‘Not always, unfortunately.’ Gillard thanked him before hanging up. The secrets of the Willow women would soon be uncovered. In the days of modern electronics, you need a very savvy technical mind to keep ahead of the police. Going on the run required cutting off communications entirely, something he didn’t think Crystal would do. It was only five minutes later when Townsend patched through a call from the control room at Thames Valley Police.

‘Two patrol units arrived at South View Caravan and Camping fifteen minutes ago, sir,’ the female operative said. ‘No sign of the target vehicle or the missing female.’

‘Make sure they ask about Blanchard too, while they are searching,’ Gillard said. He asked them to forward any ANPR details of the camper van from the region, thanked them and hung up.

The rest of the journey home was quiet. As he turned into his own street Gillard turned his thoughts to his aunt and wondered what Sam had been expected to deal with. The two days she had spent with them had been stressful. Gillard had on several occasions been stirred from his sleep by the tones of the BBC World Service coming from the next bedroom at two or three o’clock in the morning. It wasn’t loud, but enough to disturb him. Trish, who had always had trouble sleeping, was in the habit of getting up at just after five a.m. The sound of her moving about the house, clattering about in the kitchen, always woke them both. They knew from previous experience that Trish had a tendency to poke her nose into every cupboard and drawer as if she owned the place. Sam, who was now working some weekend shifts, had never been happy about leaving Trish on her own in the house during the day, even though one of their retired neighbours popped in every couple of hours. The sheer presence of the woman chilled the atmosphere. Craig and Sam had few enough waking hours together as it was. Last night, for no apparent reason, they’d had a row about nothing in particular. Sam had stormed off, and when Gillard turned to see his aunt in the doorway, she had a look of grim satisfaction on her face.

‘What are you so happy about?’ he had shouted at her.

‘Don’t you worry, I’ll be gone tomorrow. I know you don’t want me around. You’ll be happy when I’m dead.’

Gillard’s attempts to deny this were as futile as they were half-hearted. They both knew the relationship had been broken for good by her abortive murder trial and the events surrounding it.

So when he was greeted by his wife at the door, he expected the worst. ‘How’s it going?’ he asked, indicating the bungalow opposite.

Sam beckoned him in, then closed the door behind him. ‘Fine to start with, but she’s fallen out with Harry and Rosemary about the cats.’