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the notice board. Jobs, hostel accommodation, personal messages, dubious offers of help by phone.
    “Go and sit down and I’ll get Ron to bring you something in.”
    He had a deep, resonant voice that went with his neat appearance and confident personality. A tall man, broad in the chest, late thirties, Parker-Jones carried himself as someone of authority: an organizer, intelligent and decisive. His black hair, parted in the middle, flopped over his ears when he was in a hurry, giving him a rakish look that was somewhat at odds with his image of a solid rock in a shifting world.
    “Did you call home?” he asked Martin. “You promised me you would at least call your mother. Do you want me to do it? Martin?”
    Martin shook his head and wandered off into the TV lounge. Broken-down armchairs and two old sofas were grouped around the set, and there was a shelf of dog-eared paperbacks, some jigsaws, and board games. The walls were a sickly purple, with green woodwork. It was empty at this hour; between seven and eight was usually quiet, which was why Martin had dared take the risk.
    On the way back to his office, Parker-Jones called out to a scruffy black kid with a hearing aid, wearing a back-to-front baseball cap, “Ron, get some hot soup for Martin Fletcher, would you?”
    The black kid dropped the duster and metal wastebasket he was carrying and went over to the alcove where a copper urn with a brass tap bubbled and spat, steam jetting out of the top.
    Otley came down the narrow wooden stairway from the street, the shoulders of his raincoat stained dark with drizzle. The advice centre was on his beat. It was situated just off Brewer Street in Soho, at the bottom of a cobbled alley that during the day was crowded with market traders, selling everything from fruit and veg to lampshades, toilet paper, and bootleg records and tapes. The doorway was directly opposite the neon-lit entrance to a strip club. Farther along, a couple of shops stayed open until past midnight, catering to the soft porn magazine and video trade.
    Otley knew about the hard Swedish and German stuff in their back rooms, for selected clients only, but he let it ride. The perverts had to go somewhere. Better they got their jollies that way than molesting the young and vulnerable.
    “Bit quiet tonight, isn’t it?” Otley said.
    The three boys loitering at the notice board looked him up and down with sullen eyes. No one spoke. Hands in his raincoat pockets, Otley glanced around at the peeling mustard-colored walls with posters tacked up for rock concerts long gone. The carpet was a dank green, greasy and black with the tread of many feet. The wall opposite the reception counter was bare brick, steam pipes near the ceiling, huge Victorian radiators jutting out into the passage. To the left was the games room, which had a pool table and a football table with wooden players; to the right, past the office door, the fluted glass panels of the TV room. Otley thought he saw a rippling shadow move inside.
    He said casually, “Any of you know Colin Jenkins? Nicknamed Connie?”
    The door marked “E PARKER-JONES—PRIVATE” opened, and Parker-Jones came out. He spotted Otley at once and marched straight over.
    “What do you want?” Dark eyes under thick black eyebrows staring hard. “If you are looking for a specific person, why don’t you ask me?”
    Otley remained unruffled. He’d been stared at before.
    “You know a lad called Colin Jenkins?”
    “Yes. Red-haired, about your height. Nicknamed Connie.”
    Otley nodded slowly. “Used Vera Reynolds’s place. I need to ask some of the boys about him.” Parker-Jones was about to say something, but Otley went on in a monotone, “He’s dead. He was on the game, wasn’t he?”
    “Are you telling me or asking me?” Parker-Jones drew himself up to his full height. “Is this official? I’ve already discussed this with an Inspector . . .” He frowned and snapped his fingers. “Inspector Hall. I