They said their goodbyes, Baarda put in the call for officers to attend and take the written statement, and they walked to the car. It was gale-force winds outside. Connie dragged her fleece over her head and shivered.

‘How do people who live here know what to wear? Yesterday there was bright sunshine. Today it feels like I’m on a fishing trawler in the middle of the Atlantic.’

‘That’s Scotland for you. It would be boring if the weather was predictable. As I recall, Massachusetts isn’t all sunshine.’

‘You’ve been there?’ Connie asked.

‘A few times.’ Baarda unlocked the car. ‘Beautiful place. We holidayed in Nantucket once or twice, and I always enjoyed Boston when we were flying in and out. My father had friends there.’

‘Nantucket isn’t real. It’s all old money and competitive yacht purchases. Martha’s Vineyard is different. People live there all year. It’s a proper island community. We off to the castle?’

‘We are. You need breakfast before we do this?’ Baarda asked.

‘No, if I don’t eat until lunchtime, I can persuade myself that I’m fasting. Do you think Elspeth’s husband has any idea that she had an affair?’

‘I doubt it. If I were in his shoes, it would have been one of the first details I’d have given the police. Nick would have been an obvious suspect initially, and then there’s the option that she’d run off with him rather than having been abducted. I’m hardly a good advert for husbands having their fingers on the pulse of a marriage. It never occurred to me that my wife would ever be unfaithful. Perhaps superficially everything seemed absolutely fine.’

Connie stared out of the window as Baarda negotiated a section of roadworks where the traffic lights were down.

‘You’re going to have to tell Elspeth’s husband,’ she said.

‘That had occurred to me,’ Baarda said. ‘But perhaps not yet.’

They crossed North Bridge and took a couple of turns before Baarda pulled into a hotel car park.

‘I saw Nick last night at the yoga studio,’ Connie said.

‘Your assessment?’

‘If I had to summarise, I’d say he came across as a manipulative dick.’

‘That’s colourful,’ Baarda said, pulling on a coat.

‘Not a word that really applies to me, I’m afraid.’ Connie got out of the car, pulling an elastic hairband from her pocket and tidying her hair against the wind’s endeavours.

‘Apologies,’ Baarda said.

‘I’m kidding. And you’re right, it was colourful language, but it’s as good a description as any psycho-blurb I could give you. Which makes me wonder why a woman as intelligent and high society as Elspeth decided to risk so much for so little.’