The thing Jack had kicked through the door had fetched up against the angled side of the skip. How had Wildman been able to spit that out, Gwen wondered. It had unfurled now, like a snot-coloured starfish with four legs. The thing quivered for a moment before it went stiff, leaking yellow bile into the grey dust.

Gwen flipped open her palmtop computer, thumbed a fastkey, and dialled Toshiko at the Hub. ‘We’ve pursued Wildman down Blackfriar Way. Into the construction site. Wildman’s covered some distance since we spotted him.’

‘Interesting,’ Toshiko replied. ‘He must have made a miracle recovery. The reason we couldn’t get his secretary earlier was that she drove him home, because he wasn’t feeling well.’

‘Just an excuse, d’you think?’ asked Gwen. ‘A reason for them to sneak off for an afternoon shag?’

‘Unlikely,’ said Toshiko. ‘From what I can make out, Wildman is a bit of a sad bachelor. No suggestion that he’s got a girlfriend. Or a boyfriend. Or a close relationship with an animal.’

‘I’m not sure about that.’ Gwen eyed the dead starfish thing that Wildman had spat out at Jack. ‘There’s certainly something that’s not quite right with him,’ she said. ‘I’m going in to support Jack. Can you get police back-up to close off this whole area, and then get here yourselves?’

‘OK,’ confirmed Toshiko.

‘Was Mitch all right?’

‘Mitch?’ asked Toshiko.

‘The policeman at the pick-up.’

‘When did you start worrying about the police?’

‘I never stopped,’ Gwen told her. ‘So, was he OK?’

‘Didn’t notice,’ admitted Toshiko. ‘We were too busy scraping up bits of victim. Talk to you later.’ And she ended the call.

Gwen could hear running on the floor above her. Shoes pounding and scraping on dusty concrete. She scanned this floor, and saw where they must have gone. She stepped through a gap in the wall where emergency doors would later be fitted, and looked up into the stairwell. Concrete stairs made a four-sided spiral up into the building. There were no rails in place, so she hugged the wall, staying well away from the edge where, flight by flight, the drop became sheerer and more disorienting.