‘Then what’s the right question?’

‘Why was Christina so willing to part with her tickets for this voyage?’

‘And the answer?’

‘Ralph couldn’t afford to be seen on board by someone who’d served with the real Captain Neville.’

‘But Christina told me they were getting married.’

‘She is, but to whom?’

Beth stared at William for some time before she said, ‘How long have you known?’

William checked his watch. ‘Ee by gum. I’ve only been certain for about ten minutes.’

• • •

Beth wanted to fly straight back to England so she could confront Christina before the wedding took place, but William talked her out of the idea. He knew it would only give Faulkner another opportunity to escape, and if he did, it would be the only thing anyone remembered about his short and undistinguished career. It helped that Catherine had stepped in and insisted Beth stay with them while she was in New York.

‘The Met, the Frick and the MoMA with our own personal tour guide?’ said Catherine. ‘What more could a girl ask for?’

Mr Justice Whittaker nodded sagely, but didn’t comment when his wife said she would be only too happy to accompany Beth to Carnegie Hall and take William’s seat for the Ella Fitzgerald concert. The judge didn’t complain, but then he’d never heard of Ella Fitzgerald. He couldn’t wait to return to England and preside once again over the trial of Miles Faulkner, and had already decided on the length of his sentence.

‘What about Christina?’ Beth asked him.

‘Assisting an offender,’ pronounced the judge, ‘although Mr Booth Watson wouldn’t find it difficult to get her off that charge, as long as she doesn’t visit Captain Ralph Neville in prison.’

William couldn’t wait to get back to England.

• • •

‘How many murders were there in London last year?’ asked Commander Hawksby, as he took his place at the head of the table for the first meeting of the newly formed Unsolved Murders Unit.

‘One hundred and eighty-one, sir,’ replied Detective Sergeant Adaja.

‘How many of those were domestic?’ asked The Hawk, switching his attention to the other side of the table. Although the room was large compared with the rabbit warren the rest of the team worked in, the table in the centre could just about seat six. A photograph of the Queen hung on the wall behind The Hawk’s desk, and a silver cup on the bookshelf reminded them that he’d once been the Met’s middleweight boxing champion.

‘Thirty-four,’ said Jackie.

‘And how many of those ended up with a conviction?’

‘Twenty-nine. Most of them were waiting for us to turn up, while the remainder were arrested within twenty-four hours.’

‘That’s the secret. Most domestic murders are solved in the first twenty-four hours, forty-eight at the most,’ said The Hawk. ‘After that, they begin to think they’ve got away with it, and become more and more confident as each day passes.’

‘Which is certainly true in the case of Mr Clive Pugh,’ said Jackie, opening her case file. ‘He murdered his wife a couple of months after taking out a million-pound insurance policy on her life, and was handsomely rewarded for his trouble.’