Tinder finished in the garden by sniffing around the wood and then returned indoors to eat the rest of his breakfast. Jan buttered her toast, poured some coffee and took her breakfast upstairs to have as she showered and dressed. Bring warm clothes suitable for the country, Camile had included in her emailed instructions. She had, and was now dressed in jeans and a thick woollen jumper.

Returning downstairs, Jan took her padded zip-up jacket from its hook in the hallway and went into the kitchen. Tinder looked at her, hopeful for a walk.

‘I’ll take you into the village later, but for now we’re going in the garden,’ she told him. She knew she could trust him not to disappear through the hedge in daylight. It was after dark when he gave chase and vanished into the woods.

Tucking her phone into her jacket pocket, Jan went into the garden and began gathering up the pieces of wood and stacking them to one side. They hadn’t been broken or damaged, just removed from where she’d fixed them over the hole. She found the wire netting with the twine she’d used to tie it in place still attached. As she looked more closely she could see that it hadn’t been gnawed through; the knots had been unpicked. Could foxes do that? No. What animal could? None that she knew of.

She crossed the lawn to the hole in the hedge and, squatting down, examined the track marks. There were fresh ones, but it was still impossible to identify them. On the branches either side of the hole was more twine.

Puzzled and unnerved but wanting to cover the hole again as quickly as possible, Jan began bringing over the wood she’d used previously and started boarding up the hole again. Tinder sniffed around the patio. She fetched more wood and wire netting from the shed and secured it in place with twine. It was much better fortified now, stronger and more robust, but as she worked she had a strange, unsettling feeling that her efforts could all be in vain. Anything that had the intelligence to untie knots and disassemble wood and wire netting wouldn’t be kept out by this. The more she thought about it, the more she was convinced an animal hadn’t done this. It must have been a person or people and she trembled at the thought. Chris had been wrong to dissuade her from reporting it to the police simply because she couldn’t give a good description.

Half an hour later, satisfied she’d done her best and the repair would hopefully keep them out for a while at least, Jan returned the tools to the shed and went indoors. She sat on a kitchen stool and phoned Coleshaw Police Station.

‘I want to report an intruder,’ she said to the call handler.

‘Is the intruder on the premises now?’

‘No.’