‘But you didn’t?’

He stared into the fire and paused, as if he realized he had already given too much away, then he said quietly, ‘I have my demons, Mr Banks, but they also fire me. I’m afraid that if I subjected them to therapy I’d have no more fuel, no more creativity. Whatever Veronica might say, my music’s born from conflict and feeling, not just technical skill.’ He tapped his head. ‘I really hear those things. And I was afraid if I opened my head to some shrink all the music would escape and I would be condemned to silence I couldn’t live like that. No, I didn’t go.’

Patsy returned with the coffee. Ivers took it, smiled at her, and she sat on the floor beside him with her legs curled under her and her hand resting on his thigh.

‘Did you know at the start of the friendship that Caroline was a lesbian?’ Banks asked.

‘Yes. Veronica told me Caroline was living with a woman called Nancy Wood. Fair enough, I thought. Live and let live. I’m a musician, not the bohemian type, perhaps, but I’ve been around enough oddballs in my time not to worry about them too much. And I’m fairly broad-minded. So Caroline was a lesbian. I never for a moment thought that my wife…’

‘So if you blamed anyone it was Caroline?’

‘Yes.’ He hesitated, realizing what he’d said. ‘But I didn’t kill her, if that’s what you’re getting at.’

‘What did you do yesterday evening?’

He sipped his coffee and spoke, half into the mug. Stayed in. With Patsy. We don’t go out all that much.’

Patsy looked at Banks and nodded in agreement. He saw shadows behind her eyes. He wasn’t sure he believed her. ‘Do you own a car?’ he asked.

‘We both do.’

‘Where do you park?’

‘We’ve got spots reserved in the village, behind the pub. Obviously there’s no parking up here.’

‘When did you last see your wife?’

He thought for a moment. ‘About a month ago. I was in Eastvale on business and I dropped in to see how Veronica was doing. I called at the shop first. I usually do that to avoid meeting Caroline, but sometimes if it’s evening I just have to face it out.’

‘How did Caroline react to these visits?’

‘She’d leave the room.’

‘So you never spoke to her?’

‘Not much, no. And Veronica would be tense. I’d never end up staying long if Caroline was around.’

‘Are you sure that was the last time you visited the house, a month ago?’

‘Yes, of course I am.’

‘You didn’t go there yesterday evening?’

‘I told you. We stayed in.’

‘You’re a musician,’ Banks said. ‘You must know Vivaldi’s work.’

‘I – of course I do.’

‘Do you know the Laudate pueri?’

Ivers turned aside and reached for some bread and butter. ‘Which one? He wrote four, you know.’

‘Four what?’

‘Four settings for the same liturgical piece. I think it’s Psalm 112, but I can’t be sure. Why do you ask?’

‘Have you heard of a singer called Magda Kalmar?’

‘Yes. But I-’

‘Did you usually buy your wife a Christmas present?’

‘I did last year.’

‘And this year?’

He buttered his bread as he spoke. ‘I was going to. Am. I just haven’t got round to it yet.’

‘Better hurry up, then,’ Banks said with a smile. ‘Only one more shopping day to Christmas.’ He put his cup down on the hearth and stood up to leave. ‘Thank you very much for the tea and bread,’ he said to Patsy, ‘and it was an honour to meet you Mr Ivers. I’ve enjoyed your music for a long time.’

Ivers raised an eyebrow. Banks was thankful he just nodded and didn’t say anything about being surprised that policemen listened to music.

Banks walked over to the door and Ivers followed him. ‘About Veronica,’ he said. ‘She must be in a terrible state Do you think she needs me?’

‘I don’t know,’ Banks said. He honestly didn’t. Did a wife who lost her female lover turn back to her husband for comfort? ‘Maybe you should ask her.’

Ivers nodded, and the last thing Banks noticed before the door closed was the darkening expression in Patsy Janowski’s eyes, fixed on the pipe in Ivers’s hand.

