‘How do you suppose Hawke got wind of it?’

Hanna shrugged. ‘I don’t know. Maybe White got drunk one night and opened his mouth a bit wide. There’s not much on this island that Hawke doesn’t know about. Sometimes I think his intelligence service is better than mine.’

I nodded. ‘He knew I’d been shot,’ I said. ‘McKittrick didn’t.’

‘If I find the leak in my department, they’ll be fired so fast they’ll think it was from a cannon,’ said Hanna grimly. He leaned inside his car and came out with a large envelope. ‘This came for you.’

It looked official and was of heavy and expensive cream laid stationery, addressed to me at the Royal Caribbean Hotel.

‘How did you get your hands on it?’ I asked.

Hanna smiled. ‘That’s the kind of question you don’t ask a policeman. I just thought you might like to see it sooner rather than later.’

I looked at the envelope. Embossed on the flap was a coat of arms. I had difficulty ripping it open because it seemed to be constructed on the lines of a bank vault. Hanna said, ‘You’ve been invited to a cocktail party.’

I took the card from the envelope and found that it was so. The Honourable Walden P. Conyers, Prime Minister of Campanilla, took pleasure in requesting the attendance of Mr William Kemp at a reception at Government House, 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. that very evening, dress informal.

I turned suspiciously to Hanna. ‘You must have X-ray eyes. How did you know what was in here?’

‘I’ve got one, too,’ he said. ‘Interesting, isn’t it?’

I looked down at my suit. I had been wearing it continuously since I had arrived on Campanilla and it was beginning to show the strain. It looked grubby and there were dark sweat stains under the arms. ‘I don’t know how far your protocol takes informality,’ I said. ‘But this is the only lightweight suit I have, and I’d boil to death in my English suit.’

Hanna gave me a measuring look, like an undertaker at a resident in an old people’s home. ‘I’ve just got a couple of suits back from the cleaners,’ he said. ‘I’d say you’re about my size. You can come back with me and have a fitting if you like.’

‘That’s very accommodating of you,’ I said.

He smiled warmly and said, ‘I think we’ll leave Mrs Salton for tomorrow. White has been salted away so he can’t talk to anyone.’ He checked his watch. ‘We just have time to go home and change before the party.’

‘It’s as late as that? I didn’t have lunch – I forgot.’