Russell went into the bathroom. I listened to him rattling around in there.
‘He’s walked around the far side of the bed.’ Russell came out, pointing. ‘You can tell that by the footprint in the blood.’
‘What footprint?’
‘Partial heel print. Open your eyes, you idiot. Look down. You might learn something.’ I looked as he continued. ‘It’s at the edge of the last stain there. Shaped like a crescent moon.’
I saw it, felt stupider still, cursing myself.
‘How do you know that’s not the paramedic’s footprint? Or whoever found her?’
‘Because there’s only one.’ Russell eased out an exhausted breath. ‘If the blood was still wet when the finder and the medics got here, there’d be shoeprints all over the damn floor.’
‘Right.’
‘The fact that you didn’t see that footprint or recognise its significance makes me want to jump out that window there, Evan,’ Russell said. ‘That footprint is the key piece of evidence in this whole room.’
‘Oh, just ease up, would you?’ I snapped.
‘It’s critical.’ Russell ignored the warning. ‘That changes the whole scene. Why go around that side of the bed at all? She had both her major valuables sitting onthisside of the bed. The phone and the laptop right there, on display. And yet he searched further.Muchfurther.Around the other side of the bedfurther.’
‘Unless she had something on that side on display and it’s gone now. A nice piece of jewellery? Maybe we’re looking for the local junkie.’
‘Look at the clothes. They’re cheap,’ Russell said. ‘Anko. That’s Kmart. She’s not wearing a diamond tennis bracelet and Kmart jeans. He wasn’t just looking for valuables. He was calmly searching for something specific. He came in calm and he left calm. He even flicked the lights off on the way out. You notice that? Notice the lights are off?’
‘I did, actually.’
‘She’d have turned them on to see who was at the door. He’d have needed them on while he searched the room. He flicked them off on his way out. Speaks to his presence of mind.’
‘Why did he turn them off?’
‘Probably so her light wouldn’t stay on all night, so nobody would get curious about why she wasn’t going to sleep. The publican. Another guest. He wanted to make sure she wasn’t found until morning.’
‘It might have been shame,’ I ventured. ‘Couldn’t it have been that? Shame at what he’d done?’
‘No,’ Russell said.
‘So what was he looking for, then?’
‘A notebook,’ Russell said.
‘What?’
‘There’s a pen on the bedside table. A good pen. No notebook. You don’t remember to bring your fancy pen and forget to bring anything to use it on.’
I noticed the pen sitting there by the lamp for the first time. It was gold. Embossed. How the hell hadn’t I seen it? Russell walked to the bed, lifted each pillow carefully, looked beneath it, let the pillows fall back where they’d been. He lifted the coverlet and peered into the bed.
‘Check down the back of the headboard, will you?’
I did. Nothing.
‘Is there a handbag?’ Russell asked.
I glanced around. ‘I’m not seeing one.’
‘I’m not blind, Evan. I can look around this bloody room as well as you can. I mean, is there a handbag with the body? Did you ask Dodge?’
‘Why would there be a handbag with the body?’
