‘With his eyes open like that I wasn’t sure whether he was alive or dead at first. I pulled his wallet out and found his discharge papers and so on. That told me who he was. I made straight for the nearest telephone and reported. Then I came back and waited.’

Which must have taken nerve, Grant reflected, thinking of the fog and the darkness and what lay in the mud below the pier. ‘Ever done any aides to C.I.D. work, lad?’

‘No, sir.’

‘We’ll have to see what we can do then, won’t we? Hang on here until I tell you to go. I might need you later on and there should be a cup of tea going in a minute or two if I know the Studio bunch.’

Johnson tried hard to conceal his pleasure and failed. At that moment, Henry Wade, who had been crouching beside Garvald’s body, looked up, the light from the arc lamp glinting on his spectacles.

‘I’ll tell you one thing, sir. He hasn’t been here long.’

Grant turned to Nick. ‘He couldn’t have been, could he? When was it he took off in your car?’

‘About three o’clock.’

‘Let’s assume he’d been dead for at least half an hour when Johnson found him. That leaves about forty-five minutes to fill. I wonder what he was doing?’

‘He only had one purpose in coming back,’ Nick said. ‘I’m sure of that now.’

‘The cash from the Steel Amalgamated job? You still believe in that?’

‘More than ever.’

Grant leaned against the van and took the cigarette Nick offered. ‘Let’s assume you’re right. If that cash existed, who would Garvald have left it with? His driver, the man we couldn’t catch? If Manton was the wheelman on that job, it would give us another motive for some of the things that have happened tonight.’

Nick shook his head. ‘Ben wrote to Bella from prison just before he got out. He said, “See you soon – Ben.” Why? He didn’t love her any more. He told me himself he wouldn’t have touched her with a ten-foot pole and I believed him.’

‘Which means he wanted to see her for only one reason?’

‘To recover the money she’d been looking after for him all these years. The only weakness I can see in the argument is Bella herself. Knowing her, I would have thought she would have spent it long ago.’