Friend of the Devil

17

Banks, Winsome and Jamie Murdoch sat in the bleak interview room, Murdoch in his orange police-issue coverall, picking his fingernails. The duty solicitor, Ms. Olivia Melchior, sat in the corner. She had already had a word with Jamie and explained the situation, told him it was best to answer simply and truthfully unless he was in danger of incriminating himself or having his rights violated — and she would be the judge of that. Banks turned on the tape recorders and video, went through the preamble about time, date and those present, then gave Jamie his proper caution, the one about the disadvantages of not saying now something he might later rely on in court. Jamie kept on staring down at his fingernails.

“Right,” said Banks. “Why did you run away, Jamie?”

“You were going to fit me up, weren’t you?”

“What do you mean?”

“For the smuggling charge. The cigs and booze. You were going to fit me up. I’ve heard about things like that.”

“This isn’t about smuggling, Jamie.”

“It isn’t?”

“No.”

“What, then?”

“This is about the rape and murder of Hayley Daniels.”

Murdoch glanced back down at his fingernails. “I’ve already told you, I don’t know nothing about that.”

“Come on, Jamie, you were just around the corner.”

“The walls are thick. You can’t hear much from inside.”

“You can if the door is open, though, can’t you, Jamie?” Winsome said.

Murdoch stared at her. “Huh?”

“When Hayley Daniels and her friends left,” Winsome went on, “you left the door open a crack and were able to hear what they were saying. We think you heard Hayley say she was going into the Maze on her own.”

“So what?”

“Do you admit this?” Winsome pressed.

“I might have. You know, it’s bad manners to slam the door and lock it the minute your last punters are out in the street. You give them a few seconds. Somebody might have forgotten something. A handbag, a jacket.”

“Very considerate of you, I’m sure,” said Banks. “And I thought you were supposed to lock up fast to avoid a break-in.”

“That, too. But…”

“Hayley Daniels gave you a hard time, didn’t she?”

“How do you mean?”

“When you told her the toilets weren’t working so she couldn’t use them, she gave you a verbal mouthful, used bad language. Come on, Jamie, we’ve been through this before.”

“It was vile,” Murdoch said. He shook his head slowly. “I’ve never known such vile words coming from… from…”

“Such a pretty mouth? She was a good-looking girl, wasn’t she, Jamie. Nice body, too.”

“I wouldn’t know about that.”

“Oh, come on,” said Banks. “Don’t tell me you didn’t notice. Even I noticed, and she was dead when I saw her.”

Ms. Melchior gave Banks a warning glance. She obviously knew that he had a tendency to go off on weird, almost surreal, tangents to throw his suspects off their predetermined stories.

“She was fit enough,” said Murdoch.

“Fit and she knew it?”

“They usually do.”

“What do you mean by that, Jamie?”

“What I say. Girls like her. They know they’re fit.”

“Is that why you like the song, have it as your ring tone?”

“It’s just a bit of fun.”

“Flaunt it, do they, these fit lasses?”

“You should see the clothes they wear — or don’t.” He gave an unpleasant, harsh laugh.

“Like Jill?”

“Jill?”

“Yes, the girl who works for you. Jill Sutherland. She’s a pretty lass, isn’t she? She used to take shortcuts to the car park through the Maze, didn’t she? Is that where you got the idea?”

“What idea?”

“That it was a suitable place for an ambush.”

“That’s ridiculous.”

“But it’s enough to drive any red-blooded bloke crazy, isn’t it?” Banks said. “The way they dress and the things they say.”

“Don’t answer that, Jamie,” said Ms. Melchior. “He’s leading you.” She gave Banks a stern glance. “And you, stop it. Stick to the relevant questions.”

“Yes, Ms.,” said Banks.

Ms. Melchior glared at him.

“How long had you known Hayley?” Winsome asked.

“I didn’t know her,” said Jamie. “Just saw her when she came in the pub with her friends.”

