“You want a coroner’s permission to dig up a coffin on the off chance that the body inside is Jimmy Nunn’s?”

Jack took one of the glasses of wine from Maggie. He knew not to disturb her when she was in full flow.

“How you going to manage that exactly . . . ? ‘Oh, guv, you know that grave that half of London thought belonged to Harry Rawlins? Well, can we dig it up please ’cos I think my dad might have been the getaway driver in an unsolved raid on a security van?’”

“I didn’t say Jimmy was dead. In fact, if Tony’s right, Jimmy walked away clean with pockets full of cash. But someone’s in there, Mags, and it definitely isn’t Rawlins.”

“Who cares? Genuinely, Jack. Who cares which deadbeat gangster got buried 35 years ago?”

Jack looked at her with his beautiful, wide eyebrows-up eyes. He cared. Maggie put down her wine and cradled his face in her warm, water-wrinkled hands.

“You confuse me so much,” she whispered. “I see the excitement in your eyes when you talk about this case and about your birth father and I love it, but, Jack, you have to think straight. For 35 years, the police haven’t given a toss who’s really in that grave. How are you going to make them care now?”

“You’re right,” Jack conceded. “I’ll need to think of a far more compelling reason than just some missing gangster. Thanks, Mags. What would I do without you, eh? Did you leave the water in?”

And he headed for the bathroom.

Maggie looked around the spare bedroom in despair. Jack had finally found his passion, his focus, his smile—and it made her deeply worried. Instead of being the making of him, she worried it might actually be the breaking of him.

Jack had been parked outside Julia’s home for about an hour, watching the comings and goings. What he first thought was a small mid-terraced two-up, two-down was actually three small terraced houses knocked into one. He discovered this when a little black girl with braided hair and a bright pink hoody went in one “house” and, moments later, came out of another.

This part of Chester was middle income, and Jack reckoned Julia owned a good £300 k of property between the three terraced houses. He knocked on the front door nearest to where he’d parked. From inside, Jack could hear a woman’s voice shouting instructions about not doing anything else before she got back, then the door was opened by a tall, slim woman, wiping her floury hands on a souvenir tea towel slung over her shoulder.

“Julia Lawson?” Jack asked. He couldn’t help the tone of the question: he could see she’d spotted him for a copper.

Julia blocked the doorway, as if protecting every living soul beyond it.

“You have to call first. If you don’t call, I have the right to turn you away. These kids don’t like surprises.”

“I’m not here to see any of the children, Miss Lawson. I’m here to see you.”