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a few moments as the car stopped and started its way back towards the seafront.
    Every now and again I caught the sergeant’s glance in the rear-view mirror. I marvelled at his ability to look so disinterested. I could have done with some tips from him during my first year in prison.
    ‘What were you doing at Chief Inspector Clipton’s funeral?’ Crowder’s voice broke through my unhappy memories. I was rather glad.
    ‘I went to make sure the bastard really was dead,’ I snapped. Before prison I wouldn’t have dreamed of speaking to a police officer so dismissively or sarcastically. I had been brought up to respect the law. Now everything was different, including me. I tried not to show my tension. I knew Crowder would see it and perceive it as a weakness. Ray’s words came to me. ‘ Show the bastards you don’t give a toss. That way they can’t hurt you, even when they do hurt you’.
    Crowder shook his big head like a St Bernard dog, and a sorrowful expression swept across his lugubrious face. ‘You’re not still trying to prove that you’re innocent, are you, Alex? I don’t think the parole board will take a good view of that.
    Didn’t you tell them how sorry you are and that you’d hand the money over if you could lay your hands on it?’
    Of course Crowder would know what the parole board report had said. ‘Is that what you’re after? Well, I’m sorry to disappoint. I haven’t a clue where it is.’
    ‘No? We’ve long since come to the conclusion that Andover doesn’t exist. He was your alter ego.
    You were and are Andover.’
    I knew I wasn’t. ‘Traffic’s heavy.’ Say nothing.
    Show nothing – Ray again.
    ‘Why was Clipton travelling to the Isle of Wight? Did you arrange to meet him?’ Crowder said, with a harder edge to his voice.
    ‘Hardly. Perhaps he fancied a holiday.’
    ‘Where’s the three million pounds you stole, Alex?’
    ‘It’s stopped raining.’
    ‘All right, let’s try another one. Where were you between nine and eleven this morning?’
    I swivelled to look directly at him. ‘You know where I was. I was making my way from my houseboat to Ryde to catch the hovercraft. And if you ask your fair-haired detective he will verify that I was nowhere near Joe Bristow’s office until just before eleven.’
    Crowder smiled which made me more uncomfortable than before. I had struck lucky with the fair-haired detective theory, but I felt uneasy. Why had he been so obvious? I had the feeling that I was intended to spot him.
    The sergeant pulled up outside the hovercraft terminal. Before I could climb out Crowder said in that deceptively comforting voice, ‘You’ve got that money, Alex, and I’m going to find out where it is. OK, so you may not have killed Joe Bristow yourself, but you know who did. You may even have ordered his death.’ He held up his hand to prevent me from protesting. I couldn’t anyway; I was struck dumb by what he was saying. My mouth must have been agape with amazement.
    He continued, ‘I’ll get you in the end, Alex. I just thought you ought to know that.’
    As I watched the car drive off I felt cold with fear. Crowder’s threats weren’t empty ones.
    There was also something personal in the way he had spoken. My God, as if I hadn’t been through a bad enough time with DCI Clipton, now I had another vindictive copper on my back.
    My fear swiftly turned to anger. It fed my determination to find Andover and clear my name. I’d take great pleasure in ramming that down the smug bastard’s throat.
    I waited until the car was out of sight, then turned westwards towards Old Portsmouth and the High Street, where Miles’s office was based.
    My mind wandered back to my conversation with Clipton’s daughter, which I’d hardly had time to digest with Crowder breathing down my neck. Why had Clipton taken an overnight bag with him to the Island? Who had he arranged to see? Had he booked in anywhere? Where was his mobile phone? I couldn’t recall them