Blood on the Cowley Road (DI Susan Holden 1)

‘Unfortunately not. We found his lorry, parked in its usual place just off Meadow Lane, but there was no sign of a diary there. And there was no sign of one in his charred pockets either. So it looks like the killer found it.’

The two women relapsed into silence. The older woman sipped daintily at her still three-quarters-full glass. ‘Maybe everything will be clearer in the morning,’ she said optimistically. ‘I bloody well hope so!’ the younger woman said vehemently. And with that she drained the rest of her whisky and got up to leave.

‘They’re playing tonight.’ Detective Constable Wilson and WPC Lawson were about to drive out of the Cowley Police Station car park again, only this time Wilson was signalling right. ‘I think I might go.’

Lawson yawned theatrically, and pumped her hand in front of her mouth like a five-year-old auditioning for the role of Native American Indian in a multi-ethnic, non-nativity, Christmas show.

‘More of a rugby girl are you?’ Wilson continued cheerfully, his mood lifted by the prospect of visiting the Kassam Stadium in work time.

‘I prefer tennis actually,’ Lawson replied tartly. ‘And, in case you hadn’t noticed, I am a woman, not a girl!’

‘Sorry!’ said Wilson, the apology rising instantly to his lips.

An awkard silence fell. Wilson pretended it hadn’t by concentrating extra hard on the traffic lights in front of him. Nevertheless, he was relieved when Lawson broke it.

‘The thing I most like about tennis is serving.’ She paused. ‘You get a pair of balls that you can squeeze and bounce as much as you like, and then you get to whack them over the net as hard as possible. I find that very satisfying.’

Wilson looked across, expecting to see a grin on her face, but she was facing forward, apparently oblivious of him, her mouth and eyes (or at least the one eye he could see) expressionless. Not for the first time in his acquaintanceship with Lawson, he found himself at a loss to know what the hell to think.

Silence descended again, and this time Wilson was happy that it had. It continued while he drove up the Watlington Road, then swung right along the Grenoble Road, which separates Greater Lees from a countryside whose most obvious features are a proliferation of power lines and the stench of the sewage works. At the fourth roundabout he took the second exit, which led into the car park that served the complex constructed by Firoz Kassam. To the left stood the barely complete Bowlplex and Ozone Cinema, and to the right the three-sided Kassam Stadium, home of Oxford United, a team who had once in the heady days of Robert Maxwell and Jim Smith risen to the very top league, but which now languished in the bottom one. For a few seconds, as he drove round to the front of the stadium and parked his car, Wilson was no longer a policeman, but only a wide-eyed boy at one with his football team.

‘Well, let’s get on with it!’ WPC Lawson was outside the car looking in, waiting for Wilson to emerge from his dream. ‘You’re the blooming football expert, not me.’

Wilson smiled and clambered out. ‘I bet you know much more than you’re letting on. I can see you mixing it with the boys in the playground, sliding in with two-footed tackles just to show them who was boss.’

She grinned back. ‘Maybe you’re smarter than you look, Wilson.’

‘I guess that wouldn’t be difficult,’ he replied.

‘Hi there, I’m Alan Wright.’ The greeting came from a man who had appeared from a door to the left of the ticket office windows. He was short, wore glasses and was dressed in jogging bottoms and a bright yellow open-neck shirt which said more about his football allegiance than his sense of sartorial style. They exchanged introductions, and then he took them inside.

‘Coffee?’

‘No thanks. We just need some information. As I mentioned on the phone, we need to get a handle on the habits of two men. We know they are both fans. We want to know if they had a habit of sitting together. One is Jake Arnold and the other Martin Mace.’

‘Well, if they booked by phone, or used a card to pay, we’ll have a record. What sort of time frame are we looking at?’

‘Last season and this,’ Wilson replied.

Wright’s fingers flew confidently across the computer keyboard on his desk. ‘Yes!’ he said triumphantly. ‘Here we are. Jake Arnold. Been to a couple of home games this season. Rochdale and Rushden. Sat in the South Stand Upper the first time, and the South Stand Lower the second time. Do you want me to print the details?’

‘Yes,’ Wilson said. ‘But what about last season?’

Again the fingers got to work. ‘Hm! Interesting. Only four games. The first was in January, against Wrexham, then one in February, none in March, and two in April.’

‘How many tickets did he buy?’ Lawson said, her first words since they had entered the building.

‘Just one in the first two games, then two in the next two.’

‘Really?’ Wilson said.

‘And always in the South Stand,’ Wright added. ‘Though not in the same place. He obviously didn’t have a favourite seat.’

Lawson had moved over to the printer and was scrutinizing the sheet of paper she had picked up from it. ‘He bought two tickets for the Rochdale and Rushden games too.’

‘So the question is: who was the other person?’

Wright looked up. ‘Sorry, who was the other person you were interested in?’