“But according to the records, you were both in the first year of college together, before you dropped out,” said Winsome. She adjusted her reading glasses and tapped the file on the table in front of her.

“Maybe I saw her around. It’s a big college.”

“Ever ask her out?”

“I might have done. So what?”

“Just that you have a history, that’s all.” Winsome took off her glasses and leaned back in her chair.

“You fancied her right from the start, didn’t you?” Banks said.

“What’s wrong with that?”

“But she wouldn’t have anything to do with you. She was fussy about who she went out with. Preferred older men, professors, someone with a bit of experience, money, brains.”

Jamie slammed his fist on the table.

“Calm down, Jamie,” Ms. Melchior said. “Is this going anywhere?” she asked Banks.

“Oh, yes,” he said. “Isn’t it, Jamie? You know where it’s going, don’t you? Saturday the seventeenth of March. Saint Patrick’s Day. What was special about that day?”

“Nothing. I don’t know.”

“Some yobbos wrecked your toilets, didn’t they?”

“Yeah.”

“What happened? Did they find your peephole from the storeroom to the ladies’?”

Murdoch froze. “What?”

It had been a long shot on Banks’s part — no one had mentioned such a thing — but it was turning out to be a good guess. It was exactly the sort of thing he thought someone like Murdoch would do. “We’ll leave that for the moment,” Banks went on. “Hayley was looking particularly good that night, wasn’t she? The short skirt, low top. Looked a bit like a tart, didn’t she?”

“DCI Banks,” Ms. Melchior interrupted. “Fewer of those sorts of comments, if you don’t mind.”

“Sorry,” said Banks. “But you fancied her, didn’t you, Jamie?”

“She was very attractive.”

“And you’d wanted her for a long time.”

“I liked her, yes.”

“And she knew it?”

“I suppose she did.”

“And then this business with the toilets came up.”

“She should never have said the things she did.”

“She humiliated you in front of everybody, didn’t she?”

“She shouldn’t have called me those names.”

“What names, Jamie?”

“Terrible names. About my manhood and things.” He gave a shifty glance toward Ms. Melchior, who seemed enthralled.

“She called you impotent, didn’t she? ‘Limp dick.’ That really got your goat, didn’t it?”

“How could she say something like that? She knew I… knew I liked her. How could she be so cruel?”

“She was drunk, Jamie. And she needed a piss.”

“Mr. Banks!”

Banks held his hand up. “Sorry.”

“I couldn’t help that, could I?” said Jamie. “It wasn’t me wrecked the fucking bogs!”

Banks heard a tap at the door. Winsome answered, came back and whispered in his ear.

“This interview is suspended at six-thirteen P.M.,” Banks said. “DCI Banks and DC Jackman are leaving the room, PC Mellors is entering to keep an eye on the suspect.” Banks glanced at Ms. Melchior. “You coming?”

She seemed torn between her client and whatever new revelation had just come up. “You’ll be all right, Jamie?”

“He’ll be all right, ma’am,” the PC said.

Jamie nodded, eyes averted.

“Very well, then.” Ms. Melchior gathered up her papers and briefcase and strutted out after Banks and Winsome, across the market square to the Fountain. A brisk wind had sprung up, and she had to hold her lilac skirt down with one hand as she walked. There was already a crowd gathered outside the pub, and the two uniformed constables were doing a sterling job of defending the crime scene.

Once they had signed the sheet, Banks and the others were allowed inside the Fountain, where a thorough search had been in progress ever since they had taken Jamie Murdoch over to the station, all legal and aboveboard. The SOCOs were dressed in protective clothing and wore breathing filters against the dust, and an assistant handed out the same gear to Banks, Winsome and Ms. Melchior, who seemed a bit embarrassed in her hard hat, overalls and face mask.

