Scarface went over to a ladder that led up through the opening in the roof. He climbed quickly up it and disappeared from view. Ella had been up there once to have a look. The top of the ladder was tied to a cross-beam and it looked out over the whole farmyard. The roof itself was too rickety to stand on.

‘Sod this,’ said Sonya. ‘I have to see what’s going on.’ And she started to climb up after him.

‘There’s only room for one,’ Ella shouted after her, but Sonya ignored her.

‘They’ll get in here,’ said Daniel, his voice a harsh whisper. ‘And they’ll kill us. There’s too many of them.’

‘There’s too many of them.’

‘Admit it, Harry: you’re scared.’

‘Shut up, Daniel,’ said Harry. ‘You’re a real downer, you know.’

Harry was having to speak quite loudly to be heard because there was a banging on the outside of the barn that sounded like rolling thunder as a hundred hands battered the metal sheets. More and more dents were appearing and Ella could hear grown-ups snuffling and sniffing at any gaps or holes. She wished she hadn’t stayed to look at them as they came to the farm. It made them too real. It would have been easier if she had no picture of them and could pretend they weren’t that bad, that they were weak and useless, not scary at all. The banging could be rain or hailstones. The movement outside? The grunts and moans? It could be a herd of escaped cows. Or horses. Or …

Anything other than diseased grown-ups. If they got in they would take her like they’d taken her brother and so many of her friends. She wished Scarface would come back down. She didn’t feel safe without him. These kids were useless; all they did was argue. Daniel was too scared to do anything. He was walking about in circles, going from one wall to another, listening, looking up at the sky, muttering to himself, crying all the time, and thumping his chest with his fist. Harry was being mean to Louisa, calling her stupid, and she was having a go back. Every now and then Harry would break off the argument and go over to where the banging noise was loudest and smash the wall with his club. Swear at the grown-ups.

It made no difference. Nothing made any difference. The grown-ups kept banging on the walls – so loud that Ella couldn’t think – and pushing against them so that they were getting steadily more and more bent in.

Ella had an image that the barn was her head, and the grown-ups were hammering directly on her skull. She wanted it to stop. She wanted it all to stop.

There was a rattling at the door.

And then Louisa screamed.