Long before they got there, even deep amid branches so tangled they managed to lose sight of each other, they could see the wavering glow of a huge fire some distance ahead. When Heck finally staggered, panting, into Hetherby Close, he found that Hazel and the rest of the villagers had also discarded concern for their personal safety and were milling all over the pile of burning rubble where the police station had once stood. He advanced into the chaos, goggle-eyed. Up close, the debris mainly consisted of shattered timbers and scorched bricks, and had heaped itself around a central crater – what had once been the cellar – from out of which cloying black smoke was pouring. ‘What happened?’ Heck shouted, wafting his way back and forth. He snatched at someone. But it was dizzy old Sally O’Grady, who could only respond by shaking her head and fixing him with a fishlike stare, her cheeks blackened with soot. ‘What happened?’ he said, blundering over the hot wreckage to the next figure.
