The Child Who Read Online Free PDF Page A

there?’
    ‘I can’t comment, Tim, you know that. If you’ll excuse—’
    ‘Can’t comment on what, Leo? You’re not denying that this is your case?’
    ‘Please, Tim, I really should be—’
    ‘Who’s the client, Leo? Is he local? Will he be charged?’
    Leo shook free his arm. ‘Excuse me,’ he said, with more force this time. He shoved and the journalists closest to him stumbled. Cummins dropped his notebook. He let it lie, raising himself instead on his tiptoes.
    ‘You have a daughter, right, Leo? How do you feel about what happened to the Forbes girl? How does your family feel about your involvement in this case?’
    Leo felt himself flush. He did not look back but pressed his way onwards, leaking from the crowd and through the doorway.
    Inside it was no less frantic. Exeter Police Station was an inert place, usually: a city-sized precinct for small-town misdemeanours where business was conducted with languid efficiency. Not today. Officers – some uniformed, others suited – streaked from doorway to doorway, bearing files or flapping pages and with an air that there was somewhere else they needed to be.
    Leo’s entrance, nevertheless, did not go unnoticed. The desk sergeant was waiting. A tall man, wide too, he had his long arms locked and his hands splayed on the counter. Leo gave a twitch in the officer’s direction. It was ignored. Leo straightened his jacket and pinched his tie-knot and failed to stop himself checking across his shoulder as he started forwards. Cummins, he saw, was pressed against the glass of the door, his hands around his eyes. How do you feel? he had asked. How does your family feel? As though Leo’s family were anyone’s business but his own.
    Leo approached the desk. His jacket was twisted and he shrugged a shoulder. He glanced back towards the entrance, then faced the man on reception. There was no question about who would speak first.
    ‘Good morning,’ Leo said. He cleared his throat. ‘I have an appointment. With a client.’
    The desk sergeant drew back. ‘Your name . . . sir?’ The desk sergeant’s was Brian and he surely knew Leo’s.
    ‘Curtice,’ said Leo through a frown. ‘Leonard Curtice.’ He allowed his expression to settle. ‘I’m sorry if I’m late but there was quite a crowd on the—’
    ‘Sign here. Then go through there.’ The desk sergeant flicked his chin towards a set of double doors.
    So this would be the way of things, Leo thought as he recrossed the lobby. Howard had warned him, just as he in turn had warned his daughter, but still he had not been prepared. It was discomfiting, he would admit. But no matter. Yes, his daughter was upset but she was, after all, only fifteen years old – she could not be expected to understand. As for the desk sergeant, the local hacks, anyone else who had assumed he had sided with Felicity’s murderer: their ignorance, surely, was their problem. At least now Leo understood. At least, now, he knew the extent of the hostility he would have to deal with.
    He shifted his briefcase from left hand to right and once again adjusted his tie. He passed through the set of double doors. There was an escort waiting for him on the other side. The man nodded and the nod gave Leo heart. He called Leo ‘sir’ and without a hint of a sneer. He behaved properly, professionally, and Leo resolved to do the same. He would talk to Ellie and he would bear all the rest. Here, now, he had a job to do.

4
     
    They were being watched. It was part of the agreement. The investigating team – the police – were excluded but the social worker, the boy’s parents: they were watching and listening to everything that was being said. Which, in practical terms, was very little: questions but no answers; prompts but no replies; a lopsided conversation, then, that had toppled, momentarily, into silence.
    Leo glanced again at the security camera. He wanted to stand and to pace but standing and pacing was what the police had done, what