Cola stood rooted to the spot and shook his head from side to side. The sun had dried the blood that spattered down the front of his apron, and flies buzzed around him. He didn’t look at them. ‘She’s at the back, out beyond the big hole in the fence.’

‘I want you to show us where she is,’ the first policeman said.

‘I just told you where she is,’ Cola snapped, voice rising up sharply.

The two policemen exchanged a glance that somehow managed to suggest that Cola’s reluctance was significant, worth remembering. But they turned away from him and from the foreman and walked around the side of the building, saying nothing.

It was noon and the sun beat down on the flat tops of the officers’ uniform caps. Beneath them, their hair was sopping, their necks running with sweat. At the back of the building, they saw the large hole in the fence and made towards it. Behind them, filtering through the death squeals that still came from the building, they heard human sounds and turned towards them. Clustered around the back entrance of the building, their aprons as red with gore as Cola’s, five or six men huddled in a tight ball. Used to this curiosity, the policemen turned back to the fence and headed towards the hole. Bowing low, they went through it in single file and then off to the left, towards a large spiky clump of bush that stood beyond the fence.

The officers stopped a few metres from it. Knowing to look for the foot, they easily found it, saw its sole peering out from beneath the low branches. Both shoes lay just in front of it.

The two of them approached the foot, walking slowly and looking at the ground where they walked, as careful to avoid the malevolent puddles as to keep from stepping in anything that might be another footprint. Just beside the shoes, the first one knelt down and pushed the waist-high grass aside with his hand.

The body lay on its back, the outer side of the ankles pressed into the earth. The policeman reached forward and pushed at the grass, exposing a length of hairless calf. He removed his sun-glasses and peered into the shadows, following with his eyes the legs, long and muscular, following across the bony knee, up to the lacy red underpants that showed under the bright red dress that was pulled back over the face. He stared a moment longer.