He made his way against the wind back to the car and drove up the hill again. The Ivers household had left him with a strange feeling. However rustic and cosy it was, he couldn’t help but suspect that all was not well, and that nobody had told him the complete truth. He had little doubt that Ivers had bought the record for Veronica and had more than likely delivered it, too. But he couldn’t prove it. As soon as he could, he would go back to visit Claude Ivers again.

The Queen’s Arms was never very busy at five o’clock on a winter’s afternoon. It was too late for the lunchtime drinkers and too early for the after-work crowd. The only other customers, apart from Banks, Richmond and Susan Gay, were three or four people with shopping bags full of Christmas presents.

The three of them sat in the deep armchairs around the fire. Banks and Richmond were drinking pints and Susan had accepted a brandy and soda. They had pooled their notes and still had nothing concrete to go on. Richmond had discovered that Nancy Wood had left Eastvale for an extended trip to Australia. A phone call to immigration had established that she was indeed there. Richmond followed with a call to the Sydney police, who got back to him a couple of hours later with positive confirmation. That was one serious suspect eliminated.

Richmond had so far got nowhere with the photograph of Ruth, the mysterious woman. The record, too, remained unexplained. They would have to start canvassing classical record shops all over England, and that would take time. Veronica Shildon’s therapist had confirmed that Veronica had left her office at about seven o’clock the previous evening, as usual, and that she had mentioned going shopping.

‘You said that Caroline ran off to London when she was sixteen?’ Banks said to Susan.

‘That’s what her brother told me.’

‘And she was down there for about six years before she came up to Eastvale. A lot can happen in that time. Any idea where she was?’

‘Sorry, sir, they didn’t seem to know anything. Either that or they weren’t saying.’

‘Was that the feeling you got?’

‘There was certainly something weird about them. Susan shuddered as she spoke.

‘Never mind. We’ll find out when we talk to them again. Maybe you can get a printout from the PNC, Phil? Caroline Hartley might have a record down there. Runaways often get in trouble with the law.’

Richmond nodded.

‘Any other leads?’ Banks asked.

They shook their heads. He smiled. ‘Don’t look so bloody despondent, Susan. At least it means you’ll get Christmas Day at home.’

‘Sir?’

‘If we don’t solve a murder in twenty-four hours, the odds are we’ll be at it a long time. A day here or there isn’t going to make a lot of difference unless we come up with a hot lead tomorrow. And it is Christmas. Things slow down. You know as well as I do it’s impossible to get anything done for a couple of days. Nobody’s around, for a start. All we can do is get the statements sorted out and see if we can build up a clear picture of the victim. You find often enough that the seeds of the death are in the life, so to speak, and given the life Caroline Hartley led that may have been more apt in her case. We’ll do what we can with the photo, the record and the London connection, and in a day or two we’ll visit her family again and push a bit harder. Maybe you and I could have a bit of a chat with the amateur dramatic society again, too, Susan. There might be some connections there – jealousy, rivalry, something like that.’

Susan nodded.

‘And I don’t think Veronica Shildon’s coming clean with us, either,’ Banks went on. ‘But then she’s not likely to. She’ll be protecting Caroline’s memory, especially if there’s any shady business in the girl’s past. Her alibi checks out, but there are ten minutes unaccounted for between her return home and going to Christine Cooper’s. She could have nipped back earlier, too, say between seven and half past, if she’d wanted to, and only pretended to arrive later. Then there’s Cooper himself, and his wife for that matter. If there was anything odd going on between those two households, who knows what kind of can of worms it might have opened. All I’m saying is that we should keep an open mind while we let them all stew for a while. Let them enjoy Christmas. Maybe we’ll do the rounds again on Boxing Day when they’re all full and comfy. An old sparring partner of mine from the Met, Dirty Dick Burgess, always used to prefer Sundays for surprise raids. Boxing Day’s probably even better.’