It was clear to Redfyre, having gotten to know both self-confessed, synchronised stranglers during his interview sessions, that the two ingenious manipulators had certainly colluded with each other in the presentation of the body in the graveyard. They’d emptied pockets, removed shoes and socks, changed ties, planted a half crown and poured brandy down the dead man’s throat. They’d plotted and planned together, all right. Plan A relied on police stupidity and inaction: vagrant, unidentified, death by natural causes. Bury in town plot. Plan B was in reserve place in case someone raised queries and an investigation was launched. And that was where Redfyre and Dr. Beaufort came onstage, asking questions and ferreting about in pockets and digestive tracts.

Most annoyingly, the pair had also colluded—in the most tactful way—with Redfyre himself. He was quite certain of that. They had saved themselves from a ramrod-straight police charge of first-degree murder by the subtle implication that they understood that he believed, as they did, in true justice. Plan C had been triggered. A double confession. And, most powerful of all, perhaps, before leaving the station, Gisbourne had notified him with the smiling triumph of a Parthian lining him up over his shoulder for a last shot of his readiness to marshal the forces of an extremely effective and expensive London defence lawyer.

A furrowed brow and a slow growl greeted Redfyre’s tongue-in-cheek comment on the ability of the CID.

“If you say so, Inspector. Right. Let’s take a last look at this fairy tale you’ve concocted before we sign our careers away. It all revolves around the victim, Hardy. The unknown element and late entrant to the party. Hardy is a man of the world, a sophisticate from London town, and it’s he who catches on first to the infamous truth behind the gathering. All right so far?”

“That’s correct. A tourist looking out for a good time in the sticks. But a reprobate—a gangster, fraudster and all-round scoundrel, as his wife will testify.”

“This is the bit I don’t hold with—the ‘infamous truth,’” MacFarlane grumbled on. “Anyway, go on, dangle it in front of me again. I’ll try to put myself into the skin of that puritanical windbag of a Prosecutor for a minute. Will he understand what you’re getting at, Redfyre? It’s a bit Machiavellian even for me, and I wasn’t born yesterday.”