Running Scared by Ann Granger

have been watching me. He had to be careful.’
     
    ‘Not careful enough, it seems,’ said Harford as if the whole thing was entirely my fault.
     
    Luckily we were interrupted. A tap at the door heralded Parry, looking pleased with himself. He brandished a yellow envelope.
     
    ‘Got ’em, sir. Got the snaps and the negs.’
     
    Harford rose to his feet with dignity. I got the impression he wasn’t sorry for the interruption either.
     
    ‘Good man,’ he said. ‘Thank you for your time, Miss Varady. We’ll talk again.’
     
    Parry gave me a triumphant wink.
     
    ‘Do you know, Daphne,’ I said, when they’d left, ‘I never thought I’d say it, but I think I’d rather deal with Parry than with Inspector Harford.’
     
    ‘He’s a very handsome young man, isn’t he?’ said Daphne sentimentally.
     
    I’d noticed that, but I wasn’t going to let it influence me. Women of Daphne’s age, I told myself, were susceptible to young men of Harford’s ilk. Not so yours truly.
     
    Eventually, after all the photographs were taken, everything measured up, and documented, they dismantled their lights and Coverdale’s body was removed, leaving behind a sinister chalked outline, over which I had to step to return to the flat at one in the morning. They really didn’t want me returning to the flat at all. They said I’d be interfering with a scene of crime. I pointed out I wasn’t going to sleep in the basement well, but in my flat, in my bed – and Coverdale hadn’t crossed my doorstep. I can’t say I relished the idea of going into the flat, let alone sleeping there alone that night, but I insisted as a matter of principle, even though Daphne offered me a bed.
     
    ‘Don’t touch anything, right?’ Parry warned.
     
    ‘He wasn’t ever in my flat,’ I repeated, I don’t know for what number of times.
     
    ‘We’ll just check, shall we?’
     
    Parry followed me into the flat, also stepping over the chalk outline, and stared around. ‘It don’t look touched,’ he admitted.
     
    ‘It’s not. Now can I be left in peace in my own home? I’ve had a very trying evening.’
     
    ‘Just mind how you go in and out. Don’t touch anything in the stairwell. Although we’ll want your dabs for elimination. Bloke will come round tomorrow for ’em.’
     
    ‘Where’ve I heard that before?’ I muttered.
     
    They were still scurrying around out there when I went to bed, and in a way that was comforting. I still went to sleep with the light on.
     
     
    ‘Hitch looked in this morning and turned the water off again,’ said Ganesh plaintively. ‘He said he and Marco will come over later and install the new loo and washbasin ready for tomorrow morning.’
     
    It was Sunday morning and he’d arrived around nine. That’s classed as daybreak on a Sunday in my book at the best of times and after a disturbed night, I’d hoped for a lie-in. I wasn’t dressed or ready for visitors and had to open the door in my Snoopy nightshirt.
     
    ‘Turn it on again,’ I said grumpily, padding back inside.
     
    ‘I did and it spurted out the hole in the wall where the washroom tap used to be.’
     
    ‘But you must be able to turn off the washroom plumbing separately.’
     
    ‘Well, I haven’t found a way to do it. Can I use your shower?’
     
    ‘How much are they charging you to come in on a Sunday?’ I asked. ‘Or haven’t they said?’
     
    ‘Hitch is a mate,’ Ganesh defended him. ‘He’s doing it so’s we don’t have to keep running round to the petshop on Monday morning every time we want to take a leak. You know how you grumbled about that.’
     
    ‘That’s right, blame me. Go and take your shower.’
     
    I trailed back to the bedroom and tugged on jeans and a sweater. Ganesh was still locked in the bathroom when I came back, and outside the window, in the basement, the police were back and still searching around. There was a guy fingerprinting the doorway and the windowsill. Like it or not,