Roberta Teys has been placed in Barnstingham Mental Asylum without proper paperwork, and Lynley orders Nies to provide all material related to her case. At the lodge, he and Havers review the thin case file. Stepha Odell tells them the keys to the Teys farmhouse are with Richard Gibson, William’s nephew and heir. When Richard returned to Keldale, he was shocked by Roberta’s weight and blamed William for ignoring her. Stepha doubts Roberta murdered her father; he was the only close family she had.

At Keldale Abbey, Deborah and St. James are waylaid by the American guests, Hank and JoJo Watson, who barrel in with gossip and theories about the case. They point out the vestry recess where the dead newborn was found three years earlier.

The crime scene at the barn confirms Havers’s earlier inference: If the dog died first and the body collapsed over it, staging is unlikely. The report never says what became of the dog, which angers Lynley. Inside the house, the kitchen and dining room are spotless. In the sitting room, a candlelit shrine to Tessa Teys dominates one corner, unsettling Havers. Roberta’s room yields a family photograph cropped to hide another girl who looks like Tessa, an album from which multiple images have been cut out, and, under the mattress, a cache of rotting food.

Back in the village, the Dove and Whistle is loud and warm. The barmaid, Hannah, attracts Lynley’s attention for her punk style. In the quieter lounge, Lynley floats the compulsive-eating hypothesis; Havers pushes back, then abruptly apologizes for snapping at the farm. She says that she was “spooked” (109). Dinner arrives as roast chicken and peas, echoing the victim’s last meal and her own household’s fare, and she rushes out, shaken.

Back at Keldale Lodge, Stepha Odell gives Lynley a packet of case materials just delivered from Richmond. While Lynley sorts the contents, he notes the absence of anything about Whiskers. Stepha says Constable Langston buried the dog. Lynley reconsiders the sequence in the barn given the separate killing of the dog. He shows Stepha a photograph found in Roberta’s room of Roberta with an older girl. Stepha identifies the girl as Gillian Teys, Roberta’s sister, who left Keldale about 11 years earlier. According to Stepha, after Gillian left, William burned her belongings, photographs, and even her birth certificate. She was “dead to William” (120). Stepha says Roberta adored Gillian and must have hidden the photo from William. She mentions that Gillian had been close to Richard before he moved away.

The next morning, Lynley and Havers visit Olivia Odell’s house by the River Kel. Olivia, still grief stricken, says William was a stabilizing presence for her and her daughter, Bridie. She describes an earlier argument at the Dove and Whistle between William and Richard. William criticized the barmaid Hannah’s appearance; Richard retorted about judging by appearances and shifted to Roberta’s weight and William’s parenting. William responded with a crude remark about Richard’s marriage. The confrontation ended without blows. Olivia confirms Richard knew he stood to inherit the farm under William’s will.

Olivia believes that Roberta wanted her to marry William. Tessa Teys had not died but had deserted the family shortly after Roberta’s birth. William had hired a private investigator to locate Tessa so he could pursue an annulment in the church, and before he died, he had just learned that Tessa had been found in York.

Lynley telephones the investigator, Harry Houseman, who provides Tessa’s address in York and reveals that she committed bigamy by marrying again without formally ending her first marriage. Lynley and Havers drive to the York address, a tidy middle-class house. They see Tessa on the terrace looking youthful and composed, far from the destitute runaway they envisioned.

Tessa Teys, now Mowrey, admits she married William at 16, had Gillian, then later Roberta. After Gillian’s birth, William became intensely religious and withdrew from her, saying he needed to “purify his soul” (136). Feeling excluded, she left a few weeks after Roberta’s birth and ran away to York. Six weeks later, she met and married Russell Mowrey without divorcing William. They had two children: Rebecca and William. She says Russell left three weeks ago, after learning about her past. Lynley informs her that William was murdered that same night and Roberta has been charged. Tessa insists Russell would not have killed William and says she never saw Gillian again.

Driving back, Lynley and Havers discuss possible suspects and the “shrine” (143) to Tessa in the Teys home. They go to Barnstingham Mental Asylum, where Dr. Samuels says Roberta is not catatonic but “chooses not to” speak (147). In Roberta’s room, Havers is struck by Lynley’s empathetic approach to talking to Roberta, who only reacts when Lynley mentions finding Gillian. They return to Keldale, where Nigel Parrish is in a “violent quarrel” (151) with another man on the bridge, blocking their car.