‘Thank you for sharing that information, Ms Campbell.’ Barrett was now ready to leave. ‘If you think of anything else that may be relevant to the investigation, do call.’ He handed over a card with his number on it.

‘As I said, I don’t want to cause anyone any trouble. I’m just telling you what I know. It is my duty.’

‘We appreciate your time.’ Palmer got up from his chair and left the house with Barrett, leaving Jane sitting perfectly still on the sofa.

When the two men returned to the police station, Elly Hale was standing in the reception area greeting Matilda Edgely.

‘Miss Edgely.’ Palmer welcomed her with a smile and a nod of his head.

‘Inspector.’ She was slightly out of breath and her cheeks and nose were red. ‘I realised something.’ She stopped for a moment to catch her breath. ‘His glasses, he wasn’t wearing his glasses.’

‘Who wasn’t?’ Barrett asked perplexed.

‘Dennis. He always wore glasses, but I remember, when I found him, he wasn’t wearing them. I only just realised. I knew something was wrong but I couldn’t put my finger on it until now.’

Barrett and Palmer looked at each other. The young woman was right. Dennis had not been wearing glasses when they found his body.

‘Thank you very much for letting us know.’ Palmer shook her hand. ‘You’ve done the right thing.’

‘I want to help,’ she said vulnerably. ‘It’s not right, what they did to him.’

Elly could see that Tilly was becoming emotional.

‘You absolutely did the right thing.’ Elly encouraged showing Tilly to the door and wanted to give the young woman a chance to get herself together before she left.

‘We are getting somewhere,’ Palmer said, following Barrett out of reception and up to the incident room.

‘We are, Joe. Do you know if any glasses were found at the scene?’

‘I don’t believe so, but I’ll call forensics and see what they bagged up.’

‘Let me know when you’ve spoken to them. We also need to get Andrew Wade back again. He has some explaining to do.’

‘Yes, sir,’ Palmer said as he sat down at his desk and picked up the phone.

‘I’ll check with the wife. It’s possible the glasses are at his home or something, but we need to find them.’

‘Could our killer have taken them as a trophy?’ Palmer asked holding the phone to his ear.

‘Stop watching so much CSI on TV.’ Barrett winked as he disappeared into his office to put in a call to Veronica Wade.

Chapter 9

6.47pm Saturday 14th December

‘Right, here is where we are.’ Barrett stood in front of his team, holding court. ‘Dennis Wade seems to have had no enemies.