“I did a bit of experimenting on ’em. Vitamin injections, I told them it was. Special treatments. And I used to hold their noses while they were asleep. Used to pull up their eyelids and look at their eyes, while they were unconscious. Nurses don’t never give anesthetics, see, but Dr. Brenner was letting me ’ave all sorts, and the Athorns just let me do stuff to ’em, even Gwilherm. ’E loved me coming over. ’E’d spend days on benzedrine and then ’e’d get sedatives off me. Proper junkie.

“I used to say to ’im, now, don’t you go telling anyone what we’re doing. These are expensive treatments. It’s only because I like your family.

“Some days, I used to fink, I’ll kill the kid and then give evidence against Gwilherm. That was one idea I ’ad. I fort, I’ll get in the papers, all dressed up, give evidence against ’im, you know. My picture on the front page… and I fort that’d be somefing interesting to talk to Steve about, when ’e seen my picture in the paper. Men love nurses. That was the on’y fing I ’ad going for me when I was out wiv Irene, and then the bitch starts pretending she’s a nurse an’ all…

“Only fank Gawd I never did any of that, fank Gawd I saved the Athorns, because what would I ’ave done wiv Margot if I ’adn’t ’ad them up the road? I’d nicked their spare key by then. They never noticed.

“I never fort it would work,” said Janice, “’cause I ’ad to frow the plan togevver in about five minutes. I knew she was onto me, when she saved the chocolates, and I was up all night, finking, worrying… and it was the next day, or maybe the day after, Steve went charging out of her surgery that last time. I was scared she’d warned ’im about me, because when I went round that night, ’e made some excuse not to let me in… I mean, ’e never went to the police, so now I know I was being paranoid, but at the time—”

“You weren’t being paranoid,” said Strike. “I spoke to him yesterday. Margot told him he ought to stop eating anything you prepared him. Just that. He understood what she was saying, though.”

Janice’s face grew redder.

“That bitch,” she said venomously. “What did she do that for? She ’ad a rich ’usband and a lover wanting her back, why’s she got to take Steve off me?”

“Go on,” said Strike, “about how you did it.”

A subtle change now came over Janice. Previously, she’d seemed diffident, matter-of-fact, or even ashamed of her own impetuousness, but now, for the first time, she seemed to enjoy what she was saying, as though she killed Margot Bamborough all over again, in the telling.

“Went out wiv Larry. Told ’im some bullshit about this poor family what needed to concrete over somefing on their roof terrace. Said they were dirt-poor. ’E was so keen to impress me, silly sod, ’e wanted to go do the building work for ’em.”

She rolled her eyes.

“I ’ad to give ’im all this crap about ’ow that would made the dad feel inadequate… I said just nicking a few bags of concrete mix off the building site’d be enough.

“Larry drove it to Albemarle Way for me and carried it up to their landing. I wouldn’t let ’im come any further, said it would be uneffical for ’im to see patients. ’E was silly, Larry, you could tell ’im anyfing… But he wouldn’t marry me,” said Janice suddenly. “Why is that? Why wouldn’t anyone marry me? What ’aven’t I got, that ovver women ’ave?” asked the nurse who’d pulled back the eyelids from her drugged victims to stare into their unseeing eyes. “Nobody ever wanted to marry me… never… I wanted to be in the paper in a white dress. I wanted my day in church and I never got it. Never…”

“You needed an alibi as well as concrete, presumably?” said Strike, ignoring her question. “I assume you chose the demented old lady in Gopsall Street because she couldn’t say one way or another whether you’d been with her when Margot disappeared?”

“Yeah,” said Janice, returning to her story, “I went to see ’er late morning and I left drugs there and a note, to prove I’d been in. I knew she’d agree I was there early evening. She didn’t ’ave no family, she’d agree with anyfing you said to ’er…

“I went from ’er place to buy a cinema ticket for the late-night show, and I called up my babysitter and told ’er I’d be later than I fort because we were getting the last viewing. I knew Irene wouldn’t wanna go wiv me. She’d been makin’ noises about not feelin’ up to it all morning. I knew she didn’t ’ave no bad toof, but I pretended to go along wiv it. Irene never wanted to go anywhere we weren’t gonna meet men.”

“So, you went back to the surgery that afternoon—in through the back door, I suppose?”

“Yeah,” said Janice, her eyes slightly unfocused now. “Nobody saw me. I knew Margot ’ad a doughnut in the fridge, because I’d been in there that morning and seen it, but there was people around all the time, so I couldn’t do nuffing. I injected it wiv Nembutal sodium solution, froo the cellophane.”

“You must’ve been well practiced by now? You knew how much to give her, so she could still walk up the road?”

“Nuffing’s certain,” said the nurse. Unlike Creed, she didn’t pretend omnipotence, but then, she’d also been, however reluctantly, in the business of healing as well as killing. “I ’ad a good feeling for dosages, but you can’t never be an ’undred percent sure. I’d ’eard she was going to meet some friend in a pub up the road, and she usually ate somefing before she went, but I couldn’t be sure she’d eat it, or still be able to walk up the road after, or when it would really hit ’er…

“All the time I was doing it, getting the concrete and drugging the doughnut, I was finking, this won’t work, it can’t work. You’re gonna go to prison, Janice… And you know somefing?” said the nurse, now pink cheeked and fierce, “By then, I didn’t even care. Not if she’d told Steve about me. I fort, I’ll go on trial and I’ll tell ’em ’ow ’e treated me like a mum and a nurse and took advantage, round my flat all hours. ’E’ll ’ave to bloody notice me and ’ear me then, won’t ’e? I didn’t care. I just fort, I want you dead, lady. I want you dead, you wiv your ’usband and your boyfriend on the side, and my man coming to see you three times a week…

“Eivver she dies, I fort, and I get away wiv it, or I’ll be famous, I’ll be in the papers… and I liked the idea, then.”

She looked around her small sitting room, and Strike was certain that she wondered what her cell would be like.

“I left the surgery and went round the long way to the Athorns’, but when I let myself in, Gwilherm wasn’t there. I fort, OK, that’s a problem. Where is ’e?

“And then Deborah and Samhain started moaning. They didn’t want their vitamin injections. I ’ad to get strict wiv ’em. I said to Deborah, it’s these injections what’s keeping you well. You don’t take ’em, I’ll have to ring an ambulance and get ’em to take you into ’ospital for an assessment… You could scare ’er into anyfing if you told ’er she’d ’ave to go outside. I give Deborah and Samhain their ‘vitamin injections,’ lying side by side in the double bedroom. Rolled ’em onto their sides. They were out for the count.