Burkin, his plate full, moved away from the counter, and joined Muddyman, who was holding forth about Marlow.

“I’ve been watching him for weeks now, he’s a real friendly bloke, right? He chats to the lads every day. Just because he was in the area, it doesn’t mean he’s guilty.”

Burkin picked up the lurid plastic tomato from the table and squeezed ketchup all over his plate, then stuffed a huge forkful of chips in his mouth. Bits of potato flew everywhere while he talked.

“There must be hundreds of salesmen workin’ that area, you could take your pick. You ask me, all that film was about this morning was that we’ve got more bloody tarts being bumped off”—he paused to burp—“an’ no bloody suspects.”

The “bing-bong” sounded and a voice requested the presence of DCI Tennison in Administration. The men ignored it and carried on talking about Marlow; everyone who had had contact with him seemed to be convinced that he was a good bloke and therefore not a murderer. Terry Amson arrived and picked up on the conversation.

“He lied about the lock-up, we know that.”

“We’ve only got the word of an old lag on that, it’s not proof,” Burkin retorted. There was another call over the PA system for Tennison. “Looks like the boss is gonna get the big boys pullin’ the rug on her . . . Coffee all round?” He looked at Lillie. “Your turn.”

Maureen Havers found Tennison hiding in the locker room, eating a large hamburger.

“Is DCI Hicock a big red-haired bloke? He’s in with the Commander and the Super’s there too. You’re being paged all over the station.”

“Am I?” Tennison asked innocently. “Well, they’ll just have to find me.”

Having successfully evaded her bosses, Tennison returned to the Incident Room to continue the briefing. She pinned photographs of all six of the victims on the notice-board while she waited for everyone to settle down.

“Right! Six victims, no set pattern. They did not, as far as we can ascertain, know each other. They didn’t look alike, they belonged to different age groups, different professions. Apart from certain minor similarities they were not all killed in the same manner. The only link between them all is that Marlow was in the area when they were murdered. Did he kill all six? Is there something we’ve overlooked, another link?”

Muddyman was slumped right down in his chair, totally relaxed. He waved a hand to attract Tennison’s attention.