Lucy rustled through them. It was true. Whereas the victims in the other eight cases had all been OAPs, the latter two were a single mother and her child, who’d been away on holiday in Blackpool when the burglary occurred, and an Irish barman who’d been home in Dublin for the weekend.’

‘Okay … but there has to be more to it than that.’

‘There is,’ Harry said. ‘Both the single mum and the Irish barman’s properties got trashed during the break – typical pillhead job. Total jerks looking for anything they could to score. You’ll note that both medical cabinets were raided.’

Lucy skim-read the reports again. ‘Yeah …’

‘Well … in the other eight, they weren’t. In fact, there was no unnecessary or gratuitous damage at all.’

Despite her earlier annoyance with him, Lucy had to give him marks for this; it was a good spot.

‘So, whoever did these eight OAPs is a more organised offender?’ she said. ‘But that doesn’t tie in with the opportunist element.’

Harry shrugged. ‘Maybe not. But just because he’s organised, that doesn’t make him Raffles. Look … if nothing else, he knew what he was looking for. In each case the intruder went straight to the place where the goodies were stored.’

Lucy re-checked the eight connected burglaries. On second assessment, there were distinct similarities. In the case of Reg Murgatroyd, for instance, the intruder had gone straight to a bedside cabinet where the two rings were kept, and removed them. According to the sit-rep by the PC who’d first attended, there was no other evidence of damage in the bungalow, apart from the forcing of a rear window. Whoever it was, they had not needed to search for valuables. It was the same story with the others. None of the premises had been ransacked before theft.

‘At first, I thought this had to be someone who’d been inside the houses beforehand,’ Harry said. ‘You know … who’d had a good mooch around legitimately.’

‘You mean like a tradesman?’ Lucy said. ‘A builder, a decorator?’

‘Yeah. But none of these eight have had any work done recently. And anyway, it wouldn’t have taken us long to follow that line of enquiry. He’d surely know we’d nab him.’ Harry pursed his lips. Now that they were back on the job together, he seemed relaxed again, more focussed. ‘So, the question remains … how does he know where the good stuff, such as it is, is stashed?’

It was a conundrum, for sure, and one they’d both need to apply their thinking caps too.

‘I take it you’ve already done a door-to-door?’ Lucy said.

‘Canvassed half the bloody estate. No one curious hanging around anywhere.’