Jack had parked so that he could see the pigsty. He knew that Annie would by now have sent Alec to slaughter, so he assumed Charlotte would be taking extra care of the others. He was right. Within ten minutes of arriving, Charlotte emerged from the house and wandered, head down and dragging her feet, towards her pigs.

‘That her?’ Mason asked eagerly.

‘Don’t get out of the car taking it for granted she’s complicit and that she’ll lead us directly to Mulhern’s killer. If she’s our connection between all of the burglaries, I doubt she fully understands how important she is. We’re not here to scare her. OK?’

As Jack and Mason approached, Charlotte was bent over with her back to them, raking the slurry into a corner, while the remaining pigs constantly got in her way. Charlotte put her hand onto the back of the biggest pig and leant heavily on it. The pig just stood there, as though it knew that she needed support. Charlotte then put the broom into the crook of her elbow, covered her face with her hand and began to sob. Jack and Mason stopped dead in their tracks.

Jack looked away in an attempt to give her a moment of private grief. Mason, on the other hand, had no clue why she was crying. ‘What’s up with her, Jack?’

Jack was looking along a dirt path that cut down the side of the smallholding. He walked in that direction, and Mason followed. The dirt path ran the length of the house before disappearing into the back field. What had caught Jack’s attention were the parallel tyre marks; too wide to be a car, and too narrow to be the lawnmower. These were quadbike tracks. As Jack followed the path a little further towards the building, he crossed Charlotte’s eyeline.

‘She chose Alec!’ Charlotte was so desperate to talk to someone – anyone – other than the murderous Annie that she didn’t even say ‘hello’. She didn’t seem to be embarrassed by her show of emotion, even though she was still crying quietly. ‘I nursed Alec from the day he was born. He was the runt, so he’s the only one I had to do that with. Pigs are very intelligent animals, DS Warr. And they bond with us. Like dogs.’

Mason shook his head in disbelief: this seemingly heartbroken woman was crying over a pig! Jack could hear Mason take a long, slow breath to keep himself from smirking.

‘This is DI Mason,’ Jack said. ‘From Oxford. His investigation has crossed with ours, so he’s down here for the time being, helping us out.’ Mason tried to redeem himself by smiling sympathetically.

Before Charlotte could reply, Annie appeared with a farrier come to re-shoe Florrie and Judas before their appearance in the annual equestrian event. If looks could have killed, Annie would have dropped dead right there in the slurry.