‘Someone was,’ Ben said. ‘Do you know why they followed us?’

‘I’m not allowed to talk about him.’

Here we go again. This was abuse; plain and simple. Nu didn’t have the capacity to extract the horror stories that the others had drilled into her head. She would always retain that childish innocence, no matter how many years she collected.

‘Are you talking about the creeper, Nu?’ he asked. ‘It’s a fairy tale, okay? You need to understand that. You’ve no reason to be afraid. He’s just a man.’

‘He was a long time ago,’ she replied, retreating out the door. ‘I’m sorry that she told you about him.’

Ben watched as she paced down the path, fading into the grey as though they were one.

‘See you later,’ he whispered, pitying her like all the others; he couldn’t help it.

The villagers were obviously early risers. Hopefully they hadn’t gone for a family stroll and happened upon Chloe in their tent. Her nerves were fraught enough without meeting their faces first thing in the morning.

Ben had one place left to check before returning to her. Sparling’s map had tagged a cemetery a few paces north of the church. He couldn’t recall if it fell within the grounds but it was close by. He never thought to ask Chloe about it. But the fact that she hadn’t brought it into the conversation didn’t heighten his optimism.

After retracing his steps through the church’s doorway, Ben sidled in close to its wall where the brambles dragged across his jacket, soaking what was already wet. The stone path that lined the building offered just enough space to reach the northern side of the churchyard. But without the memory of Sparling’s map, he would never have found it.

The tombstones varied in size and shape, with some no larger than a shoebox. Most had sunken at odd angles as though the dead had pulled them down from beneath. Engravings were no longer legible; smoothed out of existence by too many hard winters. Decomposed leaves layered the earth like old skin and everywhere the land was unkempt.

In the cemetery’s farthest corner, there was a low mound of earth, recently patted down; it was more a pit than a grave. Ben didn’t like to look at it. He was ambling by its perimeter – gleaning what shelter he could from the surrounding trees, admiring the bleakness of it all – when his boot crunched on something. Had it not been so hauntingly quiet he might not have heard it.

‘And what have we got here?’ Ben said, pinching the sunglasses from the black soil and, still kneeling, examining them before the brightening sky.