This time when they entered, Michael Reave lifted his head and watched her sit down. There was a plastic cup of water in front of him, and his hair had been carefully brushed back from his forehead. He had also shaved, but Reave appeared to be one of those men whose five o’clock shadow could be chased away by the razor only briefly. He wore a long-sleeved navy jumper, and he leaned forward as she sat, his elbows on the table.

‘Hello, Mr Reave.’

He smiled lopsidedly. ‘What do I have to do to get you to call me Michael?’

‘Not have murdered a load of women?’ The answer was out before she could stop herself, but to her surprise his smile turned into a grin – it was brief and then gone, an oddly boyish expression.

‘I didn’t, but I can hardly blame you for thinking that.’ He tipped his head to take in the tiny room, the chains at his wrists, the burly guards behind him. ‘They’re letting us have another chat, lass. You must have impressed them.’

Heather shrugged. ‘I reckon you did that, Mr Reave. What would you like to talk about today?’

‘I thought of another story to tell you. It’s another one your mother liked. Would you like to hear it?’

Heather paused. ‘I do want to talk about my mother. And Fiddler’s Mill. I’d love to know what she was like when she was there – and what the commune was like, too.’

Reave looked away, staring at the door. His hands, she noticed, were covered in little white scars; the hands of someone who worked outdoors, who worked with knives.

‘I’ll tell you a little about that place,’ he said eventually. ‘If you listen to my story.’

‘All right then.’ DC Turner hadn’t offered her a cup of tea, or anything to drink, and she felt she had nowhere to put her hands. Self-consciously she rested them on the table. ‘Tell me a story.’

‘Once upon a time,’ there was a flash of that boyish grin again, ‘there was a king, who had a beautiful daughter. The princess sought a husband, but she insisted that any man who married her must love her so much that on the event of her death, he must agree to be buried alive in her tomb—’

‘They told these stories to kids?’

Reave was still smiling, but there was a coldness to his eyes, and she suspected he did not appreciate being interrupted.