‘I think you should try and get some sleep,’ Paul interrupted gently. ‘We can talk about this some more tomorrow. I’ll phone you.’

I wanted to ask when he’d be coming down again. I suddenly wanted to see him very much. But I held back. He was ringing from Carrie’s family home. It wouldn’t have been fair. We said our goodbyes and rang off.

To my surprise I slept. Waking early, I watched the sun slanting in through my curtains, falling on the little iron fireplace on the bedroom wall. The mantelshelf was barely wide enough for any ornament to stand on, but I’d found a slender china candlestick at a boot sale that just fitted on it and I watched the sun cast its shadow beside it on the wall. I got up and phoned the police station, left a message for Inspector Ford.

‘A candlestick,’ I told him, when he phoned back later. ‘It’s a candlestick that’s missing from Nick’s mantelpiece.’

He asked me if I could describe it.

‘It’s silver,’ I told him. ‘William IV.’

‘Heavy?’

‘Oh yes.’ I thought of its solid square base, its corners, and winced as I remembered Nick’s crushed skull. ‘Heavy enough.’

CHAPTER NINETEEN

According to everyone I knew, I needed time to get over the shock, so I took a few days off. But all I could think about was finding Nick’s murdered body, so I went back to work to take my mind off it. Unfortunately, his murder was all anyone wanted to talk about, especially Ricky and Morris. But after hours of hunting through rooms full of ballgowns for The Merry Widow, it was a relief to take a break and talk, to sit in their cheerful breakfast room with the long windows open to the fresh garden air, the sunlight streaming in from the outside. ‘The police still think it was premeditated, then?’ Morris asked, dispensing the refreshment.

‘I don’t know what they think.’ The police weren’t exactly confiding their thoughts to me. ‘But there was no sign of forced entry. Whoever his killer was, Nick let him in.’ I stared thoughtfully into my teacup. ‘And we know he was killed late at night. He was in his pyjamas and dressing gown, presumably, ready for bed so …’

‘It must have been someone he knew, wouldn’t you think?’ Ricky asked, squinting as he lit up a cigarette. ‘Someone he trusted?’

‘Well, you wouldn’t let a complete stranger in late at night, would you?’ Morris added.