‘A murder tends to do that,’ I said. ‘Plus, I’ve been a good girl, so they’ve cut the dose of my mood stabiliser.’

Banksy found the page he was looking for. ‘Well, you were right about that much, at any rate. It is now a murder investigation.’

‘Yes!’ It was just me and him, so I didn’t bother trying to hide my excitement. ‘I fucking knew it.’

‘Not a stabbing, though. You jumped the gun a bit there.’

I waited.

‘Cause of death was asphyxia. Victim was suffocated, basically. Pillow’s their best guess.’

I thought about that. Kevin wasn’t a weakling, but he wasn’t a big lad either and he’d have been half asleep, zonked out on whatever meds he’d been given last thing. Pressing a pillow over his face wouldn’t have been difficult and it wouldn’t have taken very long. ‘What about time of death?’

‘That’s a bit trickier,’ Banksy said. ‘The pathologist reckons some time between nine o’clock and ten-thirty.’

‘Which pathologist?’

‘That weirdo at Hornsey. The one with all the tattoos and piercings.’

‘Right.’ I’d never met the bloke, but he had a reputation.

‘Now, they think they can narrow that down because they already know the victim went to bed early, just after eight-thirty, and they know the nurse who was doing the rounds—’

‘Debbie.’

‘Yeah . . . she checked on him at nine-thirty and he was sleeping, not a problem. They’ve got her observation charts or whatever, got her on camera going in and out, right? So, now they’re thinking, OK . . . we’re obviously looking at whoever killed him sneaking into his room sometime between then and when Debbie makes her next round just after ten-thirty and discovers the body.’

‘Screams the place down.’

‘All nice and straightforward, so they reckon, because they’ll have their killer on tape, but apparently there’s some kind of technical issue with the cameras. So . . .’ He stopped when he saw me grinning.

‘Not exactly technical,’ I said.

I told him the same thing I told Seddon yesterday.

Aside from his pathological fear of being second in line for anything, I explained, Graham – the Waiter – is more than a little twitchy when it comes to being watched. ‘He usually does it straight after mealtimes,’ I said. ‘With whatever food’s left over. He stands on a chair and uses anything he’s not eaten to screw with the cameras. Porridge or pudding or whatever. Mashed potato is his favourite; he’s deadly with that. A nice handful of leftover mash . . . splat . . . camera knackered.’

Banksy looked horrified. ‘Can’t they stop him?’