It seemed the ill-health excuse Poe had thought of using was catching. Half the room was empty and the cops who were there looked tired and cranky.
‘Ladies and gents,’ the man said, ‘my name is Spencer Maxwell and I’m an academic with an expertise in semiotic studies. Detective Superintendent Nightingale has asked me to speak to you about the pictures of Anatids that were left at one of your crime scenes—’
‘Anatids?’ a huge cop with a ham-coloured face and a monobrow said.
‘The Anatidae are the biological family of birds that includes swans, ducks and geese. They are—’
‘Well say that then,’ Monobrow snapped. ‘It’s bad enough we’ve got to sit through this shit without you talking bloody Latin.’
‘It’s not Lat …’
Monobrow glared at him.
‘Yes, well. Anyway, I’m here to talk to you about what these Ana … birds might represent to the killer. Hopefully by the time I’ve finished you’ll be able to draw up a detailed profile of what he wants and what he plans to do next. Are there any questions?’
There weren’t. There were a lot of bored faces, though. Maxwell used the silence to distribute some handouts.
‘So, what is semiotics? Semiotics is anything that can stand for something else. A symbol rarely stands on its own; it is almost always part of something. To the person using the symbol – and in this case, judging by the neck to body ratio, it’s almost certainly a swan – it will have significant meaning.’
A bored-looking cop on the front row stuck up his hand. ‘What does a swan mean then?’
‘Traditionally, swans have represented grace and white swans have represented light and purity, even the higher self. Swans also symbolise travelling to the otherworld after death. There is also the well-known fable “The Ugly Duckling”, which is about transformation and fulfilling potential. That your perpetrator has chosen a black swan is, I think, very telling. He’s letting you know that he was once pure but he is no longer. When you catch him you’ll find he has been through a transformative life event recently. It is also possible that he thinks he is helping the people he’s killing.’
Bradshaw folded her arms and scowled. ‘What a blockhead,’ she said.
‘This handout is as much use as tits on a flatfish!’ Monobrow snapped.
‘If you don’t like it, you know where the bin is!’ Maxwell replied.
Poe had nodded off. The shouting had woken him.
It seemed Maxwell had lost control of the room. These weren’t impressionable students, desperate for good grades and willing to put up with anything; these were hard-edged, sleep-deprived cops, most of whom had barely seen their families since Christmas Eve.
Monobrow didn’t back down. He ripped his handout in half, walked over to the bin and dropped it in.
‘Fuck this,’ he said, before storming out and slamming the door behind him.
Maxwell turned white. Everyone else tried not to laugh. Even Bradshaw was smiling.
Poe wasn’t.
Something about their exchange was bothering him. He knew what it was but he didn’t know why.
It was the bin. Maxwell had told Monobrow to put his handout in the bin and Monobrow had.
Bins …
‘Show me that video again, Tilly,’ Poe whispered.
Bradshaw brought her laptop from her bag and opened it. She muted the sound and pressed play. Robert Cowell’s street sped by in real time. She slowed it down.
Nothing.
No bins.
She loaded the second video, the one they’d taken after Poe had turned around.
And there it was: a solitary dark grey bin at the top of Cowell’s drive. Hidden by a hedge on the way in, it had only been visible on the way out.