‘Course you didn’t,’ I said soothingly. ‘You’re grand. When did you start to wonder?’

‘Just a couple of months ago. Joanne was . . . I’d done something she didn’t like, and she said, “I should call the detectives and tell them your phone used to text with Chris Harper. You’d get in sooo much trouble.” I mean, she was just saying it, she wouldn’t have actually done it?’

Alison was looking anxious. ‘Course not,’ I said, all understanding. Joanne would’ve dropped Alison in a shredder feet first, if it had suited her.

‘But I started thinking. Like, “OhmyGod, what if they actually did look at my phone, they’d totally think I’d been with Chris!” And then I thought about that phone I saw Holly with. And I went, like, “What if she was getting rid of it because she was scared of the same thing?” And then I was like, “OhmyGod, what if she actually was with Chris?”’

I said, ‘Did you talk about it to Holly? Or anyone else?’

‘OhmyGod, no way, not to Holly! I said it to Gemma. I thought she’d know what to do.’

‘Gemma’s smart, all right.’ Which she was. Alison hadn’t worked out that the phone might have been Selena’s. Gemma would have. ‘What’d she say?’

Alison squirmed. Down to her lap: ‘She said it was none of our business. To just shut up and forget the whole thing.’

Conway shaking her head, jaw clenched. I said, ‘And you tried. But you couldn’t manage.’

Head-shake.

I said, ‘So you made that card. Put it up on the Secret Place.’

Alison stared, bewildered. Shook her head.

‘Nothing wrong with that. It was a good idea.’

‘But I didn’t! I swear to God, I didn’t!’

I believed her. No reason she would lie, not now. ‘OK,’ I said. ‘OK.’

Conway said, ‘Well done, Alison. Probably you were right to begin with and it’s nothing to do with Chris, but Detective Moran and I will have a chat with Holly, clear it up. First we’ll take you back down to Miss Arnold. You’re looking a bit pale.’

Keep her isolated, so she couldn’t spread the story. I stood up, kept my smile nailed in place. One of my feet had gone to sleep.

Alison pulled herself up by the banister rail, but she stayed there, holding onto it with both thin hands. In the white air her face looked greenish. She said, to Conway, ‘Orla told us about that case you did. With the—’ A shudder twisted her. ‘The, the dog. The ghost dog.’

‘Yeah,’ Conway said. More hair had come out of her bun. ‘Nasty one, that was.’

‘Once the guy confessed. Did the dog – did it keep coming back for him?’

Conway examined her. Said, ‘Why?’