Yes, he said, yes, he could.

A likely story. Those who had, in the past, accused Saul of petty bureaucracy as they supped their beers in the Anchor, bemoaning his absence of light and shade in the upholding of the law, how he never let a damn thing past if there was a box that needed ticking, now called him a clock-watcher and a shirker, someone guaranteed to do the bare minimum, and decidedly less if no one kept an eye.

But all this was a wasted discussion, if you considered that the coycrock girl might not have given them the book at all.

She had held out an apple, cupped in the palm of her hand, as a welcoming gift when she stepped into that stone circle – not a play text – according to reports. Others had it as a pomegranate, for hadn’t the girl been seen trying to shoplift one from the Provisions Store? Wasn’t she often roaming through the nunnery gardens uninvited, sneaking into hothouses? The educated curate had once told the congregation the story of a goddess who ate six seeds from that fatal fruit, then found herself bound to the underworld. It wasn’t hard to see what the coycrock girl intended.

The other version of events was that she took them no gift all – gave them only the charm of her tongue.

The Eldest Girls cried out in surprise when the girl emerged from the undergrowth. The mists were known to thin a little in November, before the climate doubled-down, sending temperatures plummeting. The coycrock looked like an apparition in the drifting haze. Here was that minion of Beelzebub they’d been calling out for. Here was Bethany Reid risen from the dead, albeit with the wrong-coloured hair.

‘Who sent you?’ Britta Sayers demanded, for the girl did have the air of a reluctant messenger, pushed forward to speak.

The Eldest Girls could look majestic in their white nightgowns as they danced and called, but they cut ridiculous figures standing stock-still, caught out, their muddied hems dragging, their cuffs hanging lower than their hands.

‘I’m Viola,’ said the girl as she moved closer, across the peaty ground. ‘Hello.’

‘We know who you are,’ Anna had replied cautiously, ‘we’ve seen you in chapel.’

There was a pause, as the coycrock girl searched for a way to break the tension, deciding in the end to thrust forward a hand for the girls to shake – a gesture that could be seen as too late and too grown-up, but one that could also be oddly endearing. It softened Jade-Marie. She stepped towards the coycrock girl, catching her toe in the hem of her nightdress, falling forward with a ‘Sorry, sorry.’

Britta Sayers slapped their two hands apart.

‘Who sent you?’ she demanded again.

‘No one,’ replied the coycrock. ‘I’ve just been watching you and…’

‘Spying!’

‘No! No, not –’