Finnigan shrugged again. ‘Hey, shit happens.’ Then his smirk grew wider and he lowered his voice. ‘But listen. Never mind all that. I’ve got to tell you what Cammie Linton told me just now. He was on the raid. Made me so fuckin’ wish I’d been there too, man.’

‘Why?’

‘Och, you wouldn’t believe it. So when the troops landed on the camp, right, there’s Watkins and about a dozen of his hippy friends all huddled under blankets around this brazier to stay warm, right? Then Watkins sees the officers running towards him, and he jumps up from under the blanket and he’s stark fuckin’ bollock naked.’

‘Oh, come off it. No way.’

Finnigan’s grin was spread so far across his face that it looked as if it was going to split. ‘You heard me. It’s, like, minus two degrees and this bawheid’s in his birthday suit. Maybe they use some kind of wacko Zen meditation to control their body temperature while they’re communing with the Being. Anyhow, then Watkins takes off and starts legging it like a bat out of hell through the snow with Coull and six more officers chasing after him. But then it gets even better, because Watkins’ hippy friends – they’re all totally in the scud too – they start yelling and screaming at the top of their voices and pelting our guys with turds. Fuckin’ turds, man. Like they were keeping them handy to use as ammunition or something.’ He shook his head in wonder. ‘You couldn’t make this up. Anyhow, they ended up making five more arrests. Grace? You okay?’

Grace’s mind had drifted off while he was talking. Naked hippies flinging excrement didn’t interest her too much, and in any case PC Cammie Linton was notorious around the station for spinning all manner of weird and wonderful yarns that only a dork like Pete Finnigan would fall for. Instead she was thinking that if Watkins was responsible for the attack on Ewan McCulloch, then whether or not the Campbell drowning was connected it went against everything Ben Hope had told her about the gold coins, and about his fears for what might have happened to his friend Boonzie. If the ecowarrior was indeed the culprit, Hope was on a wild goose chase and the apparent disappearance of Ewan’s uncle was still unaccounted for. Unless Ben Hope was getting that all wrong, too.

Then again, Ben Hope didn’t strike Grace as a guy who got things all wrong.

Finnigan looked a little peeved that she wasn’t cracking up at his account of the dawn raid. ‘What’s the matter with you? That’s the best fuckin’ story I’ve heard in yonks. Almost shat myself laughing when Cammie told me.’

She asked, ‘So has he put his hands up to it?’

‘Who?’

‘Watkins. Has he confessed to the assault?’