Following directions that the station guard gave us, we picked our way along a country lane. The hedgerows eventually gave way to a high brick wall that we followed for a kilometre before it opened to show a large country house, the sort a wealthy industrialist might have retired to in the last century. Thousands of these grand homes had rotted away after the Great War had left their owners’ sons lying in shallow, muddy graves in Flanders and beside the Somme. Behind its closed wrought-iron gates we saw a little wooden gatehouse with a man inside dressed in a white uniform. He was reading the football reports on the back page of the Morning Star and looked up when I tried the gates. They were locked, I found. He slid open a window. ‘We’re looking for a Dr Larren. Is he here?’ I asked.

‘I haven’t seen him go out.’

‘But he does work here?’

‘He’s medical director.’ He was becoming curious about us.

‘Can you let us in, please?’ Tibbot said.

‘Visiting’s over. Unless you’ve got an appointment, you can’t.’

Tibbot pursed his lips. ‘It’s important.’ I knew he didn’t want to identify himself as a policeman.

The man was becoming irritated. ‘Then make an appointment.’

‘We don’t have time.’

He went back to his match reports. ‘That’s your trouble,’ he replied.

‘We need to see him now.’

He refolded the paper. ‘Piss off or I’ll call security.’

We had already been frustrated today and this seemed our last chance. ‘Police,’ I said.

Tibbot stared at me.

‘What?’ the man in uniform blurted out, looking up from the page.

‘He’s police.’

I could see Tibbot mentally calculating the danger of admitting who he was. If we tried to slope off now, the man might well call the local station straight away and that would set a dangerous train in motion.

‘Are you? Show me your warrant card.’ He was suspicious.

Stony-faced, Tibbot drew out his warrant card. ‘Here,’ he said. He indicated a telephone on the wall inside the gatehouse. He had to brazen it out now. ‘So we would like to see Dr Larren. That must be connected to the office, yes?’

The man still looked wary, but he took the telephone from the wall. ‘What name?’ he asked.

‘Detective Sergeant Tibbot.’

The man stabbed the single button on the telephone. Tibbot kept that stony look on his face. I tried to catch his eye, to let him know that I was sorry, but he stared straight ahead. ‘Police here to see Dr Larren. All right,’ the man mumbled into the receiver. ‘Asking him,’ he said to us.

I looked across to the house. ‘What kind of hospital is it?’ I said. Perhaps Rachel had been a patient here, and for some reason Larren had taken her car to keep in trust. That seemed strange, though.

The man in white stared at me. ‘Psychiatric.’