‘The good news is that there is no forensic evidence to link you to the murder whatsoever. By which I mean there is none anywhere near the body or even in the room as far as one can tell. Although you can be sure that they will be continuing to investigate and so you shouldn’t be surprised if we are served with evidence last minute.’

‘Okay,’ I say, and I look across at Jan who seems relaxed now, in the hands of the expert.

‘There are, however, your admissions in your interviews. I am bound to say, Mr Shute, if you had listened to advice in your last interview, they wouldn’t even have that. I mean, I think we could have excluded the earlier admissions made without a caution having been administered. But we are where we are.’

‘Where is that?’ I ask.

‘That depends on you, Mr Shute. If you stand by your admissions in the interviews, we have you at the scene of the murder as it is happening, with no good explanation for being there. Not to mention the emptying of a significant sum of cash from a bank account, weeks before the death.’ She says this last part with a raised eyebrow as if expecting me to protest.

‘What do you mean, stand by my interviews? I can’t unsay what I’ve said.’

‘Well, how can I put this?’ she says slyly. ‘Not all defendants maintain at trial the account they give at the police station. Often things are said at times of considerable pressure that on reflection aren’t intended. Do you see? I mean here, for example, there is the admission on the one hand that you saw the deceased being murdered. And on the other hand, the fact that in your account you only visited that house on that street for the first time just weeks ago. On one view, you and the police are at cross purposes. You are talking about different things.’

I shift in my place. These are the same clothes I slept in, though I have washed in a public lavatory. My procedure is that I take a sock and wash it thoroughly in hot water and soap. Once it is clean I use it as a flannel before drying it again under a hot-air dryer. But clean skin under dirty clothes still makes me squirm a little.

‘But, as I told Jan, I think I did go there. In 1989, I mean. She gave me a key. I’m sure that’s what happened. I must have been there. It must have been her that I saw being killed.’

She tucks a biro behind her ear and darts a look at Jan who catches it deftly.