Page 60 of The Man Made of Smoke

Gill’s breathing was growing shallow now. He was falling asleep in front of me.

“Yes,” he said. “He did.”

For some reason, it felt important to emphasize that point. Even though Gill couldn’t see me, I leaned forward, determined to press it.

“Sohecared.”

“Suppose.”

“And you told him Rose’s story? Just as you’ve told it to me?”

Gill didn’t open his eyes, but frowned slightly.

“He already … knew.”

“He knew?”

“Working her case, wasn’t he?”

And then he started snoring.

“Yes,” I said quietly. “He was.”

Gill still had the mug clasped loosely against his solar plexus. I stood up and took it away from him, putting it on the small table between us. He grumbled, the way I imagined an infant might, but his eyes remained shut.

I went back outside into the sunlight.

The brightness and fresh air were a shock at first; I hadn’t realized how dismal and stale it had been back there in the barge. I looked down at one of the small gray windows on the side, and a swirl of grime on the glass threatened to resolve itself into a face.

I turned my head away quickly and made my way back toward the lock, imagining my father following a few steps behind me.

You told him you were police? I thought.

Well, Imighthave done. Or perhaps I hinted that I was to get him to talk to me. Or maybe he just assumed. Who knows?

I kicked at the dust on the path in frustration. But I did know one thing for certain. To the extent that there had been an investigation intoRose Saunders’s disappearance, my father had been nowhere near it. I also doubted he had any friendly local contacts to call on who would have provided him with the details.

And yet.

Gill told me you already knew Rose’s story, Dad.

He did, didn’t he.

But how could you have?

That’s a good question, isn’t it?

Maybe work through it from those first principles of yours.

Assuming what Rose Saunders had told Gill was true, she had been abducted and forced to watch a man being murdered. If she reported what had happened to the police then the same thing would happen to her. And when she did so anyway—because it was the right thing to do—she was not believed. Nobody had listened to her. Nobody had cared.

And the killer, true to his word, had returned and taken her.

My father prompted me, sounding impatient.

But what happened next?

A woman’s body was left by a trail in the woods, I thought. Apparently placed there for you to find. A photograph of that moment was delivered to you, which led you to Darren Field, and the two of you had a conversation of some kind. Then Field vanished too. It was after that—after you’d found the connection between Field and the Pied Piper—that you came here looking for Rose and talked to Brian Gill…

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