It was definitely a night for the pub.

He detected a strange atmosphere as soon as he stepped through the door of the Fretted Goose. It was as if a subtle wind had changed direction. Patrons turned to look at him as he passed, conversations falling silent as they glanced in his direction. It was noticeable and unsettling. When he reached the bar he found himself standing beside the postman, Eric Trott. They weren’t friends, but Trott and Toby had hitherto always at least acknowledged each other. Not this evening, however, it seemed. Trott resolutely ignored him.

‘All right, Toby?’ Stan nodded at him from behind the polished wood of the bar as he approached it, already reaching for a pint glass from the rack above his head. ‘Usual, is it?’

‘That’d be great, thanks.’

‘Eating tonight?’

‘Yes, please.’

Stan glanced at him. ‘Rachel joining you, is she? Bookshop Rachel?’

The enquiry made Toby pause. ‘Not tonight, no. It’s just me.’

Stan hesitated before he reached for the glass, but gave a brief nod. Beside Toby, Trott shifted.

‘Smart move,’ the postman muttered. ‘Guess she knows what’s good for her.’

‘Sorry?’ Toby asked. ‘What?’

Eric Trott was a big man, and when he turned to look at Toby, he used every inch of his bulk as an unspoken warning. Toby was not cowed in the least. He’d stood face to face with dictators and he’d been embedded with a platoon of marines in Afghanistan. He was not intimidated, either by thugs or by the threat of violence, particularly not when the threat was more flab than muscle. He was, though, easily angered by bullies. Toby’s height equalled the postman’s, even if his bulk didn’t, but Eric Trott was twice the size of Rachel.

‘Going to say anything coherent?’ Toby asked calmly. ‘Or just make vaguely violent innuendo?’

Eric was still staring him down when he said, ‘Packet of peanuts please, Stan. Stick ’em on my tab.’

Stan continued pouring Toby’s pint as he reached beneath the bar and pulled out a pack of dry roasted. He tossed them to Eric, who caught them with one hand and pushed away from the bar, still staring balefully at Toby. The noise in the pub had dropped almost to silence. Stan finished pouring Toby’s pint and set it down before him.

‘What on earth was that about?’ Toby asked the landlord quietly.

Stan picked up a folded copy of the local rag that he had behind the bar and laid it silently beside the full pint. Toby picked it up and scanned the front page, then looked blankly at the landlord.

‘What the hell is this?’

It took Rachel a while to answer the banging on the lighthouse door. When she did, she found Toby leaning heavily on the porch jamb, breathing hard, as if he’d tried to run up the hill.

‘Toby,’ she said, standing back to let him in. ‘Are you all right? What’s happened?’

‘I’ve got something you need to see,’ he said, passing her in a flurry of movement as he held something out to her. After a confused second she realized it was the local newspaper.