The pub was a shambles. There were dust and crumbled plaster everywhere. The landlord would go crazy when he found out, Banks thought, though with any luck that would be the least of his problems. They followed Stefan Nowak upstairs to one of the storerooms above the bar that abutted on Taylor’s Yard and the Maze. Someone had moved a piece of the old wainscoting away to reveal a hole big enough for a man to get through. Banks could hear voices and see the beam of a torch waving around on the other side.

“There’s no light switch,” said Stefan, handing out torches, “and no window.” He bent and made his way through the hole. Banks followed. Ms. Melchior seemed reluctant, but Winsome held back to let her go first and brought up the rear. With all the beams of light, the room they found themselves in was more than bright enough. It smelled moldy and airless, which it no doubt was, and stacked against one wall were cases of lager and cartons of cigarettes.

“Is this it?” said Banks, disappointed. “Is there no access to the Maze?”

“Hold your horses,” said Stefan, moving to the other side of the room, where he swung a hinged panel toward him. “Follow me.”

They followed. The next room was just as cramped and musty as the first, but a steep wooden staircase led down to the ground floor, where a door with well-oiled hinges and a recently installed Yale lock opened into the anonymous alley at the back of Taylor’s Yard, where no CCTV camera lens ever penetrated.

“Bingo,” said Banks.

“It’s like the bloody Phantom of the Opera,” said Stefan. “Secret passages and God knows what.”

“They were only secret from us,” Banks pointed out. “Houses and storage areas cheek by jowl like this are often connected by crawl spaces or what have you. Murdoch simply found a way of removing the covering and replacing it so he could come and go as he wanted. Originally, it just made a great hiding place for storing the smuggled goods, but when Hayley Daniels pushed him past the end of his tether, it made the perfect way for him to get back at her. He knew where she was going, and he knew he could get there in seconds without being seen. How long would it take him to get from the front door to the Maze by this route?”

“Less than five minutes,” said Stefan.

“Sir?” One of the SOCOs approached them, torch shining into a corner.

“What is it?” Banks asked.

“A plastic bag of some sort,” Stefan said. He took some photographs, the flash blinding them all momentarily in the confined space, then carefully picked up the bag with his gloved hands and opened it. “Voilà,” he said, showing the contents to Banks. “Clothes. Condoms. Hairbrush. Cloth. Bottle of water.”

“It’s his kit,” said Banks. “Templeton was right. The bastard liked it so much he was planning on doing it again.”

“Or he’d been planning it for some time,” Stefan added. “Possibly both.”

“I don’t think you should assume that,” said a pale Ms. Melchior, who was clearly by now in duty-solicitor mode again, just trying to do her job against all the mounting horror of her client’s guilt that she must have been feeling.

“We’ll see what the lab has to say,” said Banks. “Good work, Stefan, lads. Come on, let’s get back to the interview room. We don’t want to keep Mr. Murdoch waiting too much longer, do we?”

After lunch with Ginger, Annie went back to the police station to see if anything had come in. She was hoping for more good news from forensics but had learned over the years that she had to be patient. In the meantime, she busied herself locating Dr. Laura Henderson who, as it turned out, was still practicing in Bath. After a few engaged signals, Annie finally got through and introduced herself. Dr. Henderson was naturally suspicious and insisted on taking down Annie’s extension number and ringing back through the automated station switchboard.

“Sorry about that,” Dr. Henderson said when they finally got connected again, “but you can’t be too careful in my business.”

“Mine, too,” said Annie. “No problem.”

“Anyway, what can I help you with?”

“Do you remember a patient called Kirsten Farrow? This would be around 1988, perhaps early 1989. I know it’s a long time ago.”

“Of course I remember Kirsten,” said Dr. Henderson. “There are some patients you never forget. Why? Has anything happened to her?”

“Not that I know of,” said Annie. “In fact, that’s the problem. Nobody’s seen hide nor hair of her in about eighteen years. Has she been in touch with you at all?”

“No, she hasn’t.”

“When did you last see her?”

