‘I was on duty a year ago, and spent hours in this park attending to the walking wounded. I must have treated tens, if not hundreds of people and some were more seriously injured than others. It’s remarkable, therefore, that I remember Claudia at all, because she didn’t have a mark on her. Maybe that was what made her so memorable, but I’d say it was her selflessness that struck me. She told me not to waste any time on her. She was convinced that she had survived without a scratch, and I wish that had been the case. I’d personally like to offer my condolences.’

‘Honestly, you don’t have to …’ Claudia insisted.

She looked uncomfortable, and it was a feeling that Leanne shared. The picture painted by the paramedic was at odds with the image that had formed in Leanne’s mind during her countless conversations with survivors in her quest to identify Amelia’s rescuer.

As the paramedic continued, Leanne turned to Justin. ‘Did she really not have a mark on her? I thought she lost fingernails?’

Justin’s eyes were glassy. ‘A couple of false nails, a few stains on her coat, that was about it – if you discount how much she reeked of smoke,’ he said. ‘And it was the smoke that did the damage.’

‘Of course. I’m so sorry,’ Leanne said. She had great sympathy for Justin, but her feelings for his wife, however, were more difficult to define. A new layer to Claudia had been exposed. ‘I have to go. I’ll see you later.’

Leanne rushed back to Frankie and was relieved to find that Kathryn and Amelia Parker were yet to arrive.

‘Where’s my phone?’ she demanded.

‘Is everything OK?’

Leanne grabbed her phone and connected her earphones. ‘I don’t know.’ Her heart was hammering as she searched through her interview recordings until she found the one she was after. She didn’t have time to listen to the whole thing, and skipped the first couple of minutes of the telephone interview with Rex Russell before pressing play.

‘Did you see Amelia before the ceiling collapse?’ Leanne had asked him.

‘Well, erm, I’m not sure. Erm, no, probably not. I don’t remember.’

Leanne fast-forwarded again and with a little toing and froing, found the section she needed to hear.

‘When you saw this figure coming towards you, what can you remember about her? How about the colour of her skin, or her hair?’

‘She was a walking statue. Grey. Covered in dust.’

‘Was she short? Tall?’

‘She was tallish. I’m only five foot seven on a good day and she was at least my height, maybe an inch more. I’m sorry, I don’t know what else to add. I was looking at Amelia,’ Rex had replied. ‘I was thinking how she was roughly the same age as my granddaughter, how it could have been her.’