Snow and soot made a dingy partnership over Yorbridge the next day. The Close lay under a thin whitening that turned quickly to slush under boots. Inside the Chapter House, however, the air was warm with bodies and paper.

For once, Lomas was not in his accustomed seat among the clergy but at a small table in the corner, surrounded by ledgers. Makepeace, sleeves rolled, had a pen behind his ear and an expression of reluctant scholarship.

“Never joined the police to become a bookkeeper,” he muttered, turning a page.

“You joined to find out where other men have been careless,” Lomas said. “Sometimes the carelessness is in ink.”

Canon Price puttered in the background, ostensibly searching for a misplaced commentary on Leviticus, but in practice hovering like an...

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