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The room appeared to be a shrine to her late husband. Large photographs of the two of them together adorned the walls, smaller pictures were mounted in a series of frames which sat on a baby grand piano in the corner of the room.

Robert Burgess had been a fat, middle-aged man in life. He looked as though he drank too much. There was a large wedding photograph over the fireplace. Patsy was looking happy but vacant in the picture. She was plastered in make-up and her wedding dress squeezed her bust together, exaggerating her figure to almost comic proportions. Her new husband was holding her arm tightly in his, a smug expression on his plump, glossy face.

Chris took an instant dislike to the dead man.

Patsy stood up from the hearth as the first flickers of flame licked at the wood. She caught sight of Chris staring at the picture and sighed. ‘I’ve been meaning to get rid of all of those.’

‘Why? He must have been so important to you to keep them up for all this time. It’s only right that you’d want to remember him.’

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Patsy shrugged. ‘He’s dead, he’s gone. What use is all of this to me now?’

She patted the pockets of her jacket. ‘Damn, I’m out of smokes. I think the housekeeper keeps some menthol in the kitchen. I won’t be a minute.’

Chris smiled. ‘I’ll go. You always get so ratty when you can’t have your fix.’

Patsy smiled, warmly. ‘That’s right. Bring them upstairs, I’m going to run a bath.’

Chris found the cigarettes tucked away in the cutlery drawer of the small tidy kitchen and, obediently, trotted upstairs with them.

‘Are you decent?’ he asked, knocking on the bathroom door.

‘Not particularly, come on in.’

The bathroom was luxurious; white tiled with gold fittings. Framed gold discs decorated the walls.

‘My late husband’s triumphs,’ Patsy commented dryly, from the centre of a huge circular bath, which was full of frothy bubbles. ‘Of which I was the last.’

Chris sat awkwardly on the edge of the bath keeping his eyes very consciously on the metal circles on the walls. He handed Patsy her cigarettes.

She took them from him and then made a playful grab for him, trying to pull him into the bath, but he was too quick for her and leapt back into the room.

‘Spoilsport,’ she moaned, hanging on the rim of the bath. ‘Christopher, come on in. There’s room for two. Actually there’s room for about eight. I mean, can’t you just lighten up and have some fun, for Christsakes!’

‘I. . . ’ Why was this so difficult? It reminded him of something. As if he’d been here before. In exactly this situation. I’m not worthy of you, he heard himself saying. To Roz. He’d said that to Roz, while they’d kissed, selfconsciously and awkwardly, back in Little Caldwell.

‘Forget I mentioned it,’ Patsy snapped, and pushed herself away from the side. ‘If you don’t want me, that’s fine.’

‘It’s not that. . . it’s just. . . ’ Chris started and then ran out of words. Patsy sat in the middle of the bath and pushed her blonde hair away from her face, exposing dark roots near her scalp.

‘It’s just what, Christopher?’

‘Nothing,’ he said.

And started to tug off his shirt.

Tilda Jupp pressed the accelerator pedal to the floor and the little open-topped MG sports car leapt forward, skidding around the tight country bend before hurtling on into the morning light. ‘An old flame gave it to me. Nifty, eh?’

‘Madam, are you aware of the speed limit?’ Harris shouted against the wind. Perched on the tiny back seat, he was beginning to wish that he had 160

brought his warrant card with him. They’d only been on the road for an hour and this woman had already committed over a dozen serious traffic offences.

‘Don’t be ridiculous, Chief Inspector,’ she barked brightly. ‘The only positive aspects of being in the countryside are clear roads and no police officers.’

‘Present company excepted, I hope?’ Harris shouted, hanging on to his hat with one hand.

Miss Jupp eyed him through her driving goggles with open suspicion. ‘Well, we’ll see,’ she