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than they, when the owner of a similar shop had caught him leaving the store with a small box of Black Magic chocolates making a bulge in his anorak. He’d been easier on the teenagers than the shopkeeper had been on him, the way he’d called in police. Set an example. The aunt who’d just taken Richard in had been mortified.
    The girl’s name had been Ivy, he suddenly recalled. It was Ivy he’d wanted to give the sweets to as a Christmas present. But this sentiment hadn’t softened the set of his aunt’s mouth. His uncle had been a gentle man, one who made allowances, especially for a nephew whose own parents had been killed in the war. But his uncle’s disappointment, the woeful look he cast upon the boy Richard, had been more difficult to bear than a physical blow.
    Well, it wasn’t nicking sweets anymore, he thought with an almost overwhelming remorse, as the pale face of the pretty girl lying in the street came back to him. Ivy. The name was probably the reason that memory had floated to mind.
    â€œ. . . Jury! Can you stop woolgathering long enough to answer the question?”
    â€œSorry.”
    â€œI asked you if Phyllis Nancy had done the autopsy.”
    â€œNo, not yet. Tomorrow morning.”
    â€œWhat the hell’s she waiting for, her medical degree?” Racer slapped open the top folder once again. “So all we know about this Childess woman is that she lived in Bayswater, had a row with her boyfriend in this pub off Berkeley Square, and that he left her there.” He shut the folder and leaned back. “You knew all that last night, Jury.”
    â€œThen perhaps I’d better be getting on with it? Anything else?” He unfolded himself from the chair and got up, casting his eye toward the couch.
    â€œWell, when you do turn up something, lad, would you kindly let me know?”
    â€œBe happy to.” Jury eyed the small tower of gifts and turned to go. When he reached the door he heard it — them: the collapse of the boxes like a house of cards, the spillage, the voice of Racer shouting at the cat Cyril, the intercom and the voice of Racer shouting at Fiona.
    Calmly, Jury opened the door and Cyril streaked through before him, another game-plan successfully executed.
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    â€œHe’s in a right temper now,” said Fiona, filing her nails, undisturbed by the squawking intercom. Cyril had leapt to the windowsill behind her to have a wash as the telephone rang.
    Fiona picked it up, spoke, then held it toward Jury. The black receiver looked like an extension of her darkly varnished nails. It fairly dripped from her hand. “It’s Al.”
    Jury took the receiver, wondering if anyone else at headquarters besides Fiona called Detective Sergeant Wiggins by his first name. “Wiggins?”
    The voice of Wiggins was adenoidal, but precise. “I’ve come up with something, sir. I was just checking in the computer room —” The pause then was not for dramatic effect but to allow the sergeant to rustle a bit of cellophane from a box. He apparently had completed his delicate maneuver, for now the voice was clotted. “ ’N du-v’n’n, s’r —”
    â€œShove the cough drop under your tongue, Wiggins,” said Jury patiently.
    â€œOh. Sorry, sir. It was this case about ten months ago, end of February. Young woman by the name of Sheila Broome. Well, I would have passed straight over it except for the description of the body in situ. Police made sure there was nopublicity because they were afraid of copy-cat murders. For good reason. She was found in a wooded area off the A303, just near the turn-off to Taunton. She’d been strangled, apparently with her own scarf. Well, it could be a coincidence —”
    Jury stared blindly at Cyril, who was pressing one paw and then the other against the big snowflakes drifting against the windowpane. A serial