Seeing that all his subordinates in the room had left to carry out their orders, Inspector Raynard gathered his things and prepared to join the search himself. But Nick and Hancock quietly stepped in front of him, looking as though they had something to say.
"What is it?" he asked with a frown.
"The victim in the case we just took over was wearing a red coat when she was attacked, too," Nick said quietly.
This kind of speculation was not suitable for airing in front of everyone. After all, there was a fair chance it was a coincidence.
Inspector Raynard was clearly following that case as well. His frown deepened. "The college girl who was torn to pieces?"
Hancock nodded beside him. "Yes."
Inspector Raynard instinctively glanced at the photograph in his hand. The little girl Robin's smile seemed rather jarring. "Let's hope it wasn't the same killer."
Twenty minutes later, the unmarked police car stopped at the entrance to Berkeley Park.
"According to Robin's parents, after school she would cut through Hunter Lane to the south, then go halfway around the park on her way back to her grandparents' house." Nick studied the map in his hands to get his bearings.
Standing at the park entrance, Hancock looked left and right. "Her grandparents' house is actually directly north of the park, right?"
"4753 Hidiland Road, directly opposite. But her mother said she'd repeatedly told her not to go into the woods on her own." Nick scrolled through the statement Wu had sent him.
"Because kids always listen to their mothers, right?" Hancock shook his head with a smile and led the way into the densely wooded park.
Unlike the towering Douglas firs in the forest park at Balch Creek Canyon, whose crowns often reached more than fifty or sixty meters high, this park, completely surrounded by residential neighborhoods, consisted mainly of firs and cedars.
The trees were spaced farther apart, too. But perhaps precisely because their crowns did not completely monopolize the sunlight, the shrubs and vines beneath them grew exceptionally thick.
They had taken only thirty or forty steps into the park before the vegetation completely shut out the late-summer heat. The park had more than one entrance, and naturally more than one trail. Soon, the path forked.
"Keep an eye out under those bushes," Nick reminded his partner before turning onto a trail that looked more secluded.
Portland's summers were hot and dry, but even a small patch of woodland covering only three or four square kilometers was enough to create a microclimate vastly different from its surroundings.
The earthy odor produced by decaying, fermenting leaves mingled with cool moisture and filled his nostrils. It was not exactly pleasant, but it was certainly invigorating.
Nick was no stranger to this kind of environment. During a special mission on the southwestern border in his previous life, he and his comrades had lain in ambush in a similar primeval forest for more than two weeks.
Civil strife had broken out in a neighboring country at the time, and over a thousand armed militants had tried to take advantage of the chaos to cross the border into their relatively prosperous country to murder and plunder.
In the end, every last one of them had become fertilizer for that forest.
Long-dormant memories suddenly surfaced. Nick clearly remembered overhearing the regimental commander and political commissar discussing the soldiers' psychological issues afterward.
The commander had worried that after a battle so simple it had been little different from target practice or an execution by firing squad, the soldiers who had never seen bloodshed might develop PTSD symptoms like those seen in American troops.
Nick remembered this particularly well because the political commissar had casually patted his chest and assured the commander, "Don't worry. We're defending our homes and our country. We're not like those bastards who go into other countries to burn, kill, and loot."
The facts had proved him right. Almost none of the soldiers, including Nick in his previous life, had developed serious psychological problems. The few whose moods had seemed off had soon returned to normal after some political and ideological counseling.
Of course, those secrets had remained secrets even after a certain someone left the military for civilian life. The domestic media had carried only a few understated reports about shells from the neighboring country's civil war landing within their borders.
The memories stirred by his surroundings passed in an instant. Soon, Hancock's loud call came from the other side. "Nick, I found something!"
Nick's heart tightened. He immediately left the trail, pushed through the dense bushes, and bent low as he hurried over the uneven ground toward the voice.
Soon, his Black partner came into view. Hancock was crouched beneath a spruce, pushing aside the vines under it to reveal a small pinkish-purple schoolbag.
"R. H. Robin Howell's initials."
Seeing Nick emerge beside the trail with dead leaves and twigs covering his head, Hancock gave him a strained smile and pointed to the two letters written in a childish hand on the little schoolbag.
"She was clearly attacked right here." Nick quickly examined their surroundings, trying to find any footprints that might be there.
"I'll contact headquarters."
Hancock took out his phone as he spoke and made the call. "We've found a crime scene in Berkeley Park. Yes, on the south side near Hidiland Road."
Meanwhile, Nick soon found footprints nearby. They were unmistakably from the same kind of work boots as those at the dismemberment scene in Balch Creek Canyon. Just as the park officer had described earlier, even the water that had seeped into the impressions had not yet dried.
He quickly shouted to his partner, then set off along the tracks without looking back, not stopping to check whether Hancock, still on the phone, had heard him.
The park's trails were generally paved with concrete or simply covered in gravel. But to avoid running into anyone, the killer had clearly stayed off the trails after the attack and had had to walk through the undergrowth, inevitably leaving footprints.
Nick followed the tracks with his heart in his mouth, filled with apprehension.
The horror of the previous crime scene was still vivid in his mind. When he thought of how this victim was a little girl of only six, even though she was a complete stranger, the protective instinct toward young children etched into the genes of any normal human being still made him feel as though a fire were burning inside him.
Nick was deeply afraid that the next thing he saw would be a similarly horrific sight.
Fortunately, the killer did not seem to have intended to kill her on the spot this time. The footprints continued all the way to the westernmost edge of the park, finally disappearing behind a small rise.
Nick bounded up the rise, and the view suddenly opened out before him. He had reached a residential street.
Berkeley Park had no fence and directly adjoined the neighborhood street. A row of detached houses stood on the other side.
Nick stood on the slope, momentarily at a loss, his gaze sweeping back and forth. But he found no sign of any traffic surveillance cameras nearby.
After a moment's hesitation, he decided to try his luck across the street. Although households with security cameras or video doorbells installed outside their front doors were exceedingly rare these days, perhaps someone had happened to see something?
Before you continue