Lord Arthur, the Bolshevik, who had refused to do his duty in the war but somehow pulled strings to avoid punishment, whose estrangement from his family was well known, who lived the high life on, it said here, an inheritance from his maternal uncle who’d had a patent on some sort of dye. Will had wondered where the money came from. Plenty on the Red politics he no longer espoused, even more on his relationship with Bright Young Person Phoebe Stephens-Prince and their broken engagement after the events around her father’s death. It all read pretty damningly as a portrait of an unreliable, unpatriotic, nasty piece of work.

As if things needed to get worse, the section on Johnnie Cheveley’s death said Kim had been “accompanied by decorated ex-serviceman William Darling”, and there was a bloody photograph. It was from the inquest, showing Will with his arm in a sling and his hair for once sleeked under control, but it was still recognisably him. Will felt cold all over, looking at it. He didn’t want to start seeing himself in newspapers. He had too many notches on his knife and his bedpost for that.

At least there was nothing on Peacock, and nothing that would hurt Phoebe. Nobody would read the piece and come away liking the Secretans, but that was the least of their worries.

Kim still hadn’t called back. Will hovered over the telephone for a bit and stopped himself from picking it up. If Kim wanted to call, he would. He told himself that several times as the next hour ticked by, with the slow-growing feeling in his gut that he’d really bollocksed up.

He didn’t pay much attention when the man came into his shop, though in fairness, if he kicked out all the shifty-looking characters, he wouldn’t sell many books. This one was a sharp-faced chap in a mac. “William Darling?”

“That’s me. Can I help?”

“Terence Welwyn, from the Daily Mail. I wonder if you have a minute.” He didn’t wait for an answer. “I hope you can give me a bit of background. I’m writing about the Chingford case. You know Lord Arthur Secretan pretty well, don’t you?”

Will’s first instinct was to turf him out by the seat of his trousers, but his first instinct hadn’t served him well yesterday. He went for his fallback position: obstructiveness. “Don’t know about that.”

“He’s been working here, hasn’t he?”

“That’s right.”

“That’s very interesting. Why is a lord working in a bookshop?”

“He likes books,” Will said, letting his face assume the Stolid Incurious Rustic expression he’d used a lot in the Army.

“What’s he like to work with?”

“All right.”

“Would you say he’s a good bookseller?”

“He’s all right.”