‘Right. But why or how he died I can’t tell you at the moment. Did Tommy say he knew any more?’

‘Here . . .’ His father was standing.

‘It’s all right, Vince, we’re asking just about everybody in Starly the same question.’

Which was not strictly true.

‘Tommy didn’t know anything.’

‘You’re sure about that?’

‘Yes. I can bring him in as well, no problem.’

‘Thanks but I don’t think that’s necessary.’ Simon stood up. ‘Now I have to go.

But I want to give you my card, Brookie, it has this station phone number on it, plus my own mobile number. Keep it somewhere safe and ring me if you need to.’

Brookie took the card, and they were out and down the stairs before Vince said that was that. ‘Not going to say any more about it, only don’t forget any of it, not now, not ever. Understood?’

‘I’m late for school. You’ll have to come in.’

‘I’ll come in.’

‘Only, what are you going to say?’

‘I’ll think of something. And put that bloody card away.’

It was late afternoon before Simon got back to the station. He had been on the other side of Lafferton, following reports of a body being seen at the bottom of a quarry, and having to call out the full panoply of climbers, divers and support teams. It had been pouring with rain, visibility was bad, conditions underfoot treacherous, and two hours in, the body had been located and brought up.

‘Poor old boy.’

‘Slipped and slid down and that was that.’

‘He seems pretty old . . . you know anything about dogs, guv?’

The black Labrador’s mask was greying, his body battered and scarred by the fall.

‘Anyone reported losing him?’

No one had.

‘OK, stand down, sorry, everyone. Can you put him in the van and take him in to Lafferton Vets? He’ll check if he’s micro-chipped and do the necessary. Thanks, guys.’

Nobody minded. Better a dog than a child.

‘Better a dog than a child,’ Kieron said. Serrailler breathed a sigh. Operations like the one he had ordered cost money, and when the drowned body turned out to be that of a dog, the Chief might have been read him the usual lecture about resources, waste of.

‘I’m on my way home to change,’ he said now. ‘Retiring dinner for Mike Bardsley. Downside of the job, never mind what you think – I hate these bloody dinners.’

‘Rubber chicken.’

‘Almost certainly. And interminable speeches.’

Simon’s phone rang, but as it was the Greater Manchester Police number, he stayed in the room.

‘We got them,’ his counterpart in the North said, failing to suppress the jubilation in his voice. ‘Routine motorway patrol set after a car going like the clappers and weaving in and out – pulled them over. Everything in the book on vehicle regs but it was what was tucked away . . .’