‘It’s that idea of Mr Kennett’s.’

‘Oh, I’m not at all sure about that,’ she said, worriedly.

‘Neither was I when he rang yesterday evening but I’ve been mulling it over. It’s very kind of the factory to make the offer. After all, Florrie’s birthday party was a private matter,’ he emphasised. ‘It wasn’t the management’s responsibility. Yet Mr Kennett says that they’ll bear the cost of the funerals for the victims.’

‘But is it what we want?’

‘It will relieve us of the burden of organising it.’

‘Yes, but Florrie will just be one of five people lowered into a grave. There’ll be nothing personal about her funeral. It will be shared.’

‘They died together and should be buried together.’

‘A moment ago,’ she noted, ‘you were complaining about that newspaper headline robbing our daughter of her individuality. The funeral will do the same.’

‘No, it won’t. It’s a different matter altogether.’

‘I’d still like Florrie to have a service of her own.’

He was insistent. ‘Do you want us to be the odd one out, June? What if the other four families opt for a joint funeral and we refuse? We’d get a lot of criticism.’

‘Who’s to say that everyone else will accept Mr Kennett’s offer? I’m not sure that they will. Apart from anything else,’ she pointed out, ‘the victims didn’t all go to the same church. Jean Harte, I know for a fact, didn’t go to any church.’

‘Mr Kennett made allowances for that,’ he said with a touch of impatience. ‘He realised that the services themselves might take place in different churches but the burials would all take place together at the cemetery. It’s only a question of timing, June. Florrie might have a separate service but a shared burial.’

‘I still don’t like the idea.’

‘But it will simplify everything.’

‘That’s what I’ve got against it, Brian.’

‘It will also save us money.’

‘That’s an awful thing to say,’ she complained. ‘I’m surprised at you for even mentioning it. This is Florrie we’re talking about. No expense should be spared at her funeral. We can afford it and we should pay it willingly.’

‘We’ll foot the bill for the flowers, naturally.’

‘What about after the funeral?’

‘We join the others at the hotel.’

‘Exactly,’ she said. ‘We mourn our daughter in the midst of strangers.’

‘Don’t get so worked up about it, June. They’re not all strangers. We know Jean’s father and Shirley’s husband and we’ve bumped into Agnes Collier and her mother a few times while out shopping. We’re in this together,’ he reasoned. ‘It’s a tragedy common to all five families and we mustn’t imagine we’re not part of it.’

June was both wounded and puzzled. She strongly disapproved of the notion of a shared event and she couldn’t understand why her husband had agreed to it. As a rule, he always put privacy first. She was surprised when he even gave Kennett’s invitation serious consideration. The revelation that he viewed it as a means of saving money was a profound shock to her. His salary enabled them to live a comfortable life. Her husband was generous and June lacked for nothing. Yet he was now trying to cut back on funeral expenses. There was another shock in store for her.

‘June …’

‘Yes?’

‘Something else has been on my mind as well.’

‘What’s that?’

‘I’m wondering if we should sell the house and move to somewhere smaller.’

Harvey Marmion was in a good mood when he climbed into the car beside Joe Keedy. The news about his son’s forthcoming leave had given him a real fillip. Hoping to surprise his companion with the information, he was taken aback when he learnt that Keedy was already aware of it.

‘You didn’t tell me that you’d be seeing Alice last night,’ he said.

‘You didn’t ask, Harv.’

‘How is she?’

‘As pleased as the rest of us that Paul is coming home,’ said Keedy. ‘He’s had a hard time over there. A break was long overdue.’

‘There’s only one problem, Joe. It increases the pressure on us.’

‘I don’t follow.’

‘We don’t want to be bogged down in this investigation when my son comes home. We need to have the whole thing done and dusted.’

Keedy’s laugh was hollow. ‘You’ve got a hope!’

‘We’ll get a breakthrough soon. I can feel it coming.’

‘I can’t say that I share your enthusiasm. It’s still early days.’

The car was driving swiftly towards Hayes and taking a route to which it was becoming accustomed. Knowing exactly how long they had before they got there, the detectives planned the day ahead.

‘I’d like to learn more about Florrie Duncan,’ said Marmion.

‘Her father won’t even let you through the front door, Harv. The same goes for Reuben Harte, by the way. He’s the one who thought you looked shifty.’

Marmion was piqued. ‘Don’t keep ribbing me about that.’

‘I told Alice. She thought that it was funny.’

‘I hope that’s all you told her about this investigation,’ said Marmion, sternly. ‘I don’t want you divulging information. One detective is enough in any family.’

‘The subject never even came up,’ said Keedy, looking through the window. ‘We had other things to talk about.’

‘Keep it that way. As for Florrie Duncan, I’d like to know what the neighbours thought of her. I’m not going to do any snooping myself. If her father caught sight of me in the road, he’d probably chase me away with a garden fork.’

‘We can deploy some of our men there. They’ve finished house-to-house calls in the vicinity of the Golden Goose. That turned out to be a futile exercise.’

‘It had to be done, Joe. It’s unfortunate that nobody saw suspicious behaviour near the pub. Customers came and went all the time. The neighbours were so used to seeing traffic in and out of the Golden Goose that they stopped looking at it.’

‘The bomber must have come at night.’

‘How would he have got into the outhouse?’

‘With the key, I expect.’

‘That would have meant breaking into the pub after dark and that would have been dangerous. No,’ decided Marmion, ‘the landlord is pretty lax about security but I still bet that he’d check that the outhouse key was on its hook before he went to bed. Whoever borrowed it, did so during the day and slipped off to plant his bomb when everyone else was boozing in the bar.’

‘Are you going to speak to the landlord again?’

‘That’s my starting point, Joe.’

‘What about me?’

‘I’d like you to talk to Maureen Quinn again. Try to get her on her own. Her mother owes you a favour after the way you found her daughter at the church. Tell her you’d like a private word with Maureen.’

‘There’s something I’d rather do before that, Harv.’

‘Oh — what’s that?’

‘Another visit to that church may pay dividends,’ replied the other. ‘The priest lives in the house next door to it. I reckon he’ll have been made aware of the fact that Maureen spent hours in church yesterday. He may even have called on her. At all events, he’ll know the Quinn family and be able to give us the sort of information we might not get from anyone else.’

Marmion was impressed. ‘That’s a good idea, Joe. I wish I’d thought of it.’

‘So do I,’ said Keedy under his breath.

Since he had no telephone, the message was delivered to Jonah Jenks by hand. When he heard the envelope drop through the letter box, he thought at first that it would be another card from one of the neighbours, expressing their sympathy at his loss. Instead, it was a letter from the munitions factory on headed paper. Bernard Kennett, the works manager, offered his condolences and raised the possibility of a joint funeral for the five victims. Since they’d been employed at the factory, he’d been authorised to say that all expenses would be met from management coffers. The letter stressed that no compulsion would be involved. The families of the deceased were free to make their own decision about the funerals of their respective daughters.