Page 38 of The Final Vow (Washington Poe #7)

‘Tell me again what the odds are, Tilly,’ Poe said.

They were driving north. Mathers was on her way to Gretna Green too, but they had a three-hour head start.

They would beat her there comfortably. They were in Poe’s car, but Bradshaw was driving – he hadn’t wanted to waste his sandwich.

Bradshaw kept the windows open while he ate it and refused to shut them until the smell had dissipated completely.

‘While accepting that each throw is an independent event, the odds of throwing two double twenties in a row is one hundred and sixty thousand to one,’ she said.

‘But it wasn’t two in a row,’ Poe said. ‘He killed Jools Arreghini in between. It was actually two throws out of three. Gretna Green to Oxford and back to Gretna Green.’

Bradshaw nodded. ‘It was, Poe. I was simplifying the maths for you. However you put it, the odds of Gretna Green coming up twice in a sample this small are so large it is statistically irrelevant.’

She took a moment.

‘And that means I was wrong,’ she said. ‘The sniper isn’t using dice to select locations.’

‘You said the maths didn’t lie, Tilly. Nothing’s changed. The maths still isn’t lying. This is just a blip.’

But it was as if Bradshaw had stopped listening to him.

‘What a colossal waste of everyone’s time,’ she continued. ‘All the wild goose chases I’ve sent people on.’ She hit the steering wheel with the palm of her hand. ‘Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!’

‘Tilly, stop that.’

‘I even tricked you into dressing like the tenth Doctor!’

‘David Brent’s one of my favourite actors.’

‘It’s David Tennant , and the last time we watched an episode of Doctor Who you cheered for the Cybermen.’

Poe looked out of the window, watched as they sped through Lancashire.

Despite the crippling self-doubt, Bradshaw was never wrong about these things.

She never voiced opinions until she was absolutely certain.

If she said twenty-sided dice were being used to select locations, as far as he was concerned that was a stone-cold fact.

But neither was she wrong when she said something was statistically irrelevant.

It was a dialetheia. A true statement whose repudiation is also true.

He thought about what that meant. Tried to square the circle.

And after a while he began to smile.

‘What?’ Bradshaw said.

‘This isn’t a bad thing, Tilly,’ Poe said. ‘It’s a good thing.’

‘Really?’

Poe nodded. ‘Really,’ he said.