Little plaques on each level had arrows for the various sets of room numbers or facilities. The Dining Room and Bar were on the ground floor, as well as a Drying Room (important rooms are always proper nouns in mystery novels), while on various upper levels were a Laundry, a Library – which I figured must have the fireplace from the brochure, and I am therefore blaming it for getting me into this mess in the first place, so I decided it had better deliver an almost fairytale level of warmth and crackling to make up for my current situation – a Gym and an Activities Room, which had the words Pool/Darts next to it. I reminded myself to focus less on the dead body and try to enjoy the vacation part of it all, as relaxing as it had been so far. While I very much doubted Michael and I would play a social game of pool, I was sure we could find something brotherly to do together. He might like to throw darts at me.

As I continued up the stairs, the little arrow next to Roof changed from pointing up to pointing sideways, and I saw a housekeeping cart in the adjoining corridor. Score. I peeked inside: twin room, shit fridge.

There was a woman already on the roof, smoking a post-brekkie cigarette. I knew it wasn’t Sofia before they turned around, because Sofia is a lazy smoker; she’ll let a dart burn down to her fingertips if she’s not paying attention, then she’ll say, ‘Oh’ and light another one. Lucy smokes like she’s siphoning gas, so I knew it was her from the short, desperate gulps.

The cold was bracing. I nestled my hands in my pockets next to several tiny shampoo bottles I’d nicked from the housekeeping cart (I’m not above it) and walked over to her.

‘Hang on,’ she said, and sucked the soul out of the cigarette. I had a friend at university who used to chew gum, pin it to her headboard overnight and chew it again in the morning. That was how Lucy treated cigarettes: mileage. I could see that she was telling herself that it was her last. I also could see that she really believed it, as I’m sure she did every time. Turns out, this time, she was almost right. She would only have one more.

‘Internet,’ I said, taking out my phone by way of explanation (battery: 54%).