He traced the sounds to a bedroom. Door ajar. He nudged it open.

Nan lay on her back, her legs entwined in a sheet. Intact, unharmed, deeply asleep. He crossed to wake her, explain why he was there, then reconsidered, picturing her shock and distress. He felt unequal to it. And he had a crime scene to preserve. He let himself out, locked up, replaced the key. A string of calls to make.

The Muirs were Nan’s closest friends in the district. Apart from the support, they’d know if she had family who should be notified. They’d know how he could contact her husband, the reclusive gold prospector.

Yvonne Muir answered, the voice conjuring the woman in Hirsch’s mind’s eye: slight and nervy in contrast to her stolid husband, a woman whose hands were constantly at her hair and clothing, rotating her wedding ring.

He sketched the situation and she gasped, appalled; said she’d come immediately.

‘No,’ Hirsch demurred. ‘Wait for my word. I’d like to get a vet here before she wakes up.’

Yvonne was alarmed. ‘Are you sure she’s asleep? What if she’s been hurt?’

Hirsch said he’d heard snoring.

‘Well…I know she takes sleeping pills sometimes.’

‘Meanwhile,’ Hirsch said, ‘perhaps Bob could give me a hand?’

‘You just missed him,’ Yvonne said. ‘He’s rewiring a house in Spalding today.’

So Hirsch would have to examine and preserve the crime scene alone. He wasn’t confident that trained forensic officers would arrive before the end of the day, and half the town could be expected to traipse through Nan Washburn’s yard by then.

‘As soon as the vet gets here,’ he said, ‘I’ll text you to come over.’

‘Okay.’

Next, Hirsch called his boss. Jogging again.

‘You’re ruining another perfectly good run, Constable Hirschhausen.’

Then she listened, asking good questions—almost as if she could visualise the scene—and rattled off instructions: secure the area, take photographs of the dead and injured horses, preserve footprints and tyre prints. ‘As best you can in the circumstances. I expect the horses have trampled over everything? Better establish a radius too—search for discarded clothing, knives, machetes. Doorknock. I’ll try to get you a forensic team or at least a couple of CIB officers from Port Pirie.’ She paused. ‘Do you know who might be responsible?’

Hirsch did. He said, ‘Early days, sarge.’

‘All right.’ The sergeant grunted. ‘I sometimes jog with one of the vets. I’ll give her a buzz.’ She finished the call.

Hirsch began scanning the dirt for signs of vehicle and foot traffic. No good: the areas not churned up by panicked horses or hidden beneath carcasses were baked hard by the sun. Maybe forensic technicians could isolate partial tyre or shoe treads.

He took photos: the blood-smeared railings, the dead ponies with their slit throats, the survivors with their stabbed and slashed pelts.