The old garden gnome didn't know where his captors were taking him. Albert sniffed, hoping to get a telltale whiff that would tell him his relative position to the concrete factory in Bellview, but the cloth sack he was in buffered smells.

Clever.

He guessed it was 00.45. Albert was sure they'd nabbed him around midnight as he slept under Aunt Martha's shrubs. The memory made him shudder. He was getting old; nobody ever crept up on him when he was younger.

The door opened, and something heavy was dumped to his right. He heard a chink.

"Be careful Rob!," a female voice whispered. "Nobody's gonna pay ransom if they're broken."

The man grunted and closed the door. Should he try to escape? The girl's tone had convinced him that he was dealing with lunatics, but the mention of ransom suggested that he might be better off sitting tight. No, who was he kidding? Aunt Martha didn't have money.

The garden gnome was on his own.

Albert gnawed on the cloth and managed a hole, which he picked apart with his fingers. Then he took the tip of his stiff red cap and used it to enlarge the opening. Soon, he wriggled out.

The van was full of sacks. He touched one and felt the shape of garden gnome inside.

"Don't worry buddy, I'll get you out," he whispered. The other gnome didn't answer.

"Don't worry, we'll find a way to escape. Do you hear me?" Silence. Albert worked fast, worried that his comrade was in shock. He almost lost a molar but he got the knot loose and dragged out the unconscious gnome.

No pulse! He started CPR, took a second to remember that he needed to tilt the guy's head and did so. He heard a chink.

"Shit!" He started tapping the gnome's body. The guy sounded hollow.

"He's dead," the gnome whimpered, "I've administered CPR to a dead gnome."

He worked frantically on the other sacks and pulled out one lifeless body after another. What kind of sick person stole dead gnomes? And why had they taken him?

Confused and trembling, Albert lined up his companions on the far side of the van. The lock was way too high for him to reach. There was no way out. The bodies standing to attention stared at him silently and chilled him to the bone.