She stood up and restrained her daughter by placing her hands firmly on Heather’s upper arms. ‘Honey. Stop. Please. Otherwise I’ll have to call the nurses.’ It was like speaking to a child, not a grown woman.

Heather stopped writhing, but her face remained deathly pale. Margot continued, ‘I’m going to the police station this afternoon to talk to them. To – to make an identification.’ If you can call it that, she thought, after so many years. ‘And to give my DNA. I’ll know more after I’ve been.’

Now that’s where she is. Stuck in a claustrophobic room in a police station having provided her DNA.

The door opens and Gary Ruthgow enters, his bulk taking up most of the doorway. Behind him a slight young woman trots in, holding a file to her chest. His face softens when he spots her sitting stiffly on the uncomfortable plastic chair with her handbag on her lap. ‘Hello, Margot.’

She dips her head but doesn’t smile. ‘Gary.’ Her heart beats faster and she has to take another sip of water because her tongue is sticking to the roof of her mouth. This is it? The moment she finds out for certain whether or not that body is her daughter’s.

His eyes go to the empty chair beside her. ‘You didn’t bring someone with you?’

She shakes her head. Just get on with it.

Ruthgow and the DC, who introduces herself as Clotilde Spencer, take the seats opposite. Ruthgow clears his throat and looks across the table at her, his expression serious. She notices he’s wearing a soft pink tie flecked with white. ‘Now, obviously it won’t be possible for you to identify Flora, due to the, uh, decomposition of the body.’ She winces at the word. She’s trying not to think about her beautiful Flora being reduced to bones. ‘That’s why we’ve taken the DNA sample from you. But we wanted to know if there was anything else that might help us identify the remains that we’ve found.’

‘Such as?’

‘Any abnormalities, fractures, that kind of thing. Like, for example, had she ever broken her collarbone?’

‘No. She broke her ankle years ago when she was about six. Her left one. I don’t think it was ever set properly. It used to play up now and again. And it was weaker.’

DC Spencer sits up straighter. ‘Broken left ankle, you say?’

‘That’s right.’

She turns to Ruthgow and raises an eyebrow.