The more I think about this, the more I know something’s not right. But calling Jansen was maybe premature. I get on the phone to Gert Roemers, head of the computer crimes unit at the station.

‘I thought you’d left,’ he says once I’ve got hold of him and made my request.

‘Sort of. But I’m thinking of writing my memoirs and I wanted to speak to a couple of people involved in old cases.’

Roemers makes a noise like liquid’s shooting out of his nose.

‘Memoirs? Jesus. You’re not putting me in them are you?’

‘No, you’re not interesting enough.’

‘Good. All right, give me the names; I’ll call you back.’

‘First is Robert Huisman. He’s on the system already, should be easy to trace. The second is Joos Wilders, who used to work in tech, retired about four years ago.’

I stuff the letter into my pocket and go to the houseboat moored next to mine. Leah answers the door. She’s seventy-ish, grey hair and piercing eyes the colour of which I’ve never quite been able to fathom. Atlantic Ocean in winter might be close. Leah’s been living here since the early seventies when she emigrated from New York to pursue her art, abstract sculptures made from pieces she finds on her frequent wanderings round the city: scrap metal, bits of bikes, plastic bags, branches from trees, used syringes. She finds a use for everything. Her deck has a constantly changing array, and so many tourists stopped to take photos that she eventually bent her artistic principles enough to actually contemplate selling the odd piece. Now if you catch her on a good day she might even take cash. As to men, there’ve been many over the years, but none of them for long. She once told me she felt stifled, suffocated even, if one of them stayed more than four or five days. None of them ever reached six, as far as I could tell.

I give her a spare set of keys – they were Tanya’s and have a ghost of her scent, even just holding them brings back that gnawing regret – and ask her to look out for the electrician.

‘That yours?’ she asks, pointing to the Mustang.

‘Yeah,’ I say and for some reason feel a slight swell of pride.

‘Shame …’ she says, staring at it wistfully over my shoulder.

Back on board the houseboat Roemers calls. He’s got Wilders’ address, which I scribble down quickly. Huisman, though, is going to take him a little longer, he tells me. I ask him how long. He says something smart about a bit of string. I tell him to get on with it.

I’m just getting ready to leave when my phone goes off again. Nellie de Vries, Hank’s wife. I debate not answering for a moment, but we’ve not spoken recently so …