“He could have saved her.” Tyler looks at the keys still hanging from the lock. “He just left her there to die.” He doesn’t mean Oscar. It can’t have been Oscar. He was at the cottage with them. But as soon as he thinks that, he thinks about how close the cottage is, how quickly a young, fit man could set fire to a church and then hare it across the churchyard to where he knows the police will be, to establish an alibi. And if he knew they were there, then he knew what had happened to Edna as well.

Doggett puts a hand on his shoulder. “You saved her,” he says, misinterpreting Tyler’s silence.

Did he? He’s not so sure. The paramedics scatter suddenly, and Rabbani is lifted quickly onto a stretcher and bundled into the back of an ambulance. There’s an urgency to the operation that is frightening. In seconds the ambulance is tearing its way through the village, sirens blaring, assorted journalists chasing after it, their cameras flashing.

“Sir!” DS Daley trots up to them. He’s holding aloft a backpack and grinning like a cheeky schoolboy. He’s enjoying himself immensely. He opens the bag for Doggett. “Found it in some bushes by the main gate. Matches, lighter fluid. Right proper little arsonist’s kit.”

Some movement makes Tyler look up in time to see the young lad, Barry, speeding toward them across the graveyard. Paul Enfield shouts after him, but Tyler is already moving. Barry realizes his escape is cut off and changes direction. He stumbles slightly and Tyler gains ground. His lungs feel like they’re on fire and he resists the urge to cough again, knowing that if he does, he’ll stop and he won’t be able to get going again. The distance between them closes. Barry is slowing, limping slightly where he’s twisted something on the sudden turn. But Tyler is running out of time. His vision is blurring, darkening, and he’s sure he’s about to pass out. He’s not going to stop, though; even if it means his lungs burst, he won’t stop. It’s now or never. Tyler hurls himself forward, arms outstretched to take Barry around the waist, and then they are falling, barreling over each other in a twisted tangle of limbs. Tyler feels the gravel of the path digging into his hands and face, and something heavy lands on top of his stomach and pushes the last of the air out of his lungs.

—