A rhetorical question, but Ashworth answered it in his head. Oh, aye, I know. The number of times I’ve dropped her back there when she’s been too pissed to drive. Or when she’s summoned me at a moment’s notice to talk over a case.

‘You can’t think I killed her?’

Ashworth thought this had really just occurred to Connie. The idea cut through her depression and her hangover. She stared at him now, clear-eyed and horrified.

‘Some folk would think you had a motive. If it hadn’t been for her, you’d still have a job. You wouldn’t be stuck in this place living off benefit, all the world calling you names.’

‘No!’ Connie stood up to make her point. ‘That was down to me. If I’d followed best practice, if I’d made one phone call to Elias’s teacher, if I’d made the effort to visit in the evening when I knew I’d catch him in with Morgan, I’d still be working and I wouldn’t have had my picture all over the newspapers. I didn’t kill Elias. His mother did that. And Jenny Lister didn’t get me the sack. I managed to cock up my professional life all on my own.’

‘She could have backed you up a bit more, twisted the story to get you out of bother.’

Connie smiled and he saw for the first time that she was an attractive woman. ‘Nah,’ she said, ‘that was never going to happen. Not Jenny’s style.’

‘Where were you yesterday morning?’ He was starting to be convinced by her story, but he wasn’t going to let that show.

‘What time?’

‘Between about eight and eleven-thirty.’

‘I was here until nine, when I took Alice to playgroup. That starts at nine-fifteen. I drove her up to the hall and dropped her off, then went into Hexham for an hour. A treat to myself. Window-shopping and a decent coffee. Not quite the same as going into Newcastle, but all I could manage in the time. It was a nice day, so I brought the car back here and walked into the village to collect Alice.’

Ashworth looked out and saw that the rain had stopped. The sky – what you could see of it through the dripping trees – was starting to lighten. ‘Where did you park in Hexham?’

‘Next to the big supermarket, just up from the station.’

‘I don’t suppose you kept the parking ticket?’

‘I didn’t have a parking ticket!’ She was starting to get annoyed now and he liked her better this way: fiery, standing up for herself, rather than listless, all the energy sucked out of her. ‘There’s free parking there, though it’s a bit of a walk into town. I save on the parking and buy myself a coffee instead. Those are the kind of calculations I have to make, living on benefit and the pitiful maintenance my husband contributes for his daughter.’

‘Did you meet anyone you know?’

‘I don’t know anyone out here in the sticks.’