‘I swear to you, kid, even if I had wanted to play along, I’d barely been on the force for all of five minutes – think they’re gonna listen to me? Not even when we found her guitar and especially not after the note. Folk wanted her gone. Folk knew she did stuff like this. It would have been a waste of time, everyone said. And that note – well, I got to thinking that maybe she had left it somehow, but … God. No matter any more, I suppose.’

I scoff. ‘I suppose.’

‘What are you gonna do about all this, then? Huh? Now you know. What are you gonna do? You’re smart. I’m sure you’ve been recording this whole thing. You got your confession.’

I brush my phone in my pocket, microphone side up.

‘Send a sick man to prison for something I’m not even sure he did? Worse, humiliate him, because there’s no conviction without evidence? I bet he doesn’t even remember it better than he remembers this morning. And me? Well, I’ve lived my life. This was my one get-out-of-jail-free card and now God has come back to remind me how fragile this all is. You win, Miss Mona. Hope it’s a good show.’

He’s quiet. ‘People deserve to know what happened,’ I say, maybe more to myself than to him. ‘Ellis deserves to know what happened.’

He shrugs. ‘You think? I don’t know if you did. Generally I don’t know if folk deserve anything in life. As for Ellis, sure, that kid deserves the world. A different one than what we’ve made here.’

I recall the heap of podcast equipment on the floor of my dorm. ‘Booker, did you know about the podcast before I told you just now?’

He scoffs. ‘Well, I figured you were after something.’

‘Right.’ I don’t know what to do now. This is everything. But there’s still the question of what Mary Anne knows but won’t say. And who broke my equipment. Mary Anne? And if not her, who else has something to keep hidden?

‘Well,’ he says, with a sort of childish, quiet inflection. ‘Best of luck with whatever you decide.’

I take this as an invitation to leave. I don’t say anything, maintain eye contact, and I get back on to the bike and turn myself round.

‘Hey, kid,’ he calls behind me.

I turn to look at him. ‘Hm?’

‘There’s something that’s always bothered me about what happened. I don’t get it. Not to this day.’

I leave silence for him to continue.

‘When Roxy said, “You wanna shoot me, don’t you?” she wasn’t looking at me or Archie, who were the fellas with the guns,’ he says. ‘She was looking straight at Mary Anne.’

A crow screams from somewhere inside the woods.