The runner, who looked as if he couldn’t believe that someone had had the audacity to bar his path, was too breathless and reddened in his sweaty, pock-marked features to answer. In fact, all he could do now was lean over and cough up a load of phlegm. The builder, whom Lucy recognised as Jimmy Ogden, a native of the next street to theirs in Saltbridge, and a bloke who’d been sweet on her mother for many years, shook his head and pointed back across the car park.

‘You’re going nowhere, pal, but back there. The officer wants to speak to you. I heard her, so I’m damn sure you did. Now you be a good law-abiding citizen, like what you’re supposed to. Then I won’t have to rip your neck out.’

The lad didn’t need to wait long. Lucy was there in less than a second, grabbing him by the collar of his leather jacket. She mouthed a ‘thanks’ at Ogden.

He winked in return and gave her a thumbs-up.

It wasn’t always the case that Lucy could physically overpower a male suspect, despite her athletic physique, and most of the time she didn’t even try. But it soon became clear that this guy was all skin and bone. She considered the possibility that he might have a concealed weapon, but at present he was too busy struggling for breath after his brief exertion to do anything other than turn limp in her grasp as she marched him down a narrow passage and, when she found space between two wheelie-bins, slam him back against the wall.

‘Okay … who are you?’

‘You, you …?’ The guy was still sweaty and pink, but now he looked surprised as well. ‘You don’t know who I am, and you chased me?’

‘I didn’t chase you … you ran. And anyway, I might not know who you are, but I do know what you are.’

‘I’ve not done nothing.’

‘Maybe not today. Not yet. What about last Saturday night? Hang around the homeless crowd for their company, do you?’

He shook his head, rank sweat dripping off his unwashed mane. ‘I’ve not done nothing.’

‘You realise I’m fully entitled to search you?’ Lucy said. ‘That’s because I suspect you to be carrying illegal drugs. That why you were heading back to St Clement’s … to make a bit more money out of people who’ve got nothing as it is?’

He was recovering now, breathing heavily rather than panting. ‘You’ve got to show me your ID, you have to tell me who you are, what nick you come from.’

‘So, you’ve been stopped and searched before?’

‘I know my rights, that’s all.’

‘Well … I do have to do all that, you’re correct.’ She released his collar. ‘If I decide to proceed with the search.’

He didn’t reply to that but looked bewildered.