Penn had taken the time to print off an aerial view of the Dayneses’ property. He’d drawn a pink line around what he thought was the border.
He pushed the single piece of paper across the table. ‘Have I got the border right?’
Reece looked at it for a moment before nodding.
Penn pushed a green felt-tip across the table. ‘Can you mark up the footpath for me?’
Reece took the top off the pen and drew a tidy line along the most easterly point of the property. It snaked the far edge of two fields before disappearing through the hedgerow.
‘It comes directly off the road down here and travels diagonally across that big field over there.’
‘You know a lot about the path, eh?’
‘I use it for running. You don’t wanna piss off the local landowners by running somewhere you’re not supposed to.’
‘Ever happened to you?’ Penn asked.
‘Just once. I’d taken a wrong turn and ended up jogging past a couple in their outdoor swimming pool. Awkward.’
Penn took the sheet back and glanced at the line. On paper it looked as though that green line travelled close to the property, but in reality it was a good hundred metres away from the outbuildings with a fence and hedging in between.
‘So you take a wrong turn into the house last night?’
Reece took the lighter from his pocket and started tapping it on the table.
‘You knew we were gonna have to talk about that so best to just come clean. Why were you there?’
He considered his words carefully. ‘I just couldn’t believe it. I heard the whispers around that they were all dead and I just needed to see it for myself.’
‘Why?’
‘Morbid curiosity I suppose.’
‘But you weren’t particularly close to any of the family, were you?’
He shook his head.
‘Why Rozzie’s room?’
He coloured.
‘Did you like her?’
‘Yes, of course…no…I mean…’
‘It wasn’t a trick question. I only asked if you liked her.’
‘I wasn’t sure what kind of liked you meant.’
‘Was she nice to you when you worked at the house?’ Penn asked.
‘I didn’t see her very often. She wasn’t the outdoorsy type.’
‘But you must have seen her,’ Penn pushed, ignoring his evasiveness.
‘Now and again I suppose. She always smiled. She wasn’t like some of those bitchy girls. She didn’t have a permanent sneer or anything. She smiled but it wasn’t always genuine. She did it to be polite, but she often looked preoccupied, pensive, as though there was something she was working through in her mind.’
‘That’s a lot of presumption when you say that you rarely saw her.’