Annie liked pop music, but she hadn’t heard of MOJO, though she knew she must have seen it in W. H. Smith’s when she was picking up Now, Star or Heat, the trashy celebrity gossip magazines she liked to read in the bath, her one secret vice. “You didn’t approve of your son’s interest in rock music?” she asked.

“It’s not that we’re against it, or anything, you understand,” said Ross Barber. “We’ve just always been a bit more inclined toward classical – Louise sings with the local operatic society – but we’re happy that Nicholas seemed to pick up a love of music at a very early age, along with the writing. He loves classical music, too, of course, but writing about rock was how he made his living.”

“He was lucky, then,” said Annie. “Being able to combine his two loves.”

“Yes,” Louise agreed, wiping away a tear with a lacy handkerchief.

“Do you have any copies of his articles? You must be proud of him. A scrapbook, perhaps?”

“I’m afraid not,” said Louise. “It never really entered our heads, did it, darling?”

Her husband agreed. “It wouldn’t mean anything to us, you see, what he was writing about. The names. The records. We would never have heard of any of them.”

Annie wanted to tell them that wasn’t the point, but it would clearly do no good. “How long has he been doing this for a living?” she asked.

“About eight years now,” Ross answered.

“And before that?”

“He got a BA in English at Nottingham, then he did an MA in film studies, I think, at Leicester. After that he did a bit of teaching and wrote reviews, then he got a feature accepted, and after that…”

“He never studied journalism?”

“No. I suppose you might say he got in through the back door.”

“What’s your profession, if you don’t mind my asking?”

“I was a university professor,” said Ross Barber. “Classics and Ancient History. Rather dull, I’m afraid. I’m retired now, mind you.”

Annie was trying frantically to puzzle out why anyone would want to kill a music journalist, but she couldn’t come up with anything. Except drugs. Kelly Soames had said that she and Nick smoked a joint, but that meant nothing. Annie had smoked a few joints in her time, even while she was a copper. Even Banks had smoked joints. She wondered about Winsome and Kev Templeton. Kev’s drug of choice was probably E washed down with liberal amounts of Red Bull, but she didn’t know about Winsome. She seemed a clean-living girl, with her passion for the outdoors, and for potholing, but surely there had to be something. Anyway, it didn’t help very much knowing that Nick Barber smoked marijuana occasionally. She imagined it was par for the course in the rock business, whichever end of it you were in.

“Can you tell us anything about Nick’s life?” she asked. “We have so little to go on.”

“I can’t see how any of it would help you,” said Louise, “but we’ll do our best.”

“Did you see him often?”

“You know what it’s like when they leave home,” Louise said. “They phone and visit when they can. Our Nick was no better or worse than anyone else in that regard, I shouldn’t think.”

“So he was in touch regularly?”

“He phoned us once a week and tried to drop by whenever he could.”

“When was the last time you saw him?”

Her eyes filled with tears again. “Just the week before last. Friday. He was on his way up to Yorkshire, and he stopped over for the night. We always keep his old room ready for him, just in case.”

“Was there anything different about him?”

“Different? What do you mean?”

“Did he seem fearful in any way?”

“No, not at all.”

“Was he depressed about anything?”

The Barbers looked at one another, then Louise replied. “No. Maybe a little preoccupied, but certainly not depressed. He seemed quite cheerful, as a matter of fact. Nick was never the most demonstrative of children, but he was generally even-tempered. He was no different this time from any other time he called by.”

“He wasn’t anxious about anything?”

“Not as far as we could tell. If anything, he was a bit more excited than usual.”

“Excited? About what?”

“He didn’t say. I think it might have been a story he was working on.”

“What was it about?”

“He never told us details like that. Not that we weren’t interested in his work, but I think he realized it would mean nothing to us. Besides, it was probably a ‘scoop.’ He’d learned to become secretive in his business.”

“Even from you?”

“The walls have ears. He’d developed an instinct. I don’t think it really mattered to whom he was talking.”

“So he didn’t mention any names?”

“No. I’m sorry.”

“Did he tell you why he was going to Yorkshire?”

“He said he’d found what sounded like a quiet place to write, and I think there was someone he wanted to see who lives up there.”

“Who?”

Mrs. Barber spread her hands. “I’m sorry. But I got the impression it was to do with what he was working on.”

Annie cursed under her breath. If only Nick had named names. If he’d thought his parents had the least interest in his passion, then he probably would have, despite his journalistic instinct to protect his scoop. “Is that what he was excited about?”

“I think so.”

“Can you add anything, Mr. Barber?”

Ross Barber shook his head. “No. As Louise said, the names of these groups and singers mean nothing to us. I think he’d learned there was no point in mentioning them. I’m afraid I glaze over in discussions like that. No doubt members of his own generation would be very impressed, but they went right over our heads.”

“I can understand that,” said Annie. “What do you know about Nick’s life in London?”

“He had a nice flat,” said Louise. “Didn’t he, Ross? Just off the Great West Road. We stayed there not so long ago on our way to Heathrow. He slept on the sofa and let us have his bedroom. Spotless, it was.”

“He didn’t live or share with anyone?”

“No. It was all his own.”

“Did you meet a girlfriend or a close friend? Anyone?”

“No. He took us out for dinner somewhere in the West End. The next day we flew to New York. Ross and I have old friends there, and they invited us for our fortieth wedding anniversary.”

“That’s nice,” said Annie. “So you don’t really know much at all about Nick’s life in London?”

“I think he worked all the hours God sent. He didn’t have time for girlfriends and relationships and that sort of thing. I’m sure he would have settled down eventually.”

In Annie’s admittedly limited experience, if someone had reached the age of thirty-eight without “settling down,” you were a fool if you held your breath and waited for him to do so, but she also knew that many more people were holding off committing to relationships for much longer these days, herself included. “I know this is a rather delicate question,” Annie asked, “and I don’t want it to upset you, but did Nick ever have anything to do with drugs?”

“Well,” said Ross, “we assumed he experimented, of course, like so many young people today, but we never saw him under the influence of anything more than a couple of pints of bitter, or perhaps a small whiskey. We’re fairly liberal about things like that. I mean, you can’t teach in a university for as long as I did and not have some knowledge of marijuana. But if he did use drugs at all, they didn’t interfere with his job or his health, and we certainly never noticed any signs, did we?”

“No,” Louise agreed.

It was a fair answer, if not entirely what Annie had expected. She sensed that Ross Barber was being as honest as he could be. The Barbers clearly loved their son and were distraught over his death, but there seemed to have been some sort of communication gap between them. They were proud of his achievements, but not interested in the actual achievements themselves. Nick might well have interviewed Coldplay or Oasis, but Annie could just imagine Ross Barber saying, “That’s very nice, son,” as he pored over his ancient tomes. She couldn’t think of anything else to ask and glanced over at Winsome, who shrugged. Perhaps Banks would have done better; perhaps she wasn’t asking the right questions, but she couldn’t think of any more. They would have a quick look in Nick’s room, just in case he had left anything of interest, then maybe catch a pub lunch somewhere on the way back. After that, Annie would check in at the incident van and give Banks a ring. He’d want to know what she had found out, no matter how little it was.