They still hadn’t fixed the air-conditioning, he noticed, and when he phoned down to complain, the desk clerk said no one would be able to do it till the morning. Just his fucking luck. He should have felt better after sating his desire, he knew, but when he lay down and relived what he had just done he was appalled.

It was only midnight. No more than an hour ago he had been an innocent, a virtuous man. Now he had been tainted. How little time it took. And now he was worried, too. Condom or no condom, he could still get AIDS. That was a fact. The wind had done this to him, the wind and the palm trees and the hooker with the wonderful breasts and the sweet, warm place inside her. He’d been suckered. Jesus Christ, he wept, how could he face Kate and Maria again, after he’d been corrupted? That hooker hadn’t been much older than his daughter. The goddamn hot wind had made him fuck his own daughter. Even if they didn’t know, he knew. He couldn’t face them. His marriage was over, his family broken, all because of some two-bit whore who had tempted him and given him a disease. He ground his teeth. The heat seemed to bore into his bones the way the damp cold did in England that time he went with Kate, so many years ago. He was burning up. Maybe he was already showing symptoms of whatever disease that whore had given him. But that was ridiculous. Maybe he’d got flu. Or maybe it was the Santa Ana.

He turned over and tried to sleep, but the steel band tightened and the guilt hammered away at him, making sleep impossible. His life was ruined. All because of fucking California. He couldn’t think straight any more. Nothing but images shot through his mind, disjointed images: Kate crying; Maria slipping her panties off and rubbing her hand between her legs; the tanned assholes with the two-thousand-dollar smiles who were going to have his job. He couldn’t take it any more. He had to do something. Christ, they’d walked over old Walter Dimchuk for long enough, pushed him around, used him for a doormat, laughed behind his back. Now they’d corrupted his soul. Goddammit, enough was enough. His luck was going to change.

Hardly thinking, he got dressed quickly and picked up his car keys. At the last moment, just before the door shut behind him, he went back and picked up the ice pick from the dish by the television.

This time it was a Caucasian girl: blonde hair, clean-cut looks, but the same style, tight short skirt and halter top. And she wanted to make a quick phone call before she got into his car and directed him to a different hotel. It was a step up from the last one, he noticed, for Wally was noticing things clearly now, like the old-fashioned bell on the wooden desk, the discreet damask armchairs in the lobby, the wood-panelling look, the hovering scent of sandalwood. In fact, Walter felt strangely calm and in control now he knew what he was going to do. The steel band had loosened.

He smiled to himself as she went through her undressing routine, a bit more elaborate and drawn out than the last one, with slow gestures and teasing glances. He felt no desire now; it was all gone. He let her continue.

Outside, the hot wind huffed and puffed at the windows. The halter revealed white, droopy breasts, the kind that fold over like envelope flaps. Her eyes were unfocused and dull, as if she were on drugs. She had a large bruise on the outside of her right thigh and a little scar just under her navel. Appendicitis? he wondered. But the appendix was further to the right, wasn’t it? No matter. She stood naked before him finally, and he still felt no desire, only disgust and hatred. It wasn’t the same one who had ruined him, corrupted him, but they were all the same underneath. Whores. They all shared the same tainted, rotten soul. She would do. He let her unbutton his shirt, then he moved her gently away and asked her to lie face down on the bed.

‘Wanna come in from behind, hey, honey?’ she said, and grinned lasciviously, lying down and hugging the pillow.

‘No, that’s not it.’ Walter’s voice felt strange – dry and stuck deep in his chest. ‘That’s not it at all.’

‘S’OK by me.’

Walter slipped the ice pick from his jacket pocket and felt its point cool in his dry hand. He was just about to raise it above his head and plunge into the back of her neck when he heard a sound behind him.

Everything happened so fast. First, the door opened, and Walter saw a huge man blocking the exit, a giant with blond hair hanging over his massive shoulders, a tanned face carved of rock and veins thick as cables snaking down his thick arms. The man, he also noticed, was wearing a sleeveless white T-shirt and baggy, flowered pants held up by elastic.

Shit, Walter thought, glancing back at the girl for a second, then at his jacket over the back of a chair, they’re going to rip me off, rob me. That’s what the phone call was about. Just my fucking luck.

But what Walter didn’t really register until it was much too late was that when he turned towards the doorway, he had an ice pick still raised above his head, and the other man had a gun.

Walter never did get a chance to explain. The giant raised his gun and, without a word, fired two shots right into Walter Dimchuk’s angry, corrupt and unlucky heart.

‘I’m not happy with it, laddie,’ said Dr Glendenning, shaking his head. ‘Not happy at all.’

‘So the super told me,’ said Banks. ‘What’s the problem?’

They sat at a dimpled, copper-topped table in the Queen’s Arms, Glendenning over a glass of Glenmorangie and Banks over a pint of Theakston’s. It was a bitterly cold evening in February. Banks was anxious to get home and take Sandra out to dinner as he had promised, but Dr Glendenning had asked for help, and a Home Office pathologist was too important to brush off.

‘One of these?’ Glendenning offered Banks a Senior Service.

Banks grimaced. ‘No. No thanks. I’ll stick with tipped. I’m trying to give up.’

‘Aye,’ said Glendenning, lighting up. ‘Me, too.’

‘So what’s the problem?’

‘She should never have died,’ the doctor said, ‘but that’s by the way. These things happen.’

‘Who shouldn’t have died?’

‘Oh, sorry. Forgot you didn’t know. Anna, Anna Childers is – was – her name. Admitted to the hospital this morning.’

‘Any reason to suspect a crime?’

‘No-o, not on the surface. That’s why I wanted an informal chat first.’ Rain lashed at the window; the buzz of conversation rose and fell around them.

‘What happened?’ Banks asked.

‘Her boyfriend brought her in at about ten o’clock this morning. He said she’d been up half the night vomiting. They thought it was gastric flu. Dr Gibson treated the symptoms as best he could, but…’ Glendenning shrugged.

‘Cause of death?’

‘Respiratory failure. If she hadn’t suffered from asthma, she might have had a chance. Dr Gibson managed at least to get the convulsions under control. But as for the cause of it all, don’t ask me. I’ve no idea yet. It could have been food poisoning. Or she could have taken something, a suicide attempt. You know how I hate guesswork.’ He looked at his watch and finished his drink. ‘Anyway, I’m off to do the post-mortem now. Should know a bit more after that.’

‘What do you want me to do?’

‘You’re the copper, laddie. I’ll not tell you your job. All I’ll say is the circumstances are suspicious enough to worry me. Maybe you could talk to the boyfriend?’

Banks took out his notebook. ‘What’s his name and address?’