They strode back along the corridors in silence. Marie had rarely heard Jackman so abrupt. She suspected he was thinking about his own young nephews, and the danger they had been in during the reign of Alistair Ashcroft. He was probably also wondering, as was she, if enough had been done to safeguard these boys.

After instructing Simon which area he should concentrate on, Jackman turned to Marie. ‘Take Stacey and Miss Lloyd and talk to the lass who saw him with Edwards. I want to know exactly what she noticed about the boy’s appearance and demeanour.’

‘You mean, was he scared and so on?’

‘Yes, exactly,’ Jackman said.

Marie found Stacey talking to Miss Lloyd outside the teacher’s classroom.

‘Lucky it was young Lindy saw him, Officers,’ said Emily Lloyd. ‘She’s sensible, not given to overdramatising like some of the pupils.’

Lindy was obviously somewhat overawed at being interviewed by two police officers, but she turned out to be a veritable star witness, even able to tell them a little about Davy’s background.

‘Davy likes Mr Edwards, and Mr Edwards likes him too. He gives prizes to students who are interested in conservation and come to all his talks. Davy’s won three, which is pretty good. Davy’s really into conservation, you know, saving butterflies and polar bears and all that.’

‘So, when you saw them what did they look like, Lindy? Were they laughing, or did they look cross?’ asked Marie.

The girl screwed up her face in concentration. ‘Cross? Oh no, Sergeant, but they did look quite serious. They definitely weren’t laughing.’

‘And the next time you looked they’d gone. Is that right?’ asked Marie.

‘They asked me that before — the teachers and them. I reckon they had to have gone into the biology lab. It’s the last room in the corridor. There was definitely no one in the corridor when I went into my science class.’

‘Did you think that was odd, Lindy?’ asked Stacey.

Lindy looked puzzled at the question. ‘No, not at all. Davy was Mr Edwards’s wildlife conservation monitor. He tells Davy about any new projects he has planned, and Davy and some others sometimes stay late helping him.’

How sweet, thought Marie bitterly. Grooming the child who liked nature. Must have been easy. She thanked Lindy for her help, and stood for a moment, watching the child walk away.

‘I want to be a policewoman when I grow up,’ Lindy called back over her shoulder.

‘You’ll make a very good one, Lindy. You notice things, and you have a good memory.’ She smiled at the little girl.

Jackman was sifting through various letters and emails the school had exchanged with Edwards prior to his two-month stint at the school, while Lewis gave an account of the accompanying phone conversations with him.