‘I take it you are to remain as SIO, sir?’ asked Hitchens.

‘Detective Superintendent Prince is tied up with this case in Derby, the double shooting,’ said Tailby. ‘A drugs territory dispute. We’re getting some stick about it down there, apparently.’

‘Yes.’

‘It means Mr Prince can only keep a watching brief on this case, I’m afraid. But he thinks we’ve got a good start.’

‘Possibly,’ said Hitchens. ‘But there is speculation about the other attack.’

Tailby shook his head. ‘They smell different to me. This Jenny Weston sounds like a woman who got involved with the wrong sort of chap. It’s an old story. You’ll see.’

8

The Partridge Cross cycle hire centre was in a converted railway station. Past it ran what had once been the Cromford & High Peak rail line, now the High Peak Trail, a smoothly tarmacked stretch of track perfect for walkers and cyclists.

There was still a morning mist lingering in places, and the old railway cuttings seemed to have drawn it down on to the trail. It gave a damp nip to the air that hit Ben Cooper and Todd Weenink as soon as they got out of the car. But there were already vehicles in the car park. Some had cycle racks on their tailgates and mountain bikes hoisted high in the air. A family with three small children were strapping on their safety helmets ready to hit the trail. There were no traces of Jenny Weston left here now.

The day’s weather forecast from the Met Office was posted on a board outside the hire centre, next to a notice warning hirers that bikes had to be returned by 6 p.m. in the summer, or by dusk in the winter. At the other end of the building a counter concession was selling ice cream, sweets and canned drinks. In a compound, they saw at least one Dawes Kokomo among the tandems and trailer cycles. Before they went into the hire centre, they stopped and looked at the bikes.

‘You wouldn’t get me on one of these,’ said Weenink, immediately sitting astride a tandem and looking like a cowboy trying to mount a donkey. ‘Unless it was with the right bird on the back, of course. Preferably the local bike, up for a quick pedal in the woods.’

Across the car park was the Ranger centre, a two-storey converted barn. They had passed it on the way in, and Cooper had noticed Owen Fox’s silver Land Rover parked in the yard.

They found Don Marsden, the cycle hire manager, leaning against a wooden counter, wiping his hands on a cloth. He had been tinkering with one of the hire bikes, checking the tightness of the forks on the wheels, testing the brakes and adjusting the saddle. Now he was waiting for his first customer of the morning, a blank page of the log book in front of him.