‘Dominic Watson-Bruce isn’t here, either. Nor is his father, who is off abroad on holiday. No one claims to know where they are or when they’ll be back, and no one knows anything about a kidnapped girl. Apologies, but we didn’t expect to find your family here, Nick. But we did find something we expected.’

Once the strike team had determined that there wasn’t a kidnapped child on the premises, although there were some illegal aliens, Miller and her crony had entered the main office to speak with the boss. They came back with a pencil-drawn map of the compound. The two detectives and Nick, free now of his handcuffs, started walking through the maze of walls of cars, and around lonesome vehicles abandoned like lepers. Near the eastern fence, top end, was Zone M-12: a stack of smashed cars eight wide and three high, all missing tyres, windows and doors. No plates, either, but up close he could see registration marks painted in small script onto flanks or bonnets. The pile of wreckage, the scrabbly earth and the burning sun gave an apocalyptic feel to the scene, like something from a Mad Max movie. Bennet approached the middle of the wall and pointed at a blue car in the middle row. Dented to hell, roof half-crushed under the weight of the vehicle above, and Nick stared for a few seconds without realising what he was seeing. Until he noted the registration scrawled on the askew bonnet.

It didn’t make sense. ‘You came here for this? Why? What’s going on?’

Bennet didn’t answer. He slipped alongside the Venga beneath the blue car. Nick turned to Miller, demanding an answer with his eyes.

‘Yes, Nick, I’m sorry, but we came here for the car. We need to confirm that this is your wife’s old Fiat Punto.’

Nick squeezed into the small gap between the Venga and its neighbour and looked inside the Punto. Bennet was on the other side, each man’s head visible across the seats. The steering wheel was gone, perhaps sold on at some point. It was weird to see this car again after so many years, and somewhat sad to think that it hadn’t been crushed and turned into Pepsi cans, but had been left to rot. He’d driven this thing in just summer shorts, but now didn’t even want to touch it.

Bennet reached inside and pulled the bonnet release lever.

There was a dead rat in the passenger footwell, fur matted to the carp— ‘Hang on, this isn’t Anna’s car. The carpet.’

‘What about the carpet?’ Bennet said.

‘A couple of days before we scrapped it. We had some painting gear in a bag. My foot broke the lid of a bottle of turps. It bleached a big piece of the carpet on this passenger side. There’s no mark here.’