Natalie said there was someone else I should talk to.

Simon Ford had been a product developer at Greenfields for twelve years. His job was to create the supermarket's own-brand recipes in the test kitchen.

He'd left Greenfields six months earlier. He hadn't wanted to talk to anyone.

But he agreed to meet me. On one condition. Not in Cornwall, and not in a café. On a bench by the sea in Dawlish, in the wind, where nobody could hear.

He was a quiet man in his fifties, with careful eyes.

“I signed an agreement when I left,” he said. “Not to talk about my work.”

“I understand.”

“But a lawyer told me something last week,” he said. “If a company is breaking the rules, you're allowed to tell the official regulator. Or Parliament. An agreement can't stop you doing that.”

He took a folded piece of paper out of his coat pocket.

“I kept one email,” he said. “I don't know why. I think I always knew someone would need it one day.”

He handed it to me.

It was from Martin Kerr to the Greenfields test kitchen. Sent the day after I'd handed over Grandma Polly's recipe.

Simon – attached is the Pascoe's recipe from the technical audit. Match it exactly. Same 21 crimps. Same white pepper. Same diced swede. Don't mention to the supplier. We'll delist them once ours is ready. M.

I read it three times, with the wind trying to tear it out of my hands.