‘I know this is a shock,’ Strachan said. ‘So is there someone you’d like to call before we go on? Someone who can come over and sit with you?’

Marie stared blankly down at the floor. Frank had been ignoring her calls since their argument, and her own parents were holidaying at their caravan in Wales. She didn’t want any of her nosy neighbours coming in and seeing the state of the place; and none of her so-called friends had been round to see how she was getting on since she’d told them about Evan leaving, so she wasn’t about to ring them.

‘No.’ She shook her head. ‘But I’ll be OK.’

‘Are you up to answering some questions?’

Marie nodded and clasped her hands together between her knees.

‘You say your husband’s been gone for a month?’ Strachan started. ‘Can I ask why you didn’t report him missing?’

‘Because I didn’t think he was,’ Marie replied truthfully. ‘I assumed he was at his dad’s, like last time.’

‘Last time?’

‘Yeah, we had a misunderstanding a few months back, and I kicked him out,’ Marie said, blushing at the memory of the scene she’d caused in the pub. ‘He stayed at his dad’s for a week, but they had a falling-out and he came home. We cleared the air, and everything was fine. Or, at least, I thought it was.’

‘So he didn’t seem unhappy or depressed this time?’

‘No.’ Marie shook her head. ‘He went on a bit of a downer at Christmas, but that was understandable, ’cos it was the first since his mum died, and him and his dad still weren’t talking. Frank – his dad – had moved some woman in, you see, and Evan and his sister weren’t happy about it. That’s why they’d fallen out, but I could tell Evan was missing him, so I made him talk to him on Christmas Day.’

She paused when the door opened and Ogden came in carrying a cup of tea. Thanking him when he handed it to her, she took a sip to lubricate her dry mouth. She wasn’t sure why she was offloading on the woman like this, but now she’d started, she couldn’t seem to stop.

‘It didn’t go too well on the phone, so Evan drove over there the next evening. He was there for a few hours and said it was all sorted when he got home, and I was pleased when he told me he was planning to go there after work the next day to help his dad with his cars. He said it might turn into a late one, so I wasn’t concerned when he didn’t come home that night. But he didn’t come back the next night, either, and neither of them was answering their phones.’

‘Didn’t you go over to try and talk to him?’