A quick nod in answer.

‘What do we have to do to make you speak?’

‘I want him to leave.’ She looked at Hobbes. ‘I will speak to the other officer, the one who found me.’

‘Detective Fairfax?’

‘Yes.’

Hobbes made to speak, but Latimer placed her hand on his sleeve.

Camilla Greene was smiling at him. There was an edge of cruelty to it.

He stood up and walked out of the room. Latimer followed him, and she arranged for the female constable to return to her watch. Hobbes was staring through the glass.

‘Christ, Meg.’

‘I know, I know.’

‘We’re so close. She just won’t speak.’

‘So then?’

‘But he’s a mess. Fairfax! He’ll fuck it up, I know he will.’

‘He sat in the rain, in the land of the dead. Would you have done that?’

‘That isn’t how police work is done.’

‘Ah, to hell with that. What choice do we have?’

He couldn’t answer that one. Latimer gave him a moment, then said, ‘Look, he’s still an officer, isn’t he?’ Hobbes nodded. ‘So DC Fairfax is still on the books. His leave of absence has been worked through. We’re not doing anything wrong.’

He could think of arguments against her reasoning, but none of them mattered, not really, not when he looked back into the interview room and saw Camilla Greene sitting there. It was enough. He said, ‘OK. Let’s try it.’

‘You want me to fetch him?’

‘No, no. I’ll do it.’

He took the lift down to the basement level, where the canteen was situated. His mind was filled with doubt still, and he had this stupid petty fear as well that when he entered the canteen DC Fairfax would be surrounded by his colleagues, the men laughing at his ribald jokes, the women gazing at him, smiling …

But Fairfax was alone.

A cup of tea. No ‘sarnie’. A half-eaten custard tart.

Hobbes sat down opposite to him.

Neither of them spoke.

Fairfax went for a cigarette, decided against it. ‘Well, here we are.’

‘Indeed.’

Fairfax sipped at his tea. ‘What was it Kennedy used to call this stuff? Sump feed, bilge water, cat piss. He had a hundred names.’

‘Kennedy?’

‘Yeah, DS. First name, Dan. Danny Boy. Dan the Man.’

‘Before my time.’

‘Right. Right. Of course.’

And the conversation petered out.

Hobbes rubbed at his eyes. ‘Your mum’s worried about you.’

‘You think I don’t know that?’

‘There’s blood in your bed, on the towels.’

‘Ah, Jesus.’

‘What happened? You get in a fight?’

‘Yeah, some bastard was badmouthing us, disparaging Her Majesty’s finest, you know what I’m saying?’

‘I do. You were drunk?’

‘Aye, generally pissed off at life. I don’t know where, some old pub or other.’

‘Fairfax?’

‘Yeah?’

‘What did you say to Camilla Greene?’

‘Oh … not much.’

‘You persuaded her to come in. How did you do that?’

‘The usual rigmarole.’

‘I just need to know what you said to her.’

Fairfax finished his tea, and finally went for that cigarette. He lit it with the match that Hobbes offered. And only then did he speak.