But something odd happened later.

Banks was persuading the girls to come with them to the park the next day if the weather was fine. There were plenty of sheltered, well-hidden areas where you could lie in the grass or stand up against a tree and snog. He was almost there, just overcoming the last, perfunctory shreds of resistance, when Graham said, “Sorry, I can’t go tomorrow.” When Banks asked him why, he just smiled vaguely and answered with his characteristic evasiveness, “I’ve got something else to do, that’s all.” The girls weren’t too thrilled with that, and Banks never got to go out with Sylvia Nixon again.

A fight broke out somewhere near the Dodgems, Banks remembered, and a couple of older men broke it up. But his chief memory, apart from kissing Sylvia on the Caterpillar and Graham’s weak reason for missing the next day’s rendezvous, was that Graham paid. Again. He had Benson & Hedges, too: ten of them, king-size, in the golden packet.

As Banks turned off the A1 to Peterborough, he racked his brains trying to remember if he had ever asked Graham where he got his money, but he didn’t think he had. Maybe he didn’t want to know. Kids are selfish, and as long as they’re having a good time they don’t feel the need to question where it’s coming from, or at whose expense it might be. But there weren’t many places a kid Graham’s age could get his hands on so much ready cash. The paper round wouldn’t cover it, but an occasional dip in the till might. Or perhaps he stole it from his mother’s purse?

The trouble was that it didn’t seem to matter so much, just as long as Graham had the money. That he was generous went without saying. But what had he done to get it, and where, and whom, had he got it from?

Now, Banks also found himself wondering what it was that Graham had to do that Sunday that was so much more important than snogging with Sylvia Nixon’s friend June in the park. And he remembered other occasions, too, right up until the day of his disappearance, when Graham simply wasn’t there. No reason, no excuse, no explanation.

Annie’s face was starting to ache when she went to interview Liz Palmer. She’d taken a couple of paracetamol earlier, but the effect was wearing off. She took another two and probed a loose tooth with her tongue. Wonderful. The last thing she needed was a trip to the dentist’s. That bastard Armitage. His high-priced lawyer had been down the station like a shot, and as soon as the custody officer had drawn up the papers charging Armitage with criminal assault, he’d been bound over to appear in front of the magistrate the following day and sent off home. Annie would have liked to see him cooling his heels in the custody suite at least overnight, but no such luck. He’d probably walk on the charges, too. People like him usually did.