He was slow getting up this time, his feet dragging in the withered grass. I could have finished him. Instead I tied him up, partly because he was beaten and partly because the woman cried out behind me,'Stop it! You have to stop it!'.

I said, 'You're a strange mother, Mrs Wycherly. You don't seem to give a damn if your girl is dead or alive.' She laughed in my face. I went to the door, followed by the girlish laughter. A man was waiting for me on the other side of the door. His face was like a shiny, lumpy sausage, bulbous and queer under a silk stocking mask. He swung a tyre-iron in his hand. It came over in a looping arc and reached the side of my head before my fingers touched by gun butt. I fell backwards into the room and darkness