He’d lost track of the film’s plot in the first few minutes, but he noticed that it seemed to have been shot entirely in the dark. In every scene there were long camera shots, with nothing but a lit doorway or a window in the distance, and a tunnel of darkness for a character to walk through. Sometimes an actor walked towards the camera, sometimes away. But always through that darkness. Why did no one ever put the lights on? he wondered. Did the people in these stories never suspect what might be waiting for them in those shadows, when they moved beyond the rectangles of light?

But that was the whole point, wasn’t it? It was all about the vicarious fear. The thrill was in anticipating the moment when a character stepped out of the safety zone. That was what riveted him to the screen, filled his mind and kept him from sleeping. It was watching a person walk into the dark.

When his phone rang, he thought at first it was part of the film. No one called him this late, unless it was bad news. When he answered, he wasn’t surprised to find it was DI Hitchens.

‘Sorry to bother you, Ben, but I thought you should know. Raymond Sutton has tried to hang himself in his room at The Oaks.’

Chapter Thirty-Three

Chapter Thirty-Three

Wednesday

Fry was already tired when she sat down at her desk next morning. She was supposed to produce a full report for the chiefs on her visit to the Garda Síochána, an analysis of the level of co-operation, and whether she’d made any useful contacts. Fry knew that any report to be read by senior management should use two positives to every negative, if it was going to give the right impression. Three was good, too. But never four – if you used four, it started to sound like sarcasm.

Well, on this occasion, a few bullet points would satisfy them. They wouldn’t want to know too much about Garda Lenaghan, would they? The identification of Orla Doyle should be enough to focus the interest.

Fry had now made two positive IDs on the bodies found at Pity Wood Farm, though not without a bit of good luck. She hoped her efforts would be properly appreciated. It wasn’t her fault that the skull didn’t belong to Orla Doyle. Everyone in the office this morning was talking about Victim C, which was the last thing she needed.