Evan had just opened his car door when he heard his name called and saw Mrs. Williams, dressed in her Sunday best, black coat and hat, bearing down on him.

"And where are you off to now, Mr. Evans?" she asked.

"To work, I'm afraid," he said. "I'm in the middle of a murder case."

"Criminal just, it is, making you work on the Sabbath," she said. "You should speak to your superiors about it."

"It's the murderers I should speak to," Evan said, smiling, "and ask them to plan better when they're going to kill somebody."

"It's no laughing matter, missing chapel." Mrs. Williams gave him a severe look.

"Actually, I'm on my way to church," Evan said. "A Catholic church."

"Catholic?" Mrs. Williams's hand went to her heart. "That's even worse than not going at all. Praying to idols, that's what it is. What on earth would you be doing that for?"

"Orders, Mrs. W. I've got to spy on some Catholics."

"Oh well, that's all right then." She nodded. "I thought for one awful minute you were thinking of converting. Ever since you had the wedding ceremony in one of those papist kind of churches, and I haven't seen you or Mrs. Evans at chapel recently, I've been worried about you."

"Don't worry about us; we're just fine," Evan said. "And you better get a move on if you don't want to be the last one in."

"That would never do, would it?" she exclaimed, and waddled with great speed up the street to overtake Mair Hopkins.

Evan got into the car and smiled to himself as he drove down the pass. How simple life was around here. People worked all week, went to chapel on Sunday, had an occasional drink in the Red Dragon, and reared their families in peace. Usually he enjoyed his job and looked forward to driving down the pass to work every day. These last few days his job had felt like a burden. He had to honestly admit that he did not enjoy working with DI Bragg. It wasn't just that he was treated as a brainless junior. It was that constant state of tension-Bragg versus the world. He sensed that Bragg was the kind of man destined to put the backs up of all he encountered, and he wondered why, out of all the officers in the North Wales Police force, Bragg had been chosen for this particular assignment. After several years in the mostly pleasant, stress-free company of DI Watkins and WDC Glynis Davis, he found this tension hard to take.

The problem was that the tension was now spilling over into his private life.

"I thought I might take a hike this morning," Bronwen had said, as she poured coffee. "It's so nice and bright now, but they are forecasting another storm for later. I haven't been up the Glydrs for ages."

"I don't want you hiking alone," Evan had said.

Bronwen looked up, surprised. "Oh, you're dictating how I live my life now, are you?"

"There are too many strange people around these days, and it's not as if you'll encounter a lot of other hikers at this time of year. And what if the storm comes in early?"

"So what am I expected to do-sit home with my knitting?" Bronwen demanded, her face pink with anger. "You're never free to come with me, and I enjoy hiking. It gets out the frustration after the work week."

"I know, but . . ." Evan began.

"Then stop fussing over me. I've taken care of myself for most of my life. I hiked alone all the time before I met you, and I intend to continue doing so."

Evan had stomped down the hill feeling anger and frustration of his own. He wasn't being unreasonable. He knew better than anyone that there were crackpots who wandered the hills, and he didn't feel comfortable with Bronwen out on her own. But in his heart he also knew that he'd come across as a dominating husband, and that had put Bronwen's hackles up. He'd have to make it up to her. If he could get home early enough tonight, he'd take her out for a meal.

Evan had rarely been inside a Catholic church, apart from a school trip to Paris, when they had been taken around Notre Dame. And he had never attended a service there. Used to the simplicity and lack of adornment of the chapel, he felt most uncomfortable amid the statues and ritual. It seemed they were constantly standing, sitting, kneeling, and chanting in a way that was impossible to follow, and he was glad he'd taken up position behind a pillar where some particularly bad-tempered saint was scowling down at him. The hymns were unfamiliar and sung without the zest of the usual Welsh congregation. There was incense too, that curled around the pillars and made him want to sneeze.

The church was by no means full. The majority of the congregation was over the age of fifty, but there was a sprinkling of young families. As soon as mass was over, Evan made for the priest, now standing at the front door to shake hands.

It appeared that there was only one Italian family who were regular mass goers, the Salvatores, and they were in their seventies. The priest had only been assigned to this parish for the past two years, and the name Luigi Alessi didn't ring a bell. Not a regular churchgoer then. One item they could cross off their lists.

Reluctantly Evan drove on to police headquarters to meet with the rest of the team. Pritchard hadn't much to report from the night before. Most of the customers at the pub knew Luigi. They could confirm that he was inclined to talk big and get easily riled when he'd had a few, but the general feeling was that there was no real malice in him. Nobody with whom he sparred on a regular basis, anyway. Another item to cross off the list.

"I've got a list of recent phone calls here." DI Bragg waved sheets of paper. "Nothing that stands out as suspicious. Mrs. Alessi called her doctor quite a lot. Mrs. Rogers, on the other hand, hardly made any phone calls at all."

"No numbers in common then?" Evan asked.

"No, they didn't both call the same hired killer, Evans. So you can put that theory out of your mind." Inspector Bragg smirked.

"So where do we go from here?" Wingate asked, with obvious frustration in his voice.

"You have suggestions for things we're not doing and should be, Wingate?" Bragg asked.

"Well, no sir. Finding the link. That's what we've got to do."

"And how do you propose to find it?"

Wingate frowned. "Well, I thought one of us should follow up on Simon Pennington, the student."

"Can I assign that to you, then, since you're so keen?" Bragg said. "I take it you know how to contact Interpol and British embassies and all that kind of stuff you're going to need to find out where in the world he is?"

"I think I could handle it, sir," Wingate answered stonily.

"Then you go for it, son." Bragg looked at Pritchard and Evans. "Any other bright ideas? Any volunteers?"

"I wouldn't mind tackling Dr. Brock again," Evan said.

"Brock?"

"The one they call Badger. He was the one who wasn't surprised that Martin Rogers had been killed. In fact he seemed delighted. Dr. Humphries said he enjoyed baiting Professor Rogers. It might be interesting to get more of his take on things."

"Do that, if you think it's worth doing," Bragg said, with a resigned shrug. "Frankly I have a gut feeling that this has nothing to do with the university. Okay, a faculty member could have shot Rogers, but what connection could any of them have with a pizzeria ten miles away? None of them lives in Llandudno, do they?"

"No, they all live within reach of the university," Evan said. "But something's got to come out eventually. The killer had the habits of the Rogers's household down pat. Exactly when Mrs. Rogers took the dog for the walk. The fact that Martin Rogers sat at the window to have breakfast."

"Ditto for the Alessi murder," Wingate added. "Although it wouldn't be hard to establish that he cleaned the kitchen alone late at night with the TV on loudly. Any one of the neighbors could have told him that."

"I'm going to stay here and take a look at old arrest records," Bragg said. "I want to see where Alessi's name comes up and in what connection. As you say, we have to stumble upon something eventually."

"Bragg is about to throw in the towel," Wingate muttered to Evan as they walked down the hall together. "I get the feeling he's never had to handle a complicated case before. He likes the sort of murder where they catch the bloke red-handed with a smoking gun, and he hands over the weapon saying, 'I shot the bitch. She had it coming to her.' "

Evan chuckled. "It's true that most of us don't come up against a really complicated crime often. Let's hope that you and I can get somewhere on our own. He might eventually come to trust us with a little freedom."

"Dream on, sonny." Wingate chuckled as they reached the exit doors.