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Now his prints would be on the handle. Bollocks and shit. Reynolds would be justifiably furious with him – especially after the debacle during the last case, when his prints and hair had been found at more than one scene. Even though Jonas had been there in an official capacity, Marvel had made a song and dance about it and had been gunning for him from then on. He didn’t want to alienate Reynolds in the same way.

Instead he needed to glean as much information as possible that might help them to find Charlie Peach.

Jonas looked towards the minibus again; it was easily visible, maybe sixty yards away. Had the kidnapper broken this window and then had his eye caught by Charlie? Maybe his ear? Jonas bent at the knees a little to reduce his six-foot-four to more average proportions. Even from six inches lower he could see the minibus clearly.

Inside the car, the dog heaved itself to its feet and pressed its snout to the hole. A few blocks of safety glass tinkled free of the window.

Jonas heard the whoop of police sirens and walked back to the minibus to meet Reynolds.

Charlie Peach was not hiding or playing a joke. Charlie Peach had just plain vanished.

Reynolds blamed Jonas Holly. One hundred per cent. His only task had been to stop anyone leaving the show ground through the single exit with a child that was not his own – and he’d failed miserably.

The man was a jinx.

Reynolds looked again at the note stuck to the steering wheel. Even without touching it he could see a tiny fibre of greenish wool clinging to its gummed edge.

The man they were hunting had been right here, in the confines of a field that also contained a policeman who had been specifically assigned to look for him.

The more Reynolds thought about it, the worse it got.

Jonas appeared at his shoulder and Reynolds was suddenly uncomfortably aware that, at his height, Jonas probably had a bird’s eye view of his plugs. He hunched away from him angrily, then bitterly slapped the roof of the minibus where Charlie Peach used to be.

‘Welcome back, Holly,’ he said.

Reynolds’s words would sting Jonas later, but right now he ignored them and told the DI what he knew so far. Reynolds asked follow-up questions while Rice made notes. Reynolds handed Jonas a roll of police tape and told him to secure the scene, then he and Rice went to look at the other cars.

Someone fetched Jonas some metal stakes and helped him to hammer them into the firm ground around the minibus, then Jonas unwound the tape, watched by a wide-eyed audience of children in jodhpurs and ribbons.

When he’d done that, Jonas stood by the minibus and stared at the empty seats. In his mind’s eye he saw Charlie Peach, left there, maybe scared, maybe just interested, as the man approached. Had he followed him on a promise of sweets or an Xbox? Had he been dragged from his harness kicking and biting? Had he shouted for help? Would he even have understood what was going on? A mental age of four, the carers had said. Jonas felt a surge of anger at whoever had stolen such a child.

You have to save the boy, Jonas.

Lucy’s voice was so clear in his head that his heart leaped, and he had to stop himself turning to find her.

She wasn’t there. Lucy was dead. She wasn’t there.

She never was.

After the initial shock, the echo of her voice calmed him – just as it always had.

Jonas stared sightlessly at the little yellow note. ‘I’ll save him,’ he whispered fiercely. ‘I promise.’

* * *

Steven and Em had been allowed out soon after the police arrived, and walked the two miles home in silence broken only by the pony’s metallic hoofs scraping the tarmac. Em was distracted and hadn’t offered to let him ride. He hoped she was thinking about the missing boy, but he feared she was bored – or irritated by his weirdness over Jonas Holly.

At the entrance to Old Barn Farm she said, ‘Bye then.’

She wasn’t even going to let him back through the gates. He was crushed.

‘Bye then,’ he said awkwardly, then added ‘Thanks,’ because he meant it.

‘See you at school.’

‘See you at school.’

He patted Skip’s warm neck and turned towards home, hearing the gates opening behind him.

‘Do you … want to go out again some time?’

He looked back in surprise.

Em looked uncharacteristically nervous. ‘Only if you want to.’

‘I want to.’

‘Good.’ She smiled. ‘Me too.’

She waved.

‘Bye,’ he said again, and held his hand up in return.

She pointed Skip down the driveway, and Steven walked home. At least, he assumed later that he must have walked home, but only because home was where he found himself when he finally stopped running in circles, laughing and shouting with joy, inside his own head.

* * *

There were 127 cars and horseboxes on the site, and by 6pm all but three had been searched as they left through the gate, past a yawning Graham Nash and an industrious Elizabeth Rice.

Only the minibus and the Focus and Megane that had suffered broken windows remained, with three men from the forensics lab at Portishead poring over them.