A second shot sounded when Ellie was five or six feet from the Land Rover and she let out an involuntary cry – that’s it, number’s up Ellie – before she realised the shot had missed, else she wouldn’t have heard it. She realised too that it hadn’t been the high crack of a rifle, and had come from ahead of her, and then she heard the high, drilling scream sounding from above and behind her.

Noel caught her arm and bundled her into the car. Bert Annable was scrambling into the back of the Land Rover as well, shoving in beside Charlotte and Dave – Dave Chapple let out a high-pitched cry of fright and might well have soiled himself again – and Ellie registered that the barrels of Bert’s shotgun were smoking.

From the farmhouse came furious shouting.

“Best bloody go,” said Bert, breaking the shotgun open.

He was right. They had the kids, someone had shot at her, Bert had shot back and Christ alone knew what was about to kick off. Ellie grabbed the radio mic from the dashboard, flicked on the speakers and shouted into it. “Everybody out! Everybody out! Into the cars and home!”

Ernie Stasiolek came pelting across the yard with Chris Brailsford and Phil Robinson at his heels. Bert reloaded his shotgun and leant out of the window, aiming at the house. He fired first one barrel, then the other, over Ernie and the others’ heads. Not as loud as the first time he’d fired. That must have been both barrels at once.

Engines revved; wheels tore at the muddy ground. Ellie turned the key in the ignition. Something hit the windscreen, splintering the glass. A little white spider-web, up in one corner. “Everyone get down!” she shouted, throwing the Land Rover into reverse and flooring the accelerator – second time in twenty-four hours she’d done that in the front yard of Barrowman Farm.

She saw a muzzle flash twice more – the front room window, a gap in the boards – and felt something else hit the Land Rover’s bodywork. A small bullet, like the first – a big one would have punched straight through the windscreen and made a far bigger hole. That farty little .22 rifle. Paul Harper.

The Land Rover shot back towards the demolished gate; Ellie floored the brake to avoid clipping another of the cars from the village, and the engine stalled. “Fuck. Fuck.”

“Get us out of here! Get us out of here!” Dave Chapple was screaming, as she turned the ignition key again, and then again. The engine coughed and churned. Turn over you bastard, turn over. She could hear the twig-like snapping of the .22 from the house. On the first floor, a board was wrenched from one of the windows and a shotgun barrel was thrust out through the gap.