The Mozart had been playing throughout all this. It was his Requiem Mass. Had Abbott been playing it for Helen le Mesurier? He came to a decision and stepped back, allowing the hall light to reach past him. ‘All right. Come in, you bastard, and ask your questions. But I don’t want to be in any fucking book, so you can forget that for a lark.’ He turned his eyes, behind the steel frames of his glasses, on me. ‘I read about myself, I’ll sue you to hell. Do you understand?’

I nodded but said nothing.

He stepped back and went into a hallway dominated by a central hexagonal table. A large room led off to one side. Looking through the open door, I saw drawn curtains, a luxurious suite of furniture – three armchairs and a sofa – hundreds of books, a massive TV screen mounted on the wall, stand-alone speakers, a desk with a computer and printer, a stack of DVDs, piles of magazines. We didn’t go in. He led us the other way into a kitchen that was similarly over-equipped, with multiple ovens, sinks and saucepans and dozens of storage cupboards. In neither room did I notice any photographs of family or friends. Nor were there any ornaments, souvenirs, curiosities. It was the house of a man who lived entirely alone.

We sat facing him across a pine table with the walking stick lying on the surface. He did not offer us coffee or tea.

‘So this is where you ended up,’ Hawthorne said. There was no malice in his voice. He sounded politely interested.

‘This is where you put me.’

‘It looks quite cosy to me. I’d have put you somewhere very different.’

‘What is it with you, Hawthorne? What did I ever do to you?’ To my surprise, Abbott suddenly turned to me. ‘I went to your session.’

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I saw you.’

‘What did he tell you about me?’

‘He didn’t tell me anything.’ That happened to be true . . . at least, until we’d arrived in Alderney. I’d found out about Abbott from another detective, a man called Meadows, and he hadn’t actually known very much. For example, he’d only described Abbott as a former teacher without saying anything about his business interests in advertising and media.

‘He doesn’t know anything about me. He never did.’ Abbott leaned forward. ‘I never laid a finger on any kid, not in my entire life. I was a businessman. That’s all. And you might not have liked some of the stuff that I was producing, but it was all one hundred per cent legal. The simple truth is that the police picked on me. They decided to bring me down and once they’d made that decision there was nothing I could do to stop them.’