Four men in camouflage jackets trotted past her. They were all big men, bulky under their jackets, and one of them was carrying a pickaxe handle. He gave Fry a hard stare as he went by, and she felt sure she’d seen him before, possibly in court, or occupying a cell in the custody suite. If she’d seen those four sitting in a car within fifty yards of a bank, she would have been tempted to call in the response team to arrest them on suspicion of planning an armed robbery. Today, though, they all wore baseball caps that said HUNT STEWARD. The unmistakable scent of violence hung on the air.

‘I see the hunt have their own heavies, Inspector,’ said Fry.

‘The stewards, yes. They were stood down for quite a while, but they seem to have been re-formed for the occasion.’

‘Looking for a chance to teach the protestors a lesson, I suppose.’

‘We do try to keep an eye on them. But with an event like this, things can be spread over a wide area. The hounds are in one place, the riders another, and the car followers all over the shop. That’s why we tend to watch the sabs. The trouble happens where they are, one way or another.’

An officer came up and spoke to the inspector.

‘OK, thanks.’ He turned back to Fry. ‘It seems some hunt supporters blocked the sabs’ van in with their vehicles and let the tyres down. That’s pretty tame stuff, really.’

‘What about all the shouting and screaming?’

‘Oh, one of the joint masters got a bit aggravated and chased the sabs down the road.’

‘When he was on horseback?’

‘That’s “she”. Two of the Eden Valley joint masters are women. Yes, she was mounted at the time. A horse can be a bit terrifying when it’s coming towards you at a canter. That’s one reason we use them ourselves, of course.’

A moment later, two young women ran through the trees and on to the road towards the police. One of them had blood streaming down her face and into her hair from a cut above her eye, and the other was holding a hand to her mouth, wincing in pain.

‘That doesn’t look like tame stuff to me.’

‘I’ll get an ambulance here.’

‘Good luck getting it through, Inspector.’

But the two women were soon telling their story in the back of a police car while they waited for the ambulance.

‘It’s often the female sabs who get hurt,’ said the inspector, when he returned.

‘Funny, that.’

‘To be honest, I think they’re probably the most provocative. Though I suppose I shouldn’t say it.’

Fry made her way back to her Peugeot, carefully stepping over heaps of steaming horse muck on the road, and the muddy ruts left by the wheels of the transporters. She was just in time to see a stray foxhound, its tongue lolling, cocking a leg to urinate on her car.