When the copper told me it was my turn, I was out of my seat and away down that corridor like shit off a shiny shovel. Marcus and Femi were standing outside the nurses’ station and Femi said, ‘Nothing to be scared of,’ as I walked past them, which was ridiculous because I was the last person who had anything to be frightened about. I smiled, so they could see that. Behind me, Ilias was shouting, ‘Don’t tell them anything,’ and Lauren was singing her Murder on the Fleet Ward song again.

Before I’d reached the MDR, a female officer directed me into one of the treatment rooms and asked very nicely if I would be willing to provide DNA and fingerprint samples for elimination purposes. She explained that she was asking everyone on the ward.

‘Some of them will almost certainly say no,’ I told her. ‘The patients, I mean. Don’t waste your time reading anything into it, though. A few of them won’t tell you their names or else get off on giving you false ones. One or two of them might well bite you if you go anywhere near them with one of . . . those.’ I nodded, watching her as she snapped the seal and removed a swab from its container. ‘You need to know who you’re dealing with.’

Her smile showed plenty of perfect teeth but was dead as mutton.

‘Oh, don’t worry, we do,’ she said. She began talking me through the process as if I was slightly simple, told me that it was painless and explained how she would need to swab both sides of my mouth.

I held up a hand to stop her. ‘I’ve done this,’ I said.

‘You’ve had your DNA taken before?’

‘No.’ My turn to smile. ‘I’ve done what you’re doing.’ The look on her face was priceless and, just for once, I didn’t give a toss if she believed me or not. ‘So you don’t need to worry too much. I mean yeah, I’m chock full of drugs right now so I’m a bit all over the place, but I probably won’t bite you.’

It was the same detective I’d spoken to outside the men’s toilet on the night it happened. Well, the early hours of the following day if you want to be accurate about it. The thug in glasses. He was sitting behind a desk in a suit and tie. The same desk the judge had sat behind when I was in there for my last tribunal.

‘I’m Detective Constable Steve Seddon.’

I leaned forward to check out the lanyard around his neck. ‘I’m Alice Armitage. Al.’

‘I know.’ He turned a fresh page on the notepad in front of him and began writing.