It was difficult to tell whether Palmer was uncomfortable, disgusted or utterly pissed off. Jules put her money on all three.

‘You stated before that you had no idea who might be involved in this,’ he said through gritted teeth. ‘And I don’t see how the attack at the marina fits into this bullshit idea that one of the merc operators is responsible. What the fuck would they get out of blowing up an old drunk on a boat?’

She bristled at the insult to her friend but managed to control her reaction with a breathing exercise. Shah was not the only one who could swallow his rage.

‘Nothing,’ the former Gurkha replied with a shrug. ‘This is why I do not speculate for you, Detective. Until the attack on Mr Ross, I had my reasons for believing that my rivals may have made the attempt on my family. I even believed the bombing at my house was bungled as a warning – that shoddy operators were used, and possibly even sacrificed, simply to send a message. You cannot deny there is much manoeuvring and ill-feeling in my industry at the moment. There has been blood, and there will be more. So it is natural for me to suspect a rival, in my own case. For Mr Ross, however, I have no explanation. That is why I do not answer your question, Detective Palmer. I truly have no idea.’

It seemed that everyone in this room was acting out a role of some sort. Jules knew Shah was lying, but not why. While Cesky may have been able to hire men to do his bidding all the way down here, she didn’t imagine he had any real influence in this city. His power base was in Seattle. There may have been a huge American presence in Darwin, because of the local expatriate population and the recent porting of the Combined Fleet, but American power was not what it used to be. She’d only been here a day, but already she could tell that Darwin was one of those cities fêted by history to be a place in which rising empires and falling giants contended for dominance. Cesky might operate here, from a distance, but he was not important to the city or the powers that had gathered here. There would be a good reason, Jules was sure, that Shah and his lawyer hadn’t thrown his name on the table during this interview.