“Could you hang on a moment? I’ll dig out the file. I’m afraid anything from that long ago isn’t on the computer.” Annie waited, tapping her pencil on the desk. A few moments later, Dr. Henderson came back on. “Our last session was on the ninth of January, 1989,” she said. “I haven’t seen Kirsten since then.”

“Why did she stop coming to see you?”

There was a long pause at the other end. “I’m not sure I should be discussing this with you,” said Dr. Henderson.

“I’m trying to locate her,” Annie said. “Anything you could tell me might help. I wouldn’t expect you to breach confidentiality.”

“Why are you looking for her?”

“She might know something about a case I’m working on.”

“What case?”

Annie felt like saying she couldn’t divulge that information, but that would be playing the same silly game. Give a little, maybe get a little in return. “A woman has been killed in the same location Kirsten used to visit,” she said. “We were thinking—”

“Oh my God!” said Dr. Henderson. “You think he’s back, don’t you? The killer.”

It wasn’t what Annie was about to say at all, but she recognized a good opening when she heard one. “It’s a possibility,” she said. “They never did catch him.”

“But I still don’t see how I can help you.”

“Why did Kirsten stop seeing you?”

There was another pause, and Annie could almost hear the argument raging in Dr. Henderson’s mind. Finally, the pros seemed to win out over the cons. “The reason she gave me was that our sessions were becoming too painful for her,” she said.

“In what way?”

“You have to realize that Kirsten had blocked out what happened to her on the night she was attacked, and that was causing her all kinds of problems: depression, nightmares, anxiety attacks. Along with her other problems—”

“The inability to have sex or children?”

“You know about that?” Dr. Henderson sounded surprised.

“I know a little,” Annie said.

“Well, yes… along with all those other problems, she was in… well, you probably also know, then, that she did attempt suicide. I’m sure it’s in the police files.”

“Yes,” Annie lied. No point in letting Dr. Henderson think she’d given too much away. She would only clam up.

“I suggested a course of hypnotherapy, and Kirsten agreed.”

“The aim of which was?”

“Healing, of course. Sometimes you have to confront your demons to vanquish them, and you can’t do that if your memory is blocking them out.”

Annie felt she knew a thing or two about that. “And did she?”

“No. As I said, I think it was becoming too painful for her. She was getting too close. At first, progress was very slow, then she started remembering too much too fast. I think she felt she was losing control, and she started to panic.”

“What about confronting the demons?”

“It takes time,” said Dr. Henderson. “Sometimes you need a lot of preparation. You need to be ready. I don’t think Kirsten was. It would have felt like driving down a busy motorway before she’d learned to drive.”

“How far did she get?” Annie asked. “Did she remember anything significant about her attacker?”

“That wasn’t the point of the treatment.”

“I realize that, Doctor, but perhaps as a by-product?”

“I’m not sure,” Dr. Henderson said.

“What do you mean, you’re not sure?”

“That last session, Kirsten’s voice was difficult to hear, her words hard to catch. Afterward, when she came out of it, she seemed shocked, stunned at what she remembered. Even more so than usual.”

“But what was it?”

“I don’t know. Don’t you understand what I’m telling you? I don’t know. She left in a hurry, and she didn’t come back, except to let my secretary know that she wouldn’t be coming anymore.”

“But what do you think it was? What do you think shook her so much?”

Dr. Henderson paused again, then Annie heard her say in a voice barely above a whisper, “I think she remembered what he looked like.”

“Where’ve you been?” said Murdoch. “I’m getting fed up of this. I want to go home.”

“Not just yet, Jamie,” said Banks. “A few more questions first. Let’s start at the top. Maybe we can keep this short. Did you rape and kill Hayley Daniels?”

“No! How could I? You’d have seen me. There’s no way out of the pub without being on CCTV.”

Banks glanced over at Ms. Melchior, who appeared uncomfortable. She said nothing. Banks leaned forward and linked his hands on the table. “Let me tell you what I think happened, Jamie, and you can tell me if I’m wrong. Okay?”

