‘I hope you’re referring to my dodgy ankle rather than the size of my arse.’

Jai laughed. ‘Naturally. But yes, it’s almost too perfect.’

‘The village or my arse? Because that’s far from perfect.’ That had popped out before the censorship lobes in my brain had a chance to click in. Trying so hard to get our banter back that I crossed the line into dodgy territory. ‘Yes,’ I said hurriedly, cringing inside. ‘It’s quite Stepford. Almost ominous. But there are cameras everywhere. That could help us.’

‘There are tunnels in this area,’ Jai said, ignoring my babbling. ‘I wonder if that’s why they have all the fences. Are they scared of kids wandering off and falling into them? I heard they stretch for miles. Old lead mines and stuff. I’ve seen videos on YouTube. I wondered if you fancied dragging me down there? Maybe at night? In a storm? When they’re about to flood?’

I laughed, relieved I’d got away with the inappropriate arse comment. ‘Honestly, Jai,’ I said. ‘One little incident where we nearly die in a flooded cave and you won’t stop going on about it.’

We reached the rim of the valley, where the road sloped down again. A sign said, Thank you for driving carefully through Gritton. Underneath, in very faint letters as if they had been repeatedly scrubbed clean, were the words, Village of the Damned. It was almost reassuring that there were vandalising teenage scrotes in residence amongst all the perfection, but I wondered what the village had done to earn that accolade.

In another half-mile, we drove through red-brick housing which looked more normal and messy, as if people actually lived there, although there were still barriers to the pavements and some of the roads were gated. Ahead was rocky moorland and in front of it a field containing a collection of dubious-looking run-down caravans in various shades of dirt-colour.

‘That must be the place,’ I said.

I pulled up and climbed from the car, narrowly missing a neatly curled dog turd. The place contrasted so extremely with the main village, it was almost as if it was trying to make a point.

‘Nice.’ Jai unfolded himself slowly as if he didn’t want to get out.

Ten caravans were spread over a field of unkempt grass. No people were in evidence but one or two curtains twitched, and there was the muffled sound of kids screaming and dogs going ballistic inside the caravans.

‘The shutters are going down and the hackles are going up,’ I said.

‘Yeah. The cop-detection radar’s good in places like this.’