Zara looked shocked. It was hard to work out if that was because of the pistol or the question.

“Cash? Seriously, do I look like a drug dealer?”

The bank robber’s eyes, visible through the repeatedly adjusted holes in the sweaty mask, were darting around the room.

Eventually the bank robber shouted: “No… ! No, this isn’t a robbery… I just…,” then corrected that statement in a breathless voice: “Well, maybe it is a robbery! But you’re not the victims! It’s maybe more like a hostage situation now! And I’m very sorry about that! I’m having quite a complicated day here!”

* * *

That’s how it all began.

29

Witness Interview

Date: December 30

Name of witness: Anna-Lena

JACK: Hello, my name’s Jack.

ANNA-LENA: I don’t want to talk to any more policemen.

JACK: I can certainly understand that. I’ve just got a few brief questions.

ANNA-LENA: If Roger was here he’d have told you that you’re all idiots, the whole lot of you, for managing to lose a bank robber who was trapped inside an apartment!

JACK: That’s why I need to ask my questions. So that we can find the perpetrator.

ANNA-LENA: I want to go home.

JACK: Believe me, I do understand that, we’re just trying to work out what happened inside the apartment. Can you tell me what happened when the perpetrator first came in with the pistol?

ANNA-LENA: That woman, Zara, she had her shoes on. And the other one, Ro, was going to eat one of the limes. You don’t do things like that at apartment viewings! There are unwritten rules!

JACK: Sorry?

ANNA-LENA: She was going to eat one of the limes. The viewing limes! You can’t eat the viewing limes, because the Realtor’s put them there as decoration, they’re not for eating. I was about to go and find the agent and tell her, to get Ro thrown out, because you just can’t behave like that. But at that very moment that lunatic burst through the door waving a pistol.

JACK: I see. And then what happened?

ANNA-LENA: You should talk to Roger. He’s got a very good memory.

JACK: Roger’s your husband? And you’d gone to look at the apartment together?

ANNA-LENA: Yes. Roger said it would be a good investment. Is this table from IKEA? Yes, it is, isn’t it? I recognize it. They do it in ivory as well. That would have gone better with the walls.

JACK: I have to confess that I’m not responsible for the way our interview rooms are furnished.

ANNA-LENA: Just because it’s an interview room doesn’t mean it can’t look nice, does it? Seeing as you were already in IKEA. That ivory table is right next to this one in the self-service area. But you still picked this one. Well, everyone makes their own choices.

JACK: I’ll see if I can raise it with my boss.

ANNA-LENA: Well, that’s up to you.

JACK: When Roger said the apartment was a “good investment,” did that mean that you wouldn’t be settling there? You’d just buy it and sell it on later?

ANNA-LENA: Why are you asking that?

JACK: I’m just trying to understand who was in the apartment, and why, so that we can rule out the possibility that any of the hostages was in any way connected to the perpetrator.

ANNA-LENA: Connected?

JACK: We think someone may have helped him.

ANNA-LENA: And you think that could have been me and Roger?

JACK: No, no. We just need to ask a few routine questions, that’s all.

ANNA-LENA: So you think it was her, that Zara?

JACK: I haven’t said that.

ANNA-LENA: You said you think someone helped the bank robber. That Zara was dodgy, I could see it the moment I set eyes on her, she was obviously too rich to want that apartment. And I heard that pregnant woman tell her wife that Zara looked like “Cruella de Vil.” I think that’s from a film? It sounds dodgy, anyway. Or do you think it was Estelle who helped the bank robber? She’s almost ninety, you know. Are you going to start accusing ninety-year-olds of helping criminals now? Is that how modern policing works?

JACK: I’m not accusing anyone.

ANNA-LENA: Roger and I never help anyone else at an apartment viewing, I can promise you that. Roger says that the moment we walk in it’s war and we’re surrounded by enemies. That’s why he always wants me to tell everyone that the apartment needs a lot of work done to it and that the cost of that would be very expensive. As well as the smell of damp. Things like that. Roger’s a very good negotiator. We’ve made some extremely good investments.

JACK: So you’ve done this before? Bought an apartment only to flip it?

ANNA-LENA: There’s no point in an investment if you don’t sell, Roger says. So we buy, Roger does the renovations, I sort out the decor, then we sell and buy another apartment.

JACK: That sounds like an unusual thing for two people who are retired to do.

ANNA-LENA: Roger and I like working on projects together.

JACK: Are you okay?

ANNA-LENA: Yes.

JACK: You look like you’re crying.

ANNA-LENA: I’ve had a very trying day!

JACK: Sorry. That was insensitive of me.

ANNA-LENA: I know Roger doesn’t always come across as particularly sensitive, but he is. He likes us to have a project in common because he’s worried we’d run out of things to talk about otherwise. He doesn’t think I’m interesting enough to be with all day unless we’ve got a project.

JACK: I’m sure that’s not true.

ANNA-LENA: What would you know about that?

JACK: I guess I don’t know anything at all. Sorry. I’d like to ask a few questions about the other prospective buyers now.

ANNA-LENA: Roger’s more sensitive than he seems.

JACK: Okay. Can you tell me anything about the other people at the viewing?

ANNA-LENA: They were looking for a home.

JACK: Sorry?

ANNA-LENA: Roger says there are two types of buyer. Those who are looking for an investment, and those who want a home. The ones who are looking for a home are emotional idiots, they’ll pay anything because they think all their problems will just disappear the moment they move in.

JACK: I’m not sure I understand.

ANNA-LENA: Roger and I don’t let our feelings get in the way of our investments. But everyone else does. Like those two women at the viewing, the one who was pregnant and the other one.

JACK: Julia and Ro?

ANNA-LENA: Yes!

JACK: You think they were the sort who were “looking for a home”?

ANNA-LENA: It was obvious. People like that go to viewings thinking that everything would feel better if only they were living there. That they’d wake up in the mornings and not find it hard to breathe. They wouldn’t have to look in the bathroom mirror with an invisible weight in their chest. They’d argue less. Maybe touch each other’s hands the way they did when they were first married, back when they couldn’t help it. That’s what they think.

JACK: You’ll have to excuse me, but it looks like you’re crying again?

ANNA-LENA: Don’t tell me what I’m doing!

JACK: Okay, okay. But you seem to have put a fair amount of thought into how people behave at apartment viewings, is that fair to say?

ANNA-LENA: Roger does most of the thinking. Roger’s very intelligent, you know. You need to know your enemy, he says, and all your enemy wants is to get it over with. They just want to move in and have done with it and never have to move again. Roger isn’t like that. We saw a documentary about sharks once, Roger’s very interested in documentaries, and there’s a particular type of shark that dies if it stops moving. It’s something to do with the way they absorb oxygen, they can’t breathe unless they’re moving the whole time. That’s how our marriage has ended up.