Gone to Ground Read Online Free

this," Helen said, and Will stood away.
    McKusick took the drink in both hands.
    "We'll need to talk to you," Helen said. "At the station."
    McKusick looked at her vaguely and then nodded his head.
    "We should go now," Will said a few moments later, offering to help him to his feet.
    "I shall just have to explain ... my boss..."
    "Of course."
    The early morning mist had cleared leaving a wan sky; a breeze, slight for the time of year, barely disturbed the trees, yet McKusick was shivering as they led him to the waiting car.
     
    That early in the enquiry, detectives would be working as close to round the clock as motivation and overtime would allow: uniformed officers would be helping with house-to-house, and civilian staff would be setting up files, starting to cross-reference information and accessing it on computers. As senior investigating officer, it was Will's job, assisted by the office manager, to establish priorities and ensure that all viable leads were followed up. Each move, each policy decision he agreed to or set in motion would be carefully recorded.
    For some, this was an invitation to slip behind a desk and demonstrate powers of organization, delegation, play mastermind. But for Will, the crux of what he did was still what happened out on the street, confronting suspects face to face, the heat, the heart of the action. When necessary, he knew Helen to be the most capable of deputies, but together, he felt, they could achieve more than they could apart.
    And these first days were crucial. Without results, the adrenaline would cease to race and the number of officers involved in the investigation would be cut back; not so long after that, someone else would likely be brought in to look over Will's shoulder and pick out what he'd missed, point out where the investigation had gone awry.
    He didn't want that to happen.
    Detailed results of the postmortem had been promised for the following morning, along with the first results from samples taken at the scene; until then officers were following up on the names garnered from Stephen Bryan's diaries or letters, together with those of any friends or close colleagues mentioned by either his parents or the university.
    Which left Mark McKusick...
    "What did you think of the show?" Helen asked once they were back at the station and McKusick was safely out of earshot.
    "You think that's what it was, a show?"
    "Punching himself in the face."
    "He was upset..."
    "I'll say."
    "Distraught."
    "Careful to miss his eyes and nose, you notice that?"
    "He'd just heard someone he cared for had been murdered, what do you expect?"
    "Something more than play acting."
    "If that's what it was."
    A smile crossed Helen's face. "You ever do drama at school?"
    "Not if I could help it. Why?"
    "I was the White Rabbit once in
Alice in Wonderland.
This born-again hippie drama teacher reckoned it was all some kind of druggie fantasy, dreamed up by poor old Lewis Carroll on laudanum or whatever the Victorians used to get spaced out on. So that was our school show. Strobe lights and patchouli and lots of stoned Sixties music. You know, Grace Slick and Jefferson Airplane. One pill makes you larger, one pill makes you small."
    "Grace who?" Will said.
    "Never mind. I was fourteen years old, never done drugs in my life. The occasional drag on someone else's spliff aside. But I had that white rabbit spinning through an amphetamine trance so convincingly, on the second night a drug counselor came up after the show and practically begged me to make an appointment."
    "And your point is?"
    "Maybe it takes a faker to tell a fake."
     
    Mark McKusick had washed his face in cold water, combed his hair, straightened his clothes; most of the colour had returned to his cheeks. He had asked if he needed to contact a lawyer and been told that at this stage there probably wasn't any need. This was little more than a chat, informal, simply to establish some background. He was doing them a favour by being there, Will