There was a seminar she’d attended recently on the use of Sirene, a new data system linked to the Police National Computer. The system was designed to give access to information from all the Schengen countries, and get an alert placed against the details of anyone suspected of involvement in organized crime. That would be useful – when it came in. It had been mentioned during the seminar that the British part of the system would be administered by the Sirene UK Bureau. Based at the NCIS. Fancy that.

‘We’re still not up to speed on organized crime, are we?’ said Fry, when Cooper got to his feet and passed her desk.

‘That’s one of the reasons we’re going to end up being merged, isn’t it? That, and our neighbours’ problems.’

‘We can’t blame it on Nottinghamshire.’

‘We can try.’

Fry sighed. ‘You’re so parochial,’ she said. ‘You’re all so parochial.’

On the DI’s desk, the plastic wallet was now labelled as evidence examined by the documents section at the forensics laboratory.

‘The passport has been confirmed as a forgery,’ said Hitchens. ‘Likewise Rose Shepherd’s driving licence. With those two items, you can build an identity for yourself in no time.’

‘Pity there was no sign of a birth certificate,’ said Fry.

‘You don’t need a birth certificate unless you’re applying for a genuine passport. People who supply forged identity documents don’t care where or when your birth was registered. So the person called Rose Shepherd won’t have a birth certificate.’

‘What about her DNA and fingerprints?’ said Fry.

‘We’re running them through the database.’

‘No wonder she got that shredder installed. If you had a fraudulent identity yourself, you’d know about taking precautions. But, despite her East European connections, she’s not your typical terrorist suspect, is she?’

‘True. But she’d need the right contacts to change her identity so effectively. Nikolov looks likely. But there are plenty of possibilities, given her links to organized crime. When we discover her real identity, we’ll find the motive for her murder. There must be something she did in the past that she was trying to conceal.’

Cooper nodded, but he was doubtful. He found he couldn’t reconcile the picture he’d built up of Miss Shepherd with the idea of her being a criminal with a background full of sordid secrets. If she liked cats, she can’t have been all that bad.