She felt a swift stab of hope that Bert might have finally drunk himself to death – and then immediately felt ashamed. Bert was a bastard, and life would be much better without him – but it was wicked to wish him dead.

She took a firmer hold on the makeshift lead and headed towards the back of the pub. The big wooden gates were standing open and Bert’s truck had gone. She frowned. Bert was a coward and it was unlikely he’d have joined the others in fighting the fire. But where could he have gone? The next pub was over a hundred miles away, and if he wanted a drink, then the back room and bar held enough booze to sink a battleship.

She cautiously approached the back door, which was creaking back and forth in the rising wind. Bert was crafty and mean, and perfectly capable of setting a trap. Perhaps he’d hidden the truck and was lying in wait for her, drunk and beyond all reason.

‘Stay close, Brandy,’ she murmured.

The dog seemed to understand and pressed himself to her legs, his lips drawing back in a snarl.

Sal warily stepped into the back room and almost gagged from the awful smell. Flies were swarming in great black drifts and there were maggots squirming in the remains of rotting meat which had been left on the chopping board. More rotten food lay amid spilled bags of flour and sugar, and an army of ants was vying for the spoils with beetles and tiny bush mice.

She gave a yelp of fright as an enormous rat shot out from under the heavy wooden table, blood dripping from its whiskers. She jumped in terror as it ran over her feet and into the yard. Brandy snapped his teeth, missing the creature’s long tail by inches.

Sal pulled on the belt. ‘You don’t want to eat them,’ she muttered, still shaking with fright. ‘You’ll catch something horrible.’

Wary of disturbing any more rats, or of being ambushed by Bert, she kept the dog close and headed down the narrow passage. The storeroom didn’t smell, but it had been ransacked. Empty beer crates lay on their side next to smashed bottles of whisky and rum, and the crates that should have been full of bottles of spirits were missing.

She hoisted the heavy dog into her arms and picked her way through, her boots crunching the broken glass as she headed for the bar.