They got their drinks, and found a table. Liz was a bit on edge, because she was due to meet Ben’s sister for the first time. Claire was expected to arrive in another half an hour, though it would be par for the course if she was late. So he and Liz had some time together first.

‘How did you get on at the vet’s?’ she asked.

Cooper looked at her over his bottle. ‘Oh, that’s nice. I like the way you’re concerned about the cat, but you haven’t bothered asking how I am.’

‘I don’t need to ask about you. I can see you’re as always.’ She studied him for a moment. ‘It didn’t go well, then?’

He shook his head. ‘It’s kidney failure. It seems old Rand must be more ancient than he looks. That, or he’s led a riotous life.’

‘Is there anything they can do?’

‘Not without putting him through a lot of pain and discomfort.’

‘I see.’

‘So it’s just a matter of time.’

She grasped his hand. ‘I’m sorry.’

Cooper felt embarrassed. ‘He’s only a cat.’

‘Yeah, right.’

There was a silence while they drank, each with their own thoughts. And then, in that inevitable way that it always happened, they began talking about work. No, not really work – office gossip.

After a few minutes, Liz looked away as she asked him another question.

‘Do you think Diane Fry might be in need of some support?’ she said.

Cooper put down his drink. ‘What?’

‘Support. You know what support is, Ben.’

‘Right. But Diane –’

‘Yes, Diane Fry. She’s only human, you know. The talk is that she might be going through a bad time.’

Well, Cooper suspected that every week was a bad time for Diane Fry in one way or another, but he let it pass.

‘Why particularly now?’

‘The word around the station is that the new superintendent has it in for her. Doesn’t think she fits in.’

‘How is it that civilian staff always manage to gather far more information than detectives?’ said Cooper. But he didn’t really feel like joking. What Liz was saying matched his own feeling too closely.

He looked around the Hanging Gate. A thick brass rail and stools lined up at the bar. A trophy cabinet for the darts team. Rooms were separated by coloured glass panels. A florid-faced man with a bald head and a dark moustache came into the pub, and a young woman with unnaturally pale hair and sunglasses followed him. While he waited to be served at the bar, she walked past and found a seat near the back of the room. The bald man watched her all the way.

It was in this pub that Angie Fry had once tried to present him with a forged death certificate, expecting him to help her in a strategy to get her sister off her back. It recorded the death in Chapeltown, Sheffield, of Angela Jane Fry, aged thirty, and had been dated just over a year previously. It was the first time he’d ever sat at a table in a pub and talked to a dead person.