It was five past nine in the morning. Half a dozen officers, uniformed and CID, had gathered in the empty social club for the daily update, but Faraday wasn’t interested in warehouse burglaries and a particularly violent affray outside a Southsea nightclub. ‘Port Solent,’ he said. ‘Muscovy Drive.’ Cathy Lamb sat beside him, listening to his brief account of yesterday’s developments in what Faraday now termed ‘the Maloney inquiry’. A pair of sunglasses hid the worst of the swelling around her right eye, and the scratch marks down her cheek weren’t as bad as she’d first feared. Even the smell of the social club – cigarettes and stale beer – made her want to gag. ‘House to house,’ Faraday ended. ‘Any address with line of sight to number seven. That’s front and back. We’re interested in comings and goings on Friday afternoon, and we’re especially interested in a yacht that was allegedly tied up round the back. OK?’ He was looking at Dawn Ellis. She and Cathy were to handle the house-to-house inquiries, while Paul Winter held the fort back in the CID room, getting to grips with the mountain of other crimes that were still awaiting attention.
