I had not thought about smuggling, partly because I had been blinded by the money. Perhaps Tito was smuggling something, and that’s what Buzzcut and his mates are demanding. Maybe they were putting illegal things instead of his pottery in boxes, and sending them somewhere. Or maybe he was putting illegal stuff in the pottery itself. I don’t know what this has to do with the boxes of ash. When Marg assures me she knows nothing about the recent boxes, I am left with the possibility that they are coming to me from within the closed loop of the mail run. And then she says something strange: ‘Your neighbour, Mrs Slade, she asked the same questions as you a few weeks ago. What is it with you guys and boxes?’ I laugh, and pretend there is no significance to her comment, and tell her I’ll talk to her later.

In my kitchen, I open my laptop, hope that I’ve paid my internet account, and do some research on pottery smuggling. It seems that the really expensive pottery is ancient stuff, mostly from China, and it doesn’t seem the sort of thing that Buzzcut and his mates could handle. I run through references to antique vases and the big names in modern pottery, but none of it seems to fit with a country operation. And then I hit upon a 2009 article about a cocaine smuggler who made crockery out of, or including, cocaine. I am a bloody genius. A few quick searches, and I have cracked the crockery case before the police even get close to working it out. Elaine’s husband must have been incorporating cocaine in the crockery and then selling it to drug dealers, who broke it down and sold the drug for big bucks. I have accidentally received a box of ill-gotten gains. Where this puts Elaine, I don’t know.

I phone Constable Murray, doing my best to keep the triumph out of my voice.

‘How can I help you, Mr Martin?’ She is expending as little energy on talking as possible.

‘I believe I have some information that might be helpful in solving the assault and battery on Elaine Slade.’

‘Really?’

‘Yes.’ I let the line hang dead for a moment. She thinks I’m being a pest or trying to take the focus off myself, but the dramatic pause is in my favour.

‘I have reason to believe that a cocaine-smuggling business was being run out of the Slades’ farm.’ Boom.

‘Is that so?’ She almost yawns.

‘They were turning the cocaine into pottery, and then selling it — exporting it maybe. The box of crockery you guys found on the side of the road was Elaine Slade’s. The guys who took it from her were disappointed it was just normal old crockery.’

‘I’ll inform the detectives handling the case.’