Lockhart swivels in his chair and taps the pile of papers with his forefinger. ‘Nearly there. Off to the hospital to pick up the pathology report, then we’re all done.’

Barker hitches his right buttock onto a neighbouring desk and folds his arms. ‘And what about that other one, find anything out?’

Lockhart is pleased he is asking, knowing his boss to be a little sceptical about his interest in the other death.

‘Spoke to CID,’ Lockhart says. ‘They checked her phone records. She didn’t call anyone in the moments before but she’d left a suicide note, boyfriend saw it too late.’

Barker looks at him. ‘And …’

‘And something about it still doesn’t smell right.’

Leyla.

Barker gazes at his young PC. I watch the way he looks at him and I know that he is thinking of his younger self, how the one thing he learned was to trust his own instinct, to follow his nose. There are some young officers, perfectly decent ones, who just want to come in and do their hours and get the pay cheque, which is perfectly understandable of course, and there are some who have a nose, and having just speculated on Lockhart’s teeth he is now thinking about his nose – physically a slender, rather fine nose. It’s a good nose.

‘Go ahead and do whatever you need to do, never let it go,’ Barker says, seriously.

Lockhart looks at him and knows he is being trusted and says, ‘Thank you, sir.’

Barker rises from the desk. Before he can leave the office, Lockhart asks, ‘The boyfriend, gave evidence at the inquest, he was a doctor. Matthew Goodison, works at the hospital. Name mean anything, sir?’

Barker shakes his head. ‘Nope, nothing to me.’

*

Peterborough City Hospital is part of a huge out-of-town complex that includes sports grounds and factories. There’s always a queue of traffic going up to the main entrance, on account of all the people who have to get lifts or minicabs – I remember being stuck in it when I went there that day to see Dr Barnard, not long before I died.

Lockhart parks in the service car park round the side and walks up to the main atrium, vast and vaulted, with a round information desk. As he goes past the Costa franchise where I didn’t buy myself a coffee that day, he is filled with a sudden and overwhelming desire for a coconut flat white. Unlike me, he indulges the impulse. While he drinks it, he stands in front of the atrium wall and studies the A–Z Wayfinder – otherwise known as a map. The mortuary isn’t listed but he knows it’s at the back of the building. The Fracture and Orthopaedic Clinic is on the ground floor – it’s part of A & E. It’s 1.15 p.m. He’s a bit early for the mortuary; he’ll only be sitting around.