If Snow Hadn't Fallen (a Lacey Flint short story)

successful closure of the Ripper case, had formally charged the suspects.
    The post mortem on the victim was carried out. He’d died from suffocation after his soot-blackened airway had swollen and closed. Had the paramedics got to him sooner, they might have been able to insert a tube and keep him breathing. Might. There were third-degree burns over some 70 per cent of his body. At 80 per cent, it’s nearly always fatal.
    We heard that Mr Karim, who’d been walking on the far side of the recreation ground and had seen the five men fleeing, had gone into the station and had correctly identified the photographs of the five suspects. The park was still sealed off and being combed by crime-scene officers, as was the wider recreation ground. The sticks I’d described hadn’t turned up. The door-to-door enquiries went on, in the hope that someone other than Mr Karim and I had seen something, or of finding the person who’d reported the attack. The recording of the anonymous voice was listened to many times before the team concluded that the reporter was female and probably Asian. CCTV footage was gathered and watched. Still we waited for the announcement of Tulloch’s latest triumph.
    We waited in vain. And all the time there was that nagging voice at the back of my head. Something was wrong. Something even more wrong than a brutal and unprovoked racist attack. There was something I was missing.

4
    ‘WE COULD TRY hypnosis,’ someone suggested.
    ‘We cannot go to court relying on a statement acquired under hypnosis,’ snapped Tulloch. ‘Look, I’m as frustrated as anyone, but it really doesn’t look like Lacey has any more to tell us.’
    ‘I’m sorry,’ I said again.
    We were at Lewisham police station, where the Major Investigation Teams were based. The frustration around me, almost solid enough to cut through, stemmed from my inability to describe in any useful detail the clothes the five perpetrators had been wearing in the park the previous night. I’d done my best, but other than a general impression of dark casual jackets, hooded sweatshirts and dark trousers, there had been nothing. Normally, I’m very good at noticing and remembering details, but either the five men had deliberately dressed to be as inconspicuous as possible, or I’d been too shocked to take much notice.
    ‘What’s wrong?’ I asked. This should not be a difficult case. Suspects had been named and apprehended within an hour of the crime. Witness statements would be fresh and reliable. There would have been no time for alibis to be fabricated. There should barely be enough sterile plastic bags to contain the physical evidence.
    The others looked at each other. ‘This doesn’t leave this room,’ warned Tulloch.
    ‘Of course,’ I agreed.
    She threw her hands up into air. ‘We have nothing,’ she said.
    ‘Bugger all,’ added Anderson, in case Tulloch hadn’t been sufficiently clear.
    ‘They’re denying being anywhere near the park?’ I said.
    ‘Naturally,’ said Anderson, ‘but we expected that. What we didn’t expect was that two of them would have pretty solid alibis.’
    ‘Is that all?’ I asked. Alibis were tricky, but not insurmountable. They often came down to one person’s word.
Yes, my brother was at home all evening, we watched television together
.
    ‘No evidence at all,’ said Tulloch. ‘We seized every pair of shoes in every residence, but none match prints left at the scene or show any traces of mud from the park or grass from their supposed run across the field. No smell or trace of petrol on any of the clothes. No petrol found in any of the houses. You stank like a furnace last night, Lacey, no offence. They didn’t.’
    ‘I thought somebody picked them out of the Identikit photos?’ I said.
    ‘Yeah, this Karim bloke,’ said Barrett. ‘Trouble is, he knows them all anyway. He’s had run-ins with them before. They hang around his shop, apparently, making a nuisance of themselves. Bit of petty shoplifting. Any defence worth his salt will just claim he picked out five blokes he knew who’d pissed him off.’
    I was starting to see their problem. ‘Well, maybe it wasn’t them.’
    ‘On the other hand, guess who intervened one time when they were threatening Karim?’ Barrett continued. ‘Chowdhury himself, the victim. He had some balls, that guy. Stood up to them, wouldn’t let them leave until the police arrived. There’s no doubt they had a grudge against him.’
    I sighed. A