“Really?” DS glanced around. “No accounting for taste, I suppose. What do you want?”

Kim looked at him, assessing, and Will had the sudden, odd sense that there was another conversation happening, one he wasn’t hearing. “I want Will safe, with the charges dropped and his name cleared. And we need the murder weapon back, his knife. It has sentimental value.”

“That’s you two in a nutshell,” DS said. “Nothing else?”

“Yes.” Kim’s shoulders straightened. “I want to come back to work. Sir.”

DS looked at him, unblinking, for a very long moment, then his lips twitched. “So I should hope. It’s about time you stopped lolling around: idle young men will be the ruin of this country. What is it, Saturday? Come to the office on Tuesday. Not before ten: I shall have to gird my loins and let the staff know to brace themselves. And—” His gaze flicked to Will. “It seems to me you’re in urgent need of occupation as well, Mr. Darling.”

“I’ve got an occupation,” Will pointed out. “I run a bookshop.”

“Run a bookshop, pave Secretan’s way with bodies, and hang off the wrong side of yachts in your spare time. I’m not sure who you’re trying to fool.”

“Possibly I could put this proposal to him in a slightly less adversarial way?” Kim suggested.

“Why would you bother? Come along on Tuesday, Mr. Darling. You can collect your lethal weapon then.”

“What about Chingford, though?” Will asked. “What’s going to happen to him?”

“Nothing he’s going to enjoy,” DS said, in a matter-of-fact tone that hit harder than any threat. “He has a very great deal to account for, and I shall see to it he does. I don’t tolerate attacks on my people.”

“Technically, at the time, I wasn’t—” Kim began.

“Don’t be silly,” DS said with a faint smile. “Of course you were.”

***

THAT AFTERNOON, WILL borrowed a walking stick and they wandered the grounds with Phoebe and Maisie, enjoying the summer sun and, in Maisie’s case, the stability of the earth beneath her feet.

“I’m never going on a boat again. We’re flying back to Paris. Planes are wonderful.”

“But you are going back?” Will said. “I wondered, with Phoebe’s title—”

“Oh, that won’t change anything,” Phoebe said airily. “Or rather, it will be wonderful for publicity—we thought ‘Waring’s’ for the boutique, supplying exclusive Maison Zie designs. I certainly shan’t be retiring to the country to hunt and shoot fish. I can’t imagine anything more ghastly.”

“Paris, then. But we’ll see you soon?”

“You’ll have to pay us a visit,” Phoebe said. “We want to show everything off and we can’t always be running around after you two. We’re professional women, you know.”

“I dare say we’ll manage the trip,” Kim said. “Thank you both for coming. For everything.”