‘I woke up in a tool shed.’ Heath sniffed the air. ‘It smelled like sweet sap, from the chopped wood in the corner. I was trapped in some old-style handcuff thing that hurt my wrists.’ He showed Chandler the raw skin that branded his thick wrists, the skin rubbed off. ‘Feet too. Chains like you see in old movies about Ned Kelly and the like. Thick iron attached by a chain to the wall. He didn’t want me going anywhere.’

‘Can you describe them exactly?’

Heath shook his head. ‘Like D-shapes . . . loops linked by a chain. On my legs, too. My wrists were attached to the wall. My legs weren’t but the chains were too heavy to move, like they’d been set in a concrete block. I yelled for help but there was nothing from outside but squawks and chirps . . . and someone moving next door. That’s when I guessed I was chained up in a shed next to a cabin. That got me worried about what all the tools were for.’ He stared at Chandler. ‘Everything looks sinister when you’re a prisoner. I kept calling out until my throat burned but Gabriel didn’t care. He knew there was no one around to help. After a while he appeared at the door, not angry, not happy . . . just there. I pleaded with him to let me go and he told me to calm down, in that weird soft voice of his. I was afraid that he was going to do something there and then but he just mentioned something about fifty-five. I asked him what the hell he meant but he said he had work to do and left. I told him he didn’t have to kill me. Then he said something that still creeps me out. “No need to worry about it,” he said. “No need to worry at all. Of course you’ll be killed.” ’

Heath stared at Chandler, as if the seriousness of the threat had to be reinforced.

Chandler played it straight. ‘If Gabriel was that intent on killing you, how did you get away?’

His suspect put his handcuffed wrists on the table, the skin torn, blackened around the edges, dust ground into the wound.

‘Luck. I kept pulling at the cuffs, hoping that they were so old they might break. They did. One of the locking mechanisms fell out. For a few seconds I froze, looking at it on the ground, not believing it had actually happened. Leaning over I grabbed a hatchet from the bench and swung for the other cuff, trying not to chop through my wrist. I kept hammering at it, listening for him coming back from next door.’

‘And he didn’t?’