Unti Peter Robinson #22 by Peter Robinson Page A

were.”
    â€œFingerprints?”
    â€œThere’s no decent surface to get fingerprints from. Not the concrete floor and not the corrugated metal walls. The lock and the wire mesh gate are clean. We’re still dusting around the general area, but don’t expect too much with all the rain we’ve had. We might get a few partials or smudges, if we’re lucky. We’re also going to do a thorough luminal search. If blood was spilled there recently, there’s always a chance that the hangar was used before as a place of execution. There might be traces of previous crimes, and they might lead to DNA.”
    â€œGood work, Stefan. Anything new on the trace evidence, Jazz?”
    â€œYou’ll have your DNA analysis sometime tomorrow, as promised,” Jazz Singh said. “And I want you to know it’s got me in trouble with Harrogate. They thought they had priority. In the meantime, all I can tell you is that the blood type of the sample is A positive. Not very exciting news, as it’s the same as about thirty-­five percent of the UK population. But if you look on the bright side, it rules out sixty-­five percent. I’ve sent the brain matter and bone fragments for outside analysis. We don’t have the facilities for that. I’m not sure what that’ll tell us, or how long it will take, but the odds are that it’ll be very expensive and you’ll probably have solved the case by then.” She smiled sweetly and rested her hands on the table. Annie made a note of the blood type.
    Banks glanced toward PC Trevor. “Anything from the house-­to-­house?”
    â€œNothing, sir,” said a sulky PC Trevor. “Len and Dave are still out knocking on doors in Drewick.”
    Banks turned to Wilson. “Doug, I noticed the hangar’s very close to the railway lines. Do you think you can check with East Coast and any other companies who use it about whether anyone saw anything there recently?”
    Wilson nodded and made a note. “I’ll see if I can get a request on the news as well.”
    Banks let the silence stretch for a moment, then addressed the room at large. “How do you get from the airfield to the A1?” he asked. “Is the only way the way Gerry and I came? From what I could see, all there was around there were bumpy overgrown tracks until you got to the village.”
    â€œYou’d have to get back to the Thirsk road, a mile or so beyond Drewick,” said Doug Wilson. “From there you could go north to Northallerton or south to Thirsk. Either way, it’s a few miles.”
    â€œThere is another way,” said Winsome. “If you continue south on that track that runs by the airfield gates, you go through the woods parallel to the railway lines, and when you get to a village called Hallerby, you can turn right on a B road leading to the A1. That cuts off Thirsk and saves you a bit of time. There’s also a lot less traffic and only the one village to drive through.”
    â€œIs there anything in this Hallerby?”
    â€œUsual stuff, sir,” said Winsome. “Few houses, ­couple of shops, village hall, chapel, a pub.”
    â€œAnd you’d have to pass through there either way if you were taking that shortcut to or from the A1?”
    Winsome nodded. “It’s where the bumpy lane starts and heads north. The B road from the A1 continues to Thirsk.”
    â€œMaybe you could pay a visit to this Hallerby tomorrow, Winsome, and see if anyone saw lorries, or any other traffic, heading to or from the A1 via that road this weekend. Someone must have seen or heard something coming out of the woods. It might have appeared odd or rare enough to remember.”
    â€œSir,” said Winsome.
    â€œIs that all?” Banks asked, glancing around the room.
    â€œThere is one more thing, sir,” Doug Wilson said.
    â€œDoug?”
    â€œWhen DI Cabbot and I went to talk to Morgan