The gardener finishes his preparation and shoves it between his lips without answering. He reaches out for a box of matches.

“Did you like him, Mr. Wentworth?” The emphasis in Doggett’s voice is unmistakable.

The matchbox rattles in the gardener’s shaky hands but as he strikes the match, the shaking stops. He touches the lit match to the end of the cigarette and takes a deep drag, transformed by the tobacco, fortified. He looks directly at Doggett for the first time, exhales a cloud of blue smoke. “Didn’t really know him,” he says, and his voice is strong and confident now.

Doggett obviously senses the change, and any attempt at a pleasant façade drops. “When Gerald Cartwright disappeared six years ago, you were never questioned. Why was that?”

“No one came.”

“That’s not entirely true, though, is it? When we knocked on your door you’d gone away.”

“Holiday.”

“For six months?”

“Didn’t want to be around all the fuss. Bloody reporters.”

“Or maybe you were avoiding us? You’ve been in trouble with the police before, haven’t you?”

Wentworth remains calm, blowing his sweet smoke in their faces. He chooses to treat the question as rhetorical. He turns the spent match in his hand, over and over.

Doggett spells it out. “Indecent exposure.”

“That were twenty year ago.”

“Seems they caught you playing silly buggers in Weston Park. Nice spot for it from what I gather.” This time Doggett avoids looking at Tyler.

“Charges were dropped,” says Wentworth.

“No, Mr. Wentworth, you accepted a caution. That’s why we still have it on record. I take it that was about the same time Mrs. Wentworth left?”

The match flicks from Wentworth’s hand, arches gracefully through the smoke, and disappears behind a pile of newspaper. “Don’t you lot have nothing better to do than come round here, beggarin’ about stuff what happened twenty year ago?”

Tyler looks again at the room. Is this what he finds so disturbing? This man’s double life? Born in the wrong time, trapped in a loveless marriage, unable to be himself. As he looks at this friendless, dirty man, hidden away in his time-capsule cottage, the house and its treasure trove of bric-a-brac are transformed. It isn’t a house at all. It’s a prison. A place where he shuts himself away from a chaotic, frightening world that chooses to judge him. The dog has got it right; he and Doggett are the intruders, walking through the man’s memories, trudging across his soul. Suddenly Tyler understands his disquiet; one day this could be him.

“DI Doggett, can I have a word?”

Their eyes lock. Doggett turns away first but does so slowly, not a defeat so much as a tactical withdrawal. “All right, Mr. Wentworth, don’t bother getting up. We’ll see ourselves out. Just don’t go booking any long holidays, will you?”