There was a knock at the door. A uniformed constable came in and handed a note to Dalgliesh. The room was very quiet while he read it. Cordelia made herself look at his face. It was grave and expressionless and he continued looking at the paper long after he must have assimilated its brief message.

She thought that he was making up his mind to something. After a minute he said:

'This concerns someone you know, Miss Gray. Elizabeth Learning is dead. She was killed two days ago when the car she was driving went off the coast road south of Amalfi. This note is confirmation of identity.'

Cordelia was swept with relief so immense that she felt physically sick. She clenched her fist and felt the sweat start on her brow. She began to shiver with cold. It never occurred to her that he might be lying. She knew him to be ruthless and clever but she had always taken it for granted that he wouldn't lie to her. She said in a whisper: 'May I go home now?'

'Yes. I don't think there's much point in your staying, do you?' 'She didn't kill Sir Ronald. He took the gun from me. He took the gun -'

Something seemed to have happened to her throat. The words wouldn't come out.

'That's what you've been telling me. I don't think you need trouble to say it again.'

'When do I have to come back?'

'I don't think you need come back unless you decide that there's something you want to tell me. In that well-known phrase, you were asked to help the police. You have helped the police. Thank you.'

She had won. She was free. She was safe, and with Miss Learning dead, that safety depended only on herself. She needn't come back again to this horrible place. The relief, so unexpected and so unbelievable, was too great to be borne. Cordelia burst into dramatic and uncontrollable crying. She was aware of Sergeant Mannering's low exclamation of concern and a folded white handkerchief handed to her by the Superintendent. She buried her face in the clean, laundry-smelling linen and blurted out her pent-up misery and anger. Strangely enough – and the oddness of it struck her even in the middle of her anguish – her misery was centred on Bernie. Lifting a face disfigured with tears and no longer caring what he thought of her, she blurted out a final, irrational protest:

'And after you'd sacked him, you never inquired how he got on. You didn't even come to the funeral!'

He had brought a chair over and had seated himself beside her. He handed her a glass of water. The glass was very cold but comforting and she was surprised to find how thirsty she was. She sipped the cold water and sat there hiccuping gently. The hiccups made her want to laugh hysterically but she controlled herself. After a few minutes he said gently:

'I'm sorry about your friend. I didn't realize that your partner was the Bernie Pryde who once worked with me. It's rather worse than that, actually. I'd forgotten all about him. If it's any consolation to you, this case might have ended rather differently if I hadn't.'

'You sacked him. All he ever wanted was to be a detective and you wouldn't give him a chance.'

'The Metropolitan Police hiring and firing regulations aren't quite as simple as that. But it's true that he might still have been a policeman if it hadn't been for me. But he wouldn't have been a detective.'

'He wasn't that bad.'

'Well, he was, you know. But I'm beginning to wonder if I didn't underrate him.'

Cordelia turned to hand him back the glass and met his eyes. They smiled at each other. She wished that Bernie could have heard him.

Half an hour later Dalgliesh was seated opposite the Assistant Commissioner in the latter's office. The two men disliked each other but only one of them knew this and he was the one to whom it didn't matter. Dalgliesh made his report, concisely, logically, without referring to his notes. This was his invariable habit. The AC had always thought it unorthodox and conceited and he did so now. Dalgliesh ended:

'As you can imagine, sir, I'm not proposing to commit all that to paper. There's no real evidence and as Bernie Pryde used to tell us, hunch is a good servant but a poor master. God, how that man could churn out his horrible platitudes! He wasn't unintelligent, not totally without judgement, but everything, including ideas, came apart in his hands. He had a mind like a police notebook. Do you remember the Clandon case, homicide by shooting? It was in 1954, I think.'

'Ought I to?'

'No. But it would have been helpful if I had.' 'I don't really know what you're talking about, Adam. But if I understand you aright, you suspect that Ronald Callender killed his son. Ronald Callender is dead. You suspect that Chris Lunn tried to murder Cordelia Gray. Lunn is dead. You suggest that Elizabeth Learning killed Ronald Callender. Elizabeth Learning is dead.'

'Yes, it's all conveniently tidy.'

'I suggest we leave it that way. The Commissioner incidentally has had a telephone call from Dr Hugh Tilling, the psychiatrist. He's outraged because his son and daughter have been questioned about Mark Callender's death. I'm prepared to explain his civil duties to Dr Tilling, he's already well aware of his rights, if you really feel it necessary. But will anything be gained by seeing the two Tillings again?'

'I don't think so.'

'Or by bothering the Surete about that French girl who Miss Markland claims visited him at the cottage?'

'I think we can spare ourselves that embarrassment. There's only one person now alive who knows the truth of these crimes and she's proof against any interrogation we can use. I can comfort myself with the reason. With most suspects we have an invaluable ally lurking at the back of their minds to betray them. But whatever lies she's been telling, she's absolutely without guilt.'

'Do you think that she's deluded herself that it's all true?'

'I don't think that young woman deludes herself about anything. I took to her, but I'm glad I shan't be encountering her again. I dislike being made to feel during a perfectly ordinary interrogation that I'm corrupting the young.'

'So we can tell the Minister that his chum died by his own hand?'

'You can tell him that we are satisfied that no living finger pressed that trigger. But perhaps not. Even he might be capable of reasoning that one out. Tell him that he can safely accept the verdict of the inquest.'

'It would have saved a great deal of public time if he'd accepted it in the first place.'

The two men were silent for a moment. Then Dalgliesh said:

'Cordelia Gray was right. I ought to have inquired what happened to Bernie Pryde.'

'You couldn't be expected to. That wasn't part of your duties.'

'Of course not. But then one's more serious neglects seldom are part of one's duty. And I find it ironic and oddly satisfying that Pryde took his revenge. Whatever mischief that child was up to in Cambridge, she was working under his direction.'

'You're becoming more philosophical, Adam.'

'Only less obsessive, or perhaps merely older. It's good to be able to feel occasionally that there are some cases which are better left unsolved.'

The Kingly Street building looked the same, smelt the same. It always would. But there was one difference. Outside the office a man was waiting, a middle-aged man in a tight blue suit, pig eyes sharp as flint among the fleshy folds of the face.

'Miss Gray? I'd nearly given you up. My name's Fielding. I saw your plate and just came up by chance, don't you know.'

His eyes were avaricious, prurient.

'Well now, you're not quite what I expected, not the usual kind of Private Eye.'

'Is there anything I can do for you, Mr Fielding?'

He gazed furtively round the landing, seeming to find its sordid-ness reassuring.