Hirsch rolled by and turned into the alley leading to a carpark at the rear of the hall. Switched off, got out and found his way through to the incident room. Little of the original fit-out remained: a scatter of computer stations, phones, chairs, desks and wall partitions, like islands on a vast sea of hardwood floorboards.

Kellaher and Dock were conferring at a whiteboard beside the stage. They broke off when Hirsch appeared.

‘Start at the beginning, keep it brief,’ Kellaher said. ‘I need to start bringing police members back in again.’

Hirsch laid it out for them: stolen plates on a stolen car; the proximity to Mischance Creek; McAuliffe making a run for it; dead behind the wheel; the tossed pistol.

‘A pistol, not a rifle?’

‘Correct.’

‘Is he the Passat driver?’

‘Don’t know, sir.’

‘Do you have anything tying him to the shootings?’

‘No, sir.’

‘So for all we know, he could’ve been planning to hold up the Tiverton bank.’

There hadn’t been a bank in Tiverton for twenty years, but Hirsch saw the inspector’s point. ‘The fact remains, sir, it’s possible he was warned, and it’s possible he was shot by whoever warned him.’ He took out his phone, isolated the McAuliffe licence photograph. ‘This is him.’

Kellaher peered at it. ‘His prints are being run as we speak, so let’s hope he’s in the system. Meanwhile, Sergeant Dock will take your statement.’

Dock took Hirsch to a card table beneath a wall photo: the Pandowie Downs shearing shed, appropriately, in its heyday, with 1950s Austin trucks, loaded with plump wool bales, lined up for the camera.

‘That’s where it kicked off,’ Hirsch said, pointing at the photograph as he eased onto a foldup chair.

Dock shrugged. The photo was old, and he was not a man with any use for history. He sat down opposite Hirsch and said, ‘Been busy, mate.’

Hirsch said nothing. He reached an exploratory finger to the green, mock-leather surface of the card table. A small brass label along the edge facing him read: Property of the Redruth and District Bridge Club.

Dock removed a digital recorder from his pocket and set it on the table between them. ‘No objections?’

‘Go your hardest.’

Dock also took out a notebook. He thumbed through it. Trying to intimidate, Hirsch thought. Second nature.

‘Okay, let’s get started.’

But before the Homicide sergeant could form the first question, a voice called, ‘Mind if I sit in?’

Vita Roesch was striding towards them. Hirsch expected irritation from Dock, but he clattered to his feet, pulled in his stomach and worked his eyebrows at a fair demonstration of wry charm for the attractive police officer from Sydney. Hirsch, less flustered, also stood.

‘Do you mind?’ said Roesch again, with a small, disarming smile. ‘I need to hear this.’

‘I’ll get you a chair,’ Dock said.