Kelly frowned. “What’s Manimal?”

“It’s a show I was due to guest on that got cancelled before we filmed my episode,” Virgil explained as he made tea. “It was supposed to be the start of my comeback, but that’s fine, that’s the way it goes sometimes.”

“Why did he kill your neighbour?” Linda asked.

Virgil shrugged. “Robert Snyder was a thief. That’s not just my opinion: he’d been to jail for it. He probably stole something from Moreno, that’s what I think.”

“Or tried to,” said Linda, “and saw something he wasn’t supposed to.”

Virgil shrugged. “Maybe, yes.”

“Does he know you know?” Kelly asked.

“I don’t think I’d be alive today if he did.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure,” she said. “Why did he pick Javier’s face? Sounds like he wanted you to see.”

“He had no way of knowing I’d be looking out my window at that particular moment.”

“I don’t know, Virgil …”

“If he knows, he knows – so what? Nothing I can do about it. I’m not going to hide away in the town bunker. That’s not how I’m going to go out.”

“What do you know about Oscar Moreno?” Ronnie asked.

“Not a whole lot. I’ve passed his hardware store a thousand times, never been in. He lives on the other side of town, on Chester Road. We do have something in common, though – neither of us is from Desolation Hill originally. He married a widow after her husband died, moved into a house with a couple of kids and has pretty much been a stand-up guy about it all. Nobody we’ve spoken to had a single bad word to say about him.”

Ronnie nodded. “We’ve seen that before. Depraved killer establishes himself as a pillar of the community. It’s a common trait.”

Javier scowled. “You kids need a new line of work if these are the people you’re mixing with.”

“Every so often, we find someone worth the effort. Austin Cooke, for instance. We’re pretty sure the Narrow Man has him.”

Both Virgil and Javier froze.

“What … what’ll he do with him?” asked Javier.

Ronnie hesitated. “Eventually, he’ll kill him. We think. A kid goes missing around this time every year and they’re never seen again.”

“That’s true,” said Virgil. “Jesus, that’s all him? That’s all the work of one guy? I thought … I believed what the cops said. Accidents. Running away. All that crap. I believed them.”

“You couldn’t have known,” said Kelly.

“You said ‘eventually, he’ll kill him’,” Javier said. “What did you mean by ‘eventually’?”

“I mean we have no reason to believe that Austin is already dead,” said Ronnie. “In fact, we’re working on the basis that he’s alive.”

“So this is a rescue mission you’re on.”