‘Kirsty said we should bury him. She said nobody need ever know. Who would miss him? I mean, nobody acknowledged his existence. We were the sons and daughters of farmers and abattoir owners. We could do this. The ground in the woods was wet with all the rain. Kirsty went back to her dad’s house and got forks and shovels and we carried him between us into a dark bit of the wood that nobody ever goes in – the old burial grounds … and we dug a hole and put him in it.’

‘This was you, Kirsty, Daniel, Gary, and Lucas?’

She nodded. ‘Bex was still passed out.’

We were all silent. In my mind’s eye I could see the teenagers carrying this dead boy through the rain. The boy who looked like a girl. And burying him deep in the woods.

‘That’s partly why we’re campaigning against the new development,’ Anna said. ‘None of us want that area of the woods dug up. He’s been there for the last nineteen years, and everything was fine until this summer when the reservoir dried up and the old village reappeared and the Pale Child came back, and everything started going wrong.’

‘Did you have any idea who he was?’

Anna shook her head. ‘No. I still don’t.’

So this was the secret. The reason Daniel’s clothes had been covered in mud. The secret that Gary had told Violet. Was Violet missing because she knew this secret? Was Gary dead because he told her?

‘Gary told Violet this secret and now they’re both gone,’ I said. ‘And Daniel’s missing. You have to tell us if you’ve got any idea where he is, or what’s going on.’

She took a long, slow breath. ‘Look, not wanting to speak out of turn, but Daniel is a bit unstable. I know he takes drugs for his pain, because Kirsty supplies him. Maybe they affected him. If he found out Gary told Violet, maybe he felt doubly betrayed – he liked Violet and I know he would have hated the idea of her being close to Gary. But Kirsty’s always been in charge. If anyone knows what’s going on and where Daniel is, it will be Kirsty.’

We climbed into the car and set off in the direction of Kirsty’s farm, Jai driving, Formula One style.

‘Christ,’ I said.

‘Indeed. So Violet could be the daughter of that boy. But who the hell was he?’

I called Fiona. ‘Any sign of Daniel?’

‘No,’ she said. ‘But ANPR picked up his van, heading out of Gritton to the north. We’re on it.’