‘If your client could answer a perfectly simple and reasonable question, it might give me a lead, Mr Downing. But for some reason he seems to have not a single thought on the matter of what connection there might be between the attempted bombing four days ago, and the actual bombing of a known associate of his today. A bombing in which a woman was killed. A good woman, a wife and a mother who will be very much missed by her family.’

The policeman’s face was suffused with angry blotches now. Jules had to take a deep breath to still a swirl of dizziness as an unwanted memory, vivid and gruesome, arose before her eyes. A man cradling the headless body of a woman, his wife, in a foul slick of blood at the marina . . . She shook herself ever so slightly in an effort to clear the image from her head.

‘Or might it be, Mr Shah,’ Palmer continued, oblivious to her reaction, ‘that bombs explode and people die around you so fucking frequently, it’s barely worth remarking on? I wonder if we shouldn’t be looking at the issue of your security licence. It might be that the background checks weren’t nearly thorough enough, and we’ve missed some unsavoury connections somewhere. The sort of connections we don’t need in this city.’

Julianne felt Downing tap her foot twice with his shoe: Pay attention.

‘That sounds remarkably like a ham-fisted attempt at intimidation, Detective,’ he said, making a great play of looking at the microcassette recorder rather than the police officer. ‘You do understand that my client is a member in good standing of the Chamber of Commerce, the city’s Business Roundtable, and the Free Port Development Authority’s Commercial Consultancy Board?’ He emphasised the last point by cocking an eyebrow at Palmer – a gesture that would go unrecorded on the audiotape, of course.

‘Mr Shah is not some barefoot coolie just off the boat, Detective Palmer. And, unlike some other contractors I could mention, his business is run in an exemplary fashion. I know that because I have oversight of the administrative requirements. Shah Security has never been breached for unauthorised lethality, collateral injury or property damage. You will find all his documentation is in order, including the quarterly reviews by the FPDA’s audit and risk management bureau. The Free Port Development Authority has no reason to find fault with Mr Shah or his operations and his licensing fees are fully paid up. In advance, I might add.’

Rather than reminding the cop of who paid his salary, it only served to enrage him still further.

‘What I know, Mr Downing, is that this city is overrun with security contractors and bottom-feeding mercenaries, and suspending the licence of one for refusing to cooperate with the police isn’t going to make a blind bloody bit of difference to anybody. Except Mr Shah, of course.’