Someone hauled two heavy weights off her. The cold night air returned and air rushed into her lungs. Markham rolled her into the recovery position and enquired whether she was all right.

‘You . . . sh . . . sh . . .’

‘Yeah – sorry. It seemed the easiest thing to do. You’ll be all right in a minute.’

‘What’s that in her hand?’ enquired a voice she recognised as Peterson’s. ‘Is that a gun? Did she just shoot Ellis?’

What? She tried to shake her head. Of course she hadn’t shot Ellis. Wait – had Ellis been shot? Or was that in Egypt? What was going on?

Someone was prising the gun from her grasp. She heard Luke’s voice. ‘Jane – for God’s sake. How many more times can one person be found with the murder weapon in her hand? Most people go their entire lives without ever being accused of murder and here you are – twice in twenty-four hours. Here.’

He passed the gun to Markham, who made it safe and stowed it away in a discreet pocket.

Murder. He’d said murder. She felt drool run down her chin and closed her eyes in mortification.

‘Jane – wake up. You can’t go to sleep now.’

Chance would be a fine thing, she decided, but obediently opened her eyes. The world was a little blurry but many people seemed to be looking at her. She should say something.

‘Fighting . . .’ she managed. ‘Shot. Tried to stop. Fell on me. Gun. Shot.’

She closed her eyes. There. She’d given them the salient points. They could work the rest out for themselves.

‘Let’s get her up,’ said Markham. ‘Give me a hand, Parrish. What’s the position with Grint and Anders?’

As he spoke, Anders jack-knifed to his feet, reeled sideways for a moment, and then, regaining his balance, shoved Luke into Markham. They both went down. Jane heard the impact as they hit the ground. Then there were stumbling, staggering footsteps. She heard the window shutter scrape as he pulled it aside to climb through the window, and then silence.

Except for Markham, entangled with Luke Parrish and cursing. Loudly, richly and longly.

They disentangled themselves and helped Jane to her feet. She gazed blearily around, feeling that events were rather getting away from her.

‘Well,’ said Markham, cheerfully, ‘I’ve never known an organisation like yours for having a pop at each other. Let’s recap, shall we? Someone, probably not Jane or Luke, killed this Smith person. Someone, probably not Jane because I can’t see it myself, has shot Ellis. We do know, however, that I stunned Grint and Anders, and regretfully, Jane, who’s not having the best day. And now Anders has had a go at you and pushed off. It’s a miracle there are any of you left.’

Luke was staring after Anders. ‘I can’t believe he got up from that. He must be built like a brick shit—’