‘Who were you speaking to on the phone after we first found Simeon?’ Priest asked when they reached the crossroads. Busy commuters ghosted past them, weaving in and out like worker ants. The traffic was backed up and a set of temporary lights had been installed around several open holes surrounded by cones.

‘I told you. My boss, Max.’

‘You’re freelance. You don’t have a boss.’

She took another drag. ‘Everyone has a boss, Mr Priest. Even freelancers. Don’t you?’

‘Not for a while.’

She smiled, but not with her eyes. ‘Lucky you. What about a girl?’

‘Not for a while,’ said Priest, less certainly. Fox still had her arm linked into his. Priest suddenly felt very conscious of it – and of her stare. He looked around and wondered what Jessica would think if she were standing on the other side of the road, watching him.

‘Assuming that your boss knows about what happened, I imagine Simeon’s death is now public knowledge?’

She looked at the floor and found something interesting to move around with her foot. ‘They can’t stop me. I haven’t signed a confidentiality agreement.’

He decided to change track. ‘What’s your interest in the Elias case?’

‘I think there’s more to it than your libel action,’ she said in a ponderous tone. ‘And given the body in my boot I feel pretty vindicated, don’t you think?’

‘What about The Real Byte?’

Fox shrugged. ‘They’re run by Tomas Jansen. I don’t know much more than that – nothing about the other staff.’

‘You know Jansen?’

‘Everyone in journalism knows Jansen. Or at least they’ve heard of him.’

He looked away for a moment. ‘How so?’

‘He gets up people’s noses, as do many tiresome socialists. The people versus the establishment and all that – it’s all been done before and much better.’

He looked back at her. ‘You don’t approve?’

She smirked – it was a very childish gesture and conjured up a picture of freckles and pigtails in Priest’s mind. ‘It’s not that I don’t approve. I’m just saying that there is a growing tide of wariness for Marxist clichés.’

‘Which you are a part of? Or not a part of?’

She laughed, a little more grown up this time. ‘Mr Priest – I am the embodiment of neutrality.’ She winked at him and suddenly the little girl was back.

‘No doubt,’ Priest mumbled.

Fox smiled, pleased. ‘I don’t know what to do next. They’ve kept my car.’

‘Where do you live?’ Priest already knew, but didn’t want to let on.

‘Blackheath.’