“I know,” I said stiffly. That had already tagged Kevin in my mind as a shit. I had to be careful not to let my personal reactions interfere with my professional judgement, something which Neil seemed to be deliberately trying to provoke. “But I hardly think that would give Kevin a motive for killing Moira.”

“Well, there was a lot more going down between the three of them than that. Moira was convinced that Kevin had been systematically ripping Jett off. She kept egging him on to straighten out his finances, to get Kevin to give him a detailed breakdown of his earnings and his assets. Kevin was being awkward about it. Now, whether that is because he genuinely had something to hide or because Moira just pissed him off and made him stubborn, I don’t know. I do know that she was having a hell of a lot of trouble getting her hands on all her back royalties.” That confirmed what Maggie had already told me. Things were beginning to fall into place. Nothing like a bit of corroboration, though.

“There were a lot of rows about touring, too,” Neil added. “Moira kept telling Jett that he shouldn’t be having to do so much touring, that he should be concentrating on short tours of big venues like Wembley and the NEC. Kevin was furious. He seemed to think that she didn’t know what she was talking about, and she had no right to interfere after being away for so long. She really was making his life a misery. If I’d been in his shoes, I’d probably have taken a meat ax to her weeks ago.”

Neil certainly wasn’t stinting himself when it came to putting the poison in. In spite of my misgivings, I knew I had to milk it for all it was worth. “Micky?” I asked, leaning over to pour myself the last cup of coffee.

“Micky produced Jett’s first four albums, and that was the springboard that put him on the map as a producer.” Neil paused to light another cigarette, and I had time to reflect that he even spoke like a tabloid newspaper. “But the last two years have seen him plummet from the top of the tree, thanks to the old nose candy.”

“Coke?” I asked.

“The same. Just like Jett, Micky’s had too many flops for comfort, and he knows it. The collaboration was supposed to work the old magic and produce a classic album. Till Moira came along, it was shaping up to be classic dross. She encouraged Jett to shout Micky down and go back to their old style. Micky kept ranting that they were five years out of date. But then, as Moira sweetly pointed out, so are most of Jett’s fans. She also wasn’t scared of badmouthing him over his habit. Given Jett’s views on drugs, that was a serious no-no for him.”