Cherchez la Femme.

It was simpler and far more discreet for him to go up to the fifth floor than to have someone from Welfare come down to his office. If he decided he was going to have an official talk with the counselling people, he'd do so in his own time. Greg preferred to avoid anyone in investigations putting two and two together to make five, especially since nobody gossiped like a bunch of coppers. Fortunately, Joanna was just about to take her own lunch break so his visit was timely. Despite the extracurricular nature of their connection, Greg found it impossible to be anything other than a copper at this point. He tried not to play the detective with a colleague, but thirty years of policing decided otherwise.

"Describe how you remember her." Greg had brought the last of his coffee with him and sipped it as they sat in comfy chairs in one of the small counselling rooms. Picking up a glass of water, the woman in front of him frowned, inhaled perceptibly and looked skyward as she recalled what details she could. In the few seconds she took to collect her thoughts, Greg couldn't help but observe his associate with a policeman's eye.

Early thirties and comfortable with herself. A smidge over average height though she wouldn't really quite qualify as tall. Light brown hair that hung to her shoulders, tweaked behind her ears. Pale London skin and calm, mid-brown, almost fawn eyes. A light touch with the make-up, just enough to define her brows and eyelashes and lips. Not one to waste time on unessentials. Short, unpolished nails and a plain gold ring on her right hand. Her clothes were in natural colours. A bit of a mouse and entirely ordinary. He'd not actually worked with Joanna Foy before in any official capacity, but these welfare bods were much alike: relaxed and soft-spoken for the most part.

"It was more than a month ago, at the beginning of February." Still frowning, Joanna sat back in her chair, lacing her fingers together. "I remember she had a young face," she turned her tawny eyes to Greg, her thoughts focused back in time. "Silver hair and light complexion," she added, narrowing her eyes as more details hung at the edges of her memory. "A little shorter than me. The first time I met her it was a cold day and she was wearing a thick grey puffer jacket and pale, faded trousers, possibly old jeans or perhaps simply pale coloured material." Joanna shook her head. "I only saw her twice, and even then, only briefly but I remember thinking she was all in grey."

"Twice?" Greg thought back to his own encounters with Rowan Good. Yeah, twice.

"The first time was outside my house and the next time was early the following morning, a Friday, just as I was leaving for work. I gave her my spare key in case she needed to leave and get back in ... and that was it. She'd already told me she charged twelve pounds an hour and that she'd probably take three or four hours on the first clean, but that's pretty much all she said. I've not seen or heard from her since."

"Did she give you her name?"

"Rowan. She called herself Rowan Good." Joanna smiled. "I remember it well as it's a fairly famous name in some circles."

Famous? Someone was going around using a famous person's name? It was Greg's turn to frown. The name didn't sound familiar to him, so whoever it was she was impersonating couldn't be all that well known.

Smiling, the counsellor shook her head. "Not that kind of famous," she blinked slowly as the smile reached her eyes. "Historically famous. One of the Salem witches was called Sarah Good."

Oh. Greg raised his eyebrows tellingly, meeting Joanna's amused gaze. Her eyes really were rather arresting ... you didn't see that kind of golden-brown shade often. "You saying you think this woman is impersonating an old witch? 'Cos I don't think I'm going to be able to buy that in this day and age."

"I'm not suggesting anything, though you'd probably have an argument with my daughter on that score. She's really into the literature of the time for a school project on the historical persecution of minorities."

"Your daughter," Greg knew it was a bit of a stretch, but you worked with what you had. "Would she have spoken with this woman? Any chance she might remember something different to you?"

Pursing her mouth and shaking her head regretfully, Joanna looked doubtful. "The children were with me that morning Rowan came in to clean. We were all leaving the house and she arrived with her trolley. There really couldn't have been any time for either Beth or the boys to have spoken to her as we were heading to the car for school. We were coming out as Rowan was going in. There was almost no chance of a conversation."

Almost. Greg always heard the almosts.

"Did you discuss the situation afterwards with any of your kids?" he asked, rubbing his chin as he thought. "How old are they?"

"Beth ... Bethany's twelve, going on forty. Jack's nine and Max is nearly seven, why?"

"And your husband?" Greg sat back in the soft armchair mentally lifting Joanna's age by five years. "Did he have any interaction with this woman at all?"

"My husband died in a hit-and-run the same year Max was born. It's only me and the children, I'm afraid."

