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from the exhaust into the back of his car and switched the engine on.”
    â€œDid he leave any message?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œWife or children?”
    â€œWife. No kids.”
    There was a long silence. Mercer seemed disinclined to break it. He was staring out of the window again. It had started to rain, and fat drops were running down the glass, leaving tracks in the summer dust which had accumulated on the outside.
    Massey came in. He was carrying a brown paper parcel, which he put down on the table.
    â€œYou been shopping?” said Rye. He seemed glad of the interruption.
    â€œI saw that Jeejeeboy,” said Massey. He was a big serious youngster with light hair, blue eyes and the build of a campus athlete. “He gave me these.”
    He opened the parcel, and spread out the contents.
    â€œThey were things he was looking after for Sweetie. When she disappeared, he thought he’d hang on to them until she turned up again. Now it looks as if it might be—well, it might be sort of permanent—he thought he ought to hand them over.”
    There was a knee-length coat, trimmed at the cuffs and hem with fur, a fawn-coloured skirt, a lemon-coloured sweater, and a pair of lizard-skin shoes. The coat was old, and the moth had got into the fur. The other items were newish and looked as if they had cost money. Massey put his hand into his coat pocket and pulled out a paper bag, with ‘Jeejeeboy’s Stores’ printed on it. He tilted it up and a pile of trinkets fell out. There were two bracelets, an elaborate costume-jewellery brooch, a slave-girl anklet, a necklace of soapstones, a few rings, and finally, as Massey gave the bag a shake, a thin mesh chain with a small golden cross on it.
    The three men stood, for a moment, looking down at the pile on the table. Outside the rain was coming down harder. It was beginning to wash away some of the grime.
    Mercer said, “I’m going visiting. You can come with me, Massey. Parcel that stuff up. We’ll take it along.”
    Massey started to say something, but Mercer was already out of the door. He looked at Rye. Rye said, “You heard, boy. Get weaving.”
    Mercer drove his new car carefully, getting the feel of it. They had cleared the High Street before he spoke. He said, “You’d better guide me. I’ve never been there before.”
    â€œI don’t know where we’re going.”
    â€œAnd you call yourself a detective. What do you suppose we’ve brought this stuff with us for? To give it an airing?”
    â€œI imagine we’re going to ask Hedges to identify it,” said Massey. “If that’s right we’ve gone past the turning.”
    Mercer stamped on the brake so suddenly that Massey nearly hit his head on the windscreen. Then he reversed the car neatly into a gateway.
    â€œI just wanted to test the brakes,” he said. “They’re pretty good, aren’t they?”
    â€œVery,” said Massey. “Turn down here to the right. You can take the car as far as that clump of alders. Then we have to walk.”
    Easthaugh Island was a bigger version of Westhaugh, covered by the same ragged growth, divided from the bank of the river by a deeper backwater, which was spanned by a rather more permanent-looking bridge on cement piles. Sowthistle’s barge had been grounded on the inland side, and had subsided so solidly into the mud that it looked like an extension of the island.
    â€œGod, what a hole,” said Mercer.
    The place stank of stagnant water, rank vegetation and slime. He thought of Sweetie tripping home at night, over the bridge. No wonder she had left her gear behind in Mr. Jeejeeboy’s store.
    â€œHow do we get in?”
    â€œThe door’s round the other side.”
    A sloping plank led up to an opening cut in the side of the barge. Knocking produced no answer. Massey said, “He’s probably at the boozer. They won’t throw him