Dalgliesh thought, “Someone you know,” not “someone you love.” He could hear now that she was crying, and the line went dead.

He paused for a moment, gazing at the phone before making the next call, to Miss Gradwyn’s solicitor. Grief, that universal emotion, had no universal response, was manifested in different ways, some of them bizarre. He remembered his mother’s death, how at the time, wanting to behave well in the face of his father’s sorrow, he had managed to control his tears, even at the funeral. But grief revisited him down the years—briefly remembered scenes, snatches of conversation, a look, her apparently indestructible gardening gloves and, more vivid than all the small, lasting regrets which still visited him, himself leaning out of the window of the slowly moving train which was taking him back to school and seeing her figure in the same coat she had worn year after year, carefully not turning back to wave, because he had asked her not to.

He shook himself into the present. His next call, to the solicitor, was answered by a recorded message to say that the office was now closed until Monday at ten o’clock, but that urgent matters would be dealt with by the duty solicitor, who could be reached at a given number. This number was answered promptly in a crisp, impersonal voice, and once Dalgliesh had identified himself and explained that he wished urgently to speak to Mr. Newton Macklefield, his private number was given. Dalgliesh had given no explanation, but his voice must have carried conviction.