She spoke the words so unemotionally that, for a second, Greg didn't absorb what she'd actually said. As soon as his brain caught up with his ears, the ring on her right hand was explained. He was chagrined with his foot-in-mouth approach and the feeling warmed his face.

"Don't worry about it, Inspector," the counsellor's smile returned though it held a faint twist of regret. "Almost everyone expects there to be a husband around when they hear I have three children. Please don't feel awkward."

Rather than uselessly apologising, Greg nodded and looked down at his clasped hands. "You must have a very busy life with a job here and coping with three growing kids," he said, meeting her eyes again. He was impressed. Hard enough to bring up a family with two active parents; she must be tougher than she looked. "And please call me Greg. I think the situation calls for a definite lack of formality."

Joanna's gentle smile returned as she recognised his faintly uncomfortable expression. "Don't forget I'm a professional counsellor. I deal with loss and grief on a regular basis. If anyone should know how to cope in such a situation, it would have to be me."

"Yeah, but not quite the same thing though." Greg sat back and smiled fleetingly at her matter-of-factness. It took all sorts of bravery to work in the Met these days.

"Not quite, no." Joanna sipped her water.

"Did the woman take your key? Have you had the lock changed since she was in your house?" Greg returned to the heart of the matter as he remembered his own situation. If he was concerned about his key being in the questionable hands of the very strange Rowan Good, he'd no idea how he'd feel if there were kids involved. His brow creased at the idea Joanna's children might actually be in any kind of danger.

"No, I hadn't thought about it to be honest. She left the key behind in a small jar I keep near the front door for the children to put their loose buttons. I didn't even think of looking for it until the next day, but there it was. Did she take yours?"

"I thought she did but now you mention it, I'm not sure. I'll have a look when I get home tonight. It would still be sensible to change the lock; she may have made a copy. You never know."

The counsellor's face grew serious as the notion sank home. The idea hadn't even crossed her mind and she shook her head at her own naiveté. "It simply never occurred to me."

"Best to be on the safe side," Greg looked reflective. "I'll be doing the same thing at my place, whether the key was left or not. Can't be too careful these days."

"And then, of course," Joanna took a deep breath as she addressed the elephant in the room. "There's the small matter of the unbelievable cleaning job. I don't know about you, but our flat looked like a small army had gone around getting it ready to be put on the market. I've not seen the place so immaculate since we moved in, and that was before Jack was born," she watched Greg's expression. "Did she do the same thing at your house?"

Nodding slowly, Greg allowed his memory to supply a picture. "Oh yeah," he agreed softly. "Even the inside of my fridge looked brand new." He met her gaze. "Not just cleaned but ... but ..."

"Transformed?" Joanna arched her eyebrows. "Upgraded?"

Greg nodded. "It was way more than a cleaning job, that's for sure."

"It's not just the fact that the place was cleaned but things were left looking so ..." Joanna spread eloquent fingers.

"Yup, know what you're saying," Greg nodded again. "Like someone waved a magic wand."

"You'd better not say that in front of my daughter or you'll never hear the end of it." Joanna shook her head. "Beth's at that stage where she wants there to be princesses in long dresses and heroes on white horses but at the same time, she's realising that life doesn't always give you happy-ever-afters." The counsellor looked briefly subdued. "The children had to grow up very quickly after their father died."

Grey wanted to speak to the girl on the off chance she'd exchanged even a word with the so-called cleaner, but he wasn't sure how to ask, not now after what Joanna had just said. Her kids needed to keep every little bit of childhood they had left. A small brainwave arrived.

"Look," he said, trying not to sound too calculating. "If I'm going to be changing the lock on my front door, it would be a simple job to come and do the one at your place as well," he said. "That way we'll both know that we've done what we can."

"But it's been over a month since she was at my flat," Joanna frowned. "Do you genuinely think there's still a risk?

"With your kids involved, do you want to take the chance?" Greg watched as his words sank in. The counsellor bit her bottom lip and nodded.

"No, you're right," she said. "It's foolish not to fix a problem, even a potential one." Meeting his gaze again, she gave him another of the smiles that went all the way up to her eyes. "We've got one of those cylinder Yale jobs."

"Me too." Greg raised his eyebrows at yet another small coincidence. "In that case, you don't even need to change the lock itself, just have the tumbler re-keyed. Piece of cake. You got a different key you can use?"

"I think there's a pile of old keys in one of the kitchen drawers," Joanna looked faintly relieved. "Will it be expensive?"

