In the Woods

On Tuesday, Rob finally goes back to Knocknaree to retrieve his car. While there, he visits the dig site. He sits on a stone wall observing the workers. A dispute breaks out between Mark and one of his crew that sparks a memory in Rob’s mind.

Rob pulls aside a worker named Sean. He remembers Sean complaining that his trowel had gone missing. The trowel has Sean’s initials burned into its handle. He left it in the finds shed where archaeological discoveries are stored. This happened on Monday afternoon, a few hours before Katy died. The shed was locked overnight. When Sean went to retrieve the trowel the next day, it was missing.

Rob learns that only Dr. Hunt, Mark, and Damien have keys to the sheds. He calls the station and tells Sam to round up Cassie, a few floaters, and a forensics team to meet him at the dig site. As Rob waits for his backup to arrive, he realizes that Katy’s death had nothing at all to do with the disappearance of Peter and Jamie.

When the team arrives, Rob explains that Sean’s missing trowel was probably used to sexually assault Katy. It was a weapon of opportunity, which means the killer and Katy spent some time in the finds shed. He wants the team to scour the shed for evidence. They’re looking for a trowel, a bloodstained plastic bag, and primary and secondary crime scenes.

Rob reflects on the significance of cases like this:

A case breaking is like a dam breaking. Everything around you gathers itself up and moves effortlessly, unstoppably into top gear, every drop of energy you’ve poured into the investigation comes back to you, unleashed and gaining momentum. (446)

They search all the Portakabins for evidence and find the missing trowel hidden in the tool shed among plastic tarps. This is where Katy’s body was stowed overnight.

The tech team sprays the finds shed with luminol and finds traces of blood. Katy was killed here. There are numerous plastic bags stored in the shed, one of which might have been used to smother the girl. Each one will be tested for bloodstains.

The detectives interrogate everyone who has a key to the sheds: Hunt, Mark, and Damien. Damien is the only left-handed one in the group. The killer is also left-handed. Cassie and Rob agree on a strategy and tackle their prime suspect. “It was our last partnership […] we made a team worthy of bard-songs and history books. This was our last and greatest dance together” (457).

Cassie begins by talking about archaeology. This topic puts Damien at ease. Rob says, “He was such an abject little wimp, nothing to him but curls and stammers and vulnerability, you could have blown him away like a dandelion clock” (460).

The interrogation is interrupted when Rob receives a phone call from forensics. The trowel is confirmed as the rape weapon, and the team is still checking gloves and plastic bags. A small flashlight, which probably belonged to Katy, was also found among the tarps.

Cassie shows Damien several pictures of Katy: happy, smiling photos followed by crime scene and postmortem shots. He seems disturbed. Cassie then tells Damien her theory that the killer didn’t want to commit the crime. He has a conscience. People like that are haunted by what they’ve done for the rest of their lives. They eventually go to pieces and commit suicide if they don’t confess. Damien cracks and admits he killed Katy, saying it just happened.

After hours of relentless interrogation, the detectives finally have an admission of guilt. Rob observes, “For a moment, the room seemed to fold in on itself, as if some explosion too enormous to be heard had sucked all the air away” (471).

Cassie and Rob are now ready to record Damien’s full confession. He tells them about the events of Monday night. He went back to the dig site around 11:00 p.m., picked up a large rock, and let himself into the finds shed. Katy showed up at one in the morning.

They ate chocolate biscuits, and Katy told him about ballet school. Damien diverted her attention to some objects on a shelf. When her back was turned, he hit her with the rock. She struggled to get away, and he hit her again. He grabbed one of the plastic bags on the shelf and smothered her.

Damien cleaned up the finds shed and prepared to place Katy’s body on the ceremonial stone, but he saw a light in the woods. He didn’t like the idea of just dumping her body somewhere for animals to find. Instead, he took her to the tool shed and hid her under some tarps. He stowed the rock and her flashlight in the same place. Then he locked both sheds and went home.

Damien breaks down and sobs for a while. He still hasn’t revealed his motive. When Cassie calms him down, he talks about how he left the body on the altar stone the next night. He thought Katy would be safe there from predators and that someone would find her quickly. Damien belatedly realized that he had to be the one to discover her body to explain any traces of his own DNA.

The detectives leave the room to compare notes. They both recall that Damien offered the false lead of a man in a tracksuit. This is the same lead that Jessica gave under Rosalind’s coaxing. Cassie insists that Rosalind is involved, and she wants Rob to bring her in. She says, “We pull her in right now and we play them off each other till we find out what’s going on” (483).

Rob resists, saying that Rosalind is fragile and needs to be protected. He and Cassie argue ferociously. Cassie goes to track down Rosalind while Rob questions Damien, hoping to find some other motive that won’t implicate the girl.