The Fallen Angel

TWO

‘Semen,’ Teresa’s assistant said. ‘That’s the problem. We expected-’

‘Don’t tell me what you expected,’ Costa ordered. ‘Tell me what you found.’

The forensic officers glanced at one another.

‘Perhaps we won’t miss Leo after all,’ Teresa mused. ‘The honest truth is we’ve found nothing. Because of the holidays and the stinking budget cuts we’ve got to use an outside lab for DNA sampling. Takes time. Saves money. The latter seems more important than the former, at least to the bean-counters upstairs.’

‘On with it, on with it,’ Peroni urged, waving a hand at her.

She took a deep breath then said, ‘We don’t have a positive ID for any of the semen yet. The reports that came back from the outside lab aren’t usable. I’ve rejected them and said they need to be carried out again. They won’t get round to that until tomorrow.’

‘Wonderful,’ Costa muttered under his breath.

‘The best case you can come up with will still fall in court if the defence can question the DNA,’ Teresa said. ‘It’s happening more and more. I can’t take chances.’

‘We’ve been waiting days!’

‘I know.’ She paused to add a little drama, the way she always liked on such occasions. ‘The problem is the data we’ve got back doesn’t match. It’s close. But it’s not identical, as it should be. I think this is because it’s been handled badly. But there is an alternative explanation.’

She took another deep breath then said, ‘It’s just possible that we have semen specimens from two men, not one.’

The two cops didn’t say anything.

‘We didn’t look at the results until this morning,’ Di Capua said. ‘It’s probably a mistake.’

Costa looked at Teresa Lupo and said, ‘Probably?’

She frowned.

‘Look, I hate this as much as you do. I want certainties. We don’t have them. The most likely answer is that the lab screwed up. If they didn’t. .’ She shrugged. ‘Then we have two men involved in sexual encounters. One of them, I assume, is Malise Gabriel. But I can’t tell you which yet. Or who the other might be.’

‘The son?’ Peroni asked.

‘That was my first thought,’ Teresa replied ‘It seems logical. As logical as anything else in this case. I’ve sent off a sample to check. Tomorrow. .’

‘I don’t want to wait till tomorrow,’ Costa insisted.

‘Well, you’ll have to,’ she said, shaking her head. ‘Go shout at the bean-counters. There is a problem with the son, though. These two samples are different but similar, which is why we assume there’s been some mistake and really it’s two samples from the same man, contaminated somehow.’

Peroni growled and said, ‘Make this simple.’

‘If these do turn out to be from two different men, then I’d hazard a guess that they’re probably related.’

That pause again. She gazed at Costa.

‘Are you absolutely sure Robert Gabriel was adopted?’

‘Mina said so. The mother too.’

‘Quite. Are you sure?’

He thought about it and said, ‘There’s no physical resemblance. Robert was nothing like her. His habits. His personality.’ He nodded. ‘I’ll get someone to check.’

Everything needed to be re-examined. Every last piece of evidence they’d lazily taken for granted.

‘While we’re at it,’ he said, ‘let’s look at those photographs again, shall we?’