Again, Greg kicked himself for not thinking. With three growing kids and only the one income, of course money would be tight, especially in London. "Nah," he grinned. "The lads have a mountain of gadgets downstairs that come in handy, one way or another. I happen to know for a fact there's at least a couple of those little key kits in there; it only takes ten minutes to check everything and reset the pins. Would you be okay with me coming over to your place and fixing it for you? I swear it's no big deal."

"But you'll have other things to do, surely?" the counsellor was instantly tentative. "I wouldn't dream of imposing."

"It's no problem, honestly," Greg leaned forward. "Unless you live out past Watford or somewhere?"

"Bermondsey," Joanna said. "Fountain Green Square, right on the river, at the end of Bevington Street. We were lucky that Steven's life insurance paid off the mortgage. It's quite a nice spot for the children, though there's a lot of industrial traffic flying around the place these days, what with the Tideway project right next door."

Greg blinked as a map of London panned through his brain. "That's almost right across the river from me," he said. "I've got a place in Whitechapel. I could be over Tower Bridge and down your way in ten minutes," he grinned again. "Not even a hint of a problem, as long as you'd be okay for me to change your lock," he said, watching her face. "Though you might feel more comfortable getting a professional locksmith in?"

After a pause, Joanna shook her head. "As long as you're absolutely sure we'd not be putting you out ... I'd be more than happy to give you some petrol money or something ..?"

"Don't even think about it." Greg stood. "It'll cost nothing and I'm almost literally just up the road. I'm going to do my own lock tonight when I get home," he said. "Would later this evening be convenient for me to come to your place? I imagine your three would keep you on the hop most of the time."

"Well, if you're quite sure?" Joanna also stood. "How about after dinner? The boys are usually in bed by eight, but it doesn't sound as if you'll be using power tools, will you?"

Shaking his head, Greg turned to the door. "Just a little box of tricks and a screwdriver," he said, shrugging. "Though I can't promise there won't be the odd heated word. Those things are on the fiddly side."

"I'll have the kettle on for you."

###

After changing into jeans and an old sweatshirt and grabbing a bite to eat from his shiny new fridge, Greg sat at his well-lit kitchen table and opened the metal box he'd borrowed from work. He'd no idea where this particular piece of kit had come from but he wanted to check everything was there before he headed over the river. His own lock would be a trial run.

The long narrow tin was divided into small internal sections, each of which contained sets of tiny metal pins of different widths and lengths. Rekeying a cylinder lock was simple once you had the knack of it, but it had been a while since he'd done one. Staring down at the tin, he swore under his breath before going to look for his reading glasses. After searching all over the flat and in all the usual places, he tried the very last place they could possibly be, the one place he'd never leave them. The spare room.

It was the one room he'd not checked out the previous day, knowing it held nothing more than unpacked cardboard boxes, a rickety chair he kept his laptop and paid bills on and some ancient shelving. There was nothing that his mysterious cleaning lady could have done in there and so he hadn't thought about it. Until now. Pushing the door wide, Greg stopped short at the threshold of the room. He blinked. This was his pokey spare bedroom; his unused storage space of general crap, flat-pack shelves and bits he'd salvaged from the ruins of his divorce. There was nothing else in here, certainly nothing of any substance.

Except now, there was.

The stacked boxes were gone, banished to who knew where. In their place was an office. A proper office. Greg knew this because his brilliant detective abilities told him he was staring at a proper office desk. This was strange because he knew for a fact that before yesterday, he had not possessed a desk of any kind, least of all a proper one.

Whistling under his breath he prowled cautiously around the room. Not only was there a solid black wooden desk sitting in the middle, but the neglected Ikea shelving had been removed from its various boxes and assembled with a skilful hand. And then it had been sanded and varnished. His fingertips ran softly across an empty shelf. The surface was darkly glossy and exceptionally smooth beneath multiple coats of inky shellac. He sniffed carefully, but no hint of heady resin tainted the air or his fingertips. It would have been impossible to varnish anything in here without stinking the flat out for days, even with all the windows wide open and the one in this room, he checked it thoroughly, was well locked.

