‘The tow-path was too hard to offer anything useful, and the path from there up to the road was tar-sealed and provided nothing. Nor did a muddy track along the waterfront. If the heels had gone that way we would certainly have picked them up so the main road must have been the route. Mr Fox, who is probably the most meticulous clue-hound in the Force, had a long hard look at the road. Here are some blown-up shots of what he found. Footprints. A patch of oil on the verge under a hedgerow not far from the moorings. Accompanying tyre marks suggest that a motorbike had been parked there for some time. He found identical tracks on the road above Ramsdyke. At Crossdyke on an overhanging hawthorn twig—look at this close-up—there was a scrap of a dark blue synthetic material corresponding in colour and type with deceased’s pyjamas.

‘Right. Question now arose: if deceased came this way was she alive or dead at the time of transit? Yes, Carmichael?’

The man in the second row passed his paddle of a hand over the back of his sandy head.

‘Sir,’ he said. ‘It would appear from the character of the footprints, the marks on the bank, the evidence at the braeside and the wee wispies of cloth, that the leddy was at the least of it, unconscious and carried from the craft to the bike. Further than that, sir, I would not care to venture.’

The rest of the class stirred irritably.

‘By and large,’ Alleyn said, ‘you would be right. To continue—’

I

Alleyn and Troy returned together to the Zodiac. They found Dr Natouche reading on deck and the other passengers distantly visible in a seated group on the far hillside above the ford.

Natouche glanced up for a moment at Troy. She walked towards him and he stood up.

‘Rory,’ Troy said, ‘you’ve not heard how good Dr Natouche has been. He gave me a lovely lunch at Longminster and he was as kind as could be when I passed out this afternoon.’

Alleyn said: ‘We’re lucky, on all counts, to have you on board.’

‘I have been privileged,’ he replied with his little bow.

‘I’ve told him,’ Troy said, ‘how uneasy you were when she disappeared and how we talked it over.’

‘It was not, of course, that I feared that any violence would be done to her. There was no reason to suppose that. It was because I thought her disturbed.’

‘To the point,’ Alleyn said, ‘where she might do violence upon herself?’

Dr Natouche folded his hands and looked at them. ‘No,’ he said. ‘Not specifically. But she was, I thought, in a very unstable condition: a condition that is not incompatible with suicidal intention.’

‘Yes,’ Alleyn said. ‘I see. Oh dear.’

‘You find something wrong, Mr Alleyn?’

‘No, no. Not wrong. It’s just that I seem to hear you giving that opinion in the witness box.’