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‘A little help here, Koenig!’ Draper shouted.

She was holding a towel against the gaping hole in Margaret’s neck. Pressing hard, trying to stem the tide of blood. She was on her second towel. It was already sodden. Koenig thought it was a wasted effort. Margaret had done her job well; the wound was fatal. The shard of china she’d used had been the size and shape of a fluting knife, and she hadn’t hesitated. She hadn’t warned them. She’d jammed it into the soft tissue underneath her jaw and twisted until Koenig had grabbed her hand. The blood pouring from her neck was dark red, like roasted beets. She’d severed one of the major veins in her neck. The external jugular, for sure. Maybe the internal jugular as well. Not the carotid artery. The blood wasn’t light and frothy, and it wasn’t coming out hard and fast like a busted fire hydrant. This was more like an overflowing storm drain. Slow and steady but equally powerful.

But not for long. After a minute it was little more than a trickle. And then it stopped completely. Margaret’s eyes went glassy; her mouth hung open. She was dead.

Draper threw the towel to the floor in disgust. She glared at Koenig. ‘This is your fault,’ she said. ‘I wanted to cuff her, but you said not to.’

‘That’s enough,’ Carlyle said. Her face was ashen. But it was also hard. Like tempered steel. ‘This was a collective mistake, Miss Draper. We should all have recognised Margaret’s monologue for what it was – a death-row confession. We need to regroup and refocus because turning on each other isn’t going to get the eggs scrambled.’

Draper sighed. ‘I know,’ she said. ‘It’s just . . . it felt like we were about to get somewhere, you know? To get so close, only for it to . . .’

‘We weren’t close,’ Carlyle said. ‘Margaret didn’t tell us anything; all she did was provide the context. Even if we’d forced the issue, she’d have had plausible misdirection ready to go. She’d have made us look at her right hand while her left was picking our pockets.’

‘We have to do some—’

A sound made them turn towards the back of the plane.

It was Nash. She was smiling.

And giggling.

Koenig looked at Draper. ‘You want to go and see if she’ll let us in on the joke?’