“Where did you stay during that six months?”

“With friends in Bristol. Different friends. I moved around a lot.”

“Did you report to a probation officer during that time?” He nodded. “I was on parole,” he said. “I wasn’t going to take any risks. I couldn’t see the point of it, but I did as I was told.”

“Where did you go?”

“To the office in White Heath, just outside Bristol. A friend from the prison lived on the estate there.”

“What was the name of your probation officer?” Claire Bingham held her breath, convinced for a moment that he would name Jane Pym. There were so many coincidences in this case that one more seemed inevitable. But Rosco shook his head, unaware of her tension.

“I can’t remember,” he said. “It was a man. Young. Straight out of college. I expect there’ll be records somewhere.”

“And when you left prison,” she asked, “did you go to stay with your mysterious friends immediately?”

“No,” he said. “Not straight away. They couldn’t put me up straight away. The welfare officer in the nick found me a place for a while. In a probation hostel. I wasn’t there for long. There was a fire, and they moved everyone out.”

Then there was the inevitable coincidence. Claire had discovered the link between Louis Rosco and Greg Franks which Wargan was so certain existed. She sat back in her chair and regarded the man with wonder and pity. It was as if he had convicted himself.

“Can you remember any of the other residents at the hostel?” she asked.

“No,” he said with indifference. “ They were mostly youngsters. I didn’t mix much.”

Again she was astounded by the folly of his confession. It was possible, of course, that he had no memory of meeting Greg Franks in the hostel, though the memory of the fire meant they must have been there at the same time. Alternatively, if he was the killer and the murder stemmed from the meeting four years before, perhaps he thought it wise to admit to staying there. If he was not aware that all the records had been lost in the fire, he would assume that the police would find out anyway. Most likely, she thought, looking at his brown, blank, ordinary face, he had been trapped by a coincidence the superintendent would never believe, and for a moment she felt ashamed of her part in it. She even considered letting him go back to the cottage, but she had her career to think of and decided it would be safer to keep him there. They would have to search the place before they allowed him back.