‘Or maybe there’s a maniac on the rampage who gets his kicks from changing them all round and confusing their mums.’

‘Musical babes,’ said Wexford. ‘Come on, let’s go down and see.’ They descended to the foyer in the lift. ‘Good morning, Father. And who might this be?’

The priest in charge of the Catholic church of Our Lady of Loretto was leaning against the long parabola-shaped counter behind which the station sergeant, Sergeant Camb, presided. The sleeping baby in his arms was swathed, indeed tightly cocooned, in a clean pale blue cellular blanket. Only its face, fragile yet healthy-looking, and one hand were exposed. Thick dark lashes rested on the rose-leaf skin, but otherwise the child was fair, eyebrow-less and with fine downy hair as bright as a new copper coin. Holding it with tender firmness, Father Glanville looked round from his conversation with the sergeant to give Wexford a mystified grin, while Polly Davies stroked the baby’s tiny fingers with her own forefinger.

‘Your guess is as good as mine, Mr Wexford. I went over to the church just before nine and when I came back this little one was on the front steps of the presbytery. My lady help, Mrs Bream, had come in by the back door and hadn’t even noticed him.’

‘You found him just like that?’ said Wexford. ‘Just wrapped in that blanket and lying on the doorstep.’

‘No indeed. He was wrapped in this blanket inside a cardboard box. The cardboard box,’ said Father Glanville, smiling, ‘is of the kind one sees in grocery supermarkets. This particular one has printed on it: Smith’s Ready Salted Crisps, Ten Family Packs.’ He added rather anxiously, ‘I’m afraid I haven’t brought it with me.’

Wexford couldn’t help laughing. ‘Well, don’t throw it away. It’s very likely a vital piece of evidence.’ He came closer to the child who slept on regardless of the talk and the four large alien presences. ‘You brought it straight here?’

‘I brought him straight here,’ said Father Glanville with the faintest note of reproof in his voice. Wexford reflected that he ought to have known the priest would never refer to any human soul, however youthful, however unknown and unidentified, as ‘it’, and then he said:

‘I suppose he is a he? Blue blankets don’t necessarily denote maleness, do they?’

The three men, for some obscure reason known to none of them, turned their eyes simultaneously on Polly Davies. And she, somehow recognizing that to ascertain gender was her peculiar function, gently took the baby out of Father Glanville’s arms, turned away and began unwrapping the blue blanket. The baby woke up and at once began a strenuous crying. Polly re-wrapped the blanket, set the child against her shoulder, her hand pressed against the four-inch wide back.

‘This is a little girl, sir.’ She put the baby’s cheek against her own. ‘Sir, don’t you think it’s Karen Bond? I’m sure it is, it must be.’ Her voice had a catch in it. To her own evident horror, there were tears coming into her eyes. ‘To think someone just dumped her, someone else’s child, on a doorstep, in a cardboard box!’