Fry got out of the car and walked across the gravel as Cooper drove away. Actually, it was more than a barn conversion. She could see an entire range of farm buildings here. They formed three and a half sides of a square, facing on to a central courtyard. A two-storey stone barn, cleaned up and fitted with patio doors and casement windows. A tractor shed converted into twin garages and workshops. The door of one garage stood open, and the nose of a blue BMW was visible.

According to information from the control room, the neighbours on this side were called Ridgeway, Martin and April. Fry took a small detour before crossing the courtyard to their house, and looked in through the windows of one of the outbuildings. Games room. A gym. And a sauna. Very nice.

The Ridgeways themselves could have stepped straight out of Derbyshire Life. They had perfected the country look: corduroys and cashmere, tweed and waxed cotton. Fry wasn’t at all surprised when she heard their accents and discovered they both came from Luton.

‘We noticed all the activity, of course,’ said Martin Ridgeway, who wore the corduroy and waxed cotton over an Antartex shirt. ‘And a young constable called about an hour ago to ask us if we noticed anything suspicious in the early hours of Sunday morning.’

‘And did you notice anything, sir?’

‘No.’

He invited Fry into the house, which she thought was probably further than the young constable had got. She was taken into a dining room, with six spindle chairs around a polished table. A spiral staircase with cast-iron balustrades led to a first-floor gallery, what must have been a hayloft or something at one time.

‘We’re members of Neighbourhood Watch, you know,’ said Ridgeway. ‘But our co-ordinator says the police won’t give him any information. Has there been another robbery?’

‘Another?’

His eyes widened in astonishment. ‘You don’t even know about them?’

‘No, I’m sorry. Right now, we’re conducting enquiries into a suspicious death.’

‘Good heavens! We didn’t know that. But I suppose we ought to have guessed it was something more high profile, to justify all this activity. Who is it that’s died?’

‘Miss Rose Shepherd, at Bain House.’

‘Oh,’ said Ridgeway.

He sounded distinctly non-committal, as if he didn’t want to appear either too upset or too pleased at the news.

Fry thought of Keith Wade, the Mullens’ neighbour back at Darwin Street. It was odd that both Ridgeway and Wade were members of their respective Neighbourhood Watch schemes, one in a well- off rural community and the other on an Edendale housing estate. There were no superficial similarities between them, but theoretically Martin Ridgeway ought to be equally well informed about his neighbours.

‘What do you know about Rose Shepherd, sir?’ she asked.