'What sort of notes might they have made?' Jenny asked.
'I had a team of half a dozen detectives. I sent three of them into the church to ask anyone who knew her if they had heard anything of interest, whether she was having a problem with anyone, that sort of thing.'
'And this is a list of people they spoke to?'
'It is. And we didn't get anything out of it as I recall. We'd already established from Mr Strong that she'd stayed at home on the Sunday evening feeling tired, but that was about all of any use we learned there.'
'Why was that useful?'
'It wasn't particularly. It just served to rule out everyone who was at the service. We had a time of death at about eight or nine p.m. The service wasn't over until nearly ten.'
Jenny said, 'One of the names on the list is Alan Jacobs. Do you know who questioned him?'
'It was me. I had a list of people in her study group. There were about four or five names. I spoke to each of them.'
'Do you recall the conversation with Mr Jacobs?'
'Yes. I caught him at work, up at the Conway Unit. He was very helpful as I recall. He said that he had met Miss Donaldson a number of times in a group at the church, and that he'd been at the service on the Sunday night.'
'Were you able to verify that?'
'I think he gave a few names, people who confirmed he was there.'
'You think?'
'It was early days. If Craven hadn't come forward so soon the investigation would have dug deeper. As it turned out, it wasn't necessary.'
'Would you have made a note of the names he gave you?'
'If I did,' DC Stokes said, 'I'm afraid I haven't got it now. It was just preliminary stuff, running around. You scribble something down or make a note on your phone and don't necessarily hold on to it.'
'You didn't follow up on his movements or those of anyone else at the church?'
'Not in detail, no, ma'am,' the detective said with a shrug. 'Like I said, we talked to lots of people.'
Jenny considered what a study group might mean. She assumed it was a sociable gathering and that the conversation must have drifted to the group's families and work. It was hard to imagine Alan Jacobs and Eva Donaldson not having found each other interesting. It must have occurred to Jacobs that Eva could have served as an inspiration to many of the kids in his care, particularly the drug-addled teenage girls who'd have sold themselves for their next fix. And she in turn must have been intrigued by a man who worked with young people of precisely the sort her church was setting out to reach and help.
Jenny said, 'It must have struck you that professionally at least, they had much in common. Did you ask him if he discussed his work with Eva?'
'No. We didn't get much beyond the basics I'm afraid.'
Ed Prince and his team were in whispered conversation with Fraser Knight and his solicitor. What the hell is she driving at? Prince was undoubtedly asking. Nobody seemed to have any answers. Neither did Jenny. There was only a hunch, a vague, uneasy suspicion that two deaths in one study group amounted to more than mere coincidence. She knew there were many more answers to come - her problem was finding the right questions. From his seat at the back of courtroom Starr held her in his calmly critical gaze, judging, assessing, and fiercely willing her on.
Michael Turnbull returned to the hall accompanied by his wife and Lennox Strong. The three seemed inseparable. As he came forward and prepared to testify, Jenny could tell that it wasn't facing the court that daunted him, but the fact that his words would be broadcast around the world within moments of him uttering them. There was no room for error.
The consummate professional, Turnbull sat angled towards the jury, speaking to them as if they were concerned friends. Jenny wanted them to hear Eva's story from his perspective and led him through the chain of events which had brought them together. Turnbull began by describing the occasion when Pastor Lennox Strong first introduced her to him. He had been wary at first, he admitted, but over the course of several discussions in the following weeks Eva convinced him that she had been led to the Mission Church for a reason: to combat the industry that was corrupting a