‘I wonder if I could have a closer look at that.’

She raised an eyebrow. ‘It’s rather expensive.’

‘I’ve got an uncle with a big birthday coming up,’ I told her, lying glibly. ‘It’s the sort of thing he’d love.’

‘Of course …’ Vicky searched for the key to the cabinet among the heavy bunch that she carried, unlocking the glass door and sliding it open.

‘This isn’t Bert Evans unit by any chance?’ I asked, still staring at the candlestick.

‘No, no,’ she assured me, as she reached in for it. ‘This cabinet belongs to Olivia. She’s not here today.’ She glanced at the price tag. ‘But I’m sure she’d be open to offers.’

She held the candlestick out for me and I realised I was holding my breath. I took it and turned it round in my hands. It looked identical to the murder weapon, but had been well polished, the overhead spotlights dancing off its gleaming surfaces. I turned it over and studied the base. The rectangle of green baize that covered it was pristine.

‘I don’t think that baize is original,’ Vicky said, ‘probably a replacement.’ She smiled. ‘You’re holding that as if it’s an unexploded bomb.’

I smiled too, but weakly.

‘Would you like me to ring Olivia?’ she asked. ‘Ask what her best price is? I’m sure she’d be willing to do a deal, the thing’s been sitting there for at least a year.’

I felt a surge of relief. The question I had been going to ask next, where Olivia had got the candlestick from, was now irrelevant. If it had been in the cabinet so long, it couldn’t be the murder weapon. I looked at the price tag. ‘I’m afraid it’ll still be too rich for my blood.’

I handed it back to Vicky, she replaced it in the cabinet and we made our way back to the warehouse entrance. ‘If you think it’s the kind of thing your uncle might like, I could keep an eye out for another one,’ she volunteered, ‘something a bit cheaper. You never know when one might come in. I could always phone you. Would you like me to do that?’

I turned to her and smiled. ‘Yes, thanks.’

‘Hold on,’ she called, just as I was walking out, ‘didn’t you want to talk to Bert?’

I waved my scrap of paper. ‘Tom gave me his number.’

‘We can do better than that.’ She searched a drawer under the counter. ‘Here,’ she held out a business card. ‘We keep them for all our traders.’

I took it from her. It read, in elegant, curling script: Bert Evans, Antiques and Objet’s d’Art. Either he had no grasp of the apostrophe or he ought to sack his printer. But the card gave his telephone number, and his address.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE