‘Winter jasmine,’ McCreadie offered, as though reading McNab’s mind, ‘which flowers here in spring. If it gets too bright, I’ll close some blinds. I like the light. If I was an artist, I’d paint in here.’

Once settled, a tray arrived via the housekeeper to be placed on a table between them.

After a quick, ‘Thank you, Lucy,’ McCreadie said, ‘I can offer tea or coffee. If you’d rather a soft drink, I have some in the little fridge over there.’

Both McNab and Janice opted for coffee.

‘You like yours strong, DS McNab,’ McCreadie said with confidence. ‘I sense another caffeine addict. As for DS Clark, there’s hot water in the jug if you need to dilute it a bit. Can I ask you to pour? My tendons don’t allow me to lift a heavy pot.’

Janice did the honours and McNab took a long swallow of the strong and delicious coffee.

‘Better, I imagine, than what gets served up at some vending machine at the station?’ McCreadie suggested. ‘In my day, it was big pots of stewed tea that kept us going, especially on all-nighters.’ He paused there as though fondly recalling his former life for a moment.

He’s trying to get us on side, McNab thought. And it’s working as far as Janice is concerned.

‘Okay,’ McCreadie was saying. ‘Fire away.’

‘When you spoke to DI Wilson you asked if we’d found a wee girl in a confirmation dress. Why?’ Janice began.

McCreadie sat back in the leather armchair. ‘Because it’s the one that haunts me the most. The one I gave up my job over.’

A story McCreadie, no doubt, was keen to recount. McNab didn’t ask him to elaborate, but with a glance at Janice, proceeded as planned.

‘No autopsy report to confirm as yet, but the well-preserved body Dr MacLeod unearthed is thought to be that of a girl, aged somewhere between ten and fourteen, both sex and age still to be forensically confirmed.’

‘Is that Dr Rhona MacLeod, the forensic scientist involved in the sin-eater case?’ McCreadie immediately asked.

McNab nodded, made uneasy by the sudden and unexpected detour.

‘I followed that case closely,’ McCreadie went on. ‘The accessibility of forensic science to the general public, and of course by extension to the criminal world, is a concern of mine.’

McNab wondered if this sudden declaration was for his benefit. If McCreadie had done his homework like the detective he’d been and perhaps still was, then, McNab realized, he would likely know two key things about him: that he’d been demoted (like McCreadie) for going his own way in the Stonewarrior case; and that he believed making forensic knowledge easily accessible was putting the police force at both a disadvantage and, in Rhona’s case, in danger.

Unwilling to respond in a way that indicated his own feelings on the matter, McNab carried on as before.

‘The body was unclothed but there was clothing in there with her,’ he said, making no mention of the plastic bag.