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going to help me get an agent. And he was going to take me to this big promotional party thing, at this hospital, so I could meet the right people and be seen. Oh, yeah, wait – I remember now! He said he worked at this hospital in Stansted. That’s where this party was going to be. With all celebrities and that.’
    ‘Stansted?’ Slider queried. ‘Did he say the name of the hospital?’
    ‘I can’t remember. I don’t think so.’
    ‘And he never said what sort of medicine he practised? Neurology, orthopaedics, whatever?’
    ‘No. I never asked.’
    Never mind. It would be among his papers, Slider thought. ‘Would you like to tell me about this morning?’ he asked gently, and at once an alarmed look came to her eyes, and she leaned back against the pillows and twisted the fold of the sheet between her fingers.
    ‘This morning. Yes. Well. He got up early, said he had to go in to work. Five o’clock! I mean, we hadn’t long been asleep, and he gets up at five. Fair go, he says to me I can sleep a bit longer, but I was awake anyway. No, wait – he had a phone call. That’s what woke me up. The phone went off about ten to five, he listens a minute, rings off, and goes into his dressing-room and rings someone on his mobile. I mean, what’s that all about?’
    ‘Did you hear any of the conversation?’ Connolly asked.
    ‘What d’you think I am? I don’t earwig.’
    ‘It might be very important,’ Slider suggested.
    ‘I didn’t really hear anything,’ she said, mollified. ‘It was just like hello, yes, no, all right – that sort of thing. But when he came back into the bedroom he looked sort of worried, and said he had to go in to work. He said I could sleep a bit longer while he got ready – I never knew a bloke take so long getting washed and dressed and everything. I mean, I’m quicker, putting on a full face! But I have to say he’s always beautifully turned out. Immaculate. Every hair just right. Anyway, he says I’ve got to leave when he does. He’s never left me in the house without him. He said the burglar alarm was too complicated for me to set.’
    Modern burglar alarms weren’t complicated to set, Slider thought. More likely it was just natural caution. There were many reasons for not leaving a girl you’d only known a few weeks alone in your pad.
    ‘So what happened next?’ he prompted her.
    ‘Well, he’d done all his bathroom stuff and he was getting dressed. I took the chance to get in the bathroom for a pee, and when I came out he was in trousers and shirt and picking out a tie, and he says to me I’d better get dressed because he’ll be going soon. Well, I was just in this bathrobe he lends me.’ She looked across at it, lying on the back of the chair in the corner of the room – dark blue velvet towelling, thick and plushy – and her lips trembled at this reminder of him.
    ‘Did he say where he was going?’ Slider asked quickly, to keep up her momentum.
    ‘No, he just said to work. The hospital, I suppose. Anyway, then there’s this ring at the doorbell.’
    ‘Do you know what time that was?’
    ‘I dunno, but it must have been about a quarter past six, because he’d said he was leaving at half past and he was all but ready.’
    ‘How did he react when the bell went?’ Connolly asked.
    ‘Dunno, really.’ She frowned in thought. ‘He didn’t say anything, just went downstairs.’
    ‘Do you think he was expecting it?’
    ‘Maybe. He wasn’t that surprised, really.’
    ‘He wasn’t anxious, or afraid?’
    ‘I dunno. I don’t think so. Well, like I said, he’d been a bit worried since the phone call, but not, like, sweating it. Just – thoughtful, sort of. Anyway, so he goes downstairs and I hear him opening the front door, and talking to someone. I couldn’t make out what they were saying. I’d gone to the door of the bedroom, but I could just hear, like, the murmur of voices. And then – and then—’ She had come to the hard part. Her eyes were