Farnham shrugged. In truth he thought Crouch End was a big suburban yawn – what his younger brother would have been pleased to call ‘a fucking Bore-a-Torium.’ ‘Yes,’ Vetter said, ‘I see you do. And you’re right. Goes to sleep by eleven most nights, it does. But I’ve seen a lot of strange things in Crouch End. If you’re here half as long as I’ve been, you’ll see your share, too. There are more strange things happen right here in this quiet six or eight blocks than anywhere else in London – that’s saying a lot, I know, but I believe it. It scares me. So I have my lager, and then I’m not so scared. You look at Sergeant Gordon sometime, Farnham, and ask yourself why his hair is dead white at forty. Or I’d say take a look at Petty, but you can’t very well, can you? Petty committed suicide in the summer of 1976. Our hot summer. It was…’ Vetter seemed to consider his words. ‘It was quite bad that summer. Quite bad. There ere a lot of us who were afraid they might break through.’

‘Who might break through what?’ Farnham asked. He felt a contemptuous smile turning up the corners of his mouth, knew it was far from politic, but was unable to stop it. In his way, Vetter was raving as badly as the American woman had. He had always been a bit queer. The booze, probably. Then he saw Vetter was smiling right back at him.

‘You think I’m a dotty old prat, I suppose,’ he said. ’Not at all, not at all,’ Farnham protested, groaning inwardly.

‘You’re a good boy,’ Vetter said. ‘Won’t be riding a desk here in the station when you’re my age. Not if you stick on the force. Will you stick, d’you think? D’you fancy it?’ ‘Yes,’ Farnham said. It was true; he did fancy it. He meant to stick even though Sheila wanted him off the police force and somewhere she could count on him. The Ford assembly line, perhaps. The thought of joining the wankers at Ford curdled his stomach.

‘I thought so,’ Vetter said, crushing his smoke. ‘Gets in your blood, doesn’t it? You could go far, too, and it wouldn’t be boring old Crouch End you’d finish up in, either.