‘Well, but why . . .?’ Tilly’s wild leap of hope fled, leaving her feeling drained and slightly sick. Numbly she entered the kitchen where Sophie had left the two men. They hadn’t sat down; one stood by the table while the other peered out of the window above the sink. Both faces turned towards her and she was aware of a hard scrutiny from each. The closest, who was also the tallest, spoke first.

‘Morning. Mrs Matilda Hillyer?’

Tilly nodded. ‘That’s my name. What—?’ she began but she was interrupted.

‘I’m Detective Sergeant David Burns.’ He tipped his head sideways, ‘My colleague, Detective Constable Wayne Wilmot. We’d like to have a bit of a chat with you about your husband. Shall we sit down?’ He pulled out the chair where Matt normally sat. ‘Please.’ He gestured towards another seat as if the place belonged to him. To Sophie, he said, ‘Thank you, Ms, erm . . .’

‘Barker. Tilly’s my cousin and I’m staying.’ Sophie seated herself in Luke’s place and patted the chair beside her. Tilly took it, as the constable moved to sit beside his superior.

Clearing her throat, Tilly said, ‘What’s this about, Sergeant, and why now? Gerry’s been dead for two years.’

The man’s hard eyes, a curiously pale grey, bored into hers. ‘Are you quite certain about that, Mrs Hillyer? I understand there’s room for some . . . confusion, shall we say? His body was never found. And he did owe rather large sums of money. Isn’t that correct?’

Tilly gaped at him. She heard and understood his words but they made no sense. Before she could say so, Sophie’s voice cut harshly across her bewildered silence. ‘What exactly are you suggesting, Sergeant? The matter was fully investigated at the time, I can assure you. There was a full-scale search – of the sea and the coastline. They had boats out for a week looking for his body. It’s all in the coroner’s report.’

‘And yet Gerald Hillyer still managed to disappear off the face of the earth.’

Sophie cast up her eyes. ‘God give me strength! His two-year-old daughter fell overboard. He went in after her, plucked her from the water and put her in the runabout, and the tide took both it and him. We’re talking about a fast ebb in shark- and croc-infested water, man! Of course they didn’t find his body. Be a bloody miracle if they had, in my opinion. He was probably taken in the first ten minutes. I’m sorry, Till.’ Her eyes shot daggers at the officer as she turned to her cousin. ‘You shouldn’t have to listen to this. What is the point of it anyway? Why are you here?’