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wasn’t quite all there.
    ‘Which enemies?’ he asked.
    Henry Mills looked at him as if he was trying to decide something. ‘The secret police,’ he said finally.
    Joe sat forward. ‘We are the police, Mr Mills.’
    ‘Not you lot,’ Mills snapped. ‘The secret police.’
    ‘What “secret” police?’ Carlyle asked. ‘MI5?’ Bored and frustrated, he was rapidly tuning out of this conversation. Mentally he was already back at the
station, if not well on the way to going home for his dinner. He even wondered if there was going to be anything good on telly tonight before defaulting back to the matter in hand. ‘Who do
you mean?’
    Mills stared at him blankly.
    ‘MI6?’ Carlyle tried again.
    ‘No, no, no!’ Mills pointed at the poster above the fireplace. ‘Not our lot. Are you stupid?’
    Joe sniggered. Carlyle gritted his teeth.
    Henry Mills waved his arms about theatrically. ‘I’m talking about the bloody Chileans.’
    ‘Chileans?’ Carlyle looked at the poster above the fireplace. He stuck his hands deep in his pockets.
    ‘1973. The CIA-backed fascist coup d’état.’ Mills gestured at the poster, saying, ‘The overthrow of the government of President Salvador Allende. Didn’t you
learn about it in school?’
    ‘I’m not interested in what happened in 1973,’ Carlyle told him. ‘I’m interested in what happened last night – here, in this flat.’
    Now it was Mills’s turn to grow annoyed. ‘But I’m trying to explain . . .’
    Fearing an extended history lesson, the inspector held up a hand. He wondered if maybe Henry Mills should have a lawyer, after all. The brief could try and talk some sense into his client.
‘Why would someone from Chile want to kill Mrs Mills?’ he asked.
    ‘They were just fed up with her,’ Mills said, a slight croak appearing in his voice. ‘She never gave up.’
    The two policemen looked at him quizzically.
    ‘Agatha was finally getting to them. They wanted to shut her up.’
    Closing his eyes, Inspector Carlyle saw a montage of all the bullshit stories that he’d had to listen to over the years flashing before him on fast-forward. Irritated beyond belief, he
signalled to Joe and they went out into the hall.
    ‘Can you believe this bollocks?’ he said under his breath, still watching Mills through the doorway.
    Joe leaned against the wall. ‘The front door was locked, with no sign of forced entry. Same with the kitchen window. No fingerprints on the suspected murder weapon. We’re checking
the rest of the kitchen again right now, but nothing interesting so far. No unusual footprints, fibres or anything like that.’
    ‘Mills has to be our man then,’ said Carlyle, staring at the floor.
    Joe nodded.
    ‘At the very least, he’ll have to come up with something better than this Chilean connection.’
    ‘On the plus side for Mr Mills,’ Joe observed, ‘there was no blood on him or on any of his clothes, when we arrived. And there’s no sign of him having tried to clean
anything up.’
    ‘He could easily have dropped any stained clothes in the rubbish,’ Carlyle mused. ‘The bin men have already been this morning. Better speak to Camden Council and find out where
all the rubbish ends up.’
    ‘Yes,’ agreed Joe doubtfully.
    ‘Don’t worry,’ Carlyle grinned. ‘You can get a couple of PCs to sort through it all.’
    ‘That’ll make me popular.’
    ‘It’s tough at the top.’
    Now it was Joe’s turn to grin. ‘How would you know, exactly?’
    ‘Anyway,’ said Carlyle, not rising to the bait, ‘this looks fairly straightforward. Sometimes they are.’
    ‘Hmm.’ Joe scratched his head. ‘Overall, it does look like a domestic.’
    ‘I think it does,’ Carlyle agreed. ‘I don’t know what he thinks he can achieve with this Chilean nonsense, but I suppose we should be grateful that at least he’s
not trying to blame little green men.’
    The inspector stepped back into the room. Mills was still sitting calmly in his