He had a point. I hoisted myself up and went to investigate the medicine cabinet. It was well equipped. You’d have thought they were expecting a small war.

I slapped some gauze and tape over the bloody furrow the bullet had left. ‘How are you planning to get out of this room?’ I asked. ‘The door’s locked.’

‘With these handy little devices you were clever enough to bring along.’ John plucked one of the pins out of my hair.

‘Was that why you . . . Ow! That’s the one with the hook on the end, it’s caught – ’

‘One of the reasons.’ His fingers brushed my cheek in a caress so fleeting I might have imagined it. ‘You do it, then. I haven’t had much practice at this, since I usually keep my lock picks elsewhere. Thank you.’

He knelt by the door and started poking at the lock. ‘Maybe we should start thinking about where we’re going after we get out,’ I said uneasily.

‘The operative word, my love, is “out.”’ He seemed to be having some trouble, possibly because he was perspiring heavily, despite the comfortably cool temperature of the room. ‘Mary won’t be pleased when she finds us gone.’

‘Is she in love with you?’

The pick slipped and rattled onto the floor. ‘Bloody hell,’ said John between his teeth. ‘Keep your grisly suggestions to yourself, will you? If I believed that were the case I’d cut my throat and be done with it. No . . .’ Something clicked, and his fingers tightened. ‘Her motive is much simpler. She blames me – correctly, I must admit – for her brothers’ death.’

‘Her brother . . .’

‘Brothers. Two of them.’ After a brief pause he said resignedly, ‘The fat’s deep in the fire now, so I may as well abandon reticence. Or have you enough clues to reason it out for yourself? Two brothers, a strong streak of homicidal mania, and those bright, empty brown eyes . . .’

It was true; I’d only known one other person with eyes of that unusual golden brown. When I first met him, in Stockholm, I had thought him a gorgeous specimen of Nordic manhood, built like a Viking, and tall – really tall. It’s hard to find men who are six inches taller than I am. I had been prepared to overlook the fact that Leif’s sense of humour was practically nonexistent, but when I found out he was Max’s boss and one of the gang, I sort of lost my girlish enthusiasm.

John had been responsible for Leif’s death. In this case my objection to murder had been overcome by the fact that Leif had been trying to kill me, and would undoubtedly have succeeded if John hadn’t intervened.

‘You didn’t kill Georg,’ I said, watching his hands twist and press. ‘Or did you?’