‘Are you good at hiding things, Gary? Are you like a little squirrel that hides his nuts away from sight then returns to them when the time is right? Would that be you, Gary?’ asked Peterson.

‘I don’t know what you mean.’

‘Where’s the dongle, Gary?’

A sweat pulse rushed through my body and dampened my skin in places it had never done so before.

‘No comment,’ I replied.

‘We know you have that dongle and that you have hidden it away for what you think is safekeeping, but believe me, Gary, you and your loved ones are not safe until we have that dongle. Now, where is it?’

‘No comment.’

Rowlett chirped in, his mouth laden with grey meat and damp bread.

‘Stop with the “no comment”. Hiding evidence from us is a serious offence, pal. Just tell us where it is and this whole thing just goes away.’

‘No comment.’

‘Have you opened the memory stick and read its contents, Gary?’ asked Peterson.

‘No.’

‘Is that “no I haven’t opened it” or an attempt at another “no comment”, Gary?’

‘No comment.’

‘Listen, Gary,’ continued Peterson. ‘We know with absolute certainty that you have hidden the dongle somewhere outside your residence. Do you want us to have officers and dogs search the entire estate? Is that what you want, Gary?’

‘No comment.’

They kept on asking me about the dongle for the next ten minutes and I continued to answer ‘no comment’. At one point Rowlett took two photographs out of a file and placed them on the table. One was a photograph of Brendan with dried blood all around his neck and chest and the other was a photograph of a knife in a plastic tube. The knife seemed vaguely familiar to me, but I couldn’t fix on where I had seen it before. They didn’t comment on the photographs or ask me any questions relating to them.

Eventually they seemed to accept that I was not going to co-operate. I asked if I could leave.

‘That’s your prerogative, Gary,’ said Peterson. ‘But next time it might not just be us you’re dealing with. It could get a lot worse. I sense you don’t appreciate exactly who you are dealing with, which is reassuring, as it means you probably haven’t opened that memory stick. We will see you soon, Gary, and might I suggest you have a rethink before that happens.’

I left the police station feeling shaken and afraid. Peterson and Rowlett were not interested in finding Brendan’s murderer. In fact they probably already knew who the culprit was. I wasn’t a suspect; their only interest in me was concerning the dongle.

I popped into Wayne’s coffee shop, mainly, I think, to catch sight of a friendly face. He looked up at me from behind his counter and immediately picked up on my suffering.