She stared up at him blindly then suddenly got to her feet, pushed him out of the way and ran for the bathroom. He stood there, a slight frown on his face and there was a knock on the outside door. He opened it to find Jack Brady waiting.

‘Any luck?’ Miller asked.

Brady held up an old canvas bag. ‘I found all sorts in the ash-pan. What about this for instance?’

He produced a triangular piece of metal, blackened and twisted by the fire, and Miller frowned. ‘This is a corner piece off a suitcase.’

‘That’s right,’ Brady shook the bag in his right hand. ‘If the bits and pieces in here are anything to go by, I’d say she must have put every damned thing she owned into that furnace.’

‘Including her suitcase? She certainly wasn’t leaving anything to chance.’ Miller sighed. ‘All right, Jack. Take that little lot down to the car and put in a call to H.Q. See if they’ve anything for us. I shan’t be long.’

He lit a cigarette, moved to the window and looked out into the back garden. Behind him the bathroom door opened and Monica Grey emerged.

She looked a lot brighter as she came forward and sat on the edge of the bed. ‘Sorry about that. It was rather a shock. Joanna was a nice kid.’ She hesitated and then continued. ‘How – how did it happen?’

‘She jumped in the river.’ Miller gave her a cigarette and lit it for her. ‘Mrs Kilroy tells me you were good friends.’

Monica Grey took the smoke deep into her lungs and exhaled with a sigh of pleasure. ‘I wouldn’t say that exactly. I went to the cinema with her sometimes in the afternoons or she came in for a coffee, mainly because she happened to live next door.’

‘You never went out with her at any other time?’

‘I couldn’t – I work nights. I’m a croupier at a gaming club in Gascoigne Square – the Flamingo.’

‘Max Vernon’s place?’

She nodded. ‘Have you been there?’

‘A long time ago. Tell me about Joanna? Where did she come from?’

Monica Grey shook her head. ‘She never discussed her past. She always seemed to live entirely in the present.’

‘What did she do for a living?’

‘Nothing as far as I could tell. She spent a lot of time painting, but only as a hobby. I know one thing – she was never short of money.’

‘What about boyfriends?’

‘As far as I know, she didn’t have any.’

‘Didn’t that seem strange to you? She was an attractive girl.’

‘That’s true, but she had her problems.’ She appeared to hesitate and then went on. ‘If you’ve seen her body you must know what I’m getting at. She was a junkie.’

‘How did you know that?’