As he struggled up the flights of steps to the ground floor he used his good hand to call Stuart on his phone and tell him the bad news. Stuart had only just finished his lunch, and sounded as though he’d washed down the poached salmon with a quart of fine wine. His eruptive reaction to the news was pretty much what Hacker had expected.

Hacker got off the phone as quickly as he could and hurried the rest of the way to the buttery room where the castle’s large supplies of booze were stored under lock and key. It was also the room in which Mitch Graham had been charged with guarding their new prisoner, Grace Kirk. When Hacker had left his guy in there with her, the door had been securely bolted from the inside. Now it was hanging half open. A trail of red footprints led out of the door and up the passage.

Hacker burst inside the buttery room and saw Graham sprawled out with his arms and legs akimbo, still clutching his phone. He wasn’t moving. The woman had gone. Broken glass littered the floor. It looked as though dozens of bottles of Charles Stuart’s best-quality claret had been emptied around Graham’s slumped body. Except the glistening red pool wasn’t all wine, because there was a large amount of blood still pumping from the wound in his right thigh. Graham’s own very large and very sharp bowie knife was protruding from his leg six inches above the knee.

Hacker staggered over to him and almost slipped and fell in the slick of wine and blood. Kneeling beside his stricken associate, he clasped the hilt of the knife with his one usable hand and tried to yank it out, but the broad blade was so tightly clamped by Graham’s perforated quadriceps that he couldn’t shift it.

‘Graham! Mitch! Talk to me!’

No response. Graham was deeply unconscious from shock and blood loss. Hacker couldn’t move him. He was still trying to figure out what to do when, a moment later, Stuart came crashing through the buttery room door. His lunchtime tipple hadn’t just affected his voice. He stumbled to a halt on the edge of the red pool, swaying slightly on his feet as he surveyed the scene. ‘What the hell’s happening?’ he demanded. ‘Where’s the bitch gone?’

‘Obviously somewhere she doesn’t want to be found,’ Hacker snapped back at him, wishing he’d just piss off.

‘Go and find her. Now!’

‘You’ve got much bigger problems than just the Kirk woman. McCulloch’s escaped, and right now I can’t say exactly where Hope is either. I locked him in the dungeon but it would seem it’s not as secure as you thought it was. He’s probably loose by now.’