Behind the desk was a chair, but not any old chair. At first blush it looked like the love child of the leather settee and the TV from the front room: all long dark angles and sombre burgundy leather upholstery, though the nearer he got, the more classy it became. The top of the desk was clear except for two items, the first of which was an artful lamp that, upon closer inspection, turned out to be the one missing from his bedroom. Except it was now sprayed to a sleek satin darkness and changed in ways that made him think of an Italian car. The second thing on the desk was his outdated laptop, something he barely touched these days. There was always too much work to give himself the pleasure of the vast music collection he'd accumulated and stored in the ancient device.

Carefully, Greg pulled out the chair and sat himself in it. It was far more comfortable than any imaginary figment had a right to be. He relaxed into its decadent embrace and closed his eyes at the faint whiff of supple leather. He'd had a vague plan of turning this space into an office, but he'd never had the time even though he'd always wanted one just like this, with a chair he could sink into. Blinking his eyes wide, he looked down at the rear of the desk. On the right side of a roomy knee-space was a set of three drawers and to his left, a single large one. Sliding the top right drawer open, his eyebrows lifted of their own accord as he saw his reading glasses sitting in solitary splendour. His slow smile, when it arrived, was faintly manic. The whole situation was completely mad. There was nothing in any of the remaining drawers. Opening the old-fashioned HP laptop he saw it was fully charged, another impossibility, as it had never held a full charge even when he was using it on a regular basis and it had been a year since he'd even touched the thing. He was tempted to turn it one and see if there were any changes but he had a suspicion it might require time that he didn't have right now.

Moving his eyes around the rest of the room, Greg saw that the golden floorboards had made it in here too, as well as the gleaming wall-finish. All that was needed to make this a fully functional space for him to work or even sit and listen to his music ... was himself. It was as if someone had taken a picture of the idea in his brain and made it real. He shook his head again. There was some crazy weird shit going on here and he wasn't ready to look at it too closely just yet. Maybe tomorrow. Collecting his spectacles, he left the room, a deeply thoughtful expression on his face and headed back to the front door. Pausing, he checked the small dish Rowan Good had seen fit to place just inside the entryway.

I'll be damned. A shining Yale key lay in the centre. He knew it was his without needing to touch it. So the cleaning lady couldn't be done for breaking and entering, that was for sure. Not yet. It was just one more mad thing he had to think about. He turned his attention back to the lock.

Now that he was actually able to see what he was looking at, he remembered the pin-changing routine. Swinging the door inwards into the full light of the hallway, he undid the miniscule screw holding the cylinder into the lock frame; it was out and in his hand in less than five seconds. From there he followed the necessary steps to remove the pins that fitted his current key. Fishing out an old brass key he'd found in his desk in work, he delicately filled the seven pin holes with appropriate-sized replacements. Within moments, the new key was in the lock and the lock back in the door. Screwing it back into place, Greg glanced at his watch. Seventeen minutes. Not bad for someone not trained as a locksmith.

He wondered what he'd find in Bermondsey.

###

"It's rude to stare." It was the second time Joanna Foy had caught her eldest son watching their visitor with an unrelenting concentration.

The first time was barely two minutes after Greg knocked on the cheerfully-painted blue front door of the small terraced house in Fountain Green Square, sandwiched between several similar dwellings on either side. The only thing differentiating each house was the colour of the doors. Inviting him in and immediately offering him tea in the time-honoured British greeting ceremony, Greg felt eyes on him. He turned and saw a young boy with golden-brown curls in Batman pyjamas sitting on a small settee. Young, but too big to be six.

"Hello," he said. "I bet your name is Jack. Am I right?"

There was a fractional nod. The child's big brown eyes were wide and curious.

"My name is Greg and I work in the police, the same as your mum. I've come to fix your front door."

There was no further movement. The brown eyes remained fixed and steady. Greg smiled and turned towards his colleague. "I take it he doesn't get to see many strangers around the place."

Joanna shook her head. "Neither of the boys are terribly outgoing," she said. "Beth is the brave one in the family and the boys are happy to follow her lead. At least for now."

Realising that there were all sorts of bravery happening in this house, Greg checked his watch. Not quite seven. Maybe he could use a helper. He glanced down at the boy who watched everything with his mother's eyes.

"Would you like to help me fix the lock on your front door?" he asked carefully. "Only there's some very small pins and I've got big fingers," he added, waggling his digits. "See?"

"What kind of pins?"

Pulling the flat tin from his coat pocket, Greg waved it in the air. "Can we use that to lay a few things out?" he asked, pointing to a small table.

"Of course," Joanna gestured to the large wooden box serving double duty as table and storage unit. "Would you like to help, Jack?"

