‘Shouldn’t we get him in here? Put a bit of pressure on?’

I consider this.

‘To be honest, I don’t think he’s involved. And if I’m wrong, people are always more relaxed in their own home, more likely to give something away.’ Liam nods his agreement.

‘So what are you up to this morning?’ he asks.

‘There are a few things I’d like to find out. Firstly, why Rory thought turning up at the event was a good idea and where he went when he left. I want to know where he is staying and why he hasn’t gone back to London yet. Hopefully the ANPR tracking on his car will shed some light. But for now, I’m trying to find out more about Ben. Like I said before, he had some weird preoccupation with Anna’s death scene, to the point of obsession. I’d quite like a longer chat with him to find out where he was the night Anna died.’

Liam raps the table with his knuckles and offers to drive out to Ed’s house later, to which I readily agree, already imagining half an hour when I can close my eyes.

Once he has left the room, I drain the rest of my lukewarm coffee and turn back to my computer screen. Ben had boldly stated to Reuben he was studying film making, but didn’t disclose any more details. I assume because he was attending the event in Manchester, that he is also a student in the city.

Opening a new tab on my computer, I search for Manchester University film studies and peruse the list of websites, clicking on the one at the top. It is the homepage for the course with details about the modules to be studied, how to apply for the following academic year and information about various informal open evenings. I navigate the website for a few minutes and find a tab labelled ‘media’.

When I click on this, I am confronted with a selection of short films contributed by this year’s cohort. I scroll through the films and find that there are submissions from three different Bens.

I spend the next twenty minutes watching snippets of the films and, fairly easily, settle on Ben McCall as the one I met last night. Whilst the other two films edge towards the arty side of filmmaking, all hazy lights and slightly out of focus action, his veers towards demented. It features a park at night time and a fairly gory death, containing a masked man wielding a hammer.

As the masked man looks straight at the camera at the end of the film, my thoughts are drawn to my attacker. The darkness in his eyes cause my heart to skip a beat and my body gives an involuntary shudder, trying to rid the thought from my brain. I close the window and pull up another tab to search for details about Ed’s second book, A Violent Threat.

From what I can gather, it appears the killer in the book commits many murders using his favoured weapon, a hammer. Now I understand the use of Hell Hammer as the second Threat film’s adapted name, though I still think it is a woeful choice. I wonder if this short film is Ben’s attempt at bettering Reuben, at showing his vision and his directing skills.