Just before noon the doorbell rings, disturbing John's perusal of the Sunday Times Magazine. It's early for Winter to come by, but he's even more surprised when he finds Kate Wilding on his doorstep.

"Kate?" It's a two-hour drive, at the best of times, from Brighton. He knows, because Jones grumbles about traffic and road works every time he visits.

"Well spotted," Kate replies. "I'm glad to see advancing age hasn't dimmed your observational skills." She raises an eyebrow. "Can I come in?"

"Of course," he says, stepping aside. "I'm just surprised to see you. But it's a very pleasant surprise."

Sarah emerges from the kitchen and hurries over to give Kate a quick hug. "You made good time," she says, confirming John's suspicions that this isn't just a coincidental visit.

"I was able to rearrange a few things this morning. Missed the worst of the holiday drivers." She looks around. "Is Ben not here?"

"Naptime with Betty," Sarah replies, but they hear the nursery door open, and a moment later Jones appears at the top of the staircase.

He's pulled on a t-shirt and made an attempt to smooth down his hair, but he still looks tired and fragile to John. He's not the only one to think so, as he sees Kate frown slightly.

"I heard the doorbell," Jones says, coming down the stairs, but he stops when he sees Kate. "What are you doing here?"

"You didn't return my calls," she says coolly.

He flushes and looks down. "My phone was smashed. I tried to call last night but you didn't answer."

"And you didn't leave a message."

Kate has always been blunt, but John wishes she could be a little gentler just this once. But Jones straightens up and comes the rest of the way down.

"What was I supposed to say? 'Hey it's me. I'm in Midsomer, not Scotland. Give me a call'."

"How about, 'I've met a much younger woman'."

She shows Jones her mobile screen, now sporting the photo John sent her yesterday. He tries to feel guilty about that, but he's mostly just amused.

"You said you only sent it to Sarah," Jones complains, but he moves closer to Kate. "How about, 'Someone tried to kill me and I thought I'd never see you again.' That's not something you can leave on voicemail."

Kate stares at him, expression still frozen, but then she pulls him in for a hug. "You idiot."

Jones rests his cheek on the top of her head and holds her close. "I'm glad you're here."

John feels a tug on his arm and looks back at Sarah.

"I need your help with lunch," she says pointedly, jerking her head in the direction of the kitchen.

"Is this your doing?" he asks, trailing after Sarah.

"If you mean, did I tell her to rearrange her schedule and drive up from Brighton, then no. I just told her Ben was here and we would love to have her visit as well." Sarah looks smug, however, and the phone call lasted nearly fifteen minutes.

"Then well done you." With Kate here he won't have to drag Jones to a doctor. "I'll make some tea."

He can hear quiet murmurs from the hallway, then sees Kate and Ben move to the living room. A moment later, Kate comes into the kitchen.

"What happened? He says he's fine but that's clearly a lie."

"Our murderer coshed him on the head with a cricket bat. The team trainer checked him out," John says defensively, unnerved by her disapproving glare.

"What team? And does this trainer have a medical degree?"

He decides to answer the first question. "The Lower Pampling Panthers. He had the winning bats. If you play your cards right you could get a trip to Australia."

She's not diverted. "You let him play cricket after a head injury?"

"It was hardly my decision," John protests. "In case you've forgotten, he doesn't work for me any more."

"But he would have listened to you."

John doubts that anything would have stopped Jones from playing, but he knows he should have tried. The last time Jones had a concussion, he'd run the Chief Constable's fitness test and been sick for days after. Kate had given him grief about that for months.

"I'll give him a concussion check, but have you noticed any serious symptoms?"

"He was a bit unsteady after the match, but that could have been the beer."

"Or the slap," Sarah adds. "He said it was the adrenaline."

If anything, Kate looks even more disapproving. John tries to redeem them. "We checked in on him last night and he was fine."

"What about today?"

"His appetite was off this morning and he's been tired, but that's probably because we woke him up every couple of hours." John doesn't mention that Jones was still awake at midnight and up before six.

"And his emotional state?" Kate is brisk and professional, but John can sense the underlying tension.

"I can hear you," Jones calls out from the living room.

"Grumpy," John shouts back, "but that's not unusual." Jones can be downright cranky when he's tired or stressed, and he's certainly both now. He lowers his voice so big ears can't hear. "He had a rough go of it yesterday. Maybe he'll tell you more than he will me."

Kate watches as he fills the teapot. "You're worried about him."

"I walked in on a murderer about to take his head off with a cricket bat. What do you think?" It makes him sick to remember it even now. He manages a tight smile. "He was strung up and dazed, but still sassing off." He'll try to remember that instead, Jones defiant, facing death the same way he faces life, with fortitude and a smirk.

