Four

Back at the station DI Goodman set about putting together an evidence board. He handed his phone to Fidel. "Somewhere I have photos of all my nieces and nephews on there and there's a picture of the body. Print them off for me," he said. "In the meantime," he added drawing six stick figures on the board. "let's establish what we know. The deceased is Alice Waters, an 18 year old student from Kent. Off to Oxford University in September," he said writing down her name, age and Oxford. "The suspects for murder are 18 year old twins Alex and Megan Goodman. Alex is planning on doing biochemistry at uni. Megan is… well I think its marine biology or forensics. Then there is brothers Theo and Felix Hazelhurst, aged 17 and 18 respectively. Theo has one more year of school left, his brother is due to go to Wolverhampton to study Chemistry. Very science oriented group of people. The final suspect is… well… me. Ah thank you Fidel," he said taking the pictures that had been printed off and sticking them above the right names. "A 38 year old Detective Inspector living on Saint Marie who hasn't seen his family for 3 years." He sighed.

"Sir, I think we can rule out you," Florence said. She indicated her screen. "So at 12:23 we hear Alice and Megan go to the bedroom. At 12:26 you appear on the veranda and stand by the edge looking around, gesturing and describing Saint Marie to Megan. At 12:47 Megan appears behind you on the veranda and you stay together until she heads back inside to get lunch ready and seconds later Theo appears with the cutlery and the pair of you help lay the table until at 1:48, Alex shouts and you all rush inside. You're in full view of the camera the whole time and we know Alice was murdered after 12:25 because that is the last time any of you heard her voice. You couldn't have murdered her in a minute sir."

"So ruling me out, as I suspected we would, we are left with four teenagers who are friends of Alice's," he said crossing through the picture of himself. "So who has motive. Well that's easy enough."

"Megan, Sir," Fidel said pointing at the board. "She was blinded by Alice in a freak accident in Brazil. You said so yourself in the car on the way down."

"Yes but that was nine years ago. I'm not sure Megan would seek revenge that late on. She's too nice. I also don't think she would be able to stomach stabbing her. No Megan is too squeamish for things like that," Humphrey explained.

"But she's blind boss. It's not like she can see the blood is it?" Dwayne stated from his desk. Everyone turned to look at him. "What? I'm just saying. She has the best motive."

"Yes you're right. She does. But she also has a pretty good alibi," Humphrey said, "because for 1 hour she was in full view of the camera. And for the other what is it…" he said glancing at the times he'd jotted down, "ah here. The other 21 minutes I could hear her clearly in the kitchen chopping vegetables and I could see her through the window when I turned round. Also the three boys would have seen her pass them to go to Alice's room and they didn't."

"Well then she murdered her when she took her to bed," Dwayne said.

"She can't have because the murder weapon is a meat knife. A meat knife that I'm sure forensics will tell have chicken juice on it. Which I also saw in the kitchen at 12:26 before I headed out onto the veranda. No she can't have done it," Humphrey said. "Which brings us back to motive for the other three."

"Did any of them have any grudges against her? Had she upset any of them? How did they all seem around her?" Florence asked.

Humphrey looked up from the board and thought for a moment. "Well you know they looked sort of normal with each other. How they always had. Now possible motives anyone?"

"Could one of them have been angry about Megan's accident? I mean they all seem to love Megan a lot and she seems to mean the world to her. If Alice was the one who hurt her would any of them want to get payback for her?" Fidel asked.

Humphrey wagged his finger. "good point. So we have an injured girl, who would feel the effects most keenly after Megan. Her brother is obviously now a constant by her side especially when she is cooking and things, maybe he feels angry about his lost childhood because he's spent it all helping Megan. Felix and Theo aren't really affected by it but Felix is in the same form as Alice. Spending your whole school life seeing someone who should have been in trouble swanning around can't help. But then all three are with each other all the time so who had the opportunity."

"Well that would be Alex," Florence said. "He was the only one who went near the kitchen while Megan was cooking and he went to the bathroom twice. He could have easily snuck the knife out the kitchen and then taken it to the bathroom and stabbed Alice on his way. And like you said, he has motive. He's been stuck helping his sister because of his girlfriend."

"Right, we need to question him. I'll call him and find out where he is," Humphrey said.