in the database and gave the woman a short lecture about wasting police time.

She had the same result with the next call.

The third call she made put her into contact with a man whose voice wavered with grief when she explained why she was calling. His wife had been found a week after he’d reported her missing. Her car had left the road and plunged into a flooding river. It was only when the waters receded that her car was found. He’d never thought to cancel the missing persons’ report because the police knew about his wife’s death.

Beth cursed the fact that she’d dredged up painful memories for the man. She’d blame the officers who were involved in the recovery of the vehicle and informing the man his wife was dead, had she not been aware of the pressures on officers of every rank. As well as there being fewer officers, there seemed to be more paperwork than ever, more databases to update. It was inevitable that on occasions some things would get missed due to someone being overworked and overstressed.

The fourth and final call put her in touch with someone whose wife had returned home, stayed long enough to pack a bag, and had then flounced out the house and into her lover’s car.

With all four options exhausted, Beth gave the database another scan in case she’d missed something. But nothing obvious presented itself.

She was about to extend her search by a month either side of Dr Hewson’s guess when O’Dowd’s phone rang.

The DI listened for a moment then hung up. Her mouth twisted into what could only be described as a determined pout as she pulled on her suit jacket and straightened the collar. ‘Let’s go ask a man some awkward questions.’