‘Not the recent past. Not Tokyo.’

So DCI Stoner knew about Tokyo. How many people knew about Tokyo now?

‘No,’ I said. ‘Not Tokyo. Not now. That didn’t even cross my mind.’

I remembered Tara’s phone call from Tokyo. I recalled being distracted, Marlon trying to kiss the dog and Buddy not having it. Did it happen before or after that phone call? Was he in the room with her? Was he watching her as she spoke to me? Had they just made love?

‘So he was laughing at you,’ DCI Stoner said, unsmiling now.

‘Yes. There was a parking fine on the windscreen of his big Merc. They’re very strict on our street. The traffic wardens. He took it off and threw it away. He struck me as a man who thought the rules didn’t apply to him. Then he was getting in the car, starting the ignition. And I didn’t know what else I could do. And I don’t know what I thought. I thought he was disrespectful. No. More than that. I could see they had been together, and I could tell that he wanted more of her.’

‘And that he wasn’t taking you seriously.’

DCI Stoner was easy to talk to. I felt that he understood. It was good to have the playground bully on your side.

He was encouraging me to get it all straight in my mind.

He was implying that all of my actions were completely understandable and even reasonable.

‘He thought I didn’t count,’ I said. ‘He thought I was a fucking joke.’

‘And you said something before he drove away, I bet. When you confronted him outside your home, I bet you gave him a warning, didn’t you? That’s only natural.’

It was all only natural to DCI Stoner. That a man should want another man’s wife. That her husband would object. That confrontation was inevitable. What could be more natural?

‘Didn’t you?’ DCI Stoner prompted, a harder note in his voice now.

I nodded. But I was very tired now. They can hold you for twenty-four hours without charging you and I was halfway there. It is long enough to totally wear you out when you are dirty and scared and you have not slept, when you feel that you are losing everything you ever loved. It is a long day and night.

‘For the tape, please,’ DI Ure said.

‘I told him – stay away from my wife.’

Stoner waited.

I hesitated.

But just for a second.

‘Or I’ll kill you,’ I said.

DCI Stoner leaned his bulk back in the too-small chair. His wedding ring glinted in the harsh white lights of the interview room.

‘Then you went to his hotel, didn’t you?’

‘Yes.’

‘To beat the shit out of him.’

‘No – to get him to leave my wife alone.’

‘And you lost that famous temper of yours, didn’t you, Christian?’

I looked across at DI Ure.

Her serious eyes blinked at me behind her spectacles.

‘I want that lawyer now,’ I told her.