‘Who does that role?’

‘James Jefferies.’

Archie shrugged. ‘Who’s that?’

Holden pointed towards a photograph on the wall that showed a slightly wrinkled man next to a boat holding something she couldn’t quite make out. Next to him, Jessica recognised Holden.

‘He won an Olympic bronze medal thirty years ago,’ the student said, grinning.

Archie was having none of it: ‘Bronze medal, eh? Did he fall in or something?’

‘Huh?’

‘Well, if he only won a bronze, what was he doing? Rowing backwards?’

Holden spluttered, eyes wide, staring at Archie. ‘It’s really hard just to qualify for the Olympics, let alone win a medal.’

‘Bollocks is it. I’d be ashamed to come home with anything other than gold.’

Archie wandered up to the honours board and brushed away a speck of dust as Jessica stifled a grin. In the old days, the softening up would’ve been her job. He was like a little pitbull she could let off the leash as and when she chose. Usually, she wouldn’t go in so strong, but given the information Holden had opted not to tell her the previous night, she wasn’t in the best of moods.

‘When you sit on the committee, do you talk about upcoming social events?’ Jessica asked before he could compose himself.

Holden turned back to Jessica, wondering what was going on. ‘I suppose.’

‘And what’s your memory usually like? Can you remember what you had for breakfast earlier?’

‘I didn’t have breakfast.’

‘Aah, but you remember that – and if you recall that, then why didn’t you tell me last night that you, Damon and all the other members of the rowing club were here for a giant piss-up two nights ago?’

As Holden’s eyebrows rose, Jessica could see the penny dropping. ‘It was a busy night,’ he replied, trying to stay cool. ‘I didn’t know if Damon had been at the party and didn’t want to give you wrong information.’

His cheeks puffed out, a sigh of relief that he’d come up with that on the spot.

‘So, was he here or not?’ Jessica snapped.

‘When the news came out about his body this morning, everyone was in shock. Some of the lads were saying that it was only Wednesday night that we saw him last. That jogged my mind.’

Holden smiled unconvincingly. He’d known full well Damon had been at the rowing club’s party on the night he died. When Jessica had seen him the previous evening, she’d known he was holding something back; now his evasion had given her every reason to arrest him.

Jessica peered across to Archie. ‘What is it we usually call this?’

‘Being a knob head?’

‘I was thinking more “obstructing a police officer”.’

Holden was even more confused than before, glancing between Jessica and Archie, trying to work out what was going on. Good, Jessica wanted him sweating. ‘I wasn’t trying to obstruct anything,’ he protested. ‘I’d just forgotten; there were a lot of people here.’

‘How many?’

‘Most of our eighty members, plus some partners, alumni, the committee – at least a hundred and fifty.’

‘Do you have a list of attendees?’

‘Our membership secretary might.’

‘Good – I’m going to need those details.’

‘Right, I can—’

‘What do you remember about seeing Damon on Wednesday night?’

Sometimes silence worked, making the witness or suspect fill the awkward gaps, but Holden was too calculating; the best method was to keep firing questions at him.

‘Not much. It was a big black-tie thing – suits and cocktail dresses. We hold one every November because that’s when our membership has settled with the new recruits – once they’ve decided they’re committed. We hold another one at the end of the university year.’

‘That’s not what I asked.’

‘Right, right, I . . . I assume he was looking smart. We all were.’

That tallied with the shirt and dark trousers in which his body was found, so Holden wasn’t lying about everything.

‘Was he here with anyone?’

‘I’m not sure. I don’t think so. A lot of the rowing teams tend to keep to themselves – I didn’t spend any time with him. People started drifting away after a couple of hours. I think he left.’

‘Did he or didn’t he?’

‘I’m not sure. Some of the others might know. I was here all night.’

Archie jumped in without being asked: ‘I suppose you’ve got witnesses? Someone who’ll tell us you spent the evening knocking back girly cocktails?’

‘Well . . .’

‘This is quite a big club,’ Jessica said. ‘What else do you do here? It can’t just be rowing and posh parties?’

‘We hire it out now and then—’

‘I was thinking more about the two separate date rape allegations against club members from the past eighteen months.’

Holden’s eyes narrowed and he glanced around nervously at the empty surroundings. He was shrinking in front of her, clearly wishing he’d got out while he could. ‘Both of those were unproven with the charges dropped.’

Jessica turned to Archie, who had taken a sheaf of papers from a cardboard wallet and was sorting through them. ‘Aye, but what about the three call-outs for public disorder in the past three years?’

‘I wasn’t president for any of those. We’ve been adhering to rules about noise and sticking to the curfew.’

Archie moved to the next sheet. ‘One of your members ended up in hospital with hypothermia last year.’

‘He was training on his own on the water! How were we supposed to know?’

Archie moved to the next sheet but Jessica cut him off. ‘The fact is, Mr Wyatt, there’s a disturbing pattern here: complaints about noise and mess, a serious medical incident, date rape allegations and now a murder. All apparent accidents, all connected to the club you’re running. Things are spiralling out of control, aren’t they?’

Holden opened his mouth to reply and then stopped, drawing himself back up to his full height. Archie puffed his chest out and splayed his legs slightly, as if gearing up for a good old-fashioned ruck on Deansgate. Jessica looked from one man to the other, feeling the testosterone. Holden towered over the constable but Jessica wouldn’t have wanted to guess who’d come out on top if it ever came to it. Not that it would.

‘None of those earlier things happened while I was president,’ Holden said calmly. ‘Whatever happened to Damon is unfortunate – but I was here and I’m pretty sure he left halfway through the evening. I don’t know what happened after that. If you’re unsure then perhaps you should go and do some proper police work.’

Jessica let the silence hang for a moment, hoping Archie wouldn’t jump in. When he didn’t, she felt even more confident that he really did know what he was doing. She stared at Holden, who held her gaze defiantly. ‘I’m going to need a full list of all current and former members of this club,’ she eventually said.

Holden shook his head. ‘Those details don’t exist.’

‘I thought you said the membership secretary would know who was at the party?’

‘That was different – it was a ticketed event, so we would have kept track. We’ll have the current members but nothing other than that. I think you’ll find there are data protection laws anyway.’

He rocked back on his heels, the hesitation of before now gone. The smug bastard.

Archie started flicking through the folder again and handed Jessica a printout without her having to look at him.

‘One of my colleagues found this on the university website this morning,’ she said, beginning to read. ‘“For clubs to be able to use the official university seal, or to be eligible for loans, bursaries or grants, they must securely keep full membership lists of all current and former members for a minimum of ten years, or for the length of time the club has been in operation. Said details must be provided to the university upon written request within seventy-two hours.”’ Jessica looked back up at Holden, wide-eyed and innocent. ‘Didn’t you tell me last night that some of your funding came from the university?’