Kate smiles back, but John can see that her composure is shaken. "Do you mind if I borrow John?" she asks Sarah. "He can tell me if Ben tries to keep something from me."

"I'm just heating up some soup for lunch so take as long as you want."

John takes the tea tray out to the living room. Jones is sitting on the sofa, leaning back, eyes closed, but he sits up when they walk in. "I'll be mother," John says. He pours out the tea, adding plenty of milk and sugar to Jones's cup.

"I'm not in shock. Or six," Jones says, but he smiles and takes a sip.

Kate waits until he puts the mug down. "Where did he hit you?"

John can't help laughing. "Actually, it was a 70-year-old woman."

"She was captain of the English national team," Jones exclaims. He touches the back of his head and winces. "She was a great batswoman in her time."

"Let me look," Kate murmurs, and John sees she can be gentle after all. Her touch is light as she parts Jones's hair, and she strokes his cheek when he flinches. "Lucky it didn't break the skin."

John is treated to a new image of Jones dangling helplessly, blood pooling at his feet. That will haunt his dreams.

"Loss of consciousness?" Kate asks.

"A few minutes," Jones says.

"More like 10-15," John guesses, and Jones shrugs.

"All right. Let's go through the checklist. Nausea or vomiting?"

Jones shakes his head.

"Headache?" A reluctant nod.

"Blurred vision? Light sensitivity? Fatigue?" Two shakes and a shrug.

"Memory loss, confusion?"

"I'm sorry, I forgot the question."

Kate glares at him. "I'm trying to determine if you're bleeding into your brain. Try to take it seriously. Balance problems?"

"I hit the winning six," Jones says. "Steady as a rock."

"You were wobbly later," John reminds him.

"I was coming down from the adrenaline. And Melody knocked me off balance."

"Is this the cricket captain or were you alienating all the women in Lower Pampling?"

"Only the ones that got to know me." Jones looks down, shoulders hunched.

John wants to shake the guilt out of him. Jones has always taken his mistakes too much to heart, cared too much about what other people think. "You were doing your job, trying to solve your case and help find her husband's killer. And you still took the time to be her friend when she was grieving. If she was angry with you it was because she thought that friendship wasn't real. But we both know that it was, and we both know you would never deliberately hurt her."

"How can you know that?" Jones says bitterly. "Look at the reports in the news, the undercover policing inquiry. We know it happens."

"Because I know you," John replies simply. Jones could be tetchy with suspects, fierce with villains, but he was always decent and kind to victims. "You're a good man. You always have been and you always will be."

For a moment, Jones looks as if he might cry, but he masks his reaction with a gulp of tea. John sometimes thinks the English turned tea into a national fetish for that very purpose.

"Emotional overreaction," Kate pronounces. "Textbook concussion symptom. Enough about the hearts you broke. We need to find out how badly your head is broken." But she rubs Jones's back lightly, almost maternally. Sarah will be disappointed by that.

After a mental acuity check that makes even John's head swim, Kate proclaims herself satisfied that it's just a mild concussion. "No work for two days. No screen time, no alcohol, and definitely no cricket."

"Well considering the manager was arrested for fraud, the captain and his replacement were murdered, and the replacement's replacement doesn't exist, the Panthers aren't going to be playing for a while."

"Are you telling me you've spent the last two months playing cricket?" Kate says, mock incredulously.

Jones grins and points at himself. "Jack Morris, captain of the Lower Pampling Panthers. Champions of the Midsomer C-10 Slam."

"There was also a little matter of breaking a match fixing ring and catching a murderer," John says.

"You caught the murderer," Jones replies. "I was just a bystander."

John is about to protest that he's selling himself short, when Sarah calls them into lunch. Kate puts her hand on his shoulder to hold him back.

"Did something happen to him?" she asks quietly.

"Besides nearly being killed?"

"No, he's an idiot. That wouldn't bother him. Did someone else get hurt who shouldn't have?"

John shakes his head. But then he remembers the midnight conversation and wonders if Jones still doubts himself. "He said something last night," John admits. "I thought it was just the exhaustion talking, but he thinks he screwed up."

"Did he?" Kate asks, and John immediately bristles.

"Of course not. You should know better than that."

"But does he?" Kate shakes her head. "You know how he is. Always the first to blame himself when something goes wrong. I'd say getting knocked out and strung up by a murderer is something going pretty wrong."

John remembers those bursts of self-doubt; guilt at saying the wrong thing, missing a key connection, not being convincing enough in court. Of course Jones is blaming himself for nearly getting killed.

He looks into the kitchen, sees Jones laughing as he tries to airplane some soup into Betty's mouth, and wonders what's going on in his former sergeant's banged-up head.