Four days later Commander Adam Dalgliesh of New Scotland Yard dictated a final note to his secretary, cleared his in-tray, locked his desk drawer, set the combination of his security cupboard and prepared to leave for a two-week holiday on the Norfolk coast. The break was overdue and he was ready for it. But the holiday wasn't entirely therapeutic; there were affairs in Norfolk that needed his attention. His aunt, his last surviving relative, had died two months earlier leaving him both her fortune and a converted windmill at Larksoken on the north-east coast of Norfolk. The fortune was unexpectedly large and had brought its own, as yet unresolved, dilemmas. The mill was a less onerous bequest but was not without its minor problems. He needed, he felt, to live in it alone for a week or two before finally making up his mind whether to keep it for occasional holidays, sell, or pass it over at a nominal price to the Norfolk Windmill Trust who were, he knew, always anxious to restore old windmills to working order. And then there were family papers and his aunt's books, particularly her comprehensive library of ornithology, to be looked at and sorted and their disposal decided upon. These were pleasurable tasks. Even in boyhood he had disliked taking a holiday totally without purpose. He didn't know from what roots of childhood guilt or imagined responsibility had grown this curious masochism which, in his middle years, had returned with added authority. But he was glad that there was a job to be done in Norfolk, not least because he knew that the journey had an element of Might. After four years of silence, his new book of poetry, A Case to Answer and Other Poems, had been published to considerable critical acclaim which was surprisingly gratifying, and to even wider public interest which, less surprisingly, he was finding more difficult to take. After his more notorious murder cases, the efforts of the Metropolitan Police press office had been directed to shielding him from egregious publicity. His publisher's rather different priorities took some getting used to and he was frankly glad of an excuse to escape from them, at least for a couple of weeks.