Then some combination of notes, or a recognizable snatch of syllables, struck a chord in his memory. Carol singers. That’s what he could hear – carol singers. If he wasn’t mistaken, they were performing ‘Once in Royal David’s City’. He pictured a group of singers from a local church, probably performing outside a pub. ‘Stood a lowly cattle shed’ came clear through the fog. It reminded him of Pity Wood Farm, in a strange kind of way. Lowly, all right.

Somebody had once told him that Christmas had been stolen from the pagans. The twenty-fifth of December was supposed to be the birthday of Mithras, the god of blood, worshipped by Romans. Mithraic ceremonies had been held in caves, with the smell of smoke, a long knife plunged into the throat of a sacrificial bullock, and blood that fell hissing on an altar stone. Fire and blood, and the entrails of beasts. It must have been tradition.

Cooper found it unsettling to think about such things out here in the darkness, on a cold night in December, with two bodies lying almost at his feet and pools of fresh blood forming on the ground in the lingering scent of gunpowder. It was as if the singing he heard in the distance might not be carol singers at all, but the chanting of the worshippers of Mithras, deep in their caves.

Well, things went back a tidy way in these parts. Two thousand years? That was just middlin’ old.

Fry had followed him from the car. Cooper looked at her, huddling in her coat against the cold, but still shivering as though she would never stop.

‘Diane,’ he said. ‘Is it too early to wish you happy birthday?’

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Thursday

Superintendent Branagh leaned forward across her desk, folding her hands as she regarded the two detectives.

‘And did you see what happened next? What did Mr Palfreyman do?’

‘I was confused for a few minutes,’ said Fry. ‘It was dark, and very foggy.’

‘You couldn’t see anything, DS Fry? You don’t know who fired the first shot?’

‘No.’

‘DC Cooper?’

‘No, ma’am. Sorry.’

Branagh gave them both a hard stare. ‘I sincerely hope there are no misplaced loyalties here. Just because an individual has been in the job previously doesn’t make them immune to the law, you know.’

‘No, ma’am,’ said Fry.

‘We understand.’

The Superintendent didn’t look as though she believed them, though they were both trying hard not to give away any of the signs. Maintain normal eye contact, no fidgeting, no turning away from your questioner.

Branagh looked from Fry to Cooper. Then her gaze returned to Fry and stayed there, ominous and thoughtful.

‘DS Fry, you were the senior officer in this situation. Are you confident that your actions were appropriate and lawful throughout?’