Reluctantly, Lindsay nodded. “I don’t suppose I’ve got much choice.”

“Well at least Claire can afford it,” Rosalind said.

“Afford what?” Helen demanded.

“Afford Lindsay,” Rosalind replied.

“What do you mean, afford me?” Lindsay asked, puzzled.

“You’ve got to be realistic about it,” Rosalind said patiently. “You’ve got no job and no prospect of one, if I understand you correctly. If you refuse to help and Claire wants to pursue this, she’s going to have to go to a private detective. There is no reason on God’s earth why you should be prepared to do it for free. And Claire Ogilvie can certainly afford to pay.”

Lindsay looked stunned. “I’m not taking money from that bloody designer dyke,” she replied angrily. “What do you take me for?”

“Ros is right,” Sophie said quietly. “If Claire wants you to do a job, she should be prepared to pay the going rate.”

“It feels like taking money under false pretences,” said Lindsay stubbornly. “I’m hardly Philip Marlowe, am I?”

“You’ve got skills and specialist knowledge,” Rosalind argued. “It’s unprofessional not to charge her for exercising them. I can’t imagine Claire dishing out free professional advice, can you?”

“But I don’t know where to start,” Lindsay said weakly, knowing she had been outflanked by Rosalind. And, given the tenacity of her friends, she knew she’d actually have to go through with the business of charging Claire for her services.

“I might just be able to help you there,” Rosalind said with a slow smile.

Lindsay rang off and threw the cordless phone to the other end of the sofa. Burned my boats now, she thought with a scowl. “Why do I let myself get talked into these things?” she muttered as she walked through to the big, airy kitchen of Sophie’s tenement flat. Lindsay poured herself a cup of coffee and sat down to think. She had agreed to meet Claire in an hour’s time, and she wanted to get everything straight in her head before then.

Recalling Alison Maxwell wasn’t difficult. They had met the first time Lindsay had been hired to do a shift on the Scottish Daily Clarion. Lindsay had been standing at the library counter waiting for a packet of cuttings. She turned to find herself faced with a woman who seemed to have stepped out of her most secret fantasies, the ones she guiltily felt shouldn’t inhabit the mind of a politically aware feminist. The vision had sandy blonde hair, and an almost Scandinavian cast to her high-cheekboned features. She was a couple of inches taller than Lindsay, with slim hips, and a cleavage that was impossible to ignore. “Hi,” she said in a rich, cultivated Kelvinside accent. “I’m Alison Maxwell. Features department.”