Perez thought that made sense. It might explain why Anna had moved into the rented house in Stonebridge without having to provide a deposit. He was starting to think that he should drive to Berwick the following day to talk to Anna’s parents.

James Given stood up. ‘The most important thing to tell you is that Tom King is a good man. All this gossip is nonsense, and I hope you can put a stop to it. If it goes on, I’m worried that we’ll drive Tom away from the village, and then Stonebridge will have lost a very fine GP.’

Perez watched Doctor Given walk out of the hotel to his car. It had started to snow again, with large soft flakes that melted as soon as they hit the ground. In the distance a dark figure stood under a street light. He seemed to be staring at the hotel as if he was making up his mind whether or not to come in. Perez didn’t recognise the watcher, though something about him seemed familiar.

When the man saw Perez looking his way from the hotel doorway, he seemed to lose his nerve. He turned abruptly and hurried away.

9

The Hotel

Robert Anderson, the local detective in charge of the case, phoned back just as Perez was finishing dinner. Perez kept him on the line until he’d climbed the stairs to his room. He didn’t want anyone listening in to their conversation.

‘How’s it going, Jimmy?’

Perez took a chair by his bedroom window. ‘I had a wee look round Anna’s house.’

‘Did you now?’ Anderson seemed annoyed by his interference. ‘And what did you find?’

‘I think Anna had a visitor the evening she died.’

There was a moment of silence at the end of the line. ‘And what makes you think that?’

Perez explained about the note he’d found in Anna’s bedroom and the freshly cleaned glass in the kitchen cupboard. ‘That changes things, don’t you think?’

Another silence. ‘Perhaps,’ Anderson said at last. ‘Are you sure the note was in Anna’s handwriting?’

‘Certain.’ Perez remembered looking through the file in Anna’s living room. ‘I checked it against some lesson plans she’d written that were in the house.’

‘All the same,’ Anderson said, ‘we’ll need more than that to reopen the case. What do you plan to do tomorrow?’

‘I thought I’d go to Berwick to chat to Anna’s family. It seems that she knew Tom King before she moved to Stonebridge. They might be able to tell me more about the relationship.’ Perez moved to the window, but there was no sign of the man who’d been standing under the street light. ‘I’m wondering why they didn’t offer to take on Anna’s daughter.’

‘They have problems of their own,’ Anderson said. ‘Joan Blackwell has early onset dementia, and George, Anna’s father, is her full-time carer. They couldn’t cope with a growing child.’

Perez thought how unfair that was. The couple had problems of their own, and now they’d lost the daughter who might have supported them. He wondered what effect their troubles might have had on Anna. Could they have caused the young teacher more stress? Might they even have driven her to suicide? Then he thought how everyone had described Anna as a kind woman. If she knew that her parents had problems and might need her help in the future, wouldn’t that have given her a reason for staying alive?