‘If we can find the right place, why not? We’d get something decent if I sold my flat too. A new start.’ Repeating the words again. He’d never talked about moving into Harbour Street with her, though she’d dropped plenty of hints. It was as if the building itself – so public when it was filled with guests – put him off.

‘I’d love that,’ she said. ‘Really.’

‘Then I’ll give the head my notice tomorrow. He’ll need a full term.’ And so, it seemed, the decision was made.

He went to the counter to pay his friend and there seemed to be a flurry of anxiety for a moment. She wondered if he’d forgotten his cash or his credit card, but when she asked him he said it was nothing. A photo that he kept in his wallet seemed to have gone missing. She hoped he’d kept a photo of her, though she couldn’t remember him taking one. She didn’t like to mention it again because he seemed so put out to have lost it, and by then they were out in the street and on their way to the Sage.

When they returned from Newcastle, George must have gone to bed because the lounge was empty, the curtains drawn against the dark. Kate was buzzing. The concert had been so awful that it had been funny and the audience had shared the experience like a joke. In the end it was as if they’d all been present at a really special gig, with the small hall at the Sage warm and intimate, and they’d all wandered out talking and laughing about it like old friends. The last Metro home was full of partying drunks, but everyone was good-natured. A policeman got on at Haymarket and stayed on the train; someone said that had happened every night since the murder. They’d got the seat right at the front, so the lights of the approaching stations rushed at them and Kate felt as if it was a fairground ride, as if she was about ten years old.

Both kids were home when they arrived back. Ryan hadn’t long got in; it was raining and his jacket, thrown over the banister at the bottom of the stairs, was wet. Kate and Stuart had had a couple of drinks in the interval to keep them going through the second half of the gig and Kate was still not entirely sober. She felt very happy, in a tipsy, emotional way. Both her children were safe at home and she had this wonderful new man and her future seemed exciting.

The kids were in the basement sitting room in front of the television.

‘There’s been another murder,’ Ryan said as soon as they were in the room. ‘They were talking about it in the Coble.’