Alleyn said: ‘We’ll leave it for the moment and go down to the house.’

He called through the gate for Bailey and Thompson to follow and led the way down. Trehern looked at his back and opened and shut his hands.

‘Will you move along, Mr Trehern?’ Fox invited him. ‘After you.’

Trehern walked between them down to his cottage.

There were no visitors. The nets were half blown off the fence. The hollyhocks along the front path bent and sprang back in the wind, and the sign rattled.

Trehern stopped inside the gate. ‘I want to see thick. I want to see the writing.’

Alleyn showed him the warrant. He examined it with a great show of caution and then turned to the door.

Alleyn said: ‘One moment.’

‘Well? What then?’

‘It will save a great deal of time and trouble if you will let us see the thing we’re most interested in. Where have you put the clothes-line?’

‘I don’t have to do nothing,’ he said, showing the whites of his eyes. ‘You can’t force me.’

‘Certainly not. It’s your choice.’ He looked at Fox. ‘Will you take the outhouses? We can go round this way.’

He led the way round to the backyard.

Fox said pleasantly: ‘This’ll be the shed where you keep all your gear, won’t it? I’ll just take a look round, if you please.’

It was crammed with a litter of old nets, broken oars, sacking, boxes, tools and a stack of empty gin bottles. Alleyn glanced in and then left it to Fox. There was a hen coop at the far end of the yard with a rubbish heap nearby that looked as if it had been recently disturbed.

‘Give me that fork, would you, Fox?’ he said and walked down the path with it. Trehern started to follow him and then stood motionless. The first of the rain drove hard on their backs.

The clothes-line had been neatly coiled and buried under the rubbish. Alleyn uncovered it in a matter of seconds.

‘Shall we get under shelter?’ he said and walked back past Trehern to the shed. He wondered, for a moment, if Trehern would strike out at him but he fumbled with his oilskin coat and stayed where he was.

‘All right, Fox,’ Alleyn said. ‘First time lucky. Here we are.’

He gave Fox the coil and took from his pocket the piece of trip-wire from Coombe’s office. They held the ends together. ‘That’s it,’ said Fox.

Alleyn looked at Trehern. ‘Will you come here for a moment?’ he asked.

He thought Trehern was going to refuse. He stood there with his head lowered and gave no sign. Then he came slowly forward, lashed now, by the rain; a black shining figure.