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I’m insane? Even the firefighters couldn’t risk boarding either of the boats until they’d sprayed water on them, and they were wearing protective clothing.”
    â€œAnd it was too late by then.”
    â€œWhat do you mean?”
    â€œEverybody was dead.”
    â€œYes…well, I tried to tell them how dangerous it was, living there. I suspect one of them must have had a dodgy heater of some sort, too, as well as the turpentine. I know it’s been a mild winter, but still…It is January.”
    â€œMr. Hurst,” Annie asked, “what were you thinking when you saw the fire’s glow above the tree line and got on your bike?”
    Hurst looked at her, a puzzled expression on his face. “That I had to find out what was happening, of course.”
    â€œBut you said you already knew at once what was happening.”
    â€œI had to be certain, though, didn’t I? I couldn’t just go off half-cocked.”
    â€œWhat else did you think might have been causing the orange glow?”
    â€œI don’t know. I wasn’t thinking logically. I just knew that I had to get down there.”
    â€œYet you didn’t do anything when you did get down there.”
    â€œIt was too late already. I told you. There was nothing I could do.” Hurst sat forward, chin jutting aggressively. Helooked at Banks. “Look, I don’t know what she’s getting at here, but I—”
    â€œIt’s simple, really,” said Banks. “DI Cabbot is puzzled why you decided to cycle a mile—slowly—down to the canal branch, when you already knew the boats were on fire and that the wood they were made of was so dry they’d go up in no time. I’m puzzled, too. And I’m also wondering why you didn’t just do what any normal person would have done and call the bloody fire brigade straight away. From here.”
    â€œNow there’s no need to get stroppy. I wasn’t thinking clearly. Like I said, you don’t when…when something like that…The shock. Maybe you’re right. Looking back, maybe I should have phoned first. But…” He shook his head slowly.
    â€œI was waiting for you to say you hurried down there to see if there was anything you could do,” Banks said. “To see if you could help in any way.”
    Hurst just stared at him, lower jaw hanging, and adjusted his glasses.
    â€œBut you didn’t say that,” Banks went on. “You didn’t even lie.”
    â€œWhat does that mean?”
    â€œI don’t know, Andrew. You tell me. All I can think of is that you wanted those narrow boats and the people who lived on them gone, that you didn’t call the fire brigade the minute you knew they were on fire, and that as soon as you got home you put your clothes in the washing machine. Perhaps nobody can fault you for not jumping on board a burning boat, but the fifteen minutes it took you to cycle down the towpath and make the call could have made all the difference in the world. And I’m wondering if you were aware of that at the time, too.” Banks looked at Annie, and they stood up, Banks grabbing the bag of clothes. “Don’t get up,” he said to Hurst. “We’ll see ourselves out. And don’t wander too far from home. We’ll be wanting to talk to you again soon.”
    Â 
    Banks wasn’t the only one who saw his weekend fast slipping away. As Annie pulled up outside the Victorian terraced house on Blackmore Street, in south Eastvale, blew her raw nose and squinted at the numbers, she realized that the fire on the barges, or narrow boats, as Andrew Hurst had insisted they were called, was probably going to keep her well occupied for the next few days. She had been hoping that Phil Keane, the man she had been seeing for the past few months—when work and business allowed, which wasn’t all that often—would be coming up from London for the weekend.