Jamie nodded, still not looking up.

“You’d had a bad day. Been having a bad life lately, if truth be told. That miserable pub, always by yourself, the landlord sunning himself in Florida. Even Jill kept calling in sick. And she wasn’t just a help behind the bar, she was easy on the eye, too, wasn’t she? But she didn’t want anything to do with you, did she? None of them did. I think maybe you entertained the fantasy of getting Jill alone in the Maze. You knew she used it as a shortcut. Maybe that’s what you had planned for Saturday night. Finally plucked up the courage. But Jill called in sick, didn’t she, and that spoiled your little plan. Until Hayley Daniels arrived. You’d seen her around for years, even asked her out when you were at college, before you failed half your first-year courses and dropped out. Isn’t that right, Jamie?”

Murdoch said nothing. Ms. Melchior scribbled away on her legal pad and Winsome stared at a spot high on the wall.

“That Saturday night, after she called you names and insulted your manhood, you hurried them out and you heard them talking out front. Hayley had a loud, strident voice, especially when she was drunk or upset, which she was. You heard her telling her friends what a useless bastard you were, a ‘limp dick,’ all over again, in the public market square, for anyone to hear, and you left the door open a crack so you could hear them. How am I doing so far, Jamie?”

Murdoch continued to pick away at his fingernails.

“You heard Hayley say she was going down into the Maze to relieve herself, though I doubt that’s exactly how she put it. She had a foul mouth, didn’t she, Jamie?”

Murdoch looked up for a moment at Banks. “She was very coarse and crude,” he said.

“And you don’t like that in a woman, do you?”

He shook his head.

“Right, so we have the friends dispersed and Hayley heading off by herself into the Maze. Well, it didn’t take you long to figure out how you could get out there and give her what for, did it?”

“I’ve told you,” Murdoch said in a bored voice without looking up. “I couldn’t have got round there without being seen.”

“Jamie,” Banks said, “do you know anything about a storeroom attached to the Fountain, beyond the wainscoting upstairs?”

The pause before Murdoch said “No” told Banks all he needed to know.

“We’ve found it, Jamie,” said Banks. “No need to keep that lie afloat anymore. We’ve found the room, the way out, the clothes you kept there, your ‘assault kit,’ the condoms, the hairbrush, the lot. We’ve found it all. Planning quite a career, weren’t you?”

Murdoch turned very pale and stopped worrying the nail he was working on, but he said nothing.

“You’d been dreaming of something like that for a long time, hadn’t you?” Banks went on. “Fantasizing. You’d even prepared that kit to wipe traces of evidence from the body, pick up all your pubic hairs. Very clever, Jamie. But you had no idea Hayley would be your first, did you? You thought it would be Jill. Maybe also you just wandered around there after closing time hoping someone, anyone, would come along, but this was too good an opportunity to miss, wasn’t it? What a beginning to an illustrious career. That foulmouthed, sexy, tantalizing bitch Hayley Daniels.”

“Mr. Banks, could you tone it down a bit,” said Ms. Melchior, but her heart wasn’t in it.

“Sorry,” said Banks. “Would you prefer me to use euphemisms? Make it all sound a lot nicer?” He turned back to Jamie. “You went out by the usual way, and you saw Hayley doing her business there in the alley like a common tart. I suppose it excited you, didn’t it, the way looking through that peephole into the ladies’ excited you. You probably couldn’t even wait until she’d finished. You knew about the leather-goods storeroom and the weak lock, and that was where she was squatting, wasn’t it, right by the door? We found traces of her urine there. She’d been sick, too. You took her before she could even get her knickers up and dragged her in the shed, onto the soft pile of leather remnants. Very romantic. But one little thing went wrong, didn’t it? In all your excitement, you’d forgotten to switch your mobile off, and it plays a very distinctive ring tone quite loud, a real song, The Streets’ ‘Fit But You Know It,’ that you bought online. Very appropriate, don’t you think? Someone heard that, Jamie. He didn’t recognize it at first, but someone else heard it, too, a week later when you were leaving the Fountain. Who was it, Jamie? Your boss calling from Florida, the way he usually does at the end of the night? He couldn’t reach you on the phone in the Fountain, so he rang your mobile. Is that it? It would have been just after seven in the evening there and he was probably just settling down to his after-sunset, predinner margarita with some bimbo in a bikini, and he wants to know how his business is doing. What do you tell him, Jamie? Not very well? I imagine you probably lie about it the way you do about everything else. But that’s another problem. You should have changed your ring tone after you killed Hayley.

