‘The policeman told me what happened, Mum. I’m so sorry. You should have come round to me if you thought Aunt Rosemary was missing. We could have …’ She stopped, evidently not knowing what they could have, but glaring at Ballard as if it would have been a lot better than anything he or Carter could have. ‘What was she doing in Lincott, anyway?’ she demanded. ‘It’s miles away!’ Ballard wondered fleetingly if Muriel Curtin hadn’t wanted Carter to fetch her daughter when she thought her sister had disappeared not because it would be a bother, but because she was clearly someone who was only ever an instant away from pop-eyed indignation. ‘Detective Inspector Ballard,’ he said, repressively. ‘Please sit down.’ Jennifer Allardyce allowed herself to be steered to a chair by Carter, who looked cowed, presumably because he’d had a strip torn off him already, and sat down, staring at Ballard with an outraged expression, as though the whole thing were his fault. ‘Now,’ said Ballard, ‘I think we should all have a cup of tea – if you wouldn’t mind, Carter?’ In the brief interval while the young policeman poured and handed round the sugar, before retreating to stand in the doorway, he noticed that Muriel Curtin had put a placating hand on her daughter’s arm.
