“Laundry at Hampstead and TV repairs at Golders Green. Always something where bags and bundles wouldn’t look out of place. Perhaps the men were coming to mend that.” Nightingale pointed to the gas fire in the hearth. Three of its six jets were stuffed with corks.

“Domestic economy,” said Beddoes.

“But at Hampstead and Golders Green there was obviously collusion with servants who flitted. Who let them in here? Or could they just walk in? But who told—”

“Wait a bit. You know her name?”

“Carrikin. Rather odd.”

Beddoes frowned and shook his head in an aggrieved way. “Karukhin,” he pronounced, elegantly.

“It’s only what I was told,” retorted Nightingale, nettled. “Since you went on that Russian course you’ve been unbearable. Why don’t you transfer to Special Branch?”

“Run round seeing some nob doesn’t bruise his backside? Boil me first!”

“All right, all right. Karukhin. A real Russian? I mean, by birth?”

“Yes. Came over after the Rev according to Mrs. Minelli. By the way, she’s all right, Mrs. M. Even the Divi gives her the clear. Ex-waitress, naturalised ’39, in the nick. Had to work in a hospital in the war, and stayed there. Deserted by husband in ’41. Simple, devout, and all the rest. I’ve been talking to her.”

“So I gather.”

“Go in her room, and the first thing to hit you in the eye is the ikon over the mantelpiece. Reproduction of the Virgin of Vladimir.” Beddoes turned a transparent gaze on Nightingale for a moment. “She calls it a holy picture. Apparently one day in an air raid Mrs. Karukhin came on Mrs. M. saying the rosary on her knees in the passage. No words passed, and Mrs. M. thought no more of it till Mrs. K. appeared holding the ikon, handed it over and pointed imperiously at the mantelpiece. Up it went, pronto, and up it stayed. Mrs. M’s convinced it diverted the bomb to the other side of the road. This ikon, by the way, has a chased gold frame stuck with emeralds and rubies the size of marrowfats,” Beddoes explained with attempted nonchalance.

“Oh?” Nightingale surpassed him. “Sure?”

“If it’s brass and glass then the Divi’s wrong too. He saw it first. That’s when he decided to let you know. Remember they took all that horrible shiny china from Hampstead.”

“Nymphenburg porcelain, yes. So there seems to be a line in objets d’art as well as jewels—assuming that there was anything more up here, and that these are the same people. Certainly it’s unusual to keep a trunk entirely empty, especially if there’s not much cupboard space in your one room.”