A twisting in his gut and he bent over, clutching his stomach. The remains of his breakfast splashed onto the puddles in a gush of bile.

‘Best get back, sir,’ Blowers was saying. But as Arthur uncurled to stand up, he saw what it was that had shone – the metal chains Jack wore were hanging from round his neck – two ID tags, some kind of phial and a key on a chain hanging down behind the appalling, deformed body. In a swift, automatic movement, Arthur reached up and slid the key and chain over the lolling head and put it in his pocket.

Behind him, Blowers was saying something but Arthur couldn’t hear him. Then something wrenched the air. A haunting cry like an animal in distress. He looked up to see Verity, running with her long legs towards them over the marsh. He had no idea why she would be there or where she was running from. She had appeared from nowhere. The skin on her face was so pale it was almost translucent and the shiny dark of her hair and the black of her eyes made her look ghostly. He grabbed hold of her to stop her from seeing the body and she fought like a wild creature against him but he was stronger than she was and he spoke in her ear. ‘Don’t look.’

In his head a refrain played. Jack is gone. Jack is gone. Jack is gone.

5.

It was Saturday afternoon, three weeks after the flood, and Arthur sat in a booth in Askey’s milk bar on Staithe Street. The low light made stripes across the black and white checks on the floor and illuminated the kids sipping shakes and coffees at the bar. In front of him was a library copy of Brighton Rock. He was not really reading. Rather than the lines of the book he saw the grotesque fish eyes in Jack’s swollen body.

He reached into the pocket of his jacket and his fingers touched sharp metal. The key was still there.