The first box contained rolled bundles of bank notes and a well-filled cashbag; the second, a number of papers. Alleyn began to examine them. The top sheet was a carbon copy with a perforated edge. It showed, in type, a list of dates and times covering the past twelve months.

There were twenty entries. Two, placed apart from the others, and dated the preceding year, were heavily underlined. ‘22nd July, 5 p.m.’ and ‘30th September, 8.45.’

‘From a duplicating book in her desk,’ Alleyn said, ‘a page has been cut out. It’ll be the top copy of this one.’

‘Typewritten,’ Fox commented.

‘There’s a decrepit machine in the parlour. We’ll check but I think this’ll be it.’

‘Do the dates mean anything to you, Mr Alleyn?’

‘The underlined item does. Year before last. July 22nd 5 p.m. That’s the date and time of the Wally’s Warts affair. Yesterday was the second anniversary.’

‘Would the others be notes of later cures? Was any record kept?’

‘Not to begin with. There is now. The book’s on view at Wally’s Cottage. We can check, but I don’t think that’s the answer. The dates are too closely bunched. They give – let’s see; they give three entries for August of last year, one for September, and then nothing until 27th April of this year. Then a regular sequence over the last three months up to – yes, by George! – up to a fortnight ago. What do you make of it, Br’er Fox? Any ideas?’

‘Only that they’re all within licensing hours. Very nice bitter, they serve up at The Boy-and-Lobster. It wouldn’t go down too badly. Warm in here, isn’t it?’

Alleyn looked thoughtfully at him. ‘You’re perfectly right,’ he said. He went into the shop. ‘Pender,’ he called out, ‘who’s the bartender in the evenings at The Boy-and-Lobster?’

‘In the old days, sir, it were always the Major hisself. Since these yurr princely extensions, however, there be a barmaid in the main premises and the Major serves in a little wee fancy kind of a place behind the lounge.’

‘Always?’

‘When he’m capable,’ said Pender dryly, ‘which is pretty well always. He’m a masterpiece for holding his liquor.’

Pender returned to the shop. ‘There’s one other thing,’ Alleyn said to Fox. ‘The actual times she’s got here grow later as the days grow longer.’

‘So they do,’ Fox said. ‘That’s right. So they do.’

‘Well: let it simmer. What’s next? Exhibit two.’

It was an envelope containing an exposed piece of film and a single print. Alleyn was about to lay the print on Miss Cost’s pillow. This bore the impress of her head and a single grey hair. He looked at it briefly, turned aside, and dropped the print on her dressing-table. Fox joined him.