Read The Child Who for Free Online

to fill the silence.
    Leo said nothing.
    ‘Have your half an hour,’ said the inspector, waving a hand. ‘Come up with some story if you can. Just don’t try and kid me. You’re not here to do the world any favours. You’re on nobody’s side but your own.’
    They were back, it felt like, where they had started. Yet Leo, this time, let his fingers drum.
    ‘Daniel?’ Leo watched, waited. ‘Daniel, please. They will charge you. You understand that, don’t you? You understand what I’ve told you? Unless you give an account of your version of events, they’ll decide for themselves what they think happened.’
    The boy sat with his shoulders hunched. He shrugged, as much as his posture would allow – which was communication, at least, of a kind.
    ‘This refusing to speak. It does you no favours. I thought I’d made that clear. Did I not make that clear?’ His tone would not help, Leo knew, but it was becoming harder to resist. He looked at his watch, openly.
    ‘I can’t help you if you don’t let me. Your parents – ’ Leo tipped his head to the security camera ‘ – they won’t be able to help you either.’
    A noise this time: something between a sniff and a snort.
    Leo stood. He turned away and clutched his forehead. He turned back, a rebuke half formed, but Daniel was now sitting upright.
    ‘What’s . . .’
    Leo waited.
    ‘What’s . . . that thing.’ The boy, for an instant, met Leo’s eye. ‘That thing you said. The thing with the letters?’
    Leo shook his head. ‘I . . . DNA? You mean DNA?’
    The boy did not say no.
    ‘It’s a genetic . . .’ Leo stopped himself. ‘It’s us. It’s tiny pieces of us. It’s incontrov . . . It’s proof, Daniel. Like fingerprints. They take samples at the scene and try to match it to their suspect.’
    ‘But it doesn’t mean . . .’ The boy glanced at the camera. ‘It doesn’t mean anything. That . . . that I did anything.’
    ‘It . . . No, not in the sense I think you mean. But unless somehow—’
    ‘And no one saw me. Like . . . there. Doing, you know. What they say I did.’
    ‘No,’ Leo said. ‘No, that’s true. But the DNA—’
    ‘She was my girlfriend.’
    Leo stared. ‘Sorry?’
    ‘She was my girlfriend. She, you know. Loved me and that.’
    For ten, twenty, thirty seconds, Leo made no sound. Then, ‘Were you there, Daniel? Is that . . .’ He breathed. ‘Is that what you’re telling me?’
    ‘I . . . Yeah. Sort of.’
    ‘Sort of?’ Leo stepped towards the table. He held the back of his chair but did not sit down. ‘What happened, Daniel?’
    The boy shuffled. ‘We . . . we kissed and stuff.’
    ‘You kissed. Meaning, she consented?’
    Daniel frowned.
    ‘Did she let you kiss her?’
    ‘I told you: she was my girlfriend.’
    ‘Daniel, I—’
    ‘We did it all the time. And other stuff. Proper stuff. Like in films.’ The boy’s expression was a challenge but as he spoke he seemed to flush.
    ‘Proper stuff? What do you mean by that?’
    Daniel, this time, looked away. ‘Sex,’ he said and he slid a little deeper into his chair.
    This time it was Leo who glanced towards the camera. ‘Did you have sex with her, Daniel? Is that what you’re saying?’
    The boy took a moment to answer. ‘Loads,’ he said, concentrating now on his hands. ‘But, um. Not this time. She . . . she was worried. She didn’t wanna kid.’
    ‘She didn’t want to get pregnant?’
    ‘Right. So instead, this time, we did other stuff. Like, with sticks and that.’
    Leo covered his mouth with his hand.
    ‘But . . .’ Daniel shifted straighter. ‘There was someone watching. A perv or whatever. She spotted him. The girl . . . er . . . Felicity, did. She told me to get off and when I didn’t cos I didn’t see the perv she did this.’ The boy pointed to the marks on his neck. ‘By accident.’
    ‘By accident.’
    There was a silence.
    ‘And then?’ Leo sighed. ‘What happened then, Daniel?’
    Daniel jerked a shoulder. ‘I