The figure flowed past the protestors, its presence pushing them aside, its passing going unfelt.

‘That’s also someone in a Toff outfit,’ said Sefton.

It was. But it was blazing white, obviously a thing of the Sight. It was like watching an infrared image of a warm body in a cold room.

‘The trouble is,’ said Ross, ‘you can’t see much detail.’

Quill looked over his shoulder to check with Lofthouse.

‘I can’t see anything,’ she said. ‘Which I suppose is good news.’

He looked back to the image. The figure was pushing itself up against the side of the car, still getting no reaction from those around it. It started easing its way into the vehicle, until it had completely vanished inside. They watched for a few moments as nothing much happened, horribly aware of what had been reported, but seeing nothing through the tinted windows.

Suddenly, the figure burst out from the right-hand side of the car. It left a spatter of silver as it went. Quill recognized that stuff, whatever it was, as what he’d seen shining out of the car crime scene photos, a liquid that had been deposited all over the seats. With the grace of a dancer, the figure leaped onto the heads of the crowd, and then it was jumping into the air—

It was literally gone in a flash.

Quill’s team all looked at each other, excitement in their expressions.

‘Well?’ asked Lofthouse.

‘We have set eyes on our target nominal, ma’am.’

‘Excellent. I want to be kept in touch with all developments. As soon as possible, I want your proposed terms of reference for a new operation.’

Quill was sure his team would have applauded, if that was the sort of thing coppers did. For the first time in weeks, there was an eager look about them.

‘Game on,’ he said.

Chapter Two

TWO

The torso of Michael Spatley MP was a horrifying mass of wounds, including an awful washed stump of pale, open blood vessels where his genitals had been hacked at.

‘He seems to have been slashed across the throat,’ said the pathologist, ‘and then multiple incisions across the abdomen, by a very sharp blade, probably that of a razor. The weapon was not found at the scene. His testicles were cut at their base and the subsequent shock and swift large loss of blood was the cause of death. Time of death tallies with the clock on the CCTV camera, which indicates between eighteen-thirty-two and eighteen-thirty-nine. Direction of blood splatter –’ she held up a photo of the interior of the car from the files they’d all been given by DCI Forrest’s office – ‘is consistent with the assailant kneeling across the rear seats. No arterial blood was tracked back to the front seats. The driver appears, and I stress appears, to have stayed put in the front during the attack.’