He placed the mobile phone down on the table and, as I looked at it, confused, he reached forward and pressed something on the screen. The Speaker icon. Someone was listening to us at the other end. I tried to get a look at the number he’d dialled but it simply said PRIVATE. Mills glanced at me and shrugged, an almost imperceptible movement, but one that left something behind in his face: it took me a second to work out what it was, not only because he was difficult to read but because I thought, to start with, I was mistaken.

Was it regret?

‘You need to stop,’ he said, and when he took hold of the fore-end again with his spare hand, he stared at me and anything conciliatory was gone, like it hadn’t ever been there. ‘You need to stop what you’re doing.’

‘What am I doing?’

He smiled. ‘That’s cute.’

I glanced at the empty wall again, and then to the laptop lead on the floor. ‘I’d say you’ve done a pretty bang-up job of stopping me already.’ I pointed towards the mobile phone. ‘You and whoever you came here with.’

He smiled again, but it was different this time.

And then the smile faded, he cleared his throat and he said, ‘Look at you: still playing detective, even now; even as you sit there with a shotgun aimed at your face.’

Except he wasn’t aiming the shotgun at my face.

He was pointing it at the floor.

I glanced at the phone again, saw the minutes still ticking over on the display, and then back to Mills. He was staring at me, his head tilted slightly, eyes narrowed, as if he were trying to work me out – or waiting for me to catch up.

‘Stay the fuck away from Black Gale.’

He delivered the words with such ferocity, it almost felt as if they’d come from someone else. I looked him in the eyes, lingering on their stillness.

‘Or don’t,’ he said. ‘But that wouldn’t be a good idea.’

I felt myself push away from him, my back pressing hard against the chair, the weight of his words – his articulation of the threat – like a physical force. He watched me for a moment longer, and all I felt was disconcerted: it was like he really was two different people, the aggression in his voice not matching the expression on his face. That was just a blank.

Mills came forward, disrupting my train of thought.

I shifted around in my chair, following his movement, still trying to work out what was going on and who he was. Was this all a game to him?

Or was this imbalance in his personality a sickness?

He stopped a couple of feet short of me.