The old man looked at the message, then at him.
“Well,” he said, “that’s bloody rude.”
The sound of the approaching vehicle grew louder.
“Who sent it?”
“I don’t know.”
“You’ve got the number.”
He looked at the screen again. The number was there, perfectly ordinary-looking, but he didn’t recognise it. It wasn’t in his contacts.
“Never seen it before.”
“Then ring it.”
He stared at the old man for a moment. It was such an obvious suggestion that he felt foolish for not having thought of it.
He pressed the number.
Nothing.
He tried again.
**CALL FAILED.**
He frowned and looked at the top of the screen.
“No signal.”
“Not unusual up here.”
The old man nodded towards the phone.
“Bit unusual getting messages, though.”
He looked again.
No bars.
The phone vibrated.
Neither man spoke.
Slowly, he looked down.
**HE’S LYING.**
The old man read it over his shoulder.
“I’m beginning to dislike whoever this is.”
The vehicle was close now.
He stepped instinctively towards the verge.
A battered Land Rover appeared through the mist, climbing steadily towards them. It slowed.
The driver’s window came down.
“Morning, George.”
The old man raised his walking stick.
“Morning.”
The driver glanced briefly at the stranger standing beside him, gave the almost imperceptible nod reserved for people one doesn’t know on country roads, and drove on.
For several seconds they listened to the Land Rover climbing away from them.
George looked at him.
“Well, apparently I have a name now. That’s one mystery solved.”
Despite himself, he smiled.
Meg had already lost interest in both of them and was investigating something beneath the hedge.
George called her back.
“Come on. I’m heading down towards Venus Bank.”
He hesitated.
Downhill.
Back towards Hope.
Back towards the church.
Back towards whatever he had run from.
George had already started walking.
Meg trotted beside him.
The phone vibrated.
He stopped.
Another message.
**DON’T TELL GEORGE THE TRUTH.**
For several seconds he didn’t move.
George turned.
“You coming?”
He slipped the phone into his pocket.
“Yes.”
“Everything all right?”
He looked back up the empty road.
“Yes,” he said.
And followed George into the mist.
Nothing moved in the car park at Holy Trinity.
The mist hung between the trees and softened the outline of the church. Water gathered on the branches above and fell occasionally onto the gravel below.
A car passed on the A488.
For a few seconds came the hiss of tyres on wet tarmac.
Then silence returned.
The woman came through the churchyard gate.
She wasn’t hurrying now.
She crossed the car park towards a parked car and took a key from her pocket.
The lights flashed.
She opened the driver’s door and sat down.
On the passenger seat lay a mobile phone.
She picked it up.
The screen asked for a passcode.
Without hesitation she entered six digits.
The phone unlocked.
She looked through something on the screen.
Once.
Then again.
Her expression didn’t change.
She slipped the phone into her pocket.
For a moment she sat completely still.
Then she looked up towards the mist-covered hillside.
High above the church, somewhere beyond what she could see, another phone vibrated in a man’s pocket.
She started the car.
