Melanie nodded. ‘Yes. In a kind of minibus. The windows were dark so we couldn’t see much.’

Clare was suddenly alert. A minibus with dark windows. ‘Are you sure it wasn’t a bit closer?’ she said. ‘Maybe just a few miles out of town?’

She shrugged. ‘I honestly can’t remember. Does it matter?’

‘I’m afraid it might, Melanie. It might matter very much indeed.’

Melanie flushed and she seemed near to tears. Her eyes strayed to the newspaper. Then suddenly she said, ‘Look, I read about the man. The one who was shot. And yes, I was there. We were hired to be at the party. But I didn’t know anything about it. I swear. And I’d no idea it was that Gaby woman’s brother. She wasn’t even there.’

The cat leapt down from Melanie’s lap and walked back out of the room. With nothing in her hands, Melanie resumed twisting the ring. She glanced at Clare then looked down at her hands. ‘Honestly,’ she went on, her voice a whisper. ‘I didn’t know anything until it was on the news last night.’ She checked her watch again. ‘I have to go,’ she said. ‘Daniel…’

‘Come on,’ Clare said, rising from her seat. ‘I’ll drop you at the nursery. And I can run you back here again. Then I’d like you to come into the station so we can take a proper statement.’

Melanie bent to pick up a brown shoulder bag from the floor. ‘I haven’t done anything wrong,’ she said.

Clare smiled. ‘I know. But you might have seen something that could help us.’

She stood for a moment as though unconvinced then she led Clare to the front door and took a set of keys from her bag. Outside she pulled the door closed and turned a key in the mortice lock.

In the car she began directing Clare to the nursery. ‘Take a right here.’ As Clare swung the car round into Church Street Melanie spoke again. ‘Look, I don’t suppose it could be tomorrow? When Daniel’s at nursery, I mean. Save me getting a sitter.’

Clare considered this. Melanie probably didn’t know anything about the shooting. But she had been another pair of eyes inside the house on Friday night. And, judging by the time she’d arrived at the station the next morning looking for Daniel, she’d been there all night. Perhaps still there when Russell Fox had been shot.

They were approaching the nursery now. Melanie clicked off her seat belt. ‘Just drop me here if you don’t mind,’ she said. ‘Don’t want anyone seeing me getting out of the car. No offence.’

Clare was about to say she’d like Melanie to come straight over to the station, that they’d find someone to keep Daniel occupied when she saw something that changed her mind.

Or rather someone.