Ramsay did not answer directly. “When did you last see Charlie?” he asked.

“You know that,” Elliot said defiantly. “ You were here.”

“Didn’t he ask to meet you? Before he went up the hill. Didn’t he ask you to bring food and a sleeping bag? He had no-one else to ask.”

There was a silence and the old man struggled for control. “ I met him late yesterday evening,” he said. “By the Otterbridge by-pass. I took everything he wanted.”

“Did he telephone here to arrange the meeting?” Ramsay asked. “What exactly did he say?”

“Not much. He didn’t have much change for the phone. He’d just made another phone call, he said, and used all his ten p’s. He wouldn’t wait for me to phone him back.”

“Who else did he phone?” Ramsay asked. “Did he say?”

The old man shook his head. “I presumed it was Maggie Kerr,” he said. “She was always on his mind.”

“And when you met him by the Otterbridge by-pass,” Ramsay said, “did he tell you where he was going?”

Elliot shook his head again. “He was waiting for me when I arrived,” he said. “I was afraid you’d have me followed, so I drove miles out of my way round the lanes before I got there. I tried to persuade him to come back with me, to give himself up. I said you’d believe him, but he was too frightened. And he was wild, excited. There was nothing I could say that would persuade him. He just took the bag and drove away on that motorbike, laughing.”

“Tell me what was in the bag,” Ramsay said. “In detail.”

Elliot began to list the equipment he had provided. “ There was a knife,” he said. “Not a bread knife. I’ve only one of those and I couldn’t spare it. But there was a big, old kitchen knife at the back of the drawer. I gave him that.”

“Would you recognise it again?” Ramsay asked. No knife had been found in the barn during the detailed examination. But it seemed that Elliot might have provided the means used to murder his son.

“I expect so,” the old man said, unaware of the implication of the questions. “We’ve had it for years.”

There was another silence and Ramsay could sense Hunter’s impatience. He wanted to be out on the streets, knocking on doors, making things happen. He hated this waiting. But Ramsay could tell that Elliot had something else to say and that he wanted to say it in his own words.