Free Time of Death by James Craig Page A

Hi! This is Alice. Leave a message and I’ll get back to you. Bye!
    ‘Alice,’ he said as calmly as he could manage, ‘it’s Dad. Call me when you get this.’
    Keeping the phone in his hand, he walked up to a sergeant standing by the police tape. Flashing his ID, he got a nod of recognition.
    ‘Where are the schoolkids?’ Carlyle asked.
    ‘Gone to the RV points, sir,’ the sergeant said in a practised manner.
    ‘And where are the RV points?’
    ‘Er . . .’ The officer shrugged.
    Carlyle was just about to slap him, when they were interrupted by a middle-aged woman with a clipboard. ‘Which class?’ she asked Carlyle briskly.
    ‘Er . . .’ Now it was Carlyle’s turn to show his ignorance.
    The woman hid her frown behind her clipboard. ‘Teacher?’
    ‘A man, I think,’ was as much as Carlyle could manage.
    This time the woman made no attempt to hide her contempt for his ignorance.
    Summoning up the patience of a saint, she gave him one last try. ‘Upper or Lower school?’
    ‘Lower,’ Carlyle said decisively. He knew he had to have a fifty-fifty chance of being right on that one at least.
    ‘They will have gone to Monkwell Square.’
    Carlyle looked at her blankly.
    ‘It’s just next to the Ironmongers’ Hall,’ the woman said.
    ‘Just back the way you came, sir,’ the sergeant said helpfully. ‘Head towards St Paul’s – it’s just before you get to London Wall. Should only take you about
five minutes, maximum.’
    ‘Thanks,’ Carlyle replied through gritted teeth. Turning on his heels, he headed at a trot back through the gawkers and the randomly parked police cars.
    It took him only a couple of minutes to find the Square. The place was full of girls in uniform gossiping in small groups, lounging about on the grass and generally looking quite pleased at the
prospect of the afternoon off. Quite a few were smoking and he was shocked to see one girl, who looked to be even younger than Alice, taking a casual drag on a cigarette as she sat under a tree.
How would he react if he found his own daughter smoking? He would cross that bridge if and when he came to it.
    First he had to find her. It took him another few minutes to locate someone who looked like a teacher – a tall man in a suit, also brandishing a clipboard. Careful not to tread on any of
the pupils, Carlyle stepped forward and introduced himself.
    The man nodded. ‘John Doherty, Deputy Head of the Lower School.’ When Carlyle explained that he was looking for his daughter, he frowned. ‘There’s no need to
overreact.’
    Overreact?
    ‘It’s probably just a false alarm,’ Doherty continued. He looked as if he was in his early thirties, but with his floppy straw hair and boyish features he managed to look
younger than many of the girls. ‘Everyone has been accounted for. We’ve told all the ones that don’t normally get picked up that they can go home.’
    Before Carlyle could respond, the phone started vibrating in his hand. It was a text message from Alice: At home. All ok. x
    A mixture of relief and frustration washed over him. He looked up, but the teacher had already walked off. For a few seconds, Carlyle stood there, feeling like a spare part. Then he called his
wife and left the Square, heading west.
    T he bell rang, shortly followed by a low rumble of excited chatter. Michael Hagger leaned against a pillar outside the entrance to Coram’s Fields Nursery. Trying to look
like the kind of bloke who would regularly pick his kid up from playschool, he watched the children start to stream out, still happily playing, stuffing their faces with snacks, or chatting about
the day. Mostly it was women – mothers or childminders – doing the collecting, but there was the odd father here and there making the effort to be part of the post-school run.
    Once he was sure that home-time was in full swing, Hagger slipped past a woman struggling with a buggy and went inside the building. Smiling at the girls in reception, he