I’d guessed he’d fling this at me and I kept my face neutral, deliberately not letting him see how appalling I found his expression. Instead I let his words hang in the air by jotting in my notepad and nodding to myself.

‘Useful street rats, though, no?’

‘You what?’ He practically spat the words.

‘Did Ali Kousa do something to you? Or disappoint you in some way?’

Hayes’ face flickered with confusion. ‘No comment.’

‘You see, we did find Ali’s blood, skin cells and clothing fibres on the Glock in your flat.’ I pushed a forensic services print-out across the table at the solicitor. ‘And paint from the wall where you wrote “STREET RATS”. If you didn’t kill him, can you explain how those came about?’

‘No comment.’

‘We have your DNA on the discharged syringe on the floor where Ali was shot, and your finger and footprints in that squat room. Would you like to tell us about that?’

‘So? I’ve been there loads of times. Circumstantial, innit?’ He glanced at Taylor, puffed up.

‘We also have your fingerprints on the petrol canister which was in the Walkers’ back garden. Along with Ali Kousa’s prints too. No-one else’s. Just yours and Ali’s.’ I fixed my gaze on his. ‘If you weren’t involved with the arson at the soup shop, how else could those prints have got on the canister?’

‘No comment.’

‘Perhaps you need to have another word with your client, Mr Taylor, about not mentioning something which he might want to rely on later?’

Taylor gave Hayes a nod.

‘I don’t know.’

‘Who lit the match? You or Ali?’

‘DI Rah—’

‘Apologies. I forgot to mention that we have an eyewitness who’s testified to seeing Ali Kousa going into the back of the soup shop the afternoon of the fire.’ I slid Arthur Monro’s statement to the duty solicitor. ‘The thing is, we believe that Ali got the wrong shop. Is that what happened, Mr Hayes?’

‘No comment.’

‘Did you tell him to set the newsagent’s on fire and somehow he screwed up? Is that why you killed him?’

‘No comment.’

‘What would you say if I told you that when you switched on the mobile, which you used to text Ali the shop details, cell site data told us it was in your flat?’

He sat up at this. Mumbled to his brief out of the corner of his mouth. ‘What’s she on about?’

Taylor peered over the top of his glasses at the print-out. ‘Let’s move on.’

‘So, unless you want to carry the can entirely, I suggest you tell us why you did it, and who else was involved?’

‘It wasn’t me.’

‘Who was it then?’

‘No comm—’