The blanks I drew boosted my confidence when, days later, two short men in Borsalino hats turned up at Blenheim Terrace looking for Mr David. I assured them that Mr David had gone away – grateful that, wherever he was, he had eluded his shady creditors.

‘Blank,’ declared Mabel, back in the washroom. ‘Not a dicky-bird. My pals had a bit of a ruck with your Maltesers, leaving one of them in need of a National Health nose-job, but none of my nasties have come up with a sniff of his droppings, worse luck.’

‘So what do we do now, Auntie?’

‘We try and put your poor parents back together again, that’s what. Forget about the boy, he’s not worth a tinker’s. I can’t think why Violet’s so upset when she’s got such a fine son of her own. You’re doing a good job, Mart. We’ll get through this together as a family, got that?’

Inspector Morgan summoned me to another interview, my third. ‘An assessment of where we have got to so far,’ he said, pointing to the bare metal table. ‘It’s been three weeks, hasn’t it?’ His interrogative tone made me uneasy. Two constables entered the room, standing either side of the door, hands behind their backs. The walls had been freshly painted in washable olive-green. The smell was faintly acidic.

‘Mr Simmonds,’ said the inspector, in sardonically gentle tones,

‘when a young fellow goes missing, we keep an open mind if there is no ransom note or body. For the first week, we assume the man maybe lost his way home or met a nice young lady and nipped down to Brighton. The second week, we check out the better-organised parts of criminal society. If nothing seems suspicious, in the third week we start worrying that maybe someone is making a monkey of us, not telling us the whole story, get my drift? Now, Mr Simmonds, are you sure you have told me absolutely everything I need to know?’

The two big coppers at the door, I noticed, had unclasped their hands. Inspector Morgan put his face close to mine, exhaling foul smoke and cheap food. I felt my back sweating like a cellar wall.

‘So, Mr Sy-monds, what do you know about a break-in last year at the Jewish synagogue on Abbey Road?’

‘What?’ I exclaimed, my chest pounding.

‘Somebody,’ said the inspector, raising his voice, ‘nipped in one dark night and made away with antique pieces of silver, insured for ten thousand pounds. Whoever it was knew the building pretty well, set off no alarms. Couldn’t be your friend, could it, Mr Sy-monds? He must have known that synagogue, being a Jewish gentleman like yourself. Was he laying up a little nest-egg for when he ran away from home? Did he let you in on the job, eh?’

‘That’s preposterous,’ I interjected.

‘Does he have a little hidey-hole somewhere you can take us where we’re going to find the missing silver, and maybe the lad himself?’