Richard was appalled by the press conference and only thankful for its brevity. DS Foster had warned them the journalists might ask some awkward, even stupid, questions and he’d been right about that. Martha was visibly upset by the last question in particular. It was the first time the possibility of Danny being dead had been verbalised, and although it had been in all their minds it made the prospect of losing their son real and frightening and Martha broke down in tears at the very thought. Richard was furious – it was as if Danny was suddenly public property and everyone had a right to offer an opinion on where and how he was.

DI Radford took the last question as a prompt to end the conference and as Richard led his wife from the room, he wondered if the whole sickening experience was worth any new leads it might turn up.

‘I need to get Martha home,’ he told the detectives, who nodded in understanding. Yet it was himself he wanted to get home – or away from the police station at least. Richard was conscious that a phone call could come at any time and he wanted to be alone when it did.

Radford looked at him, the detective’s face like granite. ‘You’ll most likely hear from the kidnappers again this evening. I’ll come round at about five but if you hear from them in the meantime ring me straight away.’

Richard shuffled uncomfortably but nodded his agreement. Despite feeling guilty at his deception, it was too late now and he had no intention of telling Radford what was really going on.

Martha was quiet on the way home. They were again driven by DS Foster who attempted to make conversation but gave up when it became clear that neither Richard nor Martha could find the energy to converse. Foster went into the house only briefly to collect the uniformed constable who’d been there in case there was a phone call, which there had not been.

As soon as the officers closed their front door, Richard left his wife to be comforted by her mother and hurried upstairs to switch on the burner phone. He punched the wall furiously when he saw there’d been three missed calls but the physical pain to his hand didn’t distract from his frustration. The calls were from withheld numbers, leaving no option other than to wait until they called again. With the phone switched on and pushed deep into his trouser pocket, Richard went downstairs to see how Martha was.

Elaine was quizzing her daughter as to the details of the press conference.

‘Why don’t you go and lie down, Martha,’ Richard suggested. She looked at him, gratitude in her eyes and moved towards the stairs.

‘You’ll see it for yourself on the evening news, Elaine – she’s gone through enough interrogating for one day.’