‘Welcome to water world,’ Gillard said. ‘Found those kids yet?’

He nodded, which shook a few extra drips onto the desk and carpet tiles. ‘They’re fine. Turned out to be with a neighbour. But we’ve another death, a rather sad tale. A lady of ninety-three had a heart attack in her car while waiting at some defective roadworks lights. It was stuck on red for an hour and a quarter in the pissing rain, but even though others overtook her and went past, she wouldn’t move. That makes three weather-related deaths.’

‘Three?’

‘Oh yeah, the fire service pulled out some teenage girl from a car stuck under Gorlaston Bridge in the early hours. Must’ve drowned hours before. Like to catch whichever bastard was the driver, leaving her there to die. They pulled her out by boat, and called me over to take a look. Poor kid.’

‘Do we know who she is?’

‘Not yet. Doesn’t match any of the recent missing person reports, at least none locally.’

‘Who is the on-call pathologist?’

‘Delahaye. Poor bugger is run ragged. I think the coroner’s office will call for reinforcements from London, but either way they’ll not get to these bodies for a few days.’

Dr David Delahaye was Gillard’s favourite forensic pathologist: a mind like a razor and a keen eye for details. With gangly limbs and with a balding dome of a head, he absolutely looked the part.

‘My role in this is to dig up the dirty on the vehicle,’ Perry said, shrugging off his anorak and dumping it on the back of a chair. ‘Once I’ve got a coffee.’

Gillard looked around and saw that, in the absence of most of the required staff, the incident room meeting was not going to happen on time. ‘I’m already logged into the DVLA. Pass me the registration number, if you go get us both a brew. Mine’s extra milky, no sugar.’

Perry agreed, passed across his notes, and after thanking Gillard strode off to the refectory, shaking drops of water everywhere.

Gillard copied in the number and waited. The record came up quite quickly. The car was very old. A 1982 Austin Allegro, in canary yellow. SORN, since 2012. Statutory off road notification. That meant the car was not taxed for road use, had no MOT to prove it was roadworthy, and would therefore not have been insured. He wasn’t surprised. Gillard’s own father had driven an Allegro and had cursed it almost daily. Supposedly cheap and economical, they weren’t much cop even from new. Those Allegros in good condition these days would presumably be worth a bit, but keeping them running would be the problem.

The last registered keeper was a Kevin O’Connell of Lacey Dutton Caravan Park. The detective quickly switched to the local database of criminal records, and typed in O’Connell’s details. Bingo! He had form. Drink-driving, failure to stop at an accident, driving while disqualified. No jail time, but several sizeable fines. His last disqualification had not yet ended. Reading between the lines, Gillard reckoned he knew why this driver might have disappeared from the scene of an accident. He’d done it before, after all.