‘I’ve just come from my friend Paula’s house. Her husband, who’s also my friend, and my work colleague, he’s gone missing. Something’s happened to him, it must have done. It’s so out of character.’

Meredith felt an utter heel, being so disingenuous. She knew so much that might help find him, yet she was saying nothing to anybody.

‘Oh no! How long is he missing for?’

‘Just over a day so far. But there’s no way he’d vanish without a word.’

‘I am sorry, Meredith. That is very worrying.’

Meredith gave her a tight-lipped smile. ‘Don’t be nice to me. I might cry.’

‘Let me give you haircut instead. Try to take your mind off it!’

‘OK,’ she said, thinking that it would take a lot more than a trim. ‘Thanks Andrea – if you’re sure. But you must let me pay you.’

Andrea flapped her hands. ‘Certainly not! Come.’

Meredith brought her half-finished drink inside, following Andrea into her tiny little salon. Andrea settled her in the black leather chair and velcroed the plastic cape around her neck, before wetting her hair with water from a squirty bottle and combing it through. The gentle bite of the comb’s teeth against Meredith’s scalp was relaxing and she felt her shoulders drop just a little.

She had to stop worrying. Ralph would surely be found, or come home. He’d managed to get out of the ice house by himself – Meredith refused to believe anybody else could have been involved, in such a short time – so that meant he was still, contrary to all appearances, alive.

Andrea’s salon had been squeezed into the prow, where the smaller of the two bedrooms had once been. It sported two portholes, one in front of Meredith’s seat, overlooking the dockside, and one behind Andrea, who was beginning to snip at Meredith’s split ends. This porthole had a view across the river, and Meredith could see it, reflected in the big flat mirror, which also obscured the view directly in her eye line.

Something caught her eye, a reflected movement, and she jerked out of the chair, making Andrea gasp.

‘Meredith! What is matter? I nearly stab you with scissors!’

Meredith leaped up, peering frantically out. ‘There’s someone on board! I saw a man’s foot going past the porthole!’

‘What?’

They both ran through the living room of the boat – salon, pronounced ‘saloon’, as Pete kept reminding Meredith – and up the three steps to the deck.

‘You look this side, I’ll go the other,’ Meredith said, her heart pounding. The black cape was flapping out behind her and her hair was plastered to her head.