I take the piece out of his box, and slot it into its place. Everyone crowds around to see the photo of Ben pushing a body into his kiln. The man’s face is undistinguishable, and all I know about him is that he is dead. There are actually gasps around me. It is a gruesome picture, even if you don’t know what it represents.

This is the reason Ben let me go. He couldn’t find the seventh box, so he chose to let me go and lead him to it.

Elaine breaks into our private thoughts. ‘Tito took this photo, didn’t he? He was there, helping Ben put the bodies in the kiln. He was part of this. He cooked these poor people.’

Everyone looks at her, thinking that she is right and unable to say anything to comfort her.

‘Can everyone take a photo of this, and send it somewhere safe?’ I ask. Elaine’s pain and remorse are not my current problem. They respond and pull out their phones, and frame the bowl and the photo.

‘Marko, would you ring the police and tell them we’ve got important evidence in a murder case, and we’re bringing it in right now?’

He steps away and puts his phone to his ear.

And then we are in the vehicles in convoy: Ralph and Marko at the front, then Tom, me, Elaine, and Mick in the rear. We take it steady. I have told them not to let anyone pass, no matter who they are or how angry they get. The guys at the front and the back spread out from the middle three, hoping they can handle any problem that comes along before it reaches me. I have divided the pieces of the bowl between Tom and myself. If Ben or one of his men gets to one of us, hopefully the other one can make it.

We take the turn out of Wilson Road, and see no one. If so much hadn’t happened in the past forty-eight hours, I would think we were being melodramatic. Surely one of us can just whizz over to town with the evidence? But nothing is beyond Ben, so we have to do the safest thing. We pass the mailman going the other way, and his face says he’d like to know what we’re up to. He will tell Ben what he has seen.

We continue on the road to town with no other traffic.