Hirsch gave him a little salute. ‘No harm done, except to the fence and your car.’ He glanced around to the far corners of the paddock. No stock; the fence could stay as it was for the time being. ‘If you give me your details, I’ll pass them on to whoever farms this place.’

‘To pay for the fence? Yes, of course,’ the minister said.

Mid-morning, Liam Kennedy called. The family had returned from church in Redruth to find their house burgled. Most of the Christmas presents—yet to be opened—had been swiped from under the tree, together with a TV set and jewellery from the master bedroom, a phone and a laptop from the kids’ room.

Their farm was ten kilometres west of Tiverton, a 1970s suburban-style brick veneer at the end of a winding track on a slope overlooking lucerne flats. As Hirsch turned off the approach road, he saw a sun-flash a short distance along a nearby side road. A car was parked there.

Check out the Kennedys first.

He parked behind a Subaru wagon on the gravel turning circle. That was the signal for the family to spill out of the house: Liam, Fiona, two girls of upper-primary-school age. They took him inside, the air close and warm, and showed him the back door. It had been forced open. Then the Christmas tree, an artificial one, with a couple of forlorn parcels under it. Then the kitchen.

‘They raided the fridge!’ Fiona said, her face tight with stress. ‘I mean, you hear about people saying they feel violated when they’re burgled…’

‘It’s a terrible feeling,’ Hirsch agreed.

He glanced at Liam. A big man, scarred and scraped by a life on the land; combed and tidied now for church. Calmer and harder than his wife. A good thing he didn’t walk in on the burglar, Hirsch thought.

That car he’d seen…

‘Mind if I look around outside?’

‘This way,’ Kennedy said.

They were ten seconds into a sweep of the yard when Hirsch saw the dark gleam of a flat-screen TV under a rosebush beside the veranda steps. He said, very firmly, ‘Liam, I want you to fetch Fiona and the girls and go sit with them in the car. Understand? Don’t say anything to them, use hand signals.’

Kennedy twigged quickly. A rasp in his voice as he said, ‘Let me—’

‘Liam, you need to look to your family,’ Hirsch said, putting some grit into his own voice.

‘If it all gets away from you, I’m—’

‘Understood, thank you,’ Hirsch said.

He waited, watching the family troop out and into the Subaru before re-entering the house. He went through the place quickly, quietly: room by room; behind doors; under beds.

That left the wardrobes.