Like This, for Ever

looking for a vampire,’ said Weaver.
    ‘Boss,’ Anderson called to Dana. ‘Dr Hunt is downstairs, with a posse of reporters, demanding to speak to the officer in charge of the investigation.’
    Weaver met Dana’s eyes. ‘What do you want to do?’ he asked her quietly.
    ‘Have someone put him in an interview room,’ said Dana. ‘Alone. The reporters stay outside until we call a press conference.’
    Anderson looked troubled. ‘OK. Then what?’
    ‘Then nothing. When we’re done here, Pete can go down and talk to him.’
    Anderson put the phone back to his mouth, then thought better of it. ‘Boss, perhaps I should go …’ he began.
    ‘I will not dignify that pillock by sending a senior member of my team to talk to him,’ snapped Dana, before turning to Stenning. ‘When you go down, Pete – and please don’t hurry – I want to know where he’s been getting his information from and I want to know where he was the evenings all four boys a) disappeared and b) were found. That’s six occasions I want accounted for, and don’t just take his word for it. I want alibis.’
    ‘Dana …’ Now Weaver was looking troubled.
    ‘Sir, if this so-called professional had had to face three sets of parents and tell them their ten-year-olds weren’t going to grow up, ever, he might have had some qualms about adding to their pain on national bloody television.’
    If an attention-seeking pin were in the room, this would have been a good time for it to drop.
    ‘Right,’ said Weaver. ‘Anything else you can tell us, Susan?’
    ‘Well, as I was saying, although I can see where Hunt’s coming from, on the other hand, too many things just don’t add up for me,’ said Richmond.
    ‘Like what?’
    ‘People with Renfield’s Syndrome are overwhelmingly male,’ said Richmond. ‘But there are no documented cases at all of men with the condition attacking children. They attack other adults, women most commonly, but other men too.’
    Overwhelmingly male?
Dana could sense Anderson and Stenning looking her way, wondering if she was going to air her killer-is-a-woman theory.
    ‘What about this Richard Chase bloke?’ asked Stenning, who’d been reading one of the case notes. ‘He killed a kid.’
    ‘Richard Chase was a very disturbed young man,’ said Richmond, ‘but his problems were almost certainly due to drug abuse and failed medication. He was quite possibly schizophrenic. He killed six people, but with only one of them did he commit cannibalism and drink blood. I’m not saying the condition doesn’t exist, just that because of its sensational nature, it’s assumed an importance way beyond what it deserves.’
    A woman with the condition would need to select victims she could overpower more easily, thought Dana. Could she ask if there was any history of women having Renfield’s Syndrome?
    ‘Anything else?’ asked Weaver.
    ‘Yes, the sheer amount of blood we’re talking about. People with this condition crave the taste of blood in their mouths. They don’t drink it like milk because they can’t. The body would reject it. You’d most likely vomit it up. If you managed to keep it down, you’d be looking at serious organ damage. Each of these boys lost around three litres of blood. No one could drink that amount of blood and live.’
    ‘No one human,’ quipped one of the younger detectives as Weaver stood up to leave the room. ‘Word outside, Dana, please,’ he said.
    In the corridor he turned to face her. ‘Everything OK?’ he asked.
    ‘Apart from four dead children, a hysterical media reaction and a mole on the team? Yes, Sir, everything’s fine.’
    He raised his eyebrows. ‘I’ve not seen you this uptight before,’ he said. ‘If you want to stay on this case, you’re going to have to calm down.’

23
    ‘ COME ON, BOYS , watch your positions! Sam, who are you marking?’
    Barney took a quick glance around. You did not want Mr Green yelling at you on the pitch unless it was something like ‘Well-played’ or ‘Nice work’. The ball went across the pitch towards the opposition’s number 8, who had a clear shot. Barney raced across, got to the ball first and cleared it.
    ‘Lovely, Barney,’ called a female voice. Barney turned to see his form teacher, Mrs Green, on the touchline, not too far away from his dad.
    ‘Well played, Barney,’ called Mr Green. ‘Now come on, keep the pressure on!’
    Heading into the wind, Barney’s team followed the ball up the pitch. Huck