He couldn’t face the crib. Down below, he heard someone else enter the house and brushed the tears from his face before going downstairs. His superior was looking through the envelopes on the table, and a police photographer stood by the front door, waiting to go up. Penrose nodded to him, then joined Inspector Cornish on the other side of the room. ‘Looks like she planned it,’ Cornish said.

‘Did she leave a note?’

‘No, but she’d made sure her affairs were in order, such as they are. Give the woman her due – she didn’t want to die in debt.’ He handed the envelopes over, meeting Penrose’s eye for the first time. ‘It’s obviously as bad as they said, then. You look bloody awful.’

‘I’ve never seen anything like it, sir.’

‘And there’s nothing to suggest anyone else was involved?’7

‘Not as far as I can see.’

The first envelope was labelled ‘Mr Taylor’s rent’ and contained a modest amount of money. The second was addressed to the Railway Benevolent Fund, and Penrose read the brief note inside: ‘Dear Sir, please accept this letter as confirmation that I do not require any more help from this institution.’ The handwriting was neat and fluent, something which Penrose found as surprising as the sentiment. ‘Do we know anything about her circumstances?’ he asked.

‘She was a widow, according to one of the neighbours. Her husband died a few months before the youngest child was born – killed in a railway accident, hence the help she’d been getting. They say she kept herself to herself, but she loved her kids. If I had a shilling for every time I’ve heard that …’

There was a cynical note in his voice, but Penrose looked again at the parcels under the tree. ‘How many children did she have?’ he asked.

Cornish shrugged. ‘How many are up there?’

‘Four, but there are six presents, so there might be a child missing. Two if she didn’t buy anything for herself.’

The inspector nodded, chafing his hands against the cold. ‘Good thinking, Penrose. Go and find out, and get a statement from the bloke next door. I’d better have a look upstairs.’

The crowd outside was growing steadily, and there were bound to be one or two news reporters sniffing round by now, so Penrose decided to use the back entrance. Each house had its own small yard and the snow here was deep and untouched, a refreshing contrast to the compacted mess of slush and dirt to which the street had been reduced. If they had been looking for signs of an intruder, another heavy snowfall in the early hours would have foiled them; as it was, 8Penrose was grateful to step out into something clean and invigorating, into something natural. He stood in the middle of the yard, hoping that the shock of the cold might dull his other senses, but the memory of what he had seen continued to haunt him in vivid detail, and the more he tried to blot out the images, the more relentless they became. Further down the road, the bells of St Clement’s church began to ring.