‘You bet he did. He also told Dabs to cancel any cross-checking on it as no witness had said a pistol with a walnut handle was used in the armed robberies the Ripleys were suspects in. Dabs felt his whole reaction was OTT and reckoned identifying the grip as “walnut” so easily from a photograph that wasn’t even close up was a bit more than mere coincidence.’

‘So Dabs informed Countryman about his suspicions?’

‘Yes. It took a lot of guts, but the tipping point was the way Murphy treated you. Dabs suspected he did you in because you found the pistol and therefore posed a threat to him.’

‘I knew there was more to it all,’ Jane said, feeling sick to her stomach.

‘Anyway, with Dabs’s help, I covertly researched every robbery case Murphy was involved in since his first posting to the Flying Squad in the mid-seventies. The only two instances where a nine-mill Smith & Wesson .39 automatic pistol with a walnut grip was seized were the Daily Express job and the one found by you at the Ripley garage. What also stood out is the fact the witness at the ’77 and ’78 robberies described the gun that was fired by a robber as black with a brown handle. Do you remember your last job on the Flying Squad, just before you left?’

Jane looked confused. ‘You know it was the one where I was shot at and my colleague got hit trying to protect me.’

‘What exactly happened?’

Jane took a deep breath. ‘I was in a static observation point overlooking the bank, watching for the suspects to arrive. When they did, there was a massive shoot-out with my colleagues. From my raised OP I saw one of the suspects sneaking alongside some parked cars and making his way towards an alleyway. I put a call-out over the radio and went after him. I confronted him in the alleyway and shouted “armed police”.’

‘But you weren’t armed, were you?’

‘No, I just thought it might make him stop or hesitate so I could arrest him. But as you know, it didn’t work out that way.’

Elliott took a photograph from an envelope. It showed a dead man lying on the pavement with a pool of blood coming from his chest and head.

‘Do you recognize this man?’

Jane was still calm but she couldn’t help her emotions welling up. ‘Yes! He was the man who shot at me. For Christ’s sake, are you trying to play mind games with me? You obviously know who he is and what he did!’

‘And who shot him dead, Jane?’

‘Fucking Murphy did!’

‘And where was Murphy before he shot him?’