It was the description of the box rather than the ring that seized Harding’s attention. “Good God,” he said before he could stop himself. “Starburst-patterned.”

“That’s where he got the name for his company from,” said Tozer, sidling closer. “He remembers it as clearly as I do. All of it.”

“All of what?” Harding asked, looking up at him.

“All of the things… I don’t discuss with a stranger.”

“Fair enough.” Harding dropped the catalogue back on the table. “But you do believe this… heirloom… was stolen by your uncle.”

“That proves it.” Tozer jabbed a forefinger at the red-circled entry. “I’m going to see the ring tomorrow. For the first time in nearly forty years.”

“As long as that?”

“Oh yes. Uncle Gabriel clung to it for as many years as he could eke out his life. And now he hopes to cheat me of it from beyond the grave.”

“Where did he steal it from?”

“Our house in Morrab Road. Grandfather’s old-” Tozer broke off, seeming suddenly to sense he had said too much. He peered suspiciously at Harding, who had not failed to notice his use of “me” rather than “us” but tried to give no sign of it. “You don’t need to know any more.”

“Do you want me to come with you… to Heartsease?”

“No.”

“I’d like to see the ring-and the box-for myself.”

“Then go. But later in the day. I’ll be there when they start. At ten.”

It was an explicit warning-off Harding had no choice but to accept it. “All right. I’ll wait till the afternoon.”

“You do that.”

“I’m staying at the Mount Prospect.”

“Barney’s seeing you all right, then.”

And you, you miserable sod, Harding thought but did not say. “You can contact me there or on my mobile,” he said emolliently. He picked up the red ballpoint lying by the catalogue and wrote his number at the foot of the page. “I ought to have your phone number as well.”

“I’m in the book.”

“OK.”

Tozer’s gaze drifted to the catalogue. “The ring and the box… mustn’t be parted.”

“Well, they’re not going to be, are they?”

Tozer looked up at Harding. “No,” he said quietly but firmly. “They’re not.”

Harding did not wait to be asked to leave. Fresh air was what he needed after the rancid chill of Humphrey Tozer’s flat. Fortunately, there was plenty of that billowing in from the bay as he made his way back to the Mount Prospect. He phoned Carol again after his solitary dinner in the hotel’s restaurant, but elicited little sympathy.

“I told you he was bad news.”

“You never mentioned his hygiene problem.”

“I’ve done my best to forget it.”

“Well, at least I won’t have to see much of him. He’s made it obvious he wants me to keep my distance.”

“Do as he asks, then.”

“I will, believe me.”

“The sooner you’re back here, the happier I’ll be.”

“Me too. By the way, did you know Barney got the name Starburst from the box that contains this ring Humphrey wants so badly?”

“No. What does it mean-starburst?”

“It’s a pattern of some kind. I’ll see it at Heartsease tomorrow. But it’s odd, don’t you think? Barney using the name, I mean.”

“Not really. It probably just popped into his head at the time.”

“Yeah. I suppose so.” But that was not what Humphrey thought. He thought it proved the box-and the ring-meant as much to his brother as to him. And though he did not say as much to Carol, Harding was beginning to think so as well.

Harding had explored the historic heart of Penzance and was walking aimlessly along the promenade late the following morning, heading towards the fishing harbour of Newlyn, when the call came he had been expecting since breakfast.

“Hi, Tim. How’s it going?”

“Fine, thanks, Barney. How was Abu Dhabi?”

“Dry What’s it like in the old home town?”

“Overcast. If you really want to know.”

“What I really want to know is how you got on with Humph.”

“As well as could be expected. I wouldn’t say there was an outburst of gratitude, but he seems… happy enough.”

“Good.”

“He’s going to Heartsease this morning. I plan to take a look this afternoon at the ring and the famous starburst box.”

“Carol said you’d spotted the connection.” Harding had agreed with Carol that she would mention his call-one of his calls, at any rate. “Dad was always going on about it when we were kids. The name just stuck in my memory, I suppose.”

“The ring’s three hundred years old, Barney. Has it been in your family all that time?”

“Doubt it, old son. Dad never actually said which ancestor first laid hands on it. Probably didn’t know. And it certainly doesn’t matter. Just keep an eye on Humph till the auction and wait to see if he cracks a smile for the first time in decades when you plonk the bloody thing in his paw straight afterwards.”

“OK, Barney. Leave it to me.”

Heartsease was in a tree-shaded road lined with large family homes that looked to date from the inter-war years. It was a big, inelegant pile of a house, with timbered gables, squat chimneys, irregular dormers and uneven bays, dankly flanked by limp palms, overgrown evergreens and a spectacularly feral camellia.

The neighbourhood was probably quiet as a rule, but Isbister’s advertisement had brought double-parked cars and a steady stream of bargain-hunters to Polwithen Road. Harding trailed behind several of them up the drive to the side-door, taking the route prescribed by a sign out on the pavement. He reflected that Humphrey had been wise to come early. A chance to inspect the belongings of Gabriel Tozer (deceased) and to prowl round his house was evidently the high spot of quite a few people’s Saturday.

The auctioneer had put the conservatory adjoining the entrance into service as a cloakroom, where coats and bags had to be left. Catalogues were on sale at a fiver a throw, but Harding kept his money in his pocket. His interest, after all, was confined to one lot and one lot only.

As he was waiting for the ticket for his coat, he was suddenly jostled to one side by a burly, scruffily dressed figure, demanding the return of a bag he had deposited. The man was middle-aged, with grey-shot black hair cut in a rudimentary short-back-and-sides. His jowly face was flushed and pockmarked and sheened with sweat. And there was a smell of whisky on his breath.

“Leaving so soon, Mr. Trathen?” the cloakroom attendant enquired as he passed Harding his ticket and the other man a bulging Co-op carrier-bag.

“I’ve seen enough,” Trathen replied, jostling Harding still further as he took his leave.

“Doesn’t take long to see enough when you’re seeing double,” the attendant murmured. “Sorry about that,” he said, smiling at Harding. “Probably shouldn’t have let him in. I don’t think he was here as a serious buyer. As any kind of buyer, come to that.”

“No?”

“Bit of a sad case, Ray Trathen. But you don’t want to know about him, believe you me.”

Harding moved on into the house, having established that Lot 641 was to be found in bedroom 2. He paused in the large, square hallway at the foot of the stairs, up and down which his fellow punters were coming and going. Doors stood open to the drawing room, dining room and kitchen. Only one door, beneath the stairs, was marked PRIVATE. Everywhere else they were free to roam.

The interior of Heartsease was a stolid, spacious family abode, with a lot of handsomely burnished wood, well-proportioned rooms and stained-glass flourishes in several of the windows. Solitary occupant as he was, Gabriel Tozer had done a good job of filling it with possessions rather than people. Cabinets, bookcases, bureaux and tables groaned under the weight of his meticulously catalogued belongings, every chair, every lamp, every doorstop, every jug, every spoon, every neatly stacked run of Country Life and the Illustrated London News, every rug across which the punters moved, every humdrum object they picked up and put down again, bearing its telltale numbered tag.