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was now. I wondered if he’d taken the blanket. Not much room in that useless little man bag of his, and he’d be a bit conspicuous hitching a ride with it wrapped round his shoulders. I’d better go up and find it.
    I climbed the ladder, looking only at the rungs and my hands. The hayloft was a bonny place on a spring morning, with light shafting in through the rafters, and I didn’t want to remember how Al and I had spent more nights up there than in our beds during the summer. Not until I’d reached the very top did I raise my head. And there, stretched out on a bale, lay my night visitor, the blanket tucked round him, still blissfully asleep.
    A cat was curled up on his stomach. We had half a dozen black farm cats and finding one here was no miracle—they were parasites for warmth, and would sleep on the backs of the sheep or stabled ponies if they could. Animals seemed to like Cameron, to judge from Floss’s interest and the dubious attentions bestowed on him by the lamb. Carefully I negotiated the ladder’s top rung and stood looking down on the sleeping man and the cat. The bale was bathed in light. The repairs on the window below had held up well, but the roof needed attention. Slates were off it, and pale gold sunshine blazed through the gap they’d left.
    The cat stirred and yawned, exposing needle teeth and a rose-pink gullet. There was a tiny splash of white fur—I’d called it her milk spot—on her upper lip, just to the side of her nose.
    “Clover,” I whispered, and she got up, stretched every limb and jumped gracefully down from the bale. I had to be wrong, of course. There had to be more than one little black queen on the island with that mark. She yawned again, fixed me with her look of golden-eyed, loving insanity, and ran casually up my body as if she’d seen me yesterday, piercing my thigh and one nipple en route. “Ouch! You little bastard!”
    Cameron shot upright on the bale. “Shit!” he gasped, grabbing at the blanket. “I’m sorry.”
    “Not you.” I could hardly speak. “This… This cat. Where did it…?”
    “I don’t know. I woke up in the night and it was there. Jesus, what time is it?” He scrambled off the bale. “I went back to sleep.”
    “It’s about eight o’clock. Look…” I could have tried for a reproachful demeanour but doubted I could carry it off with the cat on my shoulder, plucking at the hair over my ear in one of her painful demonstrations of love. “Calm down. The old man’s gone out in the fields.”
    “The old man?” His frightened pallor became tinged with grey, as if the words hurt him. “What old man?”
    “My grandfather. It’s his farm.”
    “What about your brothers?”
    “There aren’t any. I told you that last night in case…” I took gentle hold of Clover’s scruff, suddenly ashamed. “In case I hadn’t already scared you enough with the gun.”
    “Okay. I’ll go. I’m going.” He folded up the blanket and shouldered his rucksack. He looked good in the clothes I’d given him. His frame was lithe and strong. It must have taken a lot of running and privation to strip so much weight from him. “Was your cat missing?”
    “For a year. I can’t believe she’s come back. Cameron…”
    He halted in front of me. His eyes were such a potent shade of indigo I thought he was wearing tinted contacts. Anxiety was coming off him in waves.
    “I have to go,” he whispered. “You’re right. I will bring trouble on you.”
    “What are you hiding from?”
    He ducked his head. “Don’t make me tell you.”
    “I won’t. Not if you don’t want. But I might be able to help you.”
    “You can’t. It’s debts, okay? I got in too deep with a loan shark in Glasgow and he’s after me. It’s not drug money.” Before I could protest, he had rolled up the sleeves of the jumper. The insides of his arms were pale, the skin fine and unmarked. “I saw the way you were looking at me last night.”
    I remembered. If I wasn’t