‘Good idea. Make sure she has no visitors. Got it? Not one.’

‘Certainly. I will give instructions to the desk.’

Agatha waited until she was sure they had gone, removed the stool, and went back into the hospital room. Olivia’s eyes were closed but tears were running down her cheeks. ‘I can help you,’ whispered Agatha. She gave her the pad. ‘Quickly. Before the sedative kicks in.’

With a great effort, Olivia wrote something and then fell back on the pillows.

Agatha ripped off the sheet of paper and hurried out. When she finally got into her car, she heaved a sigh of relief. She took the piece of paper out of her pocket and studied it. The spidery writing straggled across the page. Olivia had written, ‘Calle Miro, Ramblas, Barcelon . . .’

Agatha frowned. Was Sylvan still alive? She had always been sure he had escaped. It was no use going to the police with this information. George would say they spent their honeymoon in Barcelona. He would get Agatha charged with something or other.

She would need to go herself. She would tell her staff she needed a break. Toni would be left in charge to make up for her, Agatha’s, lousy treatment of the girl. If it all turned out to be a load of rubbish which led nowhere, then everyone would believe she had simply been in Spain on holiday.

Agatha decided to spend another couple of weeks making sure the agency was running smoothly and then say she was going on holiday.

But someone really ought to know where she was and why she was going. It was dark when she drove down into Carsely. The church was illuminated, shining with a golden light, welcoming her home.

She decided if Charles was in her cottage, she would tell him and maybe persuade him to go with her. But her cottage was dark and silent, with only the patter of the cats’ feet as they came to investigate.

Agatha desperately wanted to find out something all by herself, to prove to herself and others that she really was a good detective.

Agatha sat in an open-air café on the Ramblas in Barcelona and watched the crowds go up and down. She wondered if that’s what most of them did on Saturday – walk up one way and then down to the port the other way. Earlier that morning, she had located Calle Miro, but it was a narrow street leading off the Ramblas, with tall apartment buildings on either side. She did not have a house number and there was no café where she could sit and look to see if Sylvan appeared, so she had settled on the Ramblas. If Sylvan – if he were alive – had bought a new boat, then surely he would head from his apartment down the Ramblas to the port.