A road which Den presumed almost nobody outside west Devon would ever have cause to notice. And yet it was as beautiful as many a more famous stretch of highway. As it approached the river Tamar, it rendered views guaranteed to suspend a person’s breath. He had intended to emerge onto the road a few hundred yards from the bridge over the Tamar, but a wrong turning sent him too far east and he found himself enjoying the full glory of the vistas to the south. For a few moments he forgot where he was going and why. Fancifully, he imagined he had wandered into a forgotten land, where nothing had changed in a thousand years. It was a short-lived interlude. As he climbed a long gradient, his car phone began to warble and he slowed a little to answer it. ‘Cooper?’ The voice was crackly and indistinct, as usual; it was no longer feasible for local police stations to call their officers directly on the phone and everything was relayed through a central point near Bristol.
