“Quite the opposite, I’m afraid.” Banks tapped the sheets in front of him. “See, the DNA analysis of the traces of blood we found in the park is a match for the samples taken from Samir Boulad’s body. It’s Samir’s blood, Chris. No doubt about that.”

Though Chris now looked a little less nonchalant, he merely shrugged and said, “So what? Seeing as I’ve already told you I wasn’t there that night, I don’t see what it has to do with me. I’m very sorry and all that. It’s terrible that such a thing should happen so close—”

“Oh, cut the crap,” said Banks.

Carnwood shot him a reproving glance, but Banks carried on.

“Well, in itself, maybe it doesn’t mean too much to you right now that we found traces of Samir’s blood in the woods. But our toxicologist also found two different DNA samples in the saliva from the roaches and chewing gum we recovered; your feelings might change when we have samples for comparison from you and Jason.”

“What? No way.”

“Oh, there’s a way, all right,” said Banks. “Ask your solicitor. We’ll be taking mouth swabs or plucked hairs while he’s present. Or we can get a doctor to come in and take a blood sample, if you give your written consent. Believe me, we’ve plenty of grounds for arrest or a court order. Your choice. Anyway, the best is yet to come.”

Banks let the silence stretch and watched Chris chew his lower lip.

“Our technicians haven’t finished the analysis and comparisons yet, but they also found traces of blood in the boot of your car. It’s being analyzed further as we speak. Now what are the odds against us finding it’s a match for Samir’s, too?”

Chris swallowed and Banks guessed from his expression that he was doing a lot of quick thinking and re-evaluating his position. He hardly seemed aware of the duty solicitor’s presence. Finally, he rested his palms on the desk and said, “OK, I’ll make a statement. But it wasn’t me who stabbed him. It was Jason.”

AS USUAL, the “celebration” of a case solved was a sweet and sour affair, taking into account the sense of achievement in uncovering a killer, and the awareness of how many lives the revelation would ruin in addition to the killer’s and his family’s.

But alcohol helped blur the lines, and in its glow, tears soon turned to euphoria, and the mingled feelings of sorrow and regret had morphed into black humor by the time the third pint came along. It helped that they’d had another, albeit vicarious, success that afternoon: a man caught for a sexual assault in Hull had admitted to also assaulting Lisa Bartlett in Eastvale. A white man.