“Supposing you get in beside me.”

“I’m not falling for any tricks like that, Paul,” Halliwell said. “I’m older and much smarter than I was, and I want a chat with you.”

Raeburn sat quite still, watching the other, seeing the indications that Halliwell had screwed himself up to a great pitch to do this. He had a pinched, hungry look and his eyes were watering.

Then, suddenly:

“How much do you want?” Raeburn asked.

“How much do I want?” Halliwell stretched out his hand and clutched Raeburn’s wrist. “That’s easy to answer. I want half of everything. I’m after a fifty-fifty partnership. I’m going into partnership with a millionaire! You are a millionaire, Paul, aren’t you? One of the great ‘I ams’. But if I were to tell all I know, where would you be?”

“You wouldn’t do that, would you?” asked Raeburn softly,

Halliwell began to laugh, but the laugh turned into a fit of coughing. Raeburn waited, quite impassively, but his fingers were tight on the cigarette case. Once he raised it, like a club.

Some distance ahead, the wavering light of a cycle appeared; Halliwell was still coughing when the cyclist passed, but soon managed to speak again.

“I’m going to have my share back, they’re my only terms—full partnership, or I talk. I’ve served my sentence, three bloody years in jail. Years you owe me, Paul. If I talk, nothing else can happen to me, I’ve paid in full, but you—well, just you think about it.”

“I’m thinking,” Raeburn said. “Get in, and we’ll go to my flat and have a drink.”

“We’ll talk where I want to,” insisted Halliwell. “I’ve worked it all out, to the last comma. I’ve watched you night after night, driving across the Common. Do you know I didn’t recognise you at first? I saw the Rolls, and used to think if my partner had acted rightly by me I’d be in a car like that. Then I recognised you, and saw how right I was.”

“If you won’t come and talk it over, I can’t help you,” Raeburn said flatly.