‘Every so often something emerges that allows the press to rake through it all again,’ said Neil. ‘In the early years, as you can see, it would often be an alleged sighting, usually abroad. Somebody on holiday in Greece or wherever would see a wee boy of roughly the right age with a couple who might vaguely resemble Anne’s parents. Summer’s a quiet time for news, so they could fill a page or two by recapping everything, turn it into a feature. They never think about the pain they’re causing.’

Ingrams pored over a couple of these ‘Ramsay disappearance revisited’ spreads, the same sparse facts rehearsed and the same photos rerun, ten years but no substantial differences between the articles. The only thing that had changed was the witness’s head shot, the guy looking older and greyer, his reluctant and rather bleak fifteen minutes of fame evidently delivered in instalments over twenty-seven years.

The most recent piece was only a couple of weeks old, a half-page flashback feature from the Daily Record, hung on the news that a private investigator had been hired to look into the case. There were a few non-committal quotes from Jim and even a couple from Neil, but nothing from Anne. None of the pieces had comments from Anne.

‘She’s been offered plenty of money over the years for an interview, but she’s not prepared to put herself through it. It comes around nearly every year, same time. It was Jim’s idea to tell them about hiring him. He said they’d leave us alone if they had a new angle, and he was right.’

‘What happened to Anne?’ Jasmine asked. ‘After the disappearance.’

‘She was brought up by her grandparents.’

‘Must have been difficult. A terrible thing to have to come to terms with so young.’

Neil gave a small nod but looked away. He thrust his hands into his pockets, seeming to physically withdraw and leave them to the file, even though he remained exactly where he was.

Jasmine reached into her own pocket.

‘That’s my phone,’ she said to Ingrams. She stared at the screen, angling it so that Neil couldn’t see that it was blank. Ingrams could, though, and looked at her quizzically. She held it to her ear and pretended to answer, quickly explaining to nobody at all that she couldn’t talk right now and would get someone to call back.

‘Tron, that was Caroline at Galt Linklater about the Turner case. Can you go and give her a ring? The notes are out in the car.’

Ingrams assented and got up, a sheaf of cellophane-wrapped pages still in his hand.

‘Do you mind if I hang on to these a minute?’ he asked.

Neil shook his head, barely engaged. Ingrams could have asked to borrow the microwave and got the same response.