He was alone.

Hobbes was sweating from the exertion. He took a winding pathway that he hoped would lead him back to his car. And then he saw the teenager again, walking ahead towards a gate. He hurried after her and almost caught up, just as she left the cemetery. By the time he’d reached the gate, he was alone once more, standing on Lower Grove Road, with the traffic roaring by. Where was she? Which way had she gone?

He chose to turn right, following the wall for a while. Across Queens Road he saw a bus shelter. The woman was waiting there. The dress made her easy to spot: it was a pattern imprinted on his brain. But she was putting on her coat. A bus was approaching. Hobbes tried to cross the road, but a rush of traffic was coming towards him – he couldn’t make it. He moved along, hoping to cut across when there was a gap.

He saw that four or five people were waiting at the stop. It wouldn’t take them long to board, and the bus was already pulling up. He took his chance and darted into the road, dodging an oncoming car.

The bus pulled away from the kerb.

The shelter was empty.

She’d gone. He’d lost her.

Hobbes watched the bus moving off down the road, leaving him there, hunched over, trying to catch his breath. His mind swirled with images. Confusion. He saw a light flickering at the edge of his vision. He had to take more care of himself, that was obvious. Maybe do more walking, for a start …

He came back up to his full height.

And there she was.

Just a few feet away. The woman. The dress. The blue and the yellow. The flowers. Her face looking at him, her youthful face, her eyes so clear and full of life, and she stared at him and nodded in some kind of recognition. A smile crossed her lips. And he knew then, in that instant: a memory was triggered. He had seen that dress before, somewhere, long ago, so very long ago. The thought startled him. It wasn’t so much the pattern or the colour, but the rip in the side, and the blood. Another victim, perhaps, from an earlier case. But he couldn’t think from where or when: the idea would take on neither weight nor form.

And then the young woman turned and walked through an open doorway in a side wall. She moved quite slowly now, gracefully even.

He went over and looked through into a small enclosed garden.

He walked a narrow twisting pathway between tall hedges and bushes until he reached an ornamental fountain at the garden’s centre.

Water trickled from the mouth of a stone cupid.

It was the only sound, the only movement.

The woman had vanished.

All That Remains

At half past nine on Sunday evening, Hobbes was in his living room listening to a discussion programme on Radio 4, all about the meeting points of art and science. But his mind was elsewhere when the phone rang, and he couldn’t help but wonder if it was Martin, calling to say he was all right. He hadn’t heard or seen anything of him in the past week, ever since the late-night visit.