He was holding up the photograph of her from the paper, but it had been added to in felt-tip. She started laughing and clipped him one.

Maureen Havers walked in as he raised his hands to defend himself. She tapped Tennison on the back.

“Why me? I didn’t draw all over it. It was him!” Jones pointed to Burkin, who hung his head, although he couldn’t really give a fuck. When she’d gone, Jones would get a right clip round the earhole.

Tennison turned to Havers, who told her she was wanted on the top floor.

“Oh well, here it comes. See you all later.”

Otley claimed everybody’s attention as soon as she had gone. “Right, we’ve all had a jolly good laugh, now get yer pin-brains on this lot. We want all these unsolved murders on the computer, so we can cross-check them for any that occurred when Marlow was in the vicinity.”

As they went reluctantly to work, Maureen Havers had a word with Otley.

“You finished with the Oldham files? Only they haven’t been put on the computer . . .”

“I’ll sort ’em, love. Haven’t had a chance to look through them yet.”

Havers began to distribute more files around the Incident Room, which was greeted with moans and groans. Otley rapped his desk.

“Come on, you lot, settle down. Sooner you get this lot sorted, sooner we’re in the pub. As an incentive, first round’s on me!”

But a pint wouldn’t compensate for the tedious slog of sifting through hundreds of unsolved murders. Otley opened the Oldham file he had already checked over; he knew there was a problem, and now he had to work out the best way to deal with it.

The bar was full of familiar faces. At one of the marble-topped tables several of the lads were discussing the unsolved murders.

“I’ve looked at twenty-three cases,” Muddyman said, “all around Rochdale, Burnley, Southport; and I’ve got one possible but unlikely . . .”

Rosper cut in, “There was a woman found in a chicken run in Sheffield. Reckon she’d been there for months. The chickens were knocking out record numbers of eggs!”

“You know they’ve been feeding the dead ones to the live ones, that’s why we’ve had all this salmonella scare. Got into the eggs,” Lillie contributed.

“This woman was seventy-two, an old boiler!” Rosper chuckled.

They were suddenly all aware that Tennison had walked in. She looked around, located Jones and went to lean on the back of his chair.

“Next round’s on me, give us your orders,” she told them. “The bad news is: I’m asking for volunteers. They’ve withdrawn the official surveillance from Marlow, so I want four men to cover it.”

Lillie stood up. “Excuse me . . .”

“Great, that leaves three . . .”

“I was just going for a slash . . .”