Kate Dewar tried to drive to the end of Harbour Street to turn around. She always liked her car to be facing the right way outside the house when she parked. But she had to back all the way up the street again, because a uniformed officer waved to show that there was no way through. Outside Malcolm’s yard there was a minibus and a van, dozens of police officers in dark-blue anoraks. They were putting up screens so that you couldn’t see anything from the road. Blue-and-white tape, like on television detective shows, but twisted upside down and back to front so that she couldn’t read what it said. She guessed: Police. Do Not Enter. Did that mean Malcolm had been arrested? She shivered at the thought that her son had been working so closely with a killer. Perhaps the investigation was nearly over and life would go back to normal. She and Stuart could continue making plans to move and start their new life.

In the house Chloe was in – she helped Kate carry the shopping down the stairs to the kitchen – but there was no sign of Ryan. She wondered briefly what he was up to, imagined him prowling. He needs a girlfriend, she thought. Someone stable, without too much imagination. She was sorry Ryan was out; he would have known what was going on in Harbour Street.

George Enderby was in the lounge. He’d helped himself to whisky.

‘I put some money on the dresser,’ he said. ‘I hope that’s all right. I spoke to the inspector. She said that I can leave tomorrow, so you’ll be rid of me then, Kate.’ He gave a lopsided grin and she thought that really he would have liked to stay. Or he wanted her to say that she would miss him.

‘We’ll miss you,’ she said, wondering if there was really any difference sometimes between kindness and desperation to please. ‘But Diana will be glad to have you home.’

‘Ah,’ he said. ‘Diana’s moved on. She has a new man. Just like you.’ Kate wondered if he’d been sitting here all afternoon drinking her whisky, or if he’d been brooding in the lounge bar at the pub, buying drinks in return for company. He didn’t seem drunk, but still he was hardly himself.

‘Do you know what’s going on at Malcolm’s yard?’ If he’d been in the pub he might have heard the gossip.

‘No.’ He seemed hardly to care.

Back in the kitchen she put away all the food she’d bought for Christmas.