Which were DCI Windrow turning up mob-handed to ‘interview’ Andy and Joanne while forensics went over their house with a set of tweezers and a UV light source. Which was a waste of time, because searching that house had happened day one of Operation Manticore – even Beverley spotted that.

‘It’s in the papers now,’ I said. ‘Windrow’s got to dot his I’s and cross his T’s etcetera etcetera.’

He’d also told me to stay out of sight.

‘It’s all got complicated enough,’ he’d said, ‘without dragging any “additional” elements into the case.’ He was too professional to say it out loud, but it was clear he expected the Marstowes to be eliminated from inquiries pretty damn fast – at which point he was hoping the media, and with them the politics, would go away. ‘I hear you’ve got something lined up with Dominic tomorrow,’ he’d said. ‘Good. You two can keep each other out of trouble.’

I thought I heard, as if from somewhere far away, Lesley giving a hollow laugh. But I’m pretty sure it was my imagination.

‘Are you okay coming back up here?’ I asked as the Asbo climbed the hill to the top of the ridge. ‘You’re not going to be stepping on anyone’s territorial imperative, are you?’

‘You worry about your job,’ said Beverley. ‘I’ll worry about mine.’

Dominic was waiting for us at the top of the lane. He held the gate open so I could drive in and park by the skeleton of an ancient barn preserved by the National Trust. Stan was waiting with him, both of them sweating even in the shade of the western hemlocks – I think it must have been even hotter than that second day when Dominic had brought me up here to see about his ‘mate’s’ stash.

Stan was wearing the same grubby boiler suit I’d seen her in when we first met, still with the arms tied around her waist. But, in deference to the heat, she was wearing a 1950s blue and white striped bikini top that would have suited a saucy seaside postcard. Her skin was the colour of skimmed milk and I was worried she was going to burn.

Stan was with us because she had a quad bike and trailer which promised to take the slog out of transporting the detectors. The plan was that we would split up, me and Beverley going downhill to Pokehouse Wood while Dominic and Stan deployed the detectors further along the ridge, on the logging track we’d met Princess Luna on, and on Croft Ambrey and the footpaths that converged on it.

‘That’s a big area,’ he said as we piled the detectors into the trailer. ‘What’s the range of these things?’