She should get help. She looked around for a corridor com and found the weapon instead. A blood-stained knife lay on the floor a little distance away where, presumably, it had been dropped or thrown down. Her heart, up to this moment pounding so hard as almost to break through her chest, suddenly ground to a complete stop. For a moment, her head swam. And then she thought – how typical of Luke. He’d left his knife at the scene of the crime. There was his number on the handle – 2044.

She could see it all so clearly. Luke and Smith had had a furious row. She’d slapped him. And then he’d stormed past Jane in a rage. Or so she’d thought at the time. Suppose it hadn’t been rage? Suppose it had been fear? He’d killed Smith, brutally, bloodily, and then had been so desperate to get away he hadn’t even seen her standing there? Questions rattled around her brain but one thought stood out from the crowd: Sarah Smith had had her throat cut and here was Luke’s knife at the scene.

There had once been a series of brilliant detective books written long ago by a woman named Agatha Christie. Jane had read them all, one after the other, during her last year at school. Each was a difficult and complex murder mystery, and only after a great deal of questioning and deduction was the murderer successfully unmasked at the end.

Jane looked at the bloody body lying on the floor. This was not a difficult and complex murder mystery and there was no need to wait until the last page to identify this particular murderer.

She looked at the knife again. Unbelievably, barely seconds had passed since Luke had stormed past her. No one, other than Jane herself, could have known Luke had ever been here.

There was an incineration chute not ten feet away. She could destroy the knife, whisk herself away and there would be nothing to link Luke with this.

No – she couldn’t do that. That would be so wrong. Luke had killed Sarah Smith. She should report it.

Something inside her said, ‘But it’s Luke.’

‘That doesn’t change anything.’

‘It’s Luke.’

‘You’re being stupid.’

‘It’s Luke.’

‘I notice you’re not saying he didn’t do it. Even you don’t believe that, do you?’

There was no answer to that.

There was the corridor com over there. Next to the incineration chute.

Stiffly, she rose to her feet, bent and picked up the knife. She was still convinced she should report this. Because it was the right thing to do. She saw her hand reach out to the com unit. She was going to report it. Because that was the correct thing to do. She watched her hand reach out to open the com.