“You may have had a very good reason for that.”

“What would that be?”

Lynley was not about to allow the suspect to start asking his own questions at this point or any other point in the interview. He knew they’d got all they were going to get from Minshall, but not all that was available. So he said, “A SOCO team is taking evidence from your flat as we speak, Mr. Minshall, and I daresay you and I both know what’s going to be found inside that place. Another officer has your computer in hand, and I’ve little doubt what sort of pretty pictures are going to turn up on it in short order when we begin logging on to the Web sites you’ve visited. In the meantime, forensic specialists are examining your van, your neighbour-I expect you know Mrs. Singh-positively identified Davey Benton as a child who visited you in Lady Margaret Road, and when she has a look at photos of some other dead boys…well, I expect you can fill the blanks there yourself. And this doesn’t begin to address the manner in which your fellow vendors in the Stables Market are going to dig your grave for you when we talk to them.”

“About what?” Minshall said, although he sounded less full of himself now and he glanced at the solicitor as if for some kind of support.

“About what’s about to happen now, Mr. Minshall. I’m arresting you on a charge of murder. One charge and counting. This interview is concluded for the moment.”

Lynley leaned forward, gave the date and the time, and switched off the recorder. He handed over his card to James Barty and said to the solicitor, “I’m available should your client wish to expatiate on any answers, Mr. Barty. In the meantime, we’ve got work to do. I’m sure the duty sergeant will make Mr. Minshall quite comfortable here before he’s moved to a remand centre.”

Outside, Lynley said to Havers, “We need to find the boys in those Polaroids. If there’s a tale to be told about Barry Minshall, one of them is going to tell it. We need to compare them to the photos of the dead boys as well.”

She looked back at the station. “He’s dirty, sir. I can feel it. Can you?”

“He’s what Robson told us to look for, isn’t he. That air of confidence. He’s up against it, and he’s not even worried. Check into his background. Go back as far as you can manage. If he was warned off biking on the pavement when he was eight years old, I want to know about it.” Lynley’s mobile rang as he was speaking. He waited till Havers had her actions jotted down in her notebook before he answered.

The caller was Winston Nkata, and his voice had the sound of someone who was being careful to control his excitement. “We got the van, guv. Night of Kimmo Thorne’s last break-in, a van was cruising down the street too slow, like it was doing a recce of the area. Cavendish Road station took the information, but nothing came of it. Couldn’t relate it to the break-in, they said. They said the witness had to be mistaken on the number plates.”

“Why?”

“’Cause the owner had an alibi. Confirmed by nuns from that Mother Teresa group.”

“An unimpeachable source, I’d say.”

“But listen to this. Van belongs to a bloke called Muwaffaq Masoud. His phone number matches the numbers we c’n see on the video of that van in St. George’s Gardens too.”

“Where can we find him?”

“Hayes. In Middlesex.”

“Give me the address. I’ll meet you there.”

Nkata did so. Lynley motioned to Havers to hand over her notebook and biro, and he jotted the address down in it. He ended the call from Nkata and thought about what this new development implied. Tentacles, he concluded. They were reaching out in all directions.

He said to Havers, “Get on to Minshall and the rest at the Yard.”

“Are we close to something?”

“Sometimes I think so,” he answered honestly, “and other times I think we’ve barely begun.”

CHAPTER TWENTY

LYNLEY USED THE A40 TO MAKE HIS WAY OUT TO THE address in Middlesex that Nkata supplied him. It wasn’t easy to find, and the journey there encompassed wrong turns, route retracing, and the negotiation of a crossing place over the Grand Union Canal. Ultimately, the house in question turned out to be part of a small estate that was tucked within the embrace of two sports grounds, two playing fields, three lakes, and a marina. Part of Greater London, it still felt like the country, and the distant planes taking off from Heathrow couldn’t dispel the sensation that somehow one had cleaner air and the possibility of freer and safer movement here.

Muwaffaq Masoud lived in Telford Way, a narrow street comprising terrace houses of amber brick. He lived at the end of one of the terraces, and he was at home to answer the door when Lynley and Nkata rang the bell.

He blinked at them from behind heavy-framed spectacles, a slice of toast in his hand. He was not yet dressed for the day, and he wore a dressing gown fashioned like the robe boxers might don before their bouts, complete with a hood and the sobriquet “Killer” embroidered on the breast and across the back.

Lynley offered his identification. “Mr. Masoud?” he said. And when the man bobbed his head in nervous affirmation, “May we have a word, please?” He introduced Nkata and said his own name. Masoud shot a look that went from one of them to the other before he stepped back from the door.

This gave immediately into a sitting room. It was not much larger than a refrigerator box, and a wooden staircase dominated its far end. Closer, a wool-covered sofa stood on one side of the room, facing a faux fireplace on the other. In the corner, a metal curio stand held the room’s only decorations: perhaps a dozen photographs of what seemed to be a multitude of young adults and their offspring. Atop the stand, an additional picture formed part of a shrine, with silk flowers lying neatly at the base of a chrome-framed photograph of Princess Diana.

Lynley looked at the curio stand and then back at Muwaffaq Masoud. He was bearded, between fifty and sixty years old. The belt of his dressing gown suggested something of a paunch beneath it.

“Your children?” Lynley asked, nodding at the photos.

“I have five children and eighteen grandchildren,” the man replied. “There you see them. Except for the new baby, third child of my eldest daughter. I live alone here. My wife is dead these four years now. How may I be of help to you?”

“You were fond of the princess?”

“Race did not appear to be an issue for her,” he said politely. He looked down at the toast, which he was still holding. He appeared to have no further appetite for it. He excused himself and ducked into a doorway beneath the stairs. This led into a kitchen that looked even smaller than the sitting room. Through a window there, bare branches of a tree suggested a garden to the back of the house.

He returned to them, tightening the belt of his boxer’s robe. He said formally and with considerable dignity, “I hope you have not come about that housebreaking in Clapham once again. At the time, I told the officers everything I knew, which was little enough, and when I did not hear from them again, I assumed the matter was at an end. But now I must ask: Did no one among you phone the good nuns?”

“May we sit down, Mr. Masoud?” Lynley asked. “We’ve a few questions to ask you.”

The man hesitated, as if wondering why Lynley hadn’t answered his question. Finally, he said thoughtfully, “Yes indeed,” and he gestured to the sofa. There was no other seat in the room.

He fetched a chair from the kitchen for himself, and he placed it squarely opposite them. He sat, his feet flat on the floor. They were bare, Lynley saw. One toe was missing its nail. Masoud said, “I must tell you. I have never broken a law of this country. This I told the police when they came to speak with me. I do not know Clapham nor do I know any neighbourhood south of the River Thames. Even if I did know those things, on nights when I do not see my children, I go to Victoria Embankment. This is where I was on the night of that break-in in Clapham about which the police have questioned me.”