‘Who’s got the remote?’ she called across the room to nobody in particular. ‘For the TV?’

The news report had ended now, and the presenter was introducing the weather person.

‘Who’s got the remote?’ Sasha asked again, walking from desk to desk. ‘Honestly, people, it’s like being at home.’

‘This one?’ Craig held it up; it had been on his desk the whole time. Sasha pointed it at the screen. Nothing happened, she was pointing the wrong end, so she turned it over to turn up the volume and then rewind the live television feed back to the news report about Andrew Dean’s death. At the moment the crowd appeared in shot and she saw the face, she hit the pause button.

‘Right, everybody.’ She clapped her hands to get the attention of the whole room, then reached up to the screen to press her finger to the familiar face in the crowd. ‘I know this man. Tell me where from.’

‘Remove your finger,’ someone suggested, and she stepped out of the way so that people could gather around the screen and study the man’s face closely, as if he were a portrait in an art gallery.

‘Ring any bells?’ Sasha knew the Met Police in London had a crack team of Super Recognizers, people who were able to remember thousands of faces, more than some computerized recognition systems, but she didn’t have those kinds of resources here. ‘First person to tell me who this man is wins a biscuit.’

‘Sasha,’ someone called, and she turned to see DCI Vaughn at the door of his office. He was a big man – her mother would delicately describe him as stout – and his broad frame filled the narrow space. ‘Got a moment?’

‘Of course,’ she said, and left her team discussing the man in the crowd.

He stood aside as she walked in, leaving the door ajar. She pinched her toes on his carpet, conscious that once again she was barefooted, because Vaughn didn’t approve of her walking about without shoes in the office.

‘Where are we with the death in Hockley?’

‘The victim’s name is Andrew Dean. I’ve asked for the post-mortem report to be fast-tracked, we should get that this afternoon, but the cause of death looks pretty cut and dried – he was hit by a train.’

‘He got into some kind of altercation at a local pub, is that right?’

‘The deceased was from Southend – he lived just off York Road – but, yes, he spent the evening in a Hockley pub, antagonizing the other punters. He was very drunk and aggressive to various people, and was thrown out. Dean had a number of previous violent offences under his belt, for assault, affray, making threats.’

‘You think he bit off more than he could chew?’

‘It’s a possibility, or he ran into an unfriendly face from the past.’

Vaughn nodded. ‘British Transport Police are definitely stepping back from this. They say the likelihood is that the motivation for his death originated off rail network premises. So you’ll be taking the investigation forward.’