Buchanan was adding his pleas to the babble of noise, apologising to Poppy over and over for frightening her. He wanted nothing more than to run away and shoot himself in the head, but Fizz was firmly in charge of the situation and was going nowhere.

In the end, it was obvious to both of them that it was Buchanan's distraught face that convinced Poppy of their bona fides. Gradually, her screaming and sobbing subsided and Fizz, who was roughly her height and weight, was able to release her.

'We really are no danger to you, Mrs Ford,' Buchanan said. 'Believe me, if I'd known how much our appearance would distress you I'd never have put you through it. I do hope you can forgive us.'

'Yes ... if you'll just go!' she wailed through her tears.

"You're still frightening me! Please just go awayV

'I'm sorry, Poppy, but we can't go,' Fizz said, guiding her through a lamp-lit doorway into the living room. 'Not right away. My career hangs on getting to speak to you for a few minutes. Just ten minutes and then we'll leave. If you still want us to go.'

Poppy looked again at Buchanan, her br.i.m.m.i.n.g eyes reading his face as though she wanted to believe what she saw there. He gave her the hankie from his breast pocket and tentatively patted her shoulder.

'It's the truth, Mrs Ford. We've been investigating Mrs Gra.s.sick's death and we've got ourselves in a spot of trouble. We really need your help.' He found one of his business cards and, although he knew he should be keeping his ident.i.ty a secret, handed it to her.

She afforded it barely a glance but it appeared, to some 241. degree, to put her mind at rest. She took a few unsteady steps towards a low overstuffed couch and sat down, covering her eyes with a clenched wad of Buchanan's hankie.

Buchanan could hardly bear to look at her. She was a skinny little thing, no taller than Fizz but, where Fizz appeared compact and healthy, Poppy's slimness spoke of junk food and an unhealthy lifestyle. Her blonde hair was stringy, and the pallid arms sticking out of her short-sleeved sweater were skin and bone. There were still two dressings covering what must have been deep cuts on her arms and her face was covered with lesser, half-healed lacerations.

It had never once occurred to Buchanan that her reaction to being found would be such a negative one, but now the pieces were fast falling into place and he could understand the alarm he must have caused her. The cat swindle had been cruel enough and only Fizz's desperate situation had persuaded him to go along with it, but to realise that he had added to the trauma this poor girl had already suffered was doing his head in.

Fizz stood in the middle of the floor, rain dripping off her borrowed mac on to the carpet, and emanated impatience like static electricity. She pointed at an invisible wrist.w.a.tch and operated an imaginary starting handle while her eyes rolled to the door in a mime of shocked antic.i.p.ation.

Buchanan doubted very much if they would be interrupted.

If the policeman had spotted them, which he felt pretty sure was not the case, he'd have come back by now and, the way Buchanan was reading the signs, n.o.body else knew Poppy's current address. He frowned at Fizz and pointed firmly to a chair and, after a concise and insulting mime, she threw off her mac and settled down.

Buchanan took the low armchair that faced Poppy's couch across the fireplace and said, 'Would a cup of tea help, Mrs Ford?'

She shook her head, still hiding behind the hankie, but, 242. after a moment, she emerged, wiped her eyes and gave each of them a nervous appraisal. 'What do you want?' she said to Buchanan in a voice that twisted his guts. 'Who are you?'

Buchanan made a small gesture towards the card she had dropped on her lap. 'I'm a solicitor, Mrs Ford. I'm executor of Vanessa Gra.s.sick's will and my a.s.sistant, Fizz, and I have been trying to find out exactly what happened the night she died, and why.'

He glanced at Fizz but she was apparently disposed, for the present at least, to let him do the talking. Poppy, too, was willing him to go on so he did, keeping his voice as slow and gentle as he knew how, to avoid spooking her again.

'We've been blundering around in the dark for two weeks and getting nowhere. In fact it wasn't until I saw how frightened you were that I realised the truth -or, at least, part of the truth. And, please believe me, I'd never have put you through that if I'd known what we were doing.'

He shut his teeth together to stop himself from going on and on about how sorry he was and, in the pause, he could see Fizz staring at him, her whole face a question. Partly to keep her silent and partly to get it out of the way, he continued, 'You're being looked after through a Witness Protection Scheme, of course. I should have realised it when we saw the chap picking up the cat. We suspected that he was a policeman but things were happening so quickly I didn't think it through.'

'Fat lot of protection they're giving me!' she said violently, her breath still coming in dry sobs. 'If you can find me, so can they!'

'I think that's extremely unlikely,' Buchanan said, projecting a confidence he didn't feel.

'No it's not! I'm b.l.o.o.d.y sure they were on to us in the last house.'

'In Chirnside? What make you think that, Mrs Ford?'

'Someone had been asking in the pub about new residents in the village. Who had moved in within the last six 243. months? What age were they? What did they look like?'

She was spitting the words out, almost incoherent with rage and despair. 'It got back to Jamie pretty quick and they -the WAS department -said they'd move us on at the weekend. Only they weren't b.l.o.o.d.y quick enough, were they? And now you've found me and it'll be them next. Am I going to have to live like this for the rest of my life?'

'Who are theyT Fizz asked, without giving the woman time to wipe her eyes.

Poppy spared her barely a glance and shook her head violently. 'I can't talk about it.'

'Why not?' Fizz persisted but Buchanan frowned her down.

He said, 'That's all right, Mrs Ford. We won't pester you to say anything that makes you feel threatened. That's the last thing we want.'

