‘Juno, do you know of any reason why anyone would have wanted to harm Mr Nickolai?’

I hesitated for a fraction too long and he leant forward intently.

‘There were the Russians,’ I breathed out at last.

‘Russians?’ he repeated, frowning.

I sniffed into the disintegrating tissue and nodded.

He cast a brief glance at his companion and then back at me. ‘What Russians?’

CHAPTER ONE

It was the day before I met Nick, the day he phoned. It must have been back in May. I’d taken the Tribe out in the morning, as usual, and loaded them into the back of the van at the end of our run. They were exhausted after racing around up on Whiddon Scrubs, and there was much heavy panting and scratching going on.

I’d parked the van on the brow of the hill, the last place before the road drops down towards Ashburton, the last place I could be sure to pick up a phone signal. Down in the town it’s patchy to say the least, and where I live it’s non-existent. I slid behind the steering wheel and dropped the silent dog whistle into my shoulder bag. Somewhere in that cavernous void lurked my mobile phone and I rooted around until I found it. There were no messages. I glanced in the rear-view mirror. Behind the wire grille that separated us, Nookie the Huskie gazed at me with eyes of Arctic blue before she yawned, turned around a couple of times, and lay down with the others.

As I started up the engine, I lingered a moment over the view. It was still early, the sky pale and soft, dove grey above distant trees, where the tower of St Andrew’s pierced the mist that floated in a veil over the valley. I turned the ignition, the radio blurted into life and Vivaldi spilt out all over the Devon countryside.

He interests me, Vivaldi. They used to call him The Red Priest. Perhaps other red-haired people just catch my attention. Anyway, all that strident strumming of violins was a bit intense for such an early hour, and I turned the radio off.