Ed turned away from Della, and checked the living area again. It was 2:21 a.m., and the house was still silent. He thought he could hear someone snoring, but he couldn’t make out who it was.

The events of Sunday night had created an extraordinary kind of tension in the house. Ed had seen hardly anything of Karen since Sunday morning: Peter Kaiser had been keeping her away from anybody who might be considered an enemy of the Lake Vista establishment. Peter wasn’t sure yet if Karen had been responsible for tipping Ed off about the extent of the crop blight, but he wasn’t taking any chances. His mother had once told a new and rather sophisticated girlfriend of his that he had wept as a child in Bambi, especially in the scene where Bambi wanders through the fiery forest calling ‘Mother! Mother!’, and Peter had never trusted any woman since.

The tension had been heightened by Shearson’s silence. Instead of storming and raging about the house as Ed had expected him to, he had closeted himself away, and spoken to nobody but Peter and his servants. Several times during the day Ed had felt tempted to ask to talk to him, if only to clear the air. But Shearson had stayed out of sight. He wasn’t interested in Ed’s apologies, or explanations, or even his pledges to see Shearson roasting in hell. Shearson had several millions of dollars to rake off, and that was all that mattered.

‘That’s it,’ said Della, with surprising suddenness. Ed turned, and the door was already ajar.

‘You’re a genius,’ Ed told her. ‘A five-lever, armour-plated lock?’

‘They give us a pretty thorough training,’ Della explained, with unconvincing modesty.

‘You bet your investigative ass,’ said Ed, flippant, but also impressed. He’d tried to pick a padlock once, on Season’s diary, and he knew just how damned difficult lock-picking could be. He’d had to wait until Season had gotten around to telling him about her affair with Clive Harris of her own accord, and by then he hadn’t been really interested any more.

‘Come on,’ whispered Della. ‘And make sure you close the door behind you.’

They stepped into the office. It smelled of wine and cigar-smoke, and Shearson’s underarm sweat. Della switched on the green glass desklamp, and directed it away from the window, in case it cast any light across the gardens outside which could be seen from a balcony upstairs.