From out of the shed, she wheeled her bicycle.

She hadn’t ridden it in two years, but her mother made occasional use of it, so its condition was good. The tires were soft but the chain ran freely, and a drop of oil and a minute’s work with the air pump had it ready for the road. She never rode in London, but back when she’d lived here she’d cycled everywhere. Evangeline was even adept at cycling in a skirt. Being neither rich nor eccentric, she owned none of the “rational cycling wear” that tended to draw ridicule onto women in public places.

When she set off down the hill, she wobbled a little at first; but within a minute she had the hang of it again and was soon sailing along.

If her mother had been surprised to have her turn up unannounced, imagine how Grace would feel.

ON HEARING where Sebastian wanted to go, Sir Owain’s driver said, “But that’s thirty miles from here!”

“Twenty-five,” Sebastian said. “I just measured it on the map.”

“I have other duties than this,” the driver protested, but Sebastian was firm.

“As I recall it, the offer of the car was for anywhere I may wish to go.”

The driver conceded, but did nothing to disguise his displeasure. He went to get behind the wheel, and this time Sebastian had to open the passenger door for himself.

Once inside, Sebastian set the camera down on the seat beside him. The car had been fully cleaned up now, and the broken window given a running repair with a sheet of thick parchment. It was opaque, but it let in some light while keeping the wind out.

These were country lanes, but a good part of the route would be along the Bristol road. When they’d left Arnmouth behind, he slid open the window that divided the passenger cab from the driver’s position.

Leaning forward and raising his voice almost to a shout to be heard, he said, “I fear we got off on the wrong foot, you and I.”

“Did we, now,” the driver replied without emotion. In his cap and goggles, facing forward in a scarf wound tight against the oncoming weather, he had the advantage over Sebastian, whose face was up against the little window with his eyes already beginning to stream in the rush of air.

Sebastian said, “I believe the fault is mine. It’s easy to mistake loyalty for obstinacy. How long have you worked for Sir Owain?”

The driver took a while to respond. And then all that he said was, “Long enough.”

“He said those girls were torn by beasts. What do you think?”

“I wouldn’t know,” the driver said. “I didn’t see them. I stayed outside with the car.” He glanced at Sebastian. “I take it they were bad.”

“Torn by beasts or not. Someone meant to spoil them.”

They passed over the bridge across the railway line. The estuary was behind them now. Beyond the station stood a hill dense with trees.

Sebastian said, “What’s your name, driver?”

“Thomas Arnot, sir.”

“Forgive me for the way I spoke to you before.”

This belated touch of civility, along with mention of the suffering of the victims, seemed to temper the driver’s attitude.

The man said, “If you want to talk about beasts, go to the post office and ask them to show you the book.”

“The what?”

“The book where all the holiday people write down their stories of what they see on the moor.”

“Are you joshing me?”

“No, sir, I am not. And I’m not claiming there’s any truth in any of it, neither. I’ve never seen any such thing myself. But there’s been many a sighting over the years. For all I know, there could be something in it. Some animal escaped from somewhere, going back to the wild. Strange things brought home from faraway places. It’s not always peacocks and monkeys.”

Sebastian was inclined to dismiss it. He’d seen the results of animal attacks. But before he could say so, the driver suddenly said, “Is that why we’re going to the fairground? To see if anything’s escaped from their menagerie?”

And his manner was so changed, now that he saw himself included in the thinking behind the plan, that Sebastian chose not to contradict him.

“Something like that,” he said.

Then he closed the dividing window and sank back into the leather seat, steadying his mind for the drive ahead.

EVANGELINE WAS passing the upturned boats by the estuary. Out in the sand and the mud, a solitary rotted wooden post stood firm, worn down to a stump of two or three feet. A tangle of old ropes and knots festooned it like a merman’s necklace. Even farther out, rising from the water, was a dune topped with a memorial cross. A chapel had stood there once, she’d been told, until floods and the shifting river had cut it off from the town.

There was another mile to go. She’d have to keep an eye on the time, or risk returning across the moor as night fell.

In the days following their misadventure, the newspapers had reported that she and Grace had been found safe and well the next morning, none the worse for their outdoor ordeal. But many details had been suppressed in the retelling. All that Evangeline knew was that she and Grace had actually been found terrified and shivering, with most of the clothes ripped from them. And this was knowledge that she’d gleaned from the questions she’d been asked; she had no direct memory of it herself. Her closest memory was of lying in her bed while adults talked downstairs.

It was a rough ride down the last of the track, and for the final hundred yards Evangeline had to dismount and walk the bicycle. There ahead of her was the old familiar cottage, with the paddocks and the great wide bay beyond. It had been dilapidated then, and it was dilapidated now. Any more dilapidated, and it would be derelict.

“Grace?” she called from the gateway, but there was no reply.

She left her bicycle leaning against one of the outbuildings. The front wall of the wooden stable was a rusty maze of bolts and hinges and iron catches. She walked around it and found Grace in the paddock behind the house, tending to one of her horses.

She hadn’t heard Evangeline coming. Evangeline called out, “Are you well, Grace Eccles?” and Grace quickly looked toward her.

There was a moment in which Evangeline was uncertain of the reception she’d get. But it was quickly over.

“Better than some,” Grace replied, turning to face Evangeline as she crossed the paddock. Grace looked as dark and as wild as ever. “What are you doing here?”

“Just a brief visit to see some old faces.”

“And rattle some old bones?”

Instead of replying, Evangeline looked at the animal in the halter that Grace was holding. She’d been stroking its head and speaking soothing things into its ear. There was something odd in the way he held his head to listen, but Evangeline couldn’t have said why.

“What’s wrong with him?” she said.

“He kicked up and threw his owner. So his owner pulled his head around and had an eye out with his thumb. Who could do that to an animal?”

“That’s appalling. Though I could imagine wanting to do it to some people.”

Grace removed the halter. The horse didn’t move until she gave him a push, and then he trotted off.

Evangeline said, “I don’t know how you can keep a farm going on your own.”

Grace shrugged, as if there were no choice involved. She said, “I can’t sew and I can’t sing. And they don’t welcome riffraff like me in the kind of places you go.”

It was said without resentment. They started to walk back toward the house.

Grace’s father had bred horses. Grace herself did not. It was 1912, and the market for working animals was beginning to disappear. Tractors and buses and trucks were replacing more of them every year. With no capital to speak of, Grace scraped her living by taking in distressed city horses, nursing them back to health, and selling them on.

Evangeline looked out toward the estuary. The half-blinded horse had joined four others grazing down there, right up against the fence. With the sun going down, this felt like the sweetest, most isolated spot on Earth.