‘Wouldn’t it have been different,’ Cliff said rapidly, ‘if I could have told her I was sorry, and tried to make her believe I wasn’t a thief? That’s what I wanted to do. I didn’t know she was going to the shed. How could I? I just wanted to hear the Bach. I started off thinking I might try playing in unison with the radio, but it didn’t work, so I stopped and listened. Then I saw her come up the track and turn off to the shed. I wanted suddenly to tell her I was sorry. I sat by the radio for a long time listening and thinking about what I could say to her. I couldn’t make up my mind to go. Then, almost without properly willing it, I got up and walked out, leaving the music still going. I went down the hill, turning the phrases over in my mind. And then…to go in—into the dark—expecting to find her there and…I actually called out to her, you know. I wondered what she could be doing, standing so quiet somewhere in the dark. I could hear the music quite clearly. I called out: “Mrs Rubrick, are you there?” and my voice cracked. It hadn’t broken properly then, and it cracked and sounded rotten. I walked on, deeper into the shadow.’

He rubbed his face with a shaking hand.

‘Yes?’ Alleyn said. ‘You went on?’

‘There was a heap of empty bales beyond the press. I was quite close to it by then. It was so queer, her not being there. I don’t know what I thought about. I don’t know really if I’d any sort of idea about what was coming, but it seems to me now that I had got a kind of intuition. Like one of those nightmares, when something’s waiting for you and you have to go on to meet it. But I don’t know. That may not be true. It may not have happened till my foot touched hers.’

‘Under the empty bales?’

‘Yes, yes. Between the press and the wall. They were heaped up. I think I wondered what they were doing there. I suppose it was that. And then, in the dark, I stumbled into them. It’s very queer, but I knew at once that it was Mrs Rubrick and that she was dead.’

‘What did you do?’ Alleyn said gently.