Her secret source. He was finally going to tell her. Then she could reveal to them all what she’d been investigating – her mum, her boss, the whole darn world. This story was her coup, a piece to blast Piers – the competition – out of the water. There was only one job. And two trainees hungry for it.

Becky waited on the platform with the crowds of grey-clad commuters. She had to beat Piers. Her mum’s comment that morning, something that came up every now and then, was a trouble-maker of a sentiment that broke her heart every time it surfaced: her mum thinking she’d not done enough through her childhood, feeling like she’d let her down or something. It had been hard, there was no denying it, but Becky knew her mum had done her best.

Getting this job was her way of showing her mum she’d done all right.

THREE

‘So, have you had the fence people round?’ asked Kate. She knelt by Iris’s back door, holding a tower bolt against the frame, and marked the screw holes with a bradawl. She liked doing things for her, it gave her an opportunity to pay back this woman who had helped so much over the years, who had been the mother Kate had never had.

‘They can’t come until tomorrow, they’re too busy,’ said Iris, lowering herself into a kitchen chair; the last few inches of her descent were an uncontrolled plunge, and her relief showed at having made it safely. ‘All these high winds we’ve been having. They say there’s a shortage of panels.’

‘We’ve got loads in the shop,’ said Kate, then wished she hadn’t. There was nothing to be gained by highlighting that the fence company were spinning Iris a line. ‘I’m sure they know what they’re doing,’ she added quickly.

Iris raised an eyebrow. ‘Sound like a bunch of fibbers to me.’

‘If they don’t turn up tomorrow, I’ll get onto someone else. There’s a bloke who comes into the shop quite a bit. Seems decent. I’ll get his number.’

‘Thanks, love.’

Kate took a sip of chestnut-coloured tea from a mug decorated with an assortment of garden birds. ‘The police find out who it was?’

‘How can they? But I know they’re from the college. Every year we get trouble. Some new bunch, hanging out at the park, causing mischief, smoking those funny cigarettes. They’re doing a door-to-door at least. See if anyone’s seen anything, had any bother. Did they come to you this morning?’

‘I had to go to work. They’ll probably catch up with us later.’

‘Weren’t you working at the weekend? I thought you were cutting back your hours, now Becky’s left university.’

‘Back down to five days, week after next.’

Iris patted Kate’s shoulder. ‘Good. You worked all the hours God sent to get that lovely girl of yours an education, a proper start in life.’

Kate shrugged. ‘She’s the one who got herself a traineeship on a respected national paper. Beat all those others. Over two thousand applied, apparently.’ She picked up her drill. ‘This is the noisy bit.’