Poppy nodded, almost imperceptibly. 'I wish you wouldn't call me Mrs Ford. I'm not Mrs Ford any more.

That's all past. I'm myself again.'

'Will you be happier that way?' Buchanan said.

'You bet I will! It was no fun being married to a two-faced liar ... a drug-dealer ... a thug... a rotten Tears welled in her eyes and she brushed them away with an angry sweep of her fist. 'If I can just disappear, like they promised me . . .'

'You'll be able to put it all behind you and live your own life,' Buchanan finished for her. 'And I'm sure you will, Poppy. If they found you at Chirnside it must have been through some very remote stroke of luck. Believe me, I've been involved with WAS before and I've never heard of a single instance of the protection being inadequate. If neither you nor your husband told anyone that you weren't who you appeared to be--'

'Yes, but he did,' Poppy said violently. She got up and walked over to pick up a packet of cigarettes from the top of the TV. 'Jamie told one of the local cops the night they picked him up for drunk driving. b.l.o.o.d.y fool! He'd have 244. been better to pay his fine, or whatever, and keep his mouth shut. But that was Jamie.' She stuck a cigarette between her lips and laughed bitterly as she lit it. That was my wonderful husband. Never faced up to anything in his b.l.o.o.d.y life. Everything was somebody else's fault: his mum's, his teacher's, his parole officer's -never Jamie Ford's. Had to wriggle out of everything, didn't he? Even if it meant giving away our past. I knew that b.l.o.o.d.y copper would let it slip. I told Jamie it was too juicy a piece of gossip for a local bobby to keep to himself. He might as well have put it in the local paper.'

She dragged in a lungful of nicotine and resumed her seat as she let the smoke drift out through her nose.

Buchanan would have killed for a cup of tea but clearly she had no intention of making one, so he said, 'Do you feel able to tell us what happened that night, Poppy? The night Brora Lodge was demolished?'

She let out a puff of tobacco smoke in a single spurt as she raised her eyes to the ceiling and said, 'Huh!'

It looked like she was going to refuse but, after a minute, she started to talk like she needed to get it out.

'It was just a matter of hours after we'd requested a move so we were both pretty nervy and not sleeping too well. Jamie had got up to make us a cup of tea -must have been nearly two-thirty -and he saw someone in the Gra.s.sicks' garden, moving about with a torch.'

'You knew the house was empty?' Fizz asked.

'Yes, 'cause we'd thought that Lawrence might come down that weekend and he didn't. n.o.body had arrived by the time we went to bed at one o'clock.' She drew on her cigarette and smoothed her skirt as though she had lost the thread of what she was saying.

'So,' Buchanan prompted tentatively, 'you must have wondered, given the situation, if someone had mistaken their house for yours.'

'Right. Either that or the place was being burgled, and nothing would stop Jamie from going to meet trouble 245. halfway. I wanted him just to phone Dougie -he's our WAS contact and we have his mobile number so that we can speak to him right away, whatever the time of day or night.' She rubbed distractedly at a cigarette burn on the arm of her chair. 'Anyway, he got out his gun and crept out through the gardens. I begged him not to go in, but he said the best way would be to ring the doorbell and hide till he could see who came to the door. I know ... in fact, I'm b.l.o.o.d.y sure he would have gone in anyway if n.o.body had appeared -that's how crazy he was -but he didn't get the chance. I could see him from the bedroom window as he crossed the gardens. He was very careful. Kept himself hidden all the way. He was just pressing the bell when - woosh -like the whole world exploded!'

Her hands were shaking so much she could hardly handle her cigarette but the words kept tumbling out so urgently that Buchanan felt it better to let her run.

'I didn't really see what happened. The windows came in ... and the bang . . . you wouldn't believe how loud . . .

and everything was lit up, bright as day, by the flames. . .'

Buchanan, unable to prevent himself, crossed over to sit beside her and reached for her hand, whereupon she threw herself against his chest and burst into a storm of weeping.

All he could think to do was wrap his arms round her and pat her back, neither action having the least therapeutic effect. After a couple of minutes of this he said, 'I think a cup of tea is called for. Fizz, maybe you could rustle up something?'

Tcha!' Fizz returned, having clearly picked up this useful expression from Mrs Menzies, and came over to crouch beside Poppy. 'Where d'you keep your booze, kid?'

This allusion turned out to be something of a miracle cure. Poppy gave a few closing snorts, wiped her eyes and lurched across to a gla.s.s-topped cupboard and, minutes later, she and Fizz were getting outside a pair of t.i.tanic scotch and c.o.kes, while Buchanan had to settle for neat soda. 246. 'If you've already given your evidence,' Fizz asked, coming across to take Buchanan's abandoned armchair, 'surely the people you gave evidence against are behind bars? So, who's after you?'

'They banged up all the guys who were actively involved in the syndicate -that's what Jamie called the bunch of thugs he worked for -but the head honcho's son always had it in for Jamie. Jerry Kincaid. He never showed his face around his dad's operation but he had operations of his own -big business, like transporting illegal immigrants, drugs, money-laundering. The police won't ever get anything on him -his left hand doesn't know what his right hand's doing -but he's the only one who would be after us now. And he'll keep going till he finds me.'

Her fingers tightened on Buchanan's hand, which she was still, apparently, unable to dispense with. The cushions of the couch being what they were, both she and Buchanan had sunk down into a half crouch that felt, to one of them at least, a d.a.m.n sight too cosy.