Michael Robotham - Lost

Miss Foster looks up from her notes. “If you don't mind me asking, why did you ask us to do the test? We don't usually do police work.”

“It was a private request from the girl's mother.”

“But you're a detective.”

“Yes.”

She looks at me expectantly but then realizes I'm not going to explain. Referring back to the folder, she takes out several photographs. “Head hairs are usually the longest and have a uniform diameter. Uncut hair appears tapered but in this case you can see the cut tip from a hairdresser's scissors or clippers.” She points to a photograph. “This hair hadn't been dyed or permed.”

“Are you sure?”

“Positive.”

“Can you tell her age?”

“No.”

“Could she be alive?”

The question sounds too hopeful but she doesn't appear to notice. Instead she points to another highly magnified image. “When hair originates from a body in a state of decomposition a dark ring can sometimes appear near the root. It's called a postmortem root band.”

“I can't see it.”

“That makes two of us.”

A second set of photographs show the postcard. The wording is just as I remember, with large block letters and completely straight lines.

“The envelope and card didn't tell us much. Whoever sent this didn't lick the stamp. And we didn't find any fingerprints.” She shuffles through the photographs. “Why is everyone so interested in this case all of a sudden?”

“What do you mean?”

“We had a lawyer phone last week. He asked about forensic tests relating to Michaela Carlyle.”

“Did he give his name?”

“No.”

“What did you say?”

“I told him we couldn't comment. Our tests are confidential.”

It may have been Howard's lawyer, which begs the question how did he know. Miss Foster returns the file to the cabinet. I seem to have exhausted my questions.

“Don't you want to know about the other package?” she asks.

My confusion lasts a fraction of a second—long enough to give myself away.

“You don't remember, do you?”

I feel a wave of heat down my neck.

“I'm sorry. I had an accident. I was shot.” I motion to my leg. “I have no memory of what happened.”

“Transient global amnesia.”

“Yes. That's why I'm here—putting the pieces together. You have to help me. What was in the package?”

Opening a cupboard beneath the bench, she takes out a hard plastic box. Reaching inside she produces a transparent ziplock bag. It holds several triangles of pink-and-orange polyester. A bikini!

She turns it around in her fingers. “I did a little research. Michaela Carlyle was wearing a bikini like this when she disappeared, which I assume is why you asked us to analyze this.”

“I assume so, too.” My mouth is suddenly dry.

“Where did you get this?”

“I don't remember.”

She hums knowingly. “So you can't tell me what's going on?”

“I can't, I'm sorry.”

Reading something in my eyes, she accepts this.

“Is it Mickey's bikini?”

“We couldn't extract any DNA materials but we did find slight traces of urine and feces. Unfortunately, there isn't enough to analyze. I did, however, discover that it was part of a batch manufactured in Tunisia and sold through shops and catalogs in the spring of 2001. Three thousand units were imported and sold in the U.K.; five hundred were size seven.”

Rapidly I try to process the information. A few triangles of polyester weave, size seven, don't constitute proof of life. Howard could have kept the swimsuit as a souvenir or someone else could have found one similar. The details were widely publicized. There was even a photograph of Mickey wearing the bikini.

Would this be enough to convince me that Mickey was still alive? I don't know. Would it convince Rachel? Absolutely.

Stifling a groan, I try to make my brain function. My leg has started to hurt again. It doesn't feel like part of me anymore. It's like I'm dragging around someone else's limb after a failed transplant.

Miss Foster takes me downstairs.

“You should still be in the hospital,” she warns.

“I'm fine. Listen. Are there any more tests you can do . . . on the bikini?”

“What do you want to know?”

“I don't know—traces of hair dye, fibers, chemicals . . .”

“I can have another look.”

“Thank you.”

Every criminal investigation has loose ends. Most of them don't matter if you get a confession or a conviction; they're just white noise or static in the background. Now I keep going back to the original investigation looking for something we missed. All the unexplained details and unanswered questions rattle through my head when I should be sleeping.

We interviewed every resident of Dolphin Mansions. They all had an alibi except for Howard. He couldn't have known the exact contents of Mickey's money box—not unless she told him. Sarah told me she didn't know. Kirsten might have learned such a detail.

I need to see Joe again. He has the sort of brain that might be able to make sense of this. Somehow he can join random, unconnected details and make it look like dot-to-dot drawings that even a child could do.

I don't like calling him on a Saturday. For most people it's a family day. He picks up before the answering machine. I can hear Charlie laughing in the background.

“You had lunch?”

“Yeah.”

“Already?”

“We have a baby remember—it's strained food and nursing home hours.”

“Do you mind watching me eat?”

“No.”

We arrange to meet at Peregrini's, an Italian restaurant in Camden Town where the Chianti is drinkable and the chef could have come straight from central casting with his walrus mustache and booming tenor voice.

I pour Joe a glass of wine and hand him a menu. He soaks up his surroundings, collecting information without even trying.

“So what made you choose this place?” he asks.

“Don't you like it?”

“No, it's fine.”

“Well, the food is good, it reminds me of Tuscany and I know the family. Alberto has been here since the sixties. That's him in the kitchen. You sure you won't eat something?”

“I'll have pudding.”

While we wait to order, I tell him about the DNA tests and the bikini. The likelihood of other letters is now obvious.

“What would you have done with them?”

“Had them analyzed.”

“By the same lab.”

“Maybe I didn't want anyone to know about the ransom demand. I would have put them somewhere safe . . . in case something happened to me.”

Joe nods and stares into his wineglass. “OK, show me your wallet.” He reaches across the table.

“I'm not worth robbing.”

“Just give it to me.”

He thumbs through the various pockets and pouches, pulling out receipts, business cards and the plastic that pays for my life. “OK, imagine for a moment that you don't know this person but you find his wallet on the ground. What does it tell you about him?”

“He doesn't carry much cash around.”

“What else?”

This is one of Joe's psychological games. He wants me to play along. I pick up the receipts, which have dried into a clumped ball. The wallet was in the river with me. I peel them apart. Some are impossible to read but I notice half a dozen receipts for takeout food. I bought a pizza on September 24. When Joe came to see me in the hospital he asked me the last thing I remembered. I told him it was pizza.

Glancing at the table, I feel depressed. My life is piled in front of me. There are business cards from rugby mates; a discount voucher from some random shop; a reminder note from British Gas that my central heating needs servicing; a Royal Mail receipt for registered mail; my driver's license; a photograph of Luke . . .