I started with what I’d already told them – that the phones had been fried by magic up on Whiteway Head where the Mortimer Trail crosses onto Bircher Common. That there was something supernatural moving around in the woods to the south-east along the trail which might, if it was the same thing as Nicole’s invisible My Little Pony, be related to her and Hannah’s disappearance.

‘If the invisible pony really turned up at the birthday party,’ I said, ‘then we have a clear path from Rushpool, up to Whiteway Head and then west down the Mortimer Trail to where we found yesterday’s dead sheep.’

‘We were going to have to go into those woods sooner or later,’ Edmondson said to Windrow.

‘I do have indications that something weird is localised to that area. And there are historical leads to run down, and I’d like to deploy some specialist help,’ I said.

‘This would be Beverley Brook, aged twenty, resident of Beverley Avenue, London SW20?’ asked Windrow.

Well, of course they’d done an IIP check – they’d probably had Dominic do it.

‘Yes, sir.’

‘And who is she?’ he asked. ‘Exactly?’

‘Best to think of her as a consultant,’ I said.

‘Good god,’ said Edmondson. ‘Are you saying she’s a . . .’ He hesitated as his mandated diversity training caused him to trip over the word voodoo or possibly witchdoctor – I couldn’t tell which. ‘A traditional spiritualist?’ Which impressed the hell out of me, and I was tempted to agree just to reward such a valiant effort. But it’s one thing to withhold information from a senior officer and quite another to feed them false data.

‘Not really, sir,’ I said. ‘It’s just that there are some people who’ll talk to her who wouldn’t talk to us.’

‘People?’ asked Windrow dryly.

‘Special people, sir,’ I said. ‘Bees are avoiding the area in question. That’s why we think something is going on there.’

I waited for one of them to ask whether the bees were ‘special people’, but luckily both of them had more important things on their minds.

‘What’s your next step?’ asked Windrow.

‘I’d like to re-interview both sets of parents,’ I said. ‘See what they know about the invisible Princess Luna. And then I’d like to have a look at Pokehouse Wood and a couple of other places that have come up in the literature.’

‘You’re going to have a hard time getting Derek or Andy to interrupt their search,’ said Edmondson. ‘So I’d talk to them as soon as possible – before we restart operations.’

‘I’ll ask Cole to facilitate a second interview with the mothers,’ said Windrow.

There was the sound of voices from inside the canteen – members of MIU arriving and looking for coffee.

‘It’s about time we got in there,’ said Edmondson. ‘Are you ready?’

‘One more cigarette,’ said Windrow.