‘Are you referring to your son’s predilection for young girls?’

‘You know I am, Inspector. I might be old but I’m not senile. As soon as you gave me your name at the door it clicked. Janet told me weeks ago that Annie Kellerman had moved back here with her policeman husband and that her name is now Annie Walker. I assumed she told you all about her relationship with Daniel, which, by the way, came as much of a shock to me as it did to her parents. Her dad and me fell out over it and we never did get back on speaking terms before he died. And that was a shame because I liked him. The whole thing fucked up Daniel’s life and he was forced to relocate, which was when he got himself into even more trouble.’

‘So why does he come back here to Kirkby Abbey when he knows he’s not wanted?’ James asked.

‘Because I’m his father, his only living relative, and I want to see him. I know most people will never forgive him for what he did, but I have. He’s not like that any more and I want to spend as much time with him as I can before it’s my turn to part from this world.’

James could see that the old man was getting worked up and he didn’t want to be the one to bring on a heart attack. So he stood and thanked him for his time. But before leaving he got Ron to give him Daniel’s phone number and address in Keswick, which he did with a clear degree of reluctance.

Back in the patrol car, James turned the conversation over in his mind. The bit that stood out was Ron saying, ‘Rats like him don’t deserve to live.’

It reminded James of the sentence in the Twelve Days of Christmas card he’d received:

And they all deserve what’s coming to them.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

The debrief got under way in the village hall at five-thirty. By then it was dark outside and the temperature had begun to plummet. But the blizzards that were forecast still hadn’t arrived and that was something that James and the team were thankful for.

Inspector Boyd began by saying that his officers had drawn a blank on the house-to-house. Nobody they spoke to had spotted Charlie Jenkins walking his dog on Saturday night. The last time he was seen by anyone other than his wife had been in The White Hart just before closing time.

The news from the crime scene was just as disappointing. An exhaustive search of the field where the body was found had yielded sod all.

James then gave an account of his interviews with Sonia Jenkins, Janet Dyer and Ron Curtis.

‘All three of them had serious issues with the victim,’ he said. ‘And all three claim they were in bed when he was attacked. At the moment, the wife is saying all the right things and she sounds convincing, but it could be a front. It’s possible her husband’s infidelity caused her to snap and she followed him into that field. But if she did, would she really have left their dog out all night to freeze to death? I’m not so sure.’