She was jolted awake a little while later and found that Scarface had stopped. He was standing among some trees in a wood, watching something – Ella couldn’t see what – and after a while he relaxed and started walking again. As he did so, Ella spotted movement around them. Animals were approaching, like ghosts in the dark. Ella felt a moment’s fear and panic, but was calmed when she saw that Scarface wasn’t bothered. He just walked on. Ella could see now that the animals were dogs. They didn’t growl or anything, just sniffed around Scarface. Sniffed at his legs and bag, then trotted off back into the darkness under the trees.

Scarface moved a bit faster now and soon they were out of the wood and in a wide-open space. There was another smaller clump of trees ahead and a cluster of buildings half hidden among them. As they got nearer, Ella saw that it was a farm of some sort. Scarface stopped to let her down. Her legs felt stiff and weak and she had to stamp her feet to get everything working properly. She was just about to walk to the farm entrance when Scarface grabbed her and held her back, then indicated with his open palms that she should go carefully and stay behind him.

He walked on very cautiously now. There was a road going through the trees to a gate, and beyond it was a farmyard with large, mostly modern-looking buildings and an older farmhouse in the middle, the sort you saw in picture books, except the windows were all dark and the top half was black from fire. Ella noticed that part of the roof had collapsed as well. As they neared the gate, Scarface pointed to a low wire that was stretched out across the road. He stepped over it carefully and Ella did the same. A few paces further on there was another wire, this one higher up, that they had to duck under. When they got to the gate, Scarface didn’t open it, but climbed over it instead. Ella could smell animals and animal poo. It wasn’t a bad smell. Not like the rotten stink of grown-ups. Still Scarface was going carefully, pointing out to Ella all sorts of traps and obstacles. He then skirted round the farmyard into some bushes at the side.