But he had the boys. They were both married with a couple of children each, both living in the town.

“Campbell and Marie give me lunch every other Sunday,” he had said, after a few weeks of them seeing each other, going out to a meal, driving to the country one afternoon. “So how about you coming along with me next time?”

“Don’t be daft.”

“What?”

He had looked hurt. Eileen had felt a rush of guilt.

“I mean, they want to see you. They don’t know me, why would they want me to be there? Of course they wouldn’t.”

“They do. Marie said on the phone, bring your friend. She wouldn’t say it off her own bat, she’d talked about it with Campbell.”

“How do they know about me?”

“Well, because I’ve told them, how d’you think?”

She had gone. It had been hard until Marie had opened the front door smiling and after that everything had been good. Better than good. The next Sunday, it had been Keith and his Filipino wife Leah who had done the Sunday lunch, a barbecue that time, with Keith in charge because he was a chef and didn’t think women could cook meat properly.

Marrying Dougie had been marrying his family. Their wedding had been all about them, the boys, the daughters-in-law, the grandchildren, a registry office full of them.

Eileen had cried because of happiness and because of Dougie’s kindness, because of going from loneliness to a big family. And because neither Jan nor Weeny had been there.

“What do you mean, you’re getting married again, what are you talking about, Mother?” Jan had said, her voice going up and up. “What are you thinking? What about us? You can’t just marry some strange man.”

Eileen had told her everything about Dougie in a five-page letter, and written the same letter to Weeny and sent photos, sheaves of them, Dougie, the boys, the children, the dogs, Campbell and Marie’s caravan.

“He isn’t some strange man. I told you all about him.”

“I don’t know what you think you’re doing, getting married again at your time of life.”

“I’m getting myself someone to look after me and keep me company in old age,” she had said, “so you don’t have to.”

Jan had shut up then. But she had not been at the wedding.

“It’s too far to come all that way.”

“There’s trains. You can even fly from Aberdeen. I’ll pay your fares to fly, to get you here.”

She thought that had done the trick. Jan had agreed. Eileen had sent the money. Only at the last minute, one of the children had apparently gone down with something and Jan couldn’t leave him.

“I don’t believe her,” she had said to Dougie. “I don’t think Mark’s gone down with anything at all. She just doesn’t want to come. She’d no intention of coming.”

Jan had kept the air-fare money, though.

If she had hoped for one daughter at her wedding, she had known Weeny would not be there. Not after the note.

The card had primroses on it, and Weeny’s writing was very neat. She said she was too busy “Travelling” for her job as a “representative.” Eileen had no idea what Weeny’s job was. She wondered what she had done wrong—not now, in getting married to Dougie, but then, in the past, in their childhood. She couldn’t think of anything. Cliff had been proud of Weeny. He had taught her to be tough, but the sisters had fought from the moment Weeny was born until Jan had left home to live with Neil. They had fought for attention, affection, pocket money, the biggest room, the first slice of pie and the last sweet in the packet. The house had been a battleground for twenty-two years and when they had both left, within a few months of one another, Eileen had felt that a long, long war had ended. But Cliff had minded. Cliff had ceased to have anything to say from the moment Weeny had gone.

Eileen sat in the sun, her coat collar turned up against the breeze, and looked out at the sparkling sea, creaming over on to the sand in little wavelets. A poem from schooldays came into her head. They live on crispy pancakes / From the yellow tide foam.

The gulls rode on the sunlit water.

“Here you are, hot and sweet.”

Nobody but Dougie Meelup would have got a tray out of them, with the two teas not in plastic beakers but china cups and saucers, and two slices of farmhouse fruit cake on a plate.

Eileen looked at him. He set it all carefully down on the bench beside her.

“What did I ever do to deserve you?” she asked. And meant it.

“Get on.” He settled back against the bench with a sigh. “Lovely,” he said, looking out at the sea. “Isn’t that lovely? Glad you came?”

She looked with him to where the seagulls bobbed on the water. Years, she thought, years and years and years, you think that’s it, that’s the hand you were dealt, you have to make the best you can of it. But then, everything turns upside down and what have you done to deserve it? She didn’t deserve Dougie.

“I just wish c”

He lowered his cup of tea. He knew what, from her tone of voice.

“It takes time,” he said, as he always did.

“But how much time? If they made an effort, came to meet you, it’d be all right then.”

He must be tired of it, always reassuring, always getting her to see the girls’ point of view, look on the bright side, give it time.

“What do you want to do tomorrow? Go on a trip, stay here?”

“You—”

“No,” Eileen said. “You. You always give me the choice, now it’s your turn.”

He turned his head and looked out across the bay. Then he said, like a small boy wishing for a treat and fearing he would not get it, “I tell you what, then.”

“Go on.”

“I’d give a lot to go out on a boat.”

Thirty

A bird was making an irritating noise just outside the window, not a song, a regular high-pitched sound, like no bird Serrailler knew.

He came awake with a shock to find a body beside him in the bed and his mobile beeping. The hotel’s clock-radio read seven twenty.

“Serrailler.”

“Guv? I wasn’t sure what time I could wake you c”

Simon sat up. Diana stirred and turned over. “It’s fine. What’s up, Nathan?”

“I know you’re on leave, only we got her. She’s nailed.”

Simon whistled. “Forensics?”

“Yep. Came through late yesterday, I tried to reach you—”

“What have we got?”

“David Angus.”

“Oh God.”

“Two hairs.”

“In the house?”

“Nope, in the car. Car boot.”

Simon blanked out the picture that came into his head. “That it?”

“No. There’s something else c fingernail c not David, not Scott, not the little girl c they haven’t got a match yet.”

“So anotherchild?”

“Looks that way.”

“Christ. Oh Christ. Has anyone been to see Marilyn Angus?”

“Not yet.”

“Then don’t. This is mine.”

“Guv.”

“I’ll be there in a couple of hours. No one else is to pick it up and go there, understood?”

“Got it.”

Simon sat forward, his knees up, head down. It was the best news. It was what they wanted. It was what they had all worked for and prayed for. It was Ed Sleightholme nailed. The rest would follow, it would only be a matter of time. However many there were.

But it was also the last faint flicker of hope snuffed out. For Marilyn Angus, for other parents, God knows how many, for everyone in the country who had watched and prayed, hopelessly yet always hopeful, that somehow, somewhere, David Angus and the other child, or children, would be found alive.

His throat felt dry.

“Darling?” Diana put out her hand and stroked his shoulder.

He did not respond and after a couple of seconds, pushed back the duvet. “I have to get to Lafferton.”

“Why? You’re on holiday for a week.”

“That was my sergeant.” He went into the bathroom, locked the door and turned the shower on hard.

Ten minutes later he was dressed, his hair roughly rubbed dry, and putting his things into his holdall.