‘The age of chivalry is dead, Jill.’

‘But David’s reputation …’

I cut in. ‘And what about Ogilvie? Am I supposed to forget that?’

‘Why so stubborn?’ asked Hosmer.

‘That’s a quality you’ve paid for highly in the past,’ I said. ‘Don’t knock it now. Jill, let me get one thing straight. Is Conyers willing to guarantee that if I leave by noon tomorrow, the story won’t get into the press?’

‘Of course,’ said Hosmer quickly.

‘Then he’s a liar, because he’s promising something he can’t deliver. Hawke knows about it and you can be sure he’ll break the story in his own good time, and there’s nothing Conyers can do about that. This is going to come out anyway, Jill, and right now you’re being conned by Conyers, the con man. I just wanted you to understand that before telling you that I wouldn’t have left anyway.’

I glanced at Hosmer, who was moistening his lips, and added, ‘If you don’t believe me, look at your precious uncle and you’ll see it written all over his face. Lord Hosmer, common blackmailer.’

His face purpled. ‘Now, see here …’

‘Shut up!’ I said. ‘And keep that bastard Roker away from me or I’ll break his neck.’

I walked away feeling a dreary satisfaction at having been able to speak my mind for once. This whole damned business was beginning to get me down and for the first time I seriously questioned my own motives for staying. I knew the answer, of course. I was exactly what Hosmer had said: stubborn. Obstinate, pigheaded, obdurate – all to the point of wilfulness. That was the real reason I’d come a cropper in my army career.

But I didn’t like being pushed and I didn’t like being manipulated, and there were too many people trying to do both. My reaction to being pushed was to push back, but this case was so bloody amorphous that I didn’t know who or where to do the pushing. Slamming at Hosmer only gave me small satisfaction – it was hard to imagine he had anything to do with Ogilvie’s death, either directly or indirectly. The Hosmers of this world aren’t murderers. They don’t kill a man; just his spirit. But somebody had killed Ogilvie, and somebody had taken a shot at me, and there was still a hell of a stench surrounding Salton’s death. My biggest frustration right now – apart from the feeling of being unwillingly backed into a corner – was that the whole mystery was shrouded in a fog against which it was futile to push.