DS Malik hadn’t much liked Elliot’s manner. He’d seemed too smooth, almost as if he’d been expecting her phone call and had prepared for it. In her experience, members of the public got flustered when they became part of an investigation, especially when it was to do with a possible murder. But a quick call to the vicar in Marlow confirmed Elliot’s story. In fact, the vicar said that he’d gone to the pub with Elliot after choir practice as well, so he was able to say that he’d been in the same room as Elliot between the hours of seven and ten. And seeing as Elliot’s alibi was the local vicar, DS Malik hadn’t taken things any further.

But now she’d learned the murder weapon was an antique German pistol, was it perhaps worth revisiting him? Or was it just a coincidence? DS Malik tried to shake the thought. Stefan Dunwoody had taken his own life, it was the only thing that made sense. Even if he’d used an old pistol to do it.

Although, DS Malik thought to herself, there was still the mystery of the bronze medallion, wasn’t there?

This was previously the only aspect of the case that had given DS Malik pause. When the divers had fished Stefan’s body out of the river, they’d found a small medallion about the size of a two-pound coin attached by a silver chain to a buttonhole on Stefan’s jacket. The medallion was clearly very old, a dull brown in colour, with a swirling pattern of leaves carved around the edge of it and the word ‘Faith’ carved across the middle. It was something of an anomaly, if only because none of her team had come across a medallion attached to a jacket like that before.

But an old religious symbol was hardly the sort of evidence they could use to build a murder case. Any more than they could use an antique German Luger.

On her way to see Judith, DS Malik stopped briefly at one of her constables’ desks.

‘Have we found the gun yet?’

‘Not yet,’ the officer replied. ‘The divers completed their fingertip search of the riverbed this morning. They didn’t find it.’

‘Then what about in the pond?’

One of DS Malik’s working theories was that Stefan had perhaps stood on the brick dam that separated his pond from the river, shot himself in the head, and had then fallen backwards into the river while his gun had fallen forward into the pond.

‘They’ve looked on the pond side of the wall as well. No gun.’

‘They’re sure about that?’

‘They can’t be one hundred per cent sure. Not unless we dredge the pond and river properly.’

‘It may have to come to that.’

It was a very thoughtful DS Malik who finally met up with Judith.