Clear in his mind now, Hirsch turned onto the Tiverton road and cranked up the speed. Using the old hayshed as a marker, he glanced out of the other side window and caught a brief glimpse of Flann’s ute down beside the creek. He’d secure it when he got back. Have a forensic team test it for blood traces, fibres; stolen goods from the night of the shootings.

He drove on, his mind turning to Rosie DeLisle. Would she help him hide the girls? What if she played it by the book? Or went into full-scale major-operation mode, informing everyone—including a work colleague who might happen to let it slip to a Sydney colleague involved in the original witness protection betrayal? Better to turn up in Adelaide unannounced, he thought.

He checked his phone: still no signal, and it stayed that way until he was ten minutes from Tiverton. On three bars, he pulled over again. Flann kicked the side panels. Finding Gemma Pitcher in his contacts list, Hirsch texted the photo of his prisoner in cuffs, saying: Wayne locked up. Safe 2 come home.

Soon after he pulled back onto the road, his phone rang. Gemma’s number on the screen.

He tucked the Toyota into a farm gateway and accepted the call. ‘Gemma.’

‘You’ve really got him?’

‘Yes.’

‘You know what he done, right?’

‘Yes.’

‘Adam says if you can get into Wayne’s phone there are some photos.’

‘Ah. Excellent.’

‘He can’t get away?’

‘No.’

‘They won’t let him out? You know, on a technical whatever?’

‘No.’

A long pause. In the lockbox, Flann yelled and kicked the walls.

Gemma said, ‘Adam was with him, but he never shot no one and he didn’t know Wayne would do it and now he’s scared he’ll go to jail.’

‘I’ll look after Adam, that’s a promise,’ Hirsch said. ‘But the three of you need to come in. Everyone’s worried.’

Another pause and Gemma said, ‘Maybe tomorrow.’ Then she was gone.

With Flann’s phone stowed in the office safe and Flann secure in the old lockup, supplied with Pepsi, a microwaved supermarket pizza and the company of Bob Muir, perched on an Ikea garden chair, Hirsch got behind the wheel again and headed out of town. His phone rang: a number he didn’t recognise.

‘Paul?’

Sergeant Brandl. Should he tell her about the Rennie girls and Wayne Flann? Not yet. ‘Yes, sergeant?’

‘I’m on an incident-room phone. Apparently we had a call from a truck driver an hour ago.’

‘Truck driver…’ Hirsch said, and he knew at once. The air grew chill around him.