I’ve chosen my last meal. Fred.

And then I’ll stop, I tell myself. This is the last one.

‘… found dead at a remote homestead near Beaumont, Texas,’ the radio says. ‘Police have confirmed that they believe there is a connection to the double homicide in West Houston.’

Quick work. I guess they found Warner’s body—I just left it in the street—and followed the phone trail back to Sindy’s cabin, where they found a dead FBI agent and around twenty other bodies, some of which had been stitched together. Glad I’m not the one who has to deal with the fallout.

The field office director comes on the radio. ‘We’re pursuing several leads,’ she says. ‘We urge anyone with information to come forward.’

That’s code for: We’re shitting ourselves.

The news anchor is back. ‘The victims’ names have yet to be released,’ she says, barely managing to keep the glee from her voice, ‘but the details of the case have been described as “disturbing”.’

Even when my own body is eventually found, it’s unlikely that the police will connect any of this to me. Warner’s gun is probably untraceable. I only killed one of the many, many victims, and any trace of me will be buried by the sheer volume of DNA from other people. Once all the bullets have been counted and the guns examined, the cops will probably announce that all those people killed each other.

Some will suspect it isn’t true. But an open case of this magnitude would look bad for everyone. Better to blame the victims and declare the case closed.

Maybe Thistle is listening to the radio right now. Maybe she’ll follow the case from afar, and eventually realise that I wasn’t the Crawdad Man.

But that won’t help. It wasn’t the body in the back yard that destroyed our relationship. It wasn’t even the head in my freezer. It was the look on my face. She knows me now. Nothing can undo that.

Another turn-off. This narrow trail isn’t on Google Maps, and would be easy to miss. But there’s a rotting wooden sign, for the mailman.

‘My next guest is Professor Raquel Solar from Louisiana State University,’ the anchor continues. ‘Professor, these latest shootings bring this year’s gun death toll to seven hundred and twelve in Texas alone. Is it time to talk about gun control?’

Another voice comes on. ‘We’ve done nothing but talk, Susan. Compared to other countries—’

I turn off the radio. A house is visible through the trees.