‘What is it?’ Fielding asked, his earlier hesitation now replaced by curiosity, but Penrose didn’t answer. He stared down at the old-fashioned decoration, a cotton-wool snowman exactly like the one that had hung on Marlene’s Christmas tree, except that this one was stained with blood. Now he realised what it had reminded him of, that niggling moment of recognition that he hadn’t quite been able to place. The sight of Richard Hartley with his throat slit – just like the children they had been discussing only the night before – took him back to that house in the slums as if it were yesterday, to that scruffy tree, so pathetic in the truest sense of the word, and to the deep, inconsolable sadness that always resurfaced at this time of year in his work, even if it belonged to a different crime and a different family, to a different human tragedy but one which was nonetheless connected on some fundamental level with those that came before it.

‘What is it?’ Fielding asked again, and Penrose realised how strange his silence must seem.

He held the decoration out in his hand. ‘Make sure you get every detail,’ he said, and waited quietly while Fielding did as he was told, appreciating a moment to think. It was the second time in two days and the first time in years that he had thought of those children, and he wondered what had happened to the brother and sister who survived the massacre. He had tried to keep in touch with the case, driven by an unprofessional but inevitable attachment to the orphans he had found in such distress, but once they were surrendered 180to the authorities they were lost to him – and of course they would have been given new names, as if that could wipe out their past. Would he recognise them now, he wondered? If one of them passed him in the street, would he even know?

‘Give me the camera,’ he said, when Fielding had finished his work.

‘Why?’

‘Because although I’m fairly sure you’re not stupid enough to give these photographs to your editor or sell them to the highest bidder, I’d rather remove the temptation completely.’ He smiled, taking the edge off his words. ‘Hand it over. I’ll make sure any photographs that are yours are sent back to The Times as soon as they’re developed.’

‘Yes, sir.’

Penrose took the camera and rewound the film, then removed it and put it in his pocket. ‘Thank you, but you don’t have to call me sir – not unless you’re applying for a job.’

Fielding shrugged. ‘A change of scene might do me good. We’ll have to see how the pictures turn out.’ He removed a hip flask from his pocket, and waved it at Penrose. ‘You don’t mind if I have a drink? I could do with one after this.’

‘Go ahead. You can join the others in the dining room now if you like, but I need you to give me your word that you won’t discuss this scene with anyone else here. Is that understood?’