Free Dancing With the Virgins by Stephen Booth

Disappointed?
    ‘ They say plastic surgery might help. But not yet. The injury is too recent.'
    ‘ Yes, it takes time.'
    ‘ Oh, the body heals itself to a certain extent, in time. The blood clots, the wounds close over, fresh skin grows. They can do wonders with surgery, they keep telling me. But it's never quite the same, is it? You can't rebuild the original tissue, and your body remembers the injury. You're always marked in some way. ’
    The file said that Maggie Crew had received the appropriate counselling. She had gone through all the consultations with a psychiatrist. She had been encour aged to write down her feelings, to talk to Victim Sup port. The police had treated her with kid gloves for a time. But at the end of the day, they weren't getting what they wanted. Maggie Crew knew far more than she had told them. She had seen her assailant and sur vived. He was the same man, they now suspected, who had killed Jenny Weston. It was at this moment, more than ever, that they needed the information locked in Maggie's head .
    Fry wondered how secure the apartment was. It occupied part of the second floor of Derwent Court, a converted spa hotel, a relic of the town's Victorian past as a health resort. The building had stood derelict for years before an influx of county council office workers had boosted the demand for housing in Matlock. Now comfortably-off residents lived at the end of its marble corridors and stared all day at an expen sive view over the Derwent Valley, counting the cable cars as they ferried tourists to the Heights of Abraham. At least there was a concierge in the lobby downstairs. She would have to have a word with him before she left - he would be able to keep an extra careful eye out for visitors to Derwent Court .
    She stared out of the window into the darkness. The quarry-blasted hillside stood out white and stark on the skyline to the south. No attempt had been made to repair or disguise the damage that had been done to the landscape by the mineral companies. The scars had been left as a symbolic reminder, a legacy of the past. And perhaps as a warning too. A warning of what might easily happen again one day - if no one did anything to prevent it.
    ‘ Yes, some things take time,' said Maggie. 'Other things take a miracle. ’
    *
    Ben Cooper had already formed a clear idea in his mind of what Jenny Weston had been like. There had been no shortage of details there, for once. The entry in the log at the cycle hire centre had given them the basics. Not only that, but the cycle hire manager knew which car was hers. Once they had got access to it, they had found her handbag in the glove compartment, with her diary and all the information they could possibly want, written on the front page in her own hand. It listed not only the name, address and phone number of her next of kin, but also Jenny's date of birth, her National Insurance number, the numbers of her bank account and her mobile phone, the names of her doctor, dentist and vet, her religion, the address of her insurance company, her National Trust membership number, her height and weight, and her shoe size. And her blood group. And then her father, Eric Weston, had lost no time arriving from his home at Alfreton as soon as they con tacted him. Cooper had arrived back at Partridge Cross from Ringham Edge Farm just in time to sit in on the interview with DCI Tailby. Mr Weston had been all too willing to tell them about his daughter. He recited the details eagerly, as if he needed to remind himself, too, of who Jenny was. Of who she had been .
    Jenny had been married at twenty-one. Her husband, Martin Stafford, had not been liked by her parents. Police officers heard that one often, of course. Very few parents thought the men their daughters chose were good enough. But in this case, Stafford had lasted about three and a half years before his violent nature became obvious. Jenny had stayed with him another two years before they had finally parted