Nodding uncertainly, the boy stared as Greg set the tin down, lifting the lid as he did so. Inside were the multiple sections filled with the different types of minute steel pins,

"You have a good look at these," Greg straightened up. "I'll go and get the lock and then you can get the right pins out for me, okay?"

Throwing himself onto the carpet so he could peer right into the small container, Jack Foy was immediately engrossed with the tiny shining bits of steel.

Winking at Joanna, Greg walked back out to the front. Glad that he'd had a chance to practice before he drove over, he managed to have the lock's cylinder out and the door closed again inside of ten seconds. It was going to be a chilly night and he made sure the door was properly shut before he came back into the warm to where he'd left Jack. This time, three sets of young eyes lifted to his face as he re-entered the small front room.

A girl on the cusp of adolescence, the spitting image of her mother but with eyes of a darker brown. There was also another mop-headed boy with slightly fairer hair and nightwear suggesting his main interest was the Mutant Ninja Turtles. The combined wattage of the three young Foys' focus could have powered a laser through concrete.

"It's rude to stare," Joanna returned from the kitchen, handing Greg a big china mug covered in cats and the small notepad and pen he'd requested. Sitting down on an old leather poufé, Greg displayed the slender brass cylinder for all three children to see.

"You know your mum has a special key to open your front door?" he asked, glancing at each of the three faces. "And only that key will open the door, which makes everything very safe for everyone?"

There were three brief nods.

"This," he said, lifting the small cylindrical tube, "is the inner cylinder of your front door lock. And I'm going to show you how to make it take a new key. And you can all help to make sure it's done properly and then test it when I'm done. Can you help me?"

After a brief moment of contemplation, there were three more nods.

"I'm Beth." Joanna's daughter decided that she wasn't completely happy being put in the same boat as her baby brothers; after all, she was practically an adult. She held out her hand.

"Hello, Beth." The child's fingers disappeared inside his own as he shook them very gently. "I'd appreciate you testing this for me once I'm done, if you don't mind."

"I'm happy to help," she said. "Why are you changing the front door key?"

"Because it's a good idea to keep checking your house security from time to time," he said. "And because I've had practice doing this and your mum hasn't."

"Is that because you're a policeman?" Max watched his brother's fingers as Jack moved the shining pins around. "Is that how you catch crimbinals?"

"Sometimes it is, Max. We all have to be very clever these days when it comes to catching bad people." Taking a narrow black tube, Greg wiggled it into the rear of the lock's cylinder, pushing the barrel forward just as he pulled the lock's pin bed out the other end.

"Now this," he said, showing the pin bed to the children. "Is the serious part and the bit where I need your help the most Jack, okay?"

His attention squarely on the tiny brass rod in Greg's fingers, Jack nodded seriously. "What do you want me to do?

"I'm going to need your sister to write down the size of the replacement pins when I call them out, and then I need you to find them in that tin and dig them out for me. They have to be the exact right size or the lock won't be any good." Looking between the solemn expressions Greg kept his smile to a minimum. This was serious police work. He handed Beth the pad and pen.

Joanna passed over a new Yale key and Greg set about measuring the chiselled valleys carved into the brass.

"192," he said. Beth scribbled furiously. Having found the correct section inside the tin, Jack was already hunting for the corresponding pin. It was pale blue and shiny. He laid it carefully down on the coffee table.

"93 ... 102 ... 81 ... 83 ...130 ... and, last but not least ... 79." Finishing the measurements, Greg looked down at the neat line of coloured pins. "Right," he said, picking up the brass cylinder still with the old pins. "Everyone ready?"

Three very interested nods.

With a flick of his hand, he tipped the cylinder over and the existing pins fell out onto the table with a small clatter.

There were three small gasps.

"Is it broken?" Max sounded intrigued.

"No, because now, you're going to help me put these new pins back into these empty holes, lads. Your fingers are much more nimble than mine." Greg waggled his fingers again as he inserted the new key into the now empty cylinder. Max nodded. The difference was obvious.

"Okay, Mr Inspector," Jack nodded. "What should I do first?"

"Beth, what's the first number you wrote down for me please?"

"192."

"And which pin is that one, Jack?"

"This light blue one," the boy picked it up.

"Right. Put that pin in this hole for me please."

For a brief space of time, the room held its breath. The blue pin fitted perfectly within the first hole.

"Can I do one?" Max looked at the next pin. It was a glinting purple. He liked purple.