They drove through town, familiarising themselves with the layout before focusing on the quieter streets. They followed the few small scrawls of graffiti like it was a trail of breadcrumbs, losing it sometimes and having to double back to pick up the trail again. It took them the rest of the afternoon, but finally the trail led them all the way to a park, at the bottom of the hill that led to the motel.

“Well, that was a waste of time,” said Kelly.

They got out, went walking. Kelly zipped up her jacket while Two ran in excited circles. On the east side of the park there was a small building that housed the public restrooms. Facing the park, it was a pristine example of a public utility that was kept up to snuff. But the interesting stuff was all across the back in layers of names and promises and oaths and declarations.

Kelly was a quick study, but even so her ability to decipher the messages hidden in graffiti could only take her so far. Ronnie was better at it, and Linda was better still, but Warrick was the master. He was the one who’d told them all about it, after all. Graffiti was the cave painting of the modern world, he’d told Kelly after she’d taken her first trip in the van.

That had been her recruitment, she supposed. Once she was part of the group, one of the gang, he felt comfortable telling her his secrets. A town’s history, its true history, he said, could be found in the scrawls and crude pictures hidden from the prying eyes of the disapproving authorities, those to whom whitewashing a wall was the same as whitewashing a mind. They could paint over the truth as many times as they wanted, but the truth could always be scrawled anew.

Kelly found declarations of love and accusations of infidelity, she found boasts of conquests, of prowess and of physical exploits, and she found pictures of genitalia that were suspect in their accuracy.

“Look at this,” said Linda, pointing to a drawing of a thin man with a wide, smiling mouth, too big for his head. There was an artistry to it, some genuine talent, but there was something else – something about that smile that unnerved Kelly. Linda took a picture of it with her phone.

“Got something else,” Ronnie said. “A name – Donnie Welker. Says here the Narrow Man got him in 2003.”

Linda hurried over, documenting the message.

They found five more references to the Narrow Man, and then Warrick said, “Found it.”

They crowded round him. On the wall, almost at the corner and faded, yet isolated from the other scrawls, almost as if nobody dared paint over it, was a short rhyme.

The Narrow Man, the Narrow Man,

He’ll sniff you out, you know he can.

Counting, counting, one, two, three,

Your name he’ll call, his face you’ll see.