“It was as bad as being alone. Just the one person. Sister, who didn’t stay for long, wouldn’t talk about what happened. I suppose she was told not to. Nor did Miss Cressett when she took over. And now Mrs. Frensham is saying nothing. It’s like being in a morgue or under supervision. The Rolls is outside. I saw it arrive from the window. Robert, our chauffeur, will need to get back, and I can’t stay here. It’s nothing to do with me. I want to go home.”

Then, recovering herself with surprising suddenness, she turned to Dalgliesh and held out her hand. “I’m so glad you’ve come, Commander. Stuart said that you would. He told me not to worry, he’d get the best.”

There was a silence. Mrs. Skeffington looked momentarily disconcerted and turned her eyes to George Chandler-Powell. So that’s why we’re here, thought Kate, why the request for the Squad had come from Number Ten. Without turning her head, she couldn’t resist a glance at Dalgliesh. No one was better than her chief in concealing anger, but it was there for her to read in the momentary flush across the forehead, the coldness of his eyes, the face briefly hardening into a mask, the almost imperceptible tightening of the muscles. She told herself that Emma had never seen that look. There were still areas of Dalgliesh’s life which she, Kate, shared which were closed to the woman he loved, and always would be. Emma knew the poet and the lover but not the detective, not the police officer. His job and hers were prohibited territory to anyone who had not taken the oath, been invested with their dangerous authority. It was she who was the comrade-in-arms, not the woman who had his heart. You couldn’t understand the job of policing if you hadn’t done it. She had taught herself not to feel jealousy, to try to rejoice in his triumph, but she couldn’t help relishing from time to time this small ungenerous consolation.

Mrs. Frensham murmured a goodbye and left, and Dalgliesh seated himself in the chair she had vacated. He said, “I hope we won’t have to detain you too long, Mrs. Skeffington, but there is information I need to have from you. Can you tell us exactly what has happened to you since you arrived here yesterday afternoon.”

“You mean from the time I actually got here?” Dalgliesh didn’t reply. Mrs. Skeffington said, “But that’s ridiculous. I’m sorry, but there’s nothing to tell. Nothing happened—well, nothing out of the ordinary—not until last night, and I suppose I could have been mistaken. I came to have an operation set for tomorrow—I mean today. I just happened to be here. I don’t suppose I’ll ever come back. It’s all been a terrible waste of time.”