“How did it happen? I suppose you put your hand over Hayley’s mouth, then stuffed some leather remnants in, threatened you’d kill her if she struggled or told anyone, then you raped her. My God, you raped her. Vaginally and anally. Did that make you feel good? Powerful? And what about when you’d finished? I think you felt guilty then, didn’t you, when you realized what you’d gone and done. Fantasy is one thing, but reality… I should imagine it can come as quite a shock. There was no turning back now. She knew you. She knew what you’d done. One day, one way or another, it would get out. If she was left alive to tell the story. So you strangled her. Maybe you didn’t enjoy that. I don’t know. She looked too violated lying there with her legs open and her top pulled up. It showed you far too clearly what you’d done, like looking in a mirror, so you turned her gently on her side, put her legs together, as if she were sleeping, running in her sleep. That looked better, didn’t it? Not quite so ugly. How am I doing, Jamie?”

Murdoch said nothing.

“It doesn’t matter, anyway,” Banks said, standing up and terminating the interview. “We’ve got all the evidence we need, and when forensics are through with it we’ll be putting you away and throwing away the key.”

Jamie didn’t move. When Banks looked more closely he could see tears dropping on the scarred and scratched surface of the table. “Jamie?”

“She was so beautiful,” Jamie said. “And so foul. She said she’d do anything. When I… when we… she said she’d do anything if I let her go.”

“But you didn’t?”

Murdoch looked at Banks, his eyes red with tears. “I wanted to, I really did, but I couldn’t. How could I? You must understand I couldn’t let her go. Not after. She wouldn’t keep her word. A girl like that. A tramp like her. I knew she wouldn’t keep her word. I knew I had to kill her.”

Banks looked over at Ms. Melchior. “Did you get that?” he asked, and left the room.

When Annie arrived at the Queen’s Arms, Templeton’s wake was in full swing, and she found out as soon as she got there that it was also being combined with a celebration of the capture of the Hayley Daniels killer, which made for a very odd sort of party indeed. Banks, Hatchley, Gervaise and the rest sat around a long table drinking pints and telling Templeton stories, the way you did at a wake, most of them funny, some of them bittersweet. Annie wasn’t going to be a hypocrite and join in, but nor was she going to sour the mood by telling some of her own Templeton stories. The poor bastard was dead, he didn’t deserve that, let him have a proper send-off.

For some reason, Annie felt in a particularly good mood that night. It wasn’t the occasion, of course, but something to do with being back in Eastvale, back in the Queen’s Arms with the old crew. Eastern Area was okay, but she felt this was where she belonged. Winsome seemed to be enjoying herself, lounging against the bar talking to Dr. Wallace. Annie went over and joined them. Winsome seemed to stiffen a bit when she arrived, but she soon relaxed and offered Annie a drink.

“Pint of Black Sheep Bitter, please,” Annie said.

“You know,” Winsome offered, “you’re welcome to stay at mine if… you know…”

It was part apology and part a reminder that she shouldn’t drink and drive. “Thanks, Winsome,” Annie said, clinking glasses. “We’ll see how the evening goes. I’m not sure if I feel like getting pissed. How are you, Dr. Wallace? I’m DI Annie Cabbot. We met a couple of times before I was seconded to Eastern.”

Dr. Wallace shook hands with Annie. “I remember,” she said. “I’m fine. And it’s Liz, please.”

“Okay, Liz.”

“I gather they’re keeping you busy out there?”

“They are.” Annie’s drink came, and she took a long swallow. “Ah, that’s better,” she said.

Hatchley had just finished a Templeton joke, and the whole table roared with laughter. Even Detective Superintendent Gervaise joined in. She was definitely looking a bit flushed and tipsy, Annie noticed.

“So how’s the case going?” Dr. Wallace asked.

“Lucy Payne? Oh, you know, it’s plodding along. Look.” Annie touched her arm. It was only slight and momentary, but she felt Liz flinch. “We really must get together and talk about it sometime, compare notes.” She gestured around the pub. “Not here. Not now, of course. Not on an occasion like this. But there are some similarities with Kevin Templeton’s murder.”

“I’m aware of that,” said Dr. Wallace. “I’ve spoken with Dr. Clarke, your pathologist. The blades used, for a start, seem similar.”

“A razor, I believe you suggested?”

“Yes. At least that’s most likely.”

“Or a scalpel?”

“It could have been, I suppose. With that kind of wound it’s often impossible to be exact. Very sharp, at any rate. Scalpels are just a little harder for the man in the street to get hold of.”

“Or woman?”

“Of course. As you said, this is neither the place nor the time. Why don’t you drop by the mortuary? You can usually find me there.” She smiled. “If you’ll excuse me, I need to have a word with Superintendent Gervaise before she falls down.”

“Better hurry, then,” said Annie, raising her glass. “Bottoms up.”

Dr. Wallace smiled, walked away and took the empty chair beside Gervaise.

“Party pooper,” said Winsome.

Annie looked at her. “Glad to see you’re having such a good time, Winsome. Let me buy you a drink. How about something blue or pink with an umbrella in it?”

“Ooh, I don’t know,” said Winsome, clutching her half pint of Guinness to her breast.

“Oh, go on. Let your hair down.” Annie winked. “You never know what might happen.” Annie leaned over the bar and asked Cyril for one of his specials. Cyril said it was coming right up.

“Look, about the other night—” Winsome began.

“It doesn’t—”

“But it does. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to come across as such a prude. What you do is your own business, and I’ve got no right to judge you. I don’t even have any right to judge Kev the way I did.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, I’m no angel. I kept a bloke tied to a bed naked when I should have been telling him his daughter was dead.”

“Winsome, are you pissed?” Annie said. “What on earth are you talking about?”

Winsome explained about Geoff Daniels and Martina Redfern in the Faversham Hotel. Annie burst into laughter. “I really wouldn’t worry too much about that,” she said. “It sounds as if the bastard deserved it, no matter what. ‘Black bitch,’ indeed.”

Winsome smiled. “You really think so?”

“I do. You just got me a bit confused when you started. I mean, I was trying to imagine you tying a naked man to a bed in a hotel room.”

“I didn’t tie him there!”

“I know that now. It was just a funny image, that’s all. Forget it.” Annie took another long belt of beer. Winsome’s drink arrived. It was pink and blue. They were singing “Why Was He Born So Beautiful?” over at the table now. She could hear Banks’s tuneless tenor mingled with the rest. “Cat’s choir, hey?” she said.

Winsome laughed. “I mean it, you know,” she said, touching Annie’s arm. “About the other night. I’m sorry. I was insensitive.”

“Look,” said Annie, “between you and me, I fucked up. You were right to say what you did. It was a mistake. A big mistake. But it’s over now. History. Sorted.”

“Apology accepted, then?”

“Apology accepted. And I understand congratulations are in order for you? Nobody knew you could manage such a great rugby tackle. You’ll be playing for England next.”

Winsome laughed. “Can’t be much worse than the team they’ve got already.”

“Come on.” Annie put her arm over Winsome’s shoulders and together they picked up their drinks and walked over to the table, just in time to join in: “He’s no bloody use to anyone, he’s no bloody use at all.”