The two men nodded and moved on, closing a door quietly behind them.

Hudson’s office felt like a doctor’s consulting room, with soothing décor, interesting pot plants and certificates framed on the wall. Who did funeral directors get certificates from, Fry wondered. Were there classes in undertaking at night school? A diploma in coffin manufacture at High Peak College?

‘You realize there are quite a lot of people like that?’ said Hudson, after Fry had explained what she wanted.

‘Like what?’

‘People who make a hobby of going to funerals. We see them all the time. Sometimes we joke to each other that a funeral isn’t complete without our usual little bunch of habitual mourners.’

‘You mean they go to the funerals of people they never knew?’

‘Of course,’ said Hudson. ‘They watch the church notice boards, or read the death announcements in the Eden Valley Times to see what funerals are coming up. And then they plan their diaries for the week ahead. For some people, funerals are their favourite type of outing. They become social occasions. Perhaps even a place where they meet new people.’

Hudson must have noticed the shocked expression on Fry’s face.

‘It’s perfectly harmless,’ he said. ‘These are people who simply like funerals.’

‘And you recognize these individuals when they turn up?’

‘Oh, yes. Many of them are familiar faces to staff at Hudson and Slack, as they are to all my colleagues in this area.’

Fry saw Cooper open his mouth as if about to join in, but she gave him a glance to shut him up. As he dropped his eyes to his notebook, an unruly lock of hair fell over his forehead. She ought to suggest it was time for a haircut again.

‘I don’t suppose you could let me have some names, Mr Hudson?’ she said.

‘As it happens, yes. The Eden Valley Times used to publish lists of mourners on its obituary page until quite recently, and it was usually our job to collect the names. We did it as part of our service to the bereaved family, you see. The names wouldn’t be hard to find, anyway. You’d only need to look through a few back copies of the newspaper and check the obituary pages, and you’d see them listed as mourners at almost every funeral in the area.’

‘No addresses, though?’

Hudson shrugged. ‘I can’t help you with that. The only thing I can say is that they tend to stick to funerals on their own patch. They don’t travel very much for their hobby.’

Fry nodded. ‘What about Wardlow?’

‘Well, that’s different,’ said Hudson. ‘A small village, a few miles out of town – there aren’t many funerals in a place like that, as you can imagine. Hudson and Slack are one of the busiest funeral directors in the valley, but we don’t do more than one job a year in Wardlow, if that. So if there were habitual mourners in Wardlow, I